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Life on the Web

Screwed By Google

Submitted by bsfootprint on Thu, 04/05/2012 - 18:11
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Here's why it's a massively bad idea to rely on Google AdSense for revenues if you're an online publisher:

In a nutshell: Google bid on, displayed, and then failed to pay for over $40,000 of advertising space on Hatchlings. They have since stonewalled us for almost a year, locking us out of our accounts, screening our phone calls, ignoring our emails, and making it a living hell to figure out what exactly went wrong.

Google's well-known in publisher circles for pulling this kind of stunt. They cut you off at the knees with no warning, no redress.

Develop multiple revenue streams. Seriously.

Edit 4/27/2012: Added links to other sites discussing problems with Google's "we don't give a shit about you" behavior... (see below.)

Sources: 
Don’t Be Evil: How Google Screwed a Startup (blog.hatchlings.com)
The Art of Letting Go (of Google) (www.potpiegirl.com)
The Real Reason I Broke Up With Google (www.potpiegirl.com)
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  • Don't Be Evil
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Reason # 2,121,122 why you'll regret sharing your life on Facebook

Submitted by bsfootprint on Tue, 03/20/2012 - 09:10
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Here's another in a long and growing list of reasons why baring all on Facebook is a bad idea.

SEATTLE (AP) -- When Justin Bassett interviewed for a new job, he expected the usual questions about experience and references. So he was astonished when the interviewer asked for something else: his Facebook username and password.
Bassett, a New York City statistician, had just finished answering a few character questions when the interviewer turned to her computer to search for his Facebook page. But she couldn't see his private profile. She turned back and asked him to hand over his login information. More...

Everything you say and do online is public. It's like putting stuff on a supermarket bulletin board, only worse: it's accessible in real time, from anywhere. It was only a matter of time before this kind of crap started. I've always thought people who post personal information to sites like Facebook are asking for trouble, and now we're starting to see just what kind of trouble they were asking for.

As a rule, I'd suggest that you treat online conversations (written under your real name or traceable back to you) this way: Would you like to have that read aloud in a court case? How would it sound to the jury? Remember: Everything you say can and will be used against you.

Sources: 
Job seekers getting asked for Facebook passwords (finance.yahoo.com)
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  • A Tangled Web
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Facebook wiping

Submitted by bsfootprint on Tue, 03/06/2012 - 11:36
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I just spent the morning removing BS Footprint's presence from Facebook. It felt good.

I'm weary of helping build monster mega-corp web sites. I think I'll spend my time building my own.

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Apple and Google: Fun No More

Submitted by bsfootprint on Mon, 03/05/2012 - 09:10
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When did Apple and Google stop building things for the fun of it?

Nick Bilton of the New York Times wonders:

Take Apple. When Steven P. Jobs and Steve Wozniak started the company, they were just a couple of guys tinkering with technology. Now Apple is a machine that seems unwilling to stop at anything to win.

Apple’s mobile operating system, iOS, is a prime example. The company has always contended that it puts a lovely manicured walled garden around iOS to protect customers from nefarious individuals out to take their most personal and private information. Apple has refused to list thousands of applications in the App Store — often ones that competed with Apple’s products — based on this premise.

Yet over the last few weeks it has become apparent that Apple hasn’t necessarily been keeping its customers as safe as it has claimed. Last month it came to light that the company was approving apps that were freely taking people’s address books from their phones without permission. An Apple loophole also allows developers to take someone’s entire photo library. To me, that sounds more like a circus tent than a walled garden.

[snip]

Google doesn’t seem to be much fun anymore either. Apps running on its Android software can also snag photos off a phone. The company is so focused on winning that it is force-feeding customers Google Plus, a product that seems slightly unoriginal for a company as original as Google. And of course Google’s privacy policies are about as much fun as leaning back in a dentist’s chair.

For the Internet, No More Innovation for the Fun of It - NYTimes.com

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Well, duh.

Submitted by bsfootprint on Wed, 02/01/2012 - 18:10
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First, we have The Onion Facebook-CIA faux-expose.

Now this:

In February 2011, the Department of Homeland Security announced that the agency planned to implement a program that would monitor media content, including social media data. The proposed initiatives would gather information from "online forums, blogs, public websites, and messages boards" and disseminate information to "federal, state, local, and foreign government and private sector partners." The program would be executed, in part, by individuals who established fictitious usernames and passwords to create covert social media profiles to spy on other users. The agency stated it would store personal information for up to five years.
[...]
The records reveal that the DHS is paying General Dynamics to monitor the news. The agency instructed the company to monitor for "[media] reports that reflect adversely on the U.S. Government, DHS, or prevent, protect, respond government activities."
[...]
The DHS instructed the company to "Monitor public social communications on the Internet." The records list the websites that will be monitored, including the comments sections of [The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, the Huffington Post, the Drudge Report, Wired, and ABC News.]"

Source: EPIC v. Department of Homeland Security: Media Monitoring via British Tourists Arrested in the U.S. for Tweeting (Bruce Schneier)

All I can say is... what did you expect?

Sources: 
EPIC v. Department of Homeland Security: Media Monitoring (epic.org)
British Tourists Arrested in the U.S. for Tweeting (www.schneier.com)
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