Official News page 11

WINDING DOWN

An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net and technology news
by Alan Lenton

Well, as promised, I'm back with news, comment, opinions, and the occasional real fact! But first I'd like to congratulate Richard Smith, age 41, of Carlisle, England on his new name - Stormhammer Deathclaw Firebrand. Yep, the person previously known as Richard Smith has used English law to change his legal name. Actually, I have to say that I think it's a little over the top. 'Stormhammer Deathclaw' would have been perfectly adequate in my opinion.

Following our recent election over here we had what is quaintly called a 'hung' parliament. This is an interesting term, which means that no party has an overall majority and the financial markets get very jittery. Most people I talked to, though, seem to have a different interpretation, considering that a hung parliament is a good thing, with a substantial majority in favor of drawing and quartering politicians, as well. Me, I think the Belgians have the right idea, following a series of elections in which no coalition could put together a majority, they've been without a government for most of the last few years - and it doesn't seem to have harmed them!

Anyway, on with the news...

Shorts:

Two interesting things happened in the mobile phone market recently. First, newly published figures indicated that sales of Google's open source based Android based smart phones have overtaken sales of iPhones in the last quarter in the critical US market. It's a three way split with Blackberry out on top, followed by a combination of all Android based phones, and then iPhones. Of course, iPhones have sold more overall - 50 million plus - they've been on the market for longer than Android phones.

Interestingly enough, the same report (by research firm NPD) pointed out that while the cost of mobile phones as a whole has gone up five percent, to US$88, the cost of smart phones has gone down by three percent, to US$151.

Which brings us to the second thing. Google announced that they were killing off the only phone they actually sell themselves - the Nexus One. Google's experience of dealing directly with the unwashed masses was not a happy one! They rapidly discovered that if you sell to non-geeks you need to supply proper customer service, and you do not release beta quality kit unless you wish to bring down the wrath of the consumer protection organizations on yourself. Their excuse for closing their online store was that people like to fondle their potential purchases before buying! Nice try but we all know the real reason was a combination of bad sales and their inability to talk to anyone outside Fortress Google who isn't a techie.
http://www.physorg.com/news192726635.html
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/nexus-one-changes-in-availability.html

If you fancy a little break from the real world, then I can recommend Arthur Goldwag's compilation of BP oil spill conspiracy theories on the boingboing web site. It's hilarious, if a bit frightening, that they are all real theories being pushed around the net. My favorite? The story that the North Koreans -torpedoed- the rig, using a suicide submarine operating out of Cuba. My goodness, two nasty arch-enemies involved with just the stoke of a pen (well the tap of a key, at any rate). Other goodies mentioned include Obama dispatching SWAT teams to the gulf as a precursor to nationalization, and sabotage by "environmental whackos“.

I personally favor Occams Razor - possibly somebody screwed up badly, and the result is an ongoing disaster that's already claimed 11 lives and shows no sign of ending in the near future. The other alternative is something that is well known in the engineering industry, but is seldom mentioned. It's the fact that when an engineering breakthrough happens, in this case the ability to drill in deeper waters, there emerges after a time a tendency to try pushing the envelope until something breaks, setting a limit to what the technology can be used for. I'm inclined to go for the latter option.
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/06/bp-oil-spill-conspir.html

Facebook has been notorious for a while for its lax security, but now the fiasco has reached new levels. Last weekend one of Facebook's board of directors, Jim Breyer of Accel Partners - venture capitalists - was caught in one of the many rampant phishing scams, when he opened what seemed to be an invitation to a Facebook event. He opened it and entered his password, and the message immediately sent itself to all 2,300 of his 'friends'. to repeat the whole process.

I don't think it's an accident, the problem is structural to Facebook, and many other social networking sites. Some 18 months ago I worked on trying to re-engineer an open source social networking program to provide a secure system for hedge fund traders to interact with one another. It was the nearest thing to impossible I've ever come across. The whole mess was designed to leak information like sieve. Form follows function - social networking is telling everyone all about yourself, and the software allows records to access all other records. Add to this the constant pressure to get the accounts into the black, and data held becomes a financial hot commodity, which could be devalued by adding barriers to what can be displayed.

But going back to Mr Breyer - 2,300 friends? I'm impressed. I guess with that many he has to keep them listed on somewhere like Facebook, lest he forget one of them! I only have a few friends, I come from a highly mobile group of people, and over the years have simply lost touch with many friends. On the other hand, years of being in politics has garnered me a whole host of enemies, many of whom have, fortunately, fallen from power in the latest elections. And now I'm under pressure to get involved again and stand as a local councilor...
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-20004549-36.html?tag=nl.e703

There was an interesting case in the UK High Court recently. It seems that a company called Red Sky sold London's Kingsway Hall Hotel some management software. It didn't work, and eventually Kingsway ditched the Red Sky software and replaced it, suing Red Sky for the business it lost and the extra staff costs engendered.

Red Sky thought it had all bases covered and pointed to a clause in its standard terms and conditions which stated that the -only- remedy available to its customers was to use Red Sky's maintenance and support. The judge threw this argument out unceremoniously, because of the failure to provide proper documentation to Kingsway. He also pointed out that under our consumer legislation, in any contract a term is to be implied into the contract that the goods were of satisfactory quality. The software, said the judge, did not meet the standard that a reasonable person would regard as satisfactory, and awarded Kingsway just under 111,000 UK Pounds (about US$167,000) in damages.

This isn't the only case of this sort that has been in the High Court recently. Earlier this year EDS (remember EDS - now part of HP) was found to have lied to BSkyB about the capabilities of its software. BSkyB was awarded 270 million UK Pounds (about US$400 million) for this little escapade!

One can but hope that these cases will be a serious warning to software companies not to over-hype their wares in the future, but somehow I have my doubts...
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2010/05/12/red_sky_liability_ruling/

By the way, did you know Amazon spies on the notes and highlights you make on your Kindle? No? Neither did I until techdirt pointed it out in a piece last week. This is, apparently, a new 'feature' activated recently by Amazon, who then take all this info and compile it into something called 'popular highlights'. Nothing like having your private work published without your knowledge or permission, but I guess it's probably not as bad as their previous trick of deleting George Orwell's 1984. What is it in 1984 they didn't want you to know about?
http://techdirt.com/articles/20100511/1018059377.shtml

Did you ever wonder where your personal data goes when the company you trusted it to outsources and offshores its operations? How about prison? Yes prison - you know the thing with bars, locks and razor wire fencing designed to keep criminals in.

Indian outsourcers Radiant Info Systems have just done a deal with the local government of India's Andhra Pradesh state to hire 200 prisoners from one of the state jails to work on data entry! And what sort of data will the convicts be entering? Banking information! You know, I couldn't even make this sort of story up if I was short of material, because no one would believe it. And just to add a leeetle bit of cream on the jam, on the butter, on the bread, it seems that, if successful, the scheme will be extended to other prisons in the area!

Who cares about the lock in the browser bar showing encryption, when the crooks are entering that data...
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/174631,indian-outsourcing-firm-looks-to-prison-
for-data-entry-work.aspx

Geek Toys:

Ah! The lure of the past, when personal computer were personal, and anyone could tinker with the insides (remember Dolphin Dos for the Commodore 64) without bringing down the computer gestapo down on themselves for 'modding'. Well take a look at the URL and swoon - pictures of personal computers from the legendary 1975 MITS Altair 8800 through to the Amiga 4000 in 1992.

The picture of the Commodore SX-64 brought back memories for me. When I worked for Compunet I lugged one of these 'portables' around giving demos of the Compunet system. It had the advantage of being able to point the monitor at the audience (Projectors? Hah! Tens of thousands of dollars in those days.) while you could use the built in tiny screen without having to keep turning your back on the audience. I still have one arm longer than the other from carting this monster around on public transport...
http://oldcomputers.net/

Now here's something to gladden the heart of a geek. Ray guns! Yes, it seems that these long standing science fiction staples are nearing reality for the US defense establishment. The main problem is that they are still so large that they need things like 30 ton trucks to cart them around. Not exactly a portable, quick draw weapon, but at least they are starting to look feasible. At the moment they may be huge, but I don't doubt that they will get smaller eventually.

So... Get out your 30 ton truck and take a trip down to your local Incoming-R-Us defense contractor and pick up a ray gun of your choice (only available in black).
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=ray-guns-near-
crossroads&sc=physics_20100514

Scanner:

Stormhammer Deathclaw Firebrand (aka Richard Smith)
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/12/stormhammer-deathcla.html

Google attorney slams ACTA copyright treaty
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-20004450-38.html

Surge of computer selling after apparent glitch sends stocks plunging
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/07/business/economy/07trade.html?hpw
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9176426/House_panel_to_hold_stock_
market_inquiry

Acknowledgements

Thanks to readers Barb, Fi, Jason, and to Slashdot's daily newsletter for drawing my attention to material used in this issue.

Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Spamato spam filter...

Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
16 May, 2010

Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist, the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan.

Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.

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