Website forgets you can print photos

In my paper today there is an article about a new website started by a father who wants to preserve his kids photos. he was afraid that if he put them on a website like Facebook or on a disc, they might get lost. If he kept them on his computer maybe the harddrive would crash.

Here's my problem with people today. Yes, that can happen. And yes, a photo site might go out of business, & yes Kodak dumped Kodachrome. But that's not the only type of film. And guess what? If you print the photos, they will last a long time. I have 30 year old color prints in a photo album. I have 70 year old black and white prints. Does everything have to be online?

Seriously. People are so into technology that they forget there are other ways to preserve memories. It's like books. Last summer I saw at my local branch of the public library very old editions of multiple volumes of the Rise & Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbons. They were obviously old, so I looked inside. They were printed in the 1920's! The actual Declaration of Independence is in Washington. You can preserve real stuff. The obsession with "the cloud" is silly.

Yes, let's preserve stuff digitally. But let's not pretend if you don't it will go away. Physical is always better. What happens if a new format comes along & all these digitally preserved things are suddenly no longer available?

Computer fan hates sleep mode

My 7 month old computer has an issue with sleep mode. Why, I don't know. This has happened at least twice. I will be using my machine, put it into sleep, go away, remember something & wake up the computer. This is after it's been off only a couple of minutes. Apparently my HP doesn't like this, so the fan goes nuts. Starts racing really fast. I end up shutting it down & rebooting it.

Now my old computer never did this in the two years I used that 8 year old that I bought used for $100. This is a brand new $600 machine, with obviously a much larger Hard Drive, memory, & faster processor. And why is it heating up, needing the fan? I don't do much more than  surf or watch video. Plus now it's winter & the house isn't exactly 90°, plus it never did that in the summer when it was hot.

I can avoid some of this by using my USB stick that has Ubuntu on it, but then what's the point of having a new computer running Windows 7? Plus, as I have said in previous posts, Ubuntu has a number of issues relating to video. I guess I will go over to Best Buy tomorrow & ask someone. Doesn't mean they know anything, but it's close by, unlike godawful Fry's. Heck I asked someone at work ( a high tech company) & they didn't know what I was talking about!

No Script's whitelist

I decided to look today at my whitelist. I have No Script because it's a good safety measure to have on your computer. Anything that prevents an outsider from gaining access to my machine is a good thing to have. It prevents people from using javascript to read your site unseen, prevents  cross scripting attacks & clickjacking.

The problem, of course, is the ability to use sites that use javascript & flash. I find myself having to allow sites just to use the site, even if it's a site I may never use again. So I went in options & found probably a hundred sites on the whitelist.

One of the problems is that these sites put javascript on multiple pages. I would have 2 or maybe 3 listings that appeared to be the same site. Maybe a dot org & a dot com. Maybe the same address but with small differences in the address, like an additional word or letter. For instance I have in my whitelist 7, count them, 7 different listings for Google! Google.com, Googleapis (huh?), Googlecode, Googlesyndication. Get it? This is what I'm talking about. And they're not the only ones. So you need these to read content, & of course, to watch video.

You could get rid of No Script. But the point of having it to keep a watch on my system. I'm sure it slows down my computer, but most sites insist on using this format It's also why I use AdBlock Plus. And that can be a bigger pain, because some sites won't even allow you to watch video without the ads loading first. CBS sometimes lets you, but I've also at times had to allow ads to watch. And interestingly, they will have 3 ads at once & only show 1 ad, & simply count down the seconds on the others before going back to the program. ESPN3 doesn't even show the ads, just a page reading "Your event will return shortly", which is actually kind of weird because it lasts the length of the ad.

So protecting your computer can be a hassle. Sometimes I use my 4GB USB stick that has Ubuntu on it if all I want to do is surf, because video sucks on Linux. Full screen hardly works at all. So you're damned if you do, & damned if you don't.

iPhone users oversleep on New Years

Seriously, this is an issue? I continue to be amazed by a generation of fools who have this attitude that anything that didn't come out yesterday is "old fashioned" & "uncool". How about "it works". I don't own an iPhone & never will. The only cell phone I own is a prepaid flip phone that does nothing but send & receive calls. What a concept!

I don't oversleep or miss appointments because I own an actual alarm clock. Imagine that! It even plays the radio. But not my iPod. That's right. I actually own an iPod nano. Just in case you thought I was a luddite. I'm not. Heck, I'm writing a blog ain't I?

The whole thing is silly. Like people who overslept because of the end of Daylight Savings Time. Uh, you didn't change your clocks? Technology is great, but it doesn't set itself. Makes me think the geek culture is lazy. I'm surprised they're able to use computers or download stuff because they have to do something. I guess I'm just an old fogey.

TV online fails on New Years

There is a lot of talk about people watching TV on the internet. I do it myself. The problem is when it doesn't work form whatever reason, or is not acceptable. Two examples from today. Watching the Rose Parade via KTLA's website. This is a local LA station that has long had the best coverage of the parade. No commercials, shows the entire parade instead of cutting away to go to a football game, no silly guest appearances from stars of network shows. Broadcast in the bay area on an independent station.

I decided to watch online. Blurry picture, or a choppy picture. I had to close my browser several times, & then relaunch it, then I had a good picture. I have plenty of RAM. My computer has 4 GB & a 3.07 GHZ processor, so there shouldn't be an issue.

Then this afternoon I decided to try watching the Rose Bowl online. Now I've watched plenty of college football online. This is the first time I have had an issue. Not a blurry picture. A different issue. Namely the broadcast freezing up. Not once, but rather several times. Once in the middle of a pass. saw the ball in the air about to be caught. Ridiculous.

Now granted, every other time I have watched a game online, it was after the fact, & I was watching video a couple of days late. This time I was watching live. But that's supposed to be the point, allowing you to watch a live event online. Are too many people watching & that's why there's a problem? If that's the case why is the picture so good? Of course, there is also the possibility that if I was watching on TV it would be the same. But if that's the case, why? Is there a satellite problem? The game's in sunny LA, not the blizzard racked northeast.

You would think by now these issues would be gone, but clearly not. Things are better than 10 years ago, but there still are transmission issues, or my ISP is unable to deal with holiday internet traffic.

What's Firefox? says website

I cannot stand websites that are so out of date that they still don't know what a browser is.  I have another blog on a well known sports site. Or rather on a subsite devoted to personal blogs. It allows you to post your blog on Facebook. Well, actually only if you use Internet Explorer. I found this out today.

I wrote a post about Michael Vick, posted it to the site, & clicked the link that would post it to my Facebook page. Wouldn't do it. Something about the fonts & other stuff. Don't quite remember. This is not the first time I have tried. So I tried copy & paste. No can do. So finally it occurred to me to switch to IE. Yup. Posted with no problem.

I have a problem with this. IE has been losing market share for at least 2 years. It has gone from 90% to under 50%. That is a big drop. At the same time Firefox has gone from 15% to 24-25%. The rest have gone to Chrome, which has gone from not existing to around 12%. Not to mention that Apple's share of the computer market has gone up, meaning Safari's share has gone up.

So why do web developers not understand this? Because businesses mostly use IE, & sadly use IE6. So they don't understand that the regular person, plus the geeks, & those like me, who want a better experience, won't use the bug riddled, security hole that is Internet Explorer. I have also found video sites that do the same thing. We lose in the long run because the business community is stuck in 1995, & is afraid to move forward.

A lot of people simply think the blue E is the internet. I often wonder what they do when forced to use a non-Microsoft machine. Do they think a mac doesn't have internet access? We are falling behind the rest of the world. There are many countries where Firefox is the #1 browser. Do companies not realize this?


I

Illegal movie sites

So I was online looking for a movie to watch. I only have 2 hrs of online on my Netflix subscription, & Hulu & YouTube have horrible selections. So I started searching. Boy! Was I amazed to come across so many sites that had downloads & streaming of movies that just came out & just got in theaters.

I couldn't believe how many of these sites had True Grit, Little Fockers & who knows what else. Are these foreign sites or what? Not to mention how do they get the downloads on there, since these aren't on DVD yet.

Now this is the piracy the MPAA is talking about, & I understand where their coming from. If everyone watches this way, the studio makes no money. The RIAA issue is different since most CD's are on iTunes & Amazon, & a few CD's can be bought at Target & Walmart. Plus it's harder to find a particular song or Cd on pirate sites, but every movie site had brand new movies on the top of the page.

Now if the studios want to stop this, they have to stop this nonsense of not allowing recent films to be streamed on Netflix. I've had the service for over 2 years & have probably only watched 4 or 5 films online. Because they're all old films. Silly. Yeah, you can rent from iTunes, but it costs more than a Netflix subscription, plus the amount of time it would take to download. I'll stick with DVD's thank you.