Websites as Art

Here’s a site that will display any URL you enter as a hierarchical graph. Above is the graph displayed for this blog (at least, when I wrote this article; obviously as the site changes so will the graph).

The key to the colors is:

blue: for links (the A tag)
red: for tables (TABLE, TR and TD tags)
green: for the DIV tag
violet: for images (the IMG tag)
yellow: for forms (FORM, INPUT, TEXTAREA, SELECT and OPTION tags)
orange: for linebreaks and blockquotes (BR, P, and BLOCKQUOTE tags)
black: the HTML tag, the root node
gray: all other tags

Cool!

Tags: Technology, Websites, Art

I am Now Superfluous

Well, this blog isn’t read by that many people anyway, but still … apparently the day of the robot reporter (writer) has dawned. Business news provider Thomson Financial has started to use such reporters, with the help of programmers UpTick Data, to provide coverage on stories related to earnings.

When the earnings estimates of a company jump up or drop down, a robo-reporter kicks into gear and spits out a story highlighting the company’s new earnings forecast. Source: ABC News

Fortunately for me, as the story indicates, “the computer-generated pieces lack the color and description that distinguishes reporting from fact-regurgitating.” So, for those few people who do read this blog, that’s hopefully what keeps them coming back. Still, I cringe at the thought of the first robo-blogger.

Tags: Blogging, Technology, Robotics, Journalism

Stephen Colbert in the Lead for Hungarian Bridge

News.com’s Missing Links Blog posted a story about a Hungarian site hosting a poll to name a bridge. Stephen Colbert got hold of the story and encouraged his viewers to vote for him. In less than a week, he reached 17,000,000 votes … only 15,000,000 more votes than the second place nominee, as he announced on his show on August 22.

Better start inscribing that plaque, Hungary. Just goes to show what grass-roots (Internet) browsing and voting can do.

Tags: Stephen Colbert, Technology, Vote, Poll, Hungary

Motorola Moving to Make Teleconferences Less Confusing … But …

As someone who had to work at home last week, I realized (again) how painful teleconferencescan be … especially if you’re one of the callers and not one of the ones in the room itself. Motorola has filed a patent that they hope will improve things. But …

The company is looking to use the same technology that makes people who can’t sing, like Paris Hilton, sound like they are at least on key. The technology would take a ‘pitch contour’ of each speaker’s voice. If two or more people have similar voices which are bound to cause confusion, the technology will shift the voices to different semitones. That would make the voices distinctively different and easy to differentiate, but wouldn’t make them sound cartoonish. Source: MobileMag

That’s all great, but here are things not addressed by Motorola that really bug me.

• People too far away from the mike
• People on cell phones or in noisy places not muting
• People using half-duplex lines
• People talking (all at once)

The Motorola idea has merit but these other things (with the exception of the half-duplex lines) are all non-technological and require some personal cooperation.

Tags: Technology, Conference Call, Motorola, Patent

Did Jobs Snub France with Absence from Apple Expo in Paris?

In the past, Steve Jobs was a mainstay at the Apple Expo in Paris, but after missing the last two for good reason, including illness, he was slated to give the keynote this year. The Expo runs from 9/12 – 9/16.

On Monday, Apple confirmed that Jobs will not now not (sic) be attending this year’s show, but did not give a reason why. Clémentine Tisserand, speaking on behalf of the show’s organisers, Reed Expositions France, told Macworld UK on Monday that Jobs would not be delivering the show’s keynote. “There will be no keynote at this year’s show,” said Tisserand. That decision had been taken by the company, she said, but gave no further details. Source: ZDNet UK

The first thing that pops to mind is the attempt by France to open up iTunes’ DRM earlier this year. Although that was watered down, Norway, Sweden and Denmark are working on similar measures.

So, could this be Jobs’ way of snubbing Europe. Most likely, no. With expectations of new iPod high, it’s more likely he’s just too busy. On the other hand, there’s still plenty of time for more rumors.

Tags: Apple, Technology, Steve Jobs, iPod, iTunes

Heads Roll in AOL Data Breach Scandal

You may recall Search User 4417749, whose identity was discovered after some digging by the New York Times through AOL’s search data, which had released in an event which has been widely criticized. Heads are finally rolling after all the bad PR.

Two AOL employees have been fired. Additionally CTO Maureen Govern “has decided to leave AOL effective immediately,” AOL Chief Executive Jon Miller wrote in an e-mail to employees dated Monday.

The two employees who were fired were the researcher responsible for the data being posted online and the researcher’s supervisor, who reports to Govern.

My response? I’m surprised it took this long. Despite the fact that the data was taken down, mirrors still exist for the data. Heads needed to roll.

Tags: Privacy, AOL, Security, Technology

Coffee and Our Disposable Society

I was thinking about my earlier post about coffee and heart attacks as I was sugaring my coffee today (or really, artificially sweetening it). Since I was using sweetener, I was using those packets. I realized, that in my caffeine-addicted technophile way, I was wasting sooo much sweetener every day. I mean, how much really stays in the packet? Not all of it comes out. And yes, it’s a small amount, but it adds up. Think of how many millions of packets are used every day.

Hmmm … that’s a lot of sweetener, some of which people suspect to be carcinogenic, ending up in landfills.

Tags: Technology, Coffee, Environment

B.O.S.S. – Have We Really Become This Lazy?

This is only one of 30 robots that was unveiled last week as University of Florida students displayed a set of projects. B.O.S.S., or Battery Operated Smart Servant, has sensors thatlet it follow a shopper around a supermarket and slow down when necessary so items can be placed in it.

The inventor, Gregory Garcia, said “The immediate thing that jumped to my mind was all those times as a kid when my sister would accidentally hit me with a cart.”

What jumped into my mind was, here’s another device that we really do not need, unless we’ve become so lazy that we can’t even push carts around a store (I admit I won’t turn on my TV without a remote, so I’m not totally innocent) … and here’s another gadget that will suck up more of our precious energy and (in one way or another) add carbon to the atmosphere. On the other hand, think about how you shop in a crowded store. Moving your cart left and right to avoid people, other carts. This is an interesting exercise, but there’s no way it would work in a fully packed supermarket.

Tags: Technology, Robot, Shopping

Grrr … This Image Spam is Killing Me!

I keep getting spam … it’s to my personal email (my domain) so I don’t have a really good filter like Google has running on it. But I don’t use it for much. I keep getting spam which consists mostly of what seems to be bad prose … and a .gif that tries to sell me stock. For example:

If they did, said the Count, would you call it a new reign oflove, or something else? He stepped forward and took her in his arms, and kissed herforehead.

If they did, said the Count, would you call it a new reign oflove, or something else? Yes, the lovely blue-green iris drawn tight like a screen. He held out the little, pointed brown nuts onthe palm of his hand. I shall missmy prison and my visits from the angels.

Ah,new and terrible his love would be, pure and intensified by theawful fire of suffering.

The run-together words are sic, BTW. Then there’s a GIF that tries to sell me Bi-Coastal Communications stock. Grrr.

Tags: Spam, Technology, Email, Security, Stock

Echostar Told to Disable DVRs

Earlier I wrote, as a sidebar really, how I had switched from Dish Network (Echostar) to DirecTV. Since I switched I had some initial “switcher’s remorse”, as I discovered that there was a 3 input Dish DVR and also that there was a lot of criticism over the quality of the DirecTV HD programming. However, after using the Tivo capabilities of my DirecTivo for a while, that remorse definitely went away.

It’s completely disappeared now as a judge has ruled that Echostar must stop the sale of its DVRs as well as halt the use of them … disable them. This follows a ruling in April in which Tivo won a lawsuit against Echostar. Echostar has 30 days, and of course they can appeal.

I can only imagine how much pain there’s going to be now. At DBSTalk, the pain is already starting.

Update: a federal appeals court has temporarily blocked the injunction.

Tags: Tivo, DirecTV, Dish, Echostar, Technology, PVR, DVR