I was bored today. Did I do anything particularly productive?
Nah.
I formatted my hard drive and re installed my operating system. Y'know, to make it FASTER.
I do that about as often as I brush my teeth, so about everything three months. People think it's a huge pain in the ass but now a days the only applications I have to re install are Adobe CS and uTorrent.
That damn uTorrent. It's always been my go to torrent client. I'm one of those people who is never happy with an original application, I'm always on the hunt for something better, faster, stronger. Not I have to listen to Daft Punk, excuse me while I go re install iTunes. ;)
In high school it was AIM and IRC clients. I'd have as many as five separate clients, just to see which one I liked best. I was never happy though, and I was switched around. Not with torrent clients. Aside from uTorrent, the only other client I've used was the original. I never liked any of the other ones, they seemed too bulky. uTorrent was the best, to me, for some odd reason. I would download and install without care. It never failed me.
Not anymore.
After my most recent install I noticed some silly "Win Zip Registry Cleaner" and crappy toolbar in my browser. I freaked. That doesn't happen to me. I'm not that guy.
At least I wasn't, until uTorrent betrayed me.
I'm an open source type of dude, but there are a few things I understand to be true about this wonderful country and silly ol' capitalism. Whats that? You want me to share them with you? Well, OKAY!
1) You can make money doing things that don't need to be done
2) If you don't make money off something, someone else will.
Open source and freeware are so complicated. The amount of time and energy it takes to program a full application is astounding, and the fact that someone would buy your program makes it that much more rewarding. And here you have people that disagree with the crazy price points companies set, and thus tell them to go "fuck off" and write their own programs.
There is a free version of practically every piece of software I've ever wanted to use. In my day to day workflow, I use a majority of the Adobe Creative Suite. I know for a fact there is a very alternative to every piece of software in that said suite. That is amazing. If I had the time to sit down and learn Inkscape (Alternative to Illustrator. Check it out! http://inkscape.org/) I really would. Same thing with GIMP (Free Photoshop alternative, here ya go! http://www.gimp.org/) And if it weren't for Google totally destroying Microsoft Office, I'd probably be using some version of OpenOffice. Not to mention my boss pays for and requires me to know Adobe and not freeware products, so, y'know...
I still think prices for software are crazy, and yet, I understand how they justify it.
Years and years ago, Microsoft Office was a BUSINESS application suite. It would make sense to charge a million dollar business a couple of grand for your applications. After all, you want to be a million dollar business too, right?
Not anymore. All sorts of people use computers now. Rich people, poor people, middle of the road people. Unless you've been in the computer game for more than ten years, you're going to think software prices are ridiculous. So what do you do if your a small start up, with a small application, but big dreams? Well you do one of two things:
1) Let anyone download your program for free and let anyone use it. Hooray Linux!
2) You charge a little bit of money that virtually NO ONE will pay because they will either pirate it or find a free version of the same type of software.
It is a tough world out there for the small time programmer, but in the days of iPods and iPhones, things are looking up, but not in the desktop application world.
So I totally lied before. There is a third option. You can put ads INSIDE your program, or attach ANOTHER program that installs a toolbar in your web browser and some crappy adware for a quick buck.
I noticed the ad in the corner of the application the last time I downloaded it. Not that big of a deal. Its unobtrusive, and I don't have the application actually open enough for it to bother me. It just sits there, collecting money for whoever, where ever they are.
I must have not payed attention to the EULA (who does?!) and must have missed somewhere to uncheck the box for the toolbar/adware installation. Or maybe they just install it anyway. I don't know, I didn't go back and look. Even IF I was given the option, I still feel I was betrayed.
There are all sorts of applications out there that do absolutely jack shit, and they are made for the sole purpose of adding the toolbar/adware combo to generate money for whoever, where ever they are. That is it, that is all the do. Fake games, or maybe they are real games, I don't know. I don't know because I don't download that garbage, and anyone who does really needs to take a step back and re-learn the internet.
Those things scream at you, "HEY! I'M ADWARE!!! DON'T DOWNLOAD ME!". The standard IT junkie blows right past them, barely phased. We all know who falls victim to these: our mothers. Every single person reading this knows. Even if your mother is dead, she still downloaded a toolbar and installed some adware. She is probably bugging Heaven's IT guy about it right now. I wonder what kind of spam they get in Heaven?
Even those type of programs, I understand. Good for you, random programmer, you're trying to make some money! As illicit as they are, that same person could be out robbing your mother for her purse. Instead he is inside, programming toolbars that you have to uninstall, so he just robbing you of time.
But I have no respect for those types of applications, obviously. They are made to serve that purpose and that purpose only.
So why, with a track record so immaculate (at least to me) go and screw it up? Why add it to your program? Are you hurting that much? Maybe it's time to think about a day job. Do they even make that much money? What do you think they get for a toolbar install? A buck?
This isn't the first time this has happened. A program is free to download, quick to install and ready to go. Then a new version comes out, and they sneak that toolbar in.
Boom. That program is dead to me.
I immediately start searching for an application to replace it. No program is going to tell me what search engine I need to use! The last time I recall this happening was with the original BitTorrent client. You know what my reaction was? I downloaded uTorrent.
If I was in the meeting discussing whether or not to add that tripe I would vote against it. I'd make the argument that while generating money, you'll probably lose thousands of users. So is it really worth it?
RIP uTorrent (sometime I don't remember-4/10/2013)
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
MAKE SURE TO READ MY LAST POST IN ORDER.
So my "Youtube" article turned into something I totally didn't expect it to, and it ran a little long.
Make sure if you read it to read part 1 first, and move on to part 2.
Thanks, and have a nice day :P
Make sure if you read it to read part 1 first, and move on to part 2.
Thanks, and have a nice day :P
People on YouTube are totally serious. (Part 2)
Needless to say, by the time of Facebook and Youtube booming to popularity, I was well versed in trolling. Not that I did it myself, but I could sense it from a mile away.
See some of the people that weren't accepted into those elite circles were mad. Mad at the people who wouldn't let them in, and most of all mad at themselves for not being smart enough to get into the groups in the first place. So they had to do something. Some started creating their own groups. Some started going off and doing something completely different. Some forgot about the internet all together, and then some decided to fight back.
Being able to be anonymous on the internet holds a lot of benefits. If you try online and fail at something, you can start all over again and no one would know you were the same person. I've done it more times than I can count. It's a beautiful thing. But this wonderful privilege causes people to virtually yell and scream with no consequence for their actions. If someone doesn't like your YouTube video, they are going to tell you. And it probably has something to do with your mother.
They don't even have to watch the video, they are going to tell you what they think. They probably think you are gay, or that your mother is attractive. God forbid you ASK for help or criticism on a web forum, because you are going to get it. I remember posting a screen shot of a design I was working on, asking for opinions. One person spent four paragraphs telling me I was gay because I used they color gray. Because gray has the word "gay" in it. Since day one that response made me laugh, but what I wouldn't give to actually see what that person looked like. Was he an immature adult? A child who just felt like lashing out at me? Someone who doesn't use English as a first language and just got every word he wrote wrong? This was probably my first interaction with a troll, and ever since I don't so much as look at comments unless they are from close friends or maybe a fellow employee.
The comments on websites like YouTube are unfortunately not nearly as well crafted. Because of the amount of content, trolls have a lot more typing to do, so their responses usually consist of nothing more than "Hey, you suck. Fag."
I get asked about trolling all the time. How to stop it, how to block them, all sorts of stuff. I know people who still get angry and bothered by trolls, and even one or two people who have gotten emotionally upset because of them. I don't find these people stupid, and in the one or two cases where people cried, I actually empathized with them.
Remember those "E/N" website I mentioned? Yeah, well, while I helped a lot of people set their own websites up, a few of them were girls. In high school. With a public and anonymous guest book. I'll save you my illustration and I'm certain you can guess what happened. So no, if you were thinking that some 26 year old nerd from Chicago was the one crying, you were WRONG. ;)
Because those "E/N" websites weren't linked by any specific community, chances are if anyone trolled your guestbook, it was because they knew you personally. They most likely weren't serious, but never the less a fourteen year old girl probably shouldn't have her own website which serves are an online diary.
In case anyone was wondering, we totally lied when Angelfire asked us our age.
So why, after all this time, are trolls still allowed to roam free? If you ask me on a long enough time line, you would think they would become extinct. People would just start ignoring them, and once they lost the attention they so desperately craved in the first place, they would just go away. It's what should happen. Anyone who has spent more than ten minutes on any website with a comments section should know to take almost EVERYTHING on the internet with a grain of salt.
So how does this problem solve itself? Will trolls ever disappear? With technology moving as fast as it is, will everyone eventually have a YouTube page with the comments section disabled? I prefer the former, as I like to chat with the many people that are lucky enough to be connected to the world wide web.
I certainly hope that one day, everyone, and by everyone I mean even my mother, will "stop feeding the trolls".
See some of the people that weren't accepted into those elite circles were mad. Mad at the people who wouldn't let them in, and most of all mad at themselves for not being smart enough to get into the groups in the first place. So they had to do something. Some started creating their own groups. Some started going off and doing something completely different. Some forgot about the internet all together, and then some decided to fight back.
Being able to be anonymous on the internet holds a lot of benefits. If you try online and fail at something, you can start all over again and no one would know you were the same person. I've done it more times than I can count. It's a beautiful thing. But this wonderful privilege causes people to virtually yell and scream with no consequence for their actions. If someone doesn't like your YouTube video, they are going to tell you. And it probably has something to do with your mother.
They don't even have to watch the video, they are going to tell you what they think. They probably think you are gay, or that your mother is attractive. God forbid you ASK for help or criticism on a web forum, because you are going to get it. I remember posting a screen shot of a design I was working on, asking for opinions. One person spent four paragraphs telling me I was gay because I used they color gray. Because gray has the word "gay" in it. Since day one that response made me laugh, but what I wouldn't give to actually see what that person looked like. Was he an immature adult? A child who just felt like lashing out at me? Someone who doesn't use English as a first language and just got every word he wrote wrong? This was probably my first interaction with a troll, and ever since I don't so much as look at comments unless they are from close friends or maybe a fellow employee.
The comments on websites like YouTube are unfortunately not nearly as well crafted. Because of the amount of content, trolls have a lot more typing to do, so their responses usually consist of nothing more than "Hey, you suck. Fag."
I get asked about trolling all the time. How to stop it, how to block them, all sorts of stuff. I know people who still get angry and bothered by trolls, and even one or two people who have gotten emotionally upset because of them. I don't find these people stupid, and in the one or two cases where people cried, I actually empathized with them.
Remember those "E/N" website I mentioned? Yeah, well, while I helped a lot of people set their own websites up, a few of them were girls. In high school. With a public and anonymous guest book. I'll save you my illustration and I'm certain you can guess what happened. So no, if you were thinking that some 26 year old nerd from Chicago was the one crying, you were WRONG. ;)
Because those "E/N" websites weren't linked by any specific community, chances are if anyone trolled your guestbook, it was because they knew you personally. They most likely weren't serious, but never the less a fourteen year old girl probably shouldn't have her own website which serves are an online diary.
In case anyone was wondering, we totally lied when Angelfire asked us our age.
So why, after all this time, are trolls still allowed to roam free? If you ask me on a long enough time line, you would think they would become extinct. People would just start ignoring them, and once they lost the attention they so desperately craved in the first place, they would just go away. It's what should happen. Anyone who has spent more than ten minutes on any website with a comments section should know to take almost EVERYTHING on the internet with a grain of salt.
So how does this problem solve itself? Will trolls ever disappear? With technology moving as fast as it is, will everyone eventually have a YouTube page with the comments section disabled? I prefer the former, as I like to chat with the many people that are lucky enough to be connected to the world wide web.
I certainly hope that one day, everyone, and by everyone I mean even my mother, will "stop feeding the trolls".
People on YouTube are totally serious. (Part 1)
In high school, I was a nerd. I still am a nerd, but given the cultural climate I blend in a lot easier. It's been fun.
It was 2002 and we as a people were on the cusp of whats been called the "nerd renessance". I hate that term and almost everything associated with it, however I've been unable to come up with anything better. My high school wasn't necessarily bursting with people wearing thick glasses, but for some reason, people took interest in what I was doing on the computers. Even a few of the football players had blogs.
The term "blog" hadn't entered the American lexicon yet, but places like livejournal and xanga were growing by the thousands. I was still deep in what was called the "everything/nothing" community, so I was constantly asked about "computer help".
"Everything/nothing", or "e/n" for short, was what I consider the genesis of the internet craze. They were pretty much what blogs/twitter/tumblr/facebook are now, but with fewer pictures of food. People would post random silly things, macro images, and stories about their day. The biggest difference was there were close knit groups of people that linked to each others page, and some were even friends "IRL" (in real life ;)
I spent most of my high school years trying my hardest to get into ANY of these groups, but they were pretty closed off. It certainly wasn't as easy as, "hey, follow me and I'll follow you back!". Unless you got their attention by pure happenstance, you could forget getting your website "plugged". Plugging is basically a link advertising your page, and the owner of said page saying, "Hey, check this guy out".
Back then contact was made by way of IRC chat, which was like AIM, or Facebook messenger. No one used their real name, and most people even had clever nick names. No one was scared to show their face, in fact most people had live streaming webcams from their rooms/office, 24 hours a day. Chris Pirillo is one of the few people that still do this, and he has taken it to quite the next level (http://www.pirillo.com).
If you WERE lucky enough to get your page plugged, your page hits would jump up by the thousands over night. I tried everything, plugging them myself and constantly commenting on their posts saying how awesome they were. It didn't help. If anything, it just made them upset.
I tried almost everything. I even sat in IRC for days with out saying anything, then casually trying to enter the conversation. Nothing. No one even responded to me. I can't remember anything I said exactly, but in hindsight I'd imagine my tender age of 15 was pretty transparent which was probably one of the reasons I wasn't accepted into their group.
You had to be careful, though, because if you pushed them or annoyed them too much, you'd be labeled a spammer, or a troll. While they are two separate things, they are both equally as hurtful to someone not trying to do either, and just gain respect or the almighty "plug". While spamming is as simple "Send the same message indiscriminately to (large numbers of recipients) on the Internet.". Trolling is damn near an art form.
As much as I hate it, I do have this odd level of respect for the sophisticated troll, and even applauded and laughed at some of their efforts. It is mostly harmless, so there is nothing to worry about, but damn can it be annoying.
It was 2002 and we as a people were on the cusp of whats been called the "nerd renessance". I hate that term and almost everything associated with it, however I've been unable to come up with anything better. My high school wasn't necessarily bursting with people wearing thick glasses, but for some reason, people took interest in what I was doing on the computers. Even a few of the football players had blogs.
The term "blog" hadn't entered the American lexicon yet, but places like livejournal and xanga were growing by the thousands. I was still deep in what was called the "everything/nothing" community, so I was constantly asked about "computer help".
"Everything/nothing", or "e/n" for short, was what I consider the genesis of the internet craze. They were pretty much what blogs/twitter/tumblr/facebook are now, but with fewer pictures of food. People would post random silly things, macro images, and stories about their day. The biggest difference was there were close knit groups of people that linked to each others page, and some were even friends "IRL" (in real life ;)
I spent most of my high school years trying my hardest to get into ANY of these groups, but they were pretty closed off. It certainly wasn't as easy as, "hey, follow me and I'll follow you back!". Unless you got their attention by pure happenstance, you could forget getting your website "plugged". Plugging is basically a link advertising your page, and the owner of said page saying, "Hey, check this guy out".
Back then contact was made by way of IRC chat, which was like AIM, or Facebook messenger. No one used their real name, and most people even had clever nick names. No one was scared to show their face, in fact most people had live streaming webcams from their rooms/office, 24 hours a day. Chris Pirillo is one of the few people that still do this, and he has taken it to quite the next level (http://www.pirillo.com).
If you WERE lucky enough to get your page plugged, your page hits would jump up by the thousands over night. I tried everything, plugging them myself and constantly commenting on their posts saying how awesome they were. It didn't help. If anything, it just made them upset.
I tried almost everything. I even sat in IRC for days with out saying anything, then casually trying to enter the conversation. Nothing. No one even responded to me. I can't remember anything I said exactly, but in hindsight I'd imagine my tender age of 15 was pretty transparent which was probably one of the reasons I wasn't accepted into their group.
You had to be careful, though, because if you pushed them or annoyed them too much, you'd be labeled a spammer, or a troll. While they are two separate things, they are both equally as hurtful to someone not trying to do either, and just gain respect or the almighty "plug". While spamming is as simple "Send the same message indiscriminately to (large numbers of recipients) on the Internet.". Trolling is damn near an art form.
As much as I hate it, I do have this odd level of respect for the sophisticated troll, and even applauded and laughed at some of their efforts. It is mostly harmless, so there is nothing to worry about, but damn can it be annoying.
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