Archive for January 31, 2011

| January 31, 2011
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The IPocalypse is Nigh

The IPocalypse is NighThe IPocalypse will cause users with improperly configured computers to experience slowdowns, timeouts, or other connectivity issues when the Internet moves to the IPv6 protocol unless they are ready. To see if you are ready to endure the IPocalypse ghacks point us to IPv6-Test.com.  The site has an Open Source script that runs using JavaScript. Just visit the website click and wait until the test has finished. The IPv6 test runs a series of tests including the browser’s IPv4 and IPv6 capabilities, IPv4 and IPv6 connectivity with and without DNS records, and a test that checks if the ISP’s DNS server uses IPv6.

According to ghacks the most important test for users to run is the dual-stack test. There will be a transition period where websites and services can be reached via IPv4 or IPv6. The user’s computer needs to pick one of the protocols and use it for the connection which means that devices that only support IPv4 at this time can still connect to the websites. Connectivity issues occur if this is broken.

Major services and websites will switch to IPv6 for a 24 hour period on World IPv6 day on June 8. Among them are Google, Facebook, and Yahoo. That’s where the dual-stack DNS record support can be tested in a live environment.

 

This gadget was developed by Takashi Arano, Intec NetCore

What do you think?
  • Is this really the IPocalypse or just marketing hype?
  • Have you tested your connection?

Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| January 29, 2011
Comments Off on Facebook Tried to Buy Twitter

Facebook Tried to Buy Twitter

Facebook Tried to Buy Twitter

-Updated 02-12-2011- The Wall Street Journal is reporting that in recent weeks executives from both Facebook Inc. and Google Inc., (GOOG) have been talking about the acquisition of Twitter.  According to the WSJ, the potential suitors have placed an estimated valuation on Twitter of $8 billion to $10 billion.  In case you weren’t paying attention, that is a 3x increase in three months since December 2010 when it was Twitter was valued at $3.7 billion.

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Imagine the Bizarro World where social networkers Facebook and Twitter hooked up. In a recent Financial Times interview with Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, he revealed that in 2008, Facebook tried to buy Twitter for $500 million in Facebook stock.

Facebook saw the potential in Twitter but the Twitter big-wigs declined. Mr. Stone told the FT that Twitter wanted to become not just a popular site but a viable business, and not be taken over by another company. “We’ve created something that people are finding value in,” he told the FT. “But we haven’t yet created a business out of this, and we really wanted to do that.”

It is possible that if Facebook had bought Twitter it would have died. As a part of Facebook, Twitter would have been restricted to only one set of users and is unlikely to have gone through its huge period of rapid growth. Its main financial power has been in business and less in social networking according to the FT.

Twitter had 175 million registered users as of November 1, 2010, who sent about 95 million messages a day or 25 billion “tweets” last year. Twitter has pursued rapid growth over profits, but since last spring, it has brought in advertising revenues through paid for “promoted tweets.” In mid-December, Twitter said it had received a major infusion of funds from a group of investors, which reportedly put a $3.7 billion value on the site.

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Well, a valuation of  $3.7 billion or $500 million in Facebook vapor stock seems the Twitter boys did OK for themselves.

Is Twitter worth $3.7 billion? Does it have a business model to support $3.7 billion?

Is Facebook worth $50 billion?

 

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| January 26, 2011
Comments Off on Google Founder Sets Sail on Senses

Google Founder Sets Sail on Senses

Google Founder Sets Sail on SensesGoogle co-founder, Larry Page has bought a $45 million yacht. The New Zealand Herald reports that Mr. Page bought the 193-foot superyacht Senses from the New Zealand millionaire Douglas Myers for $45 million. The boat is equipped with twin 1600 HP Deutz diesel engines with a maximum speed of 15 knots, a cruising speed of 11 knots, and a range of 6,500 nautical miles.

Larry Page $45 million 193-foot super yacht Senses

The Business Insider says the 37-year-old Google billionaire’s new toy includes:

  • Larry Page $45 million 193-foot super yacht SensesInteriors finished by French designer Philippe Starck
  • Two dining rooms, one inside and one outside
  • A gym
  • On-deck jacuzzi
  • Accommodations for 24 people (10 guests and 14 crew)
  • Helipad
  • and a small flotilla of pleasure crafts

Mr. Page’s new boat is a toy among the tech elite’s boats.  Oracle’s Larry Ellison‘s boat ‘Rising Sun’ is 454-ft long, and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen‘s ‘Octopus’ comes in at 415-ft in length (which may explain why Allen is suing most of the tech world – which I wrote about here).

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Larry Page $45 million 193-foot super yacht SensesIs this Larry Page’s reward to himself now that Eric “Mr. Creepy” Schmidt is out and Mr. Page is the CEO of Google? Is this a case of Mr. Page looking to one-up or hide from the hype Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Time Magazine’s Man of the Year who also has an eagerly anticipated initial public offering and a  movie loosely based on his life?

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| January 24, 2011
Comments Off on Social Media Sites Implement SSL

Social Media Sites Implement SSL

Social Media Sites Implement SSLIn the wake of the October 2010 release of Firesheep many social media websites are stepping up their security. Firesheep is a simple-to-use user account hijacking tool that can give attackers temporary full access to accounts from many of the most popular social media websites.  Social media sites like Facebook (FB), Twitter, Gmail, Hotmail, Flickr, and WordPress, have begun to add full end-to-end encryption.

George Ou at Digital Society tracks SSL implementations on websites and has created an online services report card. The report card grades the way that social media sites implement full end-to-end encryption, and what generic protocols are deemed safe. The latest report card looks like this:

SSL online services report card

SSL iconThe table from Digital Society indicated that only Gmail.com and WordPress free hosting site get an “A” and are fully impervious to partial and full sidejacking and full hijacking of HTTP sessions. The report card gives Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft’s (MSFT) Hotmail failing grades. The bottom part of the table refers to generic protocols that are commonly used by computers and smartphones. The majority of devices use unsafe versions of protocols according to Digital Society.

Microsoft has announced the general availability of the full-session SSL (HTTPS). The security upgrade has also been applied to other Live services,  including SkyDrive, Photos, and Devices. MSFT says to activate full session SSL (I recommend you do, especially if you ever access these services on public or shared computers), head on over to account.live.com/ManageSSL. After completing their form SSL is activated and all future Web connections will be protected.  It’s important to note, however, that flipping the SSL switch means you won’t be able to reach your Hotmail via Windows Live Mail (desktop), the Outlook Hotmail connector, or the Windows Live app for Windows Mobile 6.5 and Symbian.

The latest Google site to support  SSL-encrypted connections is Google’s Picasa Web. As with many other sites, though, not everything displayed on Picasa Web is encrypted. While the home page and upload form are fully encrypted, gallery pages report as being only partly encrypted. The Google Operating System blog says that many Google services now support HTTPS connections: Gmail (enabled by default), Google Reader, Google Groups, Picasa Web Albums, Google Search, Google Finance, YouTube (partly encrypted). Other services only support encrypted connections: Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Sites, Google Health, Google Analytics, Google AdSense and AdWords, Google Web History, Google Bookmarks, Google Voice, Google Latitude, Google Checkout.

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HTTPS Everywhere logoEven average users are a bit more in-tune when it comes to security and privacy on the Web today (thanks in part to the recent Firesheep threats). There’s a simple solution: browse using HTTPS when possible. The easiest way to do that is to use Mozilla Firefox and the HTTPS Everywhere from the EFF, which I use and wrote about here.

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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

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| January 22, 2011
Comments Off on U.S. Wages Going Backwards

U.S. Wages Going Backwards

U.S. Wages Going BackwardsI hope that Wall-E is your favorite movie and Lil Wayne is your singer crooner rapper because your paycheck has gone back to 2008. The average salary for U.S. company workers has been reset to early 2008 levels according to data cited by Xconomy. According to data from PayScale, a Seattle-based firm that collects compensation data, the national trend shows that U.S. wages grew 5.4 percent from 2006 through the end of 2008. Wages decreased by about 1.4 percent during the recession in 2009, reaching their lowest point in the third quarter of that year. Average U.S. earnings have been pretty flat throughout 2010, roughly matching the level of the first quarter of 2008.

DetroitIn Detroit, the trend since mid-2008 has been more volatile than the U.S. trend (not unexpected). Wage increases in Motown were sluggish in 2007 and 2008 then in 2009 the bottom fell out of the car business and salaries followed. As of Q3 2009, the average wage in Detroit had dropped 3.1 percent from its peak in Q4 2008 according to PayScale. Pay in the D was up 1% in Q1 2010, down in Q2 and Q3 2010, and up again in Q4 2010, with a net yearly wage increase of 0.4% over 2009.

Depression - Jobless Men Keep GoingChart of the Day has another look at the sorry state of the economy. Their latest chart of the day illustrates the percent increase in the number of jobs for every decade since the 1940s. Today’s chart illustrates that up until this millennium, the number of jobs at the end of a decade has always been at least 20% greater than 10 years earlier. During the last decade, not only was that 20% plus growth not achieved, the decade actually ended with fewer jobs than when it began. This negative job growth is particularly noteworthy because the US population had increased by 10% as well as a significant increase in global wealth during the same time frame. With one year down in the current decade the chart illustrates that job growth is positive albeit only slightly so. If job growth during the current decade were to increase at the same pace as what occurred during the first year of this decade, the decade would end with an 8.7% gain in jobs.

Job Gains Chart of the DayWhat do you think?

  • Is employment returning to your area?
  • Is the U.S. doomed to another decade of job losses?
  • Will the “New Republicans” make a difference?

 

Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.

The Motor City is infamous for the bumpy financial road it has ridden. While other towns, like Houston, Tex., saw wage gains 70 percent higher than the national average between 2006 and Q1 2008, Detroit trailed national wage growth by 60 percent over the same period.

Though wage increases in Detroit were sluggish in 2007 and 2008, reflecting turmoil in key industrial sectors like automotive manufacturing, the bottom fell out in 2009. As of Q3 2009, the average wage in Detroit had dropped 3.1 percent from its peak in Q4 2008.

Detroit pay did rally a bit in Q1 2010, rising about 1 percent above the previous quarter. This was followed by a downward trend in Q2 and Q3 2010, but the year ended on a bright point, with Q4 2010 wages up more than 1 percent over the previous quarter and up 0.4 percent over a year earlier.

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