Website Final Project

I have created an online portfolio showcasing a collection of my artwork.

Check it out!!!

http://www.users.muohio.edu/swindec2/website/index.html

New Twitter Worm on the Rise

New Twitter Worm Targets Celebrities

http://blog.wired.com/business/2009/04/new-twitter-wor.html

Teen Twitter worm writer gets job, spreads new worm

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10222373-83.html

Just when we thought we were safe….

 

You log onto twitter and click on a post mentioning the name of celebrity Ashton Kutcher, unknowingly infecting your own account and sending unauthorized updates to all your contacts. The culprit is a worm that hacks into accounts and instantly sends unauthorized posts with name of celebrities like Kutcher and Oprah Winfrey. Twitter is working as hard as it isolate the worm. The worm spreads by “taking advantage of a common Web programming error, called a cross-scripting vulnerability, on the Twitter Web site…”. It apparently affects accounts accessed through the Internet Explorer browser.

The culprit behind the fifth worm in a series to infect the twitter site is the seventeen yea-old Michael Mooney from Brooklyn, N.Y. who apparently wrote the first four twitter worms because he was “bored and wanted to bring attention to the security holes.” He then caught the attention of Travis Rowland, founder of ExqSoft in Hammond, Oregon, who hired Mooney to create and release the fifth worm. The intent of the duo is not to “aggravate” twitter but simply to expose its vulnerabilities. The teen is now subject to prosecution. Whether or he was hired by the company, the act of hacking was still illegal. Since he is still a minor, the sentencing if he is prosecuted would be directed more towards rehabilitation than punishment, but  Rowland hopes to recruit Mooney into a promising career.

So are social networking sites like twitter and facebook really keeping you safe? The internet is an amazing forum for communication, messaging, information exchange but we can’t forget that it as its limitations. Ultimately we are responsible for what we put on the internet and we will always be subject to things like worms and viruses, especially with young hackers like Mooney trying to expose the security holes in sites like Twitter. Twitter has exploded in popularity and its use has increased drastically – I can’t go a week without hearing mention of the new social messaging site. Perhaps efforts by vigilantes like Mooney will help Twitter increase its security measures.

News Discussion # 11

Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/theweb/magazine/16-11/st_essay

Writer Paul Boutin offers a direct and clear warning to web loggers and adds his own personal commentary on the state of the blogosphere in 2008 by comparing web blogs to sites like Twitter and Facebook. Boutin’s main plug is that blogs are outdated, their use as a tool of “folksy self-expression and clever thought” has expired and degraded. His advice is simple: Get rid of your blog or cease your efforts to create one. His primary reason for arguing the illegitimacy of modern blogs is the supposed inability to have your voice recognized and heard on the web and the supposed plethora of “cut-rate journalists and underground marketing campaigns” that have sabotaged enthusiastic amateur bloggers. The argument however, comes across much more as an agitated puff of hot air rather than a well-reasoned and backed perspective. Boutin fails to take into account the wide range of reasons that people start and maintain blogs. Placing on the top of a google search list isn’t the main motive of most people to write an online blog. Blogs cover an almost limitless range of topics, many are specialized to specific subjects are trade, some are written by professional writers and journalists and others by teens or amateur entrepreneurs.

The claims the author makes seem somewhat irrelevant to me, especially the commentary on the lack of blog links at the top of a Google search result – instead “a search for Barack Obama’s latest speech will deliver a Wikipedia page, a Fox News article, and a few entries from professionally run sites like Politico.com.” I have no doubt that this is true but I fail to see how this is a negative incidence. Considering the political nature and weight of the topic I want legitimate, professional news sources to appear at the top of the search result list rather than blogs by amateur writers. I agree is it inevitably harder now to have your opinions heard online now due to the explosion of the blogosphere in recent years, but the very essence of the blogging and other Web 2.0 tools is that they are open, unregulated and consumer-generated and managed. The suggestions that Twitter and Facebook are better options may be plausible if you are simply looking for the most direct way of voicing your opinions and generating a quick response but they sites have their own limitations. Blogs, especially if you understand a little about html and web design, can add profitable informative content to the web and allow a more personal, thorough touch than any social networking site.

Wikipedia - Exploring Fact City

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/weekinreview/29cohen.html

Wikipedia as an online city.

It is one of the most frequently visited, maintained and updated innovations available through the world wide web. Although not always upheld by its users, there is some form of a code of conduct and a common protocol that regulates the establishment o this online city. The metropolis has interesting connotations. I imagine a metropolis as a site of buzzing of buzzing interaction, hectic traffic, constant stimulation and raised level of progression. Wikipedia has "millions of visitors and hundreds of thousands of volunteers" and an "ever-expanding total of articles and languages spoken". Wikipedia, unlike traditional cities, is not defined by physical or geographical boundaries. Its contextual source, the web, has accelerated its exponential growth. It reaches worldwide, across cultures and remains open to all users. It is truly the landmark of web 2.0. So what is the growth capacity of this city? Could it become so expansive and be edited and tweaked so many times that users no longer have worthwhile content to add?

In my annotated bibliography I evaluated the rise of online journalism and its assets comparative to traditional journalism generated by professionals rather than everyday citizens. Citizen journalism uses outlets like wikipedia and online user-friendly news sites to generate an open forum of news, research and personal response. If these sites are open-source it falls on every user to regulate and police the content. Wikis like wikipedia follow a general code. "Wikipedia encourages contributors to mimic the basic civility, trust, cultural acceptance and self-organizing qualities familiar to any city-dweller". Wikipedia citizens can see records of amendments made to their virtual city and navigate in almost any direction though its content. Traffic at least will not be a hindrance to this online metropolis, the more traffickers the better. More visitors and navigators to tis thriving city means more citizen police, so the more popular articles or controversial articles will get more views and be better tweaked.  

Wikipedia - Exploring Fact City

The Future of Broadband: Building It Out

News Post #9

http://www.portfolio.com/views/columns/dual-perspectives/2009/03/23/Building-It-Out

Every day I open my computer and log onto to the Internet in a matter of seconds – I check my favorite sites, read the email, do a few searches, and visit social networking sites. The Internet is undeniably one of the most widely used resources across the globe, and in the past five years is has grown to nearly 75 times its size. The number of global Internet users is quickly growing, so much that “global Internet traffic is likely to quadruple by 2012”. An interesting point is that most of the content accessed by web users is in the form of video files streamed through user –generated sites like You tube. The dominance of video streaming – in whichever context it is utilized for, as means of exchanging information, vocalizing opinion or data, or simply for entertainment, is more than apparent when considering that it will account for more than 90 percent of global traffic by 2012.
The capabilities of the Internet however may have challenges keeping up with the demand of its users. The pressure is on the providers now to come up with the necessary bandwidth. The softwares are available and ready to be put into use if the company is willing to make the effort. With the growing demand of consumers, Internet providers will make the necessary improvements. One of the most impressive of these improvements mentioned in the article is a system of Internet cables being laid “to, form and within Asia…that will boost international connection speeds and reduce network latency”.
An interesting point is the responsibility of the Internet users. Not all users play but the rules of Internet traffic and many don’t know how to navigate the roads properly. The unreliability and vulnerability that has hindered the functioning of Internet is generated largely by ill-equipped traffickers. As the article briefly suggests, he future of the Internet lies not only in the expansion of bandwidth but also in the knowledge and capability of the user.

My Favorite Things

I'm going to write out some of my favorite things, so you can learn more about me. I hope you like it.

• Watching movies with friends


• Traveling


• Visiting art museums


• The color GREEN


• The site Ted.com