Computers amplify harm as well as good

A catalyst is a compound in chemistry that increases the speed of a reaction without being a part of the reaction. Computers are a human catalyst, they increase our capacity to do things. We can now calculate faster, communicated faster, have instant access to vast amounts of data etc. However what is not discussed nearly enough is that it can also amplify the damage we do to each other.

There are numerous threats on the Internet, most commonly discussed are the threats to our property and our money ( the various phishing and malicious software that is around). However rarely discussed with proper depth is the damage that can occur to young people’s lives though events on their social networking. Two such events are sexting and bullying. Both of these events occur in the real world as well as the virtual, however the effects in the virtual world are increased markedly by the computer amplifier effect.

Sexting is the sending of explicit (read pornographic) images/text etc between young people (under the age of consent). These are often material of themselves or their close ‘friends’. Sexting is at an extreme end of a very busy continuum, young people are constantly sending images and text to each other, the vast bulk of which is just a form of saying hello (keeping in touch). The issue with “sexting” is not the images/text as such, it is the way young people are caught within the bounds of the child pornography laws. Sexting is child pornography by the legal definition and those involve can expect (rightly or wrongly) the full weight of the law, often with little option for discretion. This means that a young person found guilty can be placed on a sex offender’s register, with the whole life ahead of them being highly restricted. This is an activity which can destroy futures. In the US young people of 13 are facing jail for this activity, being placed on the sex offenders register and Florida is debating a sexting bill which will jail young people for up to 5 years. Australia has a similar response.

Bully can also destroy lives. Anecdotally it is one of the highest causes of teenage suicide (accurate figures on this are impossible). Bully is another activity which is on the continuum from friendly banter at one end to outright abuse on the other. It is pretty easy to see what is happening at each end, but the line where banter crosses over into bullying is blurred and changes from person to person and event to event. However it can be very hard for young people caught in the middle as this story shows. This is a real story of a 17 year old in Darwin coping with bullying and what s/he had to go through to get someone in authority to listen. (Names changed to protect ….)

Cyber threats
By {Name Deleted}


Bullying through cyber services has always been a problem since their creation, you hear about issues on the news and never take much notice to them and their outcomes, well I didn’t anyway, until I was a victim.

There was a Facebook page created called “{Name deleted}” who made up unreal stories about all the people that added it. It claimed to go to {School deleted} as a year 10 student, and seemed to know little true secrets about people and then magnified them into a full blown lie.

I made the mistake of adding it to stand up for mates getting bullied by it. It then started saying stuff about me and close mates, I got offended and went off at it and owned it I was at a mates place when this took place and she was backing me up. At this time I guess it felt like it was stuck in a corner, I was waiting for a reply to my awesome comment, instead I received a status update, “{Name deleted} is REAL {bully term deleted}” It had created another “{bully term deleted}” page, it took the way I write and used it in malicious ways. “Real {bully term deleted}” then started rumours about everyone who added it. As {bully deleted} said I was {bully term deleted}, everyone was quick to point blame.

I then started receiving threats by telephone and email. {bully deleted} started screen clipping everything I said and reordered it to look bad on my behalf. That was a little over board, because everyone that was accusing me could see the original comments in the order they were originally posted. This seemed to make {bully deleted} angry and things amplified.

At work I was receiving threats via phone at the most inconvenient times through meetings, briefings, shows, and plots. At this time, I started seeking help from colleagues as they are all adults. I was directed to contact the Telecommunication ombudsman; I took a 15 minute break, and phoned them. They told me they weren’t the right department to contact; they only deal with Internet/phone Service provider complaints. They then told me to contact the federal privacy commissioner, so I phoned them. They also told me that they were not the correct department to contact, they told me to contact the local police.

So during my lunch break I walked to the police station, after waiting ages, they told me in five words, NOT OUR PROBLEM CONTACT FACEBOOK. Going back to work all of my colleagues were so sure that the local police would have been able to fix the situation. But nothing, so I went onto Facebook looking for a contact number or email, nothing anywhere. I did notice in one section under security that they will give information to authorities when a subpoena is provided, but how do you get a subpoena when the police don’t see cyber bulling as there problem?

It led me in circles, the best thing I could do is report the page and hope Facebook will delete it. Day’s later nothing, the anger on the page was getting out of control, death threats thrown left right and centre. I had to do something about it. NOW. I contacted my principal, as I was upset and not thinking properly, he had given me his phone number in the event I ever felt like that after the last time, but because it was 1am I couldn’t call him because it wouldn’t be fair on him because he had work the next day. I sent an email to him explaining the situation, and forced myself to sleep. In the morning I had work at 6am, It was just before show when I received a phone call from school, It was a teacher I tell all my problems to, she told me she spoke to the principal and wanted to know how I was feeling.

There wasn’t much he could do because the bullying didn’t happen at school, but that didn’t stop him; he was on the phone all morning trying to sort it out. I then received several phone calls from the Australian federal police, and a telecommunication conference with the tactical cyber crime team in Canberra.

They said they could find out who it but it would take time, hours later the site had been deleted by them, but that still doesn’t help the people out there angry about all the stuff said on it.

In all honestly cyber bulling isn’t something someone should get off lightly for, it not only caused stress for me at work and home, but it also slandered my name, all my employees have Facebook and if I didn’t inform them it could have resulted in my job being terminated.
It caused a great deal of mental stress and resulted in me being unstable in thinking. There isn’t enough recourses in the community to help fight against cyber bulling. I feel like if it happened again tomorrow, I would still feel like there was nowhere to go, and probably wouldn’t be here.

Something is happening for this young person and s/he has given permission to share his/herstory with others as a warning. Here are some links if you want more information.

LifeLine 13 11 14

Kid's help line on sexting

A new resource ThinkUKnow

Suicide Prevention

On the cusp of the Third Age of Communication

We are now entering the Third Age of communication with the Internet as the main driver. This transition will be painful for those who have heavily invested in the Second Age. So what are the Ages of Communication?

First Age – One to one.

This Age is characterised by interpersonal communication and still exists as the basic form of interpersonal relationships. In terms of written communication this was the dominate age up until about 500 year ago before the invention of the printing press by Gutenberg in 1440. Books before then were hand written and labouriously transcribed mainly by monks. Few people could read and few books were actually written.

Most communication was spread by word of mouth. In terms of technology, the telephone is a first Age device.

Second Age – One to many.

The printing press kicked off this Age, however the effects were not immediately apparent as it took a long time to really take advantage of the new methods. Books were now able to be mass produced and a small number of writers where able to make books to be consumed by a large number readers. The last century of this Age came to be dominated by mass media marketing. Not only books, but newspapers and entertainment were dominated by Second Age communication. TV, Radio, Films, etc are all media where a few producers send information to a large audience with little or no ability for the audience to send information back. People became passive consumers of communication. Our political processes also mirrored this with democratic governments being a small group of people controlling large populations.

In terms of technology, TV and radio transmissions, newspaper and book publishing, music and film production are all Second Age communication channels.

Third Age – Many to many.

The internet has now enabled communication to move to the many to many mode. A simple chat room is a basic example of this with all involved able to simultaneously talk (write) and listen (read). Twitter is an example of the ultimate chat room. To those who see this for the first time it is often confusing with multiple conversations tripping over each other and much of the conversation appearing to be just noise. However if you also factor in the fact that those involved can be from anywhere in the world and people can participate in multiple chat rooms at any one time, it becomes clear that this can allow ideas to spread around the world in seconds.

With the coming of the Third Age everyone now has the ability to become producers not just consumers. The number of YouTube videos, the number of blogs around show just how popular this idea really is. And it has the established Second Age Media company’s worried. So where can it go??

TV/Film is now being replaced by people downloading their own shows and watching them when they want. In addition a new form of TV is developing where small producers are able to make small scale shows. The Streamy Awards recently showcased the best of these with some well established actors now producing their own Internet shows. (If you haven’t seen it, The Guild is a good place to start)

Radio/Music is also being replaced by people developing their own music to be played on Ipod type devices while they do other things (jogging, housework, driving etc). Talk shows first published on radio are often available on download through RSS techniques meaning that the user can develop their own talk show program.

Newspapers are being replaced by many of the blogs or information websites. People often bought newspapers not for the quality of the product, but because all the information was conveniently in one place. Now browsers can bookmark various information sites to keep you up to date with the latest information or sports scores, and these can be fed to your browser through RSS feeds. Also Mashup sites such as Digg or iGoogle allow you to browse what is happening in the world or your area of interest.

The rise of reality shows demonstrates that people now expect to be involved in their entertainment, not just passive consumers. Twitter and Facebook also allow for real-time involvement, as well as offering very accurate ways to track people’s opinions. Often sports broadcasts (particularly slower moving sports such as cricket) now include people’s comments on the action as it is happening.

There are also some more serious efforts developing the many to many technology uses of which Ushahadi is just one. To understand how this concept could develop over the next few years Clay Shirky has coined a term "cognitive surplus" to describe the way the Internet is now providing us with tools to be creative in our spare time, not just consumers.

This is only just starting to occur and it is difficult to see where it is going to head. Gutenberg would have not foreseen that his invention would have developed into the Mass Media companies of today. However Tim Berners-Lee (the father/inventor of the internet) does have a feel for where the Internet is going and is keen for the Web to become the Semantic Web, which is the ultimate Many to Many idea.

Computer Memory, is more always better?

People often assume that more is always better. A 1G memory computer is better than a 512M computer, 2G is better than 1G. But is this always true?

To answer this you need to know that memory, CPU, motherboard and operating system are all involved and this makes the answer complex.

In order to use the memory the CPU must be able to find it. It relies on the operating system to give each memory location an address. In a 32 bit operating system that means 2 to the power of 32 addresses, which is 4G. This means that on the older operating systems (like XP) and on the new ones which are 32 bit, the maximum amount of memory is 4G. Anything more and the operating system can't find it and it is ignored. (Not quite there are tricks that can be used, but in general that's the way it works).

On 64 bit operating systems (Vista, Windows 7, Mac Snow Leopard, Ubuntu and all modern servers) the system can now address 2 to the power of 64 addresses, or a theoretical limit of 16.3 exabytes. However Windows operating systems have imposed a real limit on the RAM (eg 192G for Professional).

The speed of the computer is not just about how much memory it has, the CPU must get the memory quickly in order to use it. This is all about the speed of the motherboard, or more specifically the bus speed and bus type.

Bus speeds are measured in Mhz and it is important that the motherboard, CPU and memory modules all have the same setting. Usually the motherboard sets this to the optimal setting in the BIOS.

Most CPUs access the memory through one side, called the Front Side Bus (FSB). This means that everything is going through one small bottleneck.

Memory manufactures have tried to speed this up using a technique called Dual Channeling. Here two sticks of memory work as one, theoretically doubling the speed of getting memory to the CPU. In reality it has only made a small increase in performance, not really worth worrying about.

Intel has developed a CPU called Core(TM) which can access the memory from all four sides (though one is disabled). This feature is fully implemented in the Core i7 series. Memory manufacturers have responded to this with Triple Channeling memory, which is now starting to show some performance increases. At present this only works with Motherboards, Memory Modules and CPU specifically designed for Triple Channeling. To gain this on your current computer will cost about $1000 to upgrade the Motherboard, CPU and Memory all at the same time.

There are definite memory minimums that operating systems and software need before they work properly, eg Windows 7 2G memory will be comfortable (1G will run but some things will be VERY slow).

Future of Internet Backbone

Update

Since writing this article others have also been writing about the same issue, here are two good articles which shed more light on this issue.

Welcome to my students starting the Cisco IT Essentials course in Alice Springs and Darwin. In this blog I want to talk about the problem with the backbone of the Internet and what is happening to fix it.

The Internet works using a protocol called IP (Internet Protocol) which is transmitted through the phone and telecommunications system using a protocol called TCP (Transmission Control Protocol). The whole thing is wrapped up in the term TCP/IP which this tutorial from W3Schools explains really well.

Every server on the Internet has an IP address and you need one to access the internet. Whoever gives you access (school, University or ISP) gives you an IP address when you log onto their system. This IP address can be used to track your movements and activities while on the Internet. This website will show you your IP address and tries to work out where in the world you are.

This system has worked really well since it was first established in the early 1980s. However it faces a problem today, we are running out of IP addresses. When this happens (see clock) no new servers will be able to connect to the Internet.

The version of IP (called IPv4) that we use currently uses 4 sets of 32bit numbers (like 192.168.0.0), which means we have 2 to the power of 32 or 4,294,967,296 addresses available. (actually less than that because some are reserved for other things) A newer version of IP called IPv6 uses uses 128 bit octets (like 2001:0db8:85a3:08d3:1319:8a2e:0370:7334), which means that we have 2 to the power of 128 or (rounded version sorry none of my programs could calculate the actual number) 300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 possible addresses. To put this in perspective, if every person on earth used a billion addresses each, there would still be plenty left over.

So how long before IPv6 is ready to use? To change over all the parts of the internet must be able to use IPv6, browsers, operating systems, physical equipment, logical control systems, supporting software etc. Most of this is in place now, here is a list of current sites that can only be accessed if you are using IPv6, see whether you can see them.

The browsers and operating systems have been ready since 2000, switching gear has also been made compatible and some small systems have already made the change. So anything build or bought in the last 10 years should be right, but there is an great deal of infrastructure on the internet that is older than that. Australia is ahead of the pack in getting ready for this. There is a conference later on this year to discuss this very issue. The issue for the ISPs is not when to switch, but how to enable both to the run side by side. The browsers have no difficulty with this but other control aspects do have a number of technical and control issues. All the various protocols of TCP/IP (see the tutorial earlier) must be able to work with information in both formats. Cisco has been working on this for 10 years so many of the issues have been solved in the lab and now need to be tested in the field. Internode already has started trialling an implementation while the other major ISPs are working on this as well.

I would suggest that what will probably happen is that the ISPs will gradually switch over to IPv6 but still maintain IPv4. This means that your browser will use the most appropriate IP version during a transition stage and both will run side by side for a while. One day when you check your IP address it will be a strange new number, rather than the familiar one. You probably won't notice any other difference. For the average user this change will not be noticeable, it will just be a huge headache for those trying to administer the system.

Internet TV, how close is it??

If you want to watch TV shows in Australia you use to have two options, either wait for the show to appear on a TV channel that broadcasts for free or buy a pay TV contract and get multiple channels. If however you wanted to watch the show at your convenience, not just follow the TV guide, you had to wait for the show to come out on DVD.

That is now changing. Already the ABC is streaming many of its shows on the Internet using Iview. Here you can watch a show up to 2 weeks after it was broadcast on your computer. Other TV stations have a similar service but not as well implemented as the ABC (SBS limited quality and TEN limited range) or have withdrawn it (Seven and Nine). (Correction: This situation has now changed, Channel 7 have introduced a service very similar to Iview on the ABC. This service is called PLUS7 and looks to be good quality and with many shows available soon after they are broadcast. The range looks very good, well done Channel 7.)

There are also devices such as TIVO which allow you to record shows well in advance and be able to play them back at your convenience.

In the US there is a service called HULU which streams hundreds of shows from many different channels, however Australia (and the rest of the world) is blocked from using this service. Itunes also offers some shows but the range is not great and the cost is higher than buying DVDs if you want the whole series.

Very many computer users want to use such a service and the lack of availability is driving many of them to illegal downloads.

Now Google has moved into this market. They see a market for widespread TV show and Movie streaming on the Internet. The two largest traffic sites on the Internet at the moment are Hulu and YouTube. Google owns YouTube and wants it to become a TV stations streaming to the world. They have made a start by stream the IPL live and repeats. This will test the market for them.

Google are also talking to TV manufacturers so that Internet TV can come into the house directly to the TV and not the computer.

How long will it be before home users can watch any TV show available in the world at any time (TV on demand)? I will predict that this will occur one minute after someone works out how to make money from this form of delivery. If the TV stations won't do it, someone else (like Google) will.

Soon no more point and click

Apple Ipads will go on sale in Australia next month. The Ipad is a new type of device, its not a phone, not a laptop, not an ereader, but a better described as a portable media device, if you need to describe it at all. However it does not support Flash (which is how most multimedia on the internet is delivered) which leaves it open to competition from HP's Slate, which does support Flash. It will be interesting to see how this competition plays out. Steve Jobs and Apple have often been at the cutting edge of technology and brought us devices that we did not even know we needed (Mac and Ipod) but they have also failed (remember the Lisa and NeXT).

Whichever way it goes, it seems likely that the days of using the mouse as a major input device are numbered, and it can't come quickly enough. There are few current alternatives to using the mouse on computers. There are some newer desktops available like Bumptop and there has been the ability to use voice control for a long time, but none of these have threaten the use of the mouse.

Graphic artists have long ago thrown the mouse away in favour of a stylus, but this has not gained wide acceptance.

Now, with the ipad/slate and their touch screens we have the chance to develop real touch screen input techniques, not related to mouse type point and click but using real or two handed gestures. This demonstration shows what is possible using these techniques, while Sixth sense (See previous blog) also shows what is possible if we put away the mouse.

For me I can't wait. This opens up so many possiblities. It is always interesting looking into the future of computing to see what could be coming...

Welcome Cert I Students

Welcome to those students starting the Cert I. This blog is designed to give you extra information about what is happening now in the world of Information Technology. It is worth looking here on a regular basis as I will try to update this regularly.

Further down on the blog are some other stories I have written this year which you might find of interest.

If you have a topic that you would like more information about let me know and I will create a post for it on my blog.

Also feel free to leave a comment for other to see as well. At times I will be deliberately controversial.

Just as a taste of what this blog can provide follow this link to a list of some of the "best" free software available to download from the internet. These are all "open source" software, which means that volunteers have developed them and they can be used legally by anyone for non commercial (and some even for commercial) purposes.