Google and the intruders in the China shop

Web security is too important to be left to Web firms -- or so thinks Google | IslamOnline.net

Back in the day when computers were just computers, rogue code was regarded as a form of vandalism -- denounced, but largely tolerated. Yet as computers became the networks that underlie the operations of everything, from banks and power grids to obsessive real-time social-networking, vandalism is no longer an apt description of acts that disturb networks. That is now called cybercrime. And it’s far from the exclusive domain of law enforcement authorities. Increasingly it’s the business of diplomats and heads of states.

In a recent speech by the United States’ chief diplomat, Hillary Clinton said: “States, terrorists and those who would act as their proxies must know that the United States will protect our networks.” The country’s force, in other words, could be deployed to protect the network if need be.

With Buzz, Google as a search network

Google thinks that now is the time to incorporate the social-network into the search engine | IslamOnline.net

Perhaps surprising to some, Google too makes mistakes. This fact was on display with the February launch of Buzz, Google’s social networking service apparently aimed at competing with Facebook and Twitter.

The problem was not Buzz itself, but the hasty manner with which Google pushed it onto its Gmail users. Like Twitter and Facebook, Buzz enables users to post “status” updates, links, photos, and the whole repertoire of Web-borne distractions.

However, eager to make its presence immediately felt in the new realm, Google decided not to start from scratch. Instead, it tied the new social-networking service to Gmail, its mail service with about 175 million users. And before users knew it, they were, without permission, signed up on Buzz, and assigned lists of “followers” based on the frequency of email exchanges with people in their address books.

Of iPad and the elusive "third category"

Apple's chief says iPad will sit comfortably in the space between smart-phones and laptops -- except that such space probably doesn't exist | IslamOnline.net

Whenever Steve Jobs takes the stage, he’s guaranteed to amaze and disappoint, regardless of what he has up his sleeve.  The Wednesday uncovering of Apple’s long-anticipated, feverishly-rumored tablet-like iPad was no exception.  Almost immediately after Apple’s chief took the wraps off the new gadget, the blogosphere was humming with mutterings: too expensive; no slot for memory expansion; no removable battery; no physical keyboard; and no camera either.

As for the other camp, the immediately-amazed — judging by the volume and tone of comments on popular technology websites such as Engadget and Gizmodo — they’ve plenty to appreciate in the iPad.  That includes the expansive 10-inch brilliant screen, the familiar interface (resembling, but not copying, that of iPhone and iPod Touch), the compatibility of the whole repertoire of iPhone apps, and the new iBooks app that draws books from five major book publishers in an iTunes-like interface.

In Avatar, the medium eclipses the message

Avatar is a runaway success apparently because of its cutting-edge technology, but it's not immediately clear whether that spells a boon or a bane for the future of film | IslamOnline.net

Like other films by James Cameron (of Titanic and Terminator), Avatar strives to please most everyone in the movie-going crowd: a tale of an epic struggle of "noble savages" against the much more technologically advanced, but arrogant and short-sighted, invaders from Earth, with a plot sprinkled with a love story, a journey of self-discovery, a greedy corporation, and plenty of not-so-subtle pro-environment and anti-Iraq war references.

More convenience, less privacy

The Web offers a seductive bargain: you will get more of it if you will stop being nervous about your privacy | IslamOnline.net

Privacy online is like no other privacy.  That is not because the Web is a wild west full of sinister people bent on breaking into your digital lives (though, of course, some such criminals indeed roam the cyberspace). Rather, privacy on the web is a category of its own because of the peculiarity of the Web as a communications medium.

That peculiarity has two main features. One is the Web as the ultimate storage medium. The other is the Web as a medium that has given rise to a new breed of highly diverse service providers whom we entrust with vast amounts of information about ourselves. Think of Google, Yahoo, or Facebook.

Doomed, or saved, by the app

Web applications are making our bond with the operating system ever more tenuous, but an old breed of applications is countering the trend | IslamOnline.net

The cloud is here. Cloud computing, that is. The term is not self-explanatory, but what it essentially means is that more and more of the tasks we could perform only on hard disk-installed applications (apps) are now doable on the Web.

Whether you want to type and format a document, do a bit of number-crunching on a spreadsheet, or view PDF files, Web-based apps from Zoho, Google, or Scribd, among others, would often suffice. In the old days, as in the 1990s until the early 2000s, such tasks were mostly the preserve of applications installed on the hard disk, with Microsoft’s Office suite enjoying, or having enjoyed, a nearly dominant position in that domain.

You shall upgrade to Windows 7 (or not?)

Yes, it could be the greatest Windows yet, but particularly novel about the Seventh is that you may not need to buy it | Islamonline.net

In the minds of many, Windows, the operating system, has often been associated with some notion of inevitability:that it was inevitable that one upgrades to the most recent release of Windows. Or that Windows was inevitably going to be rendered unnecessary thanks to free or much cheaper alternatives. As is often the case, reality lies somewhere between these two extremes.

There is reason, though, to revisit the "inevitability debate" as Microsoft releases, with relatively uncharacteristic advertising restraint, the seventh in its Windows dynasty.