Firefox security hole
This time it’s the Firefox browser with a security vulnerability. No details have been released so I don’t know what sort of problem it is. See Gregg Keizer at Computerworld for more information.
American Internet usage statistics
The Pew Research Center has published the latest statistics on American Internet usage. Three-quarters of adults are online with those over 65 lagging at 38%. Those without a high-school diploma also lag at 39% online. The graphic below from the Pew research project summarizes various statistics about Internet usage:
Science fiction movies
It’s Friday so here’s something a little lighter. A contributor to Gizmo’s Freeware with the nom de plume of Rizar has written an article about science fiction movies. He begins:
This article has a collection of the best science fiction (SF) movies ever. I survey the exciting range of possibilities in imaginative technology, computers, futuristic visions, underlying science/modernism, and other speculative ideas. It also includes a list of the top 100 SF films of all time as rated by film critics and users.
First I comment on some of the best science fiction movies by decade. I increase the font size of movie titles I find artistically appealing, supportive of future science or technology, semi-pure to SF, timeless in their visions, or dense with gems of SF ideas. Some of the movies that don’t quite fit into this emphasis go in the honorable mention section or may be found in the Top 100 list.
Next is a list of the top 100 greatest science fiction movies of all time. In most cases the films portray compelling speculative ideas or “what if” thought experiments, but they must at least get typically classified in the Sci-Fi/fantasy (SF/F) genre (and not for fantasy). The ranking is calculated from online critic and user ratings (see notes for the explicit calculation and grade details). The movie ratings and grades throughout the page are also calculated by these critic/user ratings.
The amazing growth of mobile platforms
If you have doubts that mobile platforms will become the consumer’s way to use the Internet in much of the world, consider some predictions from the eMarketer about usage in the so-called BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China). Here are a few statistics:
- Over 200 million mobile subscribers in both Brazil and Russia by 2014
- 853 million subscribers in India by 2014
- 1.3 billion (yes billion) subscribers and 957 million mobile Internet users in China by 2014
And the post notes:
Staggering as it may to conceptualize, there will be more mobile Internet users in China in 2010 than the entire population of the US.
Service pack 1 for Windows 7
Microsoft has announced that there will be a service pack 1 for Windows 7 but didn’t say when. It’s not news that that there would be a service pack, that was inevitable. The interest is in the timing, which may be as soon as this fall. At Computerworld, Gregg Keizer reports:
Microsoft today announced service packs for both Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, but declined to set a release date or a schedule for getting a beta in users’ hands.
According to a company spokesman, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) will primarily contain “minor updates,” including patches and hotfixes that will have been delivered earlier via the Windows Update service, rather than new features. One of the latter: an updated Remote Desktop client designed to work with RemoteFX, the new remote-access platform set to debut in SP1 for Windows Server 2008 R2.
Facebook malicious spam attack
Security software vendor McAfee says that Facebook users are being subjected to a massive malicious spam attack. InfoWorld reports:
Facebook’s 400 million users have been targeted by a spam run that could infect their computers with malicious software designed to steal passwords and other data, according to security researchers at McAfee.
Over the last two days, millions of messages have been sent, which McAfee detected through customers running the company’s security software, said Dave Marcus, McAfee’s director of security research and communication.
New cookie controls in Chrome browser
All major Web browsers have some sort of controls for managing Internet cookies but some controls are more fine-grained than others. Google’s Chrome browser now has the ability to control cookies for individual sites. It also has a link to the site for controlling Adobe Flash cookies. The video below has some details.
Debating how to draw talent into technical fields
The US is graduating fewer and fewer scientists and engineers, and concern is growing about how to deal with the falloff. TechCrunch has posted a debate between two experts on the best approach to attracting more talent.
While many people agree this is a problem, not everyone agrees on what should be done about it. Former Intel chairman and CEO Craig Barrett is a strong proponent of priming the pump with more undergraduate science, engineering, and math students. Duke/UC-Berkeley professor (and regular TechCrunch columnist) Vivek Wadhwa thinks that better rewards for people who pursue engineering and science degrees is the right approach. So we asked Barrett and Wadhwa to debate the issue of how best to fix technology education in the U.S.
SDHC memory cards
If you have a digital camera, you are familiar with flash memory cards. These little cards are also a way to add memory to a PC. While thumb drives can also act as secondary memory in PCs, they stick out and can be awkward. Memory cards, of course, go into a slot and are barely visible.
Like thumb drives, memory cards vary widely in their speed and it is worthwhile to know exactly what you are getting. Tom’s Hardware has provided benchmarks for SDHC cards that will give you a better idea of what kind of performance to expect from a card before you buy it.
Preliminary look at Internet Explorer 9
Microsoft has been working on the next version of Internet Explorer and has released a few details. Stephen Shankland at CNET reports:
For those who doubted that Microsoft was serious in its effort to re-engage with the Web, it’s time to put the skepticism aside.
At its Mix conference in Las Vegas on Tuesday, Microsoft gave programmers, Web developers, and the world at large a taste of things to come with its Web browser. Specifically, Microsoft released what it’s calling the Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview, a prototype that’s designed to show off the company’s effort to improve how the browser deals with the Web as it exists today and, just as important, to add support for new Web technologies that are coming right now.
ExtremeTech has some discussion of new features like GPU acceleration and JavaScript compilation.
The preliminary look at IE9 is promising but in the meantime Firefox and Chrome are also likely to improve. Incidentally, IE9 will not work in Windows XP.
More about the loss of privacy
The discussion of how the Internet acts to reduce privacy continues. Steve Lohr at the New York Times has written an article, How Privacy Vanishes Online, a Bit at a Time. Computers can assemble and analyze the various facts that people post about themselves to create a revealing picture. Lohr writes:
Computer scientists and policy experts say that such seemingly innocuous bits of self-revelation can increasingly be collected and reassembled by computers to help create a picture of a person’s identity, sometimes down to the Social Security number.
“Technology has rendered the conventional definition of personally identifiable information obsolete,” said Maneesha Mithal, associate director of the Federal Trade Commission’s privacy division. “You can find out who an individual is without it.”
It isn’t just the information you reveal about yourself but also what others say about you that can be used. Lohr goes on to say:
You may not disclose personal information, but your online friends and colleagues may do it for you, referring to your school or employer, gender, location and interests. Patterns of social communication, researchers say, are revealing.
“Personal privacy is no longer an individual thing,” said Harold Abelson, the computer science professor at M.I.T. “In today’s online world, what your mother told you is true, only more so: people really can judge you by your friends.”
Collected together, the pool of information about each individual can form a distinctive “social signature,” researchers say.
