The Case for Strong Passwords

keepass

The massive Gawker password breach has kicked off a part-voluntary and part-mandatory wave of password changes.

A crook who gets into your email can get just about anywhere — and not all of them end up getting jacked around by me on Facebook Chat.

(I used Storify to assemble the pieces for this post — you have to have Java enabled to view the story below) [Read more...]

The Sharecroppers Are Revolting

Free

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We’re in the midst of a fundamental generational shift in the way we think about property. Those of “us” on the fuddy-duddy side of the equation have been trying to understand what Ownership and Copyright will mean as technology progresses, but we may have been asking the wrong question all along. [Read more...]

Jester of the Round Table

mbull

Jen Zingsheim over at Custom Scoop was kind enough to ask me to sit in on the weekly Media Bullseye Roundtable with Sarah Wurrey.

We talked about online civility, the psychology of internet lackeys and minions, and the success of the Old Spice social media campaign. (@oldspice)

It’s a pretty decent little chat – and something I ought to be doing more frequently.

Hint.

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Follow @jenzings and @sarahwurrey on Twitter, if you aren’t already.

The Internet is a Kennel

spike

By now, many others have weighed in on a very recent online spat, so I won’t go into particulars.

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Person A, who is very well known, made a comment that devoid of context came across as arrogant. He didn’t mean it that way.

Person B, who is very well-respected (and less well-known,) wrote about how such interactions and communications can indeed breed incivility online, without naming names.

Person A wrote a scathing open letter to Person B.

Both Person A and Person B are friends of mine. Real friends, not just “online friendz,” with whom I have shared multiple meals and drinks apiece. So this isn’t about them.

This is about the lapdogs who try to curry favor with the Internet Famous. [Read more...]

The Big Empty

“Never underestimate the ability of shallow people to fill a void in their lives with something equally as vacuous.”

- Ike Pigott

Owning My Links

Part of the reason I started noodling with WordPress was the ability to “own” my own site. Not have it hosted elsewhere, not beholden to anyone else’s whims and limitations. I can do what I want with the template and the look and the feel and the content. I can even move the URL around, break it, and start all over if I choose.

I’ve learned a lot of helpful things about coding along the way.

Today’s “currency” on the internet is still content, although sharing and linking are vital. You’ve probably noticed that most of the links being shared online are “shortened” links. TinyURL used to have the space to itself, and as the default shortener for Twitter it was poised to be the all-time king.

Now there are many competitors. Bit.ly is the new Twitter default, and even Bit.ly went even shorter, with J.mp. Add in ri.ms and cli.gs and is.gd, and you’re only part of the way there. Google for List of Link Shortening Services and see for yourself.

I wanted to make the move to own my own links because there are some heavy hitters moving in. Bit.ly will be offering its own custom domains for link sharing. WordPress now has WP.me, Google is trotting out Goo.gl, and Facebook will have FB.me.

My links will be at ike4.me.

That will look strange to some people, for sure – but no stranger than adj.ix or anything else that comes along. After all, we’re inclined to click on just about anything.

That’s the other motivation for me. When you see me sharing a link with http://ike4.me you’ll know where it came from. I’ve locked it down, so scammers and spammers can’t use it. It’s also a nice piece of branding, if I say so myself.

The Ike4.me domain is powered by Yourls, and is fairly easy to set up. With little technical knowledge (more than most of my friends, but far less than many who get paid for coding) I was up and running within an hour. More customizations to come.

Oh, and you can find me on Twitter at http://ike4.me/tw and on Facebook at http://ike4.me/fb.

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