Cyber Effects
04/28/09 20:17
Today I am bemused by the state of the web, the world wide one. My puzzlement is due to recent New York Times stories, the point of which is:
With respect to internet security among governments, large businesses and similar entities there is nothing to be done at my humble level -- other than to be pleased about the number of jobs created in response to the need.
The tale of content cutbacks to developing countries is a matter which merits thought. For instance, was it ever a good thing to have videos such as the one about cell phones popping corn (a clever deception by a bluetooth manurfacturer intended to perk up headset sales among those concerned about the unproven link between cell phones and brain cancer) into parts of the world where people may not live long enough to even get brain cancer? How useful was it to watch somebody build a bomb in a film anybody anywhere could view? Who would deny a fellow human a chance to watch a video about health care, aids prevention, beautiful music, improving agriculture? Who are we to be, in effect, censoring what people far away watch on the web? Should capitalism be left to make that decision for people in, say, Myanmar? Plenty of governments already filter web content passing into their systems.
Personally, I have always loved the idea that “the pen is mightier than the sword,” especially side by side with the conviction that love is more powerful than its absence. Everything invented by humans for a worthy purpose can be distorted by other humans for reasons of power, greed, and so on. So I’ll go on doing what I do every day on the web, and encourage everybody else to do the same. Just keep informed and be sensible regarding online activities.
- Some providers of media content and social networks, are considering cutting down, or already have, on server space in developing nations where people like to watch many videos and stream plenty of music. In places ranging from China, Africa, Latin America, Malaysia and parts of India this is the case. The reason for the cutback? Nobody has figured out how to offset the cost of running the many extra servers with cold cash -- insufficient profit. Whether we take advantage of all those ads plastered around social networks and media sites or tune them out, the point is that in developed countries enough people click on the ads to make a difference to site owners.
- Governments of the world are putting substantial capital into internet security. This is no secret, certainly, yet the results may surprise many unpleasantly should the new features be deployed. What is feared now is not so much nuclear warheads as hostile governments shutting down banking or transportation systems somewhere across the planet. Interfering with water distribution systems, electrical grids. It is unlikely that steps taken by the US and other developed nations to prevent these things -- which have been tried often enough, according to the press -- are being disseminated by the media. Measures ranging from surreptitious wiping of sections of other countries’ computer systems to spontaneous self-destruction of those computers by malicious code imprinted into chips during manufacturing may be among the methods of prevention. Either one of these measures could do substantial harm to internet infrastructure in the target country.
With respect to internet security among governments, large businesses and similar entities there is nothing to be done at my humble level -- other than to be pleased about the number of jobs created in response to the need.
The tale of content cutbacks to developing countries is a matter which merits thought. For instance, was it ever a good thing to have videos such as the one about cell phones popping corn (a clever deception by a bluetooth manurfacturer intended to perk up headset sales among those concerned about the unproven link between cell phones and brain cancer) into parts of the world where people may not live long enough to even get brain cancer? How useful was it to watch somebody build a bomb in a film anybody anywhere could view? Who would deny a fellow human a chance to watch a video about health care, aids prevention, beautiful music, improving agriculture? Who are we to be, in effect, censoring what people far away watch on the web? Should capitalism be left to make that decision for people in, say, Myanmar? Plenty of governments already filter web content passing into their systems.
Personally, I have always loved the idea that “the pen is mightier than the sword,” especially side by side with the conviction that love is more powerful than its absence. Everything invented by humans for a worthy purpose can be distorted by other humans for reasons of power, greed, and so on. So I’ll go on doing what I do every day on the web, and encourage everybody else to do the same. Just keep informed and be sensible regarding online activities.