Daily Internet Digest

Thanks to gamers from all over and l33t-speak (that�s hacker language for the laymen out there) shout — “w00t!” — has just been named as the “Word of the Year” by the Merriam-Webster Online Web Site. According to the Merriam-Webster Web site, the word �w00t!� (spelled with two zero�s instead of two letter O�s) is an acronym for �We owned the other team,� but is mainly used as an interjection to express joy, most especially in the case of triumph.

Such as other coded languages, l33t-speak was developed for exclusivity so as to make it harder to detect hackers� online conversations. And as the nature of speakers of coded languages, despite the popularity of “w00t!,� I�m sure that these guys have moved on and have coined another term to substitute for it. But I�m sure that whatever that new term is, it would eventually get out of its exclusivity and may even be the next catch phrase of 2008.

Source: Yahoo! News

Yep, those bloody pirates have struck again! But the British police were right to save the day as they conducted a dawn raid in Cardiff, Welsh and arrested three people suspected of involvement in Internet-based music and film piracy rings. Two men (one of which is the ring leader) and a woman were said to be part of the biggest suppliers of pirated music and films in Britain, earning about 3,000 pounds (6,173 $) a month. Now I understand how these cyber thieves find the piracy business a lucrative one. Too bad it�s considered illegal and unethical. But piracy is not going to end unless people stop buying from them. Just some food for thought, folks.

Source: Reuters

Oracle recently released its latest version of its software, Identity Manager. For those who are new to this, it’s a user provisioning and administration software application that enables companies to update, upgrade, and add or remove user accounts from other applications and directories. Oracle states that the latest version of Identity Manager improves compliance since it provides “granular” reports which identified which users has access to specific data and other pertinent and sensitive information – which has always been a challenge for companies who wish to meet “regulatory mandates such as Sarbanes-Oxley, FFIEC and PCI.”

SOURCE: Internetnews

Is this even possible? According to The Business Roundtable which is an association of CEO�s of established US companies, the threat is �urgent and real.� The breakdown of such critical information infrastructure has a 10 to 20% chance of happening in the next ten years. This can be a result of many incidences. It can be natural such as calamities or even man-made disasters such as malicious codes, code errors, or terrorist attacks.

The group also stated that an Internet meltdown, if it would ever happen, will result in reduced productivity. Profits will fall as well as stock prices. Consumer spending will erode and a liquidity crisis has a big possibility of happening. This was also discussed in �Growing Business Dependence on the Internet � New Risks Require CEO Action� � a Business Roundtable report based on earlier risk analyses done by the World Economic Forum in Geneva.

Source: ComputerWorld

Green Bay and Milwaukee Wisconsin are pretty lucky as people there will now be able to avail of HBO on Broadband. HBO subscribers and Time Warner high-speed Internet and roadrunner.com Internet service users will be able to avail of this particular service. About 600 titles and 400 hours of content such as documentaries, movies, and special HBO original series can now be downloaded. There will also be entire sets of HBO series available every month, not to mention trailers upcoming shows.

Hopefully this service courtesy will soon be brought out to other markets and talks with other local cable operators for some expansion.

Source: Market Watch

Aside from Internet Explorer, Safari, Opera, Netscape Navigator and other World Wide Web browsers, Mozilla Firefox ranks second as the web browser with most market shares (next to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer).

Compared to Internet Explorer, some people prefer Mozilla Firefox since it has a better capability to block pop-up windows and the user has the freedom to install a wide variety of plug-ins and skins to customize the “feel” of their browsers.

The down-side of this is that the version 2 (and its series) of Firefox uses a lot of memory (100,000k for 5 tabs opened). Now Firefox has a solution to this problem: the all new Mozilla Firefox 3. The creator of the said browser claims that it uses lesser memory, provides more security and is more stable than the rest of the browsers available online.

Photo taken from http://www.friednerds.com

No email or PM yet from your family member or business partner in India or the Middle East? Don’t worry, they’re not evading you or anything like that. They’re having a small problem: they have been disconnected from the World Wide Web; and it’s not because of some strict government crackdown or terrorist activity, but rather because of two damaged undersea cables in the Mediterranean.

There was disruption to 70% of the nationwide network in Egypt, and India suffered up to 60% disruption.
UK firms such as British Airways have told the BBC that call centres have been affected by the outage.
Industry experts said it could take up to one week to repair the damaged cables and resume full service.
International telephone calls, which have also been affected, are being rerouted to work around the problem.

Reports are saying that the internet connection will be up within a week or so.

Source

Have you ever gone through the difficult, not to mention sluggish, process of suing somebody whether it may be about divorce or medical malpractice?

A newly established Californian website called SueEasy promises “instant” justice to your legal qualms. The website is said to be paired with lawyers and litigants thus, alarming some of the seasoned lawyers present in the country. Most of them question the quality of lawyers working for the website.

Some also are concerned about the people’s responsibility when it comes to suing someone. They said that since suing is now more “accessible” to just about everyone, then most likely, there are some who might abuse the system.

Photo taken from http://www.sueeasy.com/

Poor old television has just lost to the Internet according to a survey released by the European Interactive Advertising Association (EIAA). Apparently, a majority of the 7,000 survey participants in 10 European go online between five and seven days a week. Only 77 percent watch television just as often with 48 percent saying that their TV consumption has been reduced because of the Internet. A European teen spends an average of 11.9 hours of Internet time every week. 32 percent of the respondents cite the e-mail as particularly indispensable. Participating countries were Belgium, Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Sweden.

I wonder what the results will be like in the rest of the world. I guess it must be the same. I myself don�t even watch TV anymore. And if I do access my TV, it�s to watch DVD�s. Ask me about the recent TV commercials and I won�t be able to answer you. I even get my news over the Internet.

Source: Yahoo! News

From online mapping technology to the latest venture of Google to help homeowners monitor the amount of electricity they use with PowerMeter, the company has been on the forefront of internet technology for a long long time. The much anticipated and now praised Google maps has become a very useful tool for most people who want to see the world as it is and for what it is. Available to the public, it allows people to learn more about the world through maps loaded with all the information they need. They added the ability to see paces of interest with street-view that is possible with extensive mapping and scanning technology that lets you stand in front of the place you were interested in. Continue Reading »