Winnipeg Free Press - May 20th
Your Open Book
STILL haven’t taken the time to figure out Facebook’s confusing privacy controls (50 settings with more than 170 options)? Don’t really care about the recent changes the company has made in how they handle and display your personal data? While the socially driven advantages of the changes to world’s largest social-networking website aren’t immediate clear, there are a number of problems that can emerge if you don’t take control of your account and personal data.
“Some aspects of the idea sound good in theory, because they will make the web more personal,” writes Andy Goldberg for Monstersandcritics.com. “But it also means that you could unwittingly expose your web activities to your wife, employer or anyone of the hundreds of people who might be ‘friends’ onFacebookbut who in reality are just as likely to be mere acquaintances, work colleagues or rivals.”
The Book’s recent changes scare most privacy advocates; they can open up your profile in ways you never imagined when you signed up to upload some pictures, reconnect with some high school friends and keep informed of events in your area.
If you are still aren’t convinced you need to take a look at your privacy settings or think that committing social-networking suicide is taking things to the extreme, take a look at Youropenbook.org, which exposes how public information onFacebookhas become. Using search terms like “cheating on tests,” “don’t tell anyone,” “playing hooky,” “I hate my job” and anything else you can think of, Your Open Book shows how millions of profiles are now extremely public — even if the owners don’t know it.
Audiggle
IF you hang around with someone who has an iPhone, chances are you have seen him whip out his device and use the Shazam app to figure out what song is playing on the radio, being featured in a TV show or blasting at the nightclub.
Similar toShazamon the iPhone,Audiggleis a PC-based software that allows users to identify music they come across on the web. Whether it comes from a YouTube clip, a TV show online, Internet radio, a DVD or any other audio source you may stumble upon, Audiggle should be able to recognize it.
Along with identifying the artist and title, this rich webmashup will generate links to lyrics, videos, concert dates and a bunch of other relevant band info. WhileShazam’s strength is that it is mobile and is always in your pocket, Audiggle could be useful in some situations when you are surfing the web.
WHILE nearly every cellphone now has a digital camera, chances are unless you have hands as steady as a surgeon’s, your I-can’t-believe-I’m-taking-this-photo of MillaJovovich jogging down Broadway is probably going to come out blurry. Before you delete those low-light, blurred snaps you took last night, give Unshake a try. While it won’t make your unfocused picture perfect, it may clean it up enough to show around to your friends — and then try to sell to TMZ or Perez Hilton.
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 20, 2010 E3
