Karm City

May 15

“ Losing a few people won’t hurt Facebook, which has more than 400 million registered members, most of them oblivious to the debate over privacy. In fact, I suspect Facebook will end up being to this decade what Microsoft was to the 1990s—an ever-more-powerful company with tentacles that reach into everything. I also suspect that whatever Facebook has done so far to invade our privacy, it’s only the beginning. Which is why I’m considering deactivating my account. Facebook is a handy site, but I’m freaked by the idea that my information is in the hands of people I don’t trust. That is too high a price to pay.

Lyons, on Facebook (via newsweek)

I don’t quite understand the logic behind deactivating one’s Facebook account to be “safe” from privacy invasion.

First, it’s impossible to delete a Facebook account, so whatever information is already on Facebook’s servers will remain there.

Second, as a Facebook user, you decide what information you’d like to share, regardless of privacy options, period. If you don’t want Facebook to learn about you, don’t actively contribute content. Facebook’s not forcing you to update your wall every hour.

Ultimately, Facebook is still a great tool for keeping in touch and it often fills the same role LinkedIn does for network building. Like any service on the Internet, you should only publish content you feel comfortable sharing with anyone; any service, regardless of privacy policies, can be compromised.

May 14

Health Futures Blog: Millennial Massacre!

“Well, duh! It’s time somebody noticed! ” is probably what a lot of young people said when National Journal, a cousin of the Atlantic, revealed its recent polling data and analysis of the impact of the recession on the Millennial Generation. But the numbers are still stunning. Millennials, born between 1981 and 2002 (what happened in 2002?), outnumber the reviled Baby Boom generation by at least 16 million. According to National Journal, one third of them are now living with parents or relatives (a European level 39% of those 18-24). 28% of those aged 20-24 with less than a high school degree are unemployed, as are 20% who are only high school grads. Only 16% of the generation say they are making enough to live comfortably and save an adequate amount.

A major theme of the polling: this generation has a broad and deep commitment to public service. Perhaps not surprisingly given the grim labor market, Millennials have swamped federal public service programs. Teach for America, which recruits college grads to teach for two years in poverty areas, has seen its applications double, to 46,000 since 2008, and Peace Corps applications have reached the highest level since the program was created in the Kennedy Administration.

The brutal recession has also not extinguished Millennial optimism: twice as many Millennials believe that their own efforts, rather than outside events, will determine their economic future. One fifth say that starting their own businesses holds the greatest potential for career success. Many have responded to unemployment by creating micro-businesses, what some have called “necessity entrepreneurship”. I’ll bet more than a few of these businesses end up taking off in the recovery and become permanent additions to the economy.

May 3

“ All vans or SUVs headed into Midtown Manhattan would have to stop and have their contents inspected. If any vehicle seemed for any reason to have escaped inspection, Midtown in its entirety would be evacuated.

James Fallows

I get what he’s trying to say, but come on. TSA’s procedures are a plausible way to protect a 1,000 sq. ft flying tube. Comparing an airplane to Midtown Manhattan makes no sense.

April 29

“ Realize that a startup puts you on an emotional rollercoaster unlike anything you have ever experienced. You will flip rapidly from a day in which you are euphorically convinced you are going to own the world, to a day in which doom seems only weeks away and you feel completely ruined, and back again. Over and over and over.

Marc Andreessen

Yep.

April 28

How not to support your software

I wanted to perform an experiment to consider how much the Internet influences my daily productivity. I’m not the kind of person who surfs Facebook and Twitter all day long, but I’ve occasionally found myself in Google Reader trying to whittle down the ‘unread’ count.

I found an app called SelfControl that effectively blocks all Internet traffic for a set duration. I changed the setting to “whitelist,” which blocks everything except the sites I specify. I added all the URLs I thought I would need to access, set the clock for 5 hours and pressed start.

Immediately, my IM client disconnected. Whoops! I didn’t realize SelfControl blocked everything, including non-browser traffic! I clicked everywhere I could in the app looking for a ‘disable’ button, thinking it’d be silly to force users to wait for the clock to run out before they can access their computer again.

I guess I underestimated the smugness of one SelfControl architect, Steve Lambert.

From my iPhone, I e-mailed him stating my predicament:
Mykel: Set the timer for 5 hours. Didn't realize it doesn't just block websites but EVERYTHING. Needed to add more to the whitelist, but now I have to wait 5 hours apparently. Help! Steve: That's how the whitelist feature works. That's why the icon is a skull and cross bones. And that's why it asks for your password. Because it works... Wish I could do more!

Seriously? I’m supposed to assume it irreversibly blocks all Internet traffic by the skull and crossbones? He must be joking.

Mykel: Pretend for one second that I'm a layman and didn't think it would block ALL Internet traffic, because the skull and crossbones didn't tell me. What can I do to not be locked out? Steve: There's really nothing you can do, and there's nothing I can do. That's why people like this application. It's doing what it's supposed to do and it does it well. That's why the timer doesn't allow you to go more that 12 hours. Really what would be the point if you could get out of it? I understand you're frustrated. But the instructions are on my site. And you chose to run it for 5 hours without understanding what it does. You can spend 5 hours that way

5 minutes later, I discovered setting the system clock forward 5 hours immediately disabled it.

Mykel: Oh. You can just adjust the clock. Thanks again for your help. Good thing this happened while I was eating lunch. Now I can be productive again. Not everyone thinks like you, buddy. If the question "How can I disable this?" is in your FAQ, it means you're not doing a good enough job communicating how "permanent" the functionality is. You also need to consider that lots of people will download your app without visiting your site at all. I don't think I deserved the attitude in your responses and I'm lucky I discovered an easy way to disable it, otherwise I'd be even angrier. I learned a lesson: don't assume programmers have thought about how people use apps. Steve: Congratulations.

~~Exchanges like this are why people think app developers are elitist assholes.~~ It’s my fault I didn’t download the app from the proper site. It’s my fault I didn’t spend an hour reading Steve’s personal blog to learn how dangerous the app was.

I’m not angry that SelfControl’s usability sucks. I know lots of developers who are really cool and develop with usability in mind. I’d even say 99% of OS X developers operate with UX as the focus. Steve is in the 1% bracket. That’s okay.

What I am angry about is Steve’s wanton disregard for my needs as a user of his product. Instead of saying “you really should read the docs more. Anyway, now that you’re stuck, here’s how you can get out,” he seemed insistent on teaching me a “lesson” by intentionally not helping. Awful.

UPDATE: Apparently Steve didn’t actually build the app, he just sketched it out and paid a developer $125 to build it. Nevertheless, he’s attached his name to it, so he’s responsible for SelfControl’s users.

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I love this photo.

It illustrates the flaw in the mainstream “you’re fine just the way you are” message. For one, the ideal paints an inaccurate picture of those who are stereotypically beautiful. More importantly, it’s a contributing factor to a generation of poor health and plastic surgery.

I read the message as, “you’re never going to look this good, so stop trying and be happy with where you’ve ended up.”

Really? That’s it? In every other aspect of life, one is expected to incessantly strive for more, stopping at nothing until supreme greatness is achieved. Why does physical appearance shirk this rule? The logic of the message makes no sense, so the message needs to change.

Instead of attempting to boost the self esteem of those who aren’t stereotypically beautiful, we should be communicating that the models featured in magazines and on TV are only “beautiful” after tons of makeup and post-processing have been applied. In reality, they look very interesting, but certainly not “beautiful.”

Instead, the real definition of beauty is actually the androgynous, anamorphic faces you see in the photo. Things like plastic surgery and makeup just turn all the complex and interesting aspects of them into dull, lifeless shapes.

Many of the models in this photo arrestingly beautiful. If I stumbled across any of these in a magazine, I would certainly stop flipping the page. That’s the point, right?

April 27

The best of both worlds

April 22

Hmmm… either that left display is really tiny, or…

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“

The first sign was about midway through the argument, when Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. – who is known to write out his opinions in long hand with pen and paper instead of a computer – asked what the difference was “between email and a pager?”

Other justices’ questions showed that they probably don’t spend a lot of time texting and tweeting away from their iPhones either.

At one point, Justice Anthony Kennedy asked what would happen if a text message was sent to an officer at the same time he was sending one to someone else.

“Does it say: ‘Your call is important to us, and we will get back to you?’” Kennedy asked.

Justice Antonin Scalia wrangled a bit with the idea of a service provider.

“You mean (the text) doesn’t go right to me?” he asked.

Then he asked whether they can be printed out in hard copy.

“Could Quon print these spicy little conversations and send them to his buddies?” Scalia asked.

DC Dicta via Signs that you may not want the Supreme Court judging new media issues – Chris Blattman (via llimllib)

April 19

“ So, like, what will happen, or whatever, is like, you’ll get the replacement earbuds or whatever in the mail by, like, next Tuesday or whatever… The twenty-something Apple support guy. He’s actually the “supervisor” of the (much more professional sounding) support folks in India!