Category: Web/Tech

No, not another post on the return puzzle (and follow-up here) but a note to indicate that I will be on vacation so expect light blogging from me. The ever-productive Tyler will continue to stream great content to the world.

The Scandinavian countries all have wireless directory assistance, but the U.S. does not, largely because of privacy concerns and fear of telemarketers. Here is a summary of recent debates.

This week’s Fortune magazine (June 28, p.47) writes:

…directory assistance could be much more than just a repository for phone numbers. She argues that the phone companies, with some new software and employee training, could begin offering new services, such as a system that allows an operator to forward, for a fee, a text message to the unlisted customer you’re trying to reach. And why stop at wireless numbers? Directory assistance could list e-mail addresses, work numbers, website addresses — or any other info-nugget a customer might desire.

What I want: Large numbers of well-educated Indians, standing by a phone in Bangalore, who can use Google for me and answer my queries when I am on the road. Some of these Indians would be conversant with macroeconomic time series data, others would be experts in the use of MapQuest.com.

G-Squatting.

Data storage is becoming cheaper at rapid rates. This is one reason why I don’t ever expect a totally converged information superhighway, supplying our television, computer, music listening, etc., all in one service. Why obsess over your piping when you can have milk delivered cheaply at your doorstep? Netflix and Google’s Gmail, rather than Verizon, may represent our cultural future. Data storage and delivery also tend to be less regulated than centralized piping, plus they limit natural monopoly problems. Under this alternative model, I might receive “cultural disks” in the mail, every month or week, and decide what on those disks I am willing to pay for. Yes there will be hackers but we will be rich, the discs will be cheap and convenient, and they will offer ancillary services of organization and presentation. I can hardly wait, except now I remember I don’t even have time for the current menu of cultural offerings.

Addendum: One reader sent me this data set on the falling price storage on hard drives.

Are you tired of hearing from deposed, desperate Nigerians seeking a bank account in which to deposit their funds? Some people are striking back:

…an ad hoc militia of self-styled counterscammers on several continents is taking the fight directly to the thieves. Aiming to outwit the swindlers, they invent elaborate and often outrageous identities (Venus de Milo, Lord Vader) under which they engage the con men, trying to humiliate them and, more important, waste the grifters’ time and resources.

The possibilities are endless:

…a fraud baiter posing as one Pierpont Emanuel Weaver, a wealthy businessman, appeared to persuade a con man in Ghana in 2002 to send almost $100 worth of gold to Indiana – for “testing purposes as my chemist requires” – after being asked to put up $1.8 million for a share in a gold fortune. In other cases, swindlers are tricked into posing for pictures holding self-mocking signs, pictures then posted online. Or they are led to travel hundreds of miles to pick up a payment, only to come up empty-handed.

A 47-year-old manufacturing executive in Lincoln, Neb., said he had been engaged in such pranks for almost three years. “I’ve had many, many good laughs at their expense, and have spent nothing but time,” he said. “They have spent countless hours creating fake documents, obtaining photos of themselves holding funny signs, running to the Western Union miles away from where they live to obtain money which I never actually sent, and printing out counterfeit checks to send me.” As for his motivation, he said, “Hopefully, along the way, I’ve diverted enough of their time and resources to keep them from successfully scamming at least one hapless (albeit, most likely, greedy) victim.”

Here is the full story (NYTimes). Here is a website detailing Internet scams, and how they have been stopped. Here is one con man-vigilante exchange, which becomes increasingly humorous. By the end you will see why the scammer is labeled the “world’s rudest investment advisor.”

One question I have: Far be it for me to challenge the voluntary and welfare-enhancing provision of a public good. Nonetheless I cannot help but ask what are the motives of these vigilantes? Is this their idea of fun? Would they be equally keen to aid the vaccination of African children? Part of me is happy that both sides are kept busy with these shenanigans.

I kid you not, this lightbulb freshens the air. The outside of the bulb is coated with titanium dioxide which is activated by fluorescent light producing oxidizers that break down odors. Buy from Amazon here. Thanks to Kevin Kelly’s Cool Tools for the link.

Hardly, read the latest information. For the most part people have simply switched from Kazaa, the main involved service for the lawsuits.

Tyler is off to Paris once again to argue with the French. Knowing Tyler, however, he will continue to blog at only slightly reduced frequency! We are pleased that the great Fabio Rojas, sociologist at the University of Indiana in Bloomington, is back again as our guest.

You may have noticed we have a blog ad – support our advertisers and you support MR! And don’t forget that if you reach Amazon by clicking on the Amazon link at the bottom of the right sidebar or any book link then any purchases you make will also help to cover our costs. Thanks!

Does anyone know of blogging software that allows blog posts and blog comments to be rated with the comments rising to the top the higher they are rated? I am thinking of something much like Amazon’s book pages where readers can rate both the books and the comments. The software would have to be flexible. Alternatively, can anyone out there write or modify existing software to perform these sorts of tasks? Email me with leads. Thanks!

Have you heard the latest?:

DidTheyReadIt.com, which will launch Monday, allows anyone to secretly track e-mails they send. You’ll see whether someone opens your e-mail, how long the recipient keeps it open – even where geographically the recipient is reading it.

And that’s for only $50 a year, check it out.

How are the pundits responding?

The reaction could be harsh. “It will freak people out,” says Internet expert Esther Dyson.

“It violates our electronic space in a way that’s as uncomfortable as someone violating our physical space,” says Mitchell Kertzman, a partner at technology investment firm Hummer Winblad.

But I am not very upset. So much of privacy has to do with expectations. No one expects that their behavior in a shopping mall is private, so no one complains when it is not. Have you ever noticed that Europeans, who are so worried about privacy rights, also are such big fans of the public downtown shopping experience? But just imagine the privacy critique:

“You walk around, the whole world can watch you. They see what you look like, which stores you frequent, what credit cards you use, and what you buy. And if you wear light-colored pants, some people can even see your underwear line.”

For better or worse, we need to get over this idea of the Internet as a private or confidential sphere. Gmail, of which I am a big fan, is just the beginning. In the longer run (it’s already on the way) I expect competing communications spheres. An easy-to-use sphere, which is essentially open and fair game, and a private sphere, which is slightly harder to use and less universal but fully confidential. I’ll predict that most people prefer the open sphere, but of course time will tell. Not everyone will get what they want, but hey, Taco Bell won’t sell me a Chillito anymore either.

Addendum: Here is a related anti-privacy idea: “A pair of sunglasses that can detect when someone is making eye contact with the wearer has been developed by Canadian researchers. Besides being useful in singles bars, its inventors say the system could play a key role in video blogging, a hi-tech form of diary keeping.” So if you don’t want to be detected, don’t look.

Also, check out this post on “Brad and Dad.”

Microsoft put a bounty on the head of the author of Sasser Internet worm and tips led to his arrest on Friday. With $250,000 at stake, virus writers need to understand that their chances of getting away with it are now slim. The long arm of the bounty hunter will find you.

Google will be offering its Gmail service for free, but right now supply is limited. Not surprisingly, a market in the accounts has arisen, check out this ebay listing. I have heard that some accounts have gone for as much as $150.

If any of you know of good estimates of the consumer surplus from Google (and related search engines) more generally, please let me know. Here are some interesting magnitudes, comparing Google’s possible market value to various countries.

Thanks to Nicholas Kreisle for the pointer.

Addendum: Here is some speculation on where Google is heading in the longer run.

Ever try Internet dating? How do you know that picture is for real? Is her age shaded downwards? Or what if the guy is still married?

Here is one option:

Zeri now sifts through this city’s bustling singles scene with a local off-line dating service called CheckMates, which screens its members – some 90% of whom are refugees from the online world – using everything from Google searches to driver’s license verifications.

“My clients care about physical and financial safety, but more simply, they worry about people’s ability to misrepresent themselves online,” says CheckMates founder Carole Shattil, who for $1,500 and up will personally scour the city’s singles scene in search of a potential match.

“I meet every one of my clients,” who number around 1,100, she says. “Online services can’t do that.”

Or perhaps the photo poster can offer outside certification:

Hoping to ensure the quality angle are upstart businesses such as LookBetterOnline.com, an 8-month-old Los Angeles company that links daters with local professional photographers.

The resulting head shots, which cost $129 and aim to walk the tightrope between oddball self-portrait and soft-focus silliness, can be posted on any online dating site and are accompanied by a logo that notes the month and year the photo was shot. Gold certification (an additional $20) adds age, height and weight while platinum status ($50) includes a criminal record, marital status and bankruptcy filing review.

Of course some daters may prefer a criminal record in their significant other. And I enjoyed that last bit about the bankruptcy review. For another $100, perhaps they will report how many “naked puts” you have written.

How about this service?

Of growing concern are “organized efforts to bilk American men,” often in the form of foreign women who ask for plane fare to the USA and then vanish.

“We’re trying to clean up this industry,” says Herb Vest, founder of Dallas-based TrueBeginnings, a 6-month-old site that boasts a partnership with a criminal-record database firm called Rapsheets.com, which stockpiles 150 million records compiled from more than 110 state and county agencies.

“I don’t want to introduce someone to a felon,” Vest says.

Here is the full story. And yes, sometimes I title these posts “Markets in Everything.”