Regularly, I read articles and blog posts, but I also see a good deal from people who represent my industry, namely the Computer Technical Service or MSP folks. What I’ve encountered, however, has me incredibly troubled. A number of folks online are purporting to represent us, when in fact they aren’t doing it well at all. This hit the tipping point when two of these people came together to make an insanely bad webcast, that I had to share it with you.
I don’t often blog about banking in Canada; Because, let’s face it, I don’t want to put you to sleep. But, as I was reading today’s news, I came across an interesting turnaround by one of Canada’s larger banks: TD Bank. They appear to have been on a downward spiral of greed and customer gouging (the likes of which I don’t think I’ve ever seen).
The most amazing side effect of being in the technology business is working with all sorts of technical people. Most often, they work for manufacturers or vendors; but they sometimes branch out and start their own businesses. After more than 16 years as a consultant, I’ve learned a few things and sometimes get to pass on my “straight talk” to others who do what I’ve been doing so long. I want to do more of this when I can.
This whole HTTPS and Google’s push to encrypt (or weaponize depending on your perspective) is back on people’s lips again. I’m a little late to the party of course, since I have been out of the country so many times in the last three months that blogging has been a distant thought. With all of this talk, I’m left to wonder if the uproar has any merit.
Just like medical journals, it seems like every new day brings some new report or another on the “state” of technology. Some reports are “nothing is secure, and you can never be secure”, while others take a more restrained “Apple owns everything” approach. I’m always sceptical when I hear of these things…
I’m always wary of “recent studies” (and the press surrounding them) because they really only exist to drive the public relations effort of one company by fueling the press for another. In these cases, everyone but the reader wins. When I first read of this RBC insurance study on distracted driving, I knew something wasn’t right. Then it hit me, their apparent conclusion was Canadians are basically ass*****.
Perhaps unexpectedly, new and novel legitimate services are being created that can also be used to display pirated content. The future of piracy may be a trojan horse in every legitimately used service.
Today I’ve been thinking about the constant conflict between writing blog posts and commenting on blogs (or other types of sites). When is the line crossed from a simple comment to that of a full-blown blog? When should we tell people that comment on our sites that they should take it to a blog? I’ve pondered these ideas in the past as I’ve faced Dave Winer’s particular outlook on this topic.
When I joined the writing team at MovieViral in late 2013, I had aspirations of writing about the other topic I enjoy: movies. My interest was twofold; Get some experience writing for a larger site, and eventually work toward earning money for that work. For a time, the writing was difficult to keep up with, but I persevered. Eventually, the site would sell to a new and, British, group. In return for supporting them, they would steal from me. Let me explain.