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There are not many people who can seriously put into question the projected dominance of  Google search technology in the future evolution of the Internet.  Through his brilliantly engineered software architecture and conceptual maps of its' potential applications, supergenius Tim Berners-Lee, the acknowledged inventor of the World Wide Web, has for years been carrying his message of a "semantic web" that will make the current incarnation of the web seem like your Dad's Rolodex by comparison. 

In Berners-Lee vision, the next generation of web technology will be semantic, i.e. all data will be interconnected and capable of communicating with other "information"  through a common language so speak.  The following article discusses the development of the semantic web alongside the related, but not parallel development of Google’s search, mapping, and tracking applications.  Berners-Lee is not anti-Google, but he is passionately against the centralization of web data and any form of proprietary control over Internet content. 

I also encourage you to check out this very insightful video presentation in which Berners-Lee takes you on a virtual tour of the Web from its’ beginnings into tomorrow.  This is fascinating stuff.   Please share your thoughts with the Ashworth Blog community after brainstorming on your own.   
 

Ryan Rode
Interactive Services Manager
Ashworth University    

                 Thanks to Dana Lee for permission to use this Photo.

Have you seen the recent commercials from Verizon Wireless touting their wireless service, contrasting their service with the seemingly restrictive confinement of WIFI.   This is part of a battle for wireless dominance.  WIFI is the current wireless standard leader.  If you have a laptop, chances are you have some sort of WIFI router device in your home to provide WIFI access for it and other devices in your house such as the newest IPOD release.  You have probably utilized the WIFI offerings of a local coffee shop or hotel (I couldn’t imagine staying in a hotel today that didn’t offer WIFI or at least Ethernet network access).  If you download a free program called NetStumbler and install it on a computer that has a wireless card, you can discover wireless access points wherever you are.  The program makes a sound every time a new WIFI point is discovered.   Driving around with your laptop running NetStumbler can make your computer sound like a video game as it will sound off repeatedly like a machine gun as it find the plethora of WIFE points in the area. 

The problem with WIFI is that it is spotty and not predictable.  WIFI has a limited range and many WIFI hotspots are now guarded with security such as WPA, disallowing public access.  This has created a demand for a more streamlined wireless standard that offers blanket coverage. 

One option is the cell phone companies such as Verizon.  These services can offer as much as much as 3.5 Gig of network throughput, putting WIFI to shame.  WIMAX is another option in which metropolitan areas can offer blanket coverage throughout the area with speeds up to 4 Gig.  Both of these offerings work on some sort of subscription plan which can cost as much as $60 a month.  Unlike WIFI, each and every device must have a separate subscription, making these alternatives very expensive.  Over a dozen metropolitan WIMAX projects have been dismantled over the past year due to higher than predicted costs and a shortage of willing subscribers.  WIFI has also fired back with the new 802.11n WIFI standard this year which offers greater throughput and coverage than its WIFI predecessors.  The battle has just begun for wireless dominance…

Brad Rudisail
Computer Network Technician-Network Security Instructor
Ashworth University

               Thanks to Nick Cueva for permission to use this Photo. 

There isn’t a profitable business segment today that isn’t competitive and that even includes the SPAMMING industry.  Two of the biggest Spamming organizations, Nugache and Storm are currently going at each other head to head to dominate the SPAM/malware market.  Yes, there is a market for SPAM and malware.  Surprised?  These organizations are not owned and operated by legitimate business people.  No in is yet sure who is behind Storm but many IT security experts feel that Nugache is linked to the Russian Mob, aka the Russian Business Network. 

Both of these organizations distribute SPAM through Zombie networks and both have been involved in highly criminal activities.  Zombie networks are composed of PC’s across the globe, which have been compromised by some type of Trojan Horse which allows the Zombie controllers to then use them to send SPAM, conduct phishing attacks or other types of illegal activities.   Each of these organizations control hundreds of thousands of computers.  Take Storm for example.  Some IT security experts have estimated that the Storm Zombie network, called the Storm Botnet, runs anywhere from one to fifty million computer systems.   Even the most conservative estimates place the size somewhere around 150,000 to one million.  The Storm Botnet in 2007 accounted for 8% of all malware on Microsoft Windows computers. 

This year, Storm has an extremely viable competitor, Nugache.  Although its zombie technology is not as sophisticated as Storm’s (for instance, Storm is somehow able to send SPAM in the native language of the receiver while Nugache cannot) Nugache has a big thing going for it right now, price.  In an attempt to unseat Storm from its botnet dominance, Nugache has initiated a price war.  Nugache will send one million emails for only $100.  For $800 you can send 10 million emails. 

It is because of the ridiculously meager amount of money that is required to SPAM a million people that SPAMMING is very profitable, even if the response rate to SPAM is only .01%.   It is the sophistication of these controllable zombie networks that worry IT security professionals.  Many fear that the current war for control of the malware market is only the beginning of this illegal destructive industry.

Brad Rudisail
Computer Network Technician-Network Security Instructor
Ashworth University

                  Thanks to conskeptical for permission to use this Photo. 

Have you ever wanted to revisit a link that was fifty or more characters long and was impossible to remember?  Have you tried to tell someone about a site with an extensively elongated URL?  A great example is the link for a specific link on YouTube. 

If you access such a site from the same computer all the time you can simply save that site as a favorite in your browser.  But what if you want to access the site from any computer you want?  Here is a great website to help you do just that,  

http://www.tinyurl.com  

For instance, let’s take a link to a book on Amazon about Windows 2008: 

http://www.amazon.com/Windows-Server-Administrators-Pocket-Consultant/dp/0735624372/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1209996637&sr=8-3 

This is a nasty link that only someone with a photographic memory could possibly remember.  Simply go to tinyurl.com and paste in the link.  Then assign it an easy to remember name such as 

win2008book_i_want 

And save it.  You would then access the link by simply typing 

http://www.tinyurl.com/win2008book_i_want 

You have to type in unique names that no one else has used before because each link has to be unique.  Most easy links such as www.tinyurl.com/Brad are already used. Of course, like most technological tools, this site poses a security risk to organizations as well as a great benefit.  People who use computers at organizations that utilize web filtering, such as schools and businesses, can create personal custom links for websites that are filtered by the organization, allowing them full access to these sites.  For this reason, Tiny Url is sometimes blocked by organizations to prevent this.  I recommend that you try it out for yourself…

Brad Rudisail
Computer Network Technician-Network Security Instructor
Ashworth University

 
                              Image courtesy of 80stees.

In a surprise announcement, Microsoft vowed to increase the openness of its key products!

Yes this is still February, April 1st is several weeks away yet!

So what did Microsoft say in this release? Well,

Specifically, Microsoft is implementing four new interoperability principles and corresponding actions across its high-volume business products: (1) ensuring open connections; (2) promoting data portability; (3) enhancing support for industry standards; and (4) fostering more open engagement with customers and the industry, including open source communities

Several times in the last few years I have advocated for Microsoft to Open Source Windows and Internet Explorer and while this announcement doesn’t go that far, it does seem to be a step in the right direction.

According to Microsoft’s CEO-in-waiting and current Chief Software Architect, Ray Ozzie

“Customers need all their vendors, including and especially Microsoft, to deliver software and services that are flexible enough such that any developer can use their open interfaces and data to effectively integrate applications or to compose entirely new solutions,” said Ozzie. “By increasing the openness of our products, we will provide developers additional opportunity to innovate and deliver value for customers.”

The Microsoft products this refers to are Windows Vista (including the .NET Framework), Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008, Office 2007, Exchange Server 2007, and Office SharePoint Server 2007, and future versions of all these products. (more…)

 
             Thanks to Andreas Pizsa for permission to use this Photo.

Last year, Microsoft released their most recent version of their popular Exchange email server called appropriately, Exchange 2007.  The new upgrade has a number of valuable new tools and methodologies.   The two most important facets of this new version is the integration of Unified Messaging and Malware Defense.  Unified messaging refers to the aspect of conglomerating various messaging types - email, voicemail and faxes into one unified form.  This has been available for several years through other vendors such as Cisco.  Exchange 2007 will convert voice mails to email and send faxes directly to designated email boxes.  It will also have the ability to integrate another new Microsoft product, Forefront Security to combat malware infections in email communications.

With the plethora of new features inherit in Exchange 2007, most organizations will want to upgrade their old Exchange servers to the latest version.  However, there is hidden cost in deploying Exchange 2007.  The new version only works on 64-bit architecture (most servers today are 32 bit, the same as your PC).  This means that for most customers, the necessary hardware will also have to be purchased as well which adds thousands of dollars to the price. (more…)

I have been very quiet on this blog for the last few weeks - apologies for that but I can’t promise on the pace returning to the two or three posts a day I was averaging at times last year. Why?

I have been spending a lot of time on the micro-blogging site, Twitter. Twitter is a site where you have a maximum of 140 characters per post but instead of a traditional blog site, these posts are typically conversational. Because of the immediacy of writing 140 characters, reading and responding to ‘Tweets’ is relatively trivial and so conversations are born.

Marshall Kirkpatrick wrote a great article last year explaining how Twitter is now paying his rent. And because of the still early nature of the application, it is possible to very quickly build up a powerful network of highly influential users who are only too happy to converse with you. I have met several people recently who, up until now I only knew through Twitter. Another way I use Twitter is I often pose questions to Twitter and get great replies back from highly qualified people in minutes.

Twitter has an open API so it is possible to use third party applications to post to and read from Twitter.

(more…)

 
           Thanks to Monica Semergiu  for permission to use this Photo.

After my previous post, Doug Johnson asked me to explain the economic model of a DRM-free world. This has been done by others on numerous occasions, so what follows should only be thought of as a summary.

Today, the demand that someone (not necessarily the artist) be compensated for the creative act is driving the demand for digital rights management. Because it is today so easy to make copies of content, the idea is that any access to content must be compensated. Otherwise, we are told, the creator (or, more accurately, the rights holder) will not be rewarded.

But we have had free content since time immemorial. Not always in the form of television, obviously, but from the days the first stories were told around the campfire and the days the first paintings were drawn on the walls of caves, listeners and viewers could access that content for free.

It is important to recognize this. It is important to see that free access to content has, though history, been the rule, not the exception. That the commodification of content, that the charging of access fees, subscriptions, or some other form of tariff, is a recent invention for almost all forms of content.

Yet, somehow, through history, artists and authors and musicians managed to ply their trade. How was this possible? It was rarely through sale of recordings or reproductions. Here are some ways authors, artists and musicians can support themselves in a post-DRM world. (more…)

               Thanks to district47 for permission to use this Photo.

LinkedIn, the business social networking service, has decided to join Facebook in letting developers build applications for its site. The goal is to make the site more interactive and drive increased traffic - especially returning traffic. Opening up for developers is the biggest move LinkedIn is making, but not the only one. LinkedIn is in the process of launching a beta version of a new home page, which includes expanded news and information relevant to the user. “When we look forward to 2008, we see people and professionals more and more going beyond the connections and actually using LinkedIn to make themselves more productive on a daily basis.” Adam Nash, senior product director, said earlier.

I say great to this - in theory.

LinkedIn is a tremendous business resource and one that I use quite often, but not for features or content. I use LinkedIn for what it is meant for, networking with former and current business associates. (more…)

 
              Thanks to Manny Diller for permission to use this Photo.

Google’s chief evangelist, Vint Cerf, recently wrote a fascinating article for The Guardian in which he discusses the future of the Internet, technology, innovation, new trends, etc. with some of the world’s brightest tech minds.  If you’re interested in hearing what people like the myspace and YouTube creators see ahead, and you should be, check out this article and let me know what you think.  Click on the image above to read article.

Ryan Rode
Interactive Services Manager
Ashworth University