Like Chapaa

Helping you pay the bills

Archive for February, 2007

The Secret to Internet Chatting

February 28th, 2007

The following takes place between 5am and 6 am.

At exactly 5am I walk into the room. It isn’t very crowded but, as usual, there is already a heated debate amongst some of the regulars. I suppose a heated debate could also arise from my use of the word ‘walk’ at the beginning of this paragraph. It is complicated: some would say I teleported into the room; others would argue that it is not a room at all.

But let’s not get into that.

My guest ‘walks’ in. Just in time. I immediately launch a private conversation with her. Folks meet Smelly cat

Hey. How are you doing?
Hello. I’m fine and I hope you are too. Sorry, I’m a bit late.
Smelly Cat: That is interesting name. How did you get it?
Yeah its good, isn’t it? It’s actually my childhood nickname. I don’t really want to get into how I got it. Anyhoo, it serves its purpose quite well. When you are in a room such as this one, it helps if you have a good unique nick name – otherwise known as a handle.
Tell us about yourself
Well, I’m young and I love life. You really have to be more specific if you want more out of me.
What do you do for a living?
I’m a chat room regulator
A what?
LOL. Right, I……get paid to spend all the day in the chat rooms, like this one, and ensure that the public discussions don’t get indecent, abusive or otherwise inappropriate.
Cool
Yeah. It gets me by. The really cool thing is that I can work from home, or anywhere else.
So what is internet chat?
Internet chat is a way of communicating instantly over the internet. I like to call it TOIP.
Text over internet protocol? That doesn’t exist, does it?
No. It only exists in my mind. But you never can be too sure, what with the pace of technology nowadays. I call it TOIP because it is like an actual conversation but one in which you don’t speak but type whoever you want to say.
How does one get to experience ‘TOIP’
There are two ways of chatting on the internet:

1 You can chat via websites that have chat rooms like talkcity or mashada. Basically, you register with the website and you can then enter the chat room(s) on that site. There, you’ll find people having a public discussion that everyone ‘hear.’ You may take part in that discussion or start a private conversation with anyone.

2 You can also chat through instant messaging (IM) software (usually available for free) such as yahoo IM, MSN IM, AOL IM etc. When chatting through such software, you log in to the messenger and chat with any contacts you have.

How do get these contacts?
Contacts are actually your friends. Every messenger has an option that lets you invite contacts, so that you can chat to them whenever you’re both logged into the IM software.
What about IRC?
IRC is an open protocol for chat/instant messaging. Some people say it’s the original mode of internet chat. It works a lot like IM software. You download some software, like mIRC, and log in. It then connects you to number of IRC services or channels and you can chat. Incidentally, IRC is mostly used by adults, for their type of discussions.
Speaking of adults, are chat rooms as dangerous as depicted on CNN or Sky news?
You cannot say that chat rooms are any dangerous than walking down the street, or having a drink at the local. You just have to be careful.
Really?
The problem is that a lot of people invite problems by not practicing safe chat. You see, young people make friends really easily and they can’t help but trust (to some extent) these friends. What they don’t understand is that not everyone you chat to is honest.
How do you practice safe chat?

Never use or reveal your real name in a chat room. Use a nick name- and not one that reveals your gender or attracts bad attention e.g sexy beast.
Be careful who you trust. The person you are talking to may just as well be 20 years older than he says he is.
Think before you reveal anything personal or answer private questions .
Get away from unpleasant situations by blocking the offending user, logging out, or even re-logging in using a different name.
Meeting people (in real life) that you first me online can be dangerous. Always tell an adult about such meetings and arrange the meeting to be in a public place and go to the meeting with one or a couple of your friends.

Can parents do anything to protect their kids?

1.Adults should talk frequently to young people about their chat experience and recommend safe chat rooms to them. (An example of a regulated chat room is gridclub)

2. You may also block chatting using special software – you may also ask your ISP for help on this.
In the spirit of freedom I have to say that there are ways to get around chat-blocking, such as by using websites like meebo or e-buddy.
What does chat mean to you?
Internet chat is beautiful technology. Just take us as an example: you’re interviewing me in a chat room! That just speaks for it itself.
Any last words?
Chatting is a wonderful way to meet people and have lots of fun online – with anonymous flirting and what not! It may also pay your bills, like it does mine. For people with websites, a chat room may drive some decent traffic your way. It is also emerging as an excellent (and cheap) way of offering customer care on websites, especially for companies that provide online services.

Think about it.

Now to burst some jargon:
LOI – Laugh out loud; used to indicate laughter when chatting
MSN – Microsoft Network
AOL – America online
IRC –Internet relay chat

2 comments »

Posted in Internet Culture, Interviews

Browser Wars!! (Are You For us or Against us?)

February 26th, 2007

Hey readers! I’m curious, which browser do you use? Why?

I use flock because Flock is the web browser for you and your friends. It’s a web browser based on Firefox with integrated blogging, favorites sharing, newsreader, and access to your photo services. It’s fun and easy to use. From site: ‘Flock is an amazing new web browser that makes it easier to share media and connect to other people online. Share photos, automatically stay up-to-date with new content from your favorite sites, and search the Web with the most advanced Search Toolbar available today.’

Which browser do you use? Take the Poll:

Take the poll

Free Poll by Blog Flux

I really tried hard to convince al of you to use flock. Try and convince us to use your favorite browser by taking the poll above and leaving a comment. Thanks!!

4 comments »

Posted in Tips Hacking and Reviews

The Secret to Good old Mudslinging: How to do it Online

February 24th, 2007

It’s an election year. Imagine that you are a leading opposition politician, an aspiring presidential candidate in fact. You wake up Thursday morning to find shocking headlines in a leading daily newspaper: Criminals have broken into your website and somehow redirected it to a rival politician’s site, telling the whole world that you support your rival. Your rival is in fact the guy you’re facing off against for your party’s presidential ticket. You read on and discover that your party’s site has also been similarly attacked to redirect visitors to the incumbent government’s site which openly attacks your party. This might seem like a bad dream to you but it is, in fact, what happened in Kenya this week.

For those of you not familiar with Kenyan politics: 2007 is an election year with the main opposition party being ODM-K whose numerous frontrunners are squaring it off for the party’s presidential ticket. Kalonzo Musyoka and Raila Odinga are two of ODM-K’s leading lights. The Standard is a leading Daily in Kenya. Having introduced the cast, we’ll now go back to our story.

On Thursday, the Standard’s headline story was of how Kalonzo’s site had been attacked and made to redirect visitors to Raila’s site. In turn, ODM-K’s site was similarly redirected to the incumbent government’s site.

Oh wait, but the plot thickens! It turns out that Kalonzo’s real website was not attacked at all and neither was ODM-K’s real website. As it turns out, some criminals had set up fake websites and thus caused all this confusion and hullabaloo. This is called phishing.

Suppose you were one of these criminals. After setting up your fake Kalonzo website, all you need is for someone to come and publicize the fact that Kalonzo’s ‘website’ has been cracked so that your phishing would have its desired effects. The effect, of course, is that of creating confusion and chaos within ODM-K, among its luminaries, and the electorate. You know full well that no one will accidentally come across your fake site because the whole world already knows the url of Kalonzo’s real site – he launched it gallantly and loudly a short while ago. One thought is troubling your little criminal mind: how do you get people to notice your fake website? You have to find a sneezer!

What if you ‘passed on’ the news of Kalonzo’s site having been attacked to a leading newspaper in the hopes of them publicizing your criminal feat? After all, the perfect sneezer would be a leading newspaper. I believe that is exactly what happened. The Standard Newspaper was used.

Personally, this proves that politics is an extremely dirty game which, ideally, should not be tried at home. I do not care much for politics but I find this story intriguing and, inevitably, I have to say that the guys behind it did a real good job. Above all, this incident makes me happy. It’s sad that somebody was used and others’ feelings were hurt but having it happen online has its goodness. The more we use the internet (even for criminal purposes), the more useful it becomes. We should all learn from this sad episode.

UPDATES
As I write this, both fake websites redirect visitors to pages belonging to the Daily Nation, another major Daily in Kenya and a competitor of The Standard.

The Link to The Standard’s Headline Story:
http://www.eastandard.net/hm_news/news.php?articleid=1143965194

The Fake websites:
http://www.odm-kenya.org
http://www.kalonzofoundation.org

The Real Websites:
http://www.odmk.org/
http://www.kalonzomusyokafoundation.org/

3 comments »

Posted in Internet Culture, Tips Hacking and Reviews

Pandora Internet Radio : the Future

February 24th, 2007

Pandora Internet Radio – I have always wanted to say the future of something is here! Well, now I can. The future of radio is here. At pandora, you can create your own radio station which plays only the songs that you like. From site: Pandora™ is the doorway to this vast trove of musical information. With Pandora you can explore to your heart’s content. Just drop the name of one of your favorite songs or artists into Pandora and let the Genome Project go. It will quickly scan its entire world of analyzed music, almost a century of popular recordings – new and old, well known and completely obscure – to find songs with interesting musical similarities to your choice. Then sit back and enjoy as it creates a listening experience full of current and soon-to-be favorite songs for you.

Something happened this week that made me realize that some people still associate hacking with evil. To learn about hackers and hacking, these sites may be useful:

Just so you know, Hacking is the pursuit of happiness by seeking to understand something fully.

No comments »

Posted in Cool Sites

Who wants to win an iPod?

February 22nd, 2007

Hey readers, here’s a chance for you to win an iPod on March 2nd 2007. All you have to do is comment on a post that takes you like on this blog, that’s it.

So, here’s how it works. If one of my posts has a higher word count than any other entry in Paul Walsh’s viral game, one of my commentators ( that’s you) will be picked out of a hat.

Naturally the comments must make some sense and they must be contextual. That means that you should not just spam but when you make your comments, write on something about the post you’re commenting to. A good post to comment on could be this one. Alternatively, choose your own.

The winning name will be pick out of a hat by Paul Walsh at Segala. (link to http://segala.com/blog)

All you have to do is start commenting on this blog and make sure you comment a lot. Good luck to you!

2 comments »

Posted in Miscellaneous

To Standard Newspapers Editor

February 22nd, 2007

Dear Editor,

I refer to your headline article, ‘Nasty cyber wars as Kalonzo website is hacked‘ dated Thursday the 22nd of February 2006. In that article, you have mistakenly misused the terms ‘hacker’ and ‘hacking’. You refer to hackers as intelligent computer programmers or idle, often malicious, people with administrator privileges. In your news story, you give the impression that hacking is wrong, malicious and even criminal. This is simply scandalous!

The terms hacker and hacking have been given a bad name by the media, thus giving all an impression of how little many people know about hacking. This has created a definition controversy worldwide. In actual fact, hacking is not bad or evil at all. It is good and even necessary. Hacking is the desire to fully understand something. A “computer hacker,” then, is someone who lives and breathes computers, who knows all about computers, who can get a computer to do anything. Equally important, though, is the hacker’s attitude. (http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~bh/hacker.html) Real hackers live by certain hacker ethics. From wikipedia.org, these are:

the belief that information-sharing is a powerful positive good, and that it is an ethical duty of hackers to share their expertise by writing free software and facilitating access to information and computing resources wherever possible; and/or
the belief that system cracking for fun and exploration is ethically acceptable as long as the hacker commits no theft, vandalism, or breach of confidentiality.

Hackers built the Internet. Hackers made the Unix operating system what it is today. Hackers run Usenet. Hackers make the World Wide Web work. The world needs hackers.

There is another group of people who loudly call themselves hackers, but aren’t. These are people (mainly adolescent males) who get a kick out of breaking into computers and phreaking the phone system. Real hackers call these people ‘crackers’ and want nothing to do with them. Real hackers mostly think crackers are lazy, irresponsible, and not very bright, and object that being able to break security doesn’t make you a hacker any more than being able to hotwire cars makes you an automotive engineer. Unfortunately, many journalists and writers have been fooled into using the word ‘hacker’ to describe crackers; this irritates real hackers no end. (http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html)

Those who defaced the websites decribed in your news story are not hackers but crackers. Their act was not hacing but cracking!

5 comments »

Posted in Miscellaneous, Tips Hacking and Reviews

Discussions on the www

February 20th, 2007

There’s no doubt that USENET is the primary mode of discussion on the net (or, at least, it was). The problem, however, is that USENET is not part of the www. On the world wide web, discussions are mainly through web forums and mailing lists.

A web forum is a facility on the www for holding discussions. forums often evolve into close-knit virtual communities home to many heated debates, exchanges and even rivalry. getting involved on forum discussions is simple: simply find a forum you like and join it.
More on forums.
Some cool forums:
-talksoccer
-somethingawful
More cool Forums. (directory)

An electronic mailing list, a type of internet forum, is a special usage of email that allows for widespread distribution of information to many internet users. Basically, the discussion is held through email whereby you post to the forum by sending an email and receive replies or other users’ posts in your inbox.
More on Mailing Lists.
Active Mailing Lists that you can and should join.

As it is elsewhere, adherence to netiquette is required. For forums, special rules apply:
- Always read any established rules.
- Before starting a post, make sure it doesn’t already exist.
- follow rules of grammar.
- post in the correct section.
- Do not SHOUT.
- Stay on topic.
- Do not resurrect very old topics if you have nothing new to say.
- Do not participate in flame wars or pie-fights.
- And of course, keep the Ten Commandments of Netiquette in mind.

Some jargon:
Mailing List – a collection of names and adresses used by an individual or organisation to send material to multiple recipients.
Shouting – WRITING IN CAPS.

2 comments »

Posted in Internet Culture

Smart Internet Search with Zuula and Mindset

February 17th, 2007

This week I came across two new (-ish) but very cool ways to search the www. I simply must share these with you and so this week we’ll focus on sites that search the web.

Zuula.com This is a new metasearch engine that in my opinion is quite possibly the best metasearch eninge ever. It is particularly useful for images as it includes flickr.
Zuula allows its users to carry out Internet searches with a wide range of major search engines, returning results in a consistent interface that makes it easy for users to cross-check results across the different search engines.The user interface has “drag-n-drop” customizability (you can move around the tabs representing the different search engines), and there’s also a useful, collapsible, search history function.Many of our users like our service because it allows them to rely on their favorite search engine for most of their searching, while also giving them quick access to results from other search engines “when the searching gets tough”.-Zuula CEO

Mindset Have you ever been searching the net and wondered how you could get rid of the more commercial results and get right into the more informational ones? Yahoo mindset is your solution. It is ‘A Yahoo! Research demo that applies a new twist on search that uses machine learning technology to give you a choice: View Yahoo! Search results sorted according to whether they are more commercial or more informational (i.e., from academic, non-commercial, or research-oriented sources).‘ (from site)

Zuula and Yahoo Mindset, when used together can give you pretty amazing, useful search results. For example, I was searching for Kenyan football (aka soccer) on the web recently. Whenever I used one search engine on its own I ended up with search results that included sites that were clearly not on Kenyan football per se but justed ‘mentioned’ it. So I used Yahoo Mindset to search for Kenyan football aiming to remove all commercial results. But are the Yahoo results representative of what’s out there? The only way to find out is to search for Kenyan football using zuula and compare the Yahoo results with other search engines. I did this and felt happy with yahoo results on Kenyan football and proceeded to use Yahoo Mindset to filter out some of the commercial search results. Voila! I got what exactly what I was looking for: KenyanSoccer.

Searching the web is now actually fun and can even help you kill some time.

2 comments »

Posted in Cool Sites

The Illusion of Reality

February 16th, 2007

Einstein Once said:
“A human being is a part of a whole, called by us _universe_, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest… a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
He went on to add:
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”

Is reality really an illusion? [Read More...]

If you liked this post you might also like Brian Greene’s ‘The Elegant Universe‘ or Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time.

No comments »

Posted in Internet Culture

September Never Ends

February 14th, 2007

This is the month that never ends

it just goes on and on, my friends
some lusers started posting here
not knowing netiquette
and they’ll continue posting here
they haven’t finished yet
-Eternal September Anthem

The oldest computer network communication system still in widespread news is USENET (USEr NETwork). It is a distributed internet discussion system where users read and post email-like messages (called articles) to a number of distributed newsgroups (categories that resemble bulletin board systems in most respects).

Even though USENET is over a decade older than the www, it is still a significant part of the internet, laden with history, as many USENET newsgroups are passionate communities of discussion and the sharing of ideas. The early internet was very much shaped by USENET. Therefore, it is the place to go if you’re looking to get more involved in the internet by taking part in online discussions.

USENET is of significance cultural importance in the networked world having given rise to popular terms such as FAQ or spam. However, it has diminished in importance to mailing lists, web forums and blogs – maybe because it is accessed with special software(newsreader clients) that connects to a news server.

Fortunately, USENET is again experiencing a revival of sorts mainly due to Google Groups which allows reading and posting of articles to USENET newsgroups. Go on, join in on USENET discussions and let’s make sure that September Never Ends.

The easiest way to join is by Google Groups or usenet.com. At first, you may feel lost. That’s just because you’re a newbie. Here are some helpful FAQs and other introductory information.

4 comments »

Posted in Internet Culture

« Older Entries

Back to Top