Infosec - Things That Make You Go Hmm....

Mikko Hypponen is an excellent speaker. His first video, about the three types of online attack, really provide very sobering commentary and thoughts about Internet crime and how serious (and lucrative) it can be. As our world becomes more and more digital, it really is bothersome to think that there are a few people or organizations out there with more skills than entire populations who rely on the technology these skilled individuals like to tamper with. Also, it seems to be quite the losing battle to fight, although a very necessary one.

With his second video, on fighting viruses and defending the net, we got to see how complex the issue of internet crime can be, and the type of thinking and resourcefulness it takes to fight it. As he spoke about a more concerted global effort to fight internet crime, Hypponen brought to mind my favorite book series as a teenager, Tom Clancy's Net Force. This group was an online government agency comprised mainly of hackers as well as military forces who worked together to fight online criminal organizations and individuals. There was even a TV movie made of the series, which was discontinued after about 8 - 10 books, which I still have. I wonder if the INTERPOL or other such organizations could draw from Tom Clancy's imagination to develop the type of force needed to fight internet crime?

As far as SOPA and PIPA are concerned, a lot of today's great techies (Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page) have reached rockstar status. These guys have the means to alter our lives, truly, if they want to, and a great many of them did just that in response to Congress's mulling over of those two bills. Because of their very widespread influence, I never did get too concerned that either of these would actually pass. That also brings a book to mind, though (although, one has to extrapolate greatly from the book to think of this). Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, was about censorship, but through the burning of books. Could censorship of the Internet provide the government with the same means of control of the masses and seriously decrease our quality of life, bringing about a dystopian society (perhaps I read too much)?

HTML - "This is a line of text" = "See Spot Run"

The review on barrycumbie.com was nice and informative while remaining concise. However, that video was painfully basic and elementary. I know not everyone has HTML experience, but as the title denotes, I think the video was the equivalent of See Spot Run. Anyway, the W3Schools site was very good, and I am really enjoying all of these resources that will allow me to shore up my skills in the areas of programming and HTML. One can never be too marketable these days!

View Source is a tool that can be accessed from the dropdown menu on most Web browsers. It shows the source code for a particular Web page, and could probably be used to design a web page which emulates or draws from elements of an existing page. It could also be used to kind of reverse-engineer a page in an effort to learn HTML.

Structures - Barry Cumbie

Type	Example	Connotation
Firm	DSP Start-Up	Because this firm was developed within a fraternity, making it a firm seems to note that there is no undue focus on any individual member.
Political Party	“Rent Is Too Damn High Party”	For a political organization, this name seems to be the only one that would provide legitimacy.
Nonprofit Organization	Boys and Girls Club of America	Seeking to help mentor, develop, and benefit children without charging their parents makes this just about the only type of organization that makes for Boys and Girls Club.
Multinational Terrorist Organization	Al-Qaeda	Al-qaeda – translated “the base,”an organization that spans multiple nations and tries to create wreak havoc
Team	Los Angeles Lakers basketball team	A group of people who join together for a common goal, usually with each member specializing in certain aspects of reaching that goal (i.e. Kobe Bryant – scorer, closer; Andrew Bynum – shot blocker, rebounder)
Comedy troupe	Holy Ghost Players	Group of individuals who work together to do impromptu comedy, playing off of one another and adding humorous content, hence their name

The One Stop Shop For Urban Wear - Barry Cumbie

NOTE: The design constraints of my blog make it difficult to see the picture. However, if you click the picture, then right click the image overlay that appears and open it in a new tab/window, you should be able to see the image as large as originally intended.

DrJays.com has been one of my favorite sites for a long time. I first came to the site because I was looking to spend money from my summer job on some "fresh threads" to wear to school.

Anyway, the site is an online urban clothing retailer, so it targets those who subscribe to the hip-hop subculture, and the many subcategories thereof: athletes, preps, skaters, dancers, etc.

The site is known for its sales, as they are typically much better than any deal one can find on the top notch brands in bricks-and-mortar stores. The sales are not for one item, but discounts typically increase or decrease depending on the amount spent (usually one percentage for under $100 and a higher percentage for over $100). By using these sales - which usually have restrictions (i.e. discounts don't apply to certain brands like Nike or Beats by Dre, which is pictured above) - DrJays can entice customers to spend more. Of course, there is also a countdown timer (although by now, most regular customers are aware that a very similar sale will be up within minutes of the deadline). I don't know how they do it, but the site continues to offer the best selection and quality of clothing/accessories for "hip hop heads" at incredibly low prices. The site also features a blog, celebrity interviews, contests, and social networking accounts including Instagram, where the site encourages customers to tag DrJays and take pictures wearing their new clothes. With great product pictures, product specs, and many different forms of "entertailment" as well as memberships, exclusive deals, newsletters, and responsive customer service, DrJays is far ahead of its competition in providing the best in urban wear.

Warm Up Activity - Barry Cumbie

In “The Myth of Monotasking,”author Cathy Davidson discusses attention spans in the new digital era. She seems to be very complimentary of the new age and ready to do away with the old way of doing things (focusing on one task until it is completed and then moving on to the next one). In fact, Davidson even says that we are more productive when we take social networking breaks and so on. I find it hard to believe that anyone takes “social networking breaks.” What may start off as a break probably becomes an all out social networking binge (which may or may not be interrupted by study breaks). I think there may have been some valid points in her argument, but she seemed a bit too yielding to a generation that, in many ways, can be very lazy and entitled. I agree that laziness can breed inventions and innovations, but I think old-school discipline (and attention) is the best way to develop leadership.

In “Social Media’s Untapped Power” a strictly-for-laughs comment by the moderator became the subject of what I think is the most promising and striking content within the entire podcast, “gamification” and the productivity of games and entertainment. Both Piskorski and Bradley point to the possibility of having great collaboration occur through games. Later, they discuss finding a way to give people what they want in a way that raises your company’s bottom line – a rather old concept, as the moderator points out. It seems that the only thing that has actually changed in business over the past several years is what customers want and the different models and methods by which this could raise a company’s bottom line.

Despite my argumentative tone on the first paragraph, I think the two ideas presented in these podcasts go quite well together. People work better when there are distractions or multiple things happening at once, refreshing the brain and inspiring creativity. Using the info from the second paragraph, it seems that one could inspire a great deal of productivity from making work into a game or distraction itself. The next big break in business may indeed be finding a way to embed learning or working into fun instead of separating the two. As much as people enjoy and find ways to entertain themselves (or at least procrastinate) these days, turning such practice on its ear and giving it an actual purpose would undoubtedly revolutionize business as we know it.