Google Appologizes For Slugish Service

"We're very sorry that it happened, and you can be sure that we'll be working even harder to make sure that a similar problem won't happen again," said Urs Hoelzle, Google's senior vice president of operations in response to an interruption in service or poor performance on the companies sites for millions of users. "An error in one of our systems caused us to direct some of our traffic through Asia," Hoelzle added.

The incident has cast doubt by some about the viability of cloud computing. "Maybe companies that are thinking about a cloud strategy - such as Google Apps - need to look into backup clouds" said Sam Diaz, a senior editor at technology news site ZDNet.

Source: BBC News

Twitter Porn-star Game Could Be Attempt At Identity Theft

According to Canada's privacy commissioner, a game being plaid by Twitter users that asks them to combine their first pet's name with the name of the first street they lived on, in order to come up with a "personalized adult-film star pseudonym" for them, could actually be an attempt by hackers to obtain information that password protected websites often use to identity people. Agreed, this does sound phishy...

Source: Globe and Mail

Kanye Has A "Spaz" Over Twitter

Rapper Kanye West says that he has no intention to use Twitter but that hasn't stopped him from contacting Twitter to express his displeasure at impostors using his name and racking up followers. On his blog Kanye writes "THE HEADS OF TWITTER KNEW I DIDN'T HAVE A TWITTER AND THEY HAVE TO KNOW WHICH ACCOUNTS HAVE HIGH ACTIVITY ON THEM." and " IT'S A F****** FARCE AND IT MAKES ME QUESTION WHAT OTHER SO CALLED CELEBRITY TWITTERS ARE ACTUALLY REAL OR FAKE. HEY TWITTER, TAKE THE SO CALLED KANYE WEST TWITTER DOWN NOW .... WHY?"

Kanye also says "WHY WOULD I USE TWITTER??? I ONLY BLOG 5 PERCENT OF WHAT I'M UP TO IN THE FIRST PLACE."

It seems as though Twitter is looking into the situation as http://twitter.com/kanyewest redirects to http://twitter.com/suspended

Source: CNet News

France To Track And Punish Illegal Downloaders

French law makers have passed a lower house bill on Tuesday that would give the government of France the right to cut off the Internet access of repeat offenders in the illegal downloading battle. "Warnings to culprits would begin with two e-mails followed by a certified letter. If the piracy continues within the following year, access can be cut from two months to a year — while the user keeps paying for the service." according to this article published in the Globe and Mail. The law has its challengers however as some view it in conflict with a measure passed by the European Union a week ago, that would prohibit such measures. At the heart of the controversy is the illegal downloading of music and movies.

e-Books The Latest Target Of Pirates

The music and film industries have been fighting piracy on the Internet for years now, and it's become old news. Author's however have been relatively spared the fight, until now. With the proliferation of e-readers such as the Kindle, more and more digital copies of literary works are making their way onto the Internet where they are being made illegally available, for free.

“It’s exponentially up,” said David Young, chief executive of Hachette Book Group, whose Little, Brown division publishes the “Twilight” series by Stephenie Meyer, a favorite among digital pirates. “Our legal department is spending an ever-increasing time policing sites where copyrighted material is being presented.”

Interestingly enough, one of the worlds best know authors has this to say “The question is, how much time and energy do I want to spend chasing these guys,” Stephen King wrote in an e-mail message. “And to what end? My sense is that most of them live in basements floored with carpeting remnants, living on Funions and discount beer.”

Source: The New York Times

Looking At Star Trek - Then And Now

No surprise, I'm a Star Trek fan from way back! No, I don't have a model of the Enterprise or a uniform, and I don't travel the globe attending conventions... but I have been to all of the movies and followed most of the various series, the original was my favourite. Star Trek aka "Star Trek XI" is a real tribute to the original series with a fantastic upgrade that takes advantage of modern FX.

For those interested in the franchise, Wired has put together a gallery of images, "Then and Now" that is definitely worth a look, as is the movie...