Tutorial Blog 4: E-mail spam!

Spam is something we are all too aware of. No, I am not talking about the canned meat substitute. I am talking about electronic spam. Every computer user has experienced spam in some way, shape or form, mostly through email. We all have opened up our email to see a message labeled, "Make money fast" from some email address we have never heard of. This is an example of spam, it is an unsolicited commercial e-mail. It is estimated that over 7 trillion spam messages will be sent out in 2011 and in May of 2008 Symantec estimated that 80% of the total emails in the world are spam.

Background
One of the believed ways the word "spam" was coined was in the Spam sketch done by Monty Python's Flying Circus (found below). In the sketch, the word spam is used abundantly and the patrons of the restaurant continuously sing  "Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam... lovely Spam! wonderful Spam!" This in turn drowns out some of the conversation and "spams" the dialog. Others say that it is called "spam," because, just like the canned meat product, in that the unsolicited commercial e-mail is just a bunch of unneeded annoyances. 

The first form of electronic spam occurred in 1978 when a message was sent out to the users of ARPANET about the availability of new computer models by Gary Thuerk of Digital Equipment Corporation. The first form of chain letters occurred in 1988 under the name "Make Money Fast." The first major commercial occurred in 1994 for immigration law services which became known as "Green Card spam." From there it continued to grow, unfortunately, for computer users.

Benefits of "spamming"

Spamming is very beneficial economically. There are no barriers to entry. There are no real costs to send spam except the management of a mailing list. All a spammer needs to get are email addresses. It is a very cheap way to create advertisements and publicity (good or bad). Think of it this way, if you sent out 100 emails for a product that cost $10 and one person purchased it. Then you just made $10 relatively easily and quickly. If this continued (1% of the recipients bought the product) think of how much money you could make after sending it out to 100,000 people.

Downsides of "spamming"

The creator of spam doesn't have too many downsides.  However, the downside it does have is huge. Spammers run the risk of having legal and/or public reaction ramifications. Other than that, most of the downsides occur to the receiver of spam. The amount of spam is so high that many internet service providers  (ISPs) have had to increase capacity on their networks to deal with the spam. As a receiver of spam, you will often spend your valuable time deleting annoying spam messages. Spam can be used to spread viruses, trojan horses, malware, or other forms of malicious software. It can also be used for identity theft, phishing, and fraud.

How to Stop spam?

There is no real way to stop spam completely, but there are some ways to prevent it. Thankfully many email corporations like yahoo.com and gmail.com have spam filters where most of the spam is placed into separate folders and automatically deleted after so many days to clear out your mailbox. The video below the picture will also provide a few more tips. For more information, I would suggest going to this website: How to Avoid Spam Email.

Some email systems, like yahoo.com, have spam filters built in.

Another way to prevent spam is to download anti-spyware. Spyware is a small program, usually on your computer without your permission, to track your actions and send it back to the creator. Sometimes the spyware will send back your email so that it can be "spammed." Many anti-virus software programs already include anti-spyware. If your anti-virus software doesn't include anti-spyware, I would suggest downloading Microsoft Security Essentials or AVG Free Edition.

Closing Thoughts

I would just like to point out that I don't support spamming by corporations as I believe it would be ethically wrong. There seems to be no end of email spam in the future. Many people want a Do Not Spam List just like there is a Do Not Call List. The Legislature hasn't really gone forward with this idea. Oppositions of a Do Not Spam List believe this will just give spammers a new list of emails. Until tough restrictions are placed on spam, it is up to us (the users) to watch out for "lovely, wonderful spam."

Sources:
Information
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet/basics/spam.htm
http://www.spamhelp.org/articles/HowDoIStopSpam.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spam_%28electronic%29
http://www.wikihow.com/Stop-Spam
Multimedia
Monty Python's Flying Circus (Spam Sketch)
picture created using Jing and Paint
How to Avoid Spam Email Video

Secure Email Blog

Summary

The article that I found is about a company that should have had better security measures for their information about their clients. Within the past week Capital One has had a malicious act occur to their information as somebody was able to collect some of those clients' email addresses. A company named Epsilon, a marketing vender used to send emails, was the actually company that lost this information. Thankfully, the only thing collected were email addresses and not any other personal information. Epsilon and Capital One are investigating the matter. Capital One also reminds their clients not respond to emails asking for private information. They also explain that just because the link looks familiar, it might lead you to a fraudulent site.

My Opinion

Obviously, Epsilon should have had a better security system in place. Especially since they are a responsible for sending out Capital One's emails. Like I said before, they only collected email addresses. Yet, a stolen email address can be enough for a malicious act to occur for the owner of the address. This act will cause major public relations problems for Epsilon and Capital One. This could result in business losses for both companies. Epsilon will feel a major blow as potential customers and other current companies may look elsewhere.

Sources:
http://www.capitalone.com/protection/email.php?linkid=WWW_1009_Z_A0B2084C1F86D22A0E1FFBF38F9G1F85H5AF4I7CC8_HOME_C1_02_T_ALERTEMAIL
picture created using Jing

My Avatar Creation Experience

One of our extra credit assignments was to create an avatar from a preselected group of websites. This blog is to explain my experience from creating that avatar. The website I used was called Meez.com. To be straightforward I am not a big fan of creating avatar, but Meez made it slightly enjoyable. I emphasis the slightly part as I will describe the cons later on.

The pros, Meez is an almost entirely free Avatar creation site. Meez gives you many customizable options for your avatar. It allows for many different facial options, a plethora of clothing, accessories, and background pictures. The website is very easy to navigate. I love the action motions that Meez has in their collection.

The cons, these reasons really hurt my overall mindset of Meez.com. Some of the items on Meez.com require the user to pay. I can see their reasoning, but for any one just wanting to make an avatar, they may find this annoying. Meez does have a lot of choice, I just wish they had more diversity with some of their options. Some of their "diversity" seems to relate to product placement. The advertisements on the site can become annoying at times as they will automatically play and you can't silence them or you will end up being directed to the advertisement page.

Even with a few flaws, I give Meez.com a 3.5 out of 5. Great for anyone wanting to make a slightly involving avatar. It may take a few minutes to create as their are so many options. I think it took me about 30 minutes to create mine because of all the options. Just keep in mind that not all of the options are available unless you want to shell out the money.

Below is an example of an avatar that you can create using the options found on Meez.com. This avatar is a version of me.

Microsoft Access Project Blog

Doing this assignment was a great refresher for me as I really haven't had a reason to use Access since 2008. Upon completion of the project, I gained some useful tools. I never knew about text qualifier and the text delimiter from my past experience with Access. Knowing this now, will be great for future reference. Another thing I didn't know about Access in my past experiences was the validation rule. I saw it before, but I didn't know how it worked.

Some ways I could enhance my database would be to have different queries, forms, and reports. There are so many unique views of the data that I could create using these options. For example, I could do a 6 month Departed Family Member query or report to go along with the Individual one. Another thing I could do is to create a macro for my database. A macro would help my queries, forms, or reports look more professional and give any user some easy options.

Tutorial Blog 3: Learning about Wiki's

In 1995 the first Wiki page was placed on the internet under the name WikiWikiWeb created by Ward Cunningham. From then on Wiki pages have flourished in the age of information. Corporations inserted them into their work environments for intranets and collaborated projects. Educational institutions use Wikis to enhance student's education.

What is a Wiki?

A Wiki is a piece of server software or a website that allows the creation and editing of a number of different intertwined pages.

(This video created by www.commoncraft.com)

A Wiki has to follow three guidelines according to Ward Cunningham:

• a Wiki allows any user to edit a page or to create a new page within the Wiki.
• a Wiki promotes meaningful topics associated by using links that a user will instantly recognize.
• a Wiki isn't created for a causal user. Its goal is to promote the visitor of the site to its never ending process of creation and collaboration that changes its site's landscape.

A Wiki provides far more superior, faster, relevant information than any search engine can provide. While not always accurate, it is a great stepping stone in any information hunt. I have often used sites like Wikipedia.org to help me in my hunt to find information for essays, projects, or blogs. 

Wikipedia allows many editing options and abilities. It even allow you to view the history of the page

Creating a Wiki

I would like to point anybody to this website first on "How to Start a Wiki." There are a few sites that support the making of a Wiki page. Popular sites include Wikispaces, Google Docs, PBWiki, PikiWiki, and Wetpaint. Google Docs isn't an entirely dedicated Wiki site, but allows many of the same options that a user would find on other Wiki sites.

Criticism of a Wiki

Since Wikis allow any user to edit a page, sometimes the editor isn't editing that page for your betterment. Vandalism often happens and has been a problem on sites like Wikipedia.org, the most famous Wiki on the internet. These acts will often go unnoticed for a period of time. Many educational instructors find that Wiki sites are not creditable for these same reasons. Unfortunately, vandals will even put malware in links found on the Wiki page.

Comedian Stephen Colbert even had his audience exploit Wikipedia.org. He asked his audience to edit a page related to elephants to include, "Elephant population in Africa has tripled over the past six months." Even though this information was false, the flaw is that if enough users agree, the wiki has no choice but to accept the idea.

Closing Thoughts

 

Whether working on a business project, performing research, or for catching up on your favorite band's history, Wiki's are a valuable source. Even with the flaws of a Wiki, nobody can deny their usefulness. These days, should we really trust what we read on the internet?

Sources:
http://wiki.org/wiki.cgi?WhatIsWiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_impact_of_The_Colbert_Report
http://conovermedia.blogspot.com/2006/03/campaign-against-wikipedia.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki
http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7004.pdf
http://www.surfnetkids.com/how_to_create_a_wiki.htm
Picture taken by using Jing software on Wikipedia.org
Video found on http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english

Presentation Blog

My presentation: Donating to the Florida Museum of Natural History

To start off with, it is very hard to critic myself, but I tried to be as honest as possible with my work. I felt that there was logical flow and sequencing to my content. I answered a majority of anticipated questions, and I referred them to get in contact with the museum. I thought I performed a decent job at grabbing the attention of the audience. I probably could have come up with a better introduction or used a picture on the title slide.I thought I asked question and sparked curiosity and that I was clear in with what I was trying to share.

When it came to validating any claims, it really comes down to: did I convince the viewer to donate to the museum. I did avoid inconsistencies and errors, typos and unbelievable claims. I definitely had some clutter on some of my pages, but I did that so I didn't use more slides. To ensure readability I used a black font for my titles and used a lite color against a dark background, also I organized a majority of my content against a dark background. I usually said it and then showed my content, but occasionally due to accidents, it looked like I read straight from the slides. In conclusion, I thought I did a great job with my project. I wish I had more time to work on it and I could have done better with the audio as there is a lot of static in it which is probably due to my microphone. I could have probably used more multimedia.

I critiqued some of the other projects and think everybody did a fantastic job. I noticed everybody had their own unique way of presenting. A variety of multimedia was used as some focused more on picture, audio clips, or videos. My favorite presentation was learning about trombones by Kevin Dionne. I thought he did a fantastic job and used a variety of multimedia that improved his presentation.

Doing this project has allowed me to see that certain projects fit certain people. Some people excel in certain areas compared to others. In the business world this is key, to pick topics appropriate to your strengths and knowledge. I think doing the presentation via Web 2.0 doesn't have the same affect as doing the project in front of an audience. I would like to reference back to the trombone presentation as I think it would have been better to see in person the different trombones. As for a business sense, I would prefer to do my presentations in person instead of on the web.

Digital Rights Management

With the increase of peer to peer services which allowed easy file sharing, Digital Rights Management was soon born. Digital Rights Management (DRM), also known as Digital Restrictions Management, is control technology for copyright owners, publishers, manufactures, distributors, and other individuals for their content.  They are able to do this by either preventing access, copying, or converting to other formats. DRM affects a variety of different forms of technology like movies, music, video games, television, e-books, documents, and software. While DRM may seem great for the owners, it has met a plethora of opposition from users and sometimes the providers of this content.

History
DRM has been around for a long time, but has been drawing more and more interest since the late 1990's. DRM's big splash came in 1998. It is in place due to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act which is the American version of enforcing the World Intellectual Property Organization treaty. This act is an amendment to the United States copyright law. This act enabled the owners to exercise DRM. It created civil and criminal penalties for anyone for the creation or distributions of DRM circumvention tools and for anyone creating or distributing DRM content.

More Information on DRM
The video below provides more information about DRM:

 

DRM relies on a two part system. The first part is encryption which protects the content.  The second part is authentication to ensure only authorized users access the content. DRM will scramble content to make it unusable without the right identification. Some forms of DRM being implemented include restricting the information that you send via email at a company and how many copies of digital media you can make. Other examples include putting an expiration date on the content, allowing the content to only be on one device, and outright prevention of copying. Like the video above mentions, some owners put watermarks in their music. iTunes uses this method to track their content. Many companies like Apple use their own version of technology to protect their DRM rights. Apple uses FairPlay which insures that Apple's content isn't played on unauthorized computers. As of today, Apple doesn't use DRM on music, but still relies on it for movies and television shows. Many owners have followed suit.

The Effect on Technology
The following video provides great insight on how DRM affects consumers and producers.

The Pros of DRM
The biggest pro of DRM is its ability to protect the owners content. Many corporations and individuals are thankful that they are rightfully earning money for their works. DRM is trying to solve a serious problem that occurs in our society which is "stealing property." The movie industry estimates its losses to be about $5 billion.  Imagine the loss if DRM was not in place.

The Criticism of DRM

One of the more "kinder" anti-DRM cartoons

A Google image search on DRM shows the numerous amounts of anti-DRM cartoons. One of the more "blatant" problems with DRM is its lack of compactability. A song may work on one device, but not another. As an avid gamer, I have experienced the constraints of DRM. Some PC games require the user to be connected online to play even though it is not really necessary. Other games only allow you to download a game to a computer so many times before you have to buy the game again. For example, the game Spore only allowed you to download it 3 times in order to control their product. Ironically enough, Spore was the most pirated game that year. At one point, Sony used to install a DRM program on your computer without your knowledge in  order to track what was happening with the CD you just bought from them. This eventually became a target for viruses and hackers due to the program making computer security vulnerable.

Many critics feel that DRM violates their privacy as it allows the owners to monitor your computer. The owners have a right to view what you do with "their" content and sometimes that means monitoring what you do on your computer.

Final thoughts
DRM was designed to fix a problem in our culture but does DRM really need the fixing? Whether you love or hate DRM, it is the law and we (the people) must obey the law.

Sources:
http://www.gamepro.com/article/news/214178/analysis-digital-rights-management-in-pc-gaming/
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/drm2.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FairPlay
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management
http://epic.org/privacy/drm/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6337781.stm
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/04/02itunes.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal