"study: cyberloafing" Slacking at work «Healthy»

Devin Coldewey is a Seattle-based writer and photographer. He wrote for the TechCrunch network since 2007. Some posts, it would like you to read: the perils of externalization of knowledge | Generation I | Surveillant society | Select two | Frame war | User manifesto | Our great sin his personal site — coldewey. cc. ? Read More

Research at the National University of Singapore has confirmed what many of us it seems intuitively know: taking a little time to encode or check your favorite blogs or webcomics is actually productive behaviour.

Just like a short break for a snack or a coffee can revive you a very short break to do something other than the type or the mouse around improves the quality of your work.

Conducted by researchers Don J.Q. Chen and Vivien k. g. Lim, started with participants making repetitive tasks: highlighting each "e" in the 3500-Word. They are then told to do one of three: one group was ordered to stack sticks in a certain way, the other was told nothing but go on the Internet and the other was ordered to go online and check out several blogs and websites. Finally they asked to repeat their first challenge with another document.

Not surprisingly, at least mentally exhausted (in accordance with the infallible questionnaire) and most productive Web people. Interesting that the verification e-mail did not tend to recover people, as it is seen as a kind of work to read and respond.

Methodologically, it is not bulletproof. People doing "nothing but the web in their own environment, rather than a laboratory, but rather will be updated as the Web of people. And tasks which require more attention and mastery (creative tasks, rather than repeating) may not be as pardon the interruption. However, it was noted that the Web browser does not have any adverse impact on the participants ' ability to function. It does not act as an opiate.

Naturally, this applies only to a certain degree (not WoW raids), and working conditions in real life must be reasonable as well (web access could not raise the morale of the sweatshop). But certainly counterproductive to try to limit or control the ability of workers to go to specific sites or take a short break, like this (I just picked up one of the last paragraph). This reduces the confidence and makes people miserable. And said that checking Reddit or 1UP is stealing from the company only ignores people who know better. In addition they will keep for "stealing" without a second thought.

So next time your boss is approaching the cube while you take five hit up a few blogs to tell him about the study and suggests that they make it policy. People love politics.

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New study of antenna Omnidirectional clothing weaves

Devin Coldewey is a Seattle-based writer and photographer. He wrote for the TechCrunch network since 2007. Some posts, it would like you to read: the perils of externalization of knowledge | Generation I | Surveillant society | Select two | Frame war | User manifesto | Our great sin his personal site — coldewey. cc. ? Read More

Antenna, a bit like underwear. All their needs, but you typically want to hide them, and when you have a problem with them, it gets embarrassing. Since we lost sliding nub and previous years on our antennas, telephones and radios, antennas and more and more integrated with the construction of the device, but sometimes it is not advisable to do so.

Take our clothing, for example. As a rule receive antenna to play nice with bending and restructuring has led to a decrease in performance (and then there's these things). But from the Ohio State University to the next big step towards the creation of a sweater.

They have thin, flexible plastic substrates and etched brass on him, forming a kind of flow easy antenna. Then they wove this thread four panes waistcoat: front, rear and both shoulders. The controller about the size of a deck of cards was mounted on the belt. This device keeps track of the signal from each antenna and switch between them on the fly to keep these bars. During the tests it performs much better than the existing style of whip antenna. Most importantly it allowed secure connection regardless of the direction of person faces.

It's not quite ready for the deployment of a banana Republic just yet, but there are a lot of applications. Chen ChiChih, one of the researchers, said: "our primary goal is improving the reliability of communication and mobility of soldiers, but the same technology can work for police officers, firefighters, astronauts – people who need to keep their hands free for important work". A good signal can mean the difference between good and bad copies when the building goes down and smaller footprint means one more device or log can be another tool a soldier or a fire. I think this can be useful for espionage and police work, though. No more wires sticking out to breast secret guy.

It's not cheap: tech costs about $ 200 per person for implementation, which is probably from NASA'S budget. Researchers believe they can reduce the price and eventual integration of antennas with normal clothing for security purposes.

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Study: some ISPs still hijacking search results (Sue)

Devin Coldewey is a Seattle-based writer and photographer. He wrote for the TechCrunch network since 2007. Some posts, it would like you to read: the perils of externalization of knowledge | Generation I | Surveillant society | Select two | Frame war | User manifesto | Our great sin his personal site — coldewey. cc. ? Read More

Try this: open a new tab and type "Kindle" in the address bar. Most likely he will guide you to the Google search results page. I.e. If your Internet service provider to intercept such rogue queries and do what they will with them. A pair of computer scientists at UC Berkeley found that at least a dozen ISPS still do this, the result is that, for example, when someone types "Kindle" in the address bar, it is not the preferred search engine, but directly to Amazon's Kindle page.

Harmless, in some sense, but actually deeply invasive when considering the conditions. These providers use third party contractors who monetize such an erroneous or random requests. A wide range of search items, something like "Kindle", "Apple" and "bloomingdales ' are being listened to, enter and steal, and the intention of the user. As if that wasn't enough, one of the companies suspected of being behind the Paxfire, applied for a patent on the ISP-level track users for advertising purposes.

In truth, do a little Gore from the molehill, but for good reason. There are shenanigans as it is pulled by ISPS, network operators, content providers, carriers, and all the other every day. While the large-scale stuff as Proxying Google and skimming the results tend to get noticed, there are tons of grey area practices are most likely referred to obliquely EULAs and such. Things like packet inspection for the purpose of "quality", in reality mining with little oversight. But even if the actual extent of the problem is not national, it is important to keep your eyes open for these things.

Researchers, Christian Kreibich and Nicholas Weaver, traffic analysis by ISPS and discovered that 165 terms event and as a result of the intervention, usually directed users to the site through the affiliate program. It is possible (although unlikely) that third parties, do it yourself, as the Charter describes the VentureBeat; (from experience) they claim that the service hired to do one thing (have a standard page broken URL, for example) may be ambitious and decided to make a little money on the side.

Google previously noticed this and gave rise to the ISP to stop manipulating the results, but while it's easy enough to say when touching your requests, it is not so easy to say, if they have been sniffed. External providers can part of a job analysis package of companies such as Paxfire, routing search queries through them to write and building the database.

The smell of blood in the water, the New York law firms Reese Richman and filed a lawsuit against Milberg Paxfire and the RPM, the Virginia-based ISP accused of shady study described. As with many Internet Center lawsuits, this one will likely be several jurisdictions to effectively analyze — although both the Paxfire is also based in Virginia, the State provides a natural starting point for the proceedings.

I have the same mind with TechDirt, Mike Masnick: surprised that companies think they can do this stuff and get away with it. The level of control for services as ISPs only increases, and methods, as has already been deemed illegal and unethical. They think nobody would notice?

Here is a list of ISPS, found the study:

Cavalier-Cincinnati Bell-convincing – border – Hughes-IBBS – analysis of broadband-Megapath-Paetec – RCN – wide open West-XO Communications

If you think you may be affected by this practice, try to run the Web application Netalyzr (Berkeley) and see if anything suspicious pops up.

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