Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts

Monday, January 10, 2011

Net Neutrality

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/01/net-neutrality-fight-gop-wields-garlic-against-fcc-vampires.ars

So I was reading this article and it seems the majority of people are confused about what Net Neutrality actually means. The term Net Neutrality seems to have become a slogan for politicians to confuse the hell out of the average person to the point of just not caring. Even the writer of this article seems to be confused at whether he should hate Marsha Blackburn or not. At one point he states that her legislation is "anti-net neutrality" when it is clearly pro net neutrality.

Here is the definition I snipped from Berkeley's website:

Simply put, net neutrality is a network design paradigm that argues for broadband network providers to be completely detached from what information is sent over their networks.  In essence, it argues that no bit of information should be prioritized over another.  This principle implies that an information network such as the internet is most efficient and useful to the public when it is less focused on a particular audience and instead attentive to multiple users. 

Based on that definition, every single American that enjoys anything that the internet has to offer should rally behind  Marsha Blackburn for defending our right to enjoy a free and relatively unregulated internet. We don't need to fragment the service into separate payment tiers based on usage. We also don't need the government to take it over either or it will just end up like every other government-run system, that would only end in tears.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

IT'S ALIIIIIVE!

http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/01/mac-app-store-hands-on-many-nits-to-pick-but-off-to-a-good-start.ars

If anybody has been following the Apple news lately, they finally launched the Mac App Store this morning at 12:01AM. Some of you may be thinking: "Doesn't Apple already have an App Store?". Why, yes, yes they do. This Mac App Store is essentially going to be a Digital Delivery Service for Macintosh software much like Steam is a digital delivery service for PC games.

I think this is a step in the right direction for pretty much all software-based purchases. The faster our broadband gets and the more connected we are, the more feasible this idea becomes. We already have Hulu, Netflix, Steam, Xbox Live, Playstation Network, iTunes and more. The idea of a physical store will most likely not pertain to any kind of software anymore.

Let's just hope we can improve our internet infrastructure exponentially within the next 10 years. The recent fights going on in Congress and Senate about Net Neutrality are not filling me with much confidence. On one side of the argument we have the government yelling about how terrible the telecom corporations are for wanting to divide their service into smaller "pipelines" and charge based on what sites/services you are using. On the other hand we have the corporations yelling that they don't want the government to mess with their business, because we all know that the government is pretty much incapable of doing anything right. They have spread themselves too thin already.

We do need more ISPs to provide more competition in some of the less populous states. In Iowa we have either Mediacom Cable, or Qwest DSL for broadband. Unless you are one of the lucky people near a fast DSL node your connection will be terrible and cable is almost always the better, faster, more reliable option. So, essentially, we have a broadband cable monopoly here. If what I learned in high school was right, then a monopoly is unlawful. I have a hard time trusting that a government maintained internet service would be anywhere near as good as many other advanced countries in the world (Japan).

Anyways, enjoy your new Mac App Store and hope for more awesome in the future!