When a Quentin...

2007: Welcome to the music

2007-01-18T11:45:00.000+01:00

To my mind, music is the trend which is going to develop the most on the web this year. Everybody knows the disc industry is slowly seeking. All the majors and music producers started to sell music online with different platforms (i tunes, fnac, virgin...). In 2006, the amount of legally downloaded music has doubled. By the way, new laws, such as DADVSI in Europe, aim at diminishing illegal music transfers. But on the other hand, more and more music producers get opposed to excessive protection over music. That is why Virgin and Fnac decided to sell unprotected mp3 on their websites. Because to the protection becomes so high, that several files can't be read anymore.

Concerning the way of improving musicians' incomes ,Jamendo, for example, proposes to give 50 % of the advertising incomes to the artists.

In 2006, 5 hundred millions of illegal downloads were recorded. This is half as many as in 2005. It proves that the users also become aware of the importance of respecting an equilibrium between legal and illegal downloads. Moreover, Myspace music is also a good way to discover new artists without downloading their music illegaly.

The MIDEM, meeting about all kinds of music businesses will occur in Cannes in a week. This will be a good occasion of seeing the latest news about this important part of the web.

of videos and Cv's

2007-01-17T00:45:00.000+01:00

A good video CV must, in a few minutes, describe as precisely as possible the author. That means it must let an impression about his personality, his skills, his projects, his productions afterward. In order to create that effect, it is important to choose the right place and a representative way to film. Because things can be meant without words. I want to show my dynamism and my high ability to communicate ? The video occurs while I am walking. Then I have to talk in a clear voice, without stress. Then it is important to give a structure to the CV. First I give my name, age, situation. Then I talk about my school experience, my professional experiences, the things I love, the things I want. It is also very interesting to make a link with the media the author chose. If I chose internet to communicate, that means I must show to what extent I know this media and I act on it everyday. The main purpose is to offer more than a simple cv. A CV that reflects my personality, my motivation, my behaviour, my style. A CV that anybody can access at any moment from any connected place. The video must be a way to open to the world. The might be posted on a page on which the user can find links related to the things the author talked about. Links to a blog, links to websites. Moreover, it can be set into a designed page which is related to what we want to convey. This is the great property of internet. Let's interact !

Broadcast yourself !

2007-01-16T20:59:00.000+01:00

The main functions concerning Youtube personal space are “upload a video from a webcam” and “upload a video from a cell phone”. This is in appliance with the development of 3G.
We can therefore imagine that other functions will be available from a cell phone such as “edit your videos from your cell phone”. It is also possible to create our own lists. This means that it is possible to create a friends network like on friendset, who will be able to find those videos easily. You can also get the comments posted by users about your videos. This implies the fact that you can interact with all the world of youtube. This goes totally in the sense of web 2.0 .

Finally, you can also create your own channel, your own TV. The public can now take the control of the medias. And it is far possible in the nexts years that people will have more and more influence on the different medias including TV. With the services Video on demand, with the variety of channels, with the possibilities to interact with internet, the public becomes an actor of the medias. And those actors get organized in communities of interest which will be more and more important in the future. Youtube only offers the technical device that allows us to make our own show. Broadcast yourself !

Saving Our e-Souls !

2007-01-15T23:26:00.000+01:00

I have bought an 160GB external hard drive disk on which I save all the data that matter from my computer. If somebody stoles my computer I can get the latest data back. I know that my external hard drive disk can fail as well as my computer, but I hope both of them won’t break up at the same time. What is possible on the web is to upload all the data on a permanent server that you pay every month. But it is quite expensive and long to upload. There are also new technologies helping to secure data memory such as flash disks. They work as USB keys , without any disk. It is more efficient because it is always the disk which breaks.

A flash disk

Stalking on the web

2007-01-15T19:35:00.000+01:00

Facebook Stalking is a web expression which describe the fact of getting information on a facebook profile without the agreement of the user. This is mix between spying somebody and harassing him. Some students do It in order to know private things about their mates. It happened that teachers did it to punish students who displayed forbidden practices on their profile such as drinking alcohol on a campus.

This term could also be used concerning all the people that get information on profiles such as on myspace, meetic etc.

Stalking is a big issue because it concerns people’s privacy on the web. In the USA there are laws about cyberstalking. Portecting privacy is quite difficult because pirates always find ways to circumvent security systems.

I think that the more secured personal profiles will be, the more accurate cyberstalkers will get. Furthermore, people put their profile on the web for only a few people. But how can they control the visit of people they don’t know ? This seem impossible unless having a secured access, only for friends. But restricting an access is also closing it to anybody else, including innocent and interesting people. The debate is hard.

Privacy pollution

2007-01-15T18:54:00.000+01:00

Privacy pollution refers to all the contents that arrive on a private computer and which disturb the user. The first concrete example is spamming. Spamming is the abuse of electronic messaging systems to send unsolicited, undesired bulk messages. This is often used by companies who buy databases with a lot e mails in order to send a lot of advertising spams on your computer. Needless to talk about the pop ups appearing when a user is on the web. Everybody has suffered those instrusions.

Web pirats also use techniques to pollute private computer. They use spams with viruses, trojans , spywares that invade your computer and open it to pirats who can have access to your personal datas.

In order to protect themselves, people have access to a range of anti pop ups, anti spywares, anti virus, anti trojans such as Norton or freewares.

Norton Antivirus Box

2007-01-11T12:02:00.000+01:00

A content management system (CMS) is a computer software system used to assist its users in the process of content management. A CMS facilitates the organization, control, and publication of a large body of documents and other content, such as images and multimedia resources. A CMS often facilitates the collaborative creation of documents.

Diagram explaining how a CMS works

CMS can be used for blogs and websites. The web manager of the website logs in and have a special access which allows him to organize the different contents. He can adds some text, graphics, multimedia etc. The CMS let the blog phenomenon explode because everybody could now make his own space on the web without any money or technical skills. CMS translate our language to computer language, from wyswyg (What you see is what you get) to html or php etc.

The blog on which this article is posted works with a CMS. I have posted this text by using the CMS on which I have added links and graphics very easily. My photo website also works with a CMS. By modifying the design options, I completely changed the way it looked at the beginning.

CV

2007-01-07T20:42:00.000+01:00

Click here to download my CV

Vocabulary Wiki

2006-11-16T15:38:00.000+01:00

The link to the vocabulary wiki is http://vocabulary.metawiki.com

Ideas for a better world

2006-11-08T22:26:00.000+01:00

Actually, I find this class so original that I might need some more time to propose any new ideas to improve it. It is quite a good idea to teach english through concrete researchs. As far as I am concerned, I studied english at university. Thus I learnt grammar bases, business vocabulary and civilization. But maybe, several students would like to have more grammar or vocabulary during classes.

that is why I propose an online vocabulary lexicon that anybody will be able to fill. The blog will be sorted by categories (banking vocabulary, internet vocabulary...)

Here is a link to a topic posted on our wiki .

Area secured

2006-11-02T16:39:00.000+01:00

SHTTP means Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol which is developed by Enterprise Integration Technologies in 1995 to ensure security with commercial transactions on the Internet. A protocol that provides secure transactions over the Web. It is endorsed by a variety of organizations.

An extension to the HTTP protocol to support sending data securely over the World Wide Web. Not all Web browsers and servers support S-HTTP. Another technology for transmitting secure communications over the World Wide Web -- Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) -- is more prevalent. However, SSL and S-HTTP have very different designs and goals so it is possible to use the two protocols together. Whereas SSL is designed to establish a secure connection between two computers, S-HTTP is designed to send individual messages securely. Both protocols have been submitted to the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) for approval as a standard.

SHTTP is very important because more and more websites allow money transactions online. Here are several examples : monalbumphoto.fr , pixmania.com, rueducommerce.com …
Those websites have an e commercial activity. You choose a product on the website and then you pay online with a shttp protocole. Then you receive the product you have ordered. This is also very important for all the online mail boxes on which you login (gmail) . Buying a mp3 on a mp3 platform (itunes.com), buying a book on amazon, buying food on www.auchandirect.fr knowing that it secure to payonline. Many companies couldn’t live without shttp.

how would ebay cope with an unsecured transaction protocole ?

RSS allow you to live in the very present

2006-11-01T18:19:00.000+01:00

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication”. It is a simple XML-based system that allows users to subscribe to their favorite websites. Using RSS, webmasters can put their content into a standardized format, which can be viewed and organized through RSS-aware software or automatically conveyed as new content on another website.

Programs known as a feed readers or aggregators can check a list of feeds on behalf of a user and display any updated articles that they find. It is common to find web feeds on major websites and many smaller ones.

My blog works with Atom. Atom is nearly the same process that RSS feeds. My Atom is activated on my website although I don’t actually use actualization feeds knowing that my datas don’t refer to websites (except images and links).

Today, RSS is not only used for website but also for podcasting. You can suscribe to services (such as on itunes.com) that allow you to choose the podcasts that you want automatically downloaded. Thus, for instance, every week you get the last broadcast of your favorite radio show automatically.
The other new way of using RSS is the quick improvements in cell phone technology. The third generation cell phones will soon be able to receive RSS feeds via SMS or mails. This will a good way to see your favorite news or the latest podcasts displayed on your mobile.

This proves that Internet is not dedicated to a computer anymore. Internet spreads over other devices such as mobile but also TV (digital TV).

And what about the e-paper ? This soft screen you can pack. With an integrated wifi connection and RSS feeds you will be able to get the latest personalized news in the morning, when you go to work.

An example of e-paper

cyber war against crime

2006-10-26T16:17:00.000+02:00

Cybercrime is a term used broadly to describe criminal activity in which computers or networks are a tool, a target, or a place of criminal activity. These categories are not exclusive and many activities can be characterized as falling in one or more categories.
Although the term cybercrime is usually restricted to describing criminal activity in which the computer or network is an essential part of the crime. This term is also used to include traditional crimes in which computers or networks are used to enalbe the illicit activity.

Virtual robbery

In the United States, a non profit non governemental and scientific research association was created in order to stop cyber crime. It is called The Computer Crime Research Center (CCRC).
The website displays the different laws existing about cybercrime (such as the Texas Computer Crime Laws since 1985 ). It also inform net users about the actuality of cyber crime.

The actors of cybercrime are mostly called hackers. Several websites such as viruslist.com (http://www.viruslist.com/en/hackers/info) are fighting against them by informing people of the latest viruses and hacking actions on the web.

Recently, a famous 22 year old hacker managed to break the Apple new DRM system.
Amongst the famous cyber crimes stories, in 2000 the FBI website has been attacked by hackers who blocked the website during three hours. According to FBI itself, the hackers didn’t manage to access confidential datas…
In 2003, the new Al Jazeera website has been hacked and blocked during several hours.
In 2000 a famous virus called “I love you” spread across the world attacking many personal computers. This virus was able to scan personal passwords and datas. This is a famous example of privacy violation.

Privacy violation

Personally, I have been attacked once by a virus which neutralized my computer and forced me into rebooting the system. My brother, who recently launched a commercial website, was attacked by hackers who blocked the website during a full day, just for pleasure.

The only efficient protection is to get a firewall in order to block any dangerous download on a personal computer. The problem with anti viruses is that sometimes they update to slowly to be efficient.

Virus !

Youtube

2006-10-26T15:14:00.000+02:00

YouTube is a popular free Video sharing web site which lets users upload, view, and share video clips. The wide variety of site content includes movie and TV clips and music videos, as well as amateur content such as videoblogging.

Youtube was founded in February 2005 by three employees of Paypal : Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim and Stev Chen. The San Bruno based service uses Adobe Flash technology to display video.

Since January, the growth of Youtube was 297%. A few weeks ago, the website reached 100 millions downloads a day. This success story simply started from an idea : giving an answer to a current problem. The founders invented a system allowing the exchange of videos in streaming because they could not send each other videos by mail. They thought this problem was common and they were right.

Personally, I am not a regular user of youtube but I often click on links leading to this videos displayed on the website. I really like the concept because it is a proof of generosity. The problem is that it has been bought by Google in a financial purpose. http://www.tamingthebeast.net/articles6/youtube-success.htm

Learn english online

2006-10-26T12:13:00.000+02:00

Internet is a great way to learn and to discover the world. For over seven years, the website http://www.learnenglish.de/ has been providing internet users with free english lessons. On the website you can download many grammar lessons, vocabulary glossaries. It is also possible to access a forum on which you can ask all the questions you want concerning english. But the website is also a great way to learn more about the anglo saxon culture and History.

Once you have learnt a lesson, you can test your knowledge through various quizzes. The website also allows you to chat with native english including teachers who will help you on special difficulties you encontered.

All of this, for free.

Web awards

2006-10-24T12:03:00.000+02:00

Six communities representing six fundamental values are awarded on the web :

- Generosity : ww.deviantart.com : Deviantart lets everybody share art. Everybody can come and see the work of all the members. The only thing to do is register and create !

- Discipline : www.wikipedia.com : This huge wiki is a way for everybody to contribute to knowledge. But every article published is double checked by somebody else. That is a good example of a self disciplined community

- Patience : www.liveonbankiz.org : on this website you are in charge of a pinguin. This animal needs to eat, to learn and to feel happy. Be patient if you want him to survive

- Perseverance : www.greenpeace.org : fighting for a cause is not that easy. Perseverance has been necessary for greenpeace to be heard concerning environment. And the fight has not been won yet.

Insight : http://enigmes.online.fr : if you want the solution, find it on your own, use your insight.

Comprehension : www.bonjourdefrance.com : a good website to learn French. But needless to say that an intelligent understanding of the subject matters.

Gathering people

2006-10-23T14:52:00.000+02:00

A social network is a social structure made of nodes which are generally individuals or organizations. It indicates the ways in which they are connected through various social familiarities ranging from casual acquaintance to close familial bonds. The term was first coined in 1954 by J. A. Barnes (in: Class and Committees in a Norwegian Island Parish, "Human Relations"). The maximum size of social networks tends to be around 150 people (Dunbar's number) and the average size around 124 (Hill and Dunbar, 2002).

Myspace is a typical example of social networking. You can make blog, display videos and music and interact with all the members of the communities.

Friendset is a social network as well. Each member of the community is a relay to all his friends. Once you have clicked on a profile, you can access the profile of all the friends of you friends. Sometimes you realize that a friend of a friend is also your friend etc. Friendset is a social network where members are linked together.

Friendset logo

As far as I am concerned, I am a member of a special social and belgian network called Parano.
In order to enter the website you must be invited by a friend. The network is a virtual world led by a computer. Members must be happy. Ads are prohibited on this totally independent and free website. You can choose an area (Art, music, photo, your city…) Each member has a color :

- Infra Red : You are a potential liar. You must prove that you are honest and that your interest is happiness.
- Red : You have been upgraded by upper members. You are a member of the community
- Orange : You have more functionalities (access to forums) (I can’t tell more about it).

exclusive picture of The computer, king of Parano community

Those social networks are good because it is a good way to meet people of same interests. It is also a great way of using the possibilities of Internet. The problem is that more and more brands get interested with those communities because they can touch a lot of people easily. That is why myspace has been bought by Rupert Murdoch.

Scheme of a social network

DRM is watching you

2006-10-22T20:27:00.000+02:00

"Would you read a DRM version of Voltaire plays ?"

Digital Rights Management (generally abbreviated to DRM) is any of several technologies used by publishers (or copyright owners) to control access to and usage of digital data (such as software, music, movies) and hardware, handling usage restrictions associated with a specific instance of a digital work. The term often is confused with copy protection and technical protection measures (TPM). These two terms refer to technologies that control or restrict the use and access of digital media content on electronic devices with such technologies installed, acting as components of a DRM design.

Several big brands start to use DRM on digital and non digital devices.
Since March, Sony BMG has been testing out a rollout of content-enhanced copy-protected CDs with at least 10 commercial titles released so far and over 1 million of these discs sold in total. These discs feature a protection known as "sterile burning" developed by First4Internet, in which the original disc allows up to three copies to be made. However the recorded discs cannot be copied as these are also infected with DRM along with PC playable tracks in DRM protected Windows Media Audio files.

DRM also concerns mp3’s which could stop peer to peer traffic. Thomson will soon propose a DRM version of mp3. This can be seen as a revolution in the world of music because it is the first efficient way for music companies to have their money back.

Concerning the digital media players, Microsoft has just released a new DRM version of Windows media player. It is based on the principle of EULA (End User Licence Agreement). All the files can be transfered on the web without any problem. They can be exchanged, published etc. But those files cannot be read without a licence previsously paid on a website which trace all those files.

The Windows Media Player DRM system

The problem is that DRM totally disrespects the principle of freedom on the web. More and more communities get organized to face this phenomenon.

"Would you buy a DRM version of music parts ?"

Furthermore, DRM contents are sometimes so protected that the user needs a special player to read it. Old cd players can be trashed. Where will it stop ?

More and more web pirats start to find out how to disactivate DRM on contents. They are incitated to be more and more efficient to break security.

DRM is contested by a lot of people

DRM also endangers privacy because record houses can trace you as soon as you accept the terms and conditions (EULA)

Web neutrality in danger

2006-10-19T12:20:00.000+02:00

Web neutrality is an extension of the original term « network neutrality ».

Network Neutrality describes networks that don't favor some destinations over others, or classes of application (for example the World Wide Web) over others. Whilst the term is new, the basic concept originated in the age of the telegram in 1860 or even earlier, telegrams were routed 'equally' without attempting to discern their contents and adjusting for one application or another. Such networks are "end-to-end neutral."

One interpretation claims that the Internet is not neutral "as among all applications" since the implementation of best effort generally favors file transfer and other non-time sensitive traffic over real-time communications.

One the web, big websites such as eBay, Yahoo or Google would like to prohibit broadband providers from entering into deals that would, let video from one Web site stream faster than another.

Several websites such as savetheinternet.com hardly defend freedom and neutrality on the web. The problem is that more and more companies start to regulate contents feeds by charging them. Ed Whitacre of AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph Company) recently told Business Week :

« Now what they would like to do is use my pipes free, but I ain't going to let them do that because we have spent this capital and we have to have a return on it. So there's going to have to be some mechanism for these people who use these pipes to pay for the portion they're using. Why should they be allowed to use my pipes? »

Another trend can be observed : recently, several indepedent websites were bought back by investors and companies :

- Google took the control of Youtube
- Rupert Murdoch bought back Myspace.

Rupert Murdoch, one of the richest man in the world

Once money has entered a totally independent platform, it is easy to imagine that return on investment is also part of the deal. Manys ads might appear on those two huge websites. The new owners might restructure youtube and myspace to increase advertising visibility and maybe to offer new services. I would not be astonished to soon see a new premium offer like « download and find faster on youtube for 1$ a month only ».

On one hand, big websites defend neutrality, on the other hand companies take controls of free and independent platforms. Strange but true, Google does both.

Finally, Tim Berners-Lee, the founder of the web characterized the issue as a U.S.-only problem at present. "In Europe, Net neutrality is the rule," he said.

Berners-Lee might be right but how long will it last ? Buying a big community means touching millions of internet users, millions of potential consumers. I think the danger is here, because it is a threat for web neutrality but also for the future of that free network Berners Lee called the web.

The web 2.0 seems to be one of the most recent innovation on the Internet

2006-10-12T11:15:00.000+02:00

Web 2.0, a phrase coined by O'Reilly Media in 2004, refers to a supposed second-generation of Internet-based services — such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies — that let people collaborate and share information online in previously unavailable ways. O'Reilly Media, in collaboration with MediaLive International, used the phrase as a title for a series of conferences and since then it has become a popular (though ill-defined and often criticized) buzzword amongst certain technical and marketing communities.

All the websites using Web 2.0

This new version of the web is hard to define without using technical explanations. That is why I would say Web 2.0 is simply a network based on relations between human beings more than a simple interface between the user and a machine. Web 2.0 includes XML (Extended Mark up Language), a language which bring interactivity to the foreground.

Defining the principle of podcasting

2006-10-12T10:43:00.000+02:00

Podcasting refers to all non binary (non text) downloads on the Internet i.e video, radio broadcasts... The word comes from a portemanteau of broadcast and ipod.

The term "podcasting" was first used in a Guardian article "Audible revolution: Online radio is booming" on February 12, 2004. Adam Curry, who used to work for MTV, and Dave Winer, developer of many personal software and creator of the RSS (Really Simple Syndication).

Technically speaking, podcasting consists in seeking audio and video contents on the Internet (using RSS feeds) in order to centralize them on a single website. It is a very easy way for podcast makers to distribute their creations and for podcast seekers to find a lot of contents.

A streaming video or audio file can’t be considered as a podcast because nobody is able to download it.

2006-10-12T10:28:00.000+02:00