More on False Identities /Alternative Identities

As a follow up on a my post of 4th January regarding reports in the Melbourne Age. Check out this story from Jim’s Marketing Blog. Not everything is as it seems
You also need to be aware of changes to photographs using programs such as Photoshop and the like. Now I am not anti making a few changes to hide the odd blemish , but this guy seems to have gone over the top .

Question: How does it make you feel if this happens to you? Do you still do business with the person concerned or has all trust gone out the window?

PS: I am not skilled enough with Photoshop, so unfortunately the photo in the previous post is me warts and all.

 

Module 1 – Reflections

For me Module 1 bought together in one place the structure of the Internet. Over the years I was aware of the hardware, software and “wetware” ( a new term for me but defined simply as the human element).
According to Merriam-Webster the definition is ” the human brain or a human being considered especially with respect to human logical and computational capabilities.”

I was aware of the various protocols , but had no real understanding of how they all interacted. I suppose the best analogy I can use is that of a car driver, who can turn on the key and drive, but has no real idea of what happens under the bonnet. I suspect that most of us are like that.

The actual tasks performed in this module were pretty straight forward.  We needed to interact with remote computers via telnet and FTP. These pieces of software have been around since the beginnings of the internet to allow the early users to interact with remote computers. Telnet itself has not changed and although replaced by SSH (due to security issues over large networks)  is still used today as a solid network trouble shooting tool (Telnet.org)

Traceroute and ping tasks gave me an appreciation of how information is transported around the world. The information  about routing becomes important when tracing where bottle necks are in the transfer of information. This type of information can also be used in trcing the origin of spam. Although spammers do seem to have ways of hiding where the original mail comes from. (more of that in Module 2).

Although not strictly a Module  1 topic, a thread on the WEBCT regarding the learning log (specifically Virtuual Personality) caught my attention. This topic was really about the difference between web(written) communication and verbal communication.  The question was how well can you get to know somebody online.

Over many years we have been conditioned to verbal communications. The benefit is that in a face-to-face situation you are able to read a person’s body language and pick up on any intonations in speech. In fact there have been multiple books and article on Body Language. The  one that readily comes to mind is  Alan Pease, although there are no doubt many other presenters on this subject.

When you are reading you do not have this benefit, you depend on the author to write what they truly mean.  But I digress, many people are intimidated by writing. Even so, there are times when writing is the best way to communicate, and oftentimes the only way to get your message across.(www.mindtools.com).

I have always been able to draft proposals and other technical documents, but my downfall  has been to sit in front of a keyboard and express personal opinions. This unit is making me sit up and reflect, and turn that reflection into words to not only a small class of fellow students  but to any one of billions of people on the internet in the form of a blog.  This is daunting.  Everything that you write can be found on the internet.

I once did a google search on my name. I was astounded by the information that was out there. There is nothing I am ashamed , in fact I try to live a life of “no regrets”. Now that I am writting a blog the information linked to my name will obviously increase. SCARY.

 

Hello world!

This blog is designed to meet the requirements of NET 11 The Internet – Communications offered by Open Universities Australia and conducted by Curtin University of Technology. The content will mainly consist of learning outcomes, personal thoughts regarding my learning experiences (good , bad and ugly) as well as useful and relevant links to resources found on the internet.

I have never tried to create a blog, I have read blogs by others on my favourite subject (cycling) see for example Blogscrement. I have also had a quick look at some of the blogs set up for this unit.

Before I started this exercise , a decision had to be made as to what software to chose. Accordingly I googled blog software. Sitepoint, a site I was familiar with from NED 11 reviewed WordPress. What I like about the review was the suggestion that it was very easy to install and secondly it was open source software. I have a belief that the internet should be accessible for all and that proprietary code should be avoided where possible.

There are many articles on the blogger versus wordpress “war” but in summary it seemed to me that it was a matter of personal preference.   If I had Google mail and subscribed to Picasa I would probably have used Blogger, but as I utilise  Flickr and actually own my own domain name, I decided to try WordPress.

On the whole I fould it easy to set up and start using. I managed to work out how to write and edit a post as well as to customise the image used as a heading without reading any FAQ or utilising the forum. I did eventually decide to keep the default image as some of my photos were not quite right to use at this point of time. This will change as the blog develops.