Archive for the ‘Politics, Religion, and other lost causes’ Category
05/15/2018
There’s one more day to contact your senators and tell them you’d like to keep the old rules which promote net neutrality. In other words ask them to reject the new FCC rules. They have the power to do it.
The issue is simply, the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) want to control how things get to you over the internet. Under the new rules, the ISPs can “throttle down”, slow, individual services which come to you. What are these services? Well they’re things like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, ESPN or even this blog. Why would they do this? Well the ISPs have plans to develop their own content and naturally just might want to provide you with better service for content they sell and slower service for their competitors. Or they might just not like what some people are saying and slow that down to yesterday.
You can do something about it by urging your senators to override the new FCC rules. There’s only one more senator needed in the Senate to start the process to overturn the new FCC rules.
Here are two links to help explain what’s going on and to help you get in touch with your senators. It’s pretty easy to do.
https://creativecommons.org/2018/05/09/red-alert-for-net-neutrality/
https://www.battleforthenet.com/redalert/?org=dp
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Tags:net neutrality
Posted in Politics, Religion, and other lost causes | Leave a Comment »
05/10/2018
Next week the US Senate will vote whether to override the new FCC (Federal Communications Commission) rules which would eliminate the internet as we know it today. You may have noticed your Netflix monthly charge is going up $1 and that your Amazon Prime charge is going up 20%. Both raises have taken place since the FCC passed the new rules which will allow an ISP (Internet Service Provider) to charge Netflix, Amazon and other companies providing content over the internet more to maintain the same service as they had prior to the new rules. That includes even bloggers. You see how it works. If content providers have to pay more, eventually you’re going to pay more.
You can do something about it by urging your senators to override the new FCC rules. There’s only one more vote needed in the Senate to start the process to overturn the new FCC rules.
Here are two links to help explain what’s going on and to help you get in touch with your senators. It’s pretty easy to do.
https://creativecommons.org/2018/05/09/red-alert-for-net-neutrality/
https://www.battleforthenet.com/redalert/?org=dp
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Tags:net neutrality
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01/26/2018
Women’s March 2018
Life not varied enough? Click here.
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Tags:photography, photos, postaday, postaweek, street photography, variations on a theme, weekly photo challenge, women's march 2018
Posted in Photos, Politics, Religion, and other lost causes | 4 Comments »
12/20/2017
December 20, 2017
Net neutrality lost last week, as expected, and so did this blog. See previous post here. Although unscientific, for the two days I had the WordPress “net slow down” simulation plugin enabled, there was roughly a 7% drop in page views compared to the two days before and the two days after. I strongly suspect that page views would’ve dropped even further if I had kept the “slow down” simulation active for more days.
If you’re a blogger or a reader that wants to keep the internet alive with different and varied content, the battle for net neutrality continues. The alternative to a neutral internet is to make the internet a place where you pay to see even more advertisements and limited content that someone else decides is what you like.
https://www.battleforthenet.com
Emoji courtesy of FML at Wikimedia
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Tags:democracy, first amendment, geek, internet, isp, nerd, net neutrality, tech
Posted in Politics, Religion, and other lost causes, Wordpress | Leave a Comment »
12/13/2017
December 13, 2017
Tomorrow the FCC votes to end net neutrality. You can help stop that vote. Click on the link below to see how.
https://www.battleforthenet.com/
As an analogy, look at it this way. If you buy a pair of shoes, should the shoe company be able to tell you what day of the week you can wear them? That’s basically what the FCC wants to happen with the internet. You can help stop that.
What is net neutrality? Net neutrality is a current policy which prevents your internet service from controlling how the internet is used. The FCC wants to end that policy, thus allowing your cable or phone company to control what and how internet content gets to your phone or your home. You pay for your internet service, why should someone tell you how you’re able to use it? Companies which send internet content pay to use their internet service to send that content. Why should someone be able stop or slow down what they pay for?
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Tags:democracy, first amendment, geek, internet, isp, nerd, net neutrality, tech
Posted in Politics, Religion, and other lost causes, Wordpress | 1 Comment »
05/31/2017
Electrons are fleeting as they go about their daily duties. The ants in the world of physics, these little guys are constantly on the move. Whether lighting a room, pushing the Tesla to visit grandma, or holding a molecule together, electrons are tireless in their tasks.
You can do good by capturing fleeting moments of their work. While you sleep or go about your daily duties the spare time of your computers, tablets and phones can help find the answers to important questions which affect your lives and all the lives around you.
The World Community Grid sponsors projects which use the spare computing time of your devices to find, e.g., cures to childhood cancer or medicines which help fight Ebola. There are other projects you can sign up for with similar good causes. You can read about and sign up for the World Community Grid here.
Similar sponsors as the World Community Grid from around the world are also available running many other projects. One of them even searches for intelligent extraterrestrial life. All the projects run under the BOINC app. Information for other sponsors, their projects and BOINC is available here.
The BOINC app runs on your Android, Windows, Mac OS X or Linux (Intel) device. I’ve been running this on two of my Android devices, an older tablet and a newer phone for about 3 months now. The app is very aware of battery level, internet connection and processor activity. It can be set to only run when; the battery is over a certain charge percentage and charging, the device is connected to a wired network and when the processors are below 50% activity. Those settings are adjustable to your needs. The app can be suspended at any time also.
This post was in response to Evanescent.
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Tags:android app, app store, bionc, do good, internet, Linux, photography, photos, postaday, postaweek, weekly photo challenge, Windows, worldwide computing grid
Posted in Photos, Politics, Religion, and other lost causes, Wordpress | Leave a Comment »
05/08/2017
May 8, 2017
As a blogger this is important to you. We all depend on the Internet to fairly present our content to the world. The rules which now require Internet Service Providers (ISP) to treat all content equally are about to be stripped away. If the rules are stripped away that leaves it up to the various ISPs (ATT, Verizon, Comcast, etc.) to decide which content gets priority through the Internet. Priority could be tied to who pays the ISP more to deliver content. Or it could be tied to the ‘importance’ of the content. Or it could be tied to, “that ISP just doesn’t like you.” In short, what is now a fair system that operates without technical problems, can be changed to one that controls what goes over the Internet. You’ve probably read about how that kind of control is applied in other countries.
So take a few minutes now to express your thoughts to the FCC. I know they’ll appreciate them.
Read my submitted comments below. This post was in response to WPC Danger!.
P.S. – As I’m about to post this, the FCC site is experiencing difficulties. Maybe they haven’t paid their ISP?
(more…)
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Tags:democracy, first amendment, geek, internet, isp, nerd, net neutrality, photography, photos, postaday, postaweek, tech, weekly photo challenge
Posted in Photos, Politics, Religion, and other lost causes, Wordpress | 2 Comments »
There’s one more day to contact your senators and tell them you’d like to keep the old rules which promote net neutrality. In other words ask them to reject the new FCC rules. They have the power to do it.
Ain't Found A Good Title Blog 
