This is a new game by Yahoo that allows you to measure the buzz level of a technology through share investment by players. You can play in diverse markets, such as which is the best Linux ditribution (Fedora seems to be at the forefront), the best MMORPG (World of Warcraft), Read more
The Washington Post has an article about Creative Commons, featuring interviews with Lessig and Cory Doctorow. This seems to be the watershed that demonstrates that the movement has become mainstream. The article emphasises the many commercial uses of the movement. Does this mean that Creative Commons is not cool any Read more
Lessig has claimed that he will never again publish in a journal that is not published through some sort of open access licence, preferably a CC BY-NC licence (Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial. This raises an interesting point. Why should we academics give away our copyright when publishing in “traditional” paper journals? Read more
Search engine optimisation is an art, and people get paid a lot of money to do it. There are now some firms that offer all sorts of services to make sure that your website can be found near the top in Google and other search engines. Why is it so Read more
An article in today’s Guardian warns about the growing dangers of cybercrime. From phishing to eBay fraud, organised crime is increasingly using the internet to promote some criminal activities. Although this is a growing development, there seems to be a certain luddite stream running through these articles. It is almost Read more
Here is the list of contents: Editorial: – Laureation for Honorary Degree of LL.D: Professor W R Cornish, Professor Hector MacQueen, p.1. Special feature: – Identifying Risks: National Identity Cards, Wendy M. Grossman, pp.2-17. Peer-reviewed articles: – The Significance of UNESCO’s Universal Declaration on the Human Genome & Human Rights, Read more
Phishing, you ask? Phishing is soo 2004. Pharming is the latest craze amongst the trendy cybercriminals. Pharming is an attack that resembles a virus, it changes the host files in a computer – files that interpret the URL that you input in the browser. The site then takes you to Read more
The main Scottish universities have signed the Scottish Declaration on Open Access, organised by OATS (Open Access Team for Scotland; what a great acronym). Timothy O’Shea, the Principal at the University of Edinburgh, said that “The University of Edinburgh wants to ensure that its research is as visible as possible Read more
It seems like the story about virtual sweatshops is true after all. Romanian workers play computer games for 10 hours a day to produce virtual goods in MMORPGs which are later sold through eBay or through other websites such as Gamersloot. In those places you can buy powerful accounts, virtual Read more
(Warning: the article is entitled “Patently absurd”, I had never seen that title before!) This is an article by John Naughton about software patents (yes, I know I promised that I would not write about software patents again, but I can’t stop myself). Although the article is an adequate introduction Read more