Google Evil Capitalist Or Just Avoid Google

Google evil capitalist and you won’t find Google. Google Evil Capitalist Or Just Avoid Google

But that should be no surprise as Google has apparently been skewing its searches for some time at the expense of its competitors.

The company that gives off a hip, anti-capitalist “Don’t Be Evil” vibe is unhip, capitalist and pretty evil, according to an investigation by  the Federal Trade Commission in 2012 that was  made public yesterday, March 19, by the Wall Street Journal.

The  FTC’s Bureau of Competition found evidence that Google deliberately demoted rivals and boosted its own services at the expense of local businesses (that would be the little guys), shopping websites, and travel websites by changing ranking criteria and  removing content from those sites.

The FTC bigwigs, however, decided not to sue Google saying that  while it posed  “real harm to consumers and to innovation” it “doesn’t violate the American antitrust laws.”

CNN Money speculates that the feds just thought it was  going to be a tough case.

We, however, will note without comment that the company’s billionaire principles Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt are all huge donors to the Democrat Party and Barack Obama, with Schmidt actually being involved in the Obama administration.

We would suggest that one use for seraches DuckDuckGo, a scrappy Paoli-based company reputed for its respect of privacy, and Firefox in lieu of Chrome as one’s browser.

Google Evil Capitalist Or Just Avoid Google

OTT Supplanting Texting

eMarketer.com notes that 7.47 trillion text  messages were sent worldwide last year via short message service or SMS. This is up from 761 billion in 2004 but down from 7.7 trillion in 2012. OTT Supplanting Texting

What is supplanting them is over-the-top or OTT mobile messaging services which are done using services provided by companies like Facebook and Google rather than cell phone companies.

Last year, about 10 trillion OTT messages were sent. eMarkter estimates that by 2018 there will be 67 trillion of these messages sent and that traditional text messages will fall to 6.3 trillion.

OTT Supplanting Texting

Symbolics.Com Turned 30

Yesterday, March 15, was the 30th Anniversary of  .com. Symbolics.Com Turned 30

Yes, it was on March 15, 1985 that Symbolics, a computer manufacturer,  registered Symbolics.com, the first .com address.

While the pioneering company has since passed into history, the name is still active  having been acquired by XF.com Investments of Dallas in 2009, because its principle always wanted the oldest name on the net.

Symbolics.Com Turned 30

 

Curt Shilling Rocks Defending Daughter

If Curt Shilling, our favorite all-time Phillie, needed yet another reason for his deserved inclusion into the Hall of Fame, the rousing defense of his daughter, Gabriella, last week against cyber-bullies is an excellent one. Curt Shilling Rocks Defending Daughter

Curt tweeted, Feb. 25, a short proud papa note about Gabriella’s acceptance by Salve Regina University in Rhode Island and how she will be pitching for the softball team.

Well, the next week brought froth the vilest comments on Twitter regarding the young girl.

He noted the worst of the worst came from males attending college including college athletes; a vice president of a fraternity at Montclair State University, and college radio disc jockey.

He said it was not hard to find their identities. He said they were “pretty much ALL white, affluent, college attending children, and I mean children.”

He said he informed the athletes’ coaches and several were suspended and made to apologize.

“Gone was the tough guy tweeter, replaced by the “I’m so sorry apology used by those only sorry because they got caught,” Curt said. “It was EXACTLY like the Scared Straight episodes you watch where “tough” kids get brought to tears when they face the real world.”

He noted that some of this crap is going to follow these guys forever and deservedly.

Curt is an outspoken conservative Republican. The ones attacking his daughter don’t like him. We suspect they get their cues from David Letterman, Bill Maher and Jon Stewart. We suspect that  easy access to abortion is the political issue most dear to their hearts.

And we are certain that those proclaiming that conservatives “wage war on women” are just fine with having them as friends and allies.

To read Curt’s rant (language warning applicable as he posts some of the tweets against his daughter verbatim) go to his blog 38 pitches.wordpress.com.

Hat tip Carlos Perez at PJMedia.com

Curt Shilling Rocks Defending Daughter

Toomey Opposes Internet Regulation

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) has declared opposition to the Obama Administration’s recent assumption of internet regulation. Toomey Opposes Internet Regulation

“The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted that the Internet is a utility the government can heavily regulate,” he said. “This is terrible news for the American people. The last thing the Internet needs is a massive government takeover that threatens innovation, economic freedom, and jobs. Yet the FCC’s decision to impose heavy-handed regulations on broadband providers would do just that. The FCC’s decision is a big government, legally suspect solution in search of a problem that doesn’t exist.

“One of the main reasons why the Internet has thrived, created jobs, and provided exciting innovations is because it has never been subject to political control. That is why I intend to fight against this unwise FCC action and keep our Internet free from more government restrictions.”

He said he discussed the matter on Feb. 26 with WHP radio’s RJ Harris that can be heard here.

Toomey Opposes Internet Regulation

World Retail Sales To Reach $22 Trillion

Worldwide retail sales are exptect to reach $22.49 trillion this year reports eMarket.com, and online sales are expected to hit $1.59 trillion.

China is expected to be the world leader in internet retail sales at $315.75 billion followed by the United States at $264.28 billion and the United Kingdom at $70.39 billion.

World Retail Sales To Reach $22 Trillion

2 Billion Smartphone Users

The number of smartphone users worldwide will be 2.16 billion in 2016, according to  eMarketer.com and smartphones will be 46 percent of the world’s mobile phones.
That means most people next year will have a mobile phone of some sort.
2 Billion Smartphone Users

Internet Killed The Radio Star

eMarketerDaily.com reports that an Edison Research study showed that those under 18 listen to internet music streaming platforms such as Pandora and Spotify  64 minutes per day vs. 53 minutes per day of broadcast radio and online streams of AM/FM stations.

AM/FM led by a “significant margin” among all other age groups.
It appears, though, the radio star is finally about to get killed but not by video.

Internet Killed The Radio Star

Internet Killed The Radio Star

 

 

Internet Passes Old Media In Trust

eMarketer.com reports that the internet has passed the old media in trust. Bill Lawrence -- Internet Passes Old Media In Trust

A survey by the Edelman public relations firm shows that 64 percent of internet users world wide trusted online search engines, up 1 point from the previous year, versus 62 percent who trusted traditional media, down 3 points from last year.

Less than half those surveyed — 48 percent — trusted social media.

Internet Passes Old Media In Trust

Internet Posts May Not Be Forever

“The internet is forever” is a trope and a warning to the young (and others) regarding to take care about what one posts to the world.

While the wisdom is obvious about what one chooses to post to the world, internet posts may not be forever, after all.

The New Yorker’s Jill Lepore has an article this week pointing out the difficulties the experts have in archiving the World Wide Web.

It notes that pages die, are moved and, most significantly, overwritten hence making it hard, maybe even impossible, to find documents once posted.

This has become a problem in academia, technology and especially law.

A study conducted last year at Harvard Law School showed that more than 70 percent of of the URLs cited in the footnotes of the Harvard Law Review and other journals, and 50 percent of the URLs within United States Supreme Court opinions do no link to the original cited information, as per Ms. Lepore.

This makes the footnotes useless and the opinions unsupported.

Maybe it is best to not let dead tree record keeping die, after-all, while “paperless” is a trope that should.

Internet Posts May Not Be Forever

Internet Posts May Not Be Forever