Technogearophilia

OG: Social Plugins

jonolan — Sat, 15 May 2010 13:55:58 +0000

Recently Facebook released a platform, the Open Graph Protocol, which allows websites and applications to share information about users in order to tailor offers, features and services to each one’s interests and tastes.

It enables any web page to become an object in a social graph that can plot users’ activities and to function much as if it was a Facebook page.

The Facebook Developers’ first integration features are called Social Plugins. This is currently a set of eight (8) plugins which can easily be added to any web page or application in order to connect it more closely to Facebook, offer a set of features from Facebook, and take advantage of the Semantic Web that Facebook is developing.

Like Button:
Show a “Like” button on your site which replaces the older “Fan” button. The is currently most commonly used Social Plugin.
Recommendations:
Show users personalized suggestions for pages on your site they might like based upon their history as recorded via the Open Graph Protocol and API.
Login with Faces:
Allow the users to sign up to your site with their Facebook account. it also shows a list of the user’s friends who have also signed up for your site.
Comments:
Allow users to comment on your site. The comments will also be posted back to the users Facebook wall.
Activity Feed:
shows users what their friends are doing on your site through likes and comments.
Like Box:
This is previously known as the Fan box.
Facepile:
Shows profile pictures of the user’s friends who have already signed up for your site.
Live Stream:
Lets your users share activity and comments in real-time as they interact during a live event.

These social plugins allow website developers to create websites that have all or most of the social media functions of Facebook pages. In theory this would not only drive more traffic to Open Graph enabled websites, but also reduce the “bounce rate” by enabling greater interaction with the sites in question.

Open Graph Protocol

jonolan — Tue, 11 May 2010 23:43:30 +0000

Recently Facebook created a platform that allows websites and applications to share information about users in order to tailor offers, features and services to each one’s interests and tastes – even if that individual has never visited the site before. It enables any web page to become an object in a social graph that can plot users’ activities.

It is called the Open Graph Protocol.

From the Facebook Developers:

We shared an update last week about the products launched at f8 and that over 50,000 websites have already implemented the new social plugins to become more personalized. We created the Open Graph protocol in support of social plugins as part of our efforts to help realize the vision of the Open Graph.

Any website can implement the Open Graph protocol. It allows any web page to become a rich object in any social graph, making it easy to find what people are liking across the Web — from a movie to a blog. To start integrating the Open Graph protocol into your Web pages, read our documentation.

The Open Graph Protocol is essentially a replacement for- and an extension of Facebook Connect that makes it easier to share information.

Facebook has based the first version of the Open Graph Protocol on Resource Description Framework (RDFa) produced jointly by the W3C Semantic Web Deployment Working Group and the W3C XHTML2 Working Group in 2008. As such it based upon adding extended META tags to web pages and HTTP-based applications.

Define the XML Namespace

xmlns:fb=”http://www.facebook.com/2008/fbml”>

Define the Node

Initially this will enable, through use of Facebook’s new Social Plugins users interact with websites and have their interactions posted to their live streams / walls on Facebook. In addition to this the Open Graph Protocol allows Facebook to categorize that interaction for the purpose of delivering more targeted ad on the users’ Facebook pages.

Later, but not too much later, many other sites will be able to utilize the Graph API to harvest this data for similar purposes, turning Facebook into the online identity management hub for its more than 400 million active users, 50% of whom login to Facebook every day.

HDTV: Think About It

jonolan — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 10:46:57 +0000

Account Lock-Out

jonolan — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 14:40:56 +0000

Having strong passwords is a key component of information security, but it does have its disadvantages…

Who Gets Locked Out For Guessing My Password Wrong?

Go on! Tell the truth; who gets locked out of your systems, applications, and/or services more often, other people or bots trying to use them or you?

Eggshell Speakers

jonolan — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 13:52:03 +0000

These incredible and precisely crafted eggshell speakers are the brainchild of Japanese Flickr user, Gomhi.

Gomhi’s Eggshell Speakers

Each eggshell houses a Hi Vi B1S speaker driver, giving these DIY novelty speakers a light, crisp sound, though one that their creator described as a bit “narrow” and not particularly well-suited to music with a lot of heavy base sound.

I don’t even want to speculate upon the level of skill and precision it took to cut the shells for the housing. It must have been both painstaking and nerve-wracking work to say the least, since holes for the connectors had to cut and the front had to be cut to exactly match the driver housings in order to avoid buzz.

On the other hand, I’m more than willing to speculate on the possibility and hope that Gomhi will decide to craft a base speaker out of an emu, rhea, or ostrich egg to complete the set and deliver better base sound.

Stand Back!

jonolan — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 12:33:41 +0000

This is a hilarious spin on the classic stereotype of the science geek. I, however,wonder how they got the cat to wear those glasses and that bow tie. Ah well, one should suffer for one’s art…

Stand Back! Iz Going To Do Science!

Funny as it is, it’s wrong. Don’t stand back! Get right up and there and get into the science. Not only is science often fun, but geek is the new chic.

And don’t worry; the tie and glasses are optional.

The BZ Spiral Reaction

jonolan — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 14:30:37 +0000

Seemingly spontaneous creation of order from chaos is a pervasive yet still astounding phenomenon in nature that occurs at all scales, from the quantum to the extremely macro scales of measurement and observation. Yet, since scale must be measured in time as well as size, we can rarely observe this ordering or patterning as it is happening. Humans can most often only observe and measure the resulting patterning, not the process of patterning itself.

Fortunately we can view one example of this phenomenon thanks to work done by Anatol M. Zhabotinsky (2007) Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction. Scholarpedia, 2(9):1435

The Belousov-Zhabotinsky (BZ) reaction is a family of oscillating chemical reactions. During these reactions, transition-metal ions catalyze oxidation of various, usually organic, reductants by bromic acid in acidic water solution. Most BZ reactions are homogeneous. The BZ reaction makes it possible to observe development of complex patterns in time and space by naked eye on a very convenient human time scale of dozens of seconds and space scale of several millimeters. The BZ reaction can generate up to several thousand oscillatory cycles in a closed system, which permits studying chemical waves and patterns without constant replenishment of reactants.

The Belousov-Zhabotinsky Autocatalytic Reaction in progress is shown below:

Belousov-Zhabotinsky Autocatalytic Reaction

The BZ Spiral Reaction is an example of self-organization, a process whereby patterns spontaneously emerge from disordered systems. It is a type of autocatalytic reaction. The reaction starts at random points in the chemical mixture, but a feedback loop is created that triggers more reactions at those same starting places. The reactions then spread out in all directions so you end up with a circular or elliptical wavefront.

The BZ Spiral Reaction allows us to observe the process by which chaotic systems are brought into order. We can then extrapolate with some small measure of surety the apparently similar processes that we cannot directly observe in action.

Such observations are key to unlocking the methodology of the creation of our universe and the later rise of life within it (abiogenesis).

Resources & Reading

Further information on spontaneous patterning arising in nature can be found in Dr. Philip Ball, PhD’s Nature’s Patterns: A Tapestry in Three Parts:

When speaking of the living world, Ball seeks to go beyond the theory of natural selection, which explains why we see certain characteristics (height, shape, camouflage), to find mechanisms that can explain how such characteristics come to be. Again, this is no easy task, but for those willing to follow his discussion, the elegance of nature is laid out in zebras’ stripes, ivy leaves, and butterfly wings. Moving on to find the same patterns at work in the clouds of Jupiter and the cracks in the San Andreas fault give strength to the feeling that there are self-composing structures that guide everything in the universe toward a kind of order.

Wisdom 2.0 Summit

jonolan — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:58:27 +0000

As technology – especially the Internet and Web 2.0 applications / services such as the plethora of Social Media options – advances our lives become both more interconnected and less so at the same time. We’re also more and more inundated with data that we must either ignore or convert into information.

This is changing people’s lives in very profound ways. The entire concept of social and professional interaction has been radically changed / expanded by the 21st century’s rapid-fire advances in communication methodologies.

Many people do not know how to use and/or balance their lives against the new technologies. Many of the older generations are distrustful of the new paradigm, and many of the younger generations are so trusting of it and inundated by it that they use it without thought or conscious direction – perhaps to their and society’s detriment.

Some technology leaders and social scientists have noticed this and desire to take steps to correct these problems. Hence the upcoming Wisdom 2.0 Summit in Silicon Valley, CA at the end of April, 2010.

The Wisdom 2.0 conference is a one-of-a-kind event that brings together people from a variety of disciplines, including technology leaders, Zen teachers, neuroscientists, and academics to explore how we can live with deeper meaning and wisdom in our technology-rich age.

The great challenge of our age is not only to live connected to one another through technology, but to do so in ways that are beneficial to our own well-being, effective in our work, and useful to the world. The conference was developed to explore this and related issues.

The conference is for people who want to say yes to a connected life, and also yes to meaningful and effective one. If you are interested in the potential of technology, and wish to engage with it wisely, the Wisdom 2.0 conference may be right for you.

The first two days will include speakers, panels, and short presentations. The third day is devoted to a participant-directed unconference to explore specific subjects of interest. More information is below or click here to register.

They have an interesting mix of speakers for the event, which they describe as an “unconference.” Many business and technology leaders will be present, along with others who are more focused on how people live their lives and why they do so in the way in which they do.

Wisom 2.0 Summit Speakers

The event begins at 1pm on Friday April 30th, and runs all day Saturday. There is also a participant-directed “unconfernce” day on Sunday, May 2nd. It will be held at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley, 1401 North Shoreline Boulevard, Mountain View, CA‎.

Devils’ Cancer Catching

jonolan — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 14:10:08 +0000

The Tasmanian Devil (Sarcophilus harrisii) is a carnivorous marsupial now found in the wild only in the Australian island state of Tasmania. The Tasmanian Devil is the only extant member of the genus Sarcophilus.

It is also on the brink of extinction.

The existential threat facing the Tasmanian Devil is not anthropogenic in origin. The devils are suffering from a epidemic of cancer which has afflicted and killed over 70% of their wild population. Unless something can be done halt the cancer, Devil Facial Tumour Disease (DFTD) is expected to kill off the Tasmanian Devil within the next 25 – 50 years.

What is completely unique about DFTD is that it is contagious. The Tasmanian Devils are facing extinction from a transmissible form of cancer. They are literally experiencing and epidemic of cancer.

At least scientists have now discovered the nature of the cancer involved in DFTD.

Scientists have discovered the true identity of a contagious form of cancer that is killing Tasmanian devils. The cancer, called devil facial tumor disease, stems from cells that normally insulate nerve fibers, a new study shows.

Genetic analysis of tumors taken from infected devils in different parts of Tasmania reveals that these insulating cells, known as Schwann cells, became cancerous in a single Tasmanian devil and have since passed to other devils, an international group of researchers reports in the Jan. 1 Science.

Previously, scientists had suspected that a virus might be the source of the infection, but the new study confirms that cancer cells themselves are transmitted from devil to devil.

Knowing the origin of the contagious tumors could help conservationists diagnose the disease more accurately and may eventually lead to a vaccine that would target tumor proteins, says Katherine Belov, a geneticist at the University of Sydney who was not involved with the project.

A vaccine against the facial tumor disease, “while now pie in the sky, in 10 years might not be,” says Gregory Hannon, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island, N.Y. “Ten years might be enough time” to save the devils from extinction, he says.

– Tina Hesman Saey

As terrifying and freakish as the thought of a contagious cancer is, this is a phenomenon that is restricted to species such as the Tasmanian Devil – and possibly the Cheetah – whose populations have essentially no genetic diversity. They’re so genetically similar to one another that cells, cancerous or not, transmitted between individual animals are not recognized as foreign invaders.

Hopefully though, this new discovery of the form of the cancer ravaging the Tasmanian Devils may enable scientists to develop either a vaccine or a treatment for the animals and thereby save the species from extinction.

When Do Wires Tangle?

jonolan — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 18:53:48 +0000

With only the most rare of exceptions, anytime one has to deal with computers or home electronics, the cables and wires end up being tangled.

Reasons Why Wires Get Tangled

From my experience, the above seems to be quite accurate – and funny.