Posts by Terrence Obrien at Switched

Cell Phone Soap Operas Promote Safe Sex

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 6th 2009 at 1:05PM

Let's be frank. No one gets all that excited at the idea of safe sex and the mention of condoms. But if you're out there having unprotected sex you're a moron.

Sorry to be blunt, dear readers, but it's true, and everyone has been trying to tell you this for years and you're still not listening. But while we're resorting to name calling and verbal abuse, others like Rachel Jones, a professor of Nursing at Rutgers University, are creating more innovative campaigns to encourage people to practice safe sex.

Jones, using a grant from Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey and the National Institutes of Health, filmed a series of twelve twenty minute soap operas to be distributed online and via cell phone. The episodes tell tales of infidelity and risky behavior amongst urban women. Jones is conducting a study in which women will watch the stories over a period of time that deliver a message encouraging safe sex in order to find out if the rate of risky behavior, such as having unprotected sex, decreases in the subjects.

You can check out the double length pilot episode here. The rest be released over the coming weeks and months. [From: Fox News]

Parents Joining Facebook, Kids Horrified

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 6th 2009 at 12:01PM

You knew it was going to happen sooner or later. Ever since Facebook opened itself up to anyone with an e-mail address, back in September of 2007, it was only a matter of a time before everyone's parents started to join the social networking site, forcing kids everywhere into the awkward position of dealing with friend requests from mom and dad. The former student-only refuge has seen its over college-age population explode as employers, companies, educators, and yes, even parents, have flocked to the site, which developed a reputation as being safer and more adult friendly than the teen-dominated haunts of MySpace.

Of course, college and high school students who were accustomed to Facebook being their impregnable online fortress for posting pictures of their drunken antics have started complaining, loudly, to anyone who will listen (and many who won't). Many students have simply decided not to accept their family members, or to set different privacy filters to keep family from viewing certain parts of their profiles.

We actually understand the frustration over the loss of an online haven, but such is life. Besides, if it's something you wouldn't want your parents to see, it probably shouldn't be posted online -- we've got a feeling potential employer's wouldn't be thrilled to see it either. [From: Neatorama and ABC News]

Phishing Scams Plague Twitter

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 5th 2009 at 5:15PM

Twitter has been a haven for spam for quite some time now, but only now has the first truly serious phishing scam involving the service has been identified.

The Twitter Eng and Ops teams identified a scam involving direct messages being sent from hijacked accounts that included a link to a page designed to look exactly like the Twitter login screen. Of course, the page is a fake and entering your username and password into the screen allows the scammers to take over your account and send the same message to your friends on the service.

So keep an eye out for direct messages with suspicious links, like the current message going around that claims to be "a funny blog about you!" And double check the address bar to make sure you're about to log into "Twitter.com" and not some other domain name that just happens to have the word "Twitter" in it. [From: Twitter Blog and Download Squad]

Internet Explorer Continues to Tumble in Market Share

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 2nd 2009 at 4:21PM

Ok, maybe it's a bit early to start playing 'Taps' over the corpse of Microsoft, but there is reason to believe that a little thing called "the Internet" is slowly hacking away at the computing giant.

Stats for November show browser behemoth Internet Explorer taking another hit in browser market share, dipping below 70-percent, while Firefox held on to more that 20-percent of global market share for the first time ever. A 50-percent market share gap may seem like an unquestionable dominance, but consider that only five years ago Microsoft's browser accounted for 90-percent of global Internet traffic.

Browsers like Safari, Firefox, and even upstart Chrome spank IE when it comes to speed, features, and standards compliance, but the real reason users are defecting from IE probably has to do with its terrible record on security. Years of advice from security experts, blogs (like this one), and geeky nephews have prompted more and more people to start using other browsers at home and in the workplace.

The battle is far from over, but it seems pretty clear to us that Firefox, and companies like Google, are leading us into a post-Microsoft world. [From: Silicon Alley Insider]

How to Cook Up a Super Mario-style 1UP Mushroom Burger

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 2nd 2009 at 3:32PM

Give Yourself Extra Lives with 1UP Mushroom Burger

We haven't figured out if eating these 1UP burgers will actually give us extra lives, but we can guarantee that we will be cooking up plenty of these in the Switched kitchen in the coming days.

Potential genius, Karen Chu, has posted instruction on the DIY resource Instructables.com detailing how to create a mushroom burger that looks like the life-giving 1UP mushroom from 'Super Mario Bros.' Creating the burgers takes a little time, but they don't seem particularly difficult to make. Of course, you could make it even easier by simply using ground chuck (accept no substitutes!) to make nice round burgers of your own instead of the veggie patties included in this recipe.

All you need is some mozzarella, green food coloring, and some nice big round buns. Now get cracking, and let us know if you come right back to life the next time you have a run-in with a goomba. [From: Instructables, Via: Neatorama]

Next: The Worst Game to Movie Translations

Popular Online College Application Service Clogged By Procrastinators

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 2nd 2009 at 2:49PM

Online college applications are one of the greatest gifts to lazy, procrastinating high school seniors around the country. Of course, now everyone can literally wait till the last moment to apply for schools, and this year that is exactly what happened.

Common Application, a site that handles applications for 350 different colleges and universities, was inundated with more than 171,000 apps between December 30 and January 1. The load of last minute submissions, combined with poor planning that scheduled upgrades during those final days, brought the site to a crawl that left many students waiting for several minutes for page refreshes and hours for applications to be successfully submitted to the site.

Parents and hopeful applicants quickly flocked to College Confidential, a site for students to voice concerns and frustrations, to vent about the failure of the site. Seth Allen, president of the Common Application, said that, "having an online application has exacerbated waiting till the last minute."

Allen may have a point, and maybe some of these students will learn a valuable lesson about procrastination (though we doubt it), but more than anything, this incident points out the potential pitfalls of our increasing reliance on online systems. [From: New York Times]

Text Messaging Key to Saving Endangered Languages

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 2nd 2009 at 10:12AM

There are 6,912 identified languages spoken around the world. Some languages, only spoken by tiny pockets of populations, are in danger of disappearing thanks to an increasingly global society that is focused on modern western languages like English and Spanish.

One way advocates believe these languages, an important part of local history and culture, can stave off extinction is with text messaging software. It may seem odd, but what language can truly stay relevant in the modern world if it can't be used for text messages?

Companies, like Nuance Corp., are working on developing predictive text software for cell phones, similar to the T9 package that is standard fare on all U.S. handsets, for smaller market languages. There are unique challenges to overcome, however. Languages like Hindi, which has 45 characters, and Gaelic, which uses various accent marks, are difficult to type on a 12 key number pad which is why texting is often done in English, even in countries where English isn't the official language.

Linguists believe making local languages reasonable to use for text messaging is key to preventing them from disappearing from the face of the Earth. After all who actually communicates via voice calls anymore? [From: Wall Street Journal]

California Texting While Driving Ban Takes Effect. Happy New Year!

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 2nd 2009 at 9:15AM

With the ringing in of the new year, California became the latest state to ban texting while driving, joining the likes of New Jersey and Tennessee. California already passed a ban on teens texting and driving back in August, but now the law has been extended to all drivers regardless of age.

So what exactly is banned under the new law? Any manual communication while operating a motor vehicle is illegal. That means no sending or reading text messages, IMs, or e-mail while driving. And make sure you hit that send button before you start moving -- if you draft an e-mail while parked, but wait to hit send till you're already moving, you are in violation of the law. This ban also extends to browsing the Internet or watching television.

There are no exceptions or technicalities to get you out of this one. Touch screen or QWERTY keyboards won't make a difference. Neither will a red light or traffic jam. If you're in the driver's seat in a lane of traffic tapping out a message, you'll get slapped with a $20 fine for your first infraction, and $50 for each subsequent violation.

Hit the read link for even more answers to questions about the new ban. [From: LA Times]

Georgia Sex Offenders Must Hand Over Passwords

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 1st 2009 at 4:30PM

Georgian Sex Offenders Must Hand Over Passwords

From our "well intentioned, but crossing the line" file comes the tale of a law that will go into effect January 1, 2009 in Georgia that requires registered sex offenders to hand over usernames and passwords for any online service they subscribe to.

The law is aimed at ensuring that sex offenders do not use the Internet to prey upon children or in other inappropriate ways. Of course, there are privacy and security concerns. Critics say that the law violates the privacy of sex offenders who have served their time in prison, and that it will put an untenable burden on law enforcement official to track the online activities of thousands of registrants.

Continue reading Georgia Sex Offenders Must Hand Over Passwords

Scientists Developing Molecule Sized Computers

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 1st 2009 at 12:30PM

Those crazy scientists are at it again, trying to shrink electronics down to impossible sizes. A group called the Pico-Inside Project have made great advances towards making molecular computing a reality. The group has developed a simple circuit that consists of 30 atoms, performing the same function as 14 transistors, which are about 1,000 times larger than an atom.

The goal of the team is create entire circuits the size of a molecule, enabling systems more powerful that the fastest of todays super-computers to fit in to your pants pocket. Imagine: A smart phone advanced enough to decode the human genome in your pocket. Unnecessary? Probably. Exciting? Definitely. [From: Science Daily, Via: Slashdot]

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