This Is A Problem

This is identity theft and must also be a violation of their terms as well

I just got this email at Facebook:

There is another profile on here sending out friend requests with your name and picture on it. I don’t know what they’re up to but I thought you should know.

Great.

I sent an email to Facebook. This is identity theft and must also be a violation of their terms as well. Meanwhile, because the only way I can identify the account is through the name and there are other Geoff Foxes on Facebook, this is going to be cumbersome.

Berry Confused

A friend with a Blackberry 8320 smashed its pretty face against something. Cracked lens! By the time I told him he could fix it, he’d replaced it! Now it’s mine. Fixing the lens was easy–and I’m a major klutz.

It was originally on T-Mobile. It’s been unlocked, so it can go on AT&T and the phone and texting works fine.

It mostly works OK for Twitter and Facebook and some other apps, but when I go to use the browser I’m told: “This is a Wi-Fi service. Please ensure your device has an active Wi-Fi connection and try again.”

I have a plan from AT&T which includes data, though I haven’t moved this to their Blackberry plan yet (for my daughter, there was no cost differential). I see “edge” not “EDGE” which I believe enters into this.

Anyone know how to fix this?

Best Blow Off

Dude — If I had those guns I’d never wear a shirt.

I have mentioned before, I ‘ignore’ most non-real life friends who try and friend me on Facebook. Often I’ll send a note. I get it. I appreciate their thought.

Here’s the best note I’ve ever sent:

Dude — If I had those guns I’d never wear a shirt.

Alas, I have decided to keep Facebook for my real life friends. I hope you don’t mind, because you could obviously beat the living crap out of me.

All the best,

Geoff Fox

Saying No To Friendship

An ex-girlfriend asked to be my friend. That’s a girlfriend about 30 years removed. It was an awkward decision. Friend or no?

I turned down 43 people on Facebook today (that’s a few days worth–I’m not that popular). I sent each of them a note explaining. I wonder if that makes any difference?

Is there an etiquette guide to Facebook friends yet? Someone should write it.

An ex-girlfriend asked to be my friend. That’s a girlfriend about 30 years removed. It was an awkward decision. Friend or no? I said yes hoping that was the end of it. So far it is.

Someone I disliked in college tried to friend me. Ignore.

In my note I said “Thanks for the friend request which I really appreciate. I hope you don’t mind but I am trying to keep my Facebook account for friends from ‘real life.’

At least one copy of that note went to someone I actually knew. Oops.

Kristin Says I Look Like Ashton

I don’t see it, but Kristin said I should put the two photos on the blog to let you decide.

Kristin, our nightside web producer, stopped me as I was walking back to my desk after dinner. She wanted to know about the photo (below) which is my Facebook profile picture.

I was 25. It was rural Northern Arizona. My friend Bob took the photo. The jacket should be taken out and shot. Stef will cringe when she sees the jeans. Yes–I was wearing Chucks!

“You look like Ashton Kutcher,” Kristin said.

“If he lost about a foot of height,” was my answer.

I don’t see it, but Kristin said I should put the two photos on the blog to let you decide.

geoff-arizona.jpg

Ashton-Kutcher.jpg

Vide-Oh My

The video was put together in a near automated fashion using Apple’s iMovie, a program which only runs on Macs. Today I am jealous!

I saw a the thumbnail for a video posted by a friend of a friend on Facebook. What the heck–click. It’s a church group and a trip they took to Santa Catalina Island off the California coast.

Forget the scenery et al–what blew me away was the presentation. That’s what it is–a sophisticated presentation. It’s certainly more than you’d expect from a home movie. Video pulled out of scrapbook photos. A timeline traced the trip from the Midwest to California on a spinning globe.

The video was put together in a near automated fashion using Apple’s iMovie, a program which only runs on Macs. By specifying a template the program creates the finished product to match the desired look and feel. Can you see my jealousy?

I sent an email to Eric who pushed the buttons to make it happen. All he could do was tell me how easy it was. Eric–that doesn’t make it easier to take.

A Google search for a Windows application that does the same thing pointed to Adobe’s Premier Elements. It was the most often cited response. I’m going to give that a try. Unlike it’s more sophisticated cousins Premier Elements even handles the HD files from my little camcorder natively.

I’ll let you know how it turns out.

My Friend Lucy and Cottage Country

Her family owned an island in Canada. Woodmere Island is right off of Tobin’s island on Lake Rosseau in the Muskoka lakes. It is close to Port Carling. The island itself had been passed down through a few generations. Alas, it is no long in the family.

lucy_hauserman.jpgOne of the cool things about Facebook is coming across old friends. Recently I stumbled into Mary Lucy Hauserman. I met Lucy nearly 30 years ago in Philadelphia. I was a disk jockey back then.

Lucy was a teenager who wanted to get into radio. She made herself well known in the business and stuck with it. She is the production manager for a large cluster of stations in Philadelphia.

By the summer of ’81 I was in Buffalo. These were pre-email and cheap long distance days, but Lucy and I kept in touch.

Her family owned an island in Canada–Woodmere Island. Lucy tells me it’s right off of Tobin’s island on Lake Rosseau in the Muskoka lakes. It is close to Port Carling. That’s a nice way of saying it’s way out in the boonies.

The island itself had been passed down through a few generations. It is no longer in the family.

This area of Ontario north of Toronto is often referred to as “cottage country.” It’s quite a drive from Buffalo, but doable.

When invited to spend the weekend on Woodmere Island I jumped at the chance. Lucy’s entire family was going to be there and I was looking forward to meeting them. Who knew there would be blogs by now–no notes. There are some parts of the weekend I still remember vividly.

Going to Canada from Buffalo wasn’t out-of-the-ordinary. Canada was where you went for Chinese food! I drove along for a few hours then stopped for a bite. I ordered a sandwich and Coke, handed the clerk a US $20 and received $22 Canadian in change! What a country.

By the time I arrived at the lakefront it was well after dark. The Hauserman’s were already there and settled in. The night was mild and calm. An beautiful classic wooden boat–I think mahogany–was waiting at the dock. I got on and Lucy gunned it!

I’ll let her pick up the story.

“I remember you screaming STOP we’re gonna hit Rocks or an otter or something! But you knew I knew the islands silhouettes like the back of my hand….I knew where all the buoy were too! So Funny!”

The island itself was beautiful. It was pristine and rustic. There were a few buildings as I remember. Nothing was fancy but everything was substantial. The lake water was very cold. Too cold for me.

I was only there once. Lucy was there every summer.

“I loved our lodge with the big tables and the wonderful fireplace. the boathouse , the beach, the cabins, the walkways with the hand made lights. Water skiing off the dock, hanging out with my family, the sound the water made when it lapped against the dock, the smell of the pine needles in the sun as you rounded the path towards the boathouse….It was incredibly special to me.”

I remember Lucy’s folks being very nice to me. I immediately felt I was part of the family.

On Saturday Lucy’s mom told me of the family’s plans for Sunday church. She said I could sleep in, but I asked if I could come along?

Sunday morning we all piled into the beautiful wooden boat and went to church. Though I am Jewish I found the whole experience as warm as it was foreign to me. Not to play down the religious aspect, but all I could see was how sweet this family was.

“That little church was so amazing on top of the rocky hill….and our antique boats that took us everywhere! What in incredible gift ! I am so happy to have shared it with you, for there are not many that I can speak to… that can understand the incredibleness of Muskoka and Woodmere Island.

I am very lucky to have a friend like Lucy. Don’t think I don’t know it.

On Being Pre-Friended

We’ve been hearing for years about being data tracked in everything we do. Here’s an example of it being used. Facebook has enough knowledge of me to reasonably assume I know Rachel.

I was just on Facebook. The website sent me a note. Would I like to “friend” Rachel Blumenthal? They had pre-friended us.

I said, “yes.” Why not? I used to work with her. I like her.

I was bothered by the whole process. This has nothing to do with Rachel.

We’ve been hearing for years about being data tracked in everything we do. Here’s an example of it being used. Facebook has enough knowledge of me to reasonably assume I know Rachel.

It didn’t have to ask either of us. In court this would be circumstantial evidence. It could easily be wrong. With the number of matches Facebook makes it has to be wrong from time-to-time. It’s just the law of large numbers working against the system.

If Facebook can make this inference think what a really motivated operator can derive. All I can think of is that awful Tom Cruise movie about pre-crime, “Minority Report.”

You should not be judged or valued by what you do before you do it.

The Sad News About Dan Weston

While we were at Emerson, Dan’s dad was a dentist. Somehow Dan got hold of a medical catalog and ordered all sorts of exotic condoms. They weren’t for Dan nor me. Dan got a display case and sold them to fellow students!

It’s easier to find people with unusual names than common ones. If your name is Geoff Fox and Geoff is spelled with a “G” how tough can it be?

On the other hand it’s been tough to find my freshman college roommate, Dan Weston. There are too many Dan Weston’s (including that guy on TV for the Scooter Store). When last we spoke Dan was working for the PBS station in Hershey, PA. That was at least 30 years ago.

When I stumble across people I knew from college I ask about Dan. I just don’t stumble into that many people… and having been on the accelerated dismissal program at Emerson College that’s understandable.

“On a sadder note, I’m sorry to tell you, Dan passed away a few years ago. He was an engineer at KTLA TV here. I hadn’t seen him for a long time and only saw the notice in the Alumni magazine. He had some kind of cancer, I’m not sure. He was a sweet man.”

That came from Paul Greengross in Los Angeles who I ran into on Facebook. No one wants to get this news.

While we were at Emerson, Dan’s dad was a dentist. Somehow Dan got hold of a medical catalog and ordered all sorts of exotic condoms. They weren’t for Dan nor me. Dan got a display case and sold them to fellow students!

I wish I would have found him sooner–obviously.

Scary Lesson Learned

Be careful when going to Facebook. If you transpose two letters you’re at the king of NSFW sites!

This is experience speaking.

The Friend Quandary

The bigger question is, who has the time to constantly monitor all of these darn sites?

Are you on Facebook? How about Linkedin? Me too. My friend Jon Wolfert responded via email a few days ago after I tried to connect via Linkedin.

OK, we’re “LinkedIn” now, but I really have no idea what to do with this site. A few months ago I played around with Facebook, mainly because I wanted to see some photos Melissa [his daughter] had posted on her page, and I find that is easier to deal with than this place. But even there I have a seemingly incompatible mix of family, friends and business types.

The bigger question is, who has the time to constantly monitor all of these darn sites? -j

He’s right. It’s a fulltime job.

I forgot to mention Twitter. I’m on Twitter too, but when I tweet it’s automatically relayed to Facebook. Two birds with one stone.

Who should be my friend? Lots of strangers ask. I’ve tried to limit my friendliness to people I actually know–but I don’t want to offend.

If you’re not on Facebook I should explain. Facebook has added one thing life has always needed–an ignore button!

I actually find Facebook reasonably useful. I am watching a community of people I know. Facebook cleverly gives me the opportunity to squelch or amplify certain people without their knowledge.

Now I can look friendly without having to actually be friendly!

I guess there’s also the stalker aspect of this. I know who your friends are. I know where you’ve been. I see pictures from your fun times… and your drunk times. I’ve seen pictures of your friends too.

But I am still in a quandary about who to accept as my friend. I want to be friendly, just not too friendly. Maybe I should take the advice of soon-to-be-former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich:

“I’ve got this thing and it’s f***ing golden, and, uh, uh, I’m just not giving it up for f***in’ nothing. I’m not gonna do it. And I can always use it. I can parachute me there,”

Maybe not.

Stef’s Computer Slowly Limping Along

The computer is definitely not well. I poked and prodded. There are no simple signs it’s got a virus, but that’s probably what’s gone on, or possibly some out-of-control Facebook applet.

Oy! Stef was on the phone yesterday afternoon. Her laptop is running at stone age speed. She’s an hour and a half from here so I used Logmein.com for some remote access.

I’ve written about Logmein here and on AppScout.com. I used the remote access package they gave me for my AppScout story, but the free product would have worked–albeit, it’s tough to explain how to install it to my non-tech daughter.

The computer is definitely not well. I poked and prodded. There are no simple signs it’s got a virus, but that’s probably what’s happened… or possibly some out-of-control Facebook applet. The CPU was running at 100% but all the cycles looked to be assigned to programs that were supposed to be running. Maybe something is leeching onto already running programs?

I ran CCleaner (it was originally called Crap Cleaner) purged the caches and trash, checked the registry and rebooted. It came back close to it’s real self. I left a note for Stef and shut it down.

Unfortunately after five minutes of use today the problems were back. She’d started AOL IM and Facebook–nothing else.

Tonight around 7:00 I’ll jump back into her machine. Maybe there’s something I missed I can try? If not we swap.

I’ve got an older laptop which I’ll bring to Stef tonight (actually, we’ll meet halfway). As I type it’s running through some disk maintenance routines. It is much slower than her Dell–when her Dell isn’t slow itself.

It is frustrating I can’t find this problem. That’s something I normally do without much trouble.

Facebook

I’m not sure why, but I have a Facebook account. It’s done through my Mississippi State email address, which I still maintain.

I’ve never really done anything with the account. When one friend started sending his emails through it, I asked him to go back to ‘real’ email. It’s a pain.

My friend Sheri Lynch, the “Sheri” of radio’s Bob & Sheri, has 530 friends. I have 20.

There was a time you’d have to guess how much friendlier Sheri is than I am. Now it’s quantifiable. Sheri is 26.5 times friendlier!

My daughter has specifically asked I not ‘friend’ her. It’s a parental stalking thing. I get it.

As part of the Facebook process, I have to confirm friend requests, checking a box to explain how you know you. From now on, I’m just checking ‘we hooked up,’ regardless of who asks.

Social Networking

I have a MySpace account. I never use it. I opened it to see what MySpace was all about. We had just done a story about predators trolling there.

I scouted around and within a few minutes saw the profile of an 18 year old girl. Except, she listed her school – a middle school. It’s both sad and scary.

From time-to-time I’ll get an email from MySpace telling me I have an email on their site. It’s nearly 100% spam&#185. I’m getting to the point where I don’t even bother to check.

I have a Facebook account as well. Again, I don’t use it. In order to sign up, I needed an educational email address, which I had from Mississippi State. It still works!

A few people I know have signed on as friends. A few people I don’t know have asked to be my friend. I’m unsure what to do. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.

Is a friend on MySpace or Facebook really a friend? Is the word friend, as used on these websites, interchangeable with the word friend we’ve always used? Is this the real future of friendship?

I don’t know what I’m supposed to do on these sites. That’s just a sign of my advanced age, right? Maybe there’s really nothing to do… or I do it here by keeping my blog.

I know Stef has an active Facebook life. I know because she’s told me. As a good father, I stay away.

Maybe I’m better off that way.

&#185 – Unlike my ‘real’ spam, MySpace spam is mainly porn. Porn in real spam has become passe.

Why All The Money?

It’s a good week to be Mark Zuckerberg. First, it’s always good to be 22 years old (or so I remember). Second, it’s nice to have a little nest egg to fall back on. In his case that’s Facebook.

If you don’t know what Facebook is, don’t worry. You’re probably not a college student and here in the 21st Century, hipness is on a need to know basis.

Briefly, Facebook is a social networking site, like MySpace. Actually, it doesn’t make any difference. It gets a lot of traffic from people advertisers want to reach. Currently, traffic = revenue.

From The New York Times:

When Viacom offered $750 million for Facebook in January, he asked for $2 billion and was rebuffed, according to a person involved in the negotiations. Now, he remains undecided about the latest offer, made in the last few weeks by Yahoo.

That latest offer is for around $900,000,000 (the numbers seem to have more impact fully written out).

I don’t get it. As with the last Internet bubble, the numbers just don’t add up.

Let’s say the software, hardware, infrastructure for Facebook is $10,000,000. Oh, what the hell – make it $50,000,000. That’s got to be way high… really, really way high, but it doesn’t make any difference.

With $900,000,000 you could set up an online competitor to Facebook and spend hundreds of millions of dollars to promote it. Give away bags of money if you want – real bags of money. Buy the user’s allegiance away from Facebook.

How can that not be cheaper than buying Facebook outright&#185?

What is the sense of buying a business that will bill under $50,000,000 this year for close to a $1,000,000,000?

Back before the Internet burst the first time, loads of companies where sold for immense sums. Broadcast.com went to Yahoo! for $5.7 billion. Click on Broadcast.com today – you just get Yahoo!

From Wikipedia:

In April 1999, Broadcast.com was acquired by Yahoo! for $5.7 billion in stock and became Yahoo! Broadcast Solutions. Over the next few years Yahoo! split the services previously offered by Broadcast.com into separate services, Yahoo! Launchcast for music and Yahoo! Platinum for video entertainment. Yahoo! Platinum has since been discontinued, its functionality being offered as part of two pay services, AT&T Yahoo! High Speed Internet and Yahoo! Plus.

As of 2006, neither broadcast.com nor broadcast.yahoo.com are distinct web addresses; both simply redirect to yahoo.com.

The Broadcast.com sale wasn’t a total loss… at least it wasn’t for Mark Cuban, now owner of the Dallas Mavericks and HDNet.

So, Yahoo!, bon chance on this one. They can’t all be overpriced bombs. Can they?

&#185 – This is by no means a rap on Facebook – a perfectly fine site. I’m kvetching about price, not content.