Rhapsody's Ramblings

There is something interesting going on in technology land and LJ is obviously silent about it, leaving me to wonder why... First news popped up at 21st of September where OpenSocial was not named yet.

The buzzword these days is OpenSocial; combine that with Brad Fitzpatrick (founder of LJ, but he left LJ after the whole shebang and I believe second huge incident, see the link here).

Well we all know Brad right? However, what is Open Social?

In a nutshell, OpenSocial is a platform that allows widgets and applications to asks containers (iGoogle, Orkut and others) information about you, about your contacts and your friends, in a very simple and inter-operable way (or so it seems). In a technical nutshell: it formalizes the concept of activity stream so that some applications can contribute events and some other applications can filter them, mash them up and display them to the user. In other words, for example, what you have on LJ can be filtered to be displayed on Myspace, that is, I hope if you want it to.

They promote OpenSocial as a shared-authentication system in the sense that it makes a lot of sense for each application to NOT have to have its own copy of who you are, who your contacts and friends are.

OpenSocial is also seems to be a natural evolution of personalisation frameworks such as widgets (the Librarything one I have), which are nice and neat little extras. I can see the use of that.

Yet I can see the huge impact this has on us, LJ users, especially now that LJ after their first secrecy around the issues, say they are in on it as well. See here and here.

Here is more scoop: Details Revealed: Google OpenSocial To Launch Thursday

However, as Channel 4 rightfully asks:

But should users of social networking sites, like MySpace, LinkedIn and Friendster be worried?

The OpenSocial platform will allow developers to write programs across multiple social sites using one set of tools and, crucially, allow Google access to valuable user information.

It also potentially makes users vulnerable to fraud. With personal information readily available, identity theft is a potential risk.

Inevitably this key demographic information will be used by advertisers to more accurately target their markets. In fact, with Facebook now valued at $15bn following the Microsoft deal, it is due to unveil an advertising platform at an event in New York next week.

Of course, it is all about the money!

and

Developers have created interactive programs that let users rank their friends, wage virtual food fights or compare and recommend music. Some of the applications are now used by millions of people and are already being sought out by advertisers. "The Web has moved to its next stage," said Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

"We always knew that the Web would be significantly social. We also always knew that it would be standard, open, and extensive, which is what this combination and the other activities today are showing."

This 'openness' is the key. With so much valuable information available on the web, the question is what will it be use for?

Link to Channel 4: What is Google OpenSocial?

As much as I love to discuss books, music and all of that sort of things, it is none of the advertisers business what I actually like. There is a reason why I discuss this with friends, but not with the rest of the world. However, with the traditional sales method of music and tv series failing, it just seems that those companies still do not understand the reason why this happened. Instead what does happen is that companies that run social networks and deal with the high costs of server maintenance and traffic, rather turn to the big companies instead. Can someone tell me again why I actually do pay for LiveJournal, if they fail to understand the basic needs that we have? I do not wish to become marketing data like that and I am questioning yet again why the LJ staff is so silent about this towards their own userbase while they gloat and seek out the press instead. You guys never learn, do you? LJ, you are so tough to be loved...

Thanks to simplymelodious for re-directing, this is special.

Well for a month now Fanlib has been an issue extensively discussed on Yahoogroup Aragorn Angst. It was imagnigma who dropped a question end of March if we ever heard of it. I get a lot of spam on both adresses, so I can't exactly remember if I got it, I might have seen it, I honestly can't remember. Then a beta tester dropped a note to check it out, I signed up, read the TOS very carefully and thought it wouldn't harm to try a new archive. I'd promise I would report back any experiences, well I was the only one in the Silmarillion section for over a month... that's what happened.

I posted two fics there, my Firefly one and my Oath's foresworn. I rummaged a bit around and went on with my usual business. Still I keep track of the yahoogroup as much as I can, so suddenly Nieriel Raina, who signed up later said:

"You hereby grant FanLib a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, and perform the Submissions in connection with the Website."

Now I read the TOS, carefully, when I signed up and sure as hell that wasn't in there.

I said on the 24th of April :

Thanks for that NiRi! Well that makes me wonder what the heck they think they are doing because they can get sued for this. I mean if big media companies are so riled up about youtube, they won't be pleased about this either. I didn't spot this when I read the TOS... or my eyes skipped over it.

Well, in this case I pull my work, like Michelle I am very fond of Ficwad and those other sites I post.

Rhapsody

Now NiRi is a mod at LOTRfanfiction, so they dug in and things started to roll. Apparently for damage controle a 'Dave' popped up. Now this Dave has senstivities issues, he keeps on pissing off the mods and as the icing on the cake he also insults other archive owners. So I combed through the TOS and privacy statement again, so just for your information, especially now that Fanlib has started to go through the active members at fanfiction.net (I have PM's disabled there). The copy I left at LOTRfan fiction a few days back:

Here is the whole thread

Well, just read the TOS again,but I am not sure if Fanlib got the message from this fandom. I just read:
"Section 1. FanLib's Intellectual Property Rights FanLib claims no ownership or control over Your Submissions. You retain all of Your ownership rights in Your Submissions. However, by submitting the Submissions to FanLib, You hereby grant FanLib a non-exclusive, worldwide, and royalty-free license to use, reproduce, distribute, and display the Submissions in connection with the Website. FanLib may prepare derivative works from Your Submissions solely for the purpose of promoting and showcasing them in connection with the Website. FanLib shall not make any use of your Submissions or exercise any of the rights to Your Submissions granted to it hereunder other than in connection with the Website. This license is transferable only in the event of a sale or merger of FanLib, and only to the other Company involved in the transaction. You also hereby grant each user of the Website a non-exclusive license to access Your Submissions through the Website, and to use, distribute, and display such Submissions as permitted through the functionality of the Website and under these TOS. The foregoing licenses granted by You terminate once You remove or delete a Submission from the Website."

Excuse me, but I still don't want grant Fanlib that right, it is as simple as that. Even though it is fanfic, I want to determine where *my* work is used, not Fanlib. The whole thing about mergers and sales, with youtube in mind and knowing Yahoo is a third party, is just fishy as it can be.

It's also in the privacy statement that in case of a merger, all your details end up in the hands of the new party and will be used accordingly to their TOS and statements.

I cite:

From the privacy statement: "Use of Information
We may share aggregated demographic information with our partners and advertisers but this information is not linked to any personally identifiable Member information. We may use third party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our Website. These companies may use information (not including personal information) about your visits to our Website and to other Websites in order to provide advertisements on the Website about goods and services of interest to you. In addition, we may share Website usage information about Users on our Website with such companies for the purpose of managing and targeting advertisements on our Websites. We will use your personal information to contact you and provide you with information that you may request. We may also use your personal information for internal business purposes such as analyzing and managing our business and improving our Website. We may use third parties to help us operate our business and the Website or administer activities on our behalf. We may share your personal information with these third parties for those limited purposes."

Also Dave, I still think you need to work on that sensitivity issue, to say this: ""We honestly just got carried away. A previous outreach to a different audience had gone well we just lost our sensitivity to the personal relationships and trust that are such a defining part of sites like yours. Believe it or not, there are other sites where no one's really minding the store."

Is just a slap in the face of many hard working archive admin/web masters and moderators who try their utmost best to do work behind the screens and not to be so much in the face of users. It's simply a lame excuse to harvest pennames from archives and flock their inboxes with invites.
- Rhapsody on 05/04/07 - 04:48AM

Be very careful when you sign up, utterly careful. I am of no value to them, being an European, but I do know that they are keen on harvesting information (adress details, telephone nr's and such) from their American Users. I as usual have been very vague in the information I supplied, but I was concerned about the exclusive right thing given that my fanfic penname is known by one of the fantasy publishers I know (maybe I should consider a new penname, although he said it would never be a big issue ;) ). However, this publisher will not accept me being a member of such a site if they claim exclusive ownership of what I post there. It's to easy to trace that back and who knows what will happen with my original works.

Then there is the risk of mergers and being taken over by a larger company. With Youtube on my mind, everything you say and agree to at Fanlib will be annulled, but all your details and such will end up in the hands of a new owner and who knows what they will do with it.

This 'Dave' might look down on archive owners not tending to their shop, but I beg to differ. Every owner I know or had brief contact with will never ever use or sell your information to a commercial party. Even more so, I know that archive members, together with their mods work very hard to keep things easy accessible for you and the site up and running. I don't know what Dave and his pals are up to, but I don't think they take the fandoms very seriously. But they are harvesting new members on fanfiction.net currently!

To use the key phrase of the BBC series The Real Hustle: If it sounds to good to be true, it probably is!

Before I turn this pc off, but my friend Hellboy posted this:

The Breast Cancer site is having trouble getting enough people to click on their site daily to meet their quota of donating at least one free mammogram a day to an underprivileged woman. It takes less than a minute to go to their site and click on "donating a mammogram" for free (pink window in the middle). This doesn't cost you a thing. Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate mammogram in exchange for advertising.

Here's the web site! Pass it along to people you know.

http://www.thebreastcancersite.com/

Please tell as many friends as possible to keep this vital test available to those who otherwhise could not afford it.

Yeah, my nose is still buried in Morgoth's ring. Today it is 9/11. But for us we soon will be remembered of 11/2, then there will be 3/11/2004 (= 911 Days after 9/11) and 7/7.

When I opened the book this morning to read, I immediately read these lines:

'Have ye then no hope?' said Finrod.

'What is hope?' she said. 'An expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known? Then we have none.'

'That is one thing that Men call "hope",' said Finrod. 'Amdir we call it, "looking up". But there is another which is founded deeper. Estel we call it, that is "trust". It is not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruhin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves. This is the last foundation of Estel, which we keep even when we contemplate the End: of all His designs the issue must be for His Children's joy. Amdir you have not, you say. Does no Estel at all abide?'

'Maybe,' she said. 'But no! Do you not perceive that it is part of our wound that Estel should falter and its foundations be shaken? Are we the Children of the One? Are we not cast off finally? Or were we ever so? Is not the Nameless the Lord of the World?'

'Say it not even in question!' said Finrod.

'It cannot be unsaid,' answered Andreth, 'if you would understand the despair in which we walk. Or in which most Men walk. Among the Atani, as you call us, or the Seekers as we say: those who left the lands of despair and the Men of darkness and journeyed west in vain hope: it is believed that healing may yet be found, or that there is some way of escape. But is this indeed Estel? Is it not Amdir rather; but without reason: mere flight in a dream from what waking they know: that there is no escape from darkness and death?'

'Mere flight in a dream you say,' answered Finrod. 'In dream many desires are revealed; and desire may be the last flicker of Estel. But you do not mean dream, Andreth. You confound dream and waking with hope and belief, to make the one more doubtful and the other more sure. Are they asleep when they speak of escape and healing?'

'Asleep or awake, they say nothing clearly,' answered Andreth. 'How or when shall healing come? To what manner of being shall those who see that time be re-made? And what of us who before it go out into darkness unhealed? To such questions only those of the [Old Hope] (as they call themselves) have any guess of an answer.'

May hope be in your hearts today and the days ahead of us.

[this post is not friends locked]