Using Evernote
Managing all the information in my life is a constant battle. From remembering little tidbits at work, to recalling the model of a water filter. I’ve found as I get older I have more and more things to keep track of. So, I’ve always been on the lookout for programs which can help me do so. Evernote is a program/service that I’ve used for a number of years. But it is only recently that I’ve begun to use it to it’s full potential. It’s an example of how technology can help humans manage things.
Evernote has two major things going for it that allow it to live within almost any workflow. The first being device independence. You can use it on your desktop, android/ios device, or the web. That combined with the interaction with other applications via its API really makes it shine.
The trick for me to use it more and more has been the tagging. Notebooks are important, but since it is basically a data repository, search is much more important. So proper tagging is required in order to use it. Without tagged entries it becomes nearly impossible to track what you put in it. This also means that I’ve ended up putting all sorts of random, and not so random, data into it. I have technical data, project stuff, travel information, recipes, model numbers for some house stuff. I’ve found that by making it a default to send it stuff I know I may want to keep that it becomes more valuable. It also has saved me quite a few times by having data I could not find elsewhere. It also has me wondering though, how others use Evernote or similar programs.
XKCD on the CIA Website Hack
This is so true. Courtsey of XKCD.
What is Age on the Internet?
I was linked to this post via Making Light regarding the affects of COPPA on children who use the internet extensively. And I think on this day, July 4th, it is very relevant. Children in the USA occupy an interesting space regarding how they are treated across the board. They are used by corporations, parents, politicans, and the legal system for all sorts of purposes – most of them selfish. If you look at the Internet though you can see the effect magnified to a large degree. Unfortunately the main view on the internet is driven by fear and exploitation of children, not by those evil predators lurking on every website, but by corporations and politicians looks for an angle. COPPA represents this. I won’t even call it well meaning because it is just stupid in its purpose and execution.
What is COPPA? COPPA is the Children’s Online Protection and Privacy Act. It was passed in October of 1998 with the goal of protection children under the age of 13. The FTC is who enforces it. Now there is one obvious and glaring flaw here. How the hell can you truly verify age on the internet? Unless you require a copy of ID to be sent directly there is no actual way without doing some sort of background check. Now who is going to background check for a forum login? For access to a photo sharing site? No one, because it is expensive, and frankly idiotic to require it.
So what you have is a law that will never be realistically followed, that will only penalize the people who are honest, and will setup yet another arbitrary requirement for access. Now there are those who say “well can’t the parents give consent”? Of course they can but the hoops to obtain it are prohibitive for most sites. Here is a list of methods that make it ok. Not this must be reobtained if the terms of the site change as well. This is the COPPA compliance page.
- getting a signed form from the parent via postal mail or facsimile;
- accepting and verifying a credit card number in connection with a transaction;
- taking calls from parents, through a toll-free telephone number staffed by trained personnel;
- email accompanied by digital signature;
So unless it is a for pay site the costs incurred include processing paperwork, or a possible toll-free line. The final method requires training on the parents end. Unfortunately digital signing of an email is not yet mainstream, nor is it 100% full proof.
What is the net effect of this policy? Mostly it sets up an arbitrary system with a laughable practice of adding a checkbox to a page saying “I am over 13″. For children though it sends a different message. What it really does is tell them they have to lie about their age if they want to participate. The way the whole thing is setup makes it easier to lie than to tell the truth. It makes it so parents will go along with the lie in many cases as well. So it sends a second message that it is ok to lie when the requirements are stupid or ill thought out. The correct response would be to instead change the requirements to be more realistic. There is a final thing here, but that is a whole other topic. How fear is used to manipulate people on the internet to create this sort of thing “for the children”.
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