Are you sick of bitstrips, the (seemingly pointless) Facebook app that lets users create and share comic-strip cartoons of themselves? Evidently it wasn’t annoying enough to just tell people you’re sitting on the train, so now you can show them instead – by utilising a cartoon with more than a liberal amount of poetic licence applied to one’s appearance.
Bitstrips in action
Life may be treating you well enough that currently the bitstrip invasion hasn’t hit your Facebook timeline yet, but rest assured, the time will come. If you’re one of the many that has been affected already, and you want to go back to a simpler time, here are the simple steps to remove bitstrips from your newsfeed entirely.
There are two ways to hide bitstrips from your Facebook page.
1) When you see a cartoon on your feed, click the small arrow in the top right corner of the post and you will get a drop-down list of options, one of which is ‘Hide all from Bitstrips’. Click that, and they will automatically be filtered from your display.
2) The alternative to the above is to visit the Bitstrips app page and on the right-hand side ‘Block’ can be seen:
Click it and the following box will appear
Click ‘Confirm’ and ‘Block’ will change to inform you Bitstrips has been blocked:
Just like that, in a few simple steps, the abomination will be rid from your feed. If, however, you would like to unblock it, click the Settings icon in the top right of your Facebook screen, select Account Settings, then Blocking in the left sidebar, and you can select ‘unblock’ from beside Bitstrips.
When we log out for the final time, will our digital selves outlive us? European companies like SecureSafe and Planned Departure have recently begun to address the issue of data rights after death. The concept is not just theoretical: since July 2012, the parents of dead teenager Alison Atkins have been unable to access images, messages and poems that are locked away in cyberspace.
Cue Google’s arrival – with the unfortunately named ‘Inactive Account Manager’. While they are still alive, the programme allows users to decide what will ultimately happen to their digital presence. If set up, the system will activate when an account is dormant for between three and 12 months, without requiring a court order. The account manager will send a text to your phone and an email to a nominated trustee once the chosen time period has elapsed.
Information stored on Gmail, Google Plus, YouTube and Picasa could then be deleted, partially preserved, or totally ‘inherited’ by an heir. “We hope that this new feature will enable you to plan your digital afterlife – in a way that protects your privacy and security,” wrote Google’s product manager, Andreas Tuerk, in a blog post introducing the service last Thursday.
By letting users plan for their deaths, Google has pushed ahead of its rivals. Both Twitter and Facebook give families a say on whether an account survives the deceased as a ‘memorial’ or is removed (approximately 30 million Facebook accounts are currently ‘owned’ by dead people). But Google’s system moves power into the hands of the individual user, who may want to cherry-pick what data is passed on, and to whom.
Given that we now store many of our most intimate possessions online – photos, videos, letters – we must think about what relatives, friends and even business colleagues might (and might not) be able to access. As Andreas Jacob, Head of Marketing for SecureSafe, explained, “maybe 90 per cent of your data is not relevant for your afterlife, but maybe those 10 per cent are very, very important.”
Instead of leaving our heirs to navigate the ‘cloud’, a few simple clicks might allow us to hand over the information that matters to the people that matter when the time comes.Is this a step too far – technology’s attempt to make us immortal?
Like it or not, it is increasingly important for us to consider and evaluate how our cyber-presence will be managed after we die. It goes far beyond Google, to the data we entrust to sites like PayPal and Dropbox. Worries remain as to whether online heirlooms can really be passed on securely by the multinationals themselves, or if independent firms subject to regulation would be better placed to deal with such sensitive material.
In life, our digital footprints are mammoth-sized; in death, we are only just taking our first baby-steps. For the time being, Google seems to be leading the pack. Doubts may persist, but – as so often – if there is a Will, there may well be a way.
We’ve all read stories of cyberbullying. We’ve all watched news reports of it. We are all at risk of cyberbullying as well. Social media is increasingly becoming a tool for bullies in their quest for misery and to inflict emotional pain on their victims. According to a report by the Department of Education, published in November 2011, almost 35% of young people and children in the UK have been cyberbullied. The most common forms of abuse were text messages and emails. The staggering statistic is not the percentage of young people who have been cyberbullied, it’s that almost 30% of those young people didn’t tell anybody about the abuse. What is important to realise is that text messages and emails are private to young people. Parents don’t have access to these in most cases, and so surely it’s hard to monitor?
Social media is a new way whereby bullies are increasingly targeting their victims. Hiding behind their keyboard, bullies can inflict as much hurt and pain as they want, with seemingly little consequences. In fact, I watched a story yesterday where a family was grieving the loss of their loved one, a young boy who took his own life because of cyberbullying. It is tragic that cowards behind a keyboard can cause this. The family, grieving and hurt by their loss, set up an online memorial page on the social network Facebook. It was a place where friends and family could mourn the loss of their friend and relative, and remember him in the way they wanted, by leaving messages of love and by sharing their memories. This was not to be though. The same cyberbullies who had targeted the young boy took to his memorial page to further inflict pain on his already suffering family and friends. The father of the boy said it was even strangers who got involved who just wanted to spread hate. Why? It’s simple: people can log onto a website and get away with it. They can set up a page in a fake name, and use it to cause pain and suffering for people. Surely this has to stop. I know there are privacy options on social networking sites, and tools in place so that people can stop others getting into contact with them, but clearly this isn’t doing a great deal.
Another example I would use of cyberbullying is the use of user-generated websites, such as YouTube. Anybody in the world can produce a video and upload it to the site. The video is then viewable for everybody across the world to watch. Great? Yes, great if you want to get yourself noticed, and great if you have a real talent. What strikes me though is the fact that users are able to comment on these videos. We know that some people may give positive feedback, others may give negative feedback. The negative feedback is the one we should be aware of. Negative feedback is all well and good if you’re performing on The X Factor, Britain’s Got Talent, The Voice or any other talent show; but that feedback is supposed to be constructive from professional people. The users on YouTube, who decide to ‘critique’ a video of someone singing, on the whole, aren’t professionals from the industry. They are, for the most part, people who want to be abusive to other users. Yes, there is the option to remove the comment tool from videos; but where’s the fun in that? People won’t get the comments they long for, and the attention they crave. Maybe it is fair game, if you put yourself out there in such a manner, then you lose your right to only positive comments, much like people who enter talent shows on television.
But what we need to realise is that people should not be able to get away with bullying, just because it isn’t happening face to face. Bullying on all levels needs to be stopped, and sanctions put in place to combat it. I mentioned just one example of a young person who took their own life as the result of being a victim of cyberbullies, but I can guarantee that there are plenty of the same stories across the UK. It has to stop. Our next generation should not have to put up with it; if it happened at school, there would be sanctions and punishments to adhere to; why not the same online?
Regardless of what happens now, it needs to happen fast. The government needs to act quickly, in order to prevent more tragedies across the UK. In my opinion, what has happened is simple: bullies have more tools at their disposal, thus meaning they can spread hate across a number of formats. Young people are constantly bombarded with the idea of fame and fortune. They want to replicate what they see on television; sadly to say, television ain’t all that real, a lot of it is blown up for entertainment. I understand that people who upload videos of themselves are fair game for comments, be it positive or negative. But you just do a search on YouTube; how many people on there are clearly disabled or have severe learning difficulties? Loads. Why were they able to upload videos? Who is caring for them? It’s a question I can’t answer, but perhaps education needs to start at home so that cyberbullying can be minimised. Sanctions should be put in place at home first, and then the Internet needs to be dealt with. But, realistically, can we really ever prevent cyberbullying or are the bullies becoming too creative?
One word has dominated the news this week: “Homs” And quite frankly I’m getting tired of it now because nothing different happens from day to day, all they report on is a few more deaths. And then we had to listen to lots of people attempting to analyse something which doesn’t really need to be analysed. But, on the plus side, at least the meaningless talks surrounding the NHS managed to die down for a week; it gives us time to prepare for another week of Jeremy Kyle-style points scoring.
Political Oops of the Week
In hindsight, this was something which really shouldn’t have carried as a story, but at least it provided some needed relief from the cycle of “You are ruining the economy!”, “No, you ruined the economy first.”, and “You are trying to bring Thatcherism back!” crap we are forced to sit through on the Miliband and Cameron show.
This week we were introduced to the media-dubbed “Horsegate” which involved the PM and Rebecca Brooks’ borrowed police horse, and whether he rode it or not.
On Wednesday we started with the PM attempting to laugh off the affair, but still implying that he hadn’t rode the horse by saying that: “the only horses I am interested in are the ones you can put a bet on.” That should have been the end of it, right? Wrong!
On Thursday Mr. Cameron was asked again, but this time he claimed that it was “a matter of record” that he had been riding with Charlie Brooks (Rebecca’s husband) before, but he hadn’t rode with him after the election. Ok, so now we have gone to a denial to begrudgingly agreeing that he has ridden a horse with the husband of the owner of the horse. So that’s a little suspicious, but it wasn’t over yet.
In a surprising twist, it was Jeremy Clarkson who then felt he wasn’t getting enough attention, so he chimed in. He then went on to say that he lives there and he could confirm that the PM hadn’t ridden the horse; along with a Tory source which said that it didn’t know.
And finally, the PM admitted that he had ridden the horse repeatedly. But like any good politician, he went on to provide a eulogy to the now-deceased horse. Create some sympathy, David? Good job, you really are a great politician.
It was like watching a dog attempting to chase its tail all week. Oh, David!
The Painful…
Later this week we all got to watch the vile scenes as militants in Libya were seen on a YouTube video destroying a British war cemetery just outside Benghazi where the heroes of Churchill’s famous desert rats were buried. This was partially painful because Britain had helped, both now and in the Second World War, to free the country from oppression, and that’s the thanks it gets.
But what was painful for many people was the fact that only one day previously David Starkey had attracted a lot of controversy on Question Time when he claimed that: “People don’t like to be freed” [when asked about whether Britain should liberate Syria]. The media and people all across the nation slaughtered him for such “disgusting” remarks, but he’s clearly right as one day later the videos emerge of recently-liberated Libyans destroying a British war cemetery.
He demonstrated through his historical knowledge that the French people were ashamed after they were liberated in the Second World War, and the media just proved how right he was about the Libyan people who, evidently, felt the same way too. David Starkey really should be in politics, but it’s just a shame how someone who’s so right is slammed because he doesn’t conform to the politically correct style of the day.
And the Pointless…
Zynga is breaking away from Facebook! Oh no! Wait, you don’t know who Zynga are? Well Zynga are the American games company which created such “fantastic” and “revolutionary” hits as Farmville and Cityville.
But they are now tired of living in the shadow of Facebook so they are planning to move away from the social networking giant. So, assuming the move goes well, those who want to play their favourite games will now be able to play them away from Facebook. But I just have one query. Who cares?
This is so irrelevant and meaningless that it’s really only relevant to those directly involved in the corporate side of Zynga and Facebook because even if the move goes ahead successfully users will still be able to play the same games through Facebook. So how exactly is this news at all? The answer is that it’s not because nothing is changing for anyone but those behind the scenes, and generally when something only applies behind the scenes of something you don’t find it necessary to report it to the world.
Hey, in the place I work we are deciding to paint the backroom soon, but don’t worry because I contacted the BBC with this important information.
The so Outrageous that it’s Borderline Hilarious
Great news! Now you get to pay even more for your petrol as petrol prices hit a record high this week, again.
Currently, petrol prices after the rise now stand at 137.44p per litre and diesel has now ascended to the dizzying heights of 144.60p a litre. But the kicker is that oil prices have actually fallen from their record high. So why have petrol prices gone up and why are experts still predicting that prices are still going to keep rising regardless?
The answer is that they are going to try and squeeze as much out of us as possible because when was the last time anyone ever saw petrol prices go down for any reason? This writer certainly can’t answer that. But this is only going to spell bad news for the economy as people are naturally going to cut spending on petrol or cut spending in shops because people just don’t have the money to pay for it anymore.
Ah, this is a familiar position.
At this point, the fact that petrol prices just keep going up has stopped being annoying and outrageous and its now just kind of funny because we all know that this is going to come to a bitter end one day. Either electric cars will arrive and the fuel companies will go out of business or people will be protesting, rioting, and the market for stealing fuel will boom just like copper theft did.
And I don’t think many of us will fear that day.
A Positive Outlook for the Week Ahead
With the Syrian army crushing the city of Homs we will be able to see some sort of development in the conflict in Syria, so that’s something to look forward to because we would all like to think that most people want to see some sort of end to the fighting. The conflict will certainly be entering its next destructive phase now.
The subject of gay marriages is appearing again in the news, both in the US and in the UK, and it looks like it’s a victory for common sense and a defeat for bigotry and intolerance as politicians are now starting to challenge the established religions on the subject of marriage. In the past few weeks we have seen a few US states legalise gay marriage, too, and the UK looks like it’s fully on its way to a brighter tomorrow too.
In the US, we will be one step closer to setting the scene for the November elections to determine who will take the most powerful post in the world. With next week’s ‘Super Tuesday’ we should see a comprehensive victory for religious nutcase Rick Santorum or a comprehensive victory for tax-dodgy Mitt Romney. Either way, I’m not predicting anything other than an Obama win this November.
So maybe next week won’t be as bleak and irritating after all…
