Sunday morning greetings from a snowy Sweden

This is the view from my living room Sunday morning 11:00. It is -10 degrees Celsius and snowstorm outside. Despite this I sit beside the fire wishing this winter will as great as last one. Lots of snow and skiing. In this part of the country it usually rains all winter. One new years day it was the same temperature as at midsummer +15 degrees Celsius.

Meanwhile the snow is falling I sit here and try out new url shortener utilities and web statistics functions. I get back with a report.

Thank you for contributing to my test by reading this.



Updated 4:30 PM
I have tried up to ten different URL shortener programs today. All have easy procedures for registering. None for de-registering.

All brag about their nice statistics functions but none have that kind of tracking I want. I have found a dubious hacker site doing exactly that missing part of tracking but that site do not provide any of the other basic functions. It looks like I need to pay to get what I want and I will surely not do that.So I presume I have to remain discontent and torture you all by more url-shortening tests.

About the problem to cancel an account - I strongly support the new EU law proposal - The right to be forgotten.

The snowstorm
I was out with the car for 15 minutes. When I came back I couldn´t see the tracks at all. The wind and quality of the snow had erased the path. The horses backs were covered with snow as well. But they seemed almost enjoy the weather.
 

from my iPhone, not the best companion a day like this one

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It has to be fun, or else we cannot make it

Do we want Facebook group "hijacking"?

I recently noticed a new feature at Facebook – Facebook "group hijacking". What I mean is that you no longer get an invitation to a group when someone wants you to join. You become a member even if you´re not interested

A red notification and a line in your feeder is the only visible evidence for the fact that you now belong to a group you perhaps not want to be connected with.

Before you got an invitation you could accept or reject. Now you are connected instantly. So if you by some reason do not login to your Facebook for a few days you may have become a member of a political group you disagree with or a group abusing someone (well that group will not survive long at Facebook but there are several such cases).

If you by some reason have a lots of notification and a feeder filling itself up in a few minutes – you will perhaps never notice you are a member of that group.

To all my net friends and perhaps even Lao Tse

Today it is one years since I sat in a newly opened Sushi bar trying to read Lao Tse for the first time ever. The text was in English and I only had my old Ericsson P1 mobile.

The meal was great but I had problems with the text. Then I am not only referring to the mobile interface - I mean the content too. Considering how the old feudal China was organized those texts must have been a great drug to keep the peasants silent and obedient. And that perspective did not go well with a lunch meal. Besides it was my first Lao Tse experience ever - in English too. Just to understand the language was a challenge enough.

Why I persist in writing in English?

Why do I blog in English one of my best friends often asks me? Why do it in a language you do not master? Why not write in Swedish instead? First then you will be able to change something!

I have often thought about this too. Why persist in something doomed to fail?

In 2002 I applied for a job I really wanted. It was a Swedish Insurance company – boat insurances – with customers all over the world. I was supposed to be a project leader for a new website and be the creative designer for some exclusive yearly prints.

I came there in my best silk shirt, black feminine jacket, black pants and high heels. I had bought a new leather handbag - the colour of cognac. I was classy and sophisticated and I knew I could do that work. I even matched the design of that office. Dark blue carpets, teak and brass. But I must admit I was a bit more elegant than wearing brass - I had gold instead.

I knew I was perfect for that job. Full of self confidence I entered the room for the interview.

Intranet usability by walking in the corridor

Probably all of you have heard about "management by walking in the corridor". But usability - how does that work? It is easy, fun and uncomplicated and you get the results instantly. I will tell soon how...


I have been running an Intranet project for quite some time now. We are planning to launch the new site - a customer website for internal customers - at January 2011. Right now we are moving data at a hectic speed. In December we will have time for quality improvements and updates due to the new organization.

We have had several usability tests in different stages of the project but there are a lot of graphical design, interaction design and other communication problems to be solved.

Intenet abuses and the problems to be forgotten when wanted

"A brash website allowing users to rate Swedish teenage girls as "ugly" or "hot" based on the unauthorised use of pictures from their Facebook accounts has been reported to the police".

Source The Local, Site 'stole' pics to rank Swedish teen girls

The website is brought down now and since it was a dynamic page no content was saved in Google's Caches. Otherwise the abuse would have gone on until next indexing. Something that may take up to six months.

The owner of a website can remove content from the search engine indexes. But as victim to net abuse it is often very hard to get in touch with right person to achieve this. At big websites like Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Wordpress and Google it is mostly impossible to find a helpdesk. And the support people must know how to do it. Twitter for example directs their users to the instruction below. Which no one except for Twitter self can follow since you need to own the website.

Anyhow - here is the instruction how to remove a Google search index and cached content. If you cannot make it by your own (meaning you do not own the website) try to get in touch with the support people and send them this link.

Google's instructions in how to remove from Googles cashes

I wonder if this aspect - the cached content is included in the new law proposal from EU:
Pressrelease: European Commission sets out strategy to strengthen EU data protection rules

As a victim for net abuse - you have the right to be forgotten on Internet. Instantly!

What is most important Design or Design?

or when you cannot see the trees because of the wood

I often hear that design isn´t as important on Intranet as on external websites. I sometimes seriously think these people must have misunderstood the essence and function of good design. Or do we not speak about the same thing?

Good design helps the eye to find what´s important on a web page no matter what content there is. Of course the tools needed for creating an efficient intranet has to be working great. Interaction design has to be great too. But what if a dominant header with a lots of happy employers or even worse - totally irrelevant things - removes the focus of the work that has to be done.

Perhaps the different blocks of information compete too much making no one finding anything. Banners for example are very often taken for illustrations without any function. Sometimes too much and compressed information makes a visible hell for the eye. It has it´s own work to be done - to find what's important.

Perhaps link coloring scheme doesn´t make sence. Perhaps <H> titles is used as links making hardly no one understanding they are clickable.

I think a webpage's typography and graphical design are equally important on the inside as on the outside regarding functional design. But perhaps not regarding seducing the eye design and attract new visitors design. But bad graphical design can contradict a perfectly done workplace with a swell tools.

For those who do not understand....watch the simple examples below.

The top example is perhaps suffering from "over-design disease". The second is example is more plain. But they works for a discussion. Try to find the top navigation bar and try to guess where the post date is placed in both examples.

The background on top sucks so much energy that the top navigation bar is almost invisible. For real you cannot even read the text. A plain background stripe just behind the top navigation bar might have rescued it a bit. But since the placement of the Twitter bubble and the contrast of it makes it a bit messy this design is doomed to death. They eye need structure, lines, balanced colours and balanced contrasts to feel comfortable.

The examples is not an Intranet workplace but why should´t Intranet workplaces with even more information at the same spot not follow the same rules. I cannot get it!

Graphical design and typography is the science of "visual ergonomic". It enhances the interaction design and leads the eye to the important stuff at a web page. if it also make people feel comfortable with what they see - why neglect that just because it is an Intranet page? I cannot get it!

I sometimes think this misunderstanding is created by the technicians creating the stuff at the Intranet workplace. Most of them do not know much about design and they have to "produce". But I think everyone working with web interfaces must have basic skills in functional graphical design. Like colour schemes, contrasts, placement of information blocks like text, gadgets and banners, typography and some about image and text. Or else the eye get lost.

Then you cannot see the wood because of the trees... 
or to be more precise  - you cannot see the trees because of the wood!

What do you think?

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It has to be fun, or else we cannot make it

Would you like to reconnect with your dead spouse?

The men above are both living and  having a fun time.
One with and the other without Facebook

My father and mother 82 years old worried about my fathers Facebook account. I got his password and deactivated it. After about six month he appeard in reconnect suggestions box. I couldn´t investigate at that time but he disappeared again so I did not worry. A few months later he was there once again with the question if I wanted to reconnect with him. Instead of his profile picture there was that Facebook dummy picture. So Facebook knew his account was deactivated.

I did a few searches and found an instruction how to avoid this “bug”. You have to reactivate the account and send a mail to a specific address. And so I did. Then I deactivated the account again.

What if he would have been dead?
What if my mother had seen him in the reconnect box?
What if she hadn´t had his password to the private mail and being unable to follow that instruction?

If someone dies and you do a special “death report” - it takes six months before an account finally is shut down. She would have seen a ghost for six month.

Would you like to reconnect to your dead husband?

You must have the right to disappear from the net. And it must be simple!

Pressrelease: European Commission sets out strategy to strengthen EU data protection rules>

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It has to be fun, or else we cannot make it

The right to be forgotten on Internet

Source IDG.se

5 October 2010

EU is preparing a law that will enable users to erase information stored on them on the Internet.

The new law will allow European citizens to delete all information held about them on various sites, such as social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

Today, it is not always clear all information stored on different sites because of technical limitations. EU wants to put pressure on sites that users can choose whether the information is saved or deleted, reports the BBC.

Pressrelease: European Commission sets out strategy to strengthen EU data protection rules>




I think this a great proposal but they seems to have forgotten the fact that much of the data at for example Twitter is copied to third party. It is not only about deleting the user profile and the content at the main source. Can Twitter force third party to delete that information? Can Twitter and Facebook force Google to delete cached information quicker than the now esteemed time of six months?

Read my reflections about Twitter, third party, Google and integrity at:

Did you know your tweets might be audited and cut out of stone?>

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It has to be fun, or else we cannot make it

Did you know your tweets might be audited and cut out of stone?

Make a search on your Twitter user name. You might find some new, some old  and some badly spelt tweets you deleted immediately. Some might even be tweets you rather forget about - forever. Things you never would like a future employer to read. But they are there….almost as impossible to wipe out.

A few days ago I wanted to check up how to remove tweets from Google's index. Sadly the instruction I found at Twitter was not working. You need to own the website to manage to follow that instruction. And since I obviously do not own Twitter the text was useless. And I wondered mockingly how many people can use that instruction? How many of us owns Twitter?

Then I tried to report the failing text at Twitter support. The only way to do so was to do an abuse/privacy report. It felt like over kill but frustrated I did. But first I read Twitters privacy statement.

Twitter says in the page you once signed when you entered this world “what’s yours is yours – you own your content”. Indeed – but you seems to have no control over your content. I wonder how many people have understood this? Read more an you will understand why...


We are not paid to delete tweets!

Earlier this spring I found out all my tweets were cloned by Twitter partners like topsy.com. I also found out they did not delete the content when I deleted something at Twitter.

In April I locked my Twitter profile for a while – I needed some privacy. But all these third parties did not hide my old tweets. I had to be in touch with every third-party – if possible – to make them delete their content. I decided it was not worth that effort. I have never written anything I feel ashamed of. I was only looking over my integrity. At one time I had a nice chat with the staff at topsy.com. They told me frankly and honestly “we are not paid to delete tweets”. But they provided a synch feature.

At the same time I found a very long distant contact’s Twitter profile at another Twitter partner. In Google's search index there was frozen image of one of his friends friendslist. That friend was one of my colleagues. My name and some more colleagues were there in the list together with 80 more persons.  In Sweden you actually need permission from the The Swedish Data Inspection Board to make a register like that one. But at some parts of Internet - it is for "free".

What if my friend had decided to lock his profile of integrity reasons? How would he have felt if he found this list where all his contacts were exposed to the whole world?  

Back to yesterday evening

Within 12 hours I got answer from Twitter support. This is what they said:

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JuneClippers, Oct 26 03:26 pm (PDT):

Hello,

When you protect your account, all tweets posted after protection will be private: unlisted in Twitter search and 3rd party applications. All tweets posted before protection, however, will still be listed in search engines and 3rd party applications. Twitter does not have the ability to remove content on other websites other than Twitter.com.

Thanks,

JuneClippers

Twitter Trust and Safety

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I really appreciated the quick answer. I imagine it is the result of using the “abused line”. But there was not a single word about the failing page about how to remove content from Google's cashes. The page is still alive today.


My conclusion
If you ever regret something you have written and have a some bad luck - it will be impossible to remove. Google index will stay there at least six month after the source is deleted. And since Twitter partners do not delete their copies - you mistakes will be there forever. Both at Twitter third-party and Google.

This means:

• if you one day decide to lock you Twitter for non-friends because of integrity reasons – all you have written until that day will still be readable
• if you choose to delete a tweet - it might be there "for ever"
• the day you die - your texts will be there. Impossible for your relatives to delete. A scenario I recently have experienced. It might happen to you or your friends next time.

How many people know about this – I think most of the do not. And if they did – some would definitely stop tweeting or at least tweet about other things than now and using another kind of language. 

This can get worse
If you now have started to feel some concern about your Twitter privacy...listen carefully. Anyone can set up an alert on your tweets and get the result straight into their mailbox. Then it is no use trying to delete “bad” tweets. Your failures are already sent away. They might also be sent to some RSS feeders caching information. For example Google Reader caches almost for ever since it uses Google search caches for it's contents.

But absolutely worse scenario - if you are concerned about your integrity & safety - is the SMS auditing of tweets. In just a few minutes someone can show up at your geolocation. I hope it is a friend to you. And even if you do not tweet with geolocation - this is an excellent stalking utility. Every step you take at Twitter may be watched in the same moment by people who perhaps not is your friends.

I wonder if people know about these integrity problems at Twitter? Is this the way we want it to work? Do we want all our tweets cut out in stone? 

My answer is no!

I do not want my tweets cloned to third parties and audited by SMS or mails or stored in any kind of cache. I want an integrity option in my profile where I allow or disallow cloning, alerts and RSS feeders. Meanwhile I recommend all to think over their Twitter philosophy.

I do not want my tweets cut out of stone.
I want to have some control over what Twitter agrees is mine.
I want some Twitter Integrity!

What about you?

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More information
To do a complete search over what Tweets are indexed at Twitter use this command
site:twitter.com 'your username'

Twitter's privacy statement
Twitter's terms of service
Twitters page about how to remove from Google Index 

SMS Subscriptions
Due to Twitters interface you cannot have an SMS subscription without being allowed to follow that person. How twitter partners is set up - I do not know.

RSS feeders
RSS feeders can be enabled weather you are friends or not. Google Reader is cashing information "for ever". Things I deleted months ago are still readable at Google reader since they are based on ordinary indexing schedule. I guess it can take up to six months before old deleted tweets are flushed out.

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It has to be fun, or else we cannot make it
English is not my native language. I hope you can manage