[T]he Federal Trade Commission is mulling a simple mechanism that would allow users to opt out of behavioral tracking across the Web . . . .
FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said the system would be similar to the Do-Not-Call registry that enables consumers to shield their phone numbers from telemarketers.
. . . .
“It’s really in the hands of the private sector,” Leibowitz said. “If they want to do a better job of … giving clear choices and have clearer notice, then I think it’s in their hands to avoid legislation. I think if they don’t, and if we don’t see more progress, I think you’re going to see probably in the next Congress a fair amount of interest in moving legislation forward to have more prescriptive rules.”
-eCommerce-Guide.com
Um. It’s kinda already built in to everyone’s web browser.
Tools > Options > Privacy. Then uncheck the “Allow cookies” box. Do-Not-Track registry implemented on an individual user scale in a matter of seconds.
Doing this will “allow users to opt out of behavioral tracking across the Web.”
Sure, there will be a lot of sites that don’t work quite right. But they kinda need to have some of your info if you to interact with their site. Sending the advertising industry back to the stone age isn’t the answer here.
How about spending your efforts on educating consumers how to use their computers?
RipCode’s new TransAct Transcoder V6 can intercept content requests from an iPad and use its transcoding appliance to re-encode Flash content into a video format accepted by the iPad. It works with video files from QVGA to 1080p.
I don’t understand how this stuff works, but it really would be nice to avoid all the Flash errors on the iPad. So, get on it content owners and make the Internet more iPad friendly.
If you caught the Super Bowl last night, then you saw Vizio’s wild commercial featuring Beyonce their 240Hz Internet Apps LCD HDTVs. Amazon has them up for pre-order at reasonable prices. Check them out here.
Boxee Box, unveiled at CES 2010, is a “box” of sorts that will allow end users to connect to their social networks and stream video right from their recliner in on a huge HD screen. Easily connect to the internet with Boxee Box and watch what you want to when you want to, whether it be TV show, movies and videos or checking in with friends on Facebook and Twitter. [click to continue…]
Popbox is a setup box that plays just about any kind of media you can throw at it. The box is about the size of a router and comes with a variety of built-in “Pop Apps,” including Netflix 2.0, Photobucket, Shoutcast, Revision3, Weatherbug, Twitter, Channels.com, Fun Spot Games and others. Additionally, Popbox has a full featured SDK available to developers for full screen applications or applets.
During my brief interaction with Popbox at a CES press preview show, the navigation seemed pretty smooth and intuitive.
The Popbox carries an initial retail price of $129 and should be available in March 2010.
Sadly, the CrunchPad is no more. There have been a lot of haters directing their spite toward either the product or Michael Arrington and, while I don’t agree with everything Arrington has to say, I was genuinely looking forward to this product.
As with many products and startups, fundamental differences in business partners’ ideas (and, perhaps a bit of greed) killed the CrunchPad.
Arrington’s full rundown on the death of the CrunchPad is here. John Biggs’ take is at CrunchGear. Even if you didn’t care for the CrunchPad, both accounts are an interesting look behind the scenes.
There’s a lot of stuff on Facebook that I simply don’t understand. However, one thing that I certainly know is that the new News Feed / Live Feed stinks.
I’ve seen tons of people post examples of how to get the “old Facebook” feed back. The short of it is to move “Status Updates” to the default feed on your Facebook home page.
But, it’s not really the same.
You don’t get links, videos and picture updates. I know some now tell people in their status that there is new content (like links, video and pics) on their wall because so many people have moved to the “Status Updates” as default.
If you want to get Status Updates, News Feed, Pics, Links, etc. in your default feed, here’s how. [click to continue…]
So I logged onto Xbox LIVE last night for a little Halo 3 multiplayer, and was surprised to see Facebook on my dashboard.
Sure enough though, Facebook made the official connection to Xbox LIVE yesterday. I haven’t had the chance to give it a full run through (and I’m not sure I really want to connect with all my Facebook friends on my Xbox), but it’s still one of those big steps in our ever-expanding social world.
There’s a lot more detail on the connection over at the Facebook Blog.
