Internet

Well it just struck me that I have been at this internet game longer than most. I first went on line in 1995 - shortly after updating to Windows 95. Back in those days I had a MSN account - god those were the days - it was still trying to find its way - MSN was a closed environment that was difficult to break out of onto the World Wide Web - difficult but not impossible.

One of the first things I bought was a web directory - yes you could buy hard just the same as a telephone directory. Totally useless - but back then there wasn't Google nor Yahoo either - you just blunder around in the dark trying to make sense of the whole experience.

The next thing was to make your own web pages. My original site is still up and running and I must say I haven't been there for a long time - this back in the day that there was little to do with web pages. I used Microsoft Frontpage that had its own unique standards and things called bots, I think. These were not supported by many servers and so were next to useless on the web - however you don't know that until you find they don't work.

God this was only 15 years ago and yet it is several life times ago as fasr as the web is concerned. Back then trying to buy things from Amazon was almost impossible or very difficult as they only worked within the USA.

The first modem I had was 28k dial up. You had make sure you used it after 6pm as this was the when the cheap rate phone calls came in - it was after all a phone call you were making - none of this always on. Back then the hight of speed was an ISDN line that provided the unbelievable 110k speeds. This was extremely expensive.

So why all this pointless rambling about the old days? Well I have been following the excellent virtual revelations on BBC2. This week was about how the information you give the internet, either knowingly or passively is used to paint a picture about you and how these things could be used to compromise your privacy. The only thing is I have never assumed that anything I did on the internet was private - nothing. There were a lot of scary scenarios discussed to try and demonstrate that the Internet is watching you. Well the only thing I can say is And? This has always been so. The internet is worth far more to modern life and any suggestion that it should be more restrictive in order to protect your privacy is never going to work. After all only 15 years ago I could never have found out about the wonderful photographic styles from all over the world. The information available has changed all our lives - no longer is it the preserve of the knowing elite - now it is a few searches away - oops more information given away.

The dangers are far out weighed by the benefits - life is about managing risk and you can never be fully protected. If you get the chance watch Virtual Revelations - it is a wonderful programme - but don't have nightmares about big brother - life is too short and without the internet so much more boring and dull.

Something new

I thought I would try something new today. I am writing this from the Library at the DMU. This is a first as I have never written an entry from outside my home. The first impression about this is that it is not that exciting. After all, a computer is a computer and its location is irrelevant. However, when think about it a bit more it is really more profound than that. It means that you can comment/publish from where you are in the world so long as you have a link to the cloud (I think this is a better word than the intelligent Internet - which has too many geeky connotations). I know I am not the first one to realise this, in fact I am coming very late to this particularly party but for me it is still very profound - probably says more about me than anything else.

Anyway, it did get me think about my Internet career, such as it is. I started using the interent in 1995 with the launch of windows 95. I subcribed to Microsoft Network (MSN) very quickly realised that Microsoft just didn't get the web, infact the early MSN was based on the then market leader of AOL. Boy how things have changed. I launched my originaal website in 1996 - it is still out there in the cloud - click here to see it. This has been slowly developed and is now just the local history I reaserached and wrote at that time - is it really 13 years since I did this???

So what is the purpose of this rambling nonsense? I guess it point is this. Over the last 14 years the cloud has had a profound impact on my life and my family's than anything else that has happened in those years.

I have been lost today

Campus Centre

Arrghh!   The internet crashed today.  Having spent a wonderful hour checking the network it would seem that the problem was in 'the cloud' rather than on the local network.  To think one time I thought it was really interesting to know about http or TCP/IP - thankfully no more and now all I have to worry about is when the system crashes.

The good thing about this was that it gave me time to look over some of the books I've recently bought.  I have to say I am humbled when I look at the photography in the Wildlife Photographer of the year. Now interestingly I started to compare the photographs of a snow leopard and Gregory Crewdson -both elaborate setups and yet recording a beautiful creature the other ...well I am not sure yet whether I really like Crewdson's work. ( I know this is almost a heretical comment from someone studying photography but the artificiality leaves me cold - well that is the case at the moment and things may change! Watch this space)

Emma, one of my fellow students has circulated a set of mug shots of all my fellow students.   Interesting to see how each persons sees them self.