Category Archives: Internet

Steve Irwin Dies & Kills The Internet

Internet, News, Websites

Steve Irwin, known around the world as “The Crocodile Hunter” has died today at the age of 44 in a freak diving accident in Tropical North Queensland. Steve was shooting an underwater video off the coast of Port Douglas, when he was speared through the chest by a stingray. Emergency services were dispatched, however they were unable to revive him.

As the news of Steve Irwin’s death swept across the country, users were eagerly clicking into their favourite news sites. The huge surge of traffic into news.com.au and abc.net.au/news/ caused both of the popular news sites to go offline for quite some time.

The death of Steve Irwin is a huge loss to Australia and the world. He was an incredibly energetic and nature fanatic, who would have done anything to animal and nature conservation. I think everyone would hope that his legacy and enthusiasm towards wildlife will continue well into the future, through either his surviving family or some other manner.

Google & News Corporation Strike USD$900 Million Deal

Internet, News

On the 7th of August 2006, Google announced one of the biggest online deals in the history of the internet with News Corporation. The multi-year agreement between News Corporation’s Fox Interactive Media and Google will see Google part with approximately USD$900 Million dollars and for that pleasure, it will deliver exclusive search and keyword targeted advertising to the growing Fox Interactive Media network of sites.

The agreement states that Google will provide advertising to the Fox Interactive Media group sites, which include a swag of technology, computer gaming sites, sport related and also the behemoth that is MySpace. The benefit to News Corporation is also clear; with strategic alignment with a leading technology company like Google – it will allow News Corporation to transform its company into the dominant force in the digital media realm.

This deal, in my opinion, is going to position Google to be the premium provider of online advertising in the future. Google obviously already delivers an excellent product for the text based advertising, however affiliation with Fox Interactive Media should see them deliver more image based advertising. If they do start delivering more image/flash based advertising, this should translate into Google enhancing its current AdSense and other advertising programs which should put it clearly out in front.

The amazing thing about the agreement is that it is going to cost Google approximately USD$900 million dollars between 2007 and 2010. News Corporation have to be particularly chuffed about the whole situation since they only began investing heavily in the internet space in July 2005 with their high profile purchase of MySpace for approximately USD$580 Million dollars.

It sure is a changing landscape in recent times.

Hardly Newsworthy

Blogging, Internet, News

On the 22nd February 2005, Jason Kottke decided he would run his blog full time. To support himself and family through this time, he asked his readership to become micropatrons by donating a small sum of money.

A year to the day and Jason posted about the year in review in which he announces he is going to throw in the towel. I congratulate Jason for giving it a whirl and throughout the year, he has provided an awesome amount of content to the masses from his site.

What I fail to understand though, is how its considered newsworthy by a big gun technology site such as ZDNet? Maybe it was a slow news day or they needed a human interest story, I just don’t see how it is significant enough to warrant space on a site like that.

Chuck Norris

Humour, Internet

Chuck NorrisChuck Norris has recently been experiencing the same phenomenon that David Hasselhoff has, email mania. With the email(s) flashing around the world, it seems that Chuck Norris has also seen them and has posted a response on his site! What follows is a list, in no particular order, of some of my favourite Chuck Norris facts:

  • Chuck Norris’ tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried. Ever.
  • The chief export of Chuck Norris is pain.
  • Contrary to popular belief, Chuck Norris, not the box jellyfish of northern Australia, is the most venomous creature on earth. Within 3 minutes of being bitten, a human being experiences the following symptoms: fever, blurred vision, beard rash, tightness of the jeans, and the feeling of being repeatedly kicked through a car windshield.
  • When Chuck Norris sends in his taxes, he sends blank forms and includes only a picture of himself, crouched and ready to attack. Chuck Norris has not had to pay taxes, ever.
  • Chuck Norris does not sleep. He waits.
  • In fine print on the last page of the Guinness Book of World Records it notes that all world records are held by Chuck Norris, and those listed in the book are simply the closest anyone else has ever gotten.
  • The Great Wall of China was originally created to keep Chuck Norris out. It failed miserably.
  • Chuck Norris is currently suing NBC, claiming Law and Order are trademarked names for his left and right legs.
  • Chuck Norris has counted to infinity. Twice.
  • There is no theory of evolution, just a list of creatures Chuck Norris allows to live.
  • Chuck Norris does not hunt because the word hunting implies the probability of failure. Chuck Norris goes killing.
  • Chuck Norris once bet NASA he could survive re-entry without a spacesuit. On July 19th, 1999, a naked Chuck Norris re-entered the earth’s atmosphere, streaking over 14 states and reaching a temperature of 3000 degrees. An embarrassed NASA publically claimed it was a meteor, and still owes him a beer.
  • Chuck Norris has two speeds: Walk and Kill.
  • Chuck Norris’ blood type is AK+. Ass-Kicking Positive. It is compatible only with heavy construction equipment, tanks, and fighter jets.
  • Chuck Norris is 1/8th Cherokee. This has nothing to do with ancestry, the man ate an Indian.
  • There is no chin behind Chuck Norris’ beard. There is only another fist.
  • Most people have 23 pairs of chromosomes. Chuck Norris has 72… and they’re all poisonous.
  • If you ask Chuck Norris what time it is, he always says, “Two seconds ’til.” After you ask, “Two seconds ’til what?” he roundhouse kicks you in the face.
  • The quickest way to a man’s heart is with Chuck Norris’ fist.
  • Chuck Norris can win a game of Connect Four in only three moves.
  • What was going through the minds of all of Chuck Norris’ victims before they died? His shoe.
  • Chuck Norris is the only man to ever defeat a brick wall in a game of tennis.
  • A Handicapped parking sign does not signify that this spot is for handicapped people. It is actually in fact a warning, that the spot belongs to Chuck Norris and that you will be handicapped if you park there.
  • Chuck Norris originally appeared in the “Street Fighter II” video game, but was removed by Beta Testers because every button caused him to do a roundhouse kick. When asked bout this “glitch,” Norris replied, “That’s no glitch.”
  • The opening scene of the movie “Saving Private Ryan” is loosely based on games of dodgeball Chuck Norris played in second grade.
  • Chuck Norris once shot down a German fighter plane with his finger, by yelling, “Bang!”
  • Someone once tried to tell Chuck Norris that roundhouse kicks aren’t the best way to kick someone. This has been recorded by historians as the worst mistake anyone has ever made.
  • Chuck Norris is not hung like a horse… horses are hung like Chuck Norris.
  • Chuck Norris doesn’t shower, he only takes blood baths.
  • Time waits for no man. Unless that man is Chuck Norris.
  • In the Bible, Jesus turned water into wine. But then Chuck Norris turned that wine into beer.
  • In an average living room there are 1,242 objects Chuck Norris could use to kill you, including the room itself.
  • Faster than a speeding bullet … more powerful than a locomotive … able to leap tall buildings in a single bound… yes, these are some of Chuck Norris’s warm-up exercises.
  • Chuck Norris is the only human being to display the Heisenberg uncertainty principle — you can never know both exactly where and how quickly he will roundhouse-kick you in the face.

MySpace & News Corporation Problems

Blogging, Internet, News

In July, News Corporation announced that it had purchased Intermix and all associated products for US$580 Million. Intermix owned and operated MySpace.com, one of the largest social portal sites on the internet boasting nearly 50 million members.

Everything was going along swimmingly for News Corporation, until they started censoring what their users were writing! It is the expectation that the internet is free and anyone can write just about anything and ultimately no one will care. It seems that News Corporation took offense to their users linking and discussing their competitors. When users would mention a competitor, the posts were being edited and the offending words, images and links deleted.

You would assume that MySpace were feeling threatened by their competitor and sought to weed it out of their site. Unfortunately, this manual intervention stirred the pot a little more than expected and a huge backlash followed. As soon as the backlash gained momentum, MySpace stopped censoring their clients information and restored all of the existing data – in fear of it escalating any further.

I think this would have been a very strong lesson learned for the new owners of MySpace. In an online business, even more so for a business driven by the power of social networking, you can’t suddenly go and change the rules. If you change the rules and your users don’t like it – your competitor is only ever a handful of keystrokes away.