Sign, sign, everywhere a sign

My latest foray into the world of web 2.0 is with image generators. I googled "image generators" and stumbled upon many sites claiming to offer free image generators. I clicked on a link that advertised warning sign motifs, and selected the "aliens-warning-info" option.

At first, the alien warning image refused to load. I clicked the back button to make sure I had selected the right motif. Even a page refresh didn't render the image. I went ahead and edited the text, still with no alien image. I followed the instructions to push the "Change Label" button, and my text appeared in the "image," but still no alien motif. Then an Upload Image button appeared. I was confused. Wasn't the web site supposed to supply the image? Wasn't that the whole point of this exercise?

Below the "Upload Image" button was a fifth step that stated, "Download your image (will see above form once made, free image hosting HERE)." "HERE" linked to several "free" image hosting sites, including Flickr. However, this was simply a page of links; there was no connection between the "image" I had just generated and any of these sites. I still had no way to actually download the image.

For the time being I gave up and looked at some other image generator links. Then I went back to my original page and suddenly, there was my text in the warning-sign-styled font along with the alien-warning-info background. I continued to search for a means by which to download my "free" image. Scrolling down the page, I found several ads, some html code that you can copy and paste to your web site to provide free advertising to these folks, and finally a web form where one could "Buy/Purchase Your Personalized Product Now!" Among my options were buying magnets of my image for about $4 apiece, buy the image without the customsigngenerator.com text for a buck, or send an ecard to (and invite customsigngenerator.com to spam) a friend. So much for free.

At the bottom of the form was this note: "It's FREE to download your created image (no charge, it's a freebie with our tags), but you cannot just link to the image on our server. You must download the image and put it on your web space or find free picture hosting sites HERE." "HERE" led to the same page of image hosting site links as the previous "HERE" link. Again, no instructions for actually downloading the image were provided.

Luckily, being the web-savvy person that I am, I simply pressed the "Print Screen" button on my keyboard, cut out and edited the image in Photoshop, and voila, there is the image that you see at the top of this blog post (I used the same method on a similar web site for the image at the bottom). Hopefully, other users who have gotten so far as to use a "free" image generator will be as knowledgeable, as the warning signs don't point toward the hidden costs.

Topix for discussion

I tried Topix.net for news feeds, and found that the emphasis is on comments rather than the original sources themselves. When I clicked on the link to the article, or what I thought would be the article, I instead found the long list of comments on the article. I had to look for another link buried in a list of links off to the side to try to bring up the article again. In several cases, when I clicked on the link to the article, I was greeted by a message from the publication's web site saying that the article was not found, although in one case I was able to find the article by searching for it on the publication's web site.

I also noticed that most of the items featured on Topix.net were "popular" items--entertainment and gossip-oriented items. Many of the "articles" were actually blog entries rather than published articles. One blog entry was a simple paragraph in which the author wondered if a popular rumor were true. The blog entry had thousands of comments in response.

I have mixed feelings about all this. I come from the old school where people did research before formulating opinions and writing on them. We learned the basic essay format in school with an intro paragraph, 3 or more supporting body paragraphs and a concluding paragraph. All points that were made were backed up by citing sources.

Today, uninformed opinion rules. I see blogs and even "articles" online claiming all sorts of "truths" with no sources given and no apparent research done, much less any effort into thinking having been made beyond reactionary sensationalism. Poor sentence structure and spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors abound. Comments in response are reactionary and unintelligible. I recently learned that even in classes taught at OSU, the essay with its basic format and supported points has been replaced by the structureless, fact-less "opinion" paper. I am truly frightened by what is evidently a severe dumbing down of our society.

On the flip side, I'm grateful for a people's forum on the internet. One can find a myriad of painstakingly researched articles on an infinite variety of topics, many of which are purposely ignored by the corporate-owned mainstream media. News publications from around the world are immediately accessible. Grassroots organizations have a free, open network with which to communicate with like-minded persons and to spread their message to others who might not otherwise come across such information. Individuals can write freely and "publish" their writings on the net without having to go through a publisher. Aside from the threats of corporate restriction of internet access and governmental spying in the name of national security, the internet provides perhaps one of the more remarkable frontiers of free speech.

Despite the wealth of information and opportunity of expression available on the internet, the masses seem to be more interested in feeding their addiction to celebrity gossip and sensationalism. Self-education and independent thinking appear to be lost causes. I can only hope that some of these folks will accidentally stumble upon something meaningful in their web surfing and wake up.

Bloglines = clogged lines

This has been a very frustrating experience trying to set up news feeds on my new Bloglines account. I keep having to reload pages and retry subscribing to feeds, all with long delays. I don't know if Bloglines is just having a lot of traffic this morning or what, but this is taking far more time than it should. I've managed to add all of 4 feeds in about an hour. I'm giving up soon.

Okay, the morning rush is over. I finally finished setting up my bloglines feeds. You can access them at http://www.bloglines.com/public/kimpassible.

Technology and Time Wasters

I'm going to ask it again: who has the time??? Technology is supposed to make our lives easier, but I see a lot of it as a set of distractions. Do we really need to create virtual versions of ourselves on the internet and read thousands of blogs and news feeds just because they are available? Whatever happened to one on one interaction with human beings? Reading a book? Taking a walk?

I'm glad that the internet is available and interactive. There's a lot of useful information that average citizens would have much more difficulty obtaining were it not for the ability to freely post and find information on just about any topic imaginable. It also makes communication between physically distant people as easy as a few keystrokes and mouse clicks.

However, I have work to do during the day and a life outside of work. There aren't enough hours in the day to do everything I need and want to do and also read hundreds of blogs and feeds, check everyone's myspace and facebook and flickr pages and maintain my own. I don't know how anyone else does it, except that something else gets sacrificed. And it seems that what is most likely sacrificed, such as quality time alone or with loved ones, is pretty significant.