Category — Internet

The new Blogger is out of Beta. Defying “conventional” Web 2.0 “wisdom” of a perpetual Beta, the new version of Blogger has been formally launched.
When I read this news, I decided to migrate my Blogger account over to the new version. So I logged in to Blogger with my old username and password, expecting to see a link on my Dashboard giving me the option to migrate. If Blogger was out of Beta, it obviously meant that they had worked out all the kinks around migration of old Blogger accounts over to the new version. And since they could not force-migrate blogs automatically without the bloggers’ knowledge, they would provide means to migrate optionally.

But I was surprised to find no such link/button on the Dashboard. Hmmm… that’s strange, I thought. So I logged off and went to Blogger homepage. There was a button on the generic Blogger homepage that gave the option to switch. So I clicked it and initiated the migration process.

After a minute or two of “in progress” status, it flashed a very generic message stating that an error had occurred that prevented the migration from completing successfully. And that their engineers would look into the problem. There was absolutely no inkling about what the error might’ve been. Just a generic message asking me to look out for a link to migrate that would appear on my Dashboard sometime in the future. In short, the message did not tell me what the problem was and neither did it give me any idea about when the issue might be resolved. That’s a poor poor user experience!

And not just poor user experience. It also shows that issues relating to migration of old blogs have not been addressed fully. And yet, Blogger chose to come out of Beta and launch formally.

All this sounds frighteningly similar to the Microsoft approach of releasing half-baked software full of un-helpful and thoroughly confusing error messages! Personally… I am not concerned that I was not able to migrate over to the new version of Blogger… because my primary blog is right here and it uses WordPress (God bless WordPress!). But looks like in its efforts to compete with Microsoft for the web OS space, Google is hurtling towards becoming a Microsoft clone in all the wrong ways!

Microsoft has released Internet Explorer (IE) 7 earlier today. It has features like tabbed browsing, RSS feeds, integrated search box and “improved security features”… things that Firefox users have been almost taking for granted for a long time now. So I dunno what’s the fuss about.

Moreover, I read somewhere that the IE 7 downloads are linked to Geniune Windows validation. Also, ‘genuine Windows’ users have to ensure that they have the supported versions of Windows before they can download and install IE7. So in effect, Microsoft is putting a premium on IE7 by restricting its availability. That’s quite inexplicable given that Microsoft has already learnt the futility of initiating a browser war… not that IE7 seems to have the juice to initiate one, in any case!

And Microsoft’s claims of IE7’s “improved security features” will be severely tested in the coming days. Reports of the first vulnerability found in IE7 are already out!

‘Writely’, acquired by Google some time back, now appears in Google clothes. Google has just merged the ‘Writely’ word processor and it’s own spreadsheets app (which had itself come about after the acquisition of 2WebTechnologies back in 2005) to form Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

Ever since I started using ‘Writely’ some 2 months ago, I’ve used it to compose most of my blog posts. For me, it’s a killer app as far as online word processing is concerned (of course, ajaxWrite, Zoho Writer, etc. do exist, but the sheer convenience of logging in with my google account makes Writley a killer app for me!). The interface is clean, uncluttered and the writing area takes precedence as far as screen real-estate is concerned. Me likey!

Now that ‘Google Docs & Spreadsheets’ is here, Google’s vision, of an online office suite to challenge Microsoft’s client-specific office suite, has taken a step ahead. And with Web 2.0 junkies continuing to churn out applications and Google’s readiness to expand it’s office portfolio via inorganic growth, it isn’t long before Microsoft will have good reason to be very afraid!

Google and Yahoo’s capitulation to Chinese censorship demands is well-known. And with Chinese State tightening its grip on information, it has come as a pleasant surprise that Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, has announced that Wikipedia will not bow to censorship of politically sensitive material in China.

Wales said censorship was ‘ antithetical to the philosophy of Wikipedia. We occupy a position in the culture that I wish Google would take up, which is that we stand for the freedom for information, and for us to compromise I think would send very much the wrong signal: that there’s no one left on the planet who’s willing to say “You know what? We’re not going to give up.”‘

Way to go Jimbo!!

Three years ago, Kynhun, a Yahoo! group caused a storm in a teacup when a CERT-In directive to Indian ISPs to block it, resulted in a blanket ban on the entire Yahoo! Groups.

Whether the government, acting through CERT-In, was justified in its request to block a website, is a matter for another debate as it involves the volatile issue of freedom of expression or an individual’s right to make an independent choice as opposed to the government making it for her.

But it was clear that CERT-In had asked for blocking only the Kynhun group and not the entire Yahoo! Groups. Indian ISPs, claiming they did not have the expertise to block individual sites, went ahead an blocked the entire domain resulting in a blanket ban. A classic case of throwing away the baby with the bath water!

Everyone granted the ISPs a benefit of the doubt since this was the first ‘known’ case of such nature. And the ISPs, a chastised lot, had claimed they would work with CERT-In to rectify their mistakes and ensure they wouldn’t happen again.

And now… history repeats itself!! After CERT-In asked the ISPs to block 18 websites (some of them blogs hosted on blogspot and typepad) due to their communal nature, given the curent climate in India, the ISPs went ahead and brought out their blankets!!

Haven’t they learned anything in the intervening 3 years? Hasn’t technology improved since 2003? Do the ISPs have any clue?

Anyone who’s had the mis-fortune of interacting with ISP helpdesks in India can vouch for the fact that  ISPs don’t give a damn! … about their customers… or about technology!

And here, there is no private versus government-owned distinction. Private doesn’t mean better. We have seen that last year in Mumbai when Reliance Energy left their customers high and dry when mumbai was soaked under a deluge. And Reliance, MTNL, etc. have shown it once again… by their incompetence… this time around!!