Oxford: Actually, Steve, it's "gif" or "jif"

Steve Wilhite, the inventor of the GIF file format, caused controversy by declaring the file format should properly be pronounced 'jif' - but this has been refuted by the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Wilhite, who was awarded with a webby for his contributions to the net, said in an email interview to the New York Times that, although the Oxford English Dictionary accepts both hard and soft G pronunciations, "they are wrong".

"It is a soft 'G', pronounced 'jif'. End of story,"Wilhite said.

Wilhite found himself in disagreement with much of Twitter and even a US government-sanctioned Tumblr account that declared the .Gif a hard g. Although credit lies with him for popularising the acronym, language evolves and much of the web is familiar with the hard g Gif, though it is still up for debate.

However, John Simpson, chief editor at the Oxford English Dictionary, explained to TechEye that both pronunciations are curremtly in use.

"As we explained when GIF was selected as Oxford Dictonaries USA Word of the Year 2012, 'GIF may be pronounced with either a soft g, as in giant, or a hard g, as in graphic. The programmers who developed the format preferred a prounciation with a soft g - in homage to the commercial tagline of the peanut butter brand Jif, they supposedly quipped "choosy developers choose GIF. However, the pronunciation with a hard g is now very widespread and readily understood'".

"A coiner effectively loses control of a word once it's out there," Simpson said. "For instance, the coiner of quark in the physics sense had intended it to rhyme with cork, but general usage has resulted in it rhyming with mark".

"Whichever pronunciation you use for GIF, it should of course be the same for both the noun and the verb," Simpson said.

*EyeSee TechEye notes that the preferred pronunciation for 'Steve Wilhite' is 'Jeve Jilhije'.

by A staff writer via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Obama rules out building death star

Just when you think that politics over the pond are getting a little serious, President Obama's office has penned an official response to an online petition for the US to build a Death Star by 2016.

After all, a Death Star would create a lot of jobs and scare almost everyone in the universe.

The online petition received enough signatures to require the White House to consider it and to draft a response.

The response, drafted by Paul Shawcross, Chief of the Science and Space Branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget, said that while the Administration shares the desire for job creation and strong national defense, a Death Star isn't on the horizon.

The first reason was the cost. The construction of the Death Star has been estimated to cost more than $850,000,000,000,000,000 and it is not a good investment when you are trying to reduce the deficit.

The Obama administration does not support blowing up planets as a tool of foreign policy. Afghan farms are OK, but whole planets seem a bit wasteful.

It also does not make sense to spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man fighter.

"Even though the United States doesn't have anything that can do the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs, we've got two spacecraft leaving the Solar System and we're building a probe that will fly to the exterior layers of the Sun," the statement said.

Obama claims to knows his way around a lightsaber, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is supporting research on building Luke's arm, floating droids, and quadruped walkers.

by Nick Farrell via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Facebook blames policy changes on low user vote

Despite claiming to offer its users some semblance of democracy, Facebook has made the changes it wants to its policies - blaming users themselves for not bothering to vote on a topic which received little promotion from the company.



Last week, the site opened the polls to give its users the chance to vote on how Facebook handles people's data, and, ironically, a plan to get rid of the site's policy to let users vote in the first place. But it has now said that participation was not high enough to reach a consensus from its users.



According to Facebook's governance page, around 670,000 users voted, with roughly 88 percent rejecting the new changes. However, the total number of votes needed to stop the company doing as it pleased was short of the 30 percent of the site's billion active users, which Facebook required to make the vote count.



It has taken this as a sign to do as it pleases, despite those who did take the time to vote asking it not to make the changes.



Elliot Schrage, Vice President, Communications, Public Policy and Marketing recently caused an outrage after telling users that Facebook would be making updates to two policies which governed the site. This included the Data Use Policy, which explains how the company collects and used data when people use Facebook, and the Statement of Rights and Responsibilities (SRR), which explained the terms governing the use of services.



However, with the low vote count, Facebook has spun its way into doing what it likes, placing the blame solely on its users. It means that user data can now be shared between Facebook-owned services, primarily Instagram, and will remove controls over who can message users.



Voting, which is triggered after 7,000 people comment on a Facebook update post, will also be abolished.

by Andrea Petrou via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Foundem: Google EU antitrust proposals unacceptable

British price comparison website Foundem, which has been one company leading the charge accusing Google of antitrust practices in the EU - with a little help from the Microsoft backed ICOMP - has urged the EC to reject Google's appeasement proposals.

In a statement, Foundem said Google's proposals were "ill suited" and that the EC would have no choice but to "reject the proposals".

Unlike the US counterpart in the FTC, EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia has relentlessly prodded Google about the antitrust allegations. Google is accused of, among other things, favouring its own services with higher rankings over emerging and established competition.

A response from Foundem to the EU making the proposed settlement public, Bloomberg reports, said: "Google is keen to portray the commission's acceptance of its proposals as a fait accompli".

"If the commission were to adopt anything like these proposals, it would kill any hope of re-establishing the level playing field on which competition, innovation, and consumer choice depends," the response read. "We will have to wait for the market test to play out, but, at the moment, we can see no reasonable alternative for the commission other than to reject the proposals".

Google said it would offer websites the option to opt out from the use of their content in Google search, while at the same time making sure that these opt outs do not affect overall web rankings.

It also said specialised search websites would have the option to mark categories of information in a way that isn't indexed or used by Google, and to give news publishers the option for them to control the way their content appears in Google News. It would scrap written or unwritten obligations that force websites to use adverts exclusively from Google and would stop imposing obligations that prevent advertisers from managing search advertising across competing platforms.

The market, the EC says, will make up its mind this month. If the proposals are accepted then Google will be duty bound to stick to them for five years, while publishing results in each EC nation. But if the proposals are rejected, Almunia will be able to force Google into biding to a strict code of conduct. If it is caught breaching these terms, it faces fines of up to 10 percent of the company's revenues - worldwide.

The chief beneficiary of imposing strict rules on the web giant may not be the consumer or the markets, as argued - but in fact Microsoft, itself making inroads into the search market. Weakening Google's grip, even just in Europe, would be a massive boon to Redmond.

Foundem co-founder Shivaun Raff said last month that the only "foolproof way to tackle abusive practices is to end them".

by A staff writer via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

CISPA resurrected, heading back to Congress

The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, also known as CISPA, is back from the dead thanks to a couple of US lawmakers.

The bill was drafted to give US companies a bit more protection against lawsuits, by allowing them to collect and share more user data. The idea is that CISPA will help curb security threats, with the added benefit of undermining privacy.

Last year, the bill passed a House of Representatives vote, with a few guarantees that it would not grossly violate privacy rights, but violating them just a bit seems fine. However, the Senate refused to pass the bill, which has been stuck in legislative limbo ever since.

Now though, the unpopular bill is scheduled for a new vote. Venture Beat reports that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-MI) and Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD) will reintroduce CISPA this Wednesday. What's more, the revamped bill is not the amended version which was not passed by the Senate, which means it is even worse than the first time around.

However, CISPA is facing strong opposition from privacy groups and activists. Non-profit group Fight for the Future has created a website listing contact information for each lawmaker who cosigned the last version of the bill, a list of companies that support the new bill and a few fun facts about the bill itself.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Mozilla, the American Civil Liberties Union, Reporters Without Borders and a host of other organisations and individuals have voiced concerns over CISPA so far and the list is set to expand. However, it does not seem very likely that the bill will have much luck on the Senate floor. Republicans, who control the House and tend to support CISPA, failed to seize control of the Senate in the 2012 election, so the outcome should be the same this time around, unless lobbyists did a very good job in the meantime.

by Nermin Hajdarbegovic via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Google well poised to privatise the web

Consumer Watchdog is calling for ICANN to keep a close eye on enormous corporations such as Google and Amazon, and to reject applications made to buy new Top Level Domains (TLDs) in bulk.



The watchdog addressed the open letter to ICANN's board and CEO and other relevant parties. John M Simpson, privacy project director at Consumer Watchdog, said that there are plans by Google and Amazon to buy up enormous amounts of new TLDs. Simpson argues that it is one matter for a company to buy associated domains such as .Google, .YouTube, .Android, .Amazon, or .Kindle, but says that is not what they are looking to do.



Simpson pointed out that Google is using a subsidiary, Charlestone Road Registry, to spend $18.7 million on domain names such as .eat, .buy, .book, .free, .web, and .family, while Amazon has applied for .free, .like, .game, and .shop. They are looking to buy 101 and 76 domain strings respectively.



Consumer Watchdog said in its letter that generic words are not the property of any one company, and that when they are used in a generic way, they belong to all people. But, the watchdog points out, if they are allowed to buy generic names they are closing off common words which they haven't got intellectual property rights over - nor are they even associated with the brand. Simpson warns that ICANN will be allowing the companies to "circumvent nation-states' entrenched legal processes for obtaining legitimate and recognised trademark protections".



In doing so, the argument is that corporations will effectively be privatising parts of the internet - with the possibility of becoming walled gardens.



"Both Google and Amazon are already dominant players on the internet," Simpson said. "Allowing them further control," Simpson said, "would threaten the free and open internet that consumers rely upon".

by A staff writer via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Kiwi tries to censor Google

A Kiwi is taking his case against Google to the High Court today.

Matthew McClelland, who represents the un-named man, said he wants to have a defamatory post removed from an international website and claims it is Google New Zealand's responsibility.

According to Stuff.co.nz, the question is whether or not Google is a publisher and if innocent dissemination of defamatory material defences applies.

The problem post appeared on an American "consumer advocacy" website called RipoffReport.com in 2008.

It claimed that a person identified in court as 'A', who worked in the medical profession in New Zealand, had been caught masturbating over photographs of children. It included his name, address, profession and contact information.

Other than the word 'Kiwi', the site did not reveal anything about the person who wrote the post or how to get in contact. McClelland said his client denied the claims made in the post.

But when his client's name was typed into a search engine such as Google, the link and a snippet from the post appeared high up in the search results.

In 2010, when the post was having a negative impact on his job, 'A' started writing to Google, YahooXtra and RipoffReport.com asking for the defamatory post to be removed or blocked.

YahooXtra and Google New Zealand both blocked the post but the American website said it never "took things down".

But the post soon reappeared as a search result on Google and associate judge Abbott said it was something of a chameleon - but rather than changing its spots, it changed its URL.

The victim continued to write to Google which took it down, but after a while, Google started saying that it had no ability to control things.

McClelland argued that his client had the right to sue Google New Zealand for defamation because it knew about the post and had the ability to remove it was a publisher.

He said he could not sue Google in the US because of the costs involved so he was suing Google New Zealand instead.

Google New Zealand claimed that he had sued the wrong company.

by Nick Farrell via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines

Jeremy Hunt calls for end to legal action over 4G auction

A leaked speech has shown that Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt will push mobile operators to stay away from legal action over the 4G auction process.

Following a recent announcement that Ofcom will push back the auction process to mid 2012 as it continues to work on auction terms, Hunt has urged operators to stop squabbling and get on with it.

The speech demands that “we press on as quickly as possible with the 4G auction", mentioning that Sweden and other European nations have completed their own bidding processes a long time ago.

It is said that Hunt will argue that any delays to the issuing of 4G licenses will not be in the “national interest”, and warn mobile operators away from litigation.

Hunt will demand mobile phone operators “put aside competitive differences” and “work together… to make this happen”, writes the Telegraph.

A host of mobile operators have been dragging their feet over the process, with legal threats ranging from the thinly veiled to threatening to bring the matter to an EU court as O2 has done.

But as MPs have highlighted the delays are getting ridiculous, and are likely to cost the country millions of pounds.

Interestingly though the government has been reticent to actually stick its neck out and get involved. Though Hunt has not advocated any legislative measures be taken against mobile operators to ensure that the auction goes ahead, it does appear to be a significantly more forceful demand top get the ball rolling.

So attempting to tackle the subject head on at the Royal Television Society’s Cambridge Convention is certainly an step up from DCMS ministers fielding questions in Parliament on the subject.

Indeed up until this point DCMS has been very happy to downplay its role to us and keep the focus on Ofcom. In fact DCMS has told us repeatedly that this is "not something for us to be involved in" so we reckon this seems like something of a change of heart.

We approached O2, one of the firms which has made legal threats in the past, for a response to the Minister’s speech. O2 was did not want to comment directly on Hunt’s speech but highlighted that there were still certain of Ofcom’s proposals which it does not agree with.

“There were elements of the Ofcom’s initial proposals that we support and other elements where we believe Ofcom needs to simplify,” we were told in a statement.

“This is still part of the consultation process and we are currently waiting for Ofcom’s views on the number of responses they received earlier this year.”

“At this stage we see no reason why a successful auction cannot be delivered next year as planned.”

by Matthew Finnegan via TechEye - Latest Internet headlines