I have many techy friends. They all have wifi. Which means, if I visit them, I have to go through a long and tortuous route to use their internet connection - because a combination of UK law and common sense make using encryption on your wifi really rather important.
I don't have this problem in hotels.
In hotels, When I try to use the wifi, they just intercept my DNS requests, rerouting me to a page where I can enter my credit card details. From this they can then give anyone with my MAC address access to the internet. It works well.
Why can't home routers do this?
When I go to a friends house, I should fire up my browser and get a login page. My friend can then either give me a guest password (which will give me access for a few hours), or give me a username and password of my own (to give me access whenever I want).
Now - this will only give MAC level security - which I guess isn't perfect 9although it seems to work for hotels), but it would also provide an easy route (over the web, once you've logged in) to provide all the other information needed to configure a computer to use the router's security features.
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Thursday, 27 May 2010
Thursday, 22 April 2010
Highstreet of Tomorrow
The Internet is killing the highstreet. Specifically it is killing some particular types of shops: the shops which sell a particular type of product that you buy based on its features rather than its feel in your hands.
Why?
Because in the days before google, when all we had was fire and that new-fangled wheel thing, people who wanted to buy - say - an SLR camera would go to their local camera shop and ask for advice. Then, having got the advice they would buy the camera. These days they go on the Internet and look for advice. If they find the advice they buy the camera on the Internet. If they don't find the advice, they go to the camera shop and ask. Before going home and buying the camera on the Internet.
No highstreet shops are only good for
Things you need right now
Things you need to look at and touch as you buy them
Leisure shopping
The expert is gone. Almost. Apple Stores are the exception.
Why?
Because Apple don't care if you buy things from their shop. If you ask advice in their shop, then buy online, Apple still win. Apple stores are a good deal for apple even if they only break even - the stores don't need to make a profit (though high footfall is a necessity)
So in the future we will see more shops run by the manufacturers of products, in order to provide assistance to people who want to buy their product.
This could be like the Apple store (for, say, canon cameras)
But it could also be a Google cafe (with lessons and tech talks, and free surfing)
Or a Heinz food shop (with cooking demos, and free recipes)
What we won't see in the future are mobile phone shops like "Carphone Warehouse", because they'll all be online. Instead we'll see more Orange stores. And Maybe HTC stores. Just possibly there will also be Android and Windows 7 stores too... Three different approaches, but none of them require the shop itself to make money - the shop is an added extra that you pay for in the price of the product you buy.
Why?
Because in the days before google, when all we had was fire and that new-fangled wheel thing, people who wanted to buy - say - an SLR camera would go to their local camera shop and ask for advice. Then, having got the advice they would buy the camera. These days they go on the Internet and look for advice. If they find the advice they buy the camera on the Internet. If they don't find the advice, they go to the camera shop and ask. Before going home and buying the camera on the Internet.
No highstreet shops are only good for
Things you need right now
Things you need to look at and touch as you buy them
Leisure shopping
The expert is gone. Almost. Apple Stores are the exception.
Why?
Because Apple don't care if you buy things from their shop. If you ask advice in their shop, then buy online, Apple still win. Apple stores are a good deal for apple even if they only break even - the stores don't need to make a profit (though high footfall is a necessity)
So in the future we will see more shops run by the manufacturers of products, in order to provide assistance to people who want to buy their product.
This could be like the Apple store (for, say, canon cameras)
But it could also be a Google cafe (with lessons and tech talks, and free surfing)
Or a Heinz food shop (with cooking demos, and free recipes)
What we won't see in the future are mobile phone shops like "Carphone Warehouse", because they'll all be online. Instead we'll see more Orange stores. And Maybe HTC stores. Just possibly there will also be Android and Windows 7 stores too... Three different approaches, but none of them require the shop itself to make money - the shop is an added extra that you pay for in the price of the product you buy.
Thursday, 8 April 2010
Wiki-dating
Another approach to internet dating is to get rid of the computer.
Several of my friends are inveterate match makers. They look for ideal partners to pair up. This gives them satisfaction, and (apparently) some sort of meaning in life. I can exploit this for profit, right?
We've all seen "Hot Or Not". Why not have a dating site where you get to see the classified ads of one guy and three (random) gals, or one lady and three (arbirary) lads, and get to say "I think the best bet for this bloke or the wisest way for this woman is this one of the three". You could also say "Actually, I think these two are ideally matched"
And then you get to see
"Did I think the same as the rest of the crowd"?
and possibly, in the future, if that the guy writes to your choice of girl, you get points... and can ascend though a series of lables which mark out how good a match maker you are.
Meanwhile, the daters are using a dating website like normal. They see the ususal set of potential matches. But the matches are ordered, not by an algorithm based on a form they filled in (or their star sign and place of birth), but my what the people who are making the matching decisions suggest. You don't get matched by a soulless computer, but by people (and people have had centuries of evolution to get the art of matchmaking right. They probably know what they are doing)
And the final benefit of this idea? it could well go viral. Free advertising for your dating site. Which is what you need to draw people in.
Several of my friends are inveterate match makers. They look for ideal partners to pair up. This gives them satisfaction, and (apparently) some sort of meaning in life. I can exploit this for profit, right?
We've all seen "Hot Or Not". Why not have a dating site where you get to see the classified ads of one guy and three (random) gals, or one lady and three (arbirary) lads, and get to say "I think the best bet for this bloke or the wisest way for this woman is this one of the three". You could also say "Actually, I think these two are ideally matched"
And then you get to see
"Did I think the same as the rest of the crowd"?
and possibly, in the future, if that the guy writes to your choice of girl, you get points... and can ascend though a series of lables which mark out how good a match maker you are.
Meanwhile, the daters are using a dating website like normal. They see the ususal set of potential matches. But the matches are ordered, not by an algorithm based on a form they filled in (or their star sign and place of birth), but my what the people who are making the matching decisions suggest. You don't get matched by a soulless computer, but by people (and people have had centuries of evolution to get the art of matchmaking right. They probably know what they are doing)
And the final benefit of this idea? it could well go viral. Free advertising for your dating site. Which is what you need to draw people in.
Monday, 22 March 2010
Dating For Introverts
Computer dating took a new lease of life when the internet came along. It won't surprise me if, in a few years time, we get some figures suggesting some large portion of the population met their partners through dating websites. And while there are many popular websites, and they seem to be doing their jobs just fine, occasionally I think of new varients on the theme.
My favourite is Introvert Dating
As an introvert, this style of dating matches how I would like these websites to work.
To begin with the sites would be much the same as existing sites. You would enter a profile, save it and then be given a list of potential matches. However you would not choose to contact one of the matches, you would just signify that you are interested in them - or that you are not interested in them (maybe you give a star rating to help the recommendation engine... but thats outside the scope of this idea)
Now, once you have said you are interested, you are moved up the list of people your potential partner is matched with. The potential partner cannot see you are interested in her, but you are moved up on her list (and then sorted by either computer generated relevance, or by how many people you have said you are interested in - if you are interested in a lower percentage of yourt choices, you are moved up in the object of your affection's list)
Your partner may then decide she is not interested in you... if so, you vanish from her list of potentials, and you never hear anything more. Moreover, you are happy because you have never had to tell her that you are interested in her.
But if your partner clicks the "I'm interested" button, she gets told "He is interested in you too. Would you like to send him a message?" and is given the option of getting in touch.
So you only ever write to people you know are interested in you.
And what about those people who say "I'm interested" in everybody, just to see who is interested in them? Well, if someone is already interested, but the checker never chooses to write to them, then there is no problem - the interested person never knows anything has happened.
And because they are interested in a high percentage of their matches, they will turn up lower on the list of people interested in just a few others - and so be leess likely to be seen.
My favourite is Introvert Dating
As an introvert, this style of dating matches how I would like these websites to work.
To begin with the sites would be much the same as existing sites. You would enter a profile, save it and then be given a list of potential matches. However you would not choose to contact one of the matches, you would just signify that you are interested in them - or that you are not interested in them (maybe you give a star rating to help the recommendation engine... but thats outside the scope of this idea)
Now, once you have said you are interested, you are moved up the list of people your potential partner is matched with. The potential partner cannot see you are interested in her, but you are moved up on her list (and then sorted by either computer generated relevance, or by how many people you have said you are interested in - if you are interested in a lower percentage of yourt choices, you are moved up in the object of your affection's list)
Your partner may then decide she is not interested in you... if so, you vanish from her list of potentials, and you never hear anything more. Moreover, you are happy because you have never had to tell her that you are interested in her.
But if your partner clicks the "I'm interested" button, she gets told "He is interested in you too. Would you like to send him a message?" and is given the option of getting in touch.
So you only ever write to people you know are interested in you.
And what about those people who say "I'm interested" in everybody, just to see who is interested in them? Well, if someone is already interested, but the checker never chooses to write to them, then there is no problem - the interested person never knows anything has happened.
And because they are interested in a high percentage of their matches, they will turn up lower on the list of people interested in just a few others - and so be leess likely to be seen.
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