On the Internet, no body knows you're a dog......

One of the myth that some people share regarding the Internet is the adage "On the Internet, no body knows you're a dog", unfortunately this is not true. Willingly or otherwise, we send a lot of personal information whenever we surf the web. The information transmitted can be used to locate our geographical location, the Operating System, the browser, the screen resolution and many more. So if you visit a website even with seemingly anonymous credentials be aware that they know a lot about you than you expect.

Peter Steiner's Cartoon, The New Yorker, July 5th, 1993

Another shock to those who uses search engines(is there some one who does not), again they are tracking your all activities, ranging from IP tracking to permanent storage of cookies on hard drive (reminds of Big Brother in George Orwell's 1984). For example Google-a start up place for most of us stores permanent cookie on hard drive with uniques ID which can identify user to Google and thus enabling them to keep track of all of our search queries.

So what to do in this so called information age to keep our privacy intact. Some one suggested the use of proxies, hmmm, good choice but again the credibility of proxy web sites poses the same questions. What about TOR??? but paying for the hi speed net and getting dial up speed- a trade of which most of us are not ready for.

So by the wide spread use of cellphone, web, GPS in vehicles, are we moving towards a society where, as describedby Orwell, "Asleep or awake, working or eating, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or in bed—no escape. Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimeters inside your skull."

The following information is presented for your information only (is related to you).

PS: We can change the setting of user-agent in browser to send fake information regarding the OS and browser type etc. I will try to post some useful information some time later.

Red Vs Blue - the Champions League Final

The UEFA champions league ended in a befitting manner, the first ever all English final was nothing less than a sensation, the build up for the match was, as predicted extra ordinary, the hype created by the media was justified by the way both team played the game.

The Manchester United Vs Chelsea Final in Moscow last night provided extreme drama. At the end though Manchester United came out to be the ultimate winner but Chelsea too got their oportunities, to stun the rivals, which unofrtunately they could not convert. But the odds were in favour of Manchester United as they were English Premier League Champions and were predicted winners and Chelsea was dubbed as underdog.

The drama at park touched its peak when Cristiano Ronaldo missed a penalty and the chance to lift the Cup was spoiled by the Chelsea captain John Terry and on sudden death Edwin Van der Sar saved the penalty shoot out from Nicolas Anelka, thus giving the Manchester United the most prestigious title in Club football.

German View:

Being great follower of the game, Germans too were excited for the Champions League final and why they should not be, after all their favourite Micheal Ballack was playing for Chelsea. On every German channel the focus was more or less on Ballack than Chelsea or Manchester United. It appeared as though it was Ballack Vs Manch. United (So how could one player defeat the whole team!!!).

The Mathematician and the Poet

Many of us are familiar with Charles Babbage - father of the idea of programmable computers, and those who has some interest in English poetry may also know Alfred Tennyson . It is ineresting to note that they were invloved in a debate on poetry and maths. It is well known that mathematicians think in their own circle, they critically analyze everthing and need mathemtical proof for everything.

The stories goes as following....

After reading the following lines from Tennyson famous poem "The Vision of Sin",

"Every moment dies a man
every moment a man is born"

Our mathematician fellow was not impressed. He was not convinced that this is possible in real world, so he decided to write a letter to Tennyson.

Sir,

In your otherwise beautiful poem “The Vision of Sin”, there is a verse which reads,

“Every moment dies a man,
Every moment one is born.”

It must be manifest that if this were true, the population of the world would be at a standstill.
In truth, the rate of birth is slightly in excess of that of death.
I would suggest that in the next edition of your poem you have it read:

“Every moment dies a man,
Every moment 1,1/16th is born"

Strictly speaking, the actual figure is so long I cannot get it into a line, but I believe the figure 1, 1/16 will be sufficiently accurate for poetry.

I am, Sir
Yours

And as the poets are normally very sensitive about their creation, so was the case with Lord Tennyson, he replied in the following manner.

Dear Mr Babbage,

If I had sucked several thousand pounds out of the government teat, by telling them that I was building an automatic calculator, without delivering so much as a pile of rusty cogs, I would be a bit more conscious of my own foibles and a bit less ready to poke fun at the works of others. Particularly as vacuum tubes won’t be invented until 1906. So stick that in your big red engine and take the difference of it.

Your most humble and obedient servant,
Lord Tennyson.

Start Up

I have planned it a while ago to start writing the blog and do it regularly but as usual my natural laziness has over powered my will and I could not start it in time. But still its never too late to start. After atleast a month of struggle I mange to write this useless text, only to get started, I am sure I can come up with something less meaningless in near future.

The title "Briefe aus Deutschland moderne" is offcourse not my brainchild but is a variation from Herbert Rosendorfer's book "Briefe in die chinesische Vergangenheit (Letters back to ancient China)"