Siri can't direct you to an abortion clinic

Almost everyone I know that has an iPhone 4S has upgraded or purchased it full price for Siri, your personal assistant on your iPhone. She is able to get you the weather forecast of a particular city to helping you set up reminders/appointments to even directions to nearby restaurants, but one thing it won't give you directions for is an abortion clinic. Numerous groups and blogs have taken it upon themselves to bring it to Apple's attention that Siri is able to produce an answer when asked where the nearest drugstore was to buy protection, but was unable to produce an answer when asked about a abortion clinic. Apple claims that this is not intentional and they aren't setting up a anti-choice agenda, its just simply the product going from beta phase to final phase and it is bound to not have the answer to everything. I found it interesting that people would bring it up, and personally, I do not see the big fuss about Siri not being able to find a nearby abortion clinic; but that's just my personal opinion and others are bound and will most likely have other opinions also.

(Source: http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/01/tech/mobile/abortion-clinic-siri-iphone/index.html)

Most people go online 'for no particular reason,' survey finds

Do you ever find yourself just reaching for your laptop or computer, turn it out, and pointless go online and check anything? Don't feel left out. "A report from Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project found that about 53% of young adults ages 18 to 29 go online on any given day for no particular reason except for a diversion or just for fun. About 81% of people in this
demographic said they have done so at least occasionally. The study -- conducted among 2,260 adults ages 18 and over on landlines and cellphones -- has a margin of error of 3.7%."

It's kind of interesting to see those numbers - with the development of the web today, personally, I sometimes find myself spending hours on websites like Wikipedia just going from subject to subject!

(Source: http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/02/tech/web/adults-online-no-reason/index.html)

Fallout continues over smartphone tracking app

Just as the title of the post mentions, there apparently exists a program or application on our smart phones that "tracks" everything from every key stroke to every URL visited on the phone, claims researcher and developer Trevor Eckhart. I came about this topic when it first surfaced last week and I was kind of surprised to learn about it. With today's technology, it may seem a little difficult to imagine not owning a smart phone - I personally only know a hand full of people that refuse to switch and still use their 5+ years old phones. Smart phone have made life way easier with being able to surf the web for sites we require information from or to just kill time, being able to use applications such as Google Maps to get us from place to place, or even applications like WhatsApp that connects via the Internet and allows the user to send messages to their contacts for free; nationally or internationally. So to read the article was needless to say very shocking and surprising. This updated article talks more about how the issue has been developing and how even there has been a filing in court against Carrier IQ (the company responsible for the application). It's a very interesting article to read and see the opposing views from each side.

(Source: http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/02/tech/mobile/carrier-iq-reactions/index.html)

Facebook and the Stock Market

There has been rumors about an IPO for Facebook recently that have caused quite the stir. The biggest concern is user compatibility. Right now, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is focused on giving users the greatest experience possible and that includes creativity. This is one of the issues that people have if Facebook were to go public because then the focus would shift towards revenue streaming. Josh Constine, who is a writer for TechCrunch says this will lead to more ads popping up when browsing the website, this takes away from the user experience and creates a hassle. Once Facebook goes profit, there would be an immense pressure from stockholders to drive profits up and this will create new features on Facebook but not for the everyday user.

As a user of Facebook, would you advise Facebook to go public?

Source: CNNTech