Tag Archives: unethical behavior

Dopey Drone Pilots Delaying Firefighting on California Freeway Is Likely to Set Back Drone Industry Growth

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What were they thinking??!! There is lots of intelligence behind the design of drones, lots of intelligence in the information that can be collected via their cameras, and lots of intelligent actions that can be taken using this information. But apparently NO intelligence on the part of the voyeurs piloting the five drones that resulted in a 20-minute delay of firefighting on July 17. The FAA and other authorities who have been accused of dragging their feet in approving the use of drones now have strong arguments for their conservative views.

Technology Bloopers is headed by a lifelong advocate for applying technology to enable us to do things never before possible, to make our lives easier and more comfortable, etc. But we also are advocates for using common sense and considering all possible aspects of applying that technology, be it Elon Musk’s electric cars or space activities, Uber, or other recent marvels. Practical considerations such as human safety or impacts on ecosystems or society are likely to delay the progress of these marvels. So we should be careful to make reasonable forecasts as to when they are likely to achieve widespread adoption.

Bears Make Money, Bulls Make Money, But Pigs Get Slaughtered

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Tech companies would do well to heed this time-proven advice to investors. They are truly greedy these days, forcing themselves on users. The most recent push-back by a journalist that we’ve seen is from Patric May at the San Jose MercuryNews, who tried to unsubscribe from the firehose of unwanted emails he was receiving. One thing he learned was that using “Unsubscribe” was like pouring gasoline on a fire, because it confirmed a valid email address to the sender, who could then sell it to dozens or hundreds of other companies, all of whom could then bombard him with THEIR emails.

There are lots of other self-serving ploys from other companies. Does Dropbox really care all that much to protect your files by reminding you to use it, or is it because they want you to use a lot of storage that they can charge you for? And why else did they immediately upload all your photos to their site other than filling up your “free” storage so they could start charging you for the additional storage. Apple does the same thing to a new iPhone, whether you want them to or not. Did you really want your thousands of carefully-cataloged photos dumped into a single big tub? We thought not.

How Do I Scam Thee (with SEO)? Let Me Count the Ways.

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The count must be in the billions. Our sister websites, Wilddancer.com and WhyMenDieYoung.com had been getting a few sales pitches from people who were able to breach our FormToEmail Comments security or leave comments on our WordPress blogs. But, thanks to professional advice and implementation, we were pretty immune to the automatic web crawlers, so scammers had to make considerable effort to get through. When we added our Blooper Jar, a kind of “incoming blog”, though, we started getting frequent posts from from an apparently clueless company called SwingSEO Solutions, starting with the following from Brigitte: “Hi, my name is Brigitte and I am the marketing manager at SwingSEO Solutions. I was just looking at your Worst User Interface | Blooper Jar site and see that your site has the potential to get a lot of visitors. I just want to tell you, In case you didn’t already know… There is a website network which already has more than 16 million users, and the majority of the users are looking for niches like yours. By getting your site on this service you have a chance to get your site more visitors than you can imagine. It is free to sign up and you can read more about it here: http://anders.ga/w-6×2 – Now, let me ask you… Do you need your website to be successful to maintain your business? Do you need targeted traffic who are interested in the services and products you offer? Are looking for exposure, to increase sales, and to quickly develop awareness for your site? If your answer is YES, you can achieve these things only if you get your website on the network I am talking about. This traffic network advertises you to thousands, while also giving you a chance to test the service before paying anything at all. All the popular sites are using this service to boost their readership and ad revenue! Why aren’t you? And what is better than traffic? It’s recurring traffic! That’s how running a successful site works… Here’s to your success! Read more here: http://stg2bio.co/10fz – or to unsubscribe please go here: http://todochiapas.mx/C/36p” There were small variations in the sender’s name, title, organization name, etc., but the pattern was mostly identical. Likely these were being done by a “Mechanical Turk” being paid a very small amount for each.

Likely the number of misleading missives sent by one Mechanical Turk is small in comparison to the number of companies claiming to conduct Search Engine Optimization (SEO) intended to skyrocket your site’s ranking to the very top of web searches. There must be a few legitimate experts, but they must find it tough sledding against all the illegitimate ones. Our advice: if you truly want to use one of them, do your homework first.

Phishing for “Dead” People (or FORMER LinkedIn members)

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Like Mark Twain, reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. At least on the geni.com genealogy website. Coggshall is not a common name. Dan Coggshall confirms that he has nothing to do with Geni.com. Apparently Geni.com is just hoping to trick me into using their site. When I click on “Contact profile manager” it just dumps me back at their Home screen where they try to sign me up. Apparently there is no way to actually communicate with them unless you are playing their game. HIGHLY UNETHICAL.

Speaking of unethical, LinkedIn had been triggering regular weekly messages (exactly the same day and time each week) from an acquaintance, using as bait a handful of people who were NOT known to him but LinkedIn claimed they were. Because of this and other nasty games they played I totally quit LinkedIn. I only got a few more messages, all of which I unsubscribed, and this acquaintance’s weekly missives ceased. But a couple of days ago LinkedIn re-started the same game. Apparently the CEO’s “compassion” philosophy does not extend to members or former members of LinkedIn.