Facebook may make prophet page inaccessible in Pakistan

Facebook is disappointed at being blocked in Pakistan over a contest that encourages users to post caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed and may make the offending page inaccessible to users there, the social network said late Wednesday. Pakistan blocked access to Facebook on a court order over a competition created by a Facebook user who set up a page called “Draw Mohammed Day,” inviting people to send in caricatures of the Muslim prophet on May 20.

Islam strictly prohibits depictions of Prophet Mohammed as blasphemous and Muslims around the world staged angry protests over the publication of satirical cartoons of the prophet in European newspapers in 2006.

The statement from the Palo Alto, California-based social network said “we want Facebook to be a place where people can openly discuss issues and express their views, while respecting the rights and feelings of others.

With now more than 400 million users from around the world… we sometimes find people discussing and posting about topics that others may find controversial, inaccurate, or offensive.While some kinds of comments and content may be upsetting for someone — criticism of a certain culture, country, religion, lifestyle, or political ideology, for example — that alone is not a reason to remove the discussion.

We strongly believe that Facebook users have the freedom to express their opinions, and we don’t typically take down content, groups or pages that speak out against countries, religions, political entities, or ideas. The statement noted that “Nazi content is illegal in some countries” but said “that does not mean it should be removed entirely from Facebook.

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First playable Google doodle marks 30 years of Pac-Man

Internet giant Google marked the 30th birthday of Pac-Man by featuring the classic arcade videogame in the first-ever playable doodle on its home page. Web users who opened Google’s homepage after 1500 GMT Friday — which is midnight in Japan, where Pac-Man was born — were greeted by a small-scale Pac-man game set around a barely discernible “Google” in the middle of the game’s colorful maze.

The game designed by Toru Iwatani was first released by Japan-based Namco into arcades on May 22, 1980. The Google doodle Pac-Man comes complete with the arcade game’s trademark music and sound effects, and an “Insert Coin” button where Google’s “I’m feeling lucky” button usually is.

But even though Pac-Man grew to become the best-selling coin-operated game in history, the Google doodle was decidedly less popular with Internet users. Other online comments were more charitable, but wondered about the effect the doodle on productivity.

All the game details are spot-on, right down to the impulse to ignore work, friends, familiy and play for hours. The playable Pac-Man doodle will stay on Google for 48 hours.

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How The Internet Works

The term Internet access refers to the communication between a residence or a business and an ISP that connects to the Internet. Access falls into two broad categories: dedicated and dial-up. With dedicated access, a subscriber’s computer remains directly connected to the Internet at all times by a permanent, physical connection. Most large businesses have high-capacity dedicated connections; small businesses or individuals who desire dedicated access choose technologies such as digital subscriber line (DSL) or cable modems, which both use existing wiring to lower cost. A DSL sends data across the same wires that telephone service uses, and cable modems use the same wiring that cable television uses. In each case, the electronic devices that are used to send data over the wires employ separate frequencies or channels that do not interfere with other signals on the wires. Thus, a DSL Internet connection can send data over a pair of wires at the same time the wires are being used for a telephone call, and cable modems can send data over a cable at the same time the cable is being used to receive television signals. The user usually pays a fixed monthly fee for a dedicated connection. In exchange, the company providing the connection agrees to relay data between the user’s computer and the Internet. Dial-up is the least expensive access technology, but it is also the least convenient. To use dial-up access, a subscriber must have a telephone modem, a device that connects a computer to the telephone system and is capable of converting data into sounds and sounds back into data. The user’s ISP provides software that controls the modem. To access the Internet, the user opens the software application, which causes the dial-up modem to place a toll-free telephone call to the ISP. A modem at the ISP answers the call, and the two modems use audible tones to send data in both directions. When one of the modems is given data to send, the modem converts the data from the digital values used by computers—numbers stored as a sequence of 1s and 0s—into tones. The receiving side converts the tones back into digital values. Unlike dedicated access technologies, a dial-up modem does not use separate frequencies, so the telephone line cannot be used for regular telephone calls at the same time a dial-up modem is sending data.

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Hectic Capiznon Bloggers: WebCrawler

WebCrawler, a search engine, computer software program for locating World Wide Web (WWW) information. WebCrawler was developed by University of Washington graduate student Brian Pinkerton in 1994 but is now maintained by America Online, Inc., a commercial Internet service provider. WebCrawler uses a program called a spider. A spider sometimes called robot, softbot, spiderbot, wanderer, crawler, and fish. A Spider is a computer program that automatically monitors documents. Most Web pages include at least one link (an automatic connection) to another Web page, and some include hundreds of links. A spider takes advantage of this structure by starting at one Web page and working its way out by following every link on a Web page and then following every link provided by the new Web pages. Some spiders save the URL (Uniform Resource Locator), or address, of every Web page they visit. These spiders are used by search engines to build indexes of Web pages that users can access to search for information on a particular topic. Indexing spiders, as they are called, often also store the title and partial or complete text of a Web page so users can do more detailed searches. A WebCrawler uses a program called spider to search the WWW for new documents (called Web pages) and to index all the words in the documents. A person using WebCrawler enters a keyword or phrase, for example if you type the keyword Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009 the WebCrawler provides a list of all documents that contain the word(s) or phrase for Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009. Each title is linked to the document's site on the WWW, so users can go directly from the list to any document on the list and find more useful information about the Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009 documents.

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Using the Internet

Using Internet
Computer-based global information system. The Internet is composed of many interconnected computer networks. Each network may link tens, hundreds, or even thousands of computers, enabling them to share information with one another and to share computational resources such as powerful supercomputers and databases of information. The Internet has made it possible for people all over the world to effectively and inexpensively communicate with one another. The internet is still a great way to look things up. You can find addresses or recipes, listen to music, or find things to do. You can look up information on hobbies or musical instruments, or read a magazine or newspaper online. If you search the internet on your own, make sure the web site you find is reliable.

Using a Search Engine
The best way to find web sites is to use a search engine. Here are some helpful ones:
Google (www.google.com)
Yahoo (www.yahoo.com)
MSN (www.msn.com)
Start by typing one or two search terms or keywords that describe your topic. For example “Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009” the search engine scans the internet and gives you a list of sites that contain them and you will find information about Hectic Capiznon Bloggers 2009 topics. The results appear in a certain order, or rank. Search engines use different ways of measuring which websites are likely to be the most helpful. The site that’s listed first may not have what you want. Explore as many of the sites as possible. You might have a narrow search by using more keywords. Or trying using directories to help find what you need.

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