I found this article on Gizmodo.com, It's worth a read for all those Facebook addicts.
"Facebook privacy policies keep going down the drain. That's enough reason for many to abandon it. Here you will find nine more:
After some reflection, I've decided to delete my account on Facebook. I'd like to encourage you to do the same. This is part altruism and part selfish. The altruism part is that I think Facebook, as a company, is unethical. The selfish part is that I'd like my own social network to migrate away from Facebook so that I'm not missing anything. In any event, here's my "Top Ten" reasons for why you should join me and many others and delete your account.
10. Facebook's Terms Of Service are completely one-sided
Let's start with the basics. Facebook's Terms Of Service state that not only do they own your data (section 2.1), but if you don't keep it up to date and accurate (section 4.6), they can terminate your account (section 14). You could argue that the terms are just protecting Facebook's interests, and are not in practice enforced, but in the context of their other activities, this defense is pretty weak. As you'll see, there's no reason to give them the benefit of the doubt. Essentially, they see their customers as unpaid employees for crowd-sourcing ad-targeting data.
9. Facebook's CEO has a documented history of unethical behavior
From the very beginning of Facebook's existence, there are questions about Zuckerberg's ethics. According to BusinessInsider.com, he used Facebook user data to guess email passwords and read personal email in order to discredit his rivals. These allegations, albeit unproven and somewhat dated, nonetheless raise troubling questions about the ethics of the CEO of the world's largest social network. They're particularly compelling given that Facebook chose to fork over $65M to settle a related lawsuit alleging that Zuckerberg had actually stolen the idea for Facebook.
8. Facebook has flat out declared war on privacy
Founder and CEO of Facebook, in defense of Facebook's privacy changes last January: "People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people. That social norm is just something that has evolved over time." More recently, in introducing the Open Graph API: "... the default is now social." Essentially, this means Facebook not only wants to know everything about you, and own that data, but to make it available to everybody. Which would not, by itself, necessarily be unethical, except that ...
7. Facebook is pulling a classic bait-and-switch
At the same time that they're telling developers how to access your data with new APIs, they are relatively quiet about explaining the implications of that to members. What this amounts to is a bait-and-switch. Facebook gets you to share information that you might not otherwise share, and then they make it publicly available. Since they are in the business of monetizing information about you for advertising purposes, this amounts to tricking their users into giving advertisers information about themselves. This is why Facebook is so much worse than Twitter in this regard: Twitter has made only the simplest (and thus, more credible) privacy claims and their customers know up front that all their tweets are public. It's also why the FTC is getting involved, and people are suing them (and winning).
Check out this excellent timeline from the EFF documenting the changes to Facebook's privacy policy.
6. Facebook is a bully
When Pete Warden demonstrated just how this bait-and-switch works (by crawling all the data that Facebook's privacy settings changes had inadvertently made public) they sued him. Keep in mind, this happened just before they announced the Open Graph API and stated that the "default is now social." So why sue an independent software developer and fledgling entrepreneur for making data publicly available when you're actually already planning to do that yourself? Their real agenda is pretty clear: they don't want their membership to know how much data is really available. It's one thing to talk to developers about how great all this sharing is going to be; quite another to actually see what that means in the form of files anyone can download and load into MatLab.
5. Even your private data is shared with applications
At this point, all your data is shared with applications that you install. Which means now you're not only trusting Facebook, but the application developers, too, many of whom are too small to worry much about keeping your data secure. And some of whom might be even more ethically challenged than Facebook. In practice, what this means is that all your data - all of it - must be effectively considered public, unless you simply never use any Facebook applications at all. Coupled with the OpenGraph API, you are no longer trusting Facebook, but the Facebook ecosystem.
4. Facebook is not technically competent enough to be trusted
Even if we weren't talking about ethical issues here, I can't trust Facebook's technical competence to make sure my data isn't hijacked. For example, their recent introduction of their "Like" button makes it rather easy for spammers to gain access to my feed and spam my social network. Or how about this gem for harvesting profile data? These are just the latest of a series of Keystone Kops mistakes, such as accidentally making users' profiles completely public, or the cross-site scripting hole that took them over two weeks to fix. They either don't care too much about your privacy or don't really have very good engineers, or perhaps both.
3. Facebook makes it incredibly difficult to truly delete your account
It's one thing to make data public or even mislead users about doing so; but where I really draw the line is that, once you decide you've had enough, it's pretty tricky to really delete your account. They make no promises about deleting your data and every application you've used may keep it as well. On top of that, account deletion is incredibly (and intentionally) confusing. When you go to your account settings, you're given an option to deactivate your account, which turns out not to be the same thing as deleting it. Deactivating means you can still be tagged in photos and be spammed by Facebook (you actually have to opt out of getting emails as part of the deactivation, an incredibly easy detail to overlook, since you think you're deleting your account). Finally, the moment you log back in, you're back like nothing ever happened! In fact, it's really not much different from not logging in for awhile. To actually delete your account, you have to find a link buried in the on-line help (by "buried" I mean it takes five clicks to get there). Or you can just click here. Basically, Facebook is trying to trick their users into allowing them to keep their data even after they've "deleted" their account.
2. Facebook doesn't (really) support the Open Web
The so-called Open Graph API is named so as to disguise its fundamentally closed nature. It's bad enough that the idea here is that we all pitch in and make it easier than ever to help Facebook collect more data about you. It's bad enough that most consumers will have no idea that this data is basically public. It's bad enough that they claim to own this data and are aiming to be the one source for accessing it. But then they are disingenuous enough to call it "open," when, in fact, it is completely proprietary to Facebook. You can't use this feature unless you're on Facebook. A truly open implementation would work with whichever social network we prefer, and it would look something like OpenLike. Similarly, they implement just enough of OpenID to claim they support it, while aggressively promoting a proprietary alternative, Facebook Connect.
1. The Facebook application itself sucks
Between the farms and the mafia wars and the "top news" (which always guesses wrong - is that configurable somehow?) and the myriad privacy settings and the annoying ads (with all that data about me, the best they can apparently do is promote dating sites, because, uh, I'm single) and the thousands upon thousands of crappy applications, Facebook is almost completely useless to me at this point. Yes, I could probably customize it better, but the navigation is ridiculous, so I don't bother. (And, yet, somehow, I can't even change colors or apply themes or do anything to make my page look personalized.) Let's not even get into how slowly your feed page loads. Basically, at this point, Facebook is more annoying than anything else.
Check out this hilarious vid about Facebook :D
Facebook is clearly determined to add every feature of every competing social network in an attempt to take over the Web (this is a never-ending quest that goes back to AOL and those damn CDs that were practically falling out of the sky). While Twitter isn't the most usable thing in the world, at least they've tried to stay focused and aren't trying to be everything to everyone.
I often hear people talking about Facebook as though they were some sort of monopoly or public trust. Well, they aren't. They owe us nothing. They can do whatever they want, within the bounds of the laws. (And keep in mind, even those criteria are pretty murky when it comes to social networking.) But that doesn't mean we have to actually put up with them. Furthermore, their long-term success is by no means guaranteed - have we all forgotten MySpace? Oh, right, we have. Regardless of the hype, the fact remains that Sergei Brin or Bill Gates or Warren Buffett could personally acquire a majority stake in Facebook without even straining their bank account. And Facebook's revenue remains more or less a rounding error for more established tech companies.
While social networking is a fun new application category enjoying remarkable growth, Facebook isn't the only game in town. I don't like their application nor how they do business and so I've made my choice to use other providers. And so can you."
Hope you enjoyed this :)
DELETE your Facebook account!
The end is near :(
So i haven't really been updating after every week but to be fair i have covered basically everything so far :)
So this last one will just be about my last few days. I've been working really hard...to be honest that CRT monitor is killing my eyes! haha luckily the tea breaks and the nice view helped me through it :) not to mention the totally awesome people :)
Busy with some website backgrounds for Huisgenoot, You and Kick-off. It's for the new TopTV Company. As well as doing banners for them. What i like about Gloo was that they trusted me, they didn't just give me petty intern work but they gave me real jobs for real clients with real deadlines. I was surpised with how much they trusted me :) I worked on Cadiz and Woolworths banners even brainstormed with them on a new Woolworths campaign :D
Everyone at Gloo has really been supportive and really been friendly towards me :) After scouting all the afrikaans people heehee :P I've started to feel more at home, not because i know any of them, but because i have a lot in common with most of the people at Gloo and they are so welcoming! I mean like some of the Project Managing people are so friendly and they ALWAYS great me with a smile :) it's really been a pleasure working them! They make me want to work hard! and i can see they all do! Maybe thats why they have been voted Best Digital Design Agency 4 years in a row?!
They have the recipe of success and they doing it with a smile on their faces! And that is part of what i stand for! I mean when they brainstorm they pump out great ideas like its nothing! haha i think i can learn a lot from these guys as well as a few new tricks :) This made me realise that i pretty mch knew nothing, all my throughts and perceptions on how the industry works has completely changed, and i'm glad it did. I would have failed badly if i hadn't witnessed the inner workings of Gloo.
So thank you Gloo for opening my eyes and future! :D
P.S as much as i would love to do my own thing, i would certainly not mind working at Gloo!, by thw way today was popcorn day again! WOOHOOGLOO!
Not there yet
Today i feel weird. It's strange because i've been ranting about Gloo so much, how awesome it is and blah blah blah. the truth is they are awesome, just i feel different today. i have been feeling different this whole weekend.
*for those reading this and don't know me all that well, i love Jesus...it's as simple as that. He is my passion and drive in this world and its He that makes me want to be greater.
But to get back to what i was saying, after seeing just a glimpse of how the industry works and the inside of a design business i have realised one thing.
i don't want to do this...
don't get me wrong i love designing and creating things, but i just don't think studying for a few years and then landing in a workplace doing my job day in and day out is for me. no i'm not just lazy and don't want to do anything, i just feel the will to do something greater. i want to do something that makes a difference i want to do what i feel in my heart needs to be done.
i often find myself on the train listening to my music and looking around me, standing in the crowd is when i see those in the crowd, those with a different song in their hearts, those thinking and then giving off a subtle smile, those that have that little inspiration in them thats enough to change them and those around them. i have only these few words on my heart this morning...
I was meant for something greater.
Band Meeting
Things are starting to take shape today. I had to drive in with my car, normally i take the train, but because i had to bring my camera with i couldn't take the gamble of using public transport. After 1h30 of traffic which normally takes round 30 min i finally ended up in town only to be greeted by NO parking space. Sigh now i remember why i didn't want to work in town. But i eventually got a space a couple of blocks away.
Anyways alas i arrived at Gloo. Each day getting less awkward and more comfortable :) I've started learning some names without having to ask for them, you just have to pay attention to these things hehe. It took a while to set up my Mac to have Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign but its settled now and i can start working! At least it's CS3 now!
I finally got my 1st project gloohoo! I have to redesign the layout of their projects board. At the moment its a white marker board with the current projects they are busy with written on it. My job is to structure a workable layout and just plainly make it look pretty! My style reference is Gloo's own styling, which i reckon would be easy to recreate since it is more or less the same styling i use myself! So great success!
I had to take mug shot photo's of each design team member, this will be used to indicate who is working on what project. Made them wear my 3D glasses hahaha ice breaker much? So today it's Friday, turns out today was band meeting! haha who would've thought! i remember reading it somewhere on their website, but didn't really take it seriously. They are planning to perform 2 original songs and one cover. Plus its going to be metal! \m/ !hells yeah! \m/ but let me not tell you all their secrets :)
So yes as the days progress i'm feeling more comfortable, and more and more like a part of the team. Plus everyone is so friendly!
I like it here ^.^
Popcorn day!
So here i am sitting...in my own little Glooniverse working on a old mac, which is not that bad (it has photoshop 7 lol's). I got introduced to everyone but forgot the names the moment i heard them :D
They showed me around the place and its just plain awesome, everything looks so nice i just want to work here forever! :D Free coffee, air-hockey table and a Wii! its a small little place but with a staff of approximately 25 people i take it.
The day started off with a little meeting where everybody just got everyone up-to-date with what they're doing and how things are going. They've made me a part of a project for spur. It's not even been long and i've already learned new ways digital media is being used. Our little team brainstormed, its really just me and another guy...ironically the only other afrikaans dude i think :)
I just presented him a scamp of how the idea can take shape and they liking it :D yay! success!
*note to self...you have to spark and get noticed! now is your time!
Anyways as it turns out, apparently is wednesday popcorn day! :D yay they've got their own popcorn machine! Great success!
Gloonigan over and out!
GlooHoo!
For BTech I have to intern at a specific company of my choice this year for 4 weeks. So after a bit of googling and a bit of talking I came across Gloo. Looking at their website...because I judge a company by its website, especially design companies, i started getting amped at the possibility of interning there! :D
But typically in my case things always don't happen at all until last minute! So after emails and phone calls I got through to Gloo and so far things are looking goooood! They really look like a fun place to work at, and they produce quality work from what I could see so far. So now they are consulting with the Art Director and getting me a work station! I'm just awaiting the final details...Whoop-di-dooo! I'm really amped to finally get into the design industry and get my hands dirty with a bit of web design! So to give you an idea of how excited I am, look at this :D ----------------------------------------->
Low-Poly Lovelyness
Just the other day i sort of decided to give myself a little project with blender. Since always stumbling onto such cool designs that were made in such a simple way i just had to get my hands dirty as well. Being the gamer i am, i decided to take the challenge of using Blender's Game Engine and creating my own little real-time 3D scene.
Being clueless as to where to start, my lovely girlfriend suggested I start modeling a nice little Fridge, and without any planning it kind of just went in the direction of a 1950's kitchen. Here is my wire frame model so you can see that it is in fact low-poly. Experimenting a bit with the Yafaray Script i managed to pull of a nice render of this little fridge.
I'm not sure how exactly i will be doing the reflections in BGE, but that is not important now. I will probably be baking AO onto the texture just to provide more realism. Next up is a awesome stove! :D
