DuckDuckGo: an alternative search engine

DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo is an alternative search engine that does not track what you search. It emphasises heavily that privacy of their users are important so they do not track. This is opposite to search engine such as Google. It also highlights that it gets the best sources rather than the most sources (Which Google search engine does but this is slowly changing). 

Google search engine is all about personalisation and each google search can be different, if two different users search the same thing with personalised ads etc. DuckDuckGo is different where you will not be tracked when left and there are no personalised ads and just ads which fit with your keywords. DuckDuckGo also has the feature of bangs (!) that can directly take you to the website without searching on the page. For example, if I search '!twitter' (not case sensitive) and click on it, this will directly take me to the site. Very nifty.

Personally I have tried it and really do think it is a great alternative to Google search. In fact, it seems a lot of people think the same as there was a 600% increase in traffic when the Snowden revelations occurred about the tracking of the NSA. This search engine has seen its popularity rise and is seriously competing with Google.

It provides everything that is the opposite of Google, but that is not to say it is all a good thing. Are we too used to Google or are we just forced to use it since everyone does? Can DuckDuckGo become the next top search engine? What do you think?

Sources: https://duckduckgo.com/about 

               http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/business/2015/10/talk-talk-hack-how-safe-our-data-                hands-big-companies

The Useless Web

While many parts of the internet is utilised for business, products and entertainment. There are some sections of the internet that is made that are entirely...pointless.

The site http://www.theuselessweb.com/ lets you click and directs you to a random site that is useless in every way. Some examples of the sites that you are directed to include: eel slap, mouse pointer location, a mango and many more.  Yet it shows and proves that the internet is vast and can be used for anything if effort is ensued. The internet gives you potential to curate, remix, go viral, communicate and much more.

The site is indeed pretty useless, but nevertheless, it did remotely entertain me and did give me a sense of curiosity of what other useless sites that could be found via this.

Check it out if anything and see for yourselves. What websites did you get and what can you do with these websites?

http://www.theuselessweb.com/

Incredible Foo fighters Learn to Fly Rendition by 1000 rockers!

This absolutely gave me goosebumps and how incredible that 1000 musicians could convene and play a beautiful rendition of learn to fly just to get the real Foo Fighters to come play in their city. It sounds amazing and beautiful! Check it out!

Twitch Plays Pokémon

Twitch Plays Pokémon

"Twitch plays pokemon animated" by Source (WP:NFCC#4). Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Twitch_plays_pokemon_animated.gif#/media/File:Twitch_plays_pokemon_animated.gif

One of the most incredible scenes I witnessed on Twitch was when Twitch viewers played Pokémon through the chat channel or IRC by inputting words which translated to actions on the screen.

This social experiment had over 50 million views and over 80,000 concurrent viewers trying to move the character. Twitch estimated that over 1 million different viewers participated. The channel was chaotic, yet somehow it was addictive to try and see if the game could be completed. On March the 1st, the game was completed after 2 weeks (with a few tweaks).

This was an incredible feat and I myself, tried to help and give input into the game for a good few hours. I believe this experiment gave way for new interactions and a new original way to use live streaming than just spectating. It shows that even through chaos, that order can appear through the midst and still complete something through crowdsourcing. It shows crowdsourcing is a valuable way of working. Furthermore, It gave way to new games catered towards viewership and live streaming such as Choice Chamber as well as Quiplash. I further believe that while this experiment was not the first of its kind, it was the first in its type to really become popular and viral. This then gave popularity to more interactive games for spectators of Twitch. Recently Twitch has tried to complete the game Dark souls and eventually succeeded after 43 days. 

There is certainly potential for more interactive games for live viewership and I believe that developers are considering and taking this into account when developing games. Even if they do not, they cannot ignore the popularity that is Twitch as well as the importance of live-streaming. The input of viewers can produce important crowdsourcing material as well as paving an alternative way for games to be played, but still enjoyed.

Source: http://www.twitch.tv/twitchplayspokemon 

Other Reading:  

Ramirez, D., Saucerman, J., & Dietmeier, J. (2014). Twitch plays pokémon: a case study in big G games. In Proceedings of DiGRA (pp. 3-6).

Margel, M. Twitch Plays Pokemon: An Analysis of Social Dynamics in Crowdsourced Games.

iPhone 6 Review

I have now used the new iPhone 6 64 gb Space Grey for more than a month now and these are my thoughts about the phone.

Build Quality and Colour

One of the best aspects of the iPhone has to be the build quality. It feels premium and has a very good weight to it yet, it has a very slim design and very easy to use in one hand (not about the plus). The buttons are clicky/mechanical and no quality control problems such as dead pixel or anything alike. A minus of it could be the protruding camera module as well as the slightly slippery design. Without a case, I feel that it is prone to damages from extraneous variables. On the other hand, the phone with a case also rends its attractiveness. 

Space Grey with Ozaki case

I chose the Space Grey colour for its black front panel as the other colours come with a white front display. I wanted a black coloured phone and was forced to buy the Space Grey. However, I do wish that Apple continued with an all black and all white colour option similar to those of the 4 and 4s. Heck, even more colours for the black front would have been better. Funnily enough, from online polls (and speaking to the Apple specialist), Space Grey is the most popular colour. I really hope the next iteration of the will have more colour options or a darker back for the black coloured iPhones. Furthermore, the Space Grey colour makes the phone slimmer looking than the white, but finger prints/dust are highly visible!

Bigger Screen!

One of the major aspects and redesign of the new iPhones have been the increase in screen size (two in fact). The iPhone 6 has a 4.7 inch screen with a retina display. The screen size upgrade was a much needed improvement since Apple would have lost the smartphone race if they continued with smaller screen sizes. The iPhone 6 fits perfectly for one handed use, but at the same time big enough to watch videos and do daily tasks on the phone.

Typical iPhone screen

While the screen does look nice, the resolution of the screen is only 750p which compared to my previous HTC phone does not look as clear. For everyday use the screen is good to use but when watching videos on Youtube, I feel the screen is somewhat...lacking. When you are used to 1080p screens and videos, going back to 720p/750p really has a big disparity. Luckily, the plus does have a 1080p screen resolution. I am hoping for the next iPhone, the screen resolution on the smaller iPhone will have at least full hd quality. 

Battery Life

The battery life on the iPhone 6 may look on paper to be visibly poor due to the small battery capacity (About 1,810mAh and non-removable). It is larger than the previous model (iPhone 5s), but compared to the Samsung and LG, it is tiny! 

However, I am happy to say that it holds up to the other phones with bigger batteries and in general, my battery lasts for the whole day and I usually have about 20-30% left at the end. In fact, it lasted much longer than my previous phone. The best aspect is the incredible standby time on iPhones. Typically it only drains 1-2% over night where as android would drain 10-15%. I have to say that I am satisfied with the battery but of course, it would be great if it could have a bigger battery. Everyone wants larger batteries.

Battery Life and incredible standby time

Performance and IOS

Performance has been incredible. With the new A8 chip it is said to be about 25% faster than the A7 and coupled with Apple's iOS means it is very fast at what it needs to do. Everything feels really smooth and I think the iOS plays a part in this. There are times when it has to reload apps or tabs since the 6 only uses 1 gb ram which in my honest opinion, should have been upgraded to at least 2gb.  Lets just say the iPhone 6 is fast, very fast! It's been a pleasure using this phone and forgot how simplistic and easy it is to use a phone again. 

Verdict

It is a very very good phone and if you have the money or chance to buy, then you should go ahead. It is fast, aesthetically pleasing and now bigger!

Rating: 9/10

HTC one (M7) died

So my HTC one (M7) died just before I was to pick up someone from the airport. I attempted to revive it by doing a hard reset, but to no avail. Luckily, I was at the airport before it died so I was able to meet with my friend.

I sent it to repair since HTC does not have a straight swap like Apple does. When it came back (it took 2/3 weeks), the person who repaired my phone basically said I should have updated it to prevent this from occurring. Yep, totally a software problem when it did not turn on. Obviously hardware, thanks HTC guy!

In fact, I decided to get the iPhone 6 64gb Space Grey before it returned. So expect a review to come soon!

iPhone 6/ 6 Plus impressions

Impressions and Thoughts

The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were announced last week and will be available to those on the 19th of September 

This is the first time that Apple has released two different sizes to choose from. Previously this had not been done.  But let's get on with the specifications of the two iPhones:

iPhone 6 Specs

• Dimensions 138.2 x 67.1 x 6.9 mm
• Weight: 128g
• Display : 4.7 inch LCD, 750 x 1334 pixels , 326 PPI
• Battery: 1800 mAh
• Processor: 64-bit A8
• Ram: 1gb
• Storage: 16gb / 64gb / 128gb
• Colour: Silver/ Gold / Space gray
• Data: LTE, HSPA+ etc
• Simcard: nanosim
• Camera: 8MP iSight Rear - 1.2mp front facing
• Sound: loudspeakers
• Platform: Apple IOS, IOS 8

iPhone 6 Plus Specs

• Dimensions 158 x 77.7 x 7.1 mm
• Weight: 172g
• Display : 5.5 inch LCD, 1080 x 1920 pixels , 401 ppi
• Battery: 2915 mAh
• Processor: 64-bit A8
• Ram: 1gb
• Storage: 16gb / 64gb / 128gb
• Colour: Silver/ Gold / Space gray
• Data: LTE, HSPA+ etc
• Simcard: nanosim
• Camera: 8MP iSight Rear  with OIS- 1.2mp front facing
• Sound: loudspeakers
• Platform: Apple IOS, IOS 8

Impressions

Generally the biggest change to iPhones has been on the outside and the size. The iPhone has become more rounded and now the colour or finish takes over the whole back instead of just the middle. The camera module actually protrudes out compared to the previous models. Now, this many not be a bother if you have a case on, but having a phone naked with a camera that protrudes out seems just a bit silly. This is the danger of making a phone slimmer and improving the camera at the same time. Although Apple seems adamant that the new camera is worth it. But just how well will this hold if you, like me, like to play your phone rear side down on hard surface. Time will only tell. I would suggest getting a case.

Now Apple fans have a dilemma with two different phone sizes a 4.7 inch and a 5.5 inch screen. Personally, 5.5 inch for me is way too big. The 4.7 inch is the perfect size which is the same as the HTC ONE M7. It's comfortable to be held with one hand and big enough to watch videos with. Now, the screen sizes aren't the only differences, but the resolution as well. The 6 Plus has a better resolution as well bigger battery, OIS on the camera and possibly a bigger RAM. Everything else between the two are the same. 

In my opinions the two difference are very minimal and with most people, it wouldn't be noticed. Although the battery has improved in both models, the iPhone 6 battery stats which were shown on the unveiling, showed minimal improvements. This is probably due to the bigger screen and the amount of power it needs. The iPhone 6 Plus however, has great battery life.

I thoroughly expected people to go for the iPhone 6 over the Plus, but it seems that the Plus is much more appealing to the fans. This is because most Apple fans always believed that their screen size were fine as it was and always secretly poked fun of Android users with how big some of their phones were. But it seems everyone wanted a bigger screen. I think the screen size change has put Apple right back in with its competitors and it is what they needed to do. Although this is the first step, this step will gain many new fans or returning customers to give the iPhone a try.

If you have an iPhone 4 or  4s this would be a great upgrade, however, if you have a 5S and maybe a 5, this upgrade will be minimal. Unless the screen size is a factor that you most desired then by all means, go for it!

Today Apple also announced that has sold or preordered 4 million iPhones 6/Plus in the first 24 hours. That is an incredible feat! It seems the screen size does play a big factor and many were waiting for it.

Edit: A lot of people seem to hate the new iPhone design, but I believe it is one of the better phone designs and much improved over the previous model. However, it definitely does not beat HTC when it comes to design.