Archive for the 'Internet' Category

Brad Howe Interview: In Morgantown this Thursday

Brad Howe, Assistant Athletic Director, WVUOne of our two “rock star” speakers this Thursday in Morgantown is WVU Assistant Athletic Director Brad Howe.   He took time out of his day…er night, that is, to answer some questions to give potential attendees an idea of what he’ll be speaking about.  Just as in Charleston last week, attendees will get the chance to ask Brad questions as well.  Go Mountaineers!

1. What has been the biggest change you’ve seen in how universities market and promote their sports programs since you started out at UConn?

The internet is biggest change. When I started at UConn in ‘93 the internet/email was in the very early stages (if we even had it all - I can’t remember ever using it at UConn in the beginning). Now, it is generally the first medium we think of when deciding how to best promote one of our games/events.

We still promote our events through traditional vehicles, but the internet is the one we think of first. It allows the most flexibility and the best opportunity to hit the most people during the course of a day.

2. How are you moving the WVU athletic department forward in terms of new methods of advertising, marketing, public relations, and measuring their effectiveness?

We are constantly looking at new ideas for our web site. Recently, we have started adding more video features to the site. We receive instant feedback with our web site via the traffic. We can see right away if something we did on there was well received. That is tougher with traditional television, radio or print advertising.
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Comcast - a bit like wearing tight underpants.

And there was I laboring under the false impression that Comcast was just a bit useless. I’d almost got used to the idea of losing service for a good twelve hours once a fortnight. And I’d also come to terms with one or two of my calls (yes, I got the bundle) turning into three-way conference affairs for no apparent reason.

It’s not so much Comcast’s bizarre standards of service that get me so much as the lack of competition.

But, it’s now come to light that Comcast aren’t only a bit useless but they’re also throttling bandwidth like a pair of old underpants throttles the blood flow to your important bits.

Thankfully, there’s a new group of internet vigilantes wearing their underpants on the outside of their trousers to safeguard us all against constipated speeds - the Network Neutrality Squad.

Now, some high-profile industry players including Web evangelist Vinton Cerf and Slashdot’s Keith Dawson have formed a new group, the Network Neutrality Squad, to ferret out other examples of ISPs blocking traffic.

“The project’s focus includes detection, analysis, and incident reporting of any anticompetitive, discriminatory, or other restrictive actions on the part of Internet Service Providers,” reads a statement on the new organization’s Web site, nnsquad.org.

Meanwhile, advocates including Free Press and the Consumers Union last week filed a complaint with the FCC seeking an injunction against Comcast and damages for the company’s move to interfere with traffic. “If the FCC does not immediately condemn such actions, Comcast will continue to block or filter revolutionary, socially valuable applications and content, and other broadband service providers may follow suit,” the complaint states.

Comcast’s position is that it’s just managing the flow of traffic. “We engage in reasonable network management to provide all of our customers with a good Internet experience, and we do so consistently with FCC policy,” executive vice president David L. Cohen said in a statement.

Not in my apartment you don’t, David. I’m supposed to get something like a 16mb peak/spike - you know, when I need it the most. But, as we all know, that peak comes at the very beginning until it starts to download through molasses. And don’t get me going on the extravagant downtimes in service I experience more often than is good for any man. And also don’t get me going on the weird third world wiring that has taken place in order for me to receive my third world service.

Remember - online innovation comes about better with decent internet infrastructure.

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Elton John: Irrelevant

Elton John

Well we might as well just go ahead and cancel our conference as Sir Elton of the John has decreed that the Internet should be closed down.

According to an article in The Sun:

He claims it is destroying good music, saying: “The internet has stopped people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff.”

“Instead they sit at home and make their own records, which is sometimes OK but it doesn’t bode well for long-term artistic vision.”

“It’s just a means to an end.”

“We’re talking about things that are going to change the world and change the way people listen to music and that’s not going to happen with people blogging on the internet.”

“I mean, get out there — communicate.”

“Hopefully the next movement in music will tear down the internet.”

“Let’s get out in the streets and march and protest instead of sitting at home and blogging.”

“I do think it would be an incredible experiment to shut down the whole internet for five years and see what sort of art is produced over that span.”

“There’s too much technology available.”

“I’m sure, as far as music goes, it would be much more interesting than it is today.”

Elton, Elton, Elton. I’ve never particularly held you up as an ambassador of musical or hair-piece decency, but it always comes across as a little bit sad when somebody dismisses everything related to the Internet wholesale.

The fact that people can now control their own means of musical distribution, marketing and production bypassing the big recording conglomerates is the best thing that has ever happened to music. Was artistic musical vision always supposed to be measured by the yardstick of some grumpy old tart who churned out Crocodile Rock?

Elton, you probably have a place somewhere in the vast musical cannon, and it’s most probably as its damp gunpowder, but I wouldn’t dream of wishing music to be closed down for a period of five years just to see what we’d come up with instead of Elton John.

It wouldn’t be so bad if you practiced what you preached. Your whole back catalog is available for download online and you also streamed your gig at Madison Square Gardens over the Internet. This is akin to you espousing vegetarianism and calling for meat to be banned then being seen pigging out on pork chops.

So you don’t like blogging, you think modern music sucks, and your last album wasn’t exactly a hot cake. Perhaps the latter explains your bitterness towards the Internet?

I come across people like Sir Elton quite often. I don’t mean chubby, be-wigged rock behemoths whose star is fading, but people who regard the Internet as being a complete and utter waste of time, effort and space.

For example, the number of people I’ve spoken to who’ve had a Website built only for them to subsequently dismiss the Internet out of hand when they receive no leads or hits is quite a few. The debate as to who is at fault can be left for another day. Imagine writing-off cars as a mode of transport because you failed to put in any gas.

Now, you can be forgiven if you didn’t know you had to put gas in the thing, but not if it’s been well and truly explained in advance that gas was a functional prerequisite.

The whole idea behind Online Marketing: Innovations that Work is to help you not only understand you need gas, but to show you what kinds of gas there are available and how each one can impact the running of your car differently.

World’s Fastest And America’s Slowest Internet Connection

Did you hear the one about the 75 year old Swedish woman with the world’s fastest internet connection?

Sigbritt Löthberg’s home has been supplied with a blistering 40 Gigabits per second connection, many thousands of times faster than the average residential link and the first time ever that a home user has experienced such a high speed.

You can read more here about how it all came about and how she now has the capability to watch 1,500 simultaneous HD broadcasts at once and download a full HD-DVD in approximately two seconds. Heaven help us if anybody shows her how to use bittorrent.

Now you might think 40 gigabytes is a little excessive. However, it isn’t the speed that is the issue but the technology behind the speed.

The secret behind Sigbritt’s ultra-fast connection is a new modulation technique which allows data to be transferred directly between two routers up to 2,000 kilometres apart, with no intermediary transponders.

According to Karlstad Stadsnät the distance is, in theory, unlimited - there is no data loss as long as the fibre is in place.

“I want to show that there are other methods than the old fashioned ways such as copper wires and radio, which lack the possibilities that fibre has,” said Peter Löthberg, who now works at Cisco.

The whole of America is put to shame when you consider its fastest connection in Rhode Island strolls in at a very pedestrian 5.01 megabits. And we won’t go into the ramifications of West Virginia plodding along at a sedentary 1.12 megabits - the national average being 1.97. As far as other national average internet speeds go, Canada is trotting along at 7mb with Japan leading us all at 61mb [source].

The bottom line is capacity.

Granted, I’m not an expert, nor have I delved as deep as I might have done, but do you not think West Virginia, with all its rolling hills and splendid scenery, may benefit from something along the lines of the set-up in Sweden?






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