Spam !!! Its taking over the Internet....

The Internet has grown immensely over the years and as with anything else, with growth comes certain challenges. Along with security, identity theft and annoying pop up ads, SPAM has taken over our e-mail accounts. On a daily basis I open my yahoo e-mail account and have countless spam e-mails. They are annoying, they take up space and waste my time. How can we get rid of or prevent these pesky e-mails from reaching us ?

About.Com  has provided tips and tricks to avoiding this useless junk mail.

1.  When it is necessary to send out group e-mails or comment on a blog or a forum, make your e-mail address anonymous.

2. It may be helpful when creating a new e-mail address to make it more complex.

3. A good Anti-Spam Program is a must. There are many different options out there from POPFile, BullGuard Spam Filter or Spam Bully. This is just a very small list of the hundreds of different sites available.

4. When you receive these e-mails, you can always unsubscribe as there should be an option at the bottom to take your e-mail off of their distribution list.

5. Be careful when signing up for raffles, contests or anything where you leave your e-mail address. They will e-mail you!

6. Never click on an unknown or suspicious link in an e-mail. It may be from a friend but if the topic is odd you are better to be safe than sorry.

7. Set up your anti spam folders or spam filter in your e-mail accounts.

8. Dont be afraid to report Spam. You can always forward your spam e-mails to spam@uce.gov . This is the Spam box for the FTC.

Whether you like it or not spam is all around us, its just not as bad if you don't see it. There are certain steps you can take to ensure your e-mail account wont be overtaken by these worthless e-mails.
Be aware, be cautious and guard your e-mail address for all its worth....

The Internet has been around for how long ??

The Internet was invented in the late 1960's and of course many important events have happened along the Internet timeline. But if you had to choose one, one important date on that timeline which would you be most interested in?

July 2001: A federal judge rules Napster must remain offline until it can prevent copyrighted material from being shared by its users

We have all heard of Napster. Napster was created by Shawn Fanning and his uncle John Fanning in 1999 while Shawn attended Northeastern University. Its was originally set up as a peer- to - peer file sharing service where people could share music.....for free. After running into massive legal battles regarding copyright violations the site was forced to shut down.
The site made it easy to exchange MP3 files which musicians viewed as "stealing". The band Metallica ignited the legal battles when they discovered their song "I Disappear" was being downloaded on the site before it was even released. After being sued by musician such as Metallica, Dr. Dre and organizations as the RIAA the site officially shut down in July of 2001.
In 2002, Roxio acquired the company and in September of 2008 the site was purchased by Best Buy for $121 million who is the current parent company of the site. The site currently exists as an online music store which requires a paid online subscription.
Napster.com
Napster may have run into major difficulties over the past few years, but it opened the doors for music share and music purchase sites.

February 2007: Apple Surpasses one billion iTunes downloads

Today if you want to purchase music online, most people automatically think of the site iTunes. iTunes was established in  January of 2001. Of course with this site you pay for the files that you download but without the presence of Napster, do you think 1 billion songs would have been downloaded in 6 years !

One Billion Songs - now that is alot of music.......

New Semester, New Class, Same Internet

Today marks the beginning of the Fall 2011 Semester at Suffolk University. Its hard to believe that summer vacation is over. One of the courses i am taking this semester is New Media and New Markets which of course focuses on the Internet, marketing, web design and new media. Millions and Millions of people use the Internet. An estimate of 2,095,006,005 people are estimated to use the Internet as of March 2011. But how do you use the Internet ?

If i had to guess why people use the Internet i would have to guess... 1) Social Networking 2) Communication 3) Research 4) Entertainment 5) Marketing.

I know i personally use the Internet for social networking and for communication purposes at work.
I of course am a member of facebook and as sad as it is, i cant remember life before facebook ( i know i know - don't judge) I use facebook to keep in touch with friends, make plans, see what everyone is up to, etc.
My job 100% relys on the Internet. You learn the hard way when Internet goes down for a day and i cant get anything done - only left to play major catch up when the system is back up and running. I am constantly e-mailing, sending out reminders, logging ticket requests, setting reservation, making travel plans. Every aspect of my job relies om the world wide web. To be honest, i don't think my job could exist ( or at least function properly) without the web.
My friends and family do not rely on the Internet when it comes to work as much as i do. My mom uses it to play bejeweled, forward us those silly e-mails or check up on us on facebook ( there should be a rule that a mother cannot be friends with her daughters on any social networking sites) My father uses it to watch comedy videos before going to bed or catch an early new segment when he wakes up. My sister is always logged onto facebook catching up with friends.
There are quite a lot of people using the Internet right now -but each for a different purpose.
Why are you logging on ?