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Are your bored, restless, sick of digital doom? Then why not sign up for a service where you can vent your feelings and get some reward for doing so? Our survey panel - people like you and me - helps solve problems others may have by telling them what they think. It's that easy. So check it out. Why am I selling to you instead of ranting as usual? Well the truth is that I want you to join because you are the ePeople who count. I'm asking you nicely to help out.
http://www.xxist.com/panel/index.html
I'll let you know how many people sign up to help. And by the way, thanks if you do.
In case you think I have lost the will to live, I'll let you in to a secret. We are making the newsletter go monthly after this issue because we want to spend the time building a better community with you all. Instead of us e-mailing out what we think you should see, we want to move towards a time when you are asking for things and we try to help. A bit like an agony aunt on the Internet. To do it we need ways to feed information in and out and that's why we are setting up the panel. I know it might sound like a newsgroup, but it is meant to build knowledge for us all, not just for those who can be bothered to wade through all the nonsense. There are around 10,000 of you on this list - and that's a lot of experience, needs, issues etc. We want to make this a better service to you. Help us to help you....and see you in a month.
Annie Millar.
Managing director, XXIST.com
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| UK WEB ADVERTISING OVERTAKES THE MOVIES |
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Despite a slowdown in growth just before Christmas, UK online advertising has overtaken cinema advertising for the first time. Two separate studies also show that this growth bucks the trend in the US. A PriceWaterhouseCooper study for the Internet Advertising Bureau found that the UK online ad sector did not follow the contraction in the US market during last year's third quarter. Forrester Research also recorded year-on-year growth in the first two months of this year for online advertising, despite a fall in conventional advertising spend
Online advertisers spent a total of £49.4 million during the last quarter of 2000, up from £41.9million in the previous quarter. The online annual total spend of £154.7million compares with the £128 million spent in cinemas. In the US, the figures fell during the third quarter of 2000 for the first time. The PWC figures did show a fall in the rate of growth in the online sector during the period, but a spokesman commented that many would be surprised by the strength of the figures in view of the US experience.
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| CYBERCOPS TARGET CRIME ON THE INTERNET |
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A team of 80 cybercops attached to the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit has been set up to co-ordinate action against crime on the Internet. The team includes specialists from the national Crime Squad, the National Criminal Intelligence Service, HM Customs and Excise, police forces and civilian experts on secondment from the IT industry. America's FBI already has a cyber crime agency and their caseload has trebled in three years. The British unit hopes to learn from its successes. The new head of the unit, Det. Chief Supt. Len Hynds said the team would be investigating the use of the Internet for fraud, fomenting racial hatred, identity theft, hacking, stalking and spamming.
Cyber crime is mushrooming. Available figures suggest that more than 60 per cent of online businesses have been targeted by hackers, though industry experts accept that there is massive under-reporting in this area. One of the reasons for launching the new unit, according to the Director General of the National Crime Squad was to gain the trust of businesses in reporting incidents. "Then we can start to build up a better picture of patterns of computer-driven criminality," said Bill Hughes, the Director General.
One of the main reasons why companies are reluctant to report security breaches is the fear of publicity damaging their professional reputations. Consumers, too, have their own concerns. Research consistently shows that security worries are responsible for reluctance to shop on the Internet. It is in the interests of both the industry and the consumer that the new unit is successful.
Not everyone is full of enthusiasm for the new unit. Civil liberties groups are concerned about intrusion into personal privacy. There are still unresolved issues surrounding the controversial RIP Act: for example, the government has still not decided which ISPs will have to carry interception "black boxes", what they will consist of and how much of the cost will be borne by the taxpayer. And one group, Liberty, has called for stronger legislation to protect personal information held on computers. "There has to be a proper balance," said John Wadham, director. "We think there are not adequate safeguards and protections to ensure that our personal information isn't going to get into the wrong hands."
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| FREE MUSIC ONLINE HITTING SALES |
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The music industry is blaming the availability of free music online, copying and the US economic slowdown for a fall in sales. The world's largest market, the US, has seen singles and cassette sales fall by 38 per cent and 46 per cent, and not surprisingly, Napster is targeted as the main villain. The only bright spot from the music industry's point of view is a growth in CD sales.
Europe is the strongest market with a 1.3 per cent rise in the number of recordings sold, with the UK showing an increase of 6.2 per cent. Falls in France, Germany and Italy were blamed on copying.
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| SUPER NET PHONES ARE FINALLY HERE |
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It's almost a year since BT claimed it was launching the supermobile, a phone which trebled the speed of Internet surfing. Embarrassingly, the phones refused to work. But a new launch date of May 18 has been announced for the phones which use GPRS technology and BT will still be ahead of its three major rivals. Only one model will initially be available with two tariff packages but it will be nationwide, taking advantage of BT's £50 million investment on infrastructure. Other companies say they, too, are planning to sell GPRS phones this year, but are vague about the timing.
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Trademark owners and those with registered domain names are already finding plenty to fight - and litigate - about, but now comes news that registrars are allowing the use of so-called Unicode symbols in domain names. This includes such characters as the smiley face, musical notes and even the trademark registration symbol the circled "R". The Internet Engineering Task Force outlined technical requirements for the use of non-Latin characters and at least one registrar has already begun to accept preregistrations of domain names using Unicode symbols. Unicode is a standard adopted by the industry which provides a unique number for every character, no matter what the platform, programme or language. Trademark lawyers are already wondering how this will affect intellectual property rights, with one American lawyer remarking wryly that it "looks like another full-employment programme for trademark lawyers"!
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| INTERNET RATINGS FIRMS FACE LEGAL ACTION |
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NetValue and NetRatings are just two of the Internet audience measurement companies which could face legal action in the UK after an out of court settlement in America. In that case, Jupiter Media Metrix effectively closed down a rival business after arguing that it owned the copyright on the software used to monitor the surfing habits of users. The company operates as Jupiter MMXI in Britain and has filed new lawsuits against NetValue and NetRatings saying it is considering action in the UK. City analysts and investors have long complained that there are too many measurement methods. They use the figures to value companies based on their user statistics.
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| NEW SECURITY GROUP TO GIVE EARLY WARNINGS |
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A new Internet security group in America is to provide an early warning system about cyber threats from hackers, viruses and other forms of computer sabotage. Called the Internet Security Alliance it has been formed by the marriage of the CERT Co-ordination Centre, a US government-funded research group which detected threats like the "Love Bug" virus, and the Electronic Industries Alliance, a federation of trade organisations. Membership fees range from $2,500 to $70,000 and will give companies fast access to information about vulnerabilities, which previously would have take as long as 45 days. In the past CERT provided warnings to government agencies, but the public had to wait for the information. Last year alone, the group handled 21,756 computer security incidents affecting more than 9,350,000 hosts.
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"Hate sites" are an Internet phenomenon, which really seem to be catching on. They offer dissatisfied customers a wonderful way of venting their anger against companies which have failed to deliver. They typically involve somebody buying an Internet address with the words "ihate", "sucks" or even worse tacked on to the company's name. One of the oldest hate sites, AOLsucks.org has provided a home for disgruntled customers to voice their complaints, while BT's Openworld has been the butt of much abuse. HomeChoice, the pay-per-view and fast Internet service has found itself facing a customer revolt in the shape of an online petition complaining about the company's service.
Now comes news of "netnappers", customers with the same aim, but a slightly more sophisticated approach. People with technical expertise can "netnap" a web page and take users typing in the company's web address to a page of their own choosing. An anonymous Internet user has adopted this approach to attract unhappy customers of Dixons. The site offers advice on how to complain and how to contact Dixons. But the company could have legal redress. A spokesman commented that the whole matter was in the hands of their lawyers.
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* A teenage hacker stole Bill Gates' credit card details and used them to send him a consignment of Viagra. But he was tracked to his bedroom in Pembrokeshire, Wales by the FBI, the Canadian Mounties, the local CID and a team of computer experts and now faces a jail sentence after admitting 10 charges of hacking into corporate sites. The self-styled "Saint of E-Commerce" said he wanted to broadcast the message that the Internet was not a safe place to shop.
* A webcam featuring two tropical fish and a snail, run by the BBC's Manchester newsroom has been withdrawn after the RSPCA decided it was cruel. Internet surfers watched the creatures who were confined to a three inch by five inch tank for a week before the site was reported. Apparently the animals need a two-foot long tank with fresh running water.
* While one American magazine blames long hours surfing the Internet for making Americans fat, new research demonstrated that the Internet could actually help obese people to lose weight. When a group given educational material on weight loss were compared to another group who were actually involved in an online weight loss programme, the Internet group lost twice as much weight as the education-only group after six months.
* If any more proof were needed, here's another story top show we really are a nation of animal lovers. According to find.co.uk, a gateway web site for consumers seeking financial information over the Internet, pet insurance appears to be more important to UK investors than share dealing. In March last year, share dealing was by far the most popular activity, but by March this year, the figures had plummeted, falling below health and pet insurance web sites.
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