Posted in General, tagged General on 30 April 2007| Leave a Comment »
Posted in General, tagged General on 30 April 2007| Leave a Comment »
This is one of main reason why we should quit playing WoW… and i just read this article and found out it’s true.. this person covered all the possible aspects of why we should quit WoW, with the personal reason perhaps, and i’m very much agree with his points.
The top of what you ask? The height of World of Warcraft greatness.
A few weeks ago, a good friend of mine quit playing Warcraft. He was a council member on what is now one of the oldest guilds in the world, the type of position coveted by many of the 7 million people who play the game today, but which only a few ever get.
When he quit, I asked him if he would write a guest blog post about the experience. What follows is a cautionary tale about the pull an escape from reality can have on you.
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60 levels, 30+ epics, a few really good “real life” friends, a seat on the oldest and largest guild on our server’s council, 70+ days “/played,” and one “real” year later…
Mr. Yeager asked me to write this “guest blog” for him. I figured I should oblige him this request – it was none other than Mr. Yeager who first introduced me to (begged for me to buy, actually :-p) the World of Warcraft. It was the “perfect storm” for me; a time in my life when I was unemployed, living at my family’s house far from my friends, and had just finished my engineering degree and was taking a little time to find a job. I had a lot of free time on my hands and WoW gave me a place to spend it.
This could be a many page epic tale, but I figure I’d give you the brief history and pertinent information. The guild Mr. Yeager got me into and with which I became an officer is the oldest and largest on the server I played on. It is around 18 months old and extremely well-versed in endgame instances. I was both the “mage class lead” and an officer. I have many very good friends I met through WoW (in real life – no kidding) and even have been “involved” with another councilor in real life (yes, I know, I’m weird for meeting girls through an online video game but honestly, ask Mr. Yeager, she’s head and shoulders better than all the girls I met DJing, waiting tables, in college, and bartending at clubs in Philly). But I digress…
I just left WoW permanently. I was a leader in one of the largest and most respected guilds in the world, a well-equipped and well-versed mage, and considered myself to have many close friends in my guild. Why did I leave? Simple: Blizzard has created an alternate universe where we don’t have to be ourselves when we don’t want to be. From my vantage point as a guild decision maker, I’ve seen it destroy more families and friendships and take a huge toll on individuals than any drug on the market today, and that means a lot coming from an ex-club DJ.
It took a huge personal toll on me. To illustrate the impact it had, let’s look at me one year later. When I started playing, I was working towards getting into the best shape of my life (and making good progress, too). Now a year later, I’m about 30 pounds heavier that I was back then, and it is not muscle. I had a lot of hobbies including DJing (which I was pretty accomplished at) and music as well as writing and martial arts. I haven’t touched a record or my guitar for over a year and I think if I tried any Kung Fu my gut would throw my back out. Finally, and most significantly, I had a very satisfying social life before. My friends and I would go out and there were things to do every night of the week. Now a year later, I realize my true friends are the greatest people in the world because the fact I came out of my room, turned the lights on, and watched a movie with them still means something. They still are having a great time teasing me at my expense, however, which shows they still love me and they haven’t changed.
These changes are miniscule, however, compared to what has happened in quite a few other people’s lives. Some background… Blizzard created a game that you simply can not win. Not only that, the only way to “get better” is to play more and more. In order to progress, you have to farm your little heart out in one way or another: either weeks at a time PvPing to make your rank or weeks at a time getting materials for and “conquering” raid instances, or dungeons where you get “epic loot” (pixilated things that increase your abilities, therefore making you “better”). And what do you do after these mighty dungeons fall before you and your friend’s wrath? Go back the next week (not sooner, Blizzard made sure you can only raid the best instances once a week) and do it again (imagine if Alexander the Great had to push across the Middle East every damn week).
What does this mean? Well, to our average “serious” player this equates to anywhere between 12 hours (for the casual and usually “useless” player) to honestly 10 hours a day, seven days a week for those “hardcore” gamers. During my stint, I was playing about 30 hours a week (and still finding it hard to keep up with my farming) and logging on during my work day in order to keep up with all the guild happenings and to do my scheduling and tracking for the raids. A lot of time went into the development of new policies which took our friendly and family-oriented guild further and further away from its roots but closer to the end goal. Honestly, what that end goal is I’m not totally sure – there is truly no end to the game and every time you feel like you’re satisfied with your progress, another aspect of the game is revealed and, well, you just aren’t as cool as you can be again.
There are three problems that arise from WoW: the time it requires to do anything “important” is astounding, it gives people a false sense of accomplishment, and when you’re a leader, and get wrapped up in it, no matter how much you care or want people to care, you’re doing the wrong thing.
First off, let’s go back to the time it takes to accomplish anything in the game. To really be successful, you need to at least invest 12 hours a week, and that is bare minimum. From a leadership perspective, that 12 hours would be laughed at. That’s the guy who comes unprepared to raid and has to leave half way through because he has work in the morning or is going out or some other thing that shows “lack of commitment”. To the extreme there is the guildie who is always on and ready to help. The “good guildie” who plays about 10 hours a day and seven days a week. Yes, that’s almost two full-time jobs. Funny, no one ever asks any questions, though.
The worst though are the people you know have time commitments. People with families and significant others. I am not one to judge a person’s situation, but when a father/husband plays a video game all night long, seven days a week, after getting home from work, very involved instances that soak up hours and require concentration, it makes me queasy that I encouraged that. Others include the kids you know aren’t doing their homework and confide in you they are failing out of high school or college but don’t want to miss their chance at loot, the long-term girl/boyfriend who is skipping out on a date (or their anniversary – I’ve seen it) to play (and in some cases flirt constantly), the professional taking yet another day off from work to farm mats or grind their reputations up with in-game factions to get “valuable” quest rewards, etc… I’m not one to tell people how to spend their time, but it gets ridiculous when you take a step back.
The game also provides people with a false sense of security, accomplishment, and purpose. Anyone can be a superhero here if they have the time to put in. Not only that, a few times I’ve seen this breed the “rockstar” personality in people who have no confidence at all in real life. Don’t get me wrong, building confidence is a good thing and something, if honed appropriately, the game can do very right. But in more than a few cases, very immature people with bad attitudes are catered to (even after insulting or degrading others “in public”) because they are “better” than the rest. Usually this means they played a lot more and have better gear. I’d really hate to see how this “I’m better than you attitude” plays out in real life where it means jack how epic your loot is – when you say the wrong thing to the wrong person it’s going to have repercussions and you can’t just log out to avoid the effects of your actions.
And people put everything on the line for these accomplishments with which they associate much value. I know of children and spouses being forced to play and grind for their parents, threats of divorce, rampant neglect, failing grades in school, and thousands of dollars spent on “outsourcing” foreign help. For what, you ask? Honor. The desire to be the best for at least one week. To get the best loot in the game. What do these “heroes” receive? Why, cheers and accolades of course as they parade along in their new shiny gear… which is obsolete the first time they step into one of the premier instances. The accomplishment and sacrifice itself are meaningless a few days later. Then it’s usually off to the races again.
Finally, when you’re a leader there is a call (or more appropriately a demand) for success. Usually those you represent want to keep progressing. They want to keep improving. They want more access to the best things. It is on you to provide it. In my experience, when you fail to progress fast enough, waves ripple throughout the guild and people become dissatisfied. It’s your fault, no matter what. Everything you’ve done to keep things fair and provide for everyone does not mean a damn thing. A few will stand up for you, but when you have 150 people who all want 150 different things, you end up listening to 150 voices complaining about the job you’re doing. This volunteer job usually takes at least 10 extra hours a week (on top of regular playing). Towards the end of my year of service, I apparently couldn’t do anything right with my class. I had to rotate people to make sure everyone was getting a fair shot. I wrote actual mathematical proofs the allowed for fair and effective (yes, both) raid distribution according to efficiency, speed, and guild class population. I even rotated myself more than any other class member. People still took it upon themselves to tell me what I was doing wrong (constantly) and how their way was more fair (usually for them).
The thing that kicked me in the ass more than anything else was I really cared if my guildies were getting what they wanted out of the experience. I truly thought my efforts would make them happy. I wanted to make a difference to them. The greedy and socially phobic high school kid I thought I could help through the game, all of the couples (both married and not) who were falling apart because of the game I thought I could rescue, the girl who was deeply wounded by a guy who left her for the game but was herself addicted I thought I could save, not to mention a host of others, I thought my efforts were helping. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks: I was providing them with an escape from their problems and nurturing the very thing that was holding them back. Oh yeah, it hit me like a ton of bricks after I had changed so much and lost enough of myself that the most wonderful girl I ever met broke up with me.
I remember clearly after fumbling around life for a few weeks that I dragged myself into the bathroom to get ready for work. I was tired because I was up until close to 2 AM raiding. Every week I read though email or I would run into one of my “real” friends and I’d hear “Andy, what’s up, I haven’t seen you in a while.” I looked in the mirror and in a cinemaesque turn of events and a biblical moment of clarity, told myself “I haven’t seen me in a while either.”
That did it. I wanted to do the things I wanted to do again and be with the people who appreciated me even if I abandoned them for a year and sucked to high heaven as a friend. The prodigal son returned and my friends were happy. The best advice I got was from the girl who dumped me for being a jackass (and after I decided to really quit and be “myself again” became one of, if not my best friend in the entire world), who said “your real friends like you even when you screw up.” It’s true.
Funny side note was the reaction I got from the guild that I spent a year pouring my heart and soul into. I made my post in the guild forums saying I was leaving (half of it RPing – something that doesn’t happen after you start raiding) and that it was time for me to move on. Three days later I didn’t exist any more. The machine kept on moving without this gear. A few people asked me over email (and when I logged on to clean out the old bank) when I was coming back (I’m not going to). There are a few others I keep in contact with and am planning on going to visit sooner or later so I can hang out in person and they can finally meet me. But in the end being forgotten about so soon after still left a bittersweet taste. But one that was a lot easier to swallow than the one I chugged down every day for the better part of a year.
Don’t get me wrong, WoW did a lot of things right. At times it was a fun game that allowed me to keep in contact with friends who lived far away. More importantly it introduced me to some of the best real life friends I’ve ever met. However, it did take an undeniable toll on me and is taking a far greater one on many, many people when taken too far.
LINK::
http://www.soulkerfuffle.blogspot.com/2006/10/view-from-top.html
http://soulkerfuffle.blogspot.com/2006/10/warcraft-another-point-of-view.html
http://soulkerfuffle.blogspot.com/2006/10/view-from-top-redux.html
Posted in General, tagged General on 30 April 2007| Leave a Comment »
The term computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) was first coined by Irene Greif and Paul M. Cashman in 1984, at a workshop attended by individuals interested in using technology to support people in their work (Grudin 1994). At about this same time, in 1987 Dr. Charles Findley presented the concept of Collaborative learning-work. According to Carstensen and Schmidt (2002), CSCW addresses “how collaborative activities and their coordination can be supported by means of computer systems.” On the one hand, many authors consider that CSCW and groupware are synonyms. On the other hand, different authors claim that while groupware refers to real computer-based systems, CSCW focuses on the study of tools and techniques of groupware as well as their psychological, social, and organizational effects. The definition of Wilson (1991) expresses the difference between these two concepts:
Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) is an approach to organisational process modelling and it can be used both for general problem solving and in the management of change. It was developed in England by academics at the University of Lancaster Systems Department through a ten year Action Research programme.
The methodology was developed from earlier systems engineering approaches, primarily by Professor Peter Checkland and colleagues such as Dr Brian Wilson. The primary use of SSM is in the analysis of complex situations where there are divergent views about the definition of the problem — “soft problems” (e.g. How to improve health services delivery; How to manage disaster planning; When should mentally disordered offenders be diverted from custody? What to do about homelessness amongst young people?). In such situations even the actual problem to be addressed may not be easy to agree. To intervene in such situations the soft systems approach uses the notion of a “system” as an interrogative device that will enable debate amongst concerned parties. In its ‘classic’ form the methodology consists of seven steps, with initial appreciation of the problem situation leading to the modelling of several human activity systems that might be thought relevant to the problem situation. By discussions and exploration of these the decision makers will arrive at consensus over what changes may be systemically desirable and situationally feasible. Later explanations of the ideas give a more sophisticated view of this systemic method, and do give more attention to locating the methodology in respect to its philosophical underpinnings. It is though the earlier classical view which is most widely used in practice.
There are several hundred documented examples of the successful use of SSM in many different fields, ranging from ecology, business and military logistics. It has been adopted by many organisations and incorporated into other approaches: in the 1990s for example it was the recommended planning tool for the UK government’s SSADM systems development methodology.
The general applicability of the approach has led to some criticisms that it is functionalist, non-emancipatory or supports the status quo and existing power structures; this is a claim that users would deny, arguing that the methodology itself can be none of these, it is the user of the methodology that may choose to employ it in such a way. The methodology has been described in several books and many academic articles.
SSM remains the most widely used and practical application of systems thinking, and other systems approaches such as Critical Systems Thinking (see separate entry) have incorporated many of its ideas
Ciborra’s main concept
Ciborra goes beyond the typical characterisation of improvisation as situated, pragmatic and contingent action by referring to the existential condition of the actor (his “moods feelings, affectations and fundamental attunement with the situation”). By eschewing the notion of the actor as a “robot” adapting to changing circumstances he reintroduces the personal human aspects that shape our encounters with the world and shows how our affectations define the situation at hand and so shape action.
As expounded by Ciborra, Bricolage can be seen as the constant re-ordering of people and resources, the constant “trying out” and experimentation that is the true hallmark of organisational change. But Bricolage is not a random trying out, Ciborra emphasises that it is a trying out based on leveraging the world “as defined by the situation”.
Hospitality is Claudio’s attempt to present an alternative conception of how IT/IS is implemented. He rejects the scientific explanations of IS implementation (planning, design, goals, targets, methods, procedures) and instead views technology as an alien embodying and exemplifying its alien culture and affordances. Successful implementation is achieved when the “host” organisation (ie that implementing the technology) is able to extend courtesy and to absorb and appropriate/assimilate the alien culture where it offers advantages such as new ways of working. Claudio also warns that the host must beware that the guest can become quickly become hostile.
Ciborra claims that much of the IS and IT world (particularly their strategic management, marketing, academia and training organisations) are in crisis. He teaches that this is because IS and IT are treated as scientific disciplines when in fact they are social disciplines and hence thinking about them is based in an inappropriate paradigm which we might call “Positivism” (although Ciborra does not use this term).
Ciborra drew on the work of Roberto Unger and showed how IS can embody and so be enacted as Formative Context.
2002, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 195 pages
Ciborra’s book is eloquently summarized by John Seely Brown’s quote on the back of the book: ‘Ciborra brings his rich understanding of bricolage and phenomenology to the fore in providing fresh insights about organizations and the building and use of complex information systems.’ For those willing to challenge their day-to-day involvement in the world of information systems (IS), this book is thought provoking. It is, however, a version of a number of papers the author has published over recent years: the added value is that the papers have been reworked to read as a book.
The introduction invites the reader to leave behind the so-called scientific approach to IS when entering the real world. Two of Ciborra’s key concepts, ‘bricolage’ and ‘tinkering’, are explained. In the context of bricolage, he refers to the MIR space station, which in spite of being a technical impossibility is still up and running. Soviet and later Russian scientists are masters in bricolage. Within a socio-technical tradition, the author draws the attention to the important role people play in IS design and development. Although not referred to explicitly, the reader will also recognize much constructivist thinking in the book. The overall tone of the book is to bring management information systems (MISs) into the real world, which is imperfect, co-created but very much alive.
Chapter 2 (‘Krisis’) reports on some recent and pertinent ICT success stories. Not only have these advances in technologies and business applications been ignored by MIS research, it would have been impossible to develop them using classical IS development methods. Should we be concerned with method? If so, has MIS failed as an academic discipline? The false belief in a correct geometric world often disregards the actors. The author illustrates this point with two cases which have received much attention in academic literature: the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) and IS strategy alignment. He illustrates the weaknesses of the approaches and suggests we opt either for the ideal, or for the real.
Chapter 3 (‘Bricolage’) is used to develop some major concepts and arguments. Interesting trends in business are rarely dealt with in MIS research, and if they are it is often too late for the insights to be relevant. Business creates strategies that make these trends, often without any scientific support. Competitive advantage, as a method, is always copiable. The non-copiable difference is the corporate culture. Familiar examples of successful strategic IS developments (SABRE, Minitel, etc.) were never intended to be of strategic importance. Companies make strategy through bricolage and tinkering in order to overcome the cognitive barriers that stand in the way of innovation. An innovative project then suddenly becomes of strategic importance, ex post. What the author understands by ‘bricolage’ is highly situated, experience-based, competent improvisation: an evolutionary approach. The author positions the limited success of IS methodologies in the corner of a weak yet inflexible corporate strategy.
In Chapter 4 (‘Gestell’) the difference between infrastructure (the ‘gestell’) and MIS is developed. According to Heidegger, the essence of modern technology is the frame, the shelf, the skeleton. Infrastructure needs to be understood as socio-technical networks where components, usually considered as social and/or technical, are linked together into networks. The essence of an infrastructure is the movement, the enchainment, the multiple actions. The danger for a company is that the infrastructure becomes the ‘real world’. Ciborra draws up a corporate agenda for introducing this network view of MIS into a corporate setting.
Chapter 5 (‘Derive’) moves on to discuss the dynamics of ICT infrastructure as a socio-technical network. The corporate context plays a crucial role, as reality is often a runaway learning organization, dynamic and unpredictable. Situatedness, drifting, chaos rather than order, are some of the supporting ideas explored in this chapter. Ciborra compares industrial-age thinking (procedures) with thinking in a web of externalities. He strongly argues against procedures, since their neatness, structure and articulation focus mainly on the spatial dimension of IS, often ignoring the temporal dimension. This insight necessitates a new language for the age of dynamic efficiency, which is developed in Chapter 6 (‘Xenia’).
Ciborra describes ‘pathologies’ for failure, using concepts such as hospitality and teams instead of the more traditional concept of control. Companies should consider new technologies as an ambiguous stranger and the organization as the host. If the technology violates values, fights and identities it can turn into an enemy. Hospitality leads to innovation and learning, turning systems development methodologies into rituals.
In Chapter 7 (‘Shih’) the author elaborates the example of Olivetti. He argues that Olivetti is probably one of the first networked organizations, one that conceives its platform as a laboratory for rapid restructuring. It generates new combinations of resources efficiently as it works as a cognitive engine, enacted by a pool of flexible people. In this chapter it becomes very clear that Ciborra is talking about corporate strategy while referring to IS strategy. This opens an interesting discussion about the real subject of MIS and its future as an academic discipline. If IS strategy is indeed just corporate strategy, what can be expected from IS research methods?
In Chapter 8 (‘Kairos and Affectio’) Ciborra introduces ‘the theory of’ improvisation, and particularly the dynamic character of improvisation. He describes improvisation as situated action, always catching the latest circumstances in emergent problem-solving. With improvisation, one takes time, instead of being taken by the time. An improvising manager is in the situation; s/he takes care.
In his methodological annex, the author defends his personal approach and outlines what he calls ‘his dilettante approach’, which is what I would call the manual to Claudio Ciborra. He fuels the discussion about appropriate research methods in MIS and in doing so argues strongly for limiting models and methods.
What can be learned from this book? I would like to split this question into learning for the practising manager, and learning for the practical academic. I’m afraid that for the theoretical academic, the ideas raised by Ciborra are (unfortunately) too distant from what tends to concern him/her. MIS as an academic discipline would certainly benefit from a discussion of Ciborra’s ideas.
The practitioner will certainly recognize what s/he lives with every day when implementing IS. Ciborra neatly describes practice in terms of how it fails to obey the laws of systems design and development. He suggests attitudes and activities, which closely resemble procedures, to remedy the situation. He correctly stresses the role of people, but does not go far enough to illustrate what he really means by this undemanding statement. Above all, the book will be refreshing for those who have tried for years to work methodologically with IS and have failed without any apparent reason. They will enjoy this book. It sketches a kind of newly observed reality close to the practitioner’s heart.
For the practical academic it is an even more refreshing text, as it gathers and structures some of the fundamental ideas which have already been around for quite a number of years, but have always been voiced in the wings of the theatre, and not on the stage itself. It is neither the first publication nor is he the first author to have constructively critiqued the mainstream approach to MIS research and its applicability and importance for corporations. This book, however, makes no excuses for failures and methods, but clearly selects and advocates an alternative. This is a courageous choice, one that I certainly appreciate. I think this book is therefore a must for all those academics seriously interested in explorative MIS research on the one hand, and for those who are interested in corporate relevant research on the other.
The book considers IS strategy as identical to, or an integral part of corporate strategy, understanding strategy as an emergent process. How does this challenge ongoing MIS research? lf the practical relevance of methods and methodologies is limited, what then is the field of study of MIS? If MIS is indeed a social science (or socio-technical) would that imply a serious reorientation of major research efforts around the world?
These are the questions the book is likely to raise in the mind of the academic reader, who will probably need to put in more effort and to be more open-minded than the manager in order to benefit from the book. Ciborra cannot hide his roots or his interest in the world outside IS. Stimulating as this message is, the reader does tend to pay for this breadth with some baroque language. But then, labyrinths appeal to philosophical minds, and these questions need answering.
Walter Baets Universiteit Nyenrode, The Netherlands
Posted in General, tagged General on 20 April 2007| Leave a Comment »
19th April 2007
I just bought and ate my lunch, and for some reason I couldn’t finish em all.. so maybe I’ll keep it for tonight should I feel hungry again… so today I woke up around 7, unusual time for me to get up, yes, because I had a terrible dream… rofl.. nasty… well, as my stomach grew hungry, eventually I had some paos and milo peng for breakfast..
I borrowed the book from library last time, it explains cascade style sheet and its properties for developing a standart website.. seems abit complicated when it comes to choosing whether I should use standart htm or php as a website file extension… btw I promised my employer to deliver a rough design of the company’s website and yet I don’t have any idea still… I told her to give me the essential images, copyrighted logos and at least her expectation of what should the website provide for its surfer… but until now I haven’t received any response from her.. sighs.. maybe I should provide her a template, let her choose and from there hopefully i’ll receive some feedbacks…
Oh my boss just called me and she said she needed me to work tomorrow at great world city from 11 till 9.30.. so I accepted her offer spontaneously. Later on I contacted albert, asked him whether he’ll be working tomorrow, but he said he’s off for tml… weird.. so after that he said that previously doris also asked him whether he’s available for tml, but he said he can’t…
Btw.. Next month I’ll be at Surabaya attending my sister’s wedding …. Fortunately the examination dates is before and after the D-Day.. Hopefully I have enough time to prepare the whole thing..
20th April 2007
Yesterday I’ve been collecting some website templates and its CSS, and I found that there are actually two ways of modifying properties of an object.. whether you use global CSS for huge / standardized website or else, modifying it one by one, preferably smaller, diversified sites. Both have their own advantage/disadvantage, and since I used the global css from beginning, I’m now having a difficulty to modify a single object, since their values are inherited. Maybe it can be modified but I just don’t know it.. YET…
Since the patronage today isn’t very crowded at all, I’ll comment something about my working surroundings… left hand side we got mostly selling excellent foods, Jollibean, Polar, Old Chang Kee, and TangLin Pao… I seldom talk with jollibean aunties, the main reason is because we’re located quite far away from their place, so does Polar and OCK, although I often gave my very sweet smile to both of the aunties working in both places, hoping that they’ll give something away for me hahahaha…. But I heard that they’re also strictly counted the stock in/out, so there’s no way for me to get their stuff freely.. unless I use my money to buy of course.. I once offered some aunties my chocolates / muffins, and they used their own money to purchase their own goods for me.. after that I felt very pai seh… -.-lll
Polar has a several employee, one of them is still studying at polytechnic, and she often visit my place to look for available small change.. haha.. she’s still young and I’m not interested.. on the left hand side, the 2 TangLin pao aunties are very kind to me also. I often bought their fan choi, paos and have a chat with them frequently.. they’ve been complaining about the job, they said the job is quite monotonous, repetitive, requires endurance, and patient.. lol.. pretty much same like my current job… boredom.. oh! Drudgery!
Unless you have mate working together with you, you won’t feel bored because at least you have a person to talk with. what if you’re told to work alone on weekdays? I’m ok with that since I got lots of friend to talk with.. haha.. ok so on the opposite there lies a small shop called Umeya (teroook sia), and on the right hand side we have Rizz, and one local icecream shop.. the icecream is quite expensive, but it does have some unique flavors such as pulut hitam, nutella, teh tarik etc.. not bad.. oh yes.. last time there’s one girl give me the oreo mud pie for free some more! (because the mud pie melt already.. so can’t sell to the customer.. zhi hao gei wo lah).. mud pie $4.9 dang exp : / next shop is rizz, selling rice milk, I tried before, quite nice (because it’s free I guess) lol..
Posted in General, tagged General on 6 April 2007| Leave a Comment »
SSL: Your Key to E-commerce Security
| The e-commerce business is all about making money and then finding ways to make more money. Of course, it’s hard to make (more) money, when consumers don’t feel safe executing a transaction on your Web site. That’s where SSL (Secure Socket Layer) comes into play. Understanding how SSL affects e-commerce business can also potentially help you to unlock (more) money from your customers.
What is SSL? SSL is all about encryption. SSL encrypts data, like credit cards numbers (as well other personally identifiable information), which prevents the “bad guys” from stealing your information for malicious intent. You know that you’re on an SSL protected page when the address begins with “https” and there is a padlock icon at the bottom of the page (and in the case of Mozilla Firefox in the address bar as well). Your browser encrypts the data and sends to the receiving Web site using either 40-bit or 128-bit encryption. Your browser alone cannot secure the whole transaction and that’s why it’s incumbent upon e-commerce site builders to do their part. SSL Certificates SSL certificates come in 40-bit and 128-bit varieties, though 40-bit encryption has been hacked. As such, you definitely should be looking at getting a 128-bit certificate. Though there a wide variety of ways in which you could potentially acquire a 128-bit certificate, there is one key element that is often overlooked in order for full two-way 128-bit encryption to occur. According to SSL certificate vendor VeriSign, in order to have 128-bit encryption you need a certificate that has SGC (server grade cryptography) capabilities. |
How to Get an SSL Certificate … The Wrong Way
There are two principal ways of getting an SSL certificate: you can either buy one from a certificate vendor or you can “self-sign” your own certificate. That is, using any number of different tools (both open source and proprietary) you can actually sign your own SSL certificate and save the time and expense of going through a certificate vendor.
Technically speaking, the data may be encrypted, but there still is a fundamental problem with self-signing that defeats part of the purpose of having an SSL certificate in the first place. Self-signing a certificate is like issuing yourself a driver’s license. Roads are safer because governments issue licenses. Making sure those roads are safe is the role of the certificate authorities. Certificate authorities make sure the site is legitimate.
Self-Signed certificates will trigger a warning window in most browser configurations that will indicate that the certificate was not recognized. VeriSign admits that there are a lot of people that will click through anyway just like there are a lot of people that will click through an expired SSL certificate as well.
A site that conveys trust is also more likely to be a site that makes (more) money. There is research that suggests that having a recognizable SSL certificate may, in fact, have a direct correlation to increased e-commerce sales. VeriSign, in particular, has done some research that shows that users who visit sites that have a recognizable trust mark (like the VeriSign Secure Site seal) are more comfortable shopping on those sites and have fewer abandoned shopping carts and better repeat purchases.
Choosing an SSL Certificate Vendor
According to GeoTrust Lockhart there are several things that buyers should look for when purchasing a certificate:
Conclusion
You are who you say you are. You have nothing to hide and you are running a legitimate e-commerce business that you want consumers to trust and feel comfortable doing business with The SSL certificate system exists to help promote the security and integrity of e-commerce for everyone. In an era where phishing scams run rampant and trust is king, a proper SSL certificate may well be your key to e-commerce success.
Loves to tinker with IT – trying various flavors of unix like os, opensource apps, hardware software troubleshooting, infrastructure network design, have a great interest in chinese literature and passion and curiosity in lots of things!!
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