This image-to-text tool is possibly what you need to impress your friends. I produced a very small-scale example. A larger size was possible as well, but it would have taken up much of this page.

Here is the famous Lenna image:

Here is the result of translation/rendering. It is purely text.

It is surprising to see that portals such as Yahoo are still being used. What’s even more surprising is that many people’s entry point (and only central point of navigation) remained Google. Some people have extensive bookmarks (Favorites in M¥¢ro$o£t terminology) which are most frequently used.

Nevertheless, one of the most efficient and convenient ways to browse is from a personal portal — one which you create yourself. My portal consists of about 200 links, sub-divided into some 30 categories. They all reside on the same page so that they are only a single click away. With tabbed browsing, this becomes a crucial factor.

At the top of the page, I choose to have a snapshot of the weather, a clock, and basic search facilities for this site and the World Wide Web.

For good fit of a large number of links, I use 3 columns. Their aggregated width fits all browsers and screen resolutions.

Here are a few extra bits that are worth mentioning:

• Put usernames or numbers below links for quick copy-and-paste.
• Set up keyboard accelerators using the accesskey attribute.
• Group similar links under the same heading and use a hierarchy of header levels.

Also see: Portal Zen Garden

Many of us undervalue the amount of data which is available owing to technology. Eavesdropping became only a time investment issue in a world where every event is recorded with the aid of brute-force. As an example, from the month of December I have a 20+ MB text file which contains everything one needs to know. Webmasters do not bother investigating such files and neither do I. I only suggest that everyone becomes aware of the following:

In cases where curiosity pushes its limits or even wrong-doing is considered, someone, somewhere will be able to retrace your steps. In this cyber-space where privacy is compromised, always be cautious and remember which Internet domain you go under.

Example: Whatever you search Google for will become visible to others; not only to Google employees, but also to sites you subsequently enter. Familiarise yourself with the rules of the ‘game’. Be suspicious.

Some excellent spam advice was passed on to me by a technology-savvy client at work. Because it has been exceptionally successful, I would like to share it:

Set up distinct E-mail accounts that are intended for (at most):

• Colleagues, family and friends
• Mailing lists
• Newsgroups
• Public enquiries, e.g. directories, Web pages

Additionally, if you can have a catch-all account, give out different E-mail addresses for different purposes and leave all messages in the same ‘pool’ (mail forwarding can be used to centralise all messages as well). If one account gets abused, it can be separated out by instantiation of its address (or by breakage of some forwarders).

Separating boxes is the key

Bill Gates arrested in his younger days (photo in public domain)

Slashdot (News for Nerds; Stuff that matters) have shown some rare figures of the way employees in the IT industry use the World Wide Web:

…Microsoft employees use Google for their searches 66% of the time, but MSN Search only 20% of the time, and Firefox is their second most popular browser behind Internet Explorer 6′s whopping 98.76% share. Google employees use Google as their search engine 100% of the time and 21% use a Mozilla or Firefox browser. Apple employees like Google best and 68% use Safari…

This morning I had a recollection of how my Internet experience started. I was about 14 when I went with my mother to buy a modem. Shortly afterwards, while playing tennis, I could not get off my mind the fact that I had spent an afternoon talking to someone from Holland (on IRC). Each one of us has had that first Internet experience, which is worth remembering.

Try it now. Reminisce.

The information revolution is one which few generations live to see. Most will be born to live it.

A second top headline from the BBC is dedicated to blogs and their effects on cyberspace. It has been only hours since the last dominant blog-related headline from the BBC. A closer look revealed a ‘pagefull’ of headlines of this nature and I began to ponder Jacken’s opinion:

I can really see that big companies could feel threatened by the blogging phenomena. If I am thinking of buying a new expensive product, I always do a google search to check out what people have to say.