Life after death goes online

December 3, 2010 Last updated at 15: 39 GMT by Dave Lee, BBC World Service the machine Timecard save a Flickr account to keep safe for many years, that the death of a close relative, the elderly often can mean a gloomy weekend or two going through old things, sorting through photos, donating old clothes to charity.

But in an age when so much of our lives online, little thought was given to how to handle digital world of a person when they are no longer with us.

By the time that the "generation Facebook" become old and grey, throughout their lives can be poured with a million updates on Twitter, thousands of photos on Flickr, hours and hours of videos on YouTube and maybe your website too.

As a person dies, their online presence should terminate too? What happens to personal information in all this?

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the main story In the past we might have worried about love letters coming through those physical and when you're going through things of your grandfather and be upset by it. "

End quote Abigail Sellen Microsoft Research Richard banks believes he may have the solution. He is an interaction designer for Microsoft and his team, based in Cambridge, worked on the concept of digital memories-and how, even if a person is no longer with us, their digital car can still be enjoyed.

He told BBC Radio 4 's all in the mind as the death of his grandfather, a few years ago I was thinking about the future of mourning.

"After his death, became the recipient of a suitcase full of photos of his life.

"Inside there was about 200 shots of different periods of his life, all the old analog photos, printed, stored away in envelopes.

"Got me thinking about what would be the difference, now with my photographic practices and the type of things that I could leave for my children."

He created several devices that run independently from any computer or other internet device acts as a traditional box of images and memories.

Rather than physical photos, however, displays the images of this device via an interactive touchscreen.

"If you touch one of those photos at any time, so I am taken to a timeline," explained Mr Banks.

"What is then a whole series of photos spread over time.

"Suddenly is a way of thinking we can begin to exploit the digital quality of some of these content, so that we can begin to make the objects that represent perhaps the life of a person, or perhaps give a sense of their evolution over time, or where they spent time at different points in their lives."

Mr banks hopes that its devices would mean digital memories would be far outlive the technology that were created on-as the old photographs in case of his grandfather.

The cloud

This task is made easier by our increasing dependence on "the cloud" for hosting our information-instead of physical storage such as floppy disks, hard drives.

The boxes are designed to function independently, so don't rely on keeping some hardware

"I think we tend to think of the physical limitations of digital things through objects like floppy disks, DVDs and CDs that we have stored our content on.

"I believe that some of these physical limitations are going to go away as we begin to store more and more content online. We'll put them in places and they will pretty much just stay there ".

This, however, is another matter. There are simply too much data? If these systems Save every utterance, the suitcase of 200 valuable images could become suddenly a huge collection of useless data.

"I think that sense of overwhelming numbers and quantity of content is more difficult to manage," says Mr. Banks.

"I think there are ways to tackle that computationally-always a sense of when the photos were taken or that might be the photo and those kinds of things."

Secrets beyond the Tomb

Our online personas can offer a look Back at life people Candido of giving glimpses into the personality and friendships. But with it comes a risk sharing too.

Abigail Sellen is also part of the team working on the project. She says that we can, while we're still alive, we must consider what might be left behind when we pass away.

"A lot of those materials can be quite sensitive or personal information.

Continue reading the main story exploring the limits and potential of the human is broadcast on mindIt Tuesday to 2100GMT and repeated on Wednesday 1630GMT to "So if you leave all that behind someone who interests you, is that the person will be comfortable going through them all?"

MS Sellen says that finding secrets left behind from a deceased relative is nothing new, but it could be interpreted in the archives of e-mail and other information.

"In the past we might have worried about love letters coming through those physical and when you're going through things of your grandfather and be upset by it.

"At least in this case, you know that they have kept them for a reason, and maybe it was important to them."

In future, it might be that how we write our will and perhaps even burn our secret letters, we may have to also spend time cleaning our lives online, ready to be put on display in those closest to us.

Another change of "American Idol": Online voting

The boards will be expressed on AmericanIdol.com assisted by Facebook, as a security mechanism, verify the identity of the spectators through a registration process. Each spectator who accesses through Facebook will be allowed to vote 50 times during the weekly after transmission.

The voting of "Idol" beginning on Tuesday. Fox said he would continue to accept votes via toll-free telephone numbers and, for customers of AT&T, text messages.

AT&T to sponsor the online voting, effectively extending its sponsorship of the show. In a statement, Simon Fuller, the creator of "American Idol", said that the show had sought a way to count the votes online for several years.

"Now, Facebook has offered us a safe solution, and we are ready to go," he said.

Adding online voting is one of the most important changes for this year's "Idol", now in its 10th season. As part of a review, the show has two new judges, Steven Tyler and Jennifer Lopez and has made several changes to the format.

Online vote option should greatly increase the number of votes each week for competitors.

Katherine Meizel, author of "Idolized: music, Media and identity in" American Idol "," said that the addition of online voting could also extend the voting demographic.

"For years, there has been criticism that suggest that the dominance of Southern" Idol "winner is due to the predominance of AT&T in the South, so that this could alleviate that problem," he said in an e-mail.

TV-reality producers are increasingly trying to incorporate the Web the hearing and the Elimination of their competitions. "the X-Factor," the singing contest that Simon Cowell, the former "Idol" judge, import from Great Britain, the United States has reported an option to vote online as well. That show will premiere on Fox in the fall.

MS. Meizel noted that spin-off of "Idol" in other countries have already incorporated online voting, including the Arabic language "Super Star", telecast from 2003 to 2008.

"The public discourse about that show often relied on the idea of democratisation and the potential symbolic significance of the vote in the Middle East," he said. "And Americans are used to talk about the Internet as a democratizing force. For "American Idol", in particular, where voting is really about consumer choice disguised as quintessential Act of the democratic process, the online option really stresses that type of thought. "

Bits: Tech Talk Podcast: Online Water Cooler

An experience of two screens for TV? This week the bits: Tech Talk show Bettina Edelstein talks to Brian Stelter, a media reporter for The Times, the television industry's embrace of social networking. With a growing number of people chatting on TV show on Twitter, Facebook and other sites, television executives are trying to tap into what's called Mr. Stelter "the water cooler."

Digital comics are moving to new platforms such as tablets and smartphones that offer different ways to submit stories. J.D. Biersdorfer chats with David Steinberger, ComiXology's CEO, a website for fans of comics, about the impact of these platforms on a form of art and entertainment that has moved beyond pulp light years.

Quirky 3D barcodes are cropping up all over — on public service announcements, billboards, in magazines and even on mass transit. Pedro Rafael Rosado takes a look at the technical term "mobile tagging" and explains what makes this technology and how it works.

News of this week's roundup includes GPS for students, video streaming to Amazon Prime subscribers, large investments in the online music service Spotify and South Korea and intends to expand high-speed broadband. Technology Tip of MS. Biersdorfer: Customizing how you order your iTunes library.

To find more information about shows and links to topics that were discussed, go to page Tech Talk.

You can download the show by subscription from the New York Times podcast page or directly from iTunes.

For information on locating specific segments of the bits: TechTalk podcast, use these codes to time:

News –

Brian Stelter – 26: 15

Technical term – 3: 41

ComiXology – 13: 10

Tip of the week – 5: 55

Online crime complaints down botnet numbers up

Complaints about Internet criminal activity fell 10 percent last year, as well as the number of computers hijacked by botnets shot more than 600 percent. Computer users may be getting savvier, but security experts that online criminals are scurrying to find new methods of attack.

Americans reported 303,809 instances of online criminal activity in 2010, down from 335,655 in the previous year, according to the Federal Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) 2009 Internet crime report.

IC3 has logged an average of 25,317 complaints per month in 2010 to its website. Most complaints (14.4%) regard the non-delivery of merchandise or payment. Scams using FBI name accounted for 13.2% and 9.8% of complaints were about identity theft.

Shocking mug shots reveal toll of addiction couple rescued after 5 days trapped in ditch Gaddafi ' opens the storage of weapons ' supporters Middleton receives high marks after event hero COP Saves ducklings in danger

Although statistics 2010 rank as the second highest in the ten-year history of IC3, experts speculate that strong decline in the last year is a significant indicator of the growing awareness of protection for the average computer user.

On the other side of the coin, as the Internet population — companies and online merchants including — get savvier, online criminals find new routes to attack, or adapt older ones to meet the challenge of victims more informed.

Top 10 Botnet Threat Report – 2010, from security firm Damballa, shows that the total number of PC enslaved by botnet grew from 654 percent.

Other security news from MSNBC Tech & science as crooks fake an ATM and steal from your money there is no shortage clever tools for ATM thief. But Skimmers not exactly an aisle at Wal-Mart takes Gizmodo. a look at the black market Internet where scammers get their scary tools — or get cheated themselves. Man pleads guilty to running vast spam network Charles Manson had phone under the mattress NYT: Google China hacked, leaked say cables

A botnet is a large number of computers connected to the Internet that have been infected by malware that links them together to form a network, which is then in turn used to send spam, launch attacks against targets or distribute other forms of malware.

The "zombie" machines are often ordinary home or business PC whose owners have no idea that you have been diverted.

Botnet Software was found on more than 35% of all computers that Damballa monitors, as the technology blog that reading Dark underlined. Many machines had more than one kind of botnet malware.

Security researchers Damballa said that many botnet operators were now using their armies of zombie computers to steal data.

© SecurityNewsDaily 2011. All rights reserved

United Kingdom takes the Census Online

Following the popularity of the BBC show that Do You Think You Are genealogy are never been more popular in the United Kingdom, which is perfect timing for the 2011 Census of England and Wales which will take place on 27 March.

For the first time, British owners will have the opportunity to submit their responses to Census online.

The United Kingdom is posting 25 million household questionnaires, based on a newly developed national address, in the run-up to the 2011 Census. These should arrive in each residence by mid March.

The United States still collects data from the census in the mail and then followed by staff hired for census recruitment season. However, the Census 2010 involved some first movement towards data collection online, including a project to address verification. The Census Bureau is always a push toward more transactions online, however.

But the Internet has revolutionized the industry of family history, is at the forefront of new data collection.

People will be able to complete the questionnaire online from March 4. The card has a code on the front. This will be the key to unlock the online questionnaire.

Owners should go to www.census.gov.uk, ' Click ' to fill it out and follow the on-screen instructions.

New web services were created for the online questionnaire and an online Help Center will provide advice and guidance for completing the questionnaire.

An area of accessibility on the site will provide audio and video, in English and Welsh, for the people who are visually impaired or hearing impaired.

A census is a count of the population, and one in the United Kingdom takes place every 10 years since 1801 (with the exception of 1941).

Gives a detailed snapshot of the population as it is in a day.

There will be separate surveys throughout the United Kingdom on 27 March 2011--organized by the Office for national statistics (ONS) in England and Wales, the General Register Office for Scotland and Northern Ireland statistics and Research Agency.

Besides being a valuable resource for historians of the results of a census family play a vital role in calculating the allocation of resources to service providers of regional and local government.

Is a legal requirement for all families return census questionnaires or submit online.

People who have not returned their questionnaire from 6 April will be called immediately after a collector of the census.

One month before the 2011 census is largest event of family history of the United Kingdom which Do You Think You Are? LIVE 2011, sponsored by Ancestry.co.uk, the Telegraph, takes place at Olympia in London later this week: 25-27 February 2011.

The event is a One-Stop-genealogy-shop where visitors can discover the landscape of their past led by over 200 exhibitors; ranging from the society of Genealogists, and the National Trust, The Royal Artillery Museum and family tree DNA.

Celebrity speakers include actor Hugh Quarshie, who will tell stories from their past and horticulturalist Monty Don and television presenter. Blackadder archaeologist and actor Tony Robinson will also be included to the show to discuss the 1911 Census and how it can be used to put together a family tree.

Although it is a relatively new instrument, DNA test is now used to confirm the family links where there is no conventional records. The exhibition, renowned international experts will discuss how to apply the most recent advances in genetics to help put together a family tree.

More PC news and reviews about PC Advisor. Copyright © 2010 story, PC Advisor. All rights reserved.

M2M offerings expand as more go Online

Almost everyone has a cell phone (or two) in developed markets, but operators are still registering multiple subscribers--6 million in five districts, in the case of AT&T. These new customers are the machines around us, connected to the Internet to report on their health--or our--. As new machines connected, showed off their skills at the Mobile World Congress this week, industry figures, has raised an important question: what others say about our gadget on us?

M2M usually refers to a system where a wireless device that sends data to a backend system, where you can be collected and displayed. A common example is a metre of water in a House that regularly and automatically sends the data back to the water company for billing purposes and monitoring.

At Mobile World Congress, at&T announced that it has collaborated with many companies offering new features and services for the millions of customers who use the network for M2M services. Partnerships include one with Axeda, offering a platform for developing applications for industrial organisations, medical, it, banking, retail and Government.

Other partners include AT&T application platform provider ILS technology; SensorLogic, which offers a tracking service and monitoring fleet, and Sierra Wireless offers a hosting service for collecting and managing data from connected devices.

The Conference, AT&T is showing off some ideas M2M embedded Mobile House on display including pill wirelessly with bottles, a home security system, wireless eReaders, frames, tablets and console.

AT&T also said the imprint of its M2M service to include roaming in over 200 countries in the second half of 2011 is growing.

Sierra Wireless showed off a few commercial M2M projects that it supports. One is a system that collects data from the touch screen monitor that NEC has marks and Spencer and other stores in the United Kingdom. Collects information about which elements on screen touch most commonly the buyers. That data determine which advertisements are displayed on a larger monitor.

The system uses wireless data, since many stores don't permit third parties to use their wired Internet connections for security issues, said Matt Allpress, sales engineer for Sierra Wireless M2M in Europe.

Sierra Wireless also demonstrated by a system that collects data from automobile charging stations of Paris. For now, wireless connectivity enables Schneider Electric, which makes the charging stations, the health of charging stations for remote monitoring. You can control remotely the electricity consumption of each station and if the station needs maintenance.

In addition, the system may be used to help the driver find stations online map and reserve one, said Dorine Ruant, marketing and partnership manager for Sierra AirVantage Business Unit.

Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs used his time during a keynote Roundtable to talk about his company's vision for connected devices, which includes more than just M2M. "What we believe is that everything is going to be connected. We will have an Internet of things. Around us in the environment there is going to be hundreds or thousands of things that are in the network and can be addressed, "he said.

At home, for example, all kinds of electronics, including digital photo frames, stereo speakers, screens, boards and gaming devices will be connected wirelessly, said, some of which will send data without human intervention. Referenced a statistic released earlier this year the Consumer Electronics Association estimates that by 2014, 70 percent of consumer devices will be connected to the Internet.

Because these devices can use various wireless technologies, he imagines that the phone will be a central point for gathering data from devices, and for the control of some of them. "A vision for the industry going forward is that the phone will sit at the center of the Web of things around you and orchestrate the interactions with things," he said.

He pointed out some problems with M2M. For example, if people wear sensors that monitor their health, they may want to share only the data that sensors collect with doctors trust. However, if someone is in an accident, that the person would probably want to allow a paramedic--one who probably have never edited the first person--to access data. These are the privacy issues that the industry will need to resolve, he said.

Nancy Gohring covers phones and cloud computing to the IDG News Service. Follow Nancy on Twitter at @ idgnancy. E-mail address is Nancy_Gohring@idg.com, Nancy

Co-founder of last.FM: "Apple f only ***** over online music subs for iPhone"

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes is an internationally published technology, who has devoted over a decade to helping users get the most from technology--is to learn to plan, build a PC from a pile of parts or help them get the most out of their new MP3 player or digital camera.

Adrian has authored/co-authored technical books coordination on a variety of topics, ranging from programming to build and maintain your PC. His latest books include "Build the Ultimate Custom PC", "beginning programming" and "doctor PC Fix It Yourself Guide". He has also written training manuals that have been used by a number of Fortune 500 companies.

Adrian also runs a popular blog under the name of The Doctor PC, where he covers a wide range of topics related to computer security--from to repair and upgrade.

Redbox developing streaming online subscription-based

Watch out Netflix., Redbox finally is trying to give the online rental giant some more competition.

We really should have seen the one near that long ago, because Redbox sent an inquiry to its customer base last spring as regards a service online video for $ 3.95 per month.

According to Bloomberg, "Redbox movie rental Division is working to develop a subscription streaming service, setting of potential competition with Netflix Inc and Hulu LLC."

Bloomberg also mentions that Redbox has a partner with a "digital player" already lined up. Given that Amazon has already announced its plans to launch a subscription streaming program itself, which might seem the obvious answer. But the obvious is never much fun, so maybe that we are in a real surprise.

However, Redbox has not announced the price points or even a launch date. If that really sticks for Redbox $ 3.95 per month for unlimited streaming (relative to monthly fee of $ 7.95 for the Netflix Watch instantly), we will have a real battle going on.

Redbox already has 30,000 DVD rental kiosks at national level, but the days of going out to rent a movie, but all are gone. If Redbox wants to stay in the game rental, it's time to get that content online where the Americans did not turn around for it.

Rachel King is a freelance journalist based in New York and San Francisco.