Beyond Words

Welcome on The Internet Land, or in antoher words : the I-Land. After getting a connexion, be sure to respect somes rules to behave yourself on the Internet!



1. Watch your back. Check your privacy settings, Internet can become a jungle.
2. Be ready to learn everyday, because things change non-stop on the web.
3. Open your mind and your eyes, don't stay behind.
4. Get rid of passive entertainments, be active in the Internet : be part of the web 2.0.
5. Share with your friends, interact!
6. Check up your sources when you gather information.
7. Experience online activities (shopping, learning, even dating...)
8. Think and act responsible.
9. Post comments on my blog.
10. Enjoy!

Books are part of our lives. I think about the tales our parents read to us before sleeping, but I also refer to the ones that changed forever our vision of the world, that formed our personalities, and the ones we could not detach from after midnight...



Now, the ebooks are part of this great phenomenon of digitalization of the human work. We are succeeding in realizing the myth of the Library of Alexandria : we are gathering all the information in one place, a virtual place : the net. If a long time ago we lost the human work because of a fire, I am afraid of loosing our culture because of mass media. Of course, ebooks would make things easy : we could buy books downloading files and so we would have a better access to litterature. But I recommend you another way : the book troc! You share your book list with other people, and you choose the books you want to read. It's free, easy and it creates human contact and community activity!


Anyway, ebooks are here and I might buy one for travelling. As I have a notebook, this lovely little computer, I could definitely have an ebook. It is really practical because you can have several books in one object. But I will never stop reading real books. I just love holding the object, I love the smell of old books...

As i said before, I am not really comfortable with new technologies. Yet, I really want to learn because it is such a necessary knowledge, not only to communicate but also to find a job and to enjoy the many possibilities they offer.


And the first thing I have to confess is that I have no idea how to download files. To me Peer to peer is an unexplored territory. I always ask my friends to do it for me, I bother them and I am still ignorant. Moreover, it seems to be so easy that I actually should stop writing about it and just act and learn...

People can share files, music and films connecting their computers. The social impact is thus that they not only link each other computer to computer but also human to human. But should I remind you that it is illegal? This aspect does not seem to stop this process. But from now on, the P2P only represents the 50% of file sharing on the web. Indeed, streaming is growing fast and is about to stand in for P2P. But still, to me it is an important side of the web networks.

I have already spoken about the unstoppable transparency on the Internet, and the impossibility to control the data about us. But one of the most serious consequences is that someone can take advantage of this. For exemple, it is widely known that paedophiles use the Internet to met children on MSN for example. They make the most of the naivety of children who surf on social networks to make friends pretending to be a 13-year-old girl and hiding behind an avatar. This cyber crime is totally due to a carelessness from the parents but also from the websites...Yet, we all know these crimes happen all the time and the young victims' lives are often taken away.



On the other hand, teenagers don't seem to be aware of their image on the web. Social networks are full of dating sections where they publish snaps and information about them. For example, MyLol is a social network and dating website aimed at teenagers. Users have the option to add unlimited photos to their profiles. These can be commented on by other users, as well as rated upon a 5 star basis, and this can increase your popularity points. Of course, they all want to be the more popular teenager, thus, they add a lot of increasingly provocative and catchy photos...that can include clothes off.

That's why parents begin to be afraid of their lovely children's growing interest for these networks. They tried to forbid their progeny to surf on the evil web, but too late... the Internet is everywhere even at school.

Recently, Apple has commercialized an Iphone application to show you registered sex offenders living around you : it's called Offender Locator, and except in California you can check the exact addresses of registered paedophiles in the whole USA. Ok, it's a gadget, but it's the beginning of a witch-hunt. Can't we just realize that a little girl does not have to display publicly pictures of her only wearing underwear?

The real decisions to make are about the networks themselves : they have to put boundaries, because the teenagers won't. They have to prevent from abuses checking the profiles of online people and maybe forbidding grown-ups to chat with young people. But how to verify if Sissy3269, Tennessee, looking for a relationship is actually a young girl? Well, the last solution is to deal with the heart of the problem, to talk to your girl and to explain how people can be mean, and why she has to slow down with the Internet. She will understand.