IT and CAT
Era ends as PC pioneer dies by MARCUS WILLIAMSON IOL NEWS 11 May 2010 at 06h00
Ed Roberts was one of the early pioneers in the world of personal computing, an electronics engineer who designed and created the first widely available home microcomputer in 1974.
With no keyboard, no screen and only a set of switches to program it, this was a different beast to today's laptop and desktop PCs. However, thanks to Roberts and his colleagues, computers emerged out of the worlds of academia, the military and commerce into our homes.
It was the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics magazine that heralded this revolution.
The editors had heard of a project by Roberts' company, MITS, to create a kit computer for home use. Although the Altair 8800 machine they illustrated was just a prototype, the resulting publicity brought thousands of orders and bolstered the previously loss-making firm. The Altair announcement also caught the attention of the young Bill Gates and Paul Allen, who offered to develop software for the new machine.
Their success with this early microcomputer inspired them to found Microsoft (then called Micro-Soft).
Roberts was born in Florida in 1941 and spent his early years there and in Georgia. He became interested in electronics through his father, a home appliance repair engineer.
Working at a USAF Weapons Laboratory in Albuquerque, he met Forrest Mims, with whom he founded MITS in 1969.
Their first products were model rocket kits, radio transmitters and calculators.
Thanks to the Altair microcomputer, by 1977 MITS was turning over more than $13-million (about R90-million) a year and was sold to Pertec Computer Corporation for $6-million.
Roberts bought a farm, went off to medical school in 1982 and, started his practice as a family doctor in Cochran, Georgia, fulfilling a lifelong ambition.
Dreaming up a connected world
15 April 2009 at 08h31 www.iolnews.co.za
By Clare Dwyer Hogg
Will new information and communications technologies make the world a better place? Many commentators have imagined so.
Writing in 1858 about the invention of the new-fangled telegraph, Charles Briggs and Augustus Maverick observed that: “It is impossible that the prejudices should longer exist while such an instrument has been created for the exchange of thought between all nations on Earth.” Two world wars and more than a century later, in 1997, Nicholas Negroponte of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology expressed an almost identical idea: “The Internet will break down national borders and lead to world peace.”
It hasn’t, of course. Not yet. But for the men and women who dream the future that doesn’t mean we should stop trying. On the contrary: all the more reason to dream. But for those of us who will have to live and work in that future it is instructive to learn a bit more about what, precisely, they are dreaming. After all, many of them are being paid by serious organisations to share their visions of tomorrow. What sort of things do these visions predict?
According to Peter Madden, chief executive of the sustainable development think tank Forum for the Future, one of the main things we are all going to have to get used to is the rise of “pervasive” computing. “Information technology will be embedded everywhere. It will overlay every area of your life.”
In other words: chips with everything. Nano-computers, some as small as skin cells, will collect data and exchange information with one another wirelessly, not just responding to needs but anticipating them. Too hot? Your shirt will turn down heating or even alter its chemical properties without even asking. But then you probably won’t get too hot in the first place. Instead, the shirt will anticipate your approaching discomfort and take preventive action.
Your fridge will monitor its own contents and place an order with the local supermarket before you run out. It will also collect health data from implants in your body (and sensors in your toilet bowl) and adapt your diet accordingly.
Just as likely, it will make suggestions for what you want to eat based both on your past choices and on what people like you choose to eat. (The iTunes Genius function already does much the same thing with music.)
These may sound more like First World gimmicks than steps towards global sustainability, but they are linked by a crucial theme: efficiency. That is good news for the providers of goods and services, as the link between supply and demand becomes ever more closely matched. It also represents a new way of managing increasingly scarce resources for a planet whose population is projected to grow from the current 6.75 billion to 9 billion by 2040.
You can see a similar theme in Madden’s predictions for public transport. “The big disincentive to using public transport at the moment is that you just don’t know how long anything will take. Now imagine that you and everyone else have GPS constantly updating where you are in relation to any part of the transport network.”
Unlike existing GPSs, the device would feed information to the transport provider, allowing trains or buses to be deployed as needed, and traffic jams to be avoided.
At a more advanced level, ICT can remove the need for many journeys altogether, as technology blurs the boundaries between the physical world and its digital representations. At its simplest, this is already happening.
On Google Earth, for example, it is possible not just to switch between maps and satellite images but to click through to geographically relevant information on Wikipedia, find the nearest Starbucks or access real-time traffic information. And now Google Latitude allows users to track the whereabouts of their friends through their GPS smart phones.
Virtual worlds – the best known of which is Second Life – will no longer be the preserve of gamers. Instead, as the “3D web” takes off, they will become virtual meeting-rooms (as we saw in last month’s SustainIT supplement), and, ultimately, many more things: places to learn, to shop, to access government services or to cultivate business contacts.
Emmanuel Gruijs is the chief executive of ActiveWorlds Europe, a company pioneering the development of virtual worlds. “At the moment most virtual worlds are like museums,” he says. “You go there maybe once or twice in your life. That’s changing. My guess is that the use of this technology will become quite common in about three to five years.”
IBM, Gruijs points out, is one of several companies that already use Second Life to host internal staff meetings and hold training sessions.
The computer giant also has a growing Second Life business centre in which virtual sales people serve clients from around the world.
“You cannot underestimate the effect of walking around in an avatar and meeting people almost for real,” says Gruijs. “What virtual worlds can offer is four-fold: a sense of place, a sense of identity, a sense of belonging and, finally, a sense of safety.”
Such benefits are particularly valuable to those who would otherwise be socially or geographically excluded. Isolated rural communities – in both the developed and developing worlds – could have not only virtual high-street banks and virtual local GPs but virtual community centres, accessible through a new generation of tele-conferencing technology (consumer off-shoots of business systems such as Hewlett Packard’s Halo and Cisco’s Telepresence).
Ultimately, the new technologies have the potential to prompt a profound change in the developing world – and in the ways that the different parts of the world relate to one another.
“ICTs are an equaliser,” says Stephen Downes, a senior researcher at Canada’s National Research Council, Institute for Information Technology. “They effectively share the means of production with a wider population, lowering the barrier to entry and enabling people to educate themselves.
“There remain challenges to less developed economies: the ICTs have to exist in the first place; connectivity – which continues to be outrageously expensive in Africa – needs to be in place. But, once installed, the infrastructure almost immediately begins to produce knowledge and wealth.”
Much progress will come via mobile telephones, which have already had a hugely positive effect on Africa (see page 4). “The first billion people on to the Internet used a computer,” says Ian Nield, a specialist in “disruptive technologies” who works for BT’s research department. “The next billion will be doing it mobile – and the first billion will be using mobile as well.”
The smart phone has even greater potential. “For the past 20 years, the idea has been to leave the computing power – that’s to say, the big ‘brain’ – on the individual’s computer,” says Forum for the Future’s Peter Madden.
“One of the things we’re seeing now is the rise of so-called ‘cloud computing’, which shifts a lot of the functions of the ‘brain’ to the server. That will be very important to the developing world as it reduces the need for hardware and paves the way for cheap handsets.
“It will also help save energy. We’ll see huge server ‘plantations’ located in places with cheap renewable energy. That’s important if we’re going to fulfil the needs of the millions of people coming online for the first time. IT already uses about 2 per cent of global energy, around the same as aviation.”
This is good news for the environment – but what about global inequality? Can the new communications technologies help make the world a fairer place? Stephen Downes is sceptical. “While these technologies can play a role,” he says, “the primary resolution to the issues of global justice is social and political, not technological.”
But it’s clear that, in the realm of business, ICT can help to level the playing-field. Thus open source software will give users in the developing world access to business applications that would otherwise be beyond their financial grasp, while the new connectivity will enable new kinds of collective action – from peer-to-peer lending schemes to political protests
What next? It’s hard to say. No one can be sure when, or where, the ICT revolution will end. The one thing we can be sure of is that, the moment we stop dreaming, we risk being left behind.
---oOo---
Sorry, I can't respond to emails today.
Something has crashed on my computer,
and the mouse is missing.
---oOo---
From IOL Newsletter 4 February 2009
Google Earth dives into ocean exploration
03 February 2009 at 06h00
Sab Francisco - Online search powerhouse Google launched a new service on Monday to allow Internet users to explore the depths of the world's oceans from the comfort of their homes on dry land.
The "Ocean in Google Earth" feature allows users to virtually dive beneath the water surface, explore 3D underwater terrain and browse ocean-related content contributed by marine scientists.
Nearly four years after Google Earth enabled users to zoom in to view streets, and later explore galaxies in the sky, the latest version of the software allows virtual travellers to cross miles of unchartered territory underwater.
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Ocean in Google Earth was unveiled formally at the San Francisco Academy of Sciences by former vice president Al Gore, acclaimed oceanographer Sylvia Earle and Google executives.
"With this version of Google Earth... you can now dive into the world's oceans that cover almost three quarters of the planet and discover new wonders," said Gore, a champion in the battle against climate change.
Gore pointed out a history feature at Google Earth that lets people see how parts of the planet are changing over time, often due to human influences.
"This is an extremely powerful educational tool," Gore said. "My hope is that people around the world will use Google Earth to see for themselves the reality of the climate crisis."
Google Earth users can click icons on sea maps to see video of creatures that thrive in those locations. Internet surfers can opt to swim virtually undersea as though they are sharks, dolphins or turtles.
Ocean was inspired in part by a teasing comment Earle made to Google Maps and Earth director John Hanke.
Earle was at an event when she praised the California firm's online mapping service but suggested it be called "Google Dirt" because it ignored the 71 percent of the planet covered by water, Hanke recounted.
"Talk about a dream coming true," Earle said as she stood behind an aquarium lectern and demonstrated Ocean on a large wall screen.
"They compressed what it took me 50 years to understand; that the world is really blue. People talk about the world being green, but without the blue there wouldn't be any green."
Google Earth users will be able to record videos of undersea adventures, overlay their own voices or sound tracks, and then share them with friends, according to Hanke.
Musician Jimmy Buffett, whose hits include "Margaritaville" and "Son of a Son of a Sailor," is collaborating with Google to use Earth and Ocean to let fans travel with him on a coming concert tour starting in the Hawaiian Islands.
Buffett joked that he has lived by the bumper sticker motto: "Without geography, you are nowhere."
"You will see the travels of Jimmy," Buffett said.
"It's fun, but it makes people aware of what we need to do to protect this beautiful planet and its blue heart."
By allowing users to explore underwater volcanoes, hunt for whales and learn more about shipwrecks, Google says Ocean offers a platform for everyday Internet browsers to link up with the scientific community.
The feature includes 20 different layers of content contributed by leading ocean explorers, scientists and researchers, such as photos and videos of "hot spots" around the world and information on marine protected areas.
It also has an animal tracking device in which users can follow animals that have been tagged by satellite.
"Oceans cover more than 70 percent of the planet's surface but only a little bit has been explored," said Florence Diss, head of Google's geographical partnerships, referring to findings that humans have examined just five percent of world's seas.
Diss added that the decision to expand Google Earth to cover the world's oceans "is not about making money." Diss would not reveal the project's cost.
Google employees, affectionately referred to as "Googlers," worked on Ocean as part of a company program that allows workers devote work time to causes about which they are passionate.
Google said its updated version of Earth will also take visitors to Mars, using "street view" style images taken by a Rover exploration craft that recently manoeuvred about that planet.
Since its launch in June 2005, Google Earth has been downloaded more than 400 million times.
---oOo---
Was having trouble with my computer.
So called Richard, the 11-year-old next door kid whose bedroom looks like Mission Control, and asked him to come over.
Richard clicked a couple of buttons and solved the problem.
As he was walking away, called after him,
'So, what was wrong? He replied, 'It was an ID ten T error.'
I didn't want to appear stupid, but nonetheless inquired,
'An, ID ten T error?
What's that? In case I need to fix it again.'
Richard grinned.... 'Haven't you ever heard of an ID ten T error before?'
No,' I replied.
'Write it down,' he said, and I think you'll figure it out.'
So I wrote down: I D 1 0 T ...
I used to like the little ******............
---oOo---
Web study shows site's appearance does count (by Brian Bergstein)
IOL NEWS August 12 2005 at 10:06AM
Boston - It's no secret that men and women tend to spend their time on the Internet quite differently.
But British researchers suggest it's not just a website's subject or function that determines whether it will draw more men or women. The appearance of the site also might play a subtle role.
In a recent study at Glamorgan University Business School in Wales, test subjects rated the personal Web pages of 60 people for usability and aesthetics.
Not surprisingly, male subjects tended to assign higher ratings to pages designed by men, and females preferred sites made by women. But the researchers said they gleaned important tidbits by looking more closely at the ratings.
Women seemed to like pages with more colour in the background and typeface. Women also favoured informal rather than posed pictures.
Men responded better to dark colours and straight, horizontal lines across a page. They also were more pleased by a three-dimensional look and images of "self-propelling" rather than stationary objects.
With those standards in mind, the researchers checked out the websites for 32 British universities and determined that 94 percent had a "masculine orientation." Two percent showed a female-favoured arrangement.
Gloria Moss, a Glamorgan research fellow, said the project should be instructive for organisations that aim for wide audiences. The research -which was repeated in France and Poland to rule out British cultural bias - is being published in European journals on consumer behaviour and marketing.
So should websites consider having two faces, one for male users and another for female visitors? Moss said more research is needed.
"At the very least," she said, "we think there ought to be a combination of aesthetics." - Sapa-AP
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---oOo---
Hi, this is Celine. I can't get my diskette out.
Helpdesk: Have you tried pushing the button?
Customer: Yes, sure, it's really stuck.
Helpdesk: That doesn't sound good; I'll make a note ..."
Customer: No ... wait a minute... I hadn't inserted it yet... it's still
on my desk... sorry....
Helpdesk: Good day. How may I help you?
Male customer: Hello... I can't print.
Helpdesk: Would you click on start for me and...
Customer: Listen pal; don't start getting technical on me! I'm not Bill
Gates damn it!
Hi good afternoon, this is Martha, I can't print. Every time I try it
says 'Can't find printer'. I've even lifted the printer and placed it in
front of the monitor, but the computer still says he can't find it...
Customer: I have problems printing in red...
Helpdesk: Do you have a color printer?
Customer: Aaaah....................thank you.
Helpdesk: What's on your monitor now ma'am?
Customer: A teddy bear my boyfriend bought for me in the supermarket.
Helpdesk: And now hit F8.
Customer: It's not working.
Helpdesk: What did you do, exactly?
Customer: I hit the F-key 8-times as you told me, but nothing's
happening...
Customer: My keyboard is not working anymore.
Helpdesk: Are you sure it's plugged into the computer?
Customer: No. I can't get behind the computer.
Helpdesk: Pick up your keyboard and walk 10 paces back.
Customer: OK
Helpdesk: Did the keyboard come with you?
Customer: Yes
Helpdesk: That means the keyboard is not plugged in. Is there another
keyboard?
Customer: Yes, there's another one here. Ah...that one does work!
A customer couldn't get on the internet.
Helpdesk: Are you sure you used the right password?
Customer: Yes I'm sure. I saw my colleague do it.
Helpdesk: Can you tell me what the password was?
Customer: Five stars.
Customer: I have a huge problem. A friend has placed a screensaver on my
computer, but every time I move the mouse, it disappears!
Helpdesk: Microsoft Tech. Support, may I help you?
Old woman: Good afternoon! I have waited over 4 hours for you. Can you
please tell me how long it will take before you can help me?
Helpdesk: Uhh.? Pardon, I don't understand your problem?
Old woman: I was working in Word and clicked the help button more than 4
hours ago. Can you tell me when you will finally be helping me?
Helpdesk: How may I help you?
Customer: I'm writing my first e-mail.
Helpdesk: OK, and, what seems to be the problem?
Customer: Well, I have the letter 'a' in the address, but how do I get
the circle?
Business emails do require due care
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April 25 2005 at 08:40AM
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By Career Staff
Modern business writing is complicated. Mostly, we communicate via email, fax or SMS, and you can't always decipher the sender's intention from a few short words.
This is far different from a face-to-face meeting where you can analyse body language, facial expressions and the mood of the meeting.
But you can make your business correspondence more effective, says Lisa Lazarus of Boston Language College.
The Online Writing Lab at Purdue University offers tips for appropriate email etiquette:
Email is like a conversation. For each new subject, write a greeting, for example, Hello John or even simply John. If there are several emails being exchanged about the same topic, it is not necessary to include a greeting with each subsequent email.
Use the subject line to alert the recipient to the content of the email. Try to be specific: "follow-up sales meeting", not "meeting".
If you are sending an email to several people who are not connected in any way, make sure that you create an anonymous mailing list to keep the identity of the recipients confidential.
Punctuate and use capitals in the same way you would for any other document. Don't suddenly switch to all lower-case or upper-case letters. It makes your email look less important and is more difficult to read.
Use the correct tone: don't send emoticons such smiley faces or winks to your boss.
Emails create an electronic trail, so be very careful about what you send out.
Give attachments appropriate titles so they can easily be found if downloaded, and keep them small. If you're sending the attached file to a home email account, keep it smaller than 150kB or ask permission to send a larger file. Business email addresses can often accept larger files.
Boston Language College offers a variety of short courses that assist in improving communication skills. Contact Boston Language College on 021 422 4111 or info@bostonlanguagecollege.com
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---oOo---
'The computer swallowed grandma'
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James Clarke's Stoep Talk column
June 04 2005 at 08:49AM
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Just in case you ever feel a bit of an amateur at your PC, the Wall Street Journal recently listed problems computer service agencies encounter.
For example, a caller complained he couldn't get his computer to fax anything.
He had been trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the screen and hitting the "sent" key.
A confused caller had trouble printing documents. He said his computer flashed the message, "Cannot find printer". The caller had tried turning the computer screen to face the printer - to no avail.
Another called the technical support team to say she'd unpacked her new computer, plugged it in and had waited 20 minutes for something to happen.
Asked what happened when she pressed the power switch, she asked, "What power switch?"
A woman had a problem with her printer and was asked if she was "running it under Windows". She said:, "No, my desk is next to the door."
Technical support talking to a customer on the phone:
"Okay Bob, Now type the letter P to bring up the Programme manager."
Customer: "I don't have a 'P".
Tech support: "On your keyboard, Bob, P, on your keyboard."
Customer: "I'm not going to do that."
Big bad computer
Talking of computers, a reader, Rob Sykes, sent me this very modern nursery rhyme - author unknown.
The computer swallowed grandma.
Yes, honestly it's true.
She pressed "control" and "enter" and disappeared from view.
It devoured her completely,
The thought just makes me squirm.
She must have caught a virus
Or been eaten by a worm
I've searched through the recycle bin
and files of every kind;
I've even used the Internet
But nothing did I find
In desperation, I asked Jeeves
My searches to refine.
The reply from him was negative,
Not a thing was found "online".
so, if inside your "Inbox",
My Grandma you should see,
Please "Copy", "Scan" and "Paste" her
and send her back to me!
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---oOo---
MOST COMMON DAYS TO SEND E-MAIL Ralph F. Wilson Wilson Internet Services, Rocklin, CA
Jan 10, 2004, 10:16 PST
The EmailLabs Delivery Trends Report Q3 2003 revealed that for legitimate business e-mailers, Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the most popular days to e-mail their subscribers. E-mailings reported were: Sunday 1.4%, Monday 15.1%, Tuesday 25.4%, Wednesday 23.3%, Thursday 18.3%, Friday 15.6%, Saturday 0.9%. More than two-thirds of all messages were sent Tuesday through Thursday. Not surprisingly, Wednesday was also the day that most e-mails were opened and offers clicked on. The report was based on average statistics gathered from approximately 525 of EmailLabs' client accounts.
The report also indicates that the unsubscribe rate dropped from 0.29% to 0.17% over the previous six months, suggesting that recipients are becoming less trusting of, or perhaps more impatient with unsubscribing from unwanted e-mails. A copy of the 9-page Report in PDF format is available on EmailLabs' website. www.emaillabs.com/pressroom_12_16_03_deliverytrends.html
However, just because EmailLabs' clients sent out most of their e-mails midweek doesn't mean that this is best for all e-mailers. Be sensitive to who your subscribers are and when they prefer to read your e-mails. Some e-mails to consumers might be better read on the weekends. The way you can find out is to try different e-mail times for your own list and see which days seem to have the highest open rates.
Note from The Teacher Network: you can subscribe free to his e-newsletter.
---oOo---
COMPUTER HAIKU (Author Unknown)
Yesterday it worked.
Today it is not working.
Windows is like that.
The Web site you seek
Cannot be located, but
Countless more exist.
Program aborting
Close all that you have worked on.
You ask far too much.
The Tao that is seen
Is not the true Tao-until
You bring fresh toner.
A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
To a simple stone.
You step in the stream,
But the water has moved on.
This page is not here.
Having been erased,
The document you're seeking
Must now be retyped.
Your file was so big.
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.
Chaos reigns within.
Reflect, repent, and reboot.
Order shall return.
First snow, then silence.
This thousand-dollar screen dies
So beautifully.
Stay the patient course.
Of little worth is your ire.
The network is down.
Three things are certain
Death, taxes and lost data.
Guess which has occurred.
Out of memory.
We wish to hold the whole sky,
But we never will.
Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind. Both are blank.
---oOo---
From IOL News EVEN CYBERSPEAK HAS ITS LIMITS October 30, 2003
In March the Sunday Times reported that the first online defamation case would shortly come before a South African court.
It comes about as a result of internet users posting allegedly defamatory comments concerning the managing director of the Sundowns Football Club on the South African website www.kickoff.com.
The issue of online defamation has also drawn attention in the UK. Last December the UK Law Commission published its study of this topic, entitled Defamation and the Internet - A Preliminary Investigation.
The term cybersmearing is used by information technology law experts to denote the act of anonymous, online communication of false, disparaging or defamatory information or remarks about an entity, its management or its products or services, which causes prejudice to the entity.
Online defamation can be harmful to businesses in that they will find themselves trying to rebut unfounded accusations made anonymously.
Cybersmearing can have devastating effects by creating clouds of suspicion.
The common law recognises an individual's right to his reputation, which includes a person's good name, his business, professional and credit reputation, as well as his professional and/or business competence.
This common law right is fortified by section 10 of the constitution, which enshrines the right to human dignity.
Section 16 enshrines the right to freedom of expression, which includes the right to criticise.
However, the constitution does not grant internet users a blanket right to say what they wish, as the right to freedom of expression is limited by the provisions of section 36. Of course, comments or remarks constituting hate speech are not protected by the constitution.
The constitutional right to freedom of speech stands on equal footing with the constitutional right to human dignity.
Although defamatory statements are part of one's exercise of freedom of speech, section 36 permits the reasonable proscription of activities and expressions that pose a real and substantial threat to the values underlying the constitution, of which the right to human dignity is one.
So statements, comments or remarks that constitute defamation do not enjoy constitutional protection. Consequently, courts must always balance the right to freedom of speech with the right to dignity, which means a plaintiff must prove the alleged defamatory statement is not worthy of protection as an expression of free speech.
Prior to the advent of the internet, only the media were, generally speaking, in a position to publish widely the defamatory statements of third parties. Website operators and internet users are now in a powerful position to publish comments by means of websites, especially by means of third party online freedom of speech forums.
Defamation occurs where X publishes a wrongful and intentional defamatory statement concerning Y that impairs any facet of Y's reputation.
To determine whether statements are defamatory one must ask whether an ordinary, reasonable, balanced and right-thinking person of average intellect and education and with normal feelings and emotions, reading the words complained of would consider that the words lowered someone's esteem in the eyes of the public, and therefore in the eyes of South African internet users.
The alleged defamatory statements must be read in their context and as a whole.
Although words in their ordinary meaning may not be defamatory, either expressly or by implication, it may be possible to prove that they have a defamatory meaning according to the circumstances when the statements were published.
Generally speaking, statements to the following effect will be regarded as defamatory:
Allegations, whether direct or indirect, that a person is dishonest or has committed a crime.
Allegations that someone is guilty of disreputable conduct, such as racial or sexual bias.
Allegations placing a person's moral character or lifestyle in a bad light.
Allegations that a person is financially unstable - which applies in particular to business people - insane or corrupt.
Allegations calculated to cause disrespect, ridicule or hatred of people, or to make others less willing or unwilling to associate with them.
Allegations averring that a person is incompetent.
Any statement that will cause people to think less of someone constitutes a defamatory statement.
It should also be borne in mind that one may not defame the government, although individual members of the government may be defamed.
Meaningless abuse does not constitute defamation. This refers to abusive language, such as "bitch", "cow", and "bastard", which does not convey any defamatory imputation. The circumstances of each case will, however, be determinative.
Whenever someone proves that defamatory words or statements were published, two presumptions arise: they were published with the intention to defame and they were published unlawfully.
In the internet context, defamation can also occur by means of defamatory sketches and cartoons. Likewise, posting a digital photograph of someone on a website that suggests a defamatory fact about the person may constitute defamation. This will depend on the context, including the text and other photographs.
Repeating defamatory statements constitutes publication.
Even drawing attention to a third party's defamatory statement may constitute a separate publication of the statement. Whenever A forwards B's defamatory e-mail message concerning C to someone else, A may be guilty of publishing defamatory statements. Likewise, printing out an e-mail message and showing it to a third party may constitute publication of a defamatory statement.
When a website operator draws attention to defamatory statements on a third party's website by providing a direct link (known as a deep link) to the statements, he also publishes the said statements and is therefore directly liable for this defamation.
In a democratic society such as South Africa, the internet plays a role of undeniable importance. It is imperative that there is a free flow of information, that members of the public can voice their opinions, beliefs and comments on websites and that they can participate in online debates. But it is also of paramount importance that the reputation of individuals and businesses should not be infringed unreasonably.
Accordingly, a South African internet user's right to freedom of speech does not permit him to defame third parties.
This article first appeared in the November issue of De Rebus
---oOo---
A POEM FOR COMPUTER USERS OVER 40
(Author unknown. From the internet.)
A computer was something on TV
From a Science Fiction show of note
A window was something you hated to clean
And ram was the father of a goat.
Meg was the name of my girlfriend
And gig was a job for the nights
Now they all mean different things
And that really mega bytes.
An application was for employment
A program was a TV show
A cursor used profanity
A keyboard was a piano.
Memory was something that you lost with age
A CD was a bank account
And if you had a 3-in. floppy
You hoped nobody found out.
Compress was something you did to the garbage
Not something you did to a file
And if you unzipped anything in public
You'd be in jail for a while.
Log on was adding wood to the fire
Hard drive was a long trip on the road
A mouse pad was where a mouse lived
And a backup happened to your commode.
Cut you did with a pocket knife
Paste you did with glue
A web was a spider's home
And a virus was the flu.
I guess I'll stick to my pad and paper
And the memory in my head.
I hear nobody's been killed in a computer crash
But when it happens they wish they were dead.
