[thelist] mainstream press and cookies

[Warden, Matt]

On Mar 20, aardvark had something to say about [thelist] mainstream press...

>"The CIA got caught with a hand in the Internet cookie jar."

stylish

>"The agency removed software from one of its Web sites this week after a
>private group discovered that the CIA was using banned Internet tracking
>technology called 'cookies,' said Mike Stepp, who manages the CIA's public
>Web site."

cookies are banned? woah, i better go get rid of all those sites i built
that with certian features which relied on them & sessions (which are
reliant on cookies too, most of the time).

>"Cookies are small software files

*cough* text files *cough*

what the heck is a "software file" anyways?

>often placed on computers without a
>person's knowledge.

see, THAT is intentionally misleading, i think. yes, they're often placed
without the user's knowledge. but, it reads as if they're often placed,
but when they are, they're always without the user's knowledge.

the wording sucks. the difference between:

cookies are text files placed on computers, often without the user's
knowledge

and

cookies are text files often placed on computers, without the user's
knowledge

i guess it depends on how you read that. i'm still not too sure which way
they meant it.

>The files can make Internet browsing more convenient by
>letting sites distinguish user preferences, but they have been criticized for
>violating privacy because they can track Web surfing."

ban guns because people kill with them

>i mean, i think it's keen the government is down with the idea of banning
>cookies on its sites, i think that's great...

i dont. i think it starts the ball rolling. and i don't want that ball
rolling my way based on people being scared of relatively harmless stuff
like cookies. if you look at it, that's the pattern. first, government
sites had to be accessible, now accessibility is moving into the private
business sector

>but i bet some client calls me in the next few days asking (again) about
>cookies and asking me to kill them (having read yet another cookies-are-evil
>article)... the effect, of course, rendering some features of their site (like
>session-based shopping carts and user CSS preferences, among other
>things) void -- even though they *knew* the cookies were part of the stuff they
>requested...

yeah, probably

>it still sounds like the press just doesn't get it... it sounds like it makes good
>news to whack the CIA for cookies... so play it up... make it sound
>newsworthy...
>
>hmmmm...
>
>does that qualify as a rant?

yes.

thing is, i bet this happens in every industry.

hell, 'round here, people made a big fuss about construction of a new road
through a forest. a newspaper published an article saying there would be
over 100 trees cleared out. what they left out is that over 50% of them
were already dead and had naturally fallen.

i guess they gotta make a buck too.

--
mattwarden
mattwarden.com