Is Twitter the best way to get word out about terror alerts? Can you trust a social network to do the right thing with your photos? What really happened back in 1995 when Microsoft put the screws to Compaq? Sometimes even I am amazed at the range of topics that pass through this space, as well as they reactions they engender. Welcome to another trip through the Cringeville mailbag.
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In "Tweet if you see Osama," I wrote about how the Department of Homeland Security is planning to use Twitter to send out terror alerts, as well as replacing our current five-color alert system with a two-tiered one, either Elevated or Imminent. Reader G. W. says even that's too complicated and suggests a much simpler two-level system:
- Get a damn helmet.
- Put on your damn helmet.
Or you can just do what I do: Wear your damn helmet all the damn time.
In "Color me stupid: A privacy nightmare in the making," I wrote about Color, a new mobile photo-sharing network with absolutely no privacy restrictions whatsoever. Reader R. H. had this clever suggestion:
All we need now is app that detects my image being shared on Color, notifies me of it, and automatically files lawsuits for giving away my image without compensating me. Seems like a couple days work by a savvy app writer and the right lawyer could make a lot of money.
Cringe fan M. V. offers a final word on Alexandra Wallace, the UCLA student who got a lot more fame than she bargained for when she posted an anti-Asian rant on YouTube:
I sometimes revel in the continuing proof of Mark Twain's quote "Common sense isn't all that common." Case in point is Ms. Wallace. Seriously, who would hire her now? Unless she's going into her own business where she'll need some serious customer service and people skills, she's doomed to living in mom and dad's basement.
Hey pal, a lot of my readers still live in mom and dad's basement. Be careful there.
