untitled.

[tomhardy72]

BEWARE of  Phishing Scams!

As a final project for the course Digital Skills and Innovation for the Global Economy, we were required to select a well defined market and create a video pertaining to their interests about something related to course content. Susan and I believe that the world of phishing scams is very serious but often overlooked with the younger generations. As younger generations are online every day we have become aware of what is a scam and what is not. The older generations (65+) don’t have as much experience online and are often unable to differentiate what isn’t a scam and what is. This is why we created this brief video about the dangers of online phishing scams, what they may look like, ways to detect a scam, and ways to prevent them from happening.

Definitely take a look at this video to learn all about the dangers of phishing!

[tomhardy72]

What is Stickiness?

Stickiness in its simplest terms can be described as the number of power users (people who use your app often) added together with the number of loyal users (people who return to an app within 3 months).

Stickiness describes how well your site is doing; showing you how many people frequently use your app and who actually uses for a long time. To make your site more sticky you want to increase the value provided to the user. If your site can solve a wide variety of problems while making it easy for the user to use, your site will be more sticky. A good example of stickiness is a computer; a computer does so many things so well we use them everyday. Instead of doing research at a library, having to read through many books, a computer can easily search the web for what you are looking for. Therefore making it easier for you, and increasing the likeliness you’ll continue using your computer to solve your problems.

Overall, stickiness gives you an idea of how popular your site is, and how many people come back to it. The goal is to increase your stickiness so you and your website will do better. 

[tomhardy72]

Creating a Strong Password

With the online world becoming a bigger part in our lives, it’s important that we keep our information as ours. Creating a strong password that only you will know will help you keep it that way. Find out tips and tricks in our informational video!

[tomhardy72]

Using CodeAcademy

   This week I took a look at the website CodeAcademy, an online interactive platform that offers free coding classes in many different coding languages such as HTML, jQuery, and Javascript. Giving anyone who wants to the opportunity to learn basic coding principles from creating a basic website, all the way to the most advanced coding techniques. All you need is a little time and you can master the art of coding.

   Being somewhat experienced in coding (took a class a year ago), I already kind of understood the basic tags and language behind HTML and CSS. But instead of taking a more advanced course I decided to see how much I remembered from the course I took a year ago, and in a way it was a lot. Using basic tags like <p>, <div>, <nav>, <ul> and <li> working through their tutorial was going rather easily. For this course we were recreating a basic homepage from the Airbnb website. It was very exciting working through the process of adding images, titles, and headers while styling them all to look very professional and eye-catching. Going through how to style text took me back to the course I took last year, it’s very exciting moulding and shaping your website just by adding a few simple selector tags in the CSS document. It wasn’t until the end of the course where things began to get a little more challenging, trying to channel back to last year and remember how it worked was proving difficult but I worked through it and in the end, CodeAcademy provided a very valuable learning experience.

   In summary, I would recommend everyone try CodeAcademy at least one time to understand the basic process of what is going on within those devices that you use everyday. Coding might seem boring and bland but when you start creating something beautiful from nothing it really makes you feel good. So to anyone reading this, try CodeAcademy!

Here’s some of the badges I earned a less than an hour!

[tomhardy72]

What is AppyPie?

This week I took a look at the website AppyPie, an online resource that allows you to create a large variety of apps. The basic version is rather simple but it is still a great place to start if you’re interested in creating apps. In my adventures with this website, I was unable to use my created app on my smartphone. Whenever I attempted to launch it would just be a blank white screen and nothing would load. I was able to create a preview of the app viewable within web browsers so here it is! 

http://snappy.appypie.com/html5/thomas-machardy

I would definitely recommend playing around with AppyPie and create a free app that you can show off to your friends.

[tomhardy72]

I <3 TweetDeck

This week I played around with the application TweetDeck by Twitter; and I’ll tell you right now that if you have Twitter you have to try out his app. Personally I love seeing information, and I’ll admit I have a mild addiction to Twitter. Scrolling through my news feed dozens of times every day it’s definitely a big part of my life. With TweetDeck, instead of only seeing one feed and scrolling infinitely, I could create multiple feeds about anything I wanted. TweetDeck allows you to create lists of anything topic you like (e.g. news, sports) and create it’s own Twitter feed. Being able to combine all these feeds into one screen gives you the feeling that you are like a god, watching over everything that is happening in any topic you desire. It even allows you to create feeds for topics that are trending right now, giving you live updates on the happenings of a certain event or hashtag. You can keep track of your notifications, mentions, favourites, and many more. 

Honestly this is one of the best applications that I have experienced throughout the life of this course, and I might even start using it in my everyday life. TweetDeck is a way to constantly see what you want to see (also it’s updated live) and it is simply amazing.

[tomhardy72]

Susan Chang and I myself are doing a presentation on the world of email phishing scams! Covering everything from what they are, who is affected, and how to prevent yourself from falling into one. 

Check out our proposal video here!

[tomhardy72]

Beware of Online Phishing

What is phishing? No it’s not the one where you catch fish. Although the principal is similar, this phishing takes place in the online world. 

Phishing is the basis of using online tools such as websites, emails, or even phone calls to steal personal information and even money. Many times you will check your email and see an email from Facebook or your bank sitting there in your junk box. Which, to start, is unusual because emails from these sources you trust should appear in you inbox. Right? This is the first sign of something suspicious. So you see the email in your junk box and you open it up to see that your bank has an emergency security issue that requires you to click the link in the email and sign in to change your password (or something along those lines). This is red flag number two. It is very unorthodox for a bank to email you about a problem like this instead of call you or ask you to come in. 

If you receive an email that when you open it seems suspicious and you’re not sure of its validity. You’re probably right. Any email that seems a little off or random most of the time probably is. The best/easiest way to check its validity is to check what the email address is of the person who sent it. If someone like Facebook or Apple were to email you, the senders address would be something along the lines of “[email protected]” or “[email protected]”; something with the company’s name in the address. If you check and it’s from “[email protected]” (an example from my inbox) it’s almost certainly not legitimate. 

So when it comes on online phishing scams, an informed person should always be able to tell the difference between what’s real and what isn’t. 

If the content of the email seems odd, or you don’t recognize the senders address. Delete the email. Odds are it was someone trying to steal your information. 

TL:DR If it’s suspicious. Delete it.

[tomhardy72]

Adventures with Lightbeam

This week I experimented with a browser add-on for Mozilla’s Firefox called Lightbeam. Lightbeam is a service that tracks what first-party websites you visit (such as Twitter or CBC) and what third party sites are attached to them. Using this data it creates an interactive visualization of the relationships between these sites. 

The first thing about Lightbeam that I wasn’t a fan of was that it was only for Firefox, and as an avid Chrome user I was less than please to have to download an inferior browser. But this post is not about my distaste for Firefox it is about my experience with Lightbeam. So let’s stick to that.

Lightbeam on it’s on, at least to me isn’t that amazing. I understand it shows you that when you visit a site it’s not just that site that your connected to. It could be one other site or even twenty that you’ve never heard of. Acting as a way to show you how little control we have over this and where our data is potentially being sent to. 

Now to me (or even the average person) I don’t really take all this too seriously, using Lightbeam and seeing all the third party sites connected to me isn’t going to change the way I surf the web. However if I were to see what information or date these sites are taking and how they are being used, well, that’s a whole different story. 

I would recommend giving it a try (if you already have Firefox installed), but unless you really worry about this information and want to avoid anyone getting your data, this add-on isn’t too fantastic.

Just my two cents.

TM

Here’s my graph from the twenty or so minutes I browsed the web

[tomhardy72]

My Experience With RSS Feeds

This week I visited the website Feedly. Feedly is “news aggregator”, or in other words it combines various news feeds from an assortment of online sources. Feedly can be described as an RSS, or a Rich Site Summary; an easy way for individuals to browse the web and get their daily fix of news and current events. What makes Feedly so special is that users can save time and make their online experience simpler by adding content from different news sites to their feed. Virtually eliminating the need to go from site to site and having to navigate the constantly changing formats of different sites. 

Personally, I am a large fan of the NHL and hockey in general; and I need to know what is happening around the league every day. Instead of having to go to NHL.com, TSN.ca, ESPN.com, and even Reddit all individually to get my hockey news, I simply add various hockey news feeds to my Feedly. And lo and behold, all the news I was craving to find out all at my fingertips and in one easy to read location! Now my experiences with Feedly has only been for a few hours, however with that time I’ve been on it I would definitely recommend at least trying it. It’s understandable that some people like the variety of browsing the web and going to different sites (I’ll admit I am one of them). But these people, myself included, haven’t experienced an RSS; who knows, maybe this will change the way you browse the web.

Overall, the advantages of using an RSS such as Feedly are right out in the open: all your information is in one location, no need to change websites every five minutes, and it’s very easy to add and remove content. The only real obstacle of switching is simply adjusting to a different way of browsing. 

However, in the end it’s really up to you! 

[tomhardy72]

Etiquette in relation to social media.

In todays world social media is becoming a bigger part of everyday life. From sharing pictures of your loved one and updating friends on your daily activities, to building a strong brand or even making a living off of social media; it is clear that this is the future for all of us. 

More than ever now companies are using Twitter or Facebook to post updates about their company and informing the population of current promotions going on. But with these big companies using social media, and with the large following they have, it is crucial that they maintain a proper digital etiquette. Posts that contain poor grammar, incorrect information, or even inappropriate images or comments can damage the company’s reputation. For example, US Airways was replying to a complaint on twitter and accidentally attached an NSFW photo. A mistake of linking the wrong image put a damper on the companies online profile, however they were quick to fix the mistake. 

To avoid potential problems with social media and to keep a high reputation it is important to use proper etiquette. Some examples of good etiquette are as follows:    

Ask the right questions & respond

If there is a complaint on social media, make sure to reply and control the damage and do your best to make that person happy

Work in 2's

Reply in a timely fashion

Text = 2 minutes

Tweet = 2 hours

Email = 2 days

If you reply days later to a tweet the problem will already be over with and your reputation with that person will be poor

Be a person

Try to connect with the person and get the entire story and see what they are feeling instead of the generic “We’re sorry” reply

Build your brand! Using the above points will help you keep up a good reputation with your customers/followers by being their for them when they need you, and being able to relate to their problem and show them that you really care about their situation.