I read a story a few days ago about a family who’s neighbor recently registered as a sex offender and I was curious to see how many registered sex offenders were in my neighborhood. I was amazed on the amount of sex offenders registered in my area – I found 103 offenders and 18 non-mappable offenders in my city within a 10 mile radius. The city I live in is one of the safest cities in America voted by Good Morning America in 2010.

If you would like to know how many registered sex offenders are in your neighborhood or if you would like to get alerts for new registered sex offenders, you can visit the Family Watchdog web site.

Tips to stay safe from the Family Watchdog Web Site

Parents

• Always know where your children are.
• Put your children’s emergency identification (name, address, phone number) on their clothes.
• Teach your children your home phone number and to how call 911 if there is an emergency.
• Agree on a specific time when children must return home.
• Contact law enforcement authorities immediately if there is any suspicious or unlawful activity.
• Purchase and watch The Safe Side video with your children.

Children

• Always tell your parents where you are going.
• Never enter any home without getting your parent’s permission first.
• Never get into any vehicle, unless your parents know and have said it’s OK.
• Always wear reflective clothing at night.
• Never approach any house that is not well lit.
• Remember anything weird that an adult says or does to you and tell your parents immediately.
• Run away from people who offer you candy or other treats or want you to help look for their puppy or kitten.
• Scream, run and fight if anyone tries to grab you or make you to go with them.
• Don’t play in areas that you are unfamiliar with.
• Stay on well-lit streets and always use the sidewalk. If there is no sidewalk, always walk facing traffic.

It’s also important for parents to keep close tabs when children are using the computer for online activity.

Facebook bolsters that they have over 500 million users, but how many are active and how many of those accounts are duplicates or spam accounts? This is not the same as when McDonald’s use to publicly display that they served over 250 million. I am sure many of those were repeat customers and not unique customers.

The Facts

In September 2010, according to Compete.com statistics, Facebook had 130,812,106 unique visitors.

Facebook Missing 370 million users found.

What’s a Unique Visitor?

When a visitor comes to a web site for the first time, the web site drops a “cookie” into their browser. This cookie allows the web site to identify the visitor and track them as a Unique Visitor regardless of how many pages they visit on the same site.

How does Compete.com calculate a unique visitor?

The Unique Visitors metric only counts a person once no matter how many times they visit a site in a given month. Unique Visitors are typically used to determine how popular a site is.

Where are the other 370 million users? I think I found the missing users and more than likely they’re made up of duplicate and or spam accounts. I think Facebook should make a valid claim by stating that they have more than 130 million active users.

Facebook – “Over 130 million users logged in each month”

I would love to have a web site that had 1/100^th the traffic FB gets, who wouldn’t?

Retraction: I miss some facts about Compete stats that was brought to my attention by one of my trusted visitors, Giedrius Majauskas, who does keep me honest from time to time. Compete measures U.S. traffic only. According to some traffic sources, the U.S. currently makes up 32% of all Facebook visitors. If we do the math, Facebook gets approximately 130 million U.S. visitors and 407 million global unique visitors. This would suggest that Facebook still doesn’t have 500 million active users and only 407 million based on the math. This data is from June, 2010.

Thank you,

Giedrius Majauskas

I was wrong once again! (Even the best writers we know get it wrong some times).

On Thursday, Facebook experienced an outage for 2 ½ hours due to a glitch in the social media network’s database software. There were messages flying around the social network that the site was compromised by a group of hackers. The site was not hacked in anyway shape or form.

Facebook users were outraged yesterday because of how long the site was down before it was accessible again. The issue I have is why anyone would be so angry and upset just because you were unable to post messages or share a photos? The only people that should be upset are advertisers who count on FB to generate traffic to their respected businesses.

The outage could be looked at as a good thing, because it gives people a break from the digital space and maybe during that time you did something more productive, maybe.

The addiction is incredible and I am sure that Facebook loves this and why not. They are becoming the mainstay and they’re beginning to rival Google and Microsoft in some areas.

Facebook is great, but it will not solve World hunger. To me, it’s another fad that has gone from a dorm room to a college campus and now global. It’s a phenomenon on how fast this social giant has grown, but all good things never last forever.

The biggest concern users should have with Facebook, is not how long an outage occurred, but the ongoing phishing scams that pop up on Facebook almost every week. Cyber criminals love FB, because of its rich user base (500 million) and they know a good percentage of its members will fall for scams.

Be careful and stop sweating the small stuff.

StumbleUpon is a great tool to share websites with friends. I have been a member and advertiser since 2004. I made many online friends and one best friend in person. I enjoy some of the content that is shared, but sometimes people take advantage of the system.

Here are some of the things that will irk other StumbleUpon users and more than likely they will befriend you and unsubscribe to your favorites;

1. Multiple sends through the toolbar from the same domain. 1 or 2 is fine, but anymore, is just over doing it.
2. User’s inbox is full, but yet they continue to send sites through the toolbar. I am sure many users find this annoying. Clean out your inbox or you will be removed.
3. Stop sending business related websites that offer web design or other services – this is called self promoting and it’s against TOS (Terms of Service).
4. Requesting Stumbles and Reviews are a little pushy and it’s violates TOS. Send me a page and if I like it, I will thumbs up and/or review it. Send your stumbles in the form of “Hope you enjoy this page, I really thought it was amazing that xyz can do this”. A little commentary will help and it doesn’t come across as a demand.
5. Stop requesting shares from multiple people as many of your friends are probably mine.
6. Sending a friend request when you hardly have any favorites, reviews or subscribers. This can be interpreted as someone who is trying to game the system and will eventually send spam.
7. Expecting Reciprocation – You need to remember we all have different interest. If you send me a website on Lawn & Garden and I am a technology enthusiast, I will more than likely stumble through.

These are just some of the things that will annoy other members. Here’s a great article called – StumbleUpon Etiquette Faux Pas, Tips & Resources, there are many tips you should follow in order to get the most out of StumbleUpon.

It’s important that everybody read the Terms of Service. We can all make StumbleUpon a better community.

I am absolutely beside myself on how bad the moderation has become on StumbleUpon. I see many messages coming through my toolbar that look like (Please S.t.um.b.le if you like). What’s with the periods between words?

The reason for the periods between words is to mask the actual message. It has been known that StumbleUpon is automatically flagging messages through the toolbar from members asking or exchanging Stumbles. Here’s the problem I have with this rule. If people like what you stumble and add you as a friend, than why is it against the rules to share content that people are interested in?

I think this falls under a very gray area called self promoting. If I own a blog and I am sharing what people are interesting in, how is this self promoting? I am not sharing a post that’s selling a service or product. I feel that this needs clarity, but it has been like this since day one. If you have a dot com you are considered a commercial site.

If you are sending a page through the toolbar and you’re simply saying – (I hope you like) or (I sent you this page that you may find interesting), how is that self promoting? You are not directly asking for a thumbs up or review.

The Bigger Problem

There’s a group on StumbleUpon that acts like a vigilante and is doing more harm than good. This group has formed a coalition that has influenced the StumbleUpon staff to place member accounts under review. If your account ever gets placed under review, you can kiss it goodbye. I know many members that were put under review for no apparent reason. These members shared their blog posts with friends, which is not spamming. If a member is adding you as a friend, than it’s the same as opting-in. They didn’t discover their own articles, so don’t even go there.

The so-called vigilante group goes by the name SP@M FREE. I’m disappointed that StumbleUpon permits such cowardly behavior from a group that acts on opinion and not facts from research and proper moderation tactics. What do you expect for free?

StumbleUpon Community Rules

1. No posting of illegal, threatening, libelous, or obscene content.
2. No posting of another person’s or members personal data, such as contact details.
3. No publication of or forwarding of private messages (PM’s) to 3rd parties without permission.
4. If you are in dispute with another member, please keep the matter private and contact StumbleUpon Support immediately.
5. Reviews or tags should not be used to level personal attacks on other members, site owners or contributors to the sites reviewed.
6. Do not impersonate other members.
7. Multiple accounts per user may not be created without permission from StumbleUpon.
8. No mass unsolicited messaging or commercial spamming permitted.
9. The Group Share tool may not be used to request ratings and reviews.
10. Exchanges of ratings and/or reviews are not permitted.
11. Requesting ratings and reviews from other members is not permitted.
12. Payment or receipt of compensation in exchange for ratings or reviews is not permitted.
13. You cannot use 3rd party clients or scripts to access StumbleUpon.

We need StumbleUpon to improve and clarify the rules for sharing.

If you recently had been put under review, you can contact Walter, StumbleUpon Community Manager. Good luck in getting a response.

Are you following more people than followers? What if you could remove people you are following who are not reciprocating? You can!

In fact, with a couple of clicks, you can unfollow who are not following you. There’s a new service called InRevTwitln that’s still in beta, but works wonders.

Here’s how it works

• Enter your Twitter name
• Click on Flush (Big blue button)
• Select All (when the list is complete)
• Click on the small gray Flush button just above the list

It’s that simple!

You can keep on clicking on the big blue Flush button and continue with the steps above until you have flushed everyone not following you.

In addition to flushing people who are not following you, the service also offers up Grow and Reciprocate.

Grow: Grow your network, follow new people.
Reciprocate: Follow your followers back. Do not be a hypocrite and follow those who have chosen to follow you.

InRevTwitln also provides your Twitlin Score, Total Followers, Total Following and more.

Visit InRevTwitln and try it out for yourself.

Thanks to John over at PotPolitics for referring this site.

One town (Elgin, IL), has launched an easier way to help police with crime tips that can be achieved using text messaging. I am thrilled that this technology is being put to good use. This is a step in the right direction to slow down the crime rate in Illinois.

Police said they are hopeful that this new system allowing the public to text-message anonymous tips will encourage more of a dialogue with younger residents.

Launched about two weeks ago, the new system, called “tip411,” establishes a two-way “chat” through which people can send text messages and police can respond while keeping private the identifying information of the tipster.

Elgin Police Department Special Investigations Division Cmdr. Bill Wolf said the system gives residents an alternative means of helping to police their own communities.

“It’s just another method for people to give us information on any criminal activity, drug activity or gang activity that’s going on,” he said. “It’s also a good way for younger people and students to get us some information about things going on, or particularly if there’s something going on in the school that they want to let us know about.”

I think this new system should be rolled out nationally. The crime in Chicago amongst teen homicides this year is staggering. If this system launches in Chicago, it will send a message to the criminals that they are being watched.

What happens if I am texting a tip to the police and I have an accident? Should I rat myself out?

Twitter is more of a spam engine serving up all sorts of crazy stuff. What I don’t like about Twitter, if you are not looking at the dashboard you miss out on a lot of stuff. Go ahead and tweet an article and see how long it stays on the main page. This also depends on how many people you are following. If you are following more than 2000 people your post is gone in a flash!

Twitter is starting to come in for a landing. The growth it has seen this year is fading fast. In fact, most new members don’t even come back the following month to use the service. A new study found that more than half of those in the “Twittersphere” aren’t tweeting, aren’t following anyone, and aren’t being followed by anyone.

HubSpot’s new “State of the Twittersphere Report” for June 2009 looked a data from more than 4.5 million Twitter users, with a particular focus on “activity levels” to see how often new and existing Twitterers are actually using Twitter.

Turns out that nearly 80 percent of users haven’t added a homepage URL to their profile, while more than 75 percent never entered a bio. Even worse, 55 percent of Twitter users aren’t following anyone, 52 percent don’t have any followers of their own, and 54 percent haven’t tweeted—which, after all, is the main thing you’re supposed to do on Twitter.

The report comes on the heels of a recent Harvard Business survey that found that 90 percent of the tweeting on Twitter comes from just 10 percent of its most active users, and that the median number of “lifetime tweets” for a given Twitterer is only one.

Meanwhile, a post on Mashable notes that Twitter’s phenomenal growth in recent months has abruptly stalled, with a mere 1.47 increase in user between April and May, after blistering triple-digit spurts earlier in the year.

Happy Tweeting! If you even tweet.

The internet, e-mail and text messaging are now part of everyday life for most teenagers. They are great ways to find out information and contact your friends and family, but you should make sure that you use it safely.

Social networking sites like Bebo, Facebook and My Space are very popular, but you have to be careful about what information you put onto your profile.

Most networking sites allow you to change the security settings on your profile, so make sure that you only allow your friends to see it. Its best not to upload any pictures or videos that you wouldn’t want your parents or teachers to see. Not all adults can be trusted some can be dangerous and use these sites to target young people.

Cyber bullying is when somebody is nasty or threatening to somebody else by using e-mail, text and picture messaging or other digital technologies. Cyber bullying can’t hurt you physically, but it can have a negative effect on your emotions.

What are the dangers?

Making a fool of yourself.
If people put up pictures of themselves, or write personal diaries then they need to remember that, apart from their friends, there are other people who may use this information in a nasty way.

Child abusers making friends with kids.
If youngsters put a lot of information about themselves on the Internet, this gives “groomers” lots of ways of making friends with them (pretending to be kids themselves) and contacting them. If they put their school name and where they hang out, then it’s easier to do this.

Bullying.
If a bully gets hold of a kid’s private pictures or diary, then they can use this to be cruel and send it around to others with unpleasant messages and so on.

What counts as Personal Stuff?
Personal stuff includes your real name, messenger id, e-mail address, home address, mobile number and any pictures of you, your family or friends.

Top tips for kids

1. Tell your parents what you are doing. If they understand it, they’ll be happier with you using the internet. Don’t give anyone your password, except maybe your parents.
2. Be careful with your mobile. Don’t send pictures that might embarrass you, even to your best friend. Someone can get hold of your pictures and be nasty to you.
3. Don’t give anyone your school name. Don’t give your school name, address or phone number to people you communicate with on the internet.
4. Don’t meet up with internet friends. If you must, then take an adult with you. People are not always who they pretend to be.
5. Tell someone. Tell someone if people are saying things you don’t like or bullying you. If you don’t get help, ask advice from another adult.
6. Report it. Report bad behavior to the website you are using.
7. Don’t let bullies win. Print out and save any messages and show someone like a parent or teacher and ask them to help. If the first person doesn’t help, then ask someone else.
8. Don’t respond to nasty emails. Don’t respond to nasty emails or messages. Block or ignore the sender.
9. Could it embarrass you? Don’t put photos or things that might embarrass you on the internet.
10. Be nice even if they’re angry. Be as nice online as you are offline. If someone makes you angry don’t be angry back. Tell someone else or report it, but don’t get into a fight online.

Top Tips For Parents:

1. Get involved. Open the lines of communication between you and your kids about what they are doing.
2. Don’t go overboard. Know the risks but don’t ban the internet outright, it’s a great tool. If you are over-anxious your kids won’t tell you what they are doing.
3. Agree on the ground rules. These will depend on the age of your children and the type of websites you are happy for them to view.
4. Put the computer in a main room. With your PC in a main room such as the living room, you will be able to keep an eye on what’s going on.
5. The internet is part of school. Schoolwork these days often includes internet research and used safely the web represents an important learning resource.
6. Parental control software. Install software which is designed to block websites that are not suitable for kids.
7. Chat and instant messaging. If you are in the dark as to what these things are, then ask your kids to teach you.
8. Be careful about plagiarism and homework. The internet makes it very easy for kids to search the net and copy other people’s work. They need educating about the difference between research and plain copying.
9. Bullying on the internet. Be aware that this is a growing problem for kids particularly when using email, chat rooms or message boards. Make sure you are there to listen if they need to talk.
10. Report abuse when you see it. Forums aimed at children are generally well-moderated and should respond to complaints.

Things to remember:

• Don’t give out any personal information to ‘online friends’.
• If you upload a picture or video online, anyone can change it or share it.
• Do NOT open files or emails from people that you don’t know.
• Some people lie online in chat rooms and through instant messengers.
• Keep ‘online’ friends online, do not give them too much personal information.
• If something is making you feel uncomfortable, tell someone.

The Child Safety and Online Protection Centre handle all child related reports. If you are in the UK then this is the best place to make reports. If it’s international (for example on a US website) then you should go to the Virtual Global Taskforce (VGT). The Virtual Global Taskforce is a partnership of international law enforcement agencies, working together to make the Internet a safer place.

The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) works with Internet Service Providers, Police and Government to try to reduce the availability of illegal Internet content, particularly child abuse images. If you wish report the content of a particular site to the IWF, you can do so on their website at iwf.org.uk

You can visit Colin’s Security blog at Free PC Security

If the intent was to extinguish prostitution from Craigslist, why not moderate the classified postings to begin with? This is just a play on words and nothing more.

According to Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal – The Craigslist new section called “adult services” will be manually reviewed by Craigslist staff. I think they just should have moderated the erotic services to begin with.

Craigslist’s sex-service listings have faced intense scrutiny following the April 14 murder of 25-year-old masseuse Julissa Brisman, who advertised on Craigslist in Boston. Philip Markoff, a 23-year-old Boston University medical student, was charged with killing Brisman and with attacks on two other women he met through Craigslist.

Officials from Craigslist were not immediately available to comment.

The “erotic services” section will end within seven days and be replaced with a new section called “adult services”

“Closing the erotic services section — a blatant Internet brothel — should lead to other blocking and screening measures, and set a model for other sites, if Craigslist keeps its word,” Blumenthal said.

I am not sure this will make a difference. How can such a small staff monitor the millions who use Craigslist each day?