If a stranger came up to you on the street, would you give him your name, Social Security number and e-mail address?

Probably not.

Yet people often dole out all kinds of personal information on the Internet that allows such identifying data to be deduced. Services like Facebook,Twitter and Flickr are oceans of personal minutiae — birthday greetings sent and received, school and work gossip, photos of family vacations, and movies watched.

Read more at The New York Times

A federal court threw the future of Internet regulations into doubt Tuesday with a far-reaching decision that went against the Federal Communications Commission and could even hamper the government’s plans to expand broadband access in the United States.

Read more at The New York Times

When Kevin Jenkins wanted to teach his fourth-grade students at Spangler Elementary here how to use the Internet, he created a site where they could post photographs, drawings and surveys.

And they did. But to his dismay, some of his students posted surveys like “Who’s the most popular classmate?” and “Who’s the best-liked?”

Mr. Jenkins’s students “liked being able to express themselves in a place where they’re basically by themselves at a computer,” he said. “They’re not thinking that everyone’s going to see it.”

Read more at the New York Times

A few weeks ago, I installed the developer’s (debugger) version of Adobe’s Flash Player so that I could try out Flex. Since then, I’ve run into websites containing Flash errors. To a user that does not have the debug version of Adobe Flash Player, you won’t see the errors because many of the errors are from bits and pieces of what seems to be recycled code that is never used. Thus, not essential to what it does do. To this user, the Flash object will continue to play. It appears that these errors are more prominent in banner ads. (Actually, I haven’t found any Flash-only sites with problems.) This makes me wonder whether or not the banner ad companies care about the code. Perhaps they’ve weighed the errors against the average user running the non-debug version of Flash Player and have determined the errors to be inconsequential.

Even so, here’s a list of websites where I’ve encountered Broken Flash Flowers. Sometimes they’re on the front page, sometimes they’re not. I’ll continually add sites as I find them.

Last updated on 04/03/2010

• http://www.gonintendo.com
  • Error #2044: Unhandled IOErrorEvent:. text=Error #2035: URL Not Found.
  • Error #2044: Unhandled ioError:. text=Error #2032: Stream Error. URL: http://speed.pointroll.com/PointRoll/Media/Panels/Ford/669876/Knockout_300×250_banner.xml at offerTemplate_Knockout_fla::MainTimeline/frame1()
  • TypeError: Error #1009: Cannot access a property or method of a null object reference.
    at mx.managers::FocusManager/activate()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\FocusManager.at mx.managers::SystemManager/activateForm()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:2493]at mx.managers::SystemManager/activate()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:2451]at mx.core::Application/initManagers()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\core\Application.as:1152]at mx.core::Application/initialize()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\core\Application.as:834]at AgeGate/initialize()[/Users/einnocen/1uptech/workspaces/HEAD-flash-builder/AgeGate/src/AgeGate.mxml:0]at mx.managers::SystemManager/http://www.adobe.com/2006/flex/mx/internal::childAdded()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:2127]at mx.managers::SystemManager/initializeTopLevelWindow()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:3396]at mx.managers::SystemManager/http://www.adobe.com/2006/flex/mx/internal::docFrameHandler()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:3219]at mx.managers::SystemManager/docFrameListener()[C:\autobuild\galaga\frameworks\projects\framework\src\mx\managers\SystemManager.as:3065]
• http://www.nytimes.com
  • VerifyError: Error #1033: Cpool entry 18 is wrong type.
  • ReferenceError: Error #1065: Variable mcBannerAd_2 is not defined.
  • ReferenceError: Error #1065: Variable MainTimeline is not defined.
• http://www.wired.com
  • Error: videoComponent.traceMessages.durationMetaDataMissing at com.doubleclick.studio.video::ProgressivePlayer/metaDataTimeoutCheck() at flash.utils::Timer/_timerDispatch() at flash.utils::Timer/tick()
• http://www.livemocha.com
  • Error #2044: Unhandled IOErrorEvent:. text=Error #2036: Load Never Completed.
• http://www.funnyordie.com
  • Error: Error #2101: The String passed to URLVariables.decode() must be a URL-encoded query string containing name/value pairs.
    at Error$/throwError()
    at flash.net::URLVariables/decode()
    at flash.net::URLVariables()
    at flash.net::URLLoader/onComplete()
• http://www.youtube.com
  • Error #2044: Unhandled IOErrorEvent:. text=Error #2036: Load Never Completed.
• http://www.capcom.com/monster/
  • SecurityError: Error #2122: Security sandbox violation: SoundMixer.computeSpectrum: http://www.capcom.com/monster/index.swf cannot access http://static.capcom.com/_site/www.capcom.com/monsterhunter/_flv/welcome.flv. A policy file is required, but the checkPolicyFile flag was not set when this media was loaded.
    at flash.media::SoundMixer$/computeSpectrum()
    at br.components.sound::Equalizer/update()
    at flash.utils::Timer/_timerDispatch()
    at flash.utils::Timer/tick()
  • SecurityError: Error #2122: Security sandbox violation: SoundMixer.computeSpectrum: http://www.capcom.com/monster/index.swf cannot access http://static.capcom.com/_site/www.capcom.com/monsterhunter/_flv/welcome.flv. A policy file is required, but the checkPolicyFile flag was not set when this media was loaded.
    at flash.media::SoundMixer$/computeSpectrum()
    at br.components.sound::Equalizer/update()
    at flash.utils::Timer/_timerDispatch()
    at flash.utils::Timer/tick()
• http://www.tvshack.net
  • Error #2044: Unhandled IOErrorEvent:. text=Error #2036: Load Never Completed.
• http://www.ign.com
  • TypeError: Error #1009: Cannot access a property or method of a null object reference at com::loadFilePolite/completeHandler()