On Web Culture

Source: YouTube

Source: YouTube

A Time-Lapse Map of Every Nuclear Explosion Since 1945 by Isao Hashimoto.

Source: YouTube

Source: YouTube

Back in 2007 Dave Broome & I toured the South Island. These are the photos from that trip!

Photos from 2007 South Island Tour

2 train, 1 bus day trip to Lavenham in Suffolk.

More photos from Lavenham

(Last updated: 2011-06-29)

1. NAI Opt-Out. The big daddy of opting out. Go to the NAI’s Opt Out page, click ‘Select All’ & click ‘Submit’. It will go through all the ad networks & opt you out. If you don’t successfully opt out of some, select the ones opt out wasn’t successful for & try opting out a second time. This worked for me.

2. Microsoft Opt out. Go to their Opt Out page, make sure it says you’re opted out, if not, click Opt Out. As West Australian’s say: “too easy”.

3. Yahoo. Same as MS. Go to Yahoo’s Opt Out page, make sure it says you’re opted out, if it doesn’t then fix that.

Ok. That was the easy stuff. Now, Google.

4. Interest-based advertising. Visit the Ad Preferences page & click Opt out.

5. Turning off search history personalization. Is this online advertising? Probably not, but in case you want to opt out of this, here is how. Firstly, it differs depending on whether you’re logged in or logged out of your Google Account. In you’re logged in to your Google Account, visit Edit Services & click the link that says ‘Remove Web History permanently’. If you can’t see this link, you’re not using Web History. If you’re not logged in to your Google Account, visit Web History Opt Out & click ‘Disable customisations based on search activity’. I have a Google Account but I did both forms of Opt Out just to be hardcore :-)

Ok. We’re getting there. What you may or may not have noticed is so far a majority of our Opt Outs have been cookie-based. This means if you delete all your cookies for your preferred web browser, then all your Opt Outs will be forgotten. Oh no! Fortunately there are some permanent Opt Out options.

6. Opting out permanently of Google Advertising. There is a plugin available for Internet Explorer, Google Chrome & Mozilla Firefox browsers. Note that for Chrome it is actually an extension. There is also guidance for accomplishing effectively the same thing for Safari.

Now, for Firefox users.

7. Download the BetterPrivacy add-on. This wipes the cookies Adobe Flash sets which, again, may or may not lead to personalised online advertising tracking but if you want to go “all the way” then this add-on will allow you to do it. Note: this add-on may mess with some Flash websites that have functionality that requires persistant cookies so either add those websites to the add-on’s whitelist in Firefox or don’t use this add-on.

7a. Yes, Firefox 4 & higher has the option you can check for ‘Tell web sites I do not want to be tracked’. Your browser tells the website this when you arrive on the website. Right now I’m not aware of this setting being respected 100% by advertising networks & websites across the web, but it is probably worth turning on as nothing negative can come of having it activated as well.

Finally:

On Monday we decided to drive to Bath. On Tuesday we drove to Bath! But it was a great day trip & really fun to get out of London, see the countryside & visit Bath.

More photos from Bath

Photos from my first week in London.

More photos from London

2 weeks in Perth.

More photos from Perth