by David Hakala
It seems every form of Internet access is “high speed” or “broadband” these days. But you have to wonder exactly what “high speed” means and who really has it.
“High speed” and “broadband” are used interchangeably. “Broadband” refers to the range, or band, of signal frequencies on which an Internet signal operates. The broader the band is, the more data traffic it can carry. Think of an 8-lane highway versus a 2-lane residential street.
(more…)
by Tina Gasperson
Computing was much simpler before the days of the World Wide Web, but it was probably a lot less fun too. These days, most of our computer time is spent online, connected to other computers, looking for information housed on some other computer that might be halfway around the world.
(more…)
by Gabe Goldberg
Spam — junk email offering scams, lost-relative fortunes, exotic romance, drug deals, etc. — is a nasty curse on the current Internet. Technologies are being explored to curb or cure it, and law enforcement has occasional successes shutting down king spammers, but in the meantime, we deal with it.
Most ISPs (Internet service providers) and most email software offers options for handling spam, selecting methods of detecting it and customizing what’s done with it. And add-on software products promise wonderfully precise protection. While these choices can help, they all unfortunately have disadvantages.
(more…)
by Gabe Goldberg
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) like to brag about connection speeds offered and speak glowingly about the wonderful “experience” their services offer. But how honest are their claims and how does connection speed affect what we do online?
The two most important words in any ISPs advertisement or service contract are “up to.” As in, speeds promised are described as “up to X megabits per second.”
(Megabits means “millions of bits” and “megabits per second” is often abbreviated Mbps. A bit is the basic unit of information or data, a “binary digit,” a single unit that is either 0 or 1. Everything on the Internet and all information and software on your computer is composed of bits.)
(more…)
Powered by WordPress