2.13.2008

Fourth Annual Expert Awards Interviews: As promised, the highly anticipated Fourth Annual Expert Awards Interviews are now live. Sembee reveals his streamlined question answering strategy, KCTS prophesies of a Microsoft acquisition of Experts Exchange and webtubbs tells how he became a geek. We've also got interviews from our two winners of our new awards categories. Gertone talks about the Points Earned Average award and dan_blagut celebrates Most Ranks Climbed.

Learn how these Experts gained their super powers!

New Face: We want to extend our sincerest welcome to nommag, the newest member of the Customer Service team at Experts Exchange. Please be gentle...

New Features: Two new features have made their appearance in the past couple of weeks.

• Delete your own question: In the past, you were able to delete your own question if there were no comments in it; otherwise, you had to post a request in the Community Support zone so the Moderators could handle it. Now, you can click the link at any time, and a notice is posted in the question of your intent, and a notification is sent to all participants. If no one objects within seven days, the request is automatically processed.
  
  But there is the catch. If any comment is posted in the thread after the Delete Question button is used, it cancels the notice, and posts a request in Community Support. So unless you do object, please do not post a comment that says something like "I agree"; it will just delay the process. If you're the one making the request, even your own comment will stop the automated system.
• Closing your question: You can now close your question and accept your own comment as the answer. The system works similar to the one for deleting your question; when you post a comment, it will appear with a link to "Accept And Award Points" -- meaning that you can accept your own comment and still award points to the Experts (no, you cannot award them to yourself). You can award all, some, or even none of the points; the remaining ones are refunded to your account.
  
  As with the delete, any comment will interrupt the automated system, and will post a request to the Moderators. However, you should know that if you have decided to award some of the points, the Moderators cannot know that, and will assume that you are asking to have all of your points refunded.

For those of you who have been around for a while, please do not use the automated system and also manually post a request in the CS zone. Also, just because someone objects does not mean that the Moderators will not agree with you. For those of you who are new, please do not click the buttons more than once. If someone objects, clicking it again will only serve to annoy the animals.

Fun and Games: Okay, so maybe it isn't spring quite yet, but the weather is pretty close to that here, so we're having a Spring Cleaning Contest at Experts Exchange. To enter, all you have to do is sign up; to win, all you have to do is help the Moderators clean up abandoned questions. We've even come up with some cool prizes you can win. Check the home page for all the details.

New Geniuses: Four members of Experts Exchange have earned their Genius certificates over the past couple of weeks. nmcdermaid became the 14th EE member to earn 1,000,000 points in MS SQL Server. Adam314 is the second member to earn the Genius certificate in Perl. Rejojohny is the sixth ASP.Net Programming Genius, and jason1178 took time away from his duties as a Community Advisor to earn his certificate in the Macromedia Dreamweaver zone. Congratulations, all!

Milestones:

• Each week, we spotlight the members who earn their Genius certificates. There are only a few who have earned more than one, and you can count on one hand the number who have more than two. Of those, only two members have earned more than 2,000,000 points in more than one zone, and last week, one of them -- lrmoore -- did it for the fourth time. If you're keeping score, he is the Experts Exchange equivalent of Cy Young.
• We mentioned a few weeks back that war1 had picked up his sixth Genius certificate, but neglected to mention that in doing so, he also topped the 13,000,000 point mark.
• capricorn1 went over the 8,000,000 point level; he also has 8,000,000 points in the Access zone.
• aneeshattingal has earned over 5,000,000 points overall.
• mplungjan has topped 4,000,000 points in the Javascript zone, as has rorya in the Microsoft Excel zone.

Kudos: Congratulations are in order to two members of Experts Exchange who have been named Microsoft MVPs, but haven't received the recognition they deserve. ATIG is an MVP in the Exchange area, and dlc110161 was honored in the Microsoft Word area.

Behind every successful company are the people.

People operate the computers, people maintain the servers, people use the software to create and people think of the next big idea. Without people, the computers, the servers and the software mean nothing.

It’s no wonder why flourishing American companies go out of their way to offer their employees incredible benefits to attract and retain their all stars; they understand the importance of people. Outdoor wear manufacturer, Timberland offers employees a $3,000 subsidy towards buying a hybrid automobile. Jam company J.M. Smucker reimburses employees 100% of tuition, with no limit. Google delights employees with gourmet chefs, on-site doctors and company movie days.

Even if your company doesn’t have the resources to subsidize hybrids, reimburse tuition, or offer on-site doctors and chefs, Experts Exchange Corporate Accounts grant you access to inspired, passionate minds that can help your company succeed. Start your company’s Corporate Account now and thrive on custom solutions from Experts and access to over two million technology solutions.

These new Corporate Accounts are already benefiting from the people at Experts Exchange:

Succeed with the right people. Upgrades are available for current users.

An editor by trade, a writer by avocation and an Expert by happenstance, ericpete puts together the newsletter for Experts Exchange.

We don't normally publish much about corporate takeovers and the machinations of boards of directors and such, largely because for the bulk of our membership, it isn't that big a deal. Yes, a corporate restructuring because the stock has been acquired by pensions fund and banks has an impact on some people -- they might lose their jobs, for example -- but for the most part, as geeky types, the pay envelope is there every couple of weeks, so it isn't really that interesting.

The news last week was different, mainly because of the players. You have Yahoo, which has been caught up in the "we don't know who we are, or what we want to do" mode for so long that one of its founders (Jerry Yang) felt compelled to re-enter the fray from which he retired a few years back. You have Microsoft, whose founder (Bill Gates) has been weaning himself from the day to day operations of the company to become a philanthropist -- and if you believe that, we have a bridge we would like to sell you. And you have Google, which has turned frustrating and annoying Microsoft into an art form Steve Jobs never dreamed of.

It doesn't make a lot of difference whether it's the corner pizza store or a multi-gazillion dollar company like Yahoo; a business is an extension of the personality of the person running the show. Since Yang and his partner David Filo, took the company public, Yahoo has seemed to lose its focus, going from a search engine to a mishmash of more or less related products. It gets a ton of hits -- Alexa has it ranked No. 1 -- but while its income has been increasing, its bottom line has been decreasing.

Owners and founders of successful companies have a pretty good idea of what they want from their organizations. They know what kinds of products it should sell or services it should render, and that early imprimatur on the company is its DNA. That changes when a company goes public -- unless the owner is very smart about how he takes the company public. When that happens, the board of directors of the company -- the people who represent the stockholders -- have a large say over who runs the show. They have one concern (the return on their investment), and those goals can frequently conflict with those of the founders.

There are certainly reasons for changing the top level management of a company. Just because someone can cook doesn't mean he can manage people or food costs or sales, which is the main reason that eight out of ten new restaurants fail, and that's true with just about any business. But the other side of the coin is that someone hired to do a job doesn't necessarily have a visceral attachment to the company; his mission is to improve the company's position as the board of directors sees it.

So while various executives at Yahoo have been tinkering with the systems, its once-dominant position as the search engine of choice has eroded. It has been forced by other companies -- notably Google (the third player, still lurking out there, in the unfolding melodrama that is Microsoft's unsolicited offer to buy Yahoo) -- and its other ventures away from its core (like Google's and Microsoft's) have been met with less than spectacular results.

The problem Yahoo faces now is that the value of the deal Microsoft offered it has shrunk (as of February 6) by about ten per cent because it was a part cash, part stock deal -- and the downward trend in the market has affected everyone -- did anyone notice that Google is down 34 per cent from its high of about $747 a share? And then there's cash-rich Google that would dearly love to add to the 75 per cent of the advertising market it already has -- if federal regulators would let Google take over Yahoo. It's possible that some venture capital firms could get together and take Yahoo private, but that's a long shot. But most likely -- no matter what Yang and company president Sue Decker want -- is that Microsoft will eventually wind up owning Yahoo. Do you Mi-croooooooo?

It hasn't all been peaches and cream for Microsoft since the announcement was made, either. Curiously, in addition to the pounding the stock has taken, the loudest criticism of the deal has been that in trying to acquire Yahoo, Microsoft is becoming unfocused on what it does -- the very corporate trait that has gotten Yahoo into this mess in the first place. As with Yahoo, with the exception of those products related to its core products -- operating systems and basic software -- Microsoft has had a difficult time outdoing anyone, and has only put a dent in a market when it has acquired some other company, despite its best efforts.

Even with Google's dominance in the search-based advertising market, it might not be easy for Microsoft to pull off an acquisition like this one either; the federal regulators (not to mention those pesky folks in the European Union) might just think that that the marriage of the top-ranked website and the top-ranked supplier of operating systems and software is just a little over the top -- even if their combined search business revenues are still dwarfed by Google's. At least Google earned its position. Besides, who will Microsoft get to run the new business? No one Gates has hired so far has put much of a dent in the Google behemoth.

Not surprisingly, Yahoo's board of directors rejected Microsoft's offer on Monday morning. There were also rumors flying around Silicon Valley that Yahoo was trying to buy AOL from Time-Warner (which actually wants to sell AOL) as a way of shoring up Yahoo's stock. But no matter what happens, it's not likely to be good for Yahoo. It may well be that the bubble-burst it was able to avoid a few years ago was just taking its time catching up to one of the web's grand dames.

What are those red icons on the question lists?

The icons, which started appearing a couple of weeks ago, are questions that have gone 12 hours without any kind of response; we call them "neglected". But there's a lot more to the system than just a simple icon.

If your question becomes neglected, you will receive an email to that effect. But more importantly, Experts who are Gurus or above in the zones your question is posted in will receive an alert to it. They earn bonus points (which do not come out of your account) for responding to your question. The Moderators and Zone Advisors can also set a question to "neglected" as well.

If you have a Guru certificate or above, you are automatically included in the Question Alert program, which means you are eligible to receive those bonus points. However, you do have to enroll in it; Edit your profile, click the For Experts button, and then click the Question Alerts tab. When you receive an Alert, it is because the question has been marked as neglected, and is eligible for bonus points. The bonus is equal to the original amount of the question, but is not included in the grade multiplier.

If you do not have a Guru certificate in a zone, you can still earn bonus points; just contact a Moderator or Zone Advisor. A word of caution, though: it isn't automatic. We will be looking at your comment and answer history, because we consider this an honor -- not something you get just because you say you want to earn lots of points. The idea is to help members get solutions to their problems, and if your history shows that you post a quick and dirty comment, and then never follow up, you won't be included.

Be sure to check under the bed: Those of you who love conspiracies have to be in heaven with the news that cables connecting the Middle East and South Asia were cut last week, apparently by an old anchor. In a related story, the customer service departments of several large technology firms reported slower than normal traffic, a sign some corporate vice-presidents believe is because their products are becoming easier to use.

Maybe they can offer it to Microsoft: Earthlink is shopping around its municipal wi-fi assets, but the real question is why anyone would buy systems that are on their way to being old technology? With the development of reasonably efficient and inexpensive wi-max not that far in the future, trying to build a wi-fi environment is like trying to make money with steam-powered locomotives. Then again, there's always Google.

It can't be a coincidence: Any regular television viewer in the US knows that the writers have been on strike, and that because of the strike, most of what has been shown, instead of the usual fare, has been either re-runs or movies -- including the almost too-prophetic Wag The Dog. Prophetic? In the sense that during an election year, candidates seek out Hollywood types for endorsements (and donations), yes, and in return, those candidates who are already in office are happy to scratch a few backs.

Not that it will change anyone's mind: Microsoft has released to manufacturing the first service pack for Vista. It will be available for download next month.

Needles in haystacks: The problem with searching, for most people, is that in order to get good results, you need to understand how words get used; otherwise, you wind up with a bunch of links that don't give you the information you need. Some search engines, like Ask, are doing things to change that, something that has not gone unnoticed by Google. Relevant results? What a concept.

What's truly scary is that we actually understand this stuff: Back in our salad days, we had the opportunity -- and sadly, didn't realize it -- to get involved with some fancy physics stuff involving phase-changes and such. Now that it looks like the technology is the Next Big Thing in the memory that will be used for computing and communications devices, it gives us one more reason to kick ourselves for not wanting to take on calculus.

Yet another dagger in the hearts of grandmothers everywhere: All those photo albums, with the fading images on the stiff, glossy paper with the ubiquitous stripe on the bottom where the two pieces of paper were sealed together... soon nothing more than a memory...

They showed the world they could lead when they stuck to their guns on Microsoft: For the third consecutive months, Europeans pumped out more spam than did the US. Congress should make a law, darn it.

Because We Can Department: Occasionally, there's something delicious about annoying 75 per cent of our readers... or at least, giving them a reason to try something different.

It's that you can't drive and talk at the same time: Our genetic propensity for paranoia and the randomness with which cancer strikes notwithstanding, a Japanese study -- and who better to conduct such a study than the mobile-technology-addicted Japanese -- has demonstrated that mobile phones do not increase one's chances of getting cancer. The study did not examine other effects on brain cells, however, especially that which cause drivers to become oblivious to everything else in the universe while holding a cell phone up next to one's ear.

Sign of the Apocalypse: A mock cyber attack, hosted by the US government, was disrupted when the people who were supposed to be conducting the attack decided to target the security computers instead. Also, a new take on what might otherwise be considered a disorder.

I love movies -- a lot more than my other half does, anyway -- but it drives me nuts to watch the depiction in them about how computers and networks and the Internet work. Tom Cruise sending email to who in Mission Impossible? The little girl rebooting Jurassic Park? Sandra Bullock in The Net? Please.

But I was really kind of tickled to read an article about how DNSstuff.com created a real tool for use in the Diane Lane film, Untraceable, about a guy who tortures people and broadcasts it over the Internet. DNSstuff built a new tool, and gave it a glitzy, movie-friendly interface, and plans to make it available for free.

I also came across an article that listed the ten most common passwords: 1. password 2. 123456 3. qwerty 4. abc123 5. letmein 6. monkey 7. myspace1 8. password1 9. link182 10. [your first name]. I'm not the most computer-savvy person you're going to come across, but you would think people could use a little more imagination. A couple of tips on passwords:

• Don't make it obvious. Even using your mother's maiden name isn't that secure, especially since so many websites use that as a "hint" that you have to answer before you receive your password.
• Mix it up a bit. Add numeric characters in place of letters, and even reverse the spelling before you start changing them. If you're going to insist on using your child's birthdate as part of your password, reverse the numbers, and replace a zero with an l.
• Change your password. That doesn't mean you have to do it every month, or every six months, but don't use the same one for the next ten years either.
• Don't write your passwords down in a place that is easily accessible. The police will tell you that the difference between someone who is honest and someone who isn't is means, motive and opportunity, so don't give them the chance.

And just a reminder. The Storm worm usually gets a boost during the holidays, and in the US, we will be looking at the Presidents day and Valentine's day celebrations. I have already begun to see some of the emails; they usually come with just a short message and an IP address (not a regular URL link). So make sure your antivirus is up to date. It does matter, because there are five times as many malicious programs in circulation today compared to just a year ago. It isn't going to be a lost anchor that kills the Internet -- it's going to be so much junk floating around.

Finally, for all of you Facebook and Yahoo users, Symantec published an article last week about a vulnerability in the systems used to upload photos -- specifically with the ActiveX controls. Sans.org listed the specific CSLIDs that need to be disabled. There is also a nice, simple description of how to fix the problem temporarily.