1300-1600 words, 6 1/2 to 8 1/2 minutes. An Etching of Samson by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, from an 1882 German Bible. “He grasped two pillars of the temple and bowed himself with all his might” - Judges 16:30. Introduction This post is about online services which rely partly, or wholly, on user-contributed content. It’s about what happens to that content if those services close. I’ll examine the constraints and motivations of the parties involved. »
1300 words, 4 and a half minutes. This will probably be the first and last time I write about social networking. I’m an antisocial social networker. I had an expectation that part of the job of a networking platform (professional or social) would be to filter content or updates, both in terms of who was posting them and the individual significance or quality of the posts. Boy was I wrong. One person re-posts every single article they see, another “motivational” poster repeats blithe optimism without context at the end of every day (tellingly never the beginning). »
550 words, 2 minutes. Final Remarks “All men can see the tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved” - Sun Tzu. This is the 6th and final post in a short series on winning systems for security practitioners. The first postfeels like a while ago already, about 6000 words or 25 minutes. Those minutes haven’t been wasted. The Inevitable Car Analogy If you’ve come this far then you’ve already completed one whole lap around the circuit of winning systems. »
1450 words, 5 1/2 minutes. Resilience “In defeat: Defiance” - Winston S. Churchill. This is part 5 of 6 in a short series of posts on winning systems for Information Security practitioners. It aims to plug the gap between policy and products and put you, the practitioner, back in the driving seat. After all if you don’t know what system you’re implementing, how can you decide what products or features are important to you? »
1200 words, 5 minutes. Robustness “The first virtue in a soldier is endurance of fatigue." - Napoleon Bonaparte. This is part 4 of 6 in a short series of posts on winning systems for Information Security practitioners. It aims to plug the gap between policy and products and put you, the practitioner, back in the driving seat. After all if you don’t know what system you’re implementing, how can you decide what products or features are important to you? »