40Tech

If you tried to visit 40Tech today, you saw that we went dark from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. EST. We turned out the lights, shutting off the site, to join the online protest again SOPA and PIPA. For a look at SOPA and PIPA, check out this video.

Bye bye 2011. We hope everyone had a great and safe night last night, and we wish you all a fantastic and prosperous 2012 — filled with happiness, good times, and 366 (Leap Year) days of awesome geekery.

To start you off, hit the jump for some sweet geekiness. They’re not tech… but they’re definitely tech-inspired and will get you close to your nerdy heart!

Did you know that, every 60 seconds on the internet, there are over 695,000 Facebook updates, 168 million emails (which, frankly, shakes the whole “email is dead” theory), 219,000 PayPal payments, over 12,000 new Craigslist ads, and about 2 million people watching porn? That’s every single minute, according to the pretty infographics put together by Go-Globe.com. There are also 925 iPhone 4S sales, 11 million IM conversations, 232 computers that got infected with malware, and some 38 tons of e-waste generated.

These are only a few of the highlights of the 40 items listed across the two infographics.

We’ve written a few times before about the entertainment industry’s war against piracy, and the collateral damage that it causes. We’ve covered the U.S. government’s seizure of domains without due process, the government’s mistaken take down of 84,00 innocent sites, and attempts to push through a treaty with other nations that would, among other things, make it illegal to unlock phones. That was bad, but if a bill that is currently under consideration today is passed, things could get much worse.

Do you remember when cell phones were for rich people? It’s only a short jump in my memory to the day when a homeless kid got angry at me when I told him I didn’t have any change; convinced I must be lying because I was carrying a mobile phone. You know, back when they still kind of looked like phones, and Nokia was king?  I felt bad for the guy, but I really was broke. I got the cell phone on credit, could barely pay for the bill, and was having many a fight with the company over false charges.

This ramble isn’t to point out that cell phone companies were crooks, even back then, and it’s not to talk about my questionable technology-money choices. The point is that this was only a few years back. I was in my early 20′s — I’m only in my mid-30′s now — and have gone from having no computer, an unused email address, and the blissful (and retrospective) peace of not knowing or caring where people were or what they were doing, to being a geek tech-blogger that makes his living in online marketing and communications. I own an iPhone, my hold-out wife has finally gotten an Android, and my three-year-old owns my iPad — and regularly sends me artwork via email.

One might think that the world wide web, which is still predominantly text-based, would be the spearhead in the rise to new heights of literary articulation. Unfortunately, if you were the one who was thinking that, you were sadly misinformed. In actuality the ability or willingness to write with proper grammar and spelling has been replaced by  a general acceptance of a lower standard. The acceptanceappears general, that is. Where do you stand on the subject?

Ok, look — I don’t know if these are real scientists or what, but a bunch of song and musical-style parody videos where the subject is crazy science concepts and gear that even I (in my extreme geekiness) know almost nothing about, well… let’s just say I was too busy giggling to find out. And that was one hell of a run-on sentence – but hey! It’s another long weekend up here in Canada, and when I get a long weekend post, I like to loosen up the reigns a bit.

Seriously, though, if you want something that will boggle your brain, and maybe make you laugh to the point where your loved ones and co-workers look at you funny (not talking about myself here… really!), then you need to take a look at these!

Today, 40Tech is pleased to present you with a guest post by Jaelithe.

Everyone you know has one—everyone except for you. The mere mention of the shiny rectangle has your IT guy cussing under his breath.  One look at the interface of this phone and it’s obvious it was designed for the consumer but that doesn’t mean it can’t do the heavy-lifting too. So what has your IT department so worked up?

Welcome to another long-weekend edition of 40Tech (Canada Day today and the 4th of July on, well… the 4th). To commemorate this joyous occasion, we present you with yet another 40Tech Random Tech Video(s)! We hope you enjoy it (them), enjoy your day, and enjoy the hell out of you long weekend. Cheers! :D

Ladies and gentlemen, it is upon us once again! You know what I mean… that one day a year when those of us who are fathers are shown the respect we so richly deserve — and are showered with gifts and free dinners. Well, gifts, anyway.

Sure, the gifts are often things like ties and aftershave and the like, but at 40Tech, we believe in the power of dreams! We believe that if we can imagine it – and most especially: if we can geek on it – that it just might become a reality some day. That may be nothing more than pie in the sky, and possibly even farcical – but we care not! This is a tech-blog dammit! And for our Father’s Day we demand (see: dream about/hope for) TECH!!!