How to detect Faux News posts

This morning, as I was going over the Facebook stream with My morning coffee I ran into a friend sharing up the following:


This screen capture shows what should be a fairly believable story about a car crash that was caused by the new game Pokemon Go. A short bit of research quickly returned results that show this article actually comes from a Faux News site called Cartel Press.  As these stories are becoming more and more the normal, thought it was time to actually write a bit of a guide to detecting and verifying the stories that come across our Social Media feeds.

Step 1: GOOGLE THE STORY!

If the topic of a suspected Faux News article is in fact actual news, the chances are Google will have it in their News section, and with multiple sources available. CNN, MSNBC and other news wires should also be reporting on the topic.

 However, since not all sources these days actually verify and vet their articles before sharing them, this is not a 100% one and done solution, which brings us to the next step

Step 2: GOOGLE THE WEBSITE!

In the case of our above link, We know that Cartel Press is the Website which posted up this article, but what do We know about this Website? Again, Google becomes your friend. Here is the Google Results for Cartel Press


The first thing you will notice is that Google lists this site as a “News” source, but that is not actually Google’s fault as this happens more from the back end coding of the Website and how it tells Search Engines to catalog their site. Next look at the “articles” being returned for this site.

The top one is the afore mentioned “Pokemon Go: Major Highway Accident After man Stops in Middle of Highway to Catch Pikachu!” story, following up on that is the article about a Pokemon Go playing Teen being stabbed and mugged for their device and then an article about claiming that login issues with Pokemon Go are the work of ISIS.

But take a look at that 4th listing under News. Specifically the Website and categories listed, It’s the old faithful source of debunking Fake News, snopes and an article that debunks the story about a Teen being stabbed.

It should also be noted that Cartel Press is actually owned by another faux news site, huzlers.com. Huzlers claims in the footer of their own website the following



So, now We have at least one case of this site going with Faux News, but lets not just leave things at this point.

Notice how the original article has a picture of this reported Highway Accident? This brings us to step 3.

Step 3: REVERSE IMAGE SEARCH ANY IMAGES IN THE ARTICLE

One of the best tools (and browser plugins) I have found for this is a site called tineye.com . Tineye allows a user to either upload an image or if they have the plugin in their browser right click and perform a reverse engine search.  As you can see by the image below, when the picture of the crash from the Pokemon Go article is reverse searched, We discover a few things


1. The combo of the Crash photo and the Pokemon Go Logo return 121 Results

2. Sorting by earliest crawl dates (the date the image first is picked up by search engines) We see that the photo of the crash actually dates back to March 2nd 2014. Meaning this image of a crash that “Just happened” is in fact over 2 years old at the time of the publication of the Pokemon Go article

3. It would appear that the first posting of this image actually is credited to the Washington Times a news paper located no less than 383 Miles away from where the story reports the crash having happened

and

4. by clicking through on the Getty images link We discover this



 this crash from 2014 actually happened on Interstate 25 in Denver Colorado with there being one fatality and 20 injuries thankfully.

Step 5: LOOK THE ARTICLE OVER FOR ANYTHING ELSE YOU CAN RESEARCH

The article We have been using for the purpose of this post closes out with a line that reads

“The hashtag #dontpokemongoanddrive has since started trending on social media.”

but has it really been trending? A the time of writing this blog shows 52 instances of it on Twitter and 3 public post instances of it on Facebook, which calls into question the validity of it being a “trending hashtag”


So, there you have it people a short guide on how to Validate and Vet “News” stories online before sharing them up.

Welcoming a NEW Business (and Website) to the World

Inertial Zen Designs would like to take the time to introduce a new business (and Website!) to the Prince George BC area.

FT Reach for the Sky Behaviour Interventions 

FT Reach for the sky Behaviour Interventions was founded in June of 2016 by UNBC Alumni Florence Tsok, BSc.  Psychology with a focus for working with Children who are ranked on the Autism Spectrum Disorder [ASD] to build their practiced generalization of skills  in their natural environment.

Florence brings a strong attention to detail to her professional development of programs designed to assist children with autism. She holds a powerful belief that families should be included in the development of programs and attends conferences whenever possible to better focus the programs that FT Reach for the Sky Behaviour Interventions offers to the public.

Throughout the development of her Website, Florence was very involved with the project and was very professional, making working with her very much a pleasure.

FT Reach for the Sky Behaviour Interventions can be found on the World Wide Web at ftreachforthesky.com , on Facebook at Facebook.com/ftreachforthesky and on twitter at twitter.com/_reachforthesky

Inertial Zen Designs would like to take this time to Thank Florence for choosing Us to design her Website and wish her all the best in the future.

If you would like more information about Inertial Zen Designs, you may find us at inertialzendeisgns.com or www.facebook.com/InertialZenDesigns/

Online payment options for small business

The pending Strike / Lockout (depending on which side you ask) of Canada Post could very well be a signal to small business that it is time to reconsider just how they actually handle invoicing and payment collection for their companies, and the answer is in Technology.

In an article posted on CBC's Website Small business owner Frank Baizik was quoted as saying

“"We send invoices and we receive cheques by mail,"

The fact is, this practice is no longer the only option for businesses like Mr. Baizik’s.

Modern times have brought users to a world where online transactions are easier than ever to set up and deploy through services like Square Payments, Braintree, Interac, Stripe  and Paypal.  Many of these services have their own API protocols so that it they can be integrated into an existing Website with ease and some of the services have very reasonable, if any, fees involved.

the benefits of including payment services, like the ones listed above, include the fact that a small business can actually cut out the postal service all together when it comes to invoicing and collecting payments from customers. In this article, I thought I would take a bit of time to go over some of the options available to merchants.

Interac: interact.ca

In Canada, Interac is a major player in the payment industry. They are associated with all the Major Banks and run the infrastructure on the back end of the Debit Card Market. Through the use of features like Interac’s e-Transfer service, transfers are handled through linked email addresses and once notification of a e-Transfer is acted upon the funds are in the account of the receiver almost instantly. Fees per transaction may apply through the bank processing the transfers.

Stripe stripe.com/ca

Stripe, offers the ability to implement into one’s Website payment options, however this does come with a confirmed fee of 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction. Transfers are not as instant as with Interac’s service as Stripe’s website states that they do transfers on a 7-day rolling basis, and disputes, such as chargebacks, incur a fee of $15 fee unless the dispute is resolved in your favour in which case the fee is fully refunded.

Square squareup.com/ca

Square has been around since May of 2010, and was created by the founder of Twitter, Jack Dorsey. Much like Stripe, Square offers the ability to set up payments via ones Website, but offers much more. Square’s services include Payments through both online and point of sale, including the use of the Square reader which turns your iOS or Android mobile device into a payment terminal. Square also allows businesses to invoice clients online and even offers a online mobile marketplace for businesses. Invoices are sent via email and are free to send.

If your client pays via the invoice online there is a 2.75% fee incurred and funds are in your business account in one to two business days. Invoices can be generated directly from the Square app on one’s phone and emailed directly to customers.

Paypal paypal.com
Long associated as the payment method for Ebay purchases, Paypal is one of the older companies in online payment options. For businesses they have 3 tiers of payment processing options ranging from $0 /month to $35/month and a 2.9% + $0.30/transaction fee. Much like Square, they do offer the ability to produce invoices from one’s account that can be emailed to clients.

Braintree braintreepayments.com

Braintree Payments, is a subsidiary of Paypal, and much like Square and Stripe can be integrated into an existing website or app to allow for payments directly from customers. Pricing for Braintree states that the Merchant gets fee-free processing up to their first $50 thousand dollars in transactions and then there is a 2.9% + $0.30 fee / transaction

Braintree states that they work with all payment formats, including Credit/Debit cards, Apple Pay, Android Pay and Venmo payments.

Overall there are many options for handling the payments for a small business that do not rely on Canada Posts services. I hope this gives you a few options to consider that in the long term may well speed up and streamline the process of accepting payments.

Standards, when does a Designer stick to them or ignore them?

Pop quiz, You go to McDonald's and order up a Big Mac, what do you expect to find in the box alongside your fries and drink? I'm guessing you answer was something along the lines of the old Ad jingle

"Two all beef patties, special sauce, Lettus, cheese, pickles, onions on a seseme seed bun"

This has come to be expected because McDonald's has a standard of what the Big Mac is, and the end consumer has come to expect that standard when they order.

Web Designers, like McDonald's with their Big Mac, also have standards We are supposed to use when preparing Our products for the Customers. Those Standards are known as programming languages and is why, no matter the Website, using the code 

<img src="file.ext" alt="description" hight="pixels" width="pixels"> 

will result in your brower displaying a specific image exactly how it was told to display it on any device.

Any device and Standards is where the comparison to McDonald's much beloved hamburger starts to fall apart in Web Design though. You see, Web Design does indeed have a organization that is tasked to overseeing Web Standards.  That organization is the World Wide Web Consortium, or W3C for short.

The W3C oversees standards for Web Design, in all forms from Websites to the Web of Devices ( which is commonly being referred to as the Internet of things, or IoT), and they do their job well except for one problem. 

Thanks to the efforts of companies like Google and Microsoft's Bing, coupled with the ever progressing changes to Mobile Computing, the Standards are not progressing at the same speed as technology does.

This, actually creates a very unique problem for Designers as on the one hand, practices of Good Design should dictate that Our final products are meeting the code requirements of these W3C overseen standards while at the same time result in lower rankings on search engines or even incompabable display of content on different browers.

In other words think of dealing with Web Standards and evolving technology like this

Imagine you have walked into McDonald's, ordered that Big Mac, got to your table and upon opening the box found a Whopper.

Customers,Tips on How to secure the services of a Web Designer

We Web Designers get it, your project is important to you as are the reasons behind your desired project, but there are times when we Web Designers have to decline projects.

Earlier today, Inertial Zen Designs received an email from a potential client, nothing unusual for a Design Company to get. Only this email was but one line of text

Hello,how are you doing today?

No signature, nothing else. Well of course, to ensure that this is an actual potential client, and in the name of what's best for business, a polite response was sent with some probing questions.  Those questions included the following:

What type of Website are you looking to have designed?

How many pages are you needing this Website to be comprised of?

When is your desired Go Live date?

And 

would you be so kind as to let Me know how you discovered Inertial Zen Designs

Of course signed with 

Regards,

David Peters, Owner Inertial Zen Designs

the result of these probing questions was an INSTANT response which a 8 point list of what the person was wanting. That list, to sum up was a request to clone another Website's layout, placing it on a desired domain (which I might state was discovered to be already registered by a third party as the person sending this email stated that they did not already have a domain), in a less than 60 day time frame and expecting all of this for a budget of less than $10,000.

Now, readers, you may have noticed a unique request in My probing questions listed above, that being asking the emailer if they would be so kind as to let Me know how they came to discover Inertial Zen Designs.  This is what is known as a Turing Test, and was added to see if this potential client was actually reading the email, a failing that was proven when the "client" asked that I get back in touch with him with 3 pieces of information including

And will like to know if you are the owner ??

The fact is We Web Designers love to hear from New Clients. Part of what makes our jobs exciting is the ability to work with people and bring their ideas to life. Web Design, however, is a very complex career. We have values and standards, and can be very selective in the projects We take on, and like any Professional We expect to be treated with respect for the skill set that we have. 

Website projects, especially ones with multiple Webpages to them, can run into the hundreds of thousands, in fact the Municipal Government of the City My offices are based out of just awarded a $130,000 CAD contract to a firm for a Redesign of the City's Website.

Web Design Companies are more than happy to help you envision your project and take it from your Mind to screens that can reach potential customers find Your products and services, but for that to happen there needs to be a team effort, and that means Respect being given from both sides.

Please, for the benefit of securing your future Web Designer have the following handy when you contact us:

1. Contact Information

    We Designers love to know who we are going to be working with.

2. Summary of desired project

    Details help us envision your project.

3. Make sure that the domain you desire is available 

   Logos, Headers, Content and Search Engine Optimization all end up being tied and referencing your domain name in many ways. if your domain name is not available it can back up a project causing additional costs and the missing of your Go Live date.

4. Have your content and media ready for Us.

  Without content and media, your customers have NOTHING to read, also much like having your domain name secured, it limits the delays and saves your budget having these details ready

5.Evaluate your Budget and Time Frame / Go Live Date

 Web Design projects, like the one mentioned above, are usually billed by the hour with most Designers charging between $45 to $60 an hour minimum. 

This means that project can take around 2,167 to 2,889 man hours (around 54 to 72 weeks) For a project in the $10,000 range, you can expect a Website to take around 167 to 223 man hours (or 4 to 5 weeks ) to be designed

Keeping all this in mind up front will give you, the client, better chances of securing a Web Designer while allowing We, the Designers, the best chances of bringing your vision to life.

INERTIALZENDESIGNS.COM IS DOWN, WORKING ON FIX

Oh, the headaches of owning a small business. Sometime yesterday, there appears to have been an issue with the Website for Inertial Zen Designs.

Here's what I know, Domain Registering Company GoDaddy is indeed having issues, and it appears that instead of pointing to where the site should be, it is pointing somewhere else. What this means is that if customers go to the Website they will find it DOWN.

At this point, I do not have a timeline for when things will be back up and running, but am looking into things and hopefully will be back online soon. Thank you all for your patience in this matter, and rest assured, even though the Domain is not currently resolving, the Website can still be accessed through the temporary address of

http://izd.bugs3.com/index.html

International rulings and social media

Social Media, since the early days of services like Myspace and Yahoo 360, through to the modern sites like Facebook, Linked in and Google Plus have all worked using a basic common theory.

The site works better with more contacts 


To make this concept work a simple premise was put into action. Users were able to upload their contact lists to servers for a cross check of their friends. If your friend was already on the service a button is offered to let you request a friendship, however if they were not, then you could invite them to join.

A decision in Germany ( Article ) has now put this very concept at risk as a Judge has upheld two prior decisions that found Facebook's Friend Finder feature illegal on the grounds that sending a invite to join is unsolicited electronic communications (or as it is more commonly known as, Spam).

Now, at first though, one might be wondering just why a ruling in Germany is of any concern to a user of Social Media in Canada. This is a honest and fair question to be wondering, the answer, however is going to most likely surprise you as it comes down to one law currently in place in Canada

C.A.S.L.

CASL (info ) stands for the Canadian Anti Spam Law, which came into service in July of 2014, and actually holds people accountable with fines for reported unsolicited electronic communications. the fines are tired so that if the average consumer or privately owned business is reported to the CRTC and can not prove implied or express consent has been given up to $1,000,000.00 is issued. If the communication is from a Corporation the amount goes up to potentially $10,000,000.00 per violation.

As the ever evolving nature of the Internet continues to change, so to will laws like CASL, and decisions like the one made in Germany are going to be looked at as road maps into how these type of services are handled in relation to the future of User Privacy on a Global scale.