J passed this along to me and we both had a good laugh. A must-see for any Foursquare users who are also Star Wars fans! (Click to view large)

Via Death Star PR.

I used to be a huge fan of Firefox, but made the switch to Chrome two years ago and have not looked back.

I continue to use Firefox and Safari for certain secret agent web missions, and am consistently reminded over and over again why Chrome is a better fit for me (faster, lightweight, and handles my bazillions of open tabs better) — but I certainly understand how others may prefer Firefox, Opera, or Safari over Chrome.

What I don’t understand is the large number of internet surfers who are still using IE7, nevermind IE6! (I have had hundreds of visitors browsing this blog with IE6 in the last month alone.)

The below infographic is pretty funny and accurate, if I must say so myself. I can see how some people may get a bit offended at the death references, but hey, it’s all in good humor, right?

Which web browser is your favorite? Do you agree with this infographic?

Via Bit Rebels.

I checked my blog stats this morning to discover a plethora of traffic from an unfamiliar site. As I am always excited to encounter new readers and see how and why they chose to visit, I excitedly clicked on the source link…

…only to discover the blog of an extremely racist expat who is currently residing in Korea, using one of my various commentaries on Korean society and distorting it convey his belief that Koreans are fat, ugly, good-for-nothing beings whose “kimchi breath” makes him want to hurl.

After taking a deep breath, I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. Who knows? Maybe he had a bad day.

So I read on, and became disheartened to learn that the rest of his blog was filled with similar hate-filled speech, not only against Koreans but to women as well, consistently referring to the fairer sex as “b*tches” and “c*nts.”

My first instinct after browsing through the first few pages (don’t ask me why I got so far…it was like watching the horrible scene of an accident) was to contact the writer, or at least leave a comment asking him to remove the link to this blog.

But then I realized: what I write here is in plain sight of everyone who has access to the internet. In other words, it is free fodder for all. And just like there will always be readers who misinterpret my often-well-intentioned ramblings to take offense at my thoughts, there will always be those who will use it for malicious purposes as well.

(source)

Similarly, I know that while most people will look at pictures of Claire and see just a baby, a few will find them erotic and have perverted thoughts about my firstborn. :shudder:

As much as I would like to see a stop to actions and thought processes such as these, I can’t. I cannot control how others feel. I cannot control how others act or react. And I have found from experience that if anything, my fighting back usually results in riling anger and unwanted attention.

So I usually just ignore.

What would you do if your content were linked to from an unsavory site? Would you ask to have it removed, or would you just ignore it?

Is this yet another reason why so many bloggers choose not to get so personal on their public spaces on the web?

Somebody should tell T-800 (Twitter handle @111001001101010) that he may have better luck if he spelled “Connor” correctly.

Via Reddit.

11 days ago, Google announced a new tool that aims to speed up the loading of websites. The new Page Speed Service utilizes the optimization techniques outlined by the company’s Page Speed Online API and takes it a step further: by rewriting pages and delivering them to users using Google’s servers.

On the Google Code blog, Google says that it has seen speed improvements from 25% to 60% on some sites. Google has a gallery and a comparison test that users can try themselves.

While the service seems pretty cool at first glance, it is not without controversy due to the fact that it requires users to point the CNAME of their URL to Google’s own servers. (Take a look at the myriads of unfavorable comments on TechCrunch‘s coverage of the announcement, for instance.)

I was intrigued by the new Page Speed Service especially because I had noticed a notable slowdown of my load speed after I had started placing ads and integrated more social media. I had even started using the W3 Total Cache plugin in conjunction with CloudFlare, but did not see much of an improvement.

So despite the controversy (oh noes, Google will own the web!), I wanted to give it a go.

The Page Speed Service is currently only being offered to a limited number of webmasters, but you can request access by filling out this form. I had no idea what the requirements are for being accepted to this trial or what percentages of websites get accepted, but I decided to bite the bullet and submitted my information.

A few days later, I received an email saying that I was in!

Setup was a bit of a pain because Google’s documentation is not too comprehensive. Additionally, I had to contact my webhost to make the final CNAME change for me because it was in a non-editable portion of my DNS settings.

But once it was up and running…

I noticed a significant improvement in my page load times.

I wish I had taken screenshots of my page load times before and after the migration…but I haven’t.  Suffice it to say that my main page load time has improved by 20-30%. And this comparison is between W3 Total Cache + CloudFlare versus Google’s Page Speed Service. (I shudder to think what it would have been without those two services.)

Additionally, while some of my JavaScript broke using W3 Total Cache + CloudFlare, I have not noticed anything of the nature with Page Speed Service.

I should note, however, that my results may not be typical. Some people even report an increase in page load times using Page Speed Service!

I would also like to see some detailed documentation on how to fully utilize the service, in addition to more stats and data collected from my traffic. This is one feature I really liked about both W3 Total Cache and CloudFlare, and I am finding myself missing it.

A screenshot of the Google Page Speed Service’s Dashboard. It really doesn’t
show much when compared to those of W3 Total Cache and CloudFlare.

Google says that Page Speed Service will remain free during this trial period, and that when it is finally made available to the public, its pricing will be “competitive.” And in the welcome email I received, Google tells me that once the pricing information is available, I will have at least 30 days to migrate traffic if I chose to not continue.

Seeing the remarkable improvement in my page speed, I think that I will stick with it as long as the pricing is not too unreasonable.

Has anyone else been using Google’s Page Speed Service? What are your thoughts on it?