Jawbone Etiquette

My workplace bought each of us a Jawbone Up for end of year presents, and we promptly added each other to our "teams".

This means we can all see, after the fact, when each other have been sleeping or walking (I assume the NSA can also see it).

Among the sleeping data is a  categorisation of awake, light sleep or deep sleep. This metadata can potentially be very revealing about a person, so I was wondering what the etiquette of sharing our discussing this data might be. Particularly in the context of workmates, management and  peer pressure.

For example, is it ok to ask about a long walk that a person took? How about a long sleep? Napping during the day? What about waking up in the middle of the night, or taking a long time to get to sleep? Can you say to a person who seems a little grumpy that they need more deep sleep?

It's obvious that it is possible to stray into the creepy zone, so what rules should exist and how can they be articulated?

How do you feel about this?

Australia's 2013 Election is a Prisoner's Dilemma

Tl;dr: Either Tony Abbott reneges on his plan to give preferences to the Australian Labor Party ahead of the Australian Greens, or Labor wins the election easily.

Internode Id Increment Security Vulnerability

I was looking at the tracking information for a new phone I've ordered and I noticed that the id in the URL was relatively short, and that the site requires no authentication. That combination is always a red flag.

Dodgy FOI decision by Gillard Government: Update

11 months ago, I asked for an explanation of why the Gillard government applied a decision making process to an FOI request in 2010, that was later that year made illegal. I didn't realise at the time that the legislation outlawing the behaviour was not yet in effect, but realised after sending the email to the MP Anna Burke. I already updated my original blog post indicating I realised my mistake, but never bothered to tell the MP.

Well, I just got an emailed reply, just ridiculously late.

tl;dr: No surprises. She claims that the result "might" change based on the changed definitions, or they might find another hiding place, and it would be up to someone to actually lodge a request for a review, rather than the government correcting itself proactively.

And here it is, in full:

Oracle's Dark Pattern with the Ask Toolbar

I just noticed Oracle's use of a dark pattern in the latest Java update:

There is a checkbox to install the Ask Toolbar and to set Ask as the default search provider.

The text next to the checkbox is not clickable. This means that someone who clicks through quickly has 2 chances to install extra crapware on their computer. They are:

1. Not noticing the opted-in state of the checkbox; and
2. Noticing the opted-in state, but quickly clicking the label next to the checkbox then clicking next, not realising that the checkbox is still checked.

Most companies would stop after the first dodgy practice, though one is one too many.

The latter is the one for which I almost fell, but luckily my lack of coordination saved me and I missed the next button.

Anyone else seen some interesting Dark Patterns?