So if anyone is interested, a friend of mine has been working on this site for some time (http://www.spokeo.com).
It appears to crawl public registries, facebook, myspace, etc to formulate an identity based on relations, former addresses, phone numbers, etc... regardless of their email address. However, e-mail does appear to trigger the highest bang for the buck. Although I won't comment on the Pros/Cons - all those naysayers really need to do their homework first. Market Research / Online Data-Mining is clearly VERY sophisticated.
In a letter to a student, University of California, Berkeley officials said this:
Dear ,
I wrote to you two weeks ago regarding slow network connections in the Residence Halls. I am writing you today with an update. At present, residence halls have high speed connections (100Mbs) to each other and to all resources located on campus. Transfer rates to servers outside of campus, however, may continue to be slow at times.
The amount of traffic from the residence halls to the outside world has increased dramatically over the past few months. Residents who are using large amounts of bandwidth to the outside world, by running the popular software Napster or popular FTP and web servers, are greatly diminishing network transfer rates for everyone else with a residence hall connection.
The residence halls share bandwidth with all other campus users, including ongoing research projects which rely on consistent connection rates. To ensure adequate bandwidth availability for all campus uses, the department of Communication and Network Services has restricted the total amount of bandwidth available to the residence halls for communication with the outside world. The e-mail below from the Director of Communication and Network Services provides details on the actions they have taken.
Residential Computing is continuing to work with Communication and Network Services to achieve a balance between competing demands for bandwidth throughout campus. We understand that current transfer rates from sites beyond campus are slower than they have been in the past. If you are currently using Napster or running a web server, we strongly encourage you to stop. If you have a friends who are running Napster, we encourage you to ask them to stop. Through increased resident education and ongoing discussions with Communcation and Network Services, I will do my best to improve network connectivity for all reshall students.
Please read the message from Communication and Network Services below for more information.
>From Cliff Frost, Director of Communication and Network Services regarding network connections in the residence halls:
Background:
The Berkeley campus pays approximately $600 per megabit/second/month for connectivity to the worldwide Internet. (There are start-up costs not included in that figure, and a base cost below which the total cost cannot go, but that is a good approximation of our current cost.)
The Residence Hall networks are very well-connected to the rest of campus, and to the Internet in general. This is accomplished via a 100 megabit/second connection between the residence halls and the rest of the campus network.
Up until approximately November, 1999, the sustained use of the Residence Hall network connection was approximately 15 megabits/second. This was for all traffic--both with other campus sites and with the Internet in general.
Recent History:
Coinciding with the tremendous popularity of "napster" (which is a very nice tool in many ways) there has been a tremendous and rapid growth in the campus's traffic to and from the Internet. This growth also coincided with a similar growth to and from the Residence Halls.
In looking at the traffic patterns, and concerned about how we would pay for the exploding use of the Internet, CNS staff noticed that traffic across the 100 megabit/second connection to the Residence Halls had sprung up to peaks of 40 megabits/second and a sustained level of 25. At that point, CNS put a cap onto the traffic that the Residence Halls could exchange with off-campus sites, at 20 megabits per second. Note that this cap did NOT apply to traffic with other on-campus sites.
The effect of the 20 megabit/second cap was immediate. Traffic across the link dropped to peaks of 22-25 megabits/second, implying that most of the traffic across the link is with off-campus sites.
CNS later set the cap at 15 megabits/second and then to 10. From the data gathered it appears that the Residence Halls exchange between 2 and 5 megabits/second with the rest of campus. All the rest of the traffic is bound for the Internet.
Current Status:
At the request of Housing & Dining Services, CNS has temporarily raised the cap to 15 megabits/second while we try to work out ways to manage the explosive demand for Internet bandwidth from the Residence Halls. Housing & Dining has asked for CNS's assistance in analyzing the situation and developing potential solutions.
I don't think this was the particularly BEST way to get around Napster. Actually, I find this method grossly useless. Exactly HOW does this work to effectively distribute the load? The cap of the internet connection went on throughout finals over a period of 2-4 months.
I forget that Berkeley has an extreme dedication to their grad students by which all other students come second. This happened to be another fine example where by cutting of all the undergrads, they'd preserve the connection for the research labs.
From the numbers alone, I'd think that cost was as well a very large factor. *sigh* The latest cap was probably to average out the the active months and thus fix the budget. I can't help but feel a bit cheated for those students. If this is the method of our more prestigious schools, what will happen to the rest?
Slashdot Mirror
So if anyone is interested, a friend of mine has been working on this site for some time (http://www.spokeo.com).
It appears to crawl public registries, facebook, myspace, etc to formulate an identity based on relations, former addresses, phone numbers, etc ... regardless of their email address. However, e-mail does appear to trigger the highest bang for the buck. Although I won't comment on the Pros/Cons - all those naysayers really need to do their homework first. Market Research / Online Data-Mining is clearly VERY sophisticated.
Dear ,
I wrote to you two weeks ago regarding slow network connections in the
Residence Halls. I am writing you today with an update. At present,
residence halls have high speed connections (100Mbs) to each other and to
all resources located on campus. Transfer rates to servers outside of
campus, however, may continue to be slow at times.
The amount of traffic from the residence halls to the outside world has
increased dramatically over the past few months. Residents who are using
large amounts of bandwidth to the outside world, by running the popular
software Napster or popular FTP and web servers, are greatly diminishing
network transfer rates for everyone else with a residence hall connection.
The residence halls share bandwidth with all other campus users, including
ongoing research projects which rely on consistent connection rates. To
ensure adequate bandwidth availability for all campus uses, the department
of Communication and Network Services has restricted the total amount of
bandwidth available to the residence halls for communication with the
outside world. The e-mail below from the Director of Communication and
Network Services provides details on the actions they have taken.
Residential Computing is continuing to work with Communication and Network
Services to achieve a balance between competing demands for bandwidth
throughout campus. We understand that current transfer rates from sites
beyond campus are slower than they have been in the past. If you are
currently using Napster or running a web server, we strongly encourage you
to stop. If you have a friends who are running Napster, we encourage you
to ask them to stop. Through increased resident education and ongoing
discussions with Communcation and Network Services, I will do my best to
improve network connectivity for all reshall students.
Please read the message from Communication and Network Services below for
more information.
Dedra Chamberlin
Manager, Residential Computing
***********************************************
>From Cliff Frost, Director of Communication and Network Services regarding
network connections in the residence halls:
Background:
The Berkeley campus pays approximately $600 per megabit/second/month for
connectivity to the worldwide Internet. (There are start-up costs not
included in that figure, and a base cost below which the total cost cannot
go, but that is a good approximation of our current cost.)
The Residence Hall networks are very well-connected to the rest of campus,
and to the Internet in general. This is accomplished via a 100
megabit/second connection between the residence halls and the rest of the
campus network.
Up until approximately November, 1999, the sustained use of the
Residence Hall network connection was approximately 15 megabits/second.
This was for all traffic--both with other campus sites and with the
Internet in general.
Recent History:
Coinciding with the tremendous popularity of "napster" (which is a very
nice tool in many ways) there has been a tremendous and rapid growth in
the campus's traffic to and from the Internet. This growth also
coincided with a similar growth to and from the Residence Halls.
In looking at the traffic patterns, and concerned about how we would
pay for the exploding use of the Internet, CNS staff noticed that traffic
across the 100 megabit/second connection to the Residence Halls had sprung
up to peaks of 40 megabits/second and a sustained level of 25. At that
point, CNS put a cap onto the traffic that the Residence Halls could
exchange with off-campus sites, at 20 megabits per second. Note that this
cap did NOT apply to traffic with other on-campus sites.
The effect of the 20 megabit/second cap was immediate. Traffic across
the link dropped to peaks of 22-25 megabits/second, implying that most of
the traffic across the link is with off-campus sites.
CNS later set the cap at 15 megabits/second and then to 10. From the
data gathered it appears that the Residence Halls exchange between 2 and 5
megabits/second with the rest of campus. All the rest of the traffic is
bound for the Internet.
Current Status:
At the request of Housing & Dining Services, CNS has temporarily raised
the cap to 15 megabits/second while we try to work out ways to manage
the explosive demand for Internet bandwidth from the Residence Halls.
Housing & Dining has asked for CNS's assistance in analyzing the situation
and developing potential solutions.
I don't think this was the particularly BEST way to get around Napster. Actually, I find this method grossly useless. Exactly HOW does this work to effectively distribute the load? The cap of the internet connection went on throughout finals over a period of 2-4 months.
I forget that Berkeley has an extreme dedication to their grad students by which all other students come second. This happened to be another fine example where by cutting of all the undergrads, they'd preserve the connection for the research labs.
From the numbers alone, I'd think that cost was as well a very large factor. *sigh* The latest cap was probably to average out the the active months and thus fix the budget. I can't help but feel a bit cheated for those students. If this is the method of our more prestigious schools, what will happen to the rest?