Not long ago, I started seeing what I thought was a new search provider in my web browser.  But, I was puzzled while reviewing my browser settings—there seemed to be no mention of any Comcast-related search provider.

If you’re a Comcast customer, you, too, may have started noticing screens like this:

As it turns out, Comcast has rolled out nationally a “service” they call, “Domain Helper”.  What Comcast has actually done is to hijack any requests that return an error and redirect them to their own branded search/advertising page.

By slipping this in as the default on their network, with a poorly publicized opt-out mechanism (rather than offering it as an opt-in program), they appear to be banking on the fact that most uses won’t understand that they have been hijack.

Opting Out

If you’re a Comcast customer, you can use the opt-out mechanism to turn off the Domain Helper feature.  You’ll need to know you Comcast login credentials (but if you don’t know them, there is a link where you can find them.)

Spreading the Word

It’s troubling when the network provider is also an advertising/content provider as it creates a real conflict of interest.  In this case, that conflict of interest caused Comcast to silently redefine the way the web works for millions of people.

Please share this information with other Comcast users via your social networks, e-mail, blog, or the various sharing tools on this site.

Funeral services for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 will be held at 7pm on March 4 at Aten Design Group, 1629 Downing Street, Denver, CO 80218:

“Internet Explorer Six, resident of the interwebs for over 8 years, died the morning of March 1, 2010 in Mountain View, California, as a result of a workplace injury sustained at the headquarters of Google, Inc. Internet Explorer Six, known to friends and family as "IE6," is survived by son Internet Explorer Seven, and grand-daughter Internet Explorer Eight.”

While wearing my web developer hat, the news of IE6’s passing reminds me of a song...

I was just reading a story in the UK Telegraph, Homoeopathy should not be funded on the NHS, says report by MPs, and thinking, “Well, good; it’s nice to see people acting rationally.”  But then I started reading the comments.

It struck me (sadly, not for the first time) how many people simply believe in magic.  In this case, that an infinitesimally small amount of good stuff dissolved in huge quantities of water can have curative powers beyond water alone.  Even if the small amount is so small (e.g., one part in:

1,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000

—seriously, that’s a “30C” solution; and you can by 200C solutions!) that there are actually zero molecules of good stuff, that the water somehow retains a “memory” of the good stuff that makes the potion effective.  You know, magic.

Of the 48 comments on the Telegraph article as I write this, a large number of them were like this one:

“Homeopathy is proven to work as well as a placebo. That contradicts all the critics who say it does not work.”

Seriously.  Do you think he knows what “placebo” means?

n. pl. pla·ce·bos or pla·ce·boes

1. A substance containing no medication and prescribed or given to reinforce a patient's expectation to get well.
2. An inactive substance or preparation used as a control in an experiment or test to determine the effectiveness of a medicinal drug.
3. Something of no intrinsic remedial value that is used to appease or reassure another.

To restate the obvious (obvious to some, anyway): a placebo is something that works to the extent that it reinforces someone’s expectations but—and this is important—for no other reason.  A placebo is “inactive”, “of no intrinsic remedial value”.

When something is “proven to work as well as a placebo”, that means, basically, that it is proven to not work.  Think about it.  If a treatment produced a better effect than a placebo, we’d all agree that there is something beneficial going on.  In other words, to some degree, the treatment worked.  On the other hand, if a treatment produced a worse effect than a placebo, we’d all agree that there was something detrimental going on.  In other words, it not only didn’t work, it exacerbated the problem.

So, the fact that homeopathy has the efficacy of a placebo means that it was neither beneficial nor detrimental—that it had no effect.  Except, of course, that some people want to believe there is a positive effect and so going through the motions of taking the homeopathic remedy (a.k.a., water) reinforces their expectations of a benefit (and not always for the better.)

Homeopathy critics do not claim that placebo effects are not real and that they can not be beneficial.  They’re only claiming that homeopathy is pseudoscience.  Water has no memory.  There is no magic.

I’m reminded yet again of Tim Minchin’s perfect Storm that poetically captures the ridiculousness of homeopathy claims:

It’s a miracle! Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory!
And while it’s memory of a long lost drop of onion juice is Infinite
It somehow forgets all the poo it’s had in it!

As Linus Pauling famously observed, the best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.  And one company—Google—certainly jumps to mind when it comes to having lots of ideas.

Google Buzz is one of the latest in a long, long line of ideas that have been pouring out of Google; ideas that include Maps, AdWords, Wave, Chrome, Chrome OS, Docs, Gmail, Reader, Calendar, Apps, App Engine, Voice, Alerts, Books, Groups, ... and literally dozens more, like my recent favorite: 1 gigabit per second, fiber-to-the-home.  Oh yea, and I almost forgot, they've had some pretty good ideas related to web search, too.

I don't know, yet, if Google Buzz is a good idea or just an idea.  But it has enough visibility to bring into plain view a phenomena I like to call the innovation immune system.  The innovation immune system is similar to the corporate immune system, but operates over a broader domain.  Whereas corporate immune systems operate across members of a company, the innovation immune system operates across anyone interested in the relevant field of innovation, e.g., software, internet, etc., and especially among the "experts"—self-proclaimed or otherwise—in the field.

When a significant innovation first appears on the scene, the immune response is predictable.  Pundits in the field pounce on the new idea, eager to be the first to learn all about it.  Then, invariably, these early users start finding imperfections.  Occasionally, the imperfections are fundamental flaws that doom the idea to failure.  More often, however, they are simply artifacts of an early implementation that, over time, can be refined and polished.  But no matter, the flaws have been found!  And now, the pundits have something they so badly need: something to talk about.

Then, time moves on.  Some ideas die out, others live on.  For the ones that survive, the implementations are refined based on continuing user feedback.  Gradually, ideas evolve from "new innovation" status to "established solution" status, often with few people really noticing.  By then, the pundits—the lymphocytes of the innovation immune system—have refocused on the next round of new ideas, and are busy explaining why they don't measure up to the established solutions.

Last Fall, I blogged Google Chrome: Disruptive Technology Beginning to Sparkle because I was feeling somewhat vindicated for believing, the Fall before that, that Chrome had the trappings of a disruptive technology.

Today, I’m feeling vindicated again as I read Garrett Rogers’ ZDNet article, Chrome v5.0.317.0: Another reason to ditch Firefox.

When Chrome first appeared in 2008, it was fast, but beyond that, it did very little.  So, the techie pundits had a field day tearing it apart, making lists of all of its shortcomings, and giving all the reasons why Chrome fell short of their needs—as knowledgeable power users.

But that’s just it.

Disruptive technologies, by definition, fall short in established market segments—initially.  Disruptive technologies are those than can establish a foothold is some market segment, and then, over time, continue to improve at a rate that lets them overtake, and eventually displace, mainstream solutions in those established markets.

Chrome has not disrupted the browser world quite yet.  But the game ain’t over.