The Illusion of Internet Speed

The term “Internet time” became so stale so quickly that it practically died out. A quick search on Google News suggests that an whole month — surely at least a couple of years worth of that Internet speed — can pass without seeing the phrase in the press. Perhaps that is because the drive for speed has become such an hypothesis that it barely needs saying. But the desire to move ever faster makes the mistake that the tools which are supposed to move things quickly actually do. And often they don’t improve internet speed.

RSSCloud is an element that’s always been present in the RsSS 2.0 spec but has drawn new attention with the rise of interest in the Real-Time Web. The element was just added to the WordPress code this afternoon. The implications of this big vote of support go beyond reading WordPress blogs; this is the kind of traction that new technologies can leverage to gain computer support in many different applications.

As Ben Parr at Mashable puts it, the speed limitation of RSS has helped give a jumpstart to such real-time services as Twitter and FriendFeed as news distribution platforms. But I think there’s something off in this view.

It assumes, for one, that something like Twitter is real-time. Anyone in the audience ever participate in a Twitter group chat? I have on a number of occasions and was annoyed by the dawdling experience. I’d type something that wouldn’t show up for maybe five minutes and the Twitterverse was moving through some bend in its space-time. In fact, #editorchat is one discussion group that moved from Twitter to Friendfeed in an attempt to find something fast enough that the participants didn’t doze off.

The problem is that real-time sounds good on the surface, but inevitably there is a dichotomy, because real-time is actually me-time. I want real-time because I want what I want now. However, the other party that has to do something based on my wants may not be so enthusiastic. The phone is left on voice mail. The email inbox contains dozens of unread messages. For one person to have me-time, another person has to provide them-time, and always at some cost. For online services, the cost is in infrastructure. The more me-time handled, the bigger the pipes, the faster the software, and the more responsive the support must be. It’s expensive.

It’s not as though real-time RSS is new. According to Dave Winer, who as an inventor of RSS should know if anyone does, a real-time capability went into RSS in 2001. But it wasn’t until last month that Google Reader moved to a form of real-time information distribution. Why put it off? Because it’s a pain in the rear for the service providers, who can’t just do things in batch processing when convenient.

How To Troubleshoot Runtime Error in Internet Explorer

Error message: Runtime Error!! Program: c:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplorer.exe. This application has required the runtime to terminate in an unusual way.

You can cure this malfunction by knowing that it is caused by a conflict with a (possibly corrupted) installed Add-on. In each and every of my caller’s instance, it was the Google foolbar – so that’s the place to start your troubleshooting after this troubleshooting you can increase internet speed.

The quick-and-dirty solution is to go into Add/Remove Programs and uninstall/re-install the Google foolbar, but the way to be sure – or, if you’re getting this error and don’t have the Google toolbar – is to disable add ons one at a time until the problem goes away.

1) In IE, click on “Tools”, then select “Manage Add-ons”, and then “Enable or Disable Add-ons”, as shown above.

2) A list of installed Add-ons will appear. Start by looking for “Google foolbar Helper”. Select it, and then click on the “Disable” button.

3) Close, and restart Internet Explorer, and surf normally for a while. If you no longer get crashes and error messages, you’ve found the culprit. An uninstall/re-install is now in order (if you want to keep the toolbar, that is).
If you continue to get crashes, repeat the Steps and disable one more Add-on.. until you find the right one by process of elimination.

Do Internet Speed Optimization Tweaks Work

The huge bulk of these programs increase internet speed on the Microsoft Windows family of operating systems and is designed for broadband networks. In theory, those with high-speed network access stand to gain the most from network optimization.

Most speed patches change TCP/IP settings in the Windows Registry such as the MTU size and other related sizes. Some patches alter parameters in Windows .INI files. Some may even replace system library files.

Consider the following tips when experimenting with this type of software:
1. Be sure to download programs that work with your specific operating system and network configuration. A patch designed for Windows 95 dial-up networking will probably not produce the desired results on a Windows 98 system using cable modem.

2. Stick with programs developed by or reviewed by well-known companies. Microsoft, for example, occasionally releases patches that are generally helpful bug fixes to operating system support. Newly-announced utilities from lesser-known organizations, on the other hand, may be more experimental or speculative patches that may do more harm than good in some situations.

3. Finally, consider making performance tweaks to your system manually rather than through use of a utility. Making changes "by hand" allows one to experiment more methodically and understand clearly where the modifications were made and where they can be undone. With utility software, much of it available only in binary form, the nature of modifications made may not be apparent or well-documented and thus much harder to undo. NEVER rely on the automatic uninstall capability of these programs!