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Annasha

Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more

Kulwant-Nagi

Google disabling Kulwant Nagi’s Adsense account was the turning point of his life

Leave a Comment / Marketing, Tech Story / By

True and potential marketers have a different view of everything around us. They try to find a strong marketing opportunity every time a normal person fails to notice it. But, don’t worry as marketers or bloggers aren’t born with this talent. The biggest example for us is Kulwant Nagi, a successful affiliate marketing expert, and famous inspirational blogger. Kulwant Nagi’s hardworking and motivational life story teaches everyone how to survive in the darkest of time and not give up on yourself.

Who is he?

Today, Kulwant Nagi is the founder of Blogging Cage and the Managing Director of AffloSpark. Throughout all these years after passing engineering in 2010, he has mastered the art of digital marketing and every other aspect of it. A couple of years earlier, he’s daily income summed up to around $500$800. Kulwant believed that living in this era of digitalization you either benefit from it or become its prey.

Kulwant was born in a town called Fatehabad located in Haryana. He didn’t belong to a financially affluent family. But, his dream to go and study abroad made him work hard. After he received his engineering degree from the Institute of Technology and Management, he wanted to appear for GRE and TOEFL. The tuition for his preparation and exam fees didn’t come easily to his family. But, Kulwant got results of his hard work when he scored 1300/1600 in GRE and 99/120 in TOEFL.

But, his dream to go and study abroad shattered into million pieces when he was supposed to show at least a bank balance of Rs. 22 lakhs to receive a U.S. visa. His father didn’t have ample money so he turned to his relatives for help. But, life taught him lessons the harsh way when he realized he was on his own. Kulwant had withdrawn the applications from foreign universities.

Also Read: Search Engine Land, Success Story Of A Publication Company Pioneering In The World Of Search Marketing

How Kulwant entered into the blogging world?

He gave up after trying for another year and failing to arrange sufficient money. Kulwant started working for a company but resigned out of frustration within a year. It is then one of his friends; Ravinder Kumar pushed him to try out blogging and digital marketing. He tried writing an article in his friend’s blog and it received more than 200 comments within a day. This made him realize that he can start his blog and start making money.

Kulwant eventually got deeper into it and turned the course of his life. In 2011, he launched his first blog, KulwantNagi.com, and next year he created BloggingCage.com and invested his time in affiliate marketing. But, this was just the beginning of the 18months struggle.

Survival and motivation

Kulwant earned his first dollar after seven long months whereas most people give up after three or four months when they can’t make money. Earning a little money after seven long months made his passion stronger. He said that, for the first eighteen months of his blogging, he used 2G internet. It is nearly impossible for us to have patience and work with 2G internet. But, he proved that if one has a strong vision nothing is impossible.

He started using Fiverr and made enough money to keep himself motivated. He sold his first blog for $30 only to meet his costs extremely needed for survival. But, eventually, his monthly income started increasing and now he is a successful affiliate marketer earning millions. In 2017, he earned around $9000 just in four days doing email marketing.

Kulwant’s secret mantra of keeping himself motivated is reading tons of inspirational books. He prefers reading biographies of people who have become successful in the entrepreneurial world. 

Also Read: Brian Dean : The Founder of Backlinko, ‘the Future of Modern Day’s SEO’

Kulwant’s advice to people

According to Kulwant, blogging, or in simpler words content writing is on high demand these days. But, the problem with our generation is we are overloaded by information. We cannot set a fixed goal as we keep switching from one opportunity to another. Kulwant says that if we find an interest we should do research and start working on it. Sitting and watching other people achieving success won’t get us to that place automatically. He also says that, once we start working we should work diligently for the first six months without expecting any fruitful outcome. One just needs to find a niche and keep working for it.

encryption

Only the paid users of Zoom can now enjoy end-to-end encryption

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The beginning of the lockdown period marked the rise of the videoconferencing app, Zoom. During the initial days of quarantine, Zoom seemed to make a fortune out of it. Every single meeting starting from attending online classes to professionals attending business conferences took place on this platform. But, after a month or so, the security system of Zoom was compromised. It became vulnerable to uninvited guests joining random meetings and causing disputes. To make Zoom’s videoconferencing platform secure enough, the company paused launching any new features thus devoting all time for its security. A few weeks back, Zoom announced about end-to-end encryption for its users. But, the company declared yesterday that the advantage is only for the paid users.

End-to-end encryption scheme of Zoom

After a bunch of meeting with investors, civil liberties groups, and child-sex abuse fighters, CEO of Zoom, Eric Yuan confirmed that the company will only provide end-to-end encryption for the paid customers. He says that it is important for the community to enforce the law for free calls. The users who just signed in with an email id didn’t go through a proper identity verification thus making Zoom vulnerable in the first place. So, the company finally announced and confirmed today about its new policy.

Eric also said that it is better to work along with the FBI as many users sign in with an abusive motive. After the pandemic spread across the world, Zoom became the most important video conferencing app. But, the business backfired as encryption became the main topic of concern. Jon Callas, a technologist said that Zoom’s compromise to get rid of the troublemakers is reasonable. Every one of us witnessed how the breach in the security system caused chaos among Zoom users.

Encryption plan and end-to-end model

The main reason behind lifting off end-to-end encryption for all users is that the criminals can easily get away with their illegal activities. But, there still exist controversial perspectives as some think it will affect the non-paid customers. Every cybercriminal is usually a non-paid user but not the other way around. But, the filtration process is tough when Zoom allowed millions of users to host and attend meetings only by singing with email id.

Zoom also hired Stamos, a former Chief Security Officer at Facebook. He says that apart from providing end-to-end encryption to paid users the platform is also upgrading its existing safety. The current end-to-end encryption is for paid customers and enterprise accounts as their profiles are highly scrutinized and verified.

The end-to-end model will reduce illegal activities to a large extent and make the platform more sophisticated and secure. But, the free participants will fall at a sharp rate which is not flattering from the business viewpoint. The end-to-end encryption is mainly provided in case of charged business or for the nonprofits. An outside spokesperson of the company has said that the encryption model is still in progress and it still hasn’t decided the final customer base.

Preventing child pornography and child sex abuse

Many videoconferencing platforms have faced shortcomings in its way. But, Zoom’s reputation got crushed when the degree of child-sex abuse increased via its platform. Many complaints have been launched that the sexual predators live steam abuse threatening child safety. So, strong encryption for every user will make it difficult for the police to find the culprits and easier for abusers to carry on their filthy work. It also threatens the security and privacy of users who exchange sensitive content. This might lead to harassment and future blackmailing.

Eric also focused on the fact that no user can simply dial into an encrypted meeting. So, there are high chances that many business clients will stop using the app as well. But, no matter what, Zoom will make law enforcement its top priority.

Conclusion 

Amidst the stricter law enforcement, Zoom also announced that they don’t share information with law enforcement unless and until it is necessary, like child abuse. It still not possible for any random users to get into a meeting and get unnoticed. The end-to-end model is important to ensure child safety and protect future victims.

mark zuckerberg

Even after the virtual walkout, Zuckerberg adheres to defending Trump saying Facebook gives voice to people

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The recent brutal death of the African American George Floyd on the hands of a police officer has caused civil unrest in the U.S. Every citizen of the nation and other parts of the world has raised voice against the concrete racism that seems to continue even in the 21st century. The situation was triggered after Donald Trump’s inflammatory comment and tweets saying, “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”. The city is burning with the rage of seeking vengeance and in the meantime, Facebook got caught in the situation. While the tweets of Trump was marked misleading by Twitter, Facebook chose to defend the president. This brought a lot of criticism and also internal instability questioning the principles of Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook VS Twitter

Media and press have raised a lot of questions on how Facebook and Twitter handled the comments and tweets of Donald Trump. While Twitter decided to label Trump’s tweet, Facebook wants to keep a wide view on political grounds. Many people raised questions about Zuckerberg’s integrity and defending the president. But, Zuckerberg said that both Facebook and Twitter have similar regulations regarding election misinformation.

According to Zuckerberg, the political posts and comments are one of the most sensitive topics on social media platforms. And, the company scrutinizes every post related to the matter. But, this time Facebook decided to not take such action as it is important for people to be aware of what their president says. He lastly said that, while Twitter has always been messy, Facebook is trying to maintain a balance and give voice to as many people as possible.

Zuckerberg’s defending ground

Facebook’s decision to not label or remove the misleading information about the election has also upset the employees. Apart from being criticized by the external sources, many employees of Facebook protested against the company’s policies. Several Facebook employees chose to conduct a virtual walkout and two of them already resigned from the company.

In response to all the internal disputes, Zuckerberg conducted an extended conference with his employees. He said that Trump’s posts have upset him as well and it was difficult to take a decision of not removing it. Keeping aside the personal opinion, Facebook CEO said it was the right thing to do. He further said that though Trump’s posts were upsetting, they are valuable to the people of the country.

Facebook has always tried to give voice and free expression to as many people as possible. But, many people still believe that this is a desperate move to avoid the rage of Trump. Regarding the voter misinformation, Zuckerberg said that it will be the top priority for the next few months and it might launch a “voter hub” as well.

What if the unrest continues?

Though the political posts are the ones that undergo several cross-examinations, policies might change it the dispute continues. Mark Zuckerberg said that if the nation of U.S. witnesses prolonged civil unrest, the company will make some changes to its policy thus labeling similar kinds of posts. Stricter rules will be applied to any information that can cause or promote violence. But, these regulations might not be applied for every nation because Facebook handles the nations with ongoing conflicts differently.

Facebook’s controversial policies and harmful polarization

In response to the regulation of its policy regarding political affairs, Facebook addressed and criticized an article from The Wall Street Journal. The article suggested that Facebook is ignoring its own research algorithm about harmful polarization. Facebook was accused of contributing to any kind of polarization which has a tremendous negative impact on our society.

In response to this, a Facebook spokesperson said that the company is trying its best to limit the post of any harmful content. Since 2016, the company has applied strict rules and strengthened its policy. So, this kind of remarks that can harm the reputation of the platform can be strongly disagreeable. Moreover, the company has donated $2 million in funding to support independent research ideas on polarization.

Conclusion

With the degree of unrest increasing among U.S citizens, Facebook is likely to receive more criticism, both internal and external. Though Mark Zuckerberg has assured that the platform has an overall positive impact on the world, it might have to bend some rules when the time comes.

SpaceX

SpaceX Falcon 9 take-off will create a new history for human spaceflight

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The success of the second demonstration of Crew Dragon will bring immense respect and glory to the private space company, SpaceX. The two NASA astronauts, Douglas Hurley and Bob Behnken took off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Saturday. If Demo-2 becomes successful, Elon Musk’s company will be the first private organization to send astronauts into space.

Also Read: SpaceX Prototype Passes Important Cold Pressure Test

The prestigious moment

After ten long years, America made a big move in the aerospace sector. SpaceX has been working on this mission for more than two decades now. Finally, the take-off was successful sending humans on a private company vehicle. The automated spacecraft on which they set off their journey to space is called the Crew Dragon. This spacecraft is a gumdrop-shaped capsule that will transfer humans to and from International Space Station.

The astronauts began their journey at 3:22 PM EDT on last Saturday. The launch took place from Launch Complex 39A in NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. It was supposed to take place on 27th May but was delayed due to bad weather. Twelve minutes after the launch, Falcon 9 dropped the Crew Dragon along with the duo in the orbit. According to the plan, they will spend the next day in the orbit followed by docking with the International Space Station.

Success of SpaceX

It is a huge deal for a private company to design a spacecraft and carry out a successful take-off. The entire nation of America is looking up to SpaceX with plenty of hope. This might be the company to turn the wheel for the future of spaceflight and begin a new era. Elon Musk and his company have worked diligently to make this moment come true.

NASA also enlisted another company, Boeing to design and develop a new spacecraft that will be versatile enough to take astronauts to and from ISS. But, it seems like SpaceX didn’t give up on the mission and emerged out as the first company to make it possible. Demo-2 is the last test to check if Crew Dragon is capable of carrying out regular human spaceflight operations. Till now, Russia’s Soyuz rocket is the only successful vehicle to transfer astronauts to and from ISS. So, the people of the United Nation are praying immensely for this to be a success.

Demo-1 Mission

The first demonstration of Crew Dragon known as Demo-1 Mission took place in March 2019. But, the first test didn’t have humans on board. The spacecraft took off successfully docked with the ISS and returned safely on Earth. This was also a breakthrough as the Crew Dragon became the first American automated spacecraft to travel safely to and from ISS.

Douglas Hurley and Bob Behnken 

Before becoming the spacecraft commander for Demo-2, Douglas was a fighter pilot and a test pilot. He worked with the US Marine Corps and decided to join NASA in 2000. Apart from the launch of Crew Dragon, Douglas has been to space twice (2009 & 2011).

Bob is a veteran Air Force test pilot. He has completed two space shuttle flights in 2008 & 2010 respectively. His main responsibility in the Demo-2 Mission is docking and undocking.

The Commercial Crew Program and Crew Dragon

The expense of NASA was high to get access to a single seat on Soyuz. This made NASA come up with The Commercial Crew Program which also extended corporation with the private sector. NASA Administrator, Jim Bridenstine said that this will welcome a new beginning giving more people access to human spaceflight.

The Crew Dragon is designed in such a way that it will automatically dock with the ISS. But, the capsule is also provided with manual touchscreen monitors to try things manually. The docking was scheduled at 10:20 AM EDT on Monday. The astronauts will land back on Earth within the next six to sixteen weeks. The capsule is equipped with four parachutes which will lower the vehicle on the Atlantic Ocean. A SpaceX recovery boat will approach them from there.

Is it only the trailer?

If this mission is successful, it will mark the journey of SpaceX in human spaceflight. NASA will certify the Crew Dragon for carrying out regular human transfer operations to and from ISS. The next launch is planned for 30th August which will include four astronauts. SpaceX is also working on a new monster rocket called Starship. It looks like SpaceX will take mankind on many unexplored space journeys. Until then, may the force be strong with them!

Spellcheck with google and microsoft

Spellcheck experience gets better in Windows with the collaboration of Google and Microsoft

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Any software should regularly monitor its updates to up with the fast-changing world. Skipping the tiniest change can also shake the stability of user experience thus resulting in negative feedback. Keeping that in mind, Microsoft Edge and other Chromium browsers didn’t have an impressive spellchecker until now. Yesterday, the company decided to introduce a new spellcheck experience, Windows Spellcheck. As the name goes, it is exclusive to all the Windows users with OS Windows 8.1 or above.

What has replaced Hunspell?

Hunspell is one of the most popular spellcheckers that was previously used by Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge. It is an open-source program written in C++. But, Windows Spellcheck has finally replaced it in an attempt to wipe out the existing problems with acronyms, customized dictionaries, etc.

The new Windows Spellcheck for Microsoft Edge and Chromium browsers will have several benefits. Apart from the support for acronyms, abbreviations, and a shared custom dictionary, the new tool will also support additional languages, dialects, URLs, and email addresses. Previously, a red underline appeared in all of these which won’t happen anymore.

Microsoft’s opinion

Microsoft’s Edge team said that the collaboration of Google with the company has benefited Windows users in several ways. The user experience for both Edge and Chrome has improved especially since Microsoft decided to work with Google last year. Many big changes are yet to take place apart from the Windows Spellcheck.

Moreover, apart from the new spellchecker that rolled out yesterday, the scrolling experience of Microsoft Edge also improved last month. The company is also currently working on the Chromium Project to improve the same for Chrome. Microsoft has also helped Google back in January to improve the management of Chrome.

The Chromium Project

Microsoft introduced Microsoft Edge to the Windows users in 2015 and since then it didn’t make any major progress. It was after a couple of years that Microsoft’s team spoke to Bill Gates and decided to switch to Chromium. This was a big step for the company and also the engineering concept was different for both Edge and Chromium. So, at first, they were a bit nervous but after they made the news public in December 2018, the company received mostly positive feedbacks. Mozilla didn’t approve the change though and said they will “fight for a truly open web”.

The engineering team put a lot of effort to create a better ecosystem for both the users and the two companies. Over the years, the relationship between these two companies went haywire at certain points. But, the recent development of this new feature might bring back peace as is advantageous to both the companies.

How to enable spellcheck in Microsoft Edge?

Remember, for most of the users they don’t need to enable the spellcheck exclusively. The tool will automatically inherit the preferred language from Window settings. But, you can always visit the edge://settings/languages page to make the changes according to your language preference. 

To install additional languages to evaluate it with Windows spellcheck, here are the following steps.

  • Go to settings in your Windows PC.
  • Under settings to the section of Time & Language.
  • Click Language and then select on Add a preferred language.

If the user is unable to install the preferred language, then Microsoft will automatically start working with the spellchecker powered by Hunspell. Also, the new version of this Windows Spellcheck will be available for Edge version 83 and above.

How to enable spellcheck in Google Chrome?

Though the feature of Windows Spellcheck is the default for the Edge users it is not the same with Chrome users. The Google Chrome users need to follow these steps mentioned below to enable the Windows Spellcheck.

  • Open Google Chrome of version 83 or above.
  • Go to chrome://flags.
  • A search bar will appear. Type “Use the Windows OS spell checker” in the search bar.
  • From the drop-down menu select Enable. 
  • Re-launch the browser to implement the feature of Windows Spellcheck. 

Conclusion

Always remember to turn on the Windows OS spellcheck. Windows is providing another additional option of spellcheck, that is, Hybrid spellcheck. It allows the user to use both Windows spellcheck and Hunspell. The change is instead of typing “Use the Windows OS spell checker” in the search bar, go for “Use hybrid spell checking on Windows”.

youtube

YouTube is automatically deleting comments that can harm China’s Communist Party

Leave a Comment / COVID-19, Tech News / By

The pandemic caused due to the novel coronavirus has exposed China’s political system to a rough situation. The spread of coronavirus from the Wuhan city of China has made people believe that the novel coronavirus might be a bio-weapon after all. In this vulnerable situation, the rage of people towards China has increased which led to posting, commenting, and sharing content that holds the nation guilty.

In the meantime, YouTube is automatically deleting the two phrase comments in the Chinese language that is insulting to the CCP. The platform and its users have witnessed that within seconds these two phrase remarks are automatically vanishing from the comment section.

Is it a glitch on the system?

YouTube in response to the automatic deletion of specific Chinese comments said that it is an error in the system. The company reported to The Verge that it is a glitch on the system and they are looking into it already. According to a YouTube spokesperson, the investigation has begun and confirmed that this act is certainly not a result of any changes in the moderation policy.

A few months back YouTube declared to make some changes in its community guidelines in response to the content related to coronavirus. The spread of conspiracy theories was increasing from this platform hence they decided to use automated filters to remove them. On 16th March 2020, YouTube declared that it will remove some contents immediately without any human review if found against the guidelines. So, the company, this time said that since they are more dependent on automated filters based on AI. So, it will delete even the positive comments including those two-phrase.

User says the problem existed for a long time now

But, many of the users have also reported that it is not a recent “error” or “practice” of YouTube. Evidence shows that YouTube is responsible for deleting such comments for the past six months or more. Many users raised this issue on the official help page of the platform demanding a proper explanation for this problem. But, the issue has finally got voice when Palmer Lucky, U.S. technologist tweeted about it. Thorough investigation shows that human right activist; Jennifer Zeng raised the same issue a few weeks back.

But, the question is why YouTube would do it intentionally given that the platform is currently blocked in China. So, deleting or establishing censorship to save the reputation of the current ruling party of China should be of no concern for Google. This is very disturbing for the users of every other nation and questions the integrity of the company.

The two phrase comments

According to the reports, the Google-owned-platform, YouTube is specifically deleting comments like “wu mao” and “communist bandit” written in Chinese. The former term is a slang often used to insult the Communist Party of China. The latter was mostly used when the Chinese Nationalist government ruled the nation. The slang “wu mao” means “50-cent party” which is often used for the paid internet users that direct any kind of criticism regarding CCP away from the discussion. People believe they are paid 50 Chinese cents per post and thus the name-calling.

The human rights activist, Jennifer Zeng who spotted this mishap also posted relevant screenshots. She commented on the same phrase three times and YouTube automatically deleted it within fifteen seconds. This is not the first time that Google is criticized for censoring content that goes against CCP. Project Dragonfly launched in 2018 is proof of it.

Also read: Steve Chen – Co-Founder of YouTube

Project Dragonfly

In August 2018, Google launched a censored version of its search engine in China. It was for more than a decade that citizens of China were barred from accessing Google’s search engine. Hence, this censored search engine, also known as Project dragonfly was maybe an attempt by the company to re-establish itself in the Chinese market. But, this act of Google’s raised many questions about public interest and transparency.

Google accepting even the strictest policies of China’s search engine rules questioned its moral principles. This act of Google’s received criticism not only from many politicians but also from its employees. Hence, in June 2019, Google declared that it has dropped the Project Dragonfly and has no plan to launch China.