BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 04 Aug 11 - 04:32 PM

You refer to yourself in the third person on your to do list?

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: PatrickRose
Date: 04 Aug 11 - 04:27 PM

On my to-do list is "Write your own browser". Would that make me smart (with fake stories)?

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 03 Aug 11 - 06:08 PM

*big grin*...I'm not a bit surprised that the numbers and story were invented. I just liked the idea... and LOVED explaining about better browsers. There are very good reasons why other browsers...especially Firefox... have stolen so many IE users away.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: DMcG
Date: 03 Aug 11 - 06:02 PM

An 'average IQ for IE6' of around 83 should have sounded a warning note that the data was suspect: while not impossible any reasonable sample size would have at least some over 90, so there would have to be a substantial number below 80 ... Sounded dodgy to me well before the revelation of fakery.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: bobad
Date: 03 Aug 11 - 05:39 PM

3 August 2011 Last updated at 06:50 ET

Internet Explorer story was bogus

A story which suggested that users of Internet Explorer have a lower IQ than people who chose other browsers appears to have been an elaborate hoax.

A number of media organisations, including the BBC, reported on the research, put out by Canadian firm ApTiquant.

It later emerged that the company's website was only recently set up and staff images were copied from a legitimate business in Paris.

It is unclear who was behind the stunt.

The story was reported by many high profile organisations including CNN, the Daily Mail, the Telegraph and Forbes.

Questions about the authenticity of the story were raised by readers of the BBC website who established that the company which put out the research - ApTiquant - appeared to have only set up its website in the past month.

Thumbnail images of the firm's staff on the website also matched those on the site of French research company Central Test, although many of the names had been changed.

The BBC contacted Central Test who confirmed that they had been made aware of the copy but had no knowledge of ApTiquant or its activities.
Research claims

ApTiquant issued a press release claiming that it had invited 100,000 web users to take IQ tests and matched their results with the type of browser they used.

It also supplied extensive research data.

The results claimed to show that Internet Explorer users were generally of lower intelligence.

The BBC sought alternative views for the original story, including Professor David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge University's Statistical Laboratory, who said: "I believe these figures are implausibly low - and an insult to IE users."

No-one on ApTiquant's contact number was available for comment.

Graham Cluley, senior security consultant at Sophos, examined the source material for the BBC after concerns were raised.

"It's obviously very easy to create a bogus site like this - as all phishers know it's easy to rip-off someone else's webpages and pictures," he said.

Mr Cluley also looked at the pdf file containing the data that many people had downloaded from a variety of sources and said it did not appear to contain malware.

Source: BBC News

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 08:22 PM

Since the thread has drifted to the totally inappropriate serious discussion of browsers¹, perhaps some would be interested in recent reports:

Browser Wars: Chrome vs. 1E9 vs. Firefox appears to be a "gimme the facts" kind of article, and doesn't take sides. The other popular(?) browsers are mentioned but not really reviewed. Clicking "Next" at the bottom of the page takes you to the original mag article.

Download Blocking Test from a UK lab, and maybe of interest especially there, although the article is pretty general.

Everybody has their favorites, but when the one you have makes you reasonably happy it's difficult to keep up on changes in the other ones you might like better now. Browsers, and their rankings by the "experts," do flitter up and down in the standings reported, and nearly all the best known ones have made recent updates, some of which are significant, some of which are pretty ho-hum, and a few that are "why the s**t did they think we wanted that."

John

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 12:38 PM

"Windows Explorer is just a file browser/manager."

*grin*...and I have 40 of THOSE! 3 of which I actually use regularly. You think browsers differ? Features in file managers differ widely.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 12:35 PM

I use different browsers because, as Joe Offer says, they act 'differently'.

I recently changed my ISP from Comcast to Verizon, and now I can read posts on Facebook in only ONE browser...so far. It is Opera 11.11....which keeps asking me to update to 11.50 (and would do updates automatically if I checked that box) I HAVE a copy of 11.50, and can't read Facebook posts there. Why? Maybe some deep, hidden setting... *shrug* So far, I can't read Facebook in Firefox, either. Now, in ALL browsers I can get to my profile/settings page and it knows who I am and my ISP...it just won't show posts except in Opera 11.11.
See why I won't allow it to update? Other reasons-- I often find stuff by reading the browser cache, and Opera has totally changed the way the cache works after 10.10....making it much harder to find stuff--- so I have a copy of 9.64 using the old style when I want to, for example, find a song or an FLV (flash) file that is hard to get by direct download.
Firefox has also been using a more complex cache, but it makes it VERY hard to install different versions on the same machine (it seems to 'look' for other versions and demand to be installed in that folder).
   I have only played with Chrome a little bit, and currently my wife is using the only copy I have installed.
So far, I have avoided Safari, as it is based on the IE engine. (I also have Lunascape, which will run 3 engines, and allow YOU to choose which one) and K-Meleon and the last version of Netscape and 'SeaMonkey', which is a fancy version of Firefox)...the last 3 I seldom use.

Now.... with Firefox, you have thousands of 'add-ons' available which make it highly customizable...but too many of those and it loads VERY slowly. Opera has also started adding 'extensions' similar to Firefox, although they work differently.

Finally, the basic menu structure and settings in all browsers has changed over the years..(mostly to what I call dumbing down and allowing fewer options)...so I keep older versions for reference.
It seems security settings has driven many of the changes, and the desire to conform to business needs has driven many other changes..(like allowing Google to more easily track stuff)

Tedious? Too much? Overkill?... maybe. I do lose track at times of which one I have saved certain bookmarks in or which one has certain tabs open in. But...*shrug: some people have 4-5 bank accounts or 4 cars or 6 different Facebook profiles...( or several memberships in forums ☺)....or read 3-4 newspapers.

De gustibus non est disputandum

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 12:30 PM

Beagle was a desktop search on Linux. I found it a pain in the neck with its indexing.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: gnu
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 12:26 PM

What about IQ vs. bowser? Like, if you have a beagle... well, you know. >;-)

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 12:20 PM

Windows Explorer is the file browser. Internet Explorer is the Internet browser. They both use essentially the same program, which is the reason you can't delete IE. If you did, Windows Explorer wouldn't work and you'd have to do everything with the Command Line (formerly called DOS).

John

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 11:57 AM

As far as I know, Windows Explorer is just a file browser/manager.

Konqueror is one that does both file and web.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 10:48 AM

"Windows Explorer"?

Shows how out of it I am. I don't use Explorer as a browser. I didn't even know that it is one.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 09:52 AM

So, what's my IQ?

He's how to find out.

Take your measured IQ, Multiply by the number of browsers you have used.

add up all of the browsers you have used and dive the product of the first operation by the sum of the second.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 07:30 AM

(Don't want to sound boastful, I'm only stating it as a contribution.) My IQ is 140, measured at school, University and at other times, it always comes up as 140. My sister's is 146. We both use Microsoft Windows Explorer. My sis is a brilliant doctor, sharp as a whip. I was a teacher, for what it's worth. But Intelligence Quotient and IT literacy don't necessarily go hand in hand!

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 02:00 AM

Joe -

I still can't print anything when I use IE9, ... I had the same problem with IE7, and went to IE9 to see if it would help. It didn't. I went through 300 articles and "community help" posts at Microsoft without finding any help.

Coincidentally, my hard drive began gurgling "I'm gonna Die, put me out of my misery" so I put in a new HD.

At the first report of trouble with the old HD, I made an official-by-the-book-according-to-instructions-complete-backup following Microsoft's instructions. This is probably the twentieth such backup I've made on a Mickeysoft OS, and just like all of the others it wouldn't restore anything, so I did a complete reinstall of Vista and IE7 (which had worked once). Then updated with Micky and Installed my AV, Then reinstalled my essential programs, and four days from the start, I was ready to copy my data files that did come back perfectly from my home-made backups. The data restore only took about 5.6 days.

Almost immediately, Microsoft more or less insisted that I Install IE9, which I did. It is a little faster than IE7(?).

The fringe benefit is that printing worked fine with IE7 or IE9 after the restoration. I do get an "access denied" (that doesn't say by whom) when I try to print to PDF, but I do have a clue about where to change a security setting to clean that up (maybe). It's easier to print to paper and run it through the Scanner ADF if I want PDF.

The remaining problem is that the email backkup made per MickeyMouse instructions "imported" only about 60% of the folders that were in the backup, and I don't yet have a count on individual messages but there appear to be "around 1,000" missing. I can "import" the rest, but the only way I've found that works safely is "one at a time."

I do know, having confirmed it once again, that Microsoft studies really hard about how to back up your files, but NOBODY AT MICROSOFT HAS EVER TRIED TO RESTORE ANYTHING. (They've got Tech Support with automatic "saves" nightly.) As to what caused the printer problem for both of us, I haven't a clue and neither has Microsoft. I do know that at least 80 or so others have reported the same problem to Microsoft, and I'd dare you to try to count the reports elsewhere that Google reports.

John

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jul 11 - 01:38 AM

An article with slightly more commentary (and information) on the methodology of the bloggers who came up with this report is at Internet Explorer 6 users.

This commentary reveals that the "IQs" were determined by a test on a website. That alone is "self selecting" for stupidity because functionally intelligent people don't click on quizes on random sites. (i.e. the ones who do are mostly FaceBookers, most of whom click on every piece of malware someone "sends" them: another self-selection factor.) An alternate interpretation might be that people intelligent enough to "try a new browser" might also be "adveturous enough" to take a crap test while more conservative ones of equal "IQ" would be less likely.

Any conclusions are completely invalid without considering how many (and who) made the change from IE6 (obsolete 5 years ago) to a later IE version. So far as either report mentions, the "researchers" were apparently unaware that there were other versions of IE.

If they really were looking for "stupid" they might have investigated the report 74% of all rootkit infections originate on XP PCs They likely would have missed on their analysis of that one too, and shot themselves in the foot - or in the ass.

The "infected WinXP" machines are nearly all "pirated copies" whose operators have never been able to get security patches. Support for legal copies, still used by a few, has dwindled but remains even now sort of a low-grade mediocre fair. An unpatched version sits right in front of the fan and new shit flies in daily.

A similar situation appeared a few years ago when Mickey tried to eliminate Win98. At the time, '98 was the last version legally exportable without hard-to-get licenses, so it was the dominant version in several "developing countries." Microsludge was pretty much forced to continue limited support for the "foreign users." By the time WinXP was on the way out, dear old Mickey reported, with good evidence, that more than 90% of remaining Win98 copies in use were pirated.

When WinXP appeared, it was under export restrictions, so the ******* just bootlegged all the copies sold there. (They've also pirated some patches, according to reports?) The "infected machines" probably are predominantly "offshore" although there probably are quite a few legal copies that are among the maimed and contageous.

A recent additional article might be appropriate: More Harm Than Good?

[No real reason for this post, so don't take it seriously. It's midnight here and I got bored.]

John

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 11:37 PM

I have four browsers - IE, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. My usual browsers are IE and Chrome. I use one browser until I get mad at it, and then I use another until it earns my disdain.
For years, I'm intended to try Opera so I could be as smart as Bill D, but somehow I've never gotten around to it...

The Getaway registration worked for me in Chrome, but not perfectly. It didn't work in IE9 at all. Time for another browser, I guess.

Oh, and I still can't print anything when I use IE9, but there are some Websites that demand IE.

So, what's my IQ?

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 11:15 PM

A recent survey of browsers reports that Apple says their browser is extermely good.

An independent test, using approximately a half dozen "browser test utilities" found that the Apple browser scored much better than any other browser based on tests using Apple's tester. The big problem was that no other browser would run their test program.

(They didn't score quite as well on any of the other tests.)

Obviously, as they figured out in Atlanta recently, you can raise your test scores quite easily if you can rig the tests.

Much is being made of "compliance with the new HTML5 standard."

The FACT is that there is no HTML5 standard. A "proposed version for reading" was released several years ago. An updated "proposed for reading" version was released two years ago.

Most qualified people involved with the proposed standard predict at least 6 years from now, before an adoption AS A STANDARD will be possible.

Each browser now uses "gimmicks" that were proposed for inclusion by the maker of that browser, and each other maker has submitted other gimmicks for inclusion, but a Standard THERE AIN'T.

(I tried to get a look at the "latest proposed" version, and it had been taken down on the Committee's website - for changes?)

John

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 09:11 PM

I've 10 installed on this PC at the moment.

--

I don't think Opera and Firefox have anything in common. They don't use the same engine

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Gurney
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 08:59 PM

Back to browsers. Since I have three on my desktop, does that imply that I have an I.Q. of over 300? Or do I have to be Canadian?

Opera was my usual browser until it did something to itself on update, and I installed Firefox to get it back working. Is there a significant difference between them?

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 03:59 PM

One would think that the poorer (unhappier) ones would drink more, cheaper booze. The richer (happier) ones would drink expensive booze but less of it.

Say a part time lecturer at a community college would drink a six gallons of "Bubba's Blue Mountain Scotch" for every pint of of "Johnny Walker Blue Label" that the Dean of Harvard would drink while they would both spent the same amount of money.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 03:50 PM

I don't really know...except that the study was used as an example of "how to lie/confuse with statistics".

(But you see..I LIKE the IQ/browser result...therefore...)

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 03:46 PM

Sales by dollars or volume of booze?

college professors are a group that I would expect to buy more expensive booze as their salaries rose. The ones I have known were stupid that way.

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 03:32 PM

hmmpff!! I suppose you also reject the AMAZING correlation once found between sales of alcohol and the salaries of college professors!

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 03:18 PM

Ha, I say. Bill D, I think JtS and Jim Dixon have rather more credibility in their demurs than the study does in its conclusions. The study- as you must know, is seriously uninsightful.

OTOH, I resemble the study's contention. lol

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 02:48 PM

So how did the researchers know people's IQ? Did they ask them?

I suppose this research took place in Lake Wobegon, "where all the children are above average."

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 02:46 PM

Oh, I think you have it, Jack.. ☺

Subject: RE: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 02:34 PM

Hmmmmm 80% of pcs have Windows. IE comes with Windows. The others you have to find and install yourself. Therefore all the incurious and unadventurous and the just too dumb to find another program have IE by default.

Mystery solved?

Subject: BS: BS-tech: IQ vs. browser use (ha!)
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Jul 11 - 12:34 PM

It seems there is a general correlation between measured intelligence and choice of browsers. ( I knew it...I knew it...
I knew it...) ☺☺☺☺☺☺



http://mashable.com/2011/07/29/internet-explorer-iq/








ummm... I have preferred Opera since version 6...