I’m very happy that the majority of this week’s content, whether I had seen it or not, was suggested by readers of the newsletter. I’ve had a lot of fun putting This Week in Web together for the past four months, and will continue to do so as long as readers find value in the content.
Google competitor DuckDuckGo made so much money last year, it’s giving away $225,000
Julie Bort, Business Insider
Duck Duck Go is an alternative search system to Google search, which emphasizes anonymity and privacy in search, at least as far as the company itself controls. They routinely donate to several free and open source software companies to help with development, and this year asked their users in a survey which companies should be supported.
After tallying votes, nine companies were selected to receive $25,000 each, all with a focus on web security, privacy, anonymity, and related projects. See the full announcement and list of companies in the post on the Duck Duck Go website.
Thanks to Gary Kovar for sending this over. Submit a link for next week!
Egypt’s Newspapers in Open Revolt Over Police Attack on Press Freedom
Robert Mackey, The Intercept
Looks like the Interior Minister of Egypt finally pissed off the wrong people. For “plotting to overthrow the regime” by attempting to do their jobs properly and report on anti-government protests, two journalists were arrested after a raid.
In solidarity, newspapers in Egypt, including the state owned paper, started adding the phrase “Journalism is not a Crime” to their papers and websites, printing his photos in negative, and have threatened to refuse printing his name until he is fired. The unity between the newspapers is a powerful statement, and hopefully some reform comes of their standing up to the government, and not more arrests, or disappearances like publisher Lee Po of Hong Kong last year.
Apple Stole My Music. No, Seriously.
James Pinkstone, Vellum Atlanta
I’ve had issues with incorrect matches with Google Music, but at least they haven’t started stealing my music. By stealing I mean the literal sense of it, not duplication, as the files are erased from the host computer after being uploaded to the Apple Music servers.
Some of the issues here, and there are many, are that you lose access to your music if you aren’t connected to the internet, if you don’t continue your Apple Music subscription, or if they make an incorrect guess and serve up the wrong song, or a crappier version of it.
Honestly, I’m surprised that Apple would try such a stupid ploy. Plenty of people will try the free trial of the service and decide that they don’t want to pay for it, only to find that their own music was removed. Again, it’s not like a copy was made, but the original files removed.
Thanks to Stephanie Brinley for sending this over and supporting the site! If you’ve got a link that you want to share, submit it here.
Ten-year-old receives $10,000 reward for finding Instagram bug
Nicky Woolf, The Guardian
A boy from Finland, at ten years old, is the youngest person ever to receive a bounty from Facebook-owned Instagram for discovering a security vulnerability in the service. The vulnerability, which was closed in February, allowed users under certain conditions to delete other users’ comments on photos. I certainly hope that the recognition from such a large company, as well as the $10,000 payout that he received, help keep the boy and others his age interested in hacking away at websites and learning by breaking things.
Thank you for the topic suggestion, Scott Mann! Got something to share? Submit it here.
What It Was Like To Build A World Wide Web Site In 1995
Ben Edwards, FastCompany
In this longread, Ben Edwards shows that we may think it’s a pain to build a website now, but there are a lot of things that we don’t have to consider that he did when he started, like if your devices have PPP and TCP/IP support or writing winsock scripts. Remind me not to get annoyed next time I need to update a plugin or something.
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