Block Animated Gifs With Gif Block For Firefox

Animated Gifs are still popular on today’s Internet, albeit for different purposes. Back in the beginning days of the public Internet, webmasters used them to add animated contents to their websites. This soon died out when they realized that repeating ten second animates had a damaging effect to their website’s reputation.

Today, animated gifs are mainly posted on social networking sites like Facebook or Google+. Their biggest advantage over video is that they can be posted nearly everywhere. Videos on the other hand need to be embedded, and sites usually allow only some embed codes or even no external codes at all.

If you do not like animated gifs, you probably would like to block them right away on all sites you visit regularly. And that’s exactly what the Firefox add-on Gif Block does.

The add-on places an icon in the browser’s status bar that you can use to enable or disable gif images with. Just right-click the icon and select enable or disable to switch the state. Keep in mind though that this will block all gif images and not only animated gifs. If you visit websites regularly that post non-animated gif images, then this extension might not be for you as you would have to enable and disable the blocking regularly whenever you switch sites.

When enabled, gifs are not loaded at all. If you open the gif directly in Firefox, all you get is a blank screen starring back at you. On pages, where the gifs are posted in HTML files, you see a broken image marker instead.

You can use these as indicators that gif images have been blocked. If you want to see them, simply disable the blocking of gif images in the status bar and reload the page. The gifs should now be displayed correctly on the page.

Gif Block is a useful extension for Internet users who do not want to come in contact with animated gifs. It can also have a positive effect on page loading speeds as animated gifs can have sizes upwards of one Megabyte.

Update: Firefox users can change the default animated gif behavior in the browser’s configuration. All that needs to be done is to enter about:config in the address bar to open the browser’s advanced configuration menu. Filter for image.animation_mode in there, double-click the preference and change it to one of the following values:

none — will prevent image animationonce — will let the image animate oncenormal (default) — will allow it to play over and over

Thanks Dougle for the tip!

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Animated GIF Editor About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: Martin Brinkmann, Wednesday February 22, 2012 -
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Google to Block Per-Country Blogger Blogs

Following the announcement last week from Twitter that they can now block specific Tweets on a per-country basis, Google have now announced a similar move with Blogger that allows specific blogs to be blocked for individual countries, while keeping them online and active in the rest of the world.

Google describes the move on their blog as happening because…

“Migrating to localized domains will allow us to continue promoting free expression and responsible publishing while providing greater flexibility in complying with valid removal requests pursuant to local law. By utilizing ccTLDs, content removals can be managed on a per country basis, which will limit their impact to the smallest number of readers. Content removed due to a specific country’s law will only be removed from the relevant ccTLD.”

This move comes just under a year after the beginning of the Arab Spring which began with the people taking to the streets of Egypt and protesting against the thirty year rule of President Hosni Mubarak in which social networks such as Twitter were used extensively.  Similar uprisings quickly spread to neighbouring countries with Syria now the target of sanctions discussions at the United Nations.

It also follows Google’s discussions with China last year which saw the company temporarily withdraw from the country, only to return later having made concessions to the Chinese government.  Currently the changes apply only to Australia, New Zealand and India though Google apparently plan to roll the new system out globally.  It does not appear however that this has been introduced at the request of any specific country or countries.

The move would allow both Twitter and Google to block access to specific web content at the request of a country’s government or court-order.  This could include specific words in the case of Twitter or the blogs of people who are seen as dissidents or criminals.

When Twitter announced their censorship move last week it was met with heavy criticism from freedom-of-speech campaigners, however the Blogger move is meeting so far with a more even response with the BBC reporting Joss Wright, a research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute who told them “Google’s new approach to supporting country-level takedown requests in Blogger strikes a good balance between free speech, legality and practical issues for end users.  By allowing per-country takedown requests, Google can meet local laws without blocking content at a global level.”

In a statement the company said…

“If you visit a blog that does not correspond to your current location as determined by your IP address, the blogspot servers will redirect you to the domain associated with your country.”

Google believe the move will allow them to comply with local laws while keeping the content online around the world.  It is not yet clear however how this and the Twitter system might work with privacy browsers intended to bypass local filtering.  These are used by dissidents and political activists in countries including China, Burma and North Korea.

In the past Google have blocked specific content from their search engine in China, and blocked other content such as Nazi-related websites in Germany where such things are illegal.  Many people however believe that the Internet should not be filtered at all, and arguments are certain to continue over these moves.

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Megaupload bypass country limit About the Author:Mike Halsey is a Microsoft MVP for "Windows Expert". He is also the author of Troubleshooting Windows 7 Inside Out from Microsoft Press and the Windows 7 Power Users Guide, a how-to guide for non-technical Windows users on how to get the best out of Microsoft's new operating system, with step-by-step and quick guides. You can follow Mike on Facebook, Twitter or on his own website The Long ClimbAuthor: Mike Halsey MVP, Friday February 3, 2012 -
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How to create your own wooden block

Materials required for creating a wooden block can be obtained without facing any worries. First of all you should prefer to avail the tools and equipments that are required to construct a beautiful wooden block. Wood is a material that is ideal for the proper safety. It does not contain any unsafe chemicals. A kid can enjoy playing with wooden blocks without facing any problem. Creating a wood block is not a big issue if you have little information about wooden work. People like to make their due to the reason that they cannot afford expensive building blocks. First of all you should have clear idea of what you want to create. Most commonly, people like to create square wood blocks because they are very easy to make. If you do not want to face several complications in creating such types of building blocks then you should get best guidance in this regard.

Creating your own wooden block can help you in getting the desired item. You can make several adjustments as per your requirements. You can add various types of textures to your in order to make their more attractive. On the other hand, when you purchase a readymade wood block then it will not be possible for you to get the desired set of blocks. You may have to research the complete market to find the required product. In most of the cases, people can find the desired wooden block set from any toy store. However, if you want to create something astonishing then it is better to use some helpful techniques to make attractive building blocks. You can cut pieces of wooden planks in any shape as per your requirements. If you want to create square blocks then it is necessary to cut square wood pieces.

I advise you to take proper measurements of wooden planks before cutting them because this will help you to get perfectly slashed pieces of wood. After getting the slashed wooden pieces, you can affix them together to form a square shape. Always try to use a strong joining material that can make a stronger wooden block. After creating a block, you can add different designs and textures to it as per interests of your child. You can also write numbers or alphabetic letters on the wooden blocks to make them constructive. This can also be very helpful for your child education.

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