2000.04 (Apr)
2000.04.30 (sunday)
Great information on SLAPPs and how to protect yourself against them. California has instituted an anti-SLAPP statue, and other states are considering following suit.
Generally, a “SLAPP” is a (1) civil complaint or counterclaim; (2) filed against individuals or organizations; (3) arising from their communications to government or speech on an issue of public interest or concern. SLAPPs are often brought by corporations, real estate developers, government officials and others against individuals and community groups who oppose them on issues of public concern. SLAPP filers frequently use lawsuits based on ordinary civil claims such as defamation, conspiracy, malicious prosecution, nuisance, interference with contract and/or economic advantage, as a means of transforming public debate into lawsuits.
Most SLAPPs are ultimately legally unsuccessful. While most SLAPPs lose in court, they “succeed” in the public arena. This is because defending a SLAPP, even when the legal defense is strong, requires a substantial investment of money, time, and resources. The resulting effect is a “chill” on public participation in, and open debate on, important public issues. This “chilling” effect is not limited to the SLAPP target(s): fearful of being the target of future litigation, others refrain from speaking on, or participating in, issues of public concern.
3:17:40 PM #
More RIAA propaganda. This document does address fair use, but simply says that it is up to the Judge, implying they’ll sue you regardless. Since most people can’t afford to fight the RIAA in court, they’ve outlawed it in practice. In the eyes of the RIAA, any copying is illegal, even personal use:
As long as the copying is done for noncommercial use, the AHRA gives consumers immunity from suit for all analog music copying, and for digital music copying with AHRA covered devices. It is important to note that the AHRA does not say that such copying is lawful; it simply provides an immunity from suit.
3:12:51 PM #
Almost 100% bullshit propaganda. With statements like “The royalty provisions and the serial copying provisions are an important part of the compromise that allowed these digital recording technologies into the market,” the RIAA makes it sound like record companies’ benevolence is the only reason we’re not still in the dark ages. Not once is the term “fair use” mentioned.
Admittedly, the rules for digital copying are a little more complicated, but they exist for a reason. Under the Audio Home Recording Act, the manufacturers of some types of digital recorders pay a modest royalty to partially compensate the artists, record companies and music publishers hurt through unauthorized copying. These devices also incorporate technology to prevent what is known as serial copying, that is, second and higher generation copies.
Why are there restrictions on further copies if the royalty is built in to the cost of the media???
3:05:37 PM #
2000.04.29 (saturday)
Simply dial in the position, time, and direction you want to look in and it spits out an image. For example, you can see what a lunar eclipse looks like from the moon.
9:24:08 AM #
Currently shipping a discman-esque MP3 player that will read CD-R or CD-RWs ($199), soon to be shipping an in-dash player for the car to compete with empeg which will also read CD media (no price info yet).
9:17:34 AM #
2000.04.28 (friday)
2000.04.27 (thursday)
There is an arms-race dimension to it… If there are three briefings in a row, and you are the one with the lowest production values, you look really lame.
11:09:04 PM #
Audiotron is a audio component for your stereo system that connects (via phone line network, ethernet, or USB) to your PC. It plays WMF and MP3. All storage is on the PC, all processing is done on the Audiotron. This is what TiVo needs to be like.
see also Audiotron Homepage
10:51:52 AM #
2000.04.26 (wednesday)
4:17:38 PM #
I don’t know how many of these work. Internet Explorer 5.x doesn’t support WAIS (did it ever?). Netscape 4.7 appears to support WAIS, but our proxy at work doesn’t. :(
3:17:38 PM #
Note: Development for WAISS ceased in 1996. No new features have been added since then.
3:15:17 PM #
Most Web users will find that the abundance of server files and search engines already available on the Web will make WAIS superfluous. However, librarians, medical researchers, and others may find some specialized information available through WAIS that is not currently available on the Web.
3:14:28 PM #
3:12:54 PM #
2000.04.25 (tuesday)
I get lots of management type workshop announcements… from my mailbox today:
CareerTrack presents:
How to Handle People With Tact and SkillGenerally I don’t have problems handling people with tact and skill. It’s the people without tact and skill that I need to learn how to handle.
3:05:31 PM #
It’s a game in which changing the rules is a move. The Initial Set of rules does little more than regulate the rule-changing process. While most of its initial rules are procedural in this sense, it does have one substantive rule (on how to earn points toward winning); but this rule is deliberately boring so that players will quickly amend it to please themselves.
3:04:29 PM #
The University of Southern California says it will not join other schools in blocking students’ access to the popular Napster Internet site, which lets people swap music.
However, it looks like they will still be policing the use of Napster…
USC issued a statement Friday saying it will permit its students access to Napster “only for demonstrably legal purposes from designated university personal computers and under university supervision.”
2:59:41 PM #
2000.04.23 (sunday)
2000.04.22 (saturday)
Fuzzy Logic is software that enables “SAFE” overclocking of the system inside of Windows - WITHOUT having to reboot.
10:41:29 PM #
11:01:15 AM #
From the Digital Technical Journal. I’ll have to read through some more of these archives.
10:28:09 AM #
2000.04.19 (wednesday)
By Matt Sone of South Park fame.
I became aware of an underlying superstructure that tied all my math knowledge together. Although I had no idea how to define that superstructure, just being aware of it was a big step…
When the rays of mathematical structure do puncture the clouds of one’s monkey brain, one sees, or rather feels, the interconnectedness of totality. All these different formulas and graphs and infinite series that you have learned and mastered your whole life all actually describe different parts of the same thing.
2:54:14 PM #
The following list is a collection of estimates of the quantities of data contained by the various media. Each is rounded to be a power of 10 times 1, 2 or 5.
1:23:27 PM #
2000.04.18 (tuesday)
Shavian is an alternative alphabet for writing English. Each letter of the alphabet is based exclusively on a single sound of the present-day English language, allowing all words to be spelt exactly as they sound… Consequently, the Shavian alphabet and its spelling system are more efficient, more intuitive, and much easier to learn. The alphabet was designed as an entry in a competition initiated by George Bernard Shaw — hence its name.
10:18:56 PM #
Currently engaged in a lawsuit against the BATF concerning the regulation of model rocket engines, which are not explosive. These engines are already regulated by the Department of Transportation, FAA, and Consumer Product Safety Commission, as well as by state and local ordinances, and advanced certification is required to purchase the really large engines.
4:45:22 PM #
The largest snak and snak by-products company in the world, makers of Glow Cheeze, MeatNickles, Crunchopolis and many other of your favorite treats. We serve taste buds around the whole world but never forget our ultimate destination.
Many people know Fertnel for all those unfortunate televised court cases, but we’re much more than 16,347 lawyers. We’re the world’s largest maker of diluted Xantham Gum.
3:21:17 PM #
Jessie is a German Shepherd and part-time computer expert. - When she isn’t designing award winning web pages, or appearing in local commercials, she enjoys pizza and steak. - She is cordial and many of her friends often refer to her as a “good girl.”
11:28:31 AM #
Just in time for easter!
Peep Health: Perhaps one of the most under-represented areas of study worldwide, issues of Peep well-being are only now making their way into the mainstream consciousness.
11:13:55 AM #
2000.04.17 (monday)
Since Freeh’s appointment in 1993, the FBI’s budget has more than doubled while most other agencies have seen substantial declines. He has gained unprecedented powers to demand that communications companies build wiretapping capability into their networks, including the ability to use cell phones as tracking devices. He’s won the power to conduct black-bag break-ins in the name of national security and to implement “roving wiretaps.”
Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, the father of the legal right of privacy, once wrote, “the greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning, but without understanding.” Good security starts with plugging holes, not creating new ones for the g-men to watch everyone.
9:03:12 PM #
8:59:19 PM #
Quickly calculate relative salaries between cities, approximate mortgate payments, and more.
4:20:33 PM #
Stephen Neal, an MP3.com lawyer, accused music industry lawyers of trying to deny the company the right to have their case properly heard in court. “They don’t want to embrace fair use [of their copyrights] — they don’t want to embrace a fair trial,” he said….
Neal argued that since the services require users to prove they have a CD before listening to the music on it, they will actually increase CD sales.
But music industry lawyers refused to concede that point, and also explained the labels’ plans to offer streaming services of their own, which they said are threatened by MP3.com’s services. “We have the right to exclude [MP3.com] from this business,” music industry lawyer Katherine Forrest said. “They envisioned a potential market that belongs to [the record labels].”
8:45:02 AM #
2000.04.16 (sunday)
Universal sound recorder. Capture live audio, line-in, CD. Convert different sound formats to WAVE.
10:23:53 PM #
2000.04.15 (saturday)
Super-tricked-out PC. Be sure to check the pix of the chrome exhaust pipe on the back.
4:43:10 PM #
Remember that the Web is still young. The Web currently has about 150 million users, and since it will eventually have about a billion users (in 5-10 years, depending on what predictions you believe) it follows that 850 million of the users are not online yet. There is no reason to believe that these many new users will necessarily use the same sites as current users. In fact, since they will be late adopters they may well have different tastes than the current early adopters. Thus, current market share predicts very little about a site’s future user base. (The design implications of the differences between early and late adopters are discussed in great detail in my partner’s book The Invisible Computer.)
4:39:26 PM #
2000.04.14 (friday)
But regardless of whether this theory of CSS’s purpose is correct, one thing is certainly clear — that DeCSS has not contributed in any appreciable way to copyright infringement of DVDs. Unfortunately for the defendants, the mere fact that there’s no incipient copyright infringement doesn’t address the full range of legal arguments arrayed against them. And fortunately for the plaintiffs, the weaknesses in those legal arguments have thus far escaped the courts that have been asked to issue the preliminary injunctions.
5:12:56 PM #
2000.04.12 (wednesday)
I finally got around to tracking down this classic USENET post.
When I use an editor, I don’t want eight extra KILOBYTES of worthless help screens and cursor positioning code! I just want an EDitor!! Not a “viitor”. Not a “emacsitor”. Those aren’t even WORDS!!!! ED! ED! ED IS THE STANDARD!!!
11:19:53 PM #
With the aid of my SatEvo program, I monitor elements for satellites which I regard as decay candidates, posting predictions of upcoming re-entries to the SeeSat-L mailing list (typically) every two or three weeks.
5:23:45 PM #
Nice application in either text mode or gratuitously cool graphics/java mode.
Find out the current status of any flights between major cities within the United States.
3:07:55 PM #
The “For Dummies” and “Complete Idiot’s Guide” series have both been huge successes. Too huge, perhaps - they’ve spawned some titles which seem (to me, anyway) unnecessary, redundant, or improperly targeted. Some topics just can’t be reduced to the level of a complete idiot.
Thus, I present “The Complete Idiot’s Guides for Dummies”. These are real titles from the “The Complete Idiot’s Guide” series, compressed into one or two sentences by yours truly.
1:34:21 PM #
I am not convinced that this is a good move - old-fashioned film still retains a number of advantages over digital, picture quality being just one of them. Think about how many pixels it would take to equal the resolution of film; now imagine how noticable it will be when blown up to movie-screen size. Lucas, however, seems convinced - I’ll have to see it with my own eyes.
The tests, which included image performance and system functionality, convinced George Lucas and producer Rick McCallum of the benefits of shooting in digital 24P at 1920 x 1080 HD sampling.
12:50:29 PM #
in a sign of the company’s dedication to its cloak-and-dagger image, visitors on Tuesday were required to sign nondisclosure agreements promising not to reveal where the high-security warehouse actually is.
…By placing key computer equipment under one IBX roof, companies can link directly to other, related Internet players with clear and quick connections that will eliminate network kinks and bottlenecks, the company says.
They will also be able to share maintenance costs and make new business alliances — all while safe in the knowledge that, should a tank-driving anti-Internet extremist trundle down a nearby highway, their business computers will be protected.
…Adelson pointed out the building’s Kevlar skin, the concrete planters designed to thwart car bomb attack, the biometric hand scanners, the bulletproof glass.
7:43:52 AM #
2000.04.11 (tuesday)
Featuring the 5 to 12 stories tall,
3-bedroom, 2-1/2 bath SkyHome™. Each model includes automated kitchen, talking elevator, SkyLounge, push-button controls, central-air, hot-tub, SkyTheater, fireplace, open-roof SkyDeck, home-office, fiber-optics, smart automation 2-car garage and emergency stairways.
4:37:45 PM #
According to the Space Command Center, Iridium will probably deorbit the satellites four at a time, firing their thrusters to drop them into the atmosphere, where they will most likely burn up. But “they expect to have some parts survive because these are pretty big satellites,” a spokesman, Maj. Perry Nouis, said.
3:35:16 PM #
2000.04.10 (monday)
The LLC that operates BMan, that takes your ticket money, that has HALF A MILLION DOLLARS in year-round salaries on the books, is asking you not only to buy a ticket, but to help build their part of the event. It gets better…
11:53:12 PM #
Reprint of article from Feb. 1950. A lot of it is right on, such as the predictions about fax machines and microwave ovens (elctronic stoves), but more is way off target…
What will the world be like in A.D. 2000?
Some of the food that Jane Dobson buys is what we miscall “synthetic.” In the middle of the 20th century statisticians were predicting that the world would starve to death because the population was increasing more rapidly than the food supply. By 2000, a vast amount of research has be conducted to exploit principles that were embryonic in the first quarter of the 20th century. Thus sawdust and wood pulp are converted into sugary foods. Discarded paper table “linen” and rayon underwear are bought by chemical factories to be converted into candy.
Because everything in her home is waterproof, the housewife of 2000 can do her daily cleaning with a hose.
6:19:15 PM #
2:24:26 PM #
2000.04.09 (sunday)
This Java applet formats freeway signs for you. You provide the route numbers, town names, exits, and your choice of arrows - and SignMaker draws a sign for you.
11:44:23 PM #
View highway route markers, past and present, from around the world…
11:18:51 PM #
6:29:32 PM #
Brought to you by The Good Bunny Doll Shop - Collectible dolls and Radio Synced clocks: two great tastes that taste great together!
If you could care less about “what time is it?”, don’t bother, you wouldn’t understand. In my support group I say “my name is Bob and I’m a compulsive clock and watch setter.”
6:27:50 PM #
People don’t go to movies to listen in on the private business of the people sitting just in front or just behind or just to the side of them. They go to see the movie. They go to be entertained. Someone else’s cell phone calls are not entertaining. Trust me on this. The most boring movie in the world is still not an eighth as mind-numbing as the typical in-theater cell phone conversation, which from my experience generally goes something like this: “Hey. What’s up? Whatcha doin’? Uh. Me? I’m at the movies. Doin’ anything later? Uh. Want me to come by? Uh.”
5:32:34 PM #
MindTerm is an entirely FREE SSH client program written in 100% pure Java… MindTerm can be run as a stand-alone program or as an applet in a webpage.
12:20:09 PM #
This picture of Pluto and Charon looks like two big disco mirror balls.
10:15:32 AM #
Animated shorts done with an Apple ][ style 16 color palette - may cause flashbacks.
10:08:43 AM #
2000.04.08 (saturday)
9:58:51 PM #
We level the playing field, teaching you how to get the best price on a new car, with fair dealer profit. We give you entertaining, useful examples, negotiating tips, free budget, loan & leasing Excel spreadsheets, and review the best internet car buying and car financing sites. We analyze loan & lease dilemmas, expose dealer scams, ads, trade-in value, dealer cost, buyer’s offers. Our Goal: To save you > $2000 and be the best free consumer resource anywhere. We hate to see you scammed by the “Morally Challenged”, so enjoy our politically incorrect site that dealer lawyers tried to shut down.
11:02:46 AM #
2000.04.07 (friday)
The FBI is seeking US $75 million from Congress for a massive data-gathering systems upgrade, which will include a new system called ‘Digital Storm’ that simplifies and accelerates the collection of electronic traffic carried by telephone lines and mobile phones.
2:04:11 PM #
A nice graphic illustration of some subtle browser differences. You can see how they do it by using the “zoom in” feature of Internet Explorer, or you could save the .gif to a file and open it in a viewer.
9:34:37 AM #
2000.04.06 (thursday)
Have you ever wanted to search for variations on a phrase? Tonight I wanted to find variations of “you put your chocolate in my peanut butter” so I tried google. First search I tried was “you put your” “in my” (with the quotes), but I noticed it was ignoring the stop word “in”, so I tried “you put your” “+in my” which was better, but still not good enough. A little more experimentation led to “you put your a +in my a” (again, with the quotes) which was right on. Since “a” is a stop word, google ignores it, but tries to maintain the integrity of your phrase, so the “a”s become similar to wildcards. I was a little disappointed with the actual content of the hits (mostly “you put your chocolate in my peanut butter” (the original phrase I started with) and a lot of porn stuff (”you put your tongue in my ear” was one of the nicer ones)), but it gave me exactly what I was looking for.
11:26:42 PM #
158 hits. (none of which, BTW, are related to Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups)
11:01:47 PM #
Reviews of commercially available clocks, instructions for building your own radio-synced clock, and more!
10:42:31 PM #
There’s nothing like the joy of receiving a precision timepiece as a holiday gift.
10:25:31 PM #
The Time and Frequency Division:
- Maintains the primary frequency standard for the United States.
- Develops and operates standards of time and frequency.
- Coordinates U. S. T&F standards with other world standards.
- Provides time and frequency services for United States clientele.
- Performs research in support of improved standards and services.
10:20:01 PM #
Seinfeld apparently asked Philbin to serve up the news for him. Philbin did it gladly, informing viewers that the little Seinfeld is scheduled to arrive in October. Clarke did not want to pinpoint the due date.
10:05:01 PM #
If the ghostly tail of gas could have been seen with the naked eye from Earth, it would have stretched almost halfway across the sky.
8:21:28 AM #
2000.04.05 (wednesday)
Do you feel you are being held back in life by not being able to drink as much Mountain Dew as you would like?
5:17:36 PM #
I lived in the Mallet Assembly while attending the University of Alabama and participated in this Spring ritual every year. I’m shocked (and relieved) that there is no mention of post-Columbine hysteria.
5:17:36 PM #
space.com has a story, along with a computer-genrated picture of what you can expect to see.
4:12:01 PM #
Tomorrow night, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Moon will all be within 6 degrees of each other and will be visible for a short while after sunset. The link above is to a sky chart for Atlanta, GA, at 20:00 EDT tomorrow, but it should be close enough no matter where you are.
4:08:10 PM #
2000.04.04 (tuesday)
whasup 287 whassup 2,576 whaassup 1 whasssup 19 whassssup 9 whasssssup 5 whassssssup 5 whasssssssup 8 whassssssssup 3 whasssssssssup 3 wazup 227 wazzup 1,225 wazzzup 24 wazzzzup 7 wazzzzzup 3 wazzzzzzzzzup 1 whazup 278 whazzup 664 whazzzup 14 whazzzzup 4 whazzzzzup 1 whazzzzzzup 1 whazzzzzzzzup 1 whazzzzzzzzzzup 1 wasup 442 wassup 5,344 waassup 5 wasssup 61 wassssup 9 wasssssup 6 wassssssup 4 wasssssssup 1 wassssssssup 1 wasssssssssup 1 wassssssssssup 1 wasssssssssssup 1 wassssssssssssup 1 wasssssssssssssup 2 wasssssssssssssssup 1 wassssssssssssssssssup 1
7:10:39 PM #
The DOJ was wrong to focus on the hardware OEMs. They have shown no ability or inclination to innovate. It’s not part of the formula of their industry. I’ve seen this confirmed over and over, even the freshly funded Linux clone vendors with permission to lose money, want to be nothing more than clone vendors, selling a commodity for thin margins (like Amazon). They’re all going after Dell, a company that has never put anything interesting on a hard disk, even when they have the chance to.
The DOJ takes a neophyte’s view of the Web, and focuses on the main thing a non-technologist can see, the hardware. It’s not the freedom of the hardware that counts, it’s the freedom of the minds of the creative people.
6:10:39 PM #
“The two models we tested triple the radiation to your brain, though we still don’t know for certain whether that radiation is harmful.”
Jacobs said there was no conclusive evidence that mobile phone radiation caused health problems, but neither had the fears been discounted.
4:49:28 PM #
A testimonial of the OptOut software I linked 27 Mar from alt.religion.kibology
Now my computer doesn’t crash and Big Brother doesn’t spy on me anymore. Probably…
10:31:13 AM #
2000.04.03 (monday)
7:01:37 PM #
This is probably packing the data closer than most CD-ROM drives’ tolerances will allow… I wouldn’t be surprised if these fail in a significant percentage of drives.
6:01:37 PM #
Nvidia chipset cards
Problem: There is a problem if using the newest Nvidia drivers. We have spoken with Nvidia and they have stated they are aware of it and are working on the problem.
Solution: The new drivers seem to fix this problem.
5:59:24 PM #
Matt Glavin, president of the Southeastern Legal Foundation, said the U.S. Bureau of the Census has gone beyond its mandate of counting people for congressional redistricting by gathering demographic information and asking questions about income, plumbing and commuting.
5:36:48 AM #
2000.04.02 (sunday)
Bizzare - has to be seen to be understood.
8:24:58 PM #
8:22:00 PM #
2000.04.01 (saturday)
[updated 14 may 01] - I noticed I’m getting lots of hits on this page all of a sudden. FYI, this link is to an april fools’ day joke from 2000.
7:09:38 AM #