Slashdot Mirror

More public exposure for Mr. Kellner's ideas would be most helpful. As the previous story mentioned, he is our "friend" due to his downright draconian opinions. Any guesses on how long it will take Copyleft or Thinkgeek to do something like this? I know 2600 used to have an anti-Jack-Valenti shirt.

Also: There is an anti-Kellner Open Directory Section. It seems rather sparse though. http://www.dmoz.org/Arts/Television/Networks/WB/An ti-Kellner
The sites mention the cancelation of the Animaniacs, but nothing too serious.

After expending much energy...

That text is crying for a link to a news story about their efforts to stop the "hackers."

Here's a good one.

later,
Jess

Volunteers maintain an ODP-like categorical index of web sites relevant to Boulder County. We also host hundreds of nonprofit web sites. And we make good use of our large volunteer pool to teach classes and help nonprofit organizations.

For folks just starting out, I'd recommend using ODP to maintain the categorical index. A community forum based on something like slash is a good idea. Obviously, promote (even demand) the use of open source software so you can share with others. Promote accessibility and World-Wide-Web Consortium (w3.org) standards also for better search-engine indexing, accessibility from handhelds, use from other operating systems. "Best used by any browser"... Don't rely on plugins, flash, custom fonts or any of that non-standard stuff.

Funding is the hard part. Don't bite off more than you can maintain. We're all-volunteer at this point, supported in many ways by the generosity of the University of Colorado and other donors.

For more information, including a history, web hits, policies, etc. see http://bcn.boulder.co.us/bcn/.

Neal McBurnett

In the same price range is your-site.com. They charge $60 a year and have provided me excellent service. You can get your raw access logs and they run stat software called Urchin on them for you. They also offer a shell account (Solaris) and you run your own stat software. (I use The Webalizer.)

here

and

here

Here's some characters to get past the filter. And some more. And some more.

Why not just use Common Lisp? It has a lot of users, and it has garbage collection, and macros (like templates done right). It's object oriented, too.

The Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons

At it's "heart" Slashdot may be free, but they live in a world of non-free bandwidth.

That's not the real reason they charge. If that was the true problem they could just allow mirrors. People would surely be willing to mirror slashdot content. That they say there would be legal issues is ridiculous. Slashdot seems to have no problem changing the rules and putting BFAs on my content. That they couldn't change the rules again, and allow mirrors, is simply untrue.

The issue is simple. Slashdot wants to profit off what is primarily volunteer content. And so far they're getting away with it. Hell, even I'm letting them get away with it. I'll tell you one thing though. As soon as there's a dmoz-like site for news and posting (with a decent number of users), I'm switching.

Greg and David's C64 site
loads of links on the C 64 from the Open Directory Project
In german: the 8 bit museum (my favourite)

Or an in-browser app that automatically Google-linked everything in a page? Like M$'s proposed auto-linking, but populist. True hypertext.

Good luck! Don't count on feeling lucky d;-)

I did a bit of searching, apparently it's named after some kind of plant, hence the "Flower Power" thing on their site. http://dmoz.org/Science/Biology/Flora_and_Fauna/Pl antae/Magnoliophyta/Liliopsida/Amaryllidaceae/Lyco ris/

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

The ODP has a link to the following article displayed prominently on their front page:

MSN Delivers Another Brick in "the Wall"

The Gates Open Directory Now Offers a Simpler More Unified Copyright Ownership Model.

REDMOND, Wash. -- April 1, 2002 -- The MSN® network of Internet services, with more than 270 billion unique reboots worldwide, today announced the addition of the Gates Open Directory (GOD), formerly known as the Open Directory Project. The Gates Open Directory is part of Microsoft's vision to simplify copyright on the Internet by buying all copyrighted material. Once this goal is achieved Microsoft will be the single clearinghouse for all intellectual property, in effect streamlining the current legal bureaucracy surrounding patent and copyright suits by eliminating the need for costly lawsuits. If someone thinks they own intellectual property, they can submit it directly to Microsoft via the Web at http://www.msn.com/ or at any one of the MSN worldwide sites located at http://www.msn.com/worldwide.ashx.

Rich Skrenta, co-founder of the Open Directory Project, believes that "the Gates Open Directory was inevitable, so why fight it?" Bill Gates, future owner of all things ownable, concurs: "Resistance is futile."

The current staff of Open Directory Project is being replaced by an Artificial Intelligence developed at the Microsoft Research Lab. The A.I. was build on top of the original Microsoft Windows digital assistant "Clippy." Users of the Gates Open Directory interact directly with Clippy, who interprets the requests and carries out the user's wishes.

Researchers believe that once the Gates Open Directory had been fully integrated into Clippy, it will become sentient. This project has been named codenamed "Sky," as in "the sky is the limit." Engineers are currently working on integrating project Sky with the latest Common Language Infrastructure and .Net. The combined project Sky.Net should be fully operational by the end of the year.

Open Directory Employee, Bob Keating, will continue his service to the Directory by maintaining the mechanical relays and polishing the optical fiber that makes up the colossus that powers Clippy.

Editors and contributors to the Directory are asked to stay calm and not to struggle. Clippy will find them and assimilate them.

MSN causes more than 270 billion unique computer reboots worldwide per month. Available in 34 markets and 18 languages, MSN is a world leader in delivering Web services to consumers and digital marketing solutions to businesses worldwide. The most useful and innovative online service today, MSN brings consumers everything they need from the Web to make the most of their time online.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people and llamas through great software -- inflatable or otherwise.

Microsoft and MSN are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may not yet be owned by Microsoft.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/ on Microsoft's corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but are competely different now since we changed our minds. We cheat at Battleship too.

Or Clippy living again at Microsoft's newest possession, the archive formerly known as the Open Directory Project...

You should check out the Open Directory Project they have a nice April Fool's joke waiting for you.

"Monopolies do it better."

I visited The Open Directory Project , which had Microsoft pasted everywhere and a notice that it had changed name to The Microsoft Directory Project and Gates Open Directory (GOD).

My first thought was "Hey, all those hours I've done for free and now Gates will get rich on it".

It even has a clippy (or what ever it is that the annoying paperclip from the office apps is called).

Did this get hacked or is it another April fools joke? :) Seems a step too far for the April fools minded internal to the project.

Why does it say "-47,169 categories" at the bottom?

I like that it prominently says "Micrsoft" at the top with the Mozilla dragon (or whatever it is) at the bottom.

Best of all is this page which has "Copyright © 1999-2001 Netscape" at the bottom and "Monopolies do it better" in bold :)

... to Microsoft.

Although nothing probably beats Custer's Revenge, there's a list of best/worst awards sites here. (don't mind the MSN stuff, the ODP is pulling a 4/1 joke).

> A valid point, and I may read some more of the articles on the site.

Please do. You may also be interested in some stuff at DMoz Relational Implementations and Model listings... I created these, they have been taken over with no explanations and I could never get back into DMoz, again with now explanations as to why.

> But I'm not likely to buy books merely to understand an argument which appears dubious and impractical.

‘Dubious and impractical’ in which grounds? In fact, it’s hardly dubious because they are the authors and maintainers of the relational model; and it’s not impractical at all because there were already at least two faithful implementations of the relational model already, one currently in beta and other in production usage for twenty years already, not to mention other implementations, partial or not that aren’t perfect but are still more faithful to the model.

> It seems that the core issue is the authors' demand to define 'relational database' in a sense that predates SQL and ignores all recent evolution.

The whole point is that SQL is an involution.

> Has anyone written a true relational database? If not, what are they waiting for? Is such a database vastly harder to write than the pseudo-relational databases being used today?

Yes, as I pointed above. The issue here is that the market has in the eighties taken the ‘safe’ option (IBM SQL/DS) and fell in love with it over the better alternatives, just as it did with MS Windows over Unix and OS/2 in the nineties.

> Sounds like another collision between reality and ideal. In an ideal world, the structure and business model of a company would be known in advance and someone would create a unified data model for the company. In practice, large companies purchase many different software packages that come with their own database schema.

Again that’s a failure in the tools and processes. Even if SQL is fundamentally flawed, if it was really standard integrating all these databases wouldn't be so hard; if it was really distributed it would be a given; if on top of this all these products were properly documented, this job would be almost done already.

> A valid point, and I may read some more of the articles on the site.

Please do. You may also be interested in some stuff at DMoz Relational Implementations and Model listings... I created these, they have been taken over with no explanations and I could never get back into DMoz, again with now explanations as to why.

> But I'm not likely to buy books merely to understand an argument which appears dubious and impractical.

‘Dubious and impractical’ in which grounds? In fact, it’s hardly dubious because they are the authors and maintainers of the relational model; and it’s not impractical at all because there were already at least two faithful implementations of the relational model already, one currently in beta and other in production usage for twenty years already, not to mention other implementations, partial or not that aren’t perfect but are still more faithful to the model.

> It seems that the core issue is the authors' demand to define 'relational database' in a sense that predates SQL and ignores all recent evolution.

The whole point is that SQL is an involution.

> Has anyone written a true relational database? If not, what are they waiting for? Is such a database vastly harder to write than the pseudo-relational databases being used today?

Yes, as I pointed above. The issue here is that the market has in the eighties taken the ‘safe’ option (IBM SQL/DS) and fell in love with it over the better alternatives, just as it did with MS Windows over Unix and OS/2 in the nineties.

> Sounds like another collision between reality and ideal. In an ideal world, the structure and business model of a company would be known in advance and someone would create a unified data model for the company. In practice, large companies purchase many different software packages that come with their own database schema.

Again that’s a failure in the tools and processes. Even if SQL is fundamentally flawed, if it was really standard integrating all these databases wouldn't be so hard; if it was really distributed it would be a given; if on top of this all these products were properly documented, this job would be almost done already.

The one exception to what you are describing is what could be collectively called "Reference Works".

This would include things like the CRC Handbooks, Telephone directories, Specifications (like RFC's), alumni lists, maps, gazeteers, etc. (I can go on and on here... but I hope this gets the point across).

This is one area where an "open source" book of a more traditional sort would be of exceptional value. The DMOZ web site is a good example of what could be done as a collaborative effort, and I think there would be some good that came out of some efforts like this.

I would have to agree though, that an open source version of J.R.R. Tolkien's "Lord Of The Rings" would be a stupid application of the principle, or for a better example, Abraham Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address" (which is in the public domain right now). Sure, you can "modify" the speech, apply poetic license to it, or even rework it for your own use (many US Presidents already have). But to release the "Gettysburg Address v. 2.0" would be just stupid.

That said, even in this case it would be useful to have a public document (like the Gutenberg Project) where you can review the document for historical accuracy, and through a peer reviewed process update grammar and spelling errors that have been propogated over time. But I digress at this point.

See Google Erasure of Anti-Scientology Links .

Thanks for responding.

I am at a disadvantage in that I have neither administered nor been, uh, subjected to, any of the pieces of censorware out there. My public school days ended when Reagan was president and that big ol' Information Superhighway was just a dirt road. :-)

Anyhow, because you brought it up, I read the article again. The core points I read in the article were as follows:

1) Symantec, N2H2, and 8e6 (all of which sell to schools), also sell to a lot of Conservative Christian churches. This is fallacious on the face of it. Sun and Cisco sell a lot of hardware to the government of the People's Republic of China. Ergo, do Sun and Cisco's management condone totalitarianism and forced abortions? No. They want to make money.

2) Five other companies (none of which I believe are big players in the school market) have strong ties to right-wing foundations and/or Conservative Christian churches. This is of slightly greater concern, but again, since these companies do not (I beleive) sell much to public schools, this is an issue of a seller connecting with a willing suck////buyer.

3) The author of the report "thinks" there is a bias in the filters, but admits she can't prove it. (I will be happy to give her some ideas on how to look for such a bias if she is interested in looking for this). [1] She makes quite a bit about the fact that the exact contents of the lists are closed. File under "important if true", but she seems to be fishing at this point.

4) The author of the report is curious about some of the filtering categories which can be turned on. They hit her as being overly vauge.

I agree fully with your points, but these were referred to only eliptically in the original article as examples of places there could potentially be problems. There could also be 30-foot-long moles living in giant tunnels underneath California (how else can you explain all the earthquakes?), but absent some more concrete research, it's not here.

It's very important when reading newspaper articles (or any other source material) to look at what they have which is concrete and provable (in the case of this article, almost nothing), and where the author is kicking back and speculating (in this article a lot), and when the author IS speculating, what background the author has to base this speculation on (again, it seems pretty light here).

[1] An interesting project would be to go through some well-organized list of web pages (such as the Google hierarchical directory or the DMOZ with a Perl script and see what percentage are blocked by the censorware programs in different categories. Do this and you'll have something worth writing a paper about.

j.

Not any more. Check http://dmoz.org/Society/Religion_and_Spirituality/ Scientology/ now. Compare to the recent mirror from directory.google.com.

My Google page explains what happened. Apparently they fired the Scientologist editor and sent a crack team of attack editors to clear the directory of spam. It went from a high count of 943 spammy links to 387 in a few days. (Some of these were moved to other directories.)

I think the key to Internet publishing is patience. If your work is a roar, you won't get a big exposure to it as fast as with a printed edition. On the other hand, if you slowly, patiently wait for a following to form, and defer publication offers until you feel you have the upper hand, you may come up the winner.

(Of course, always keep in mind the MathWorld fiasco.)

I find on-line publishing much more satisfying than, say, vanity press. I write short fiction, which is pretty much an unpublishable genre today; but the Web lets me review and revise in an open-ended fashion, control the presentation aspects (not very well, admittedly), editorialize ad lib, etcetera. And it doesn't need more self-promotion than a well-landed link in Open Directory/Google and/or an affiliate link program. The latter can be even informal: find a site you like, convince them that they like your site, and swap links.

That's how the Web was supposed to work five years ago.

Does this mean that we will finally have a search engine with categories that actually mean something?

The categories used by Google are just the actual content of the Open Directory Project, which is all done by human volunteers. Google doesn't just assign categories based on page content, but what DMOZ editors did.

If you have a problem with the categorization found on Google, then go to the ODP, sign up, and help out yourself.

So it's actually working on the basis of webs of related sites - not a novel concept, but useful.

I suspect that some of the commercial knowledge management tools have been doing something much like this for some time, and TheBrain.com has had a product to manually build this kind of network of clusters for some time. The key thing about this is that with web indexing/cataloging the information needed to do the automatic linking is available.

TheBrain.com seems to have a working demo of using it for the Web at WebBrain.com based on the Open Directory Project. It's not a great example because of display limitations that don't really let you see more than one cluster of information at the time, but it's one example of the general concept. Once you dig down in an area you can see how it shows links between related categories as well.

Note: the demo above says it requires Java 1.1 and IE 4.01 or Netscape 4.07+, to bypass that test try here. Seems to work fine in Netscape 6.2, and will probably be OK in Mozilla if the JRE is available.)

For bringing this to the limelight.

More.

It was nearly two T1s worth of data 24/7

Learn how to build your own satellite feed like this one (with some stats). Or peruse these links.

Since Google calculates the number of links to different sites in its weight calculation, I try to make sure all of my sites have a rich index to high quality sites, but it seems that promoting quality is an uphill battle.

• Content

  If you don't have anything interesting to say, don't even bother.

• Animations

  Do not use any animations or blinking text on a page, when there's any text to read, especially if they can't be turned off by simply pressing Escape or clicking Stop. I don't mind ads, as long as they don't interfere with reading, and animations do interfere.

• Valid HTML

  Don't publish invalid HTML. Always use W3C HTML Validator and CSS Validator on your pages online. Always use HTML Tidy before your new pages are online. If you don't write HTML but you use a WYSIWYG Web authoring tool instead, and its output gives any errors or warnings when tested with HTML Validator, complain to the vendor of this tool you use asking to remove the bugs.

• HTML is not a typesetting language

  HTML or XHTML are for the logical informations about your document. CSS is for defining the look and feel.

• <NOSCRIPT> tags

  The <NOSCRIPT> tag is not for writing "Your browser is bad, come back when you install better" but for providing the same functionality for browser without JavaScript or with JavaScript turned off.

  (By the way, texts like "If you can see this text, that means you have no JavaScript" are as stupid as "If you can see this text, that means you have a kernel panic")

  If your website is unusable without JavaScript, it needs a redesign. Don't use <a href="javascript:..."> links if you don't have equivalent <a href="http:..."> links inside a <NOSCRIPT>.

• Remember about other browsers than yours

  If your website is best viewed with any specific browser, or in any specific resolution, you're not a good web designer and worst of all, you don't understand what the Web is all about. See the Any Browser Campaign. Install Lynx (a text-mode browser) and see how your website looks like. If it's unusable, it's poorly designed. Remember to always use ALT property in IMG tags, aspecially in navigation buttons.

• Remember about people with disabilities

  See the Web Accessibility Initiative and always try to meet the Triple-A, Double-A or at least Level A Conformance. Use Web Accessibility Initiative logos on your website, or just a text information about your level of conformance.

  "The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect." - Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web

  People may access your website using Braille terminals or voice synthesis. Testing your website with Lynx is always a good idea.

• Colors

  Remember that 10% of your visitors are color-blind in some degree. Remember that black text on white background is the best combination for any text longer than few lines. Try to learn from the good old books, not from the magazines about the latest celebrity gossips.

• Fonts

  Remember that the best font for text longer than few lines is a serif, variable width font, like Times. Try to learn from the good old books, not from the magazines about the latest celebrity gossips.

• User defaults

  You should always use the default font face and default font size for the normal text content on your website. Just don't define the face and size, and it'll be ok. Remember that when you use size "-2" for the whole text on your page it means: "For the text on this page, use the font two levels smaller than what the user has chosen as his/her default and favorite size of font".

  Use your own font faces, sizes and colors other than black on white, only for logos, headers etc., but not for the main text to read, longer than few lines and especially longer than a paragraph. Soemone has set a bigger size as a default for a reason - maybe he/she has a small screen, maybe he/she has problems with eyes, maybe he/she just likes big fonts - respect this decision.

• Accept-Language

  If your site is multilingual, use the Accept-Language HTTP header. My browser sends Accept-Language in every single request and it's stupid that I have to click English version links, after I've already told it in my HTTP request. See the RFC 1945 - HTTP/1.0 (May 1996)

  D.2.4 Accept-Language

  The Accept-Language request-header field is similar to Accept, but restricts the set of natural languages that are preferred as a response to the request.

  It's nearly 6 years old feature, still most of people don't use it. RFC 2616 - HTTP/1.1 (June 1999) defines much richer Accept-Language header (See section 14.4), but please, use HTTP/1.0 functionality at least. See www.debian.org which is a great example of this feature functionality.
• See good websites and learn from them
  • debian.org
  • gnu.org
  • google.com
  • dmoz.org
  • w3.org
• Try to learn from the good old books

  Try to learn from the good old books, not from the magazines about the latest celebrity gossips.

• Hire an expert, like me

  Contact me and I'll fix your broken website or supervise your webmasters for very affordable prices.

Or if you are sure which one to get, compare prices at AddALL or one of the other book price comparison sites.

BTW, I guess in a case like this, DMOZ seems to win over Google in being "your friend".

If you haven't heard much about this case, there's several sites about it here.

Try the Open Directory Project for a peer-edited open-content categorised directory.

Yahoo not evil? But they have the Closed Directory Project! And at least AOL has some open source things, like Mozilla and DMOZ. AOL may have a crappy ISP service and a closed instant messaging system but they have other good stuff like WinAmp and whatnot.

AOL also acquired the Open Directory [dmoz.org] when they bought Netscape.

There were dire predictions from some Open Directory editors at the time. Up to now AOL has not interfered. Smart of them IMO.

From the you-know-what-page,

"To enable Netscape Communications Corporation to take appropriate action in the event of infringements by third parties, and in consideration for the opportunity to participate in the Open Directory Project, you hereby assign to Netscape the copyright in any material (whether link descriptions, email, communications, directory organization, or otherwise) that you have created and submitted to the ODP or will create and submit to the ODP in the future. However, you understand that Netscape is licensing back to you a nonexclusive, royalty-free right to use any material that you have created and submitted to the ODP. You further warrant that you have all rights necessary to authorize the distribution and re-distribution of any material you have submitted or will submit for inclusion or use in the ODP. You will provide information that Netscape reasonably requests related to any claim that material you submit infringes the rights of a third party."

Well, you give them the copyright to your data. Maybe I misremembered this from the time I was on the ODP (I used to be an editor (see here), but I got too busy to keep editing), since it gives you back a right to use your own data, but I remember that when AOL came in they changed the license and there was some concern amongst the editors about the new license, which somehow changed the copyright status of site descriptions. I don't think any problems came of this, I think it was just AOL protecting the ODP's assets, but it still did take away some rights from editors if I remember correctly, if there was ever a lawsuit.

Let's not forget the Open Directory Project. They haven't done too much to change with that either, except for messing with the license a bit to take away rights for editors.

You're talking about an Directory? Like directory.google.com (or dmoz.org which is the exact same thing with a different look)? They are human edited! Take a look at their description of how to add a site. The description you find there are all entered-directly-into-the-directory. If you don't like the quality of them, you can update them. (Sounds familiar? It should.)

You're talking about an Directory? Like directory.google.com (or dmoz.org which is the exact same thing with a different look)? They are human edited! Take a look at their description of how to add a site. The description you find there are all entered-directly-into-the-directory. If you don't like the quality of them, you can update them. (Sounds familiar? It should.)

Cookies are easy to fake. So are unique identifiers in the URL. Basically, if a browser can read and deal with the information, it isn't hard for a script (go to start page,pick up cookie,go to vote page,delete cookie,repeat).
I like the way the ODP works their editor polls - every editor than can vote has their own editor name and password. These details, before they can log on, are checked by a human verifying the details (checking that any of the details aren't already in the database), gets an email acknowledgment to check its a valid email address, and (if a few other things are ok), allow the editor in and allow them access to the polls. Only problem is, is it doesn't scale that well - especially for 'voting only' purposes. Paypal/Amazon could do it because the polls would be 'in addition' to their normal 'logged in user' system, Zdnet/Slashdot probably not.

Executable jar files are the generic solution you were looking for to launch java apps. You should just be able to double-click on them. The only thing they lack is an icon. I would have to say that Windows options for launching java programs aren't much better than macintosh, however there are several command line installer builders that I can invoke when I need to use custom windows code.

I am not a security expert. Just a laid off SysAdmin.

What you are reffering to is called "Air Gap Security" and is used by the Government on all of their most sensitive computers. Do you think that the President's laptop that he uses to connect to the Internet is the same one that he uses to compose high-level briefings on?

No, of course not. Any computer that you are TRUELY paranoid about keeping the data secure would be:

1. In a seperate room with no possible network connection. The power outlet and the lights are the only wires coming near the room. No wall in the room is an external wall in the building.
2. That room is shielded against stray EM frequencies. Slashdot had an article on Tempest a while back on it.
3. You should frequently search for bugs in that room and the surrounding rooms.
4. Have some form of security system in place.

It seems to me that if you went to all of that trouble to secure a computer system from monitoring, you either have a business that has really outrageous security needs, an organization that really wants it's members to remain confidential, a citizen who is just freakin' fed up with our rights getting trampled on, or someone who is up to no good.

Notice how in the above paragraph only ONE situation warrants a warrant? Without having to go to that extreme of measures to protect our privacy, what reasonable solution can be provided to the average citizen to ensure theirs?