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http://it.mycareer.com.au/industry/20001010/A367 25 -2000Oct6.html

An interesting development is the use of abstract computer-generated images for passwords - they display the images on screen and have the users pick which ones comprise the password. It's easier to remember since we're better at recalling images than random text. As a bonus it's impossible for users to tell other people the password if the images appear in different positions each login.

• Dr Nielsen's quick and dirty ways to better usability [Sydney Morning Herald] (Feb. 19)
• Keep the web simple, stupid [BBC] (Feb. 18)
• Miss the Web's early days? Use this time machine to visit! [ZDNet] (Feb. 15)
• The Future of Cellphones Is Here. Sort Of [New York Times] (Feb. 14)
• Olympics Site Not Medal-Worthy [WIRED News] (Feb. 11)

And do put the source after the title, the title is what is interesting here, knowing the source is secodary. This also helps to keep the primary information (title) on one line, if the secodary information (source + date) wraps then that is less of an issue.

Sun is out alright, they are going to release a Linux box based on intel x86. See here.

I admit that this comment is going to sound very ad hominum: We need to examine Obasanjo's claims carefully. He's worked for Microsoft very recently.

Ordinarily, I wouldn't call attention to this, but Microsoft as a company has a really bad track record of astroturfing just about any kind of on- or off-line forum:

• CompuServe forums
• Political Action Committee
• "Independent" research groups
• Letter writing campaigns
• MSNBC articles
• online poll 1, online poll 2
• ZDNet talk backs

Sorry, Dare, but that's the facts: if you lie down with pigs, you wake up smelling a bit like pig excrement.

Obviously you havn't read this, which discusses a thesis by a doctor of economics. I predict a time when people will be directly wired to virtual worlds, and not live in this one, a kind of voluntary 'matrix' scenario.

Except macs don't break down as easily and most of their parts are "commodity parts". The main thing to worry about replacing is the motherboard and you have to be an idiot or suffer unbelievable misfortune to break that. How many more articles do you have to read about Macs surviving fires while PCs in a room farther from the flame die before you understand that there is a bit more quality in an Apple package? Albeit, Macs do occasionally suffer from the "first off the line" bugs just as many or most manufactured items (e.g. cars) are prone.

Well, the Prime Minister is correct, the poster is wrong. Tuvalu sold the rights to .tv two years ago to a company called Idealab for $50 million. So Idealab lost money. Now Verisign is buying it for less than that. Big deal.

For 2, you're underestimating the cost of upgrading in an enterprise. If those 10,000 users are spread through 50 offices then the costs of upgrading are huge, both one time and on going. This is very different to the cost of a few hundred hard drives.

For 3, even the most closed software is still customizable. Our copy of office has had templates added, to give company standard documents and presentations.

For 4, it's nothing to do with the newness or size of the company. Even the biggest company or organization can have their websites hacked. However, if it is an ASP, then the company which owns the data has NO possibilty of preventing or correcting the problem.

TECHNOLOGY
Awarded jointly to John Keogh of Hawthorn, Victoria, Australia, for patenting the wheel in the year 2001 , and to the Australian Patent Office for granting him Innovation Patent #2001100012.

Sorry, somebody already patented that one in Australia last year: here. Is crazy, no?

So come on people! Its important to ensure that we crack down on those who cannot afford to buy ridiculously overpriced products, otherwise the rich won't carry on getting richer, and the poor won't be further enslaved to products they don't need but have be told to want.

Seriously though, it is times like this that are the perfect opportunity for the free-software advocates to get out there and push their product. Dammit, advertise, promote, market - let the common Joe or Jane know how they can break their bonds and join a community that ins't there to fleece them for every penny, but to try offer a more fulfilling alternative. And yes, money can and should be made from open source, but there is a difference between making money and gathering a treasure trove dragon-like.

I would love to see Mr Gates and ask him, "why are you collecting so much money? What are your motivations? Do you really believe you are Smaug?"

Oh, I'm British btw, so I probably should just shut up, but I do the same here: everyone I talk to about software i try to explain the benefits of OSS. I hope I am slowly getting through.

~Dan

--Fools going past what they need running after what they want. -- TK

That's not an isolated case either. Another Powermac got toasted and lived to tell about it and the pictures to prove it (Babelfish translation, site is in spanish).

Although I am a mac freak, I would have NEVER thought that a Powermac would be able to withstand THAT kind of heat/damage. Even though the outside will look like a warzone has taken place, be assured that your data will be safe.

Maybe this has been posted before but according to this
Australian news item Microsoft are not really keen on NGOs using their software. Certainly "support" does not seem to describe their behaviour.

Never submit a story about a newly descovered security hole in unix/linuxsecurity holes (and here) about linux generally get ignored.

1. Original (no prior art)
   
2. Not obvious to one skilled in the field
   

Personally, I think he's trying to avoid a massive flame war. Look at this quote from an article referenced in Slashdot a few days ago:

"Free Software Foundation founder and major developer of the operating system known as GNU/Linux, Richard Stallman"

Major developer? Since when? It sounds like Stallman is going out of his way to co-opt Linux (he emailed Taco asking him to link to the story) and Linus doesn't want to play. Good for him.

I live near Indianapolis, IN, and the city recently signed an agreement with CityNet to allow them to run fibre optic lines through the existing sewer systm to connect buildings to the main fibre circuits for the city. This approach is already in use in Albuquerque, NM. Rather than ripping up our roads, a small robot travels along the sewer, laying the fibre. This is great news for those of us who drive through Indy, as there are already enough road construction projects clogging the streets.

This article provides some more technical details about the claims.

The new article as well as the earlier one both say that the technology is "backed by a report from Monash University" {in Melbourne}, but back in April, Monash vigorously disputed claims of their support. They conducted an independent review but the compression algorithm was black-boxed. The company may be misrepresenting the purpose and parameters of the review, from the university's point of view.

I was once astroturfed by LinuxGram.

http://www.slashdot.org/articles/01/05/01/1936218. shtml

I was saying that LinuxGram sometimes posts a lot of Crap. Specifically an interview with Volker Wiegand by Maureen OGara where she took everything he said out of context and misquoted him in several places. I cant find the story on their site right now. But here is a summary from fairfax it.
http://it.mycareer.com.au/breaking/20010208/A20552 -2001Feb8.html

Here is a link with Volker Wiegands responce where he says that Maureen OGara deliberately misquoted him. http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2001-02 -08-002-20-NW-SS

When I posted the comment on Slashdot, two people created new Slashdot logins and replied. One was called SuSE_Rulez and the other was called ingenuity7. You can tell they were knew logins because they hadnt posted before or since. And Slashdot gives the UID numbers out consecutively and I checked to see what slashdot UID I would get on that day and it came right after theirs. Also look how ingenuity7 refers to LinuxGram as CSN which is its less well known parent company. To me he seems to know a lot more than normal people do about LinuxGram.

Of course, when I was astroturfed by LinuxGram I was hardly surprised but this story about LinuxToday is disapointing. Other journalists have replied to my face if I disagreed with them and thats the way it should be done.

SCC is 60Gbps and is primarily used by Optus.

http://it.mycareer.com.au/breaking/2001/07/30/FFX9 39Y4RPC.html

You know, when I did a search on "teoma search engine technology" on several search engines (including google and teoma of course), the only one that came up with a decent result was Lookle, with this result from about.com: Review of Teoma Search Engine - Tasty New Search Engines Part 2. Now Lookle is somewhat innovative, and copycats google to no end, and were apparently threatened by google (trademark, not patent) last June. As far as I know, nothing came of it because google decided not to pursue.

Now as I see it there's two kinds of companies out there: those that are too busy innovating to sue, and those too busy suing to innovate. Adobe seems to have joined the Dark side; But Google's been making all sorts of cool changes lately, enough to make you think they hired more linux geeks, not more lawyers. So I doubt anything like a patent suit will cross their minds. When it does, I switch search engines. It hasn't for, what, seven years?

And THAT's why google's *my* favorite search engine.

Gremio

And here too:

A columnist from The Age dared report that Australian IT managers had no plans to run Linux in their datacenters

The resposes he got were along the same level.

From the Unisys History Newsletter : "The first UNIVAC passed its formal acceptance test on March 29-30, 1951 and was turned over to the Census Bureau, which operated it in the factory for nearly a year. A formal dedication ceremony was held on June 14, but coverage in the general press was minimal."

http://australianit.news.com.au/common/storyPage/0 ,3811,2085164%5E442,00.html

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/2001/06/06/ FFXHH7FZLNC.html

http://it.mycareer.com.au/breaking/2001/06/06/FFX7 G6FZLNC.html

http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/telco/story/0,2000020 799,20227632,00.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/nat/newsnat-6j un2001-50.htm

http://www.whirlpool.net.au

http://www.a1h.com