Though I am not a big audio/video file (I still have a 2 head VCR), just the idea that a remote company can have control over how I use my personal equipment scares me. All I really have to say is that hopefully, once this stuff really starts to hit the market in full force, the mass market will soon figure out that they're being led like calf to slaughter and all of this content control management crap will die a death of 1,000 DIVX's.
Imagine it, if you register through direct dial-up the caller-id packets will flow to the clearinghouse and your name and number can be cross referenced in a database to get your address this can then be used as a key to other databases (lather, rinse, repeat). If you register through the internet, the process of registering itself can place a cookie on your machine that now M$ can sell web-bugs to assist web sites in personally identifying each user. (this will be marketed to consumers as "for their protection" -- Picture B.G. in a fuzzy blue sweater sitting on a stool changing from his Doc Martins into his tennis shoes saying "remember the internet is full of _bad people_ and M$ is simply looking out for your safety in my network neighborhood" -- Ohhhhhh Thank-you Mr. Gates)
In every physical product you can simply toss thos demographic collection^h^h^h^h^h^h... warranty registration cards away and still use the product, completely anonymous to the manufacturer. However, with mandatory electronic authentication anonymity will be gone. Even if you try to block your caller-id packets with *67, 1-800 numbers still get your data. Even if you fill in bogus personal information (which I forsee M$ will interpret as fraud and thus a crime) they at least have your IP address and date and time of your connection which can easily be cross-referenced with your ISP (one litte subpoena is all it takes).
Now imagine Windows Update. Delete that cookie from your hard drive and you must re-authenticate or "NO SECURITY PATCH FOR YOU."
What was that word that judge used to describe Bill Gates? Ahhhhh yessssss NAPOLEANIC!!!!!
Actually, I said measurable not significant. You are right that the dilation factor would be quite small. In fact the dilation factor would be between 1.00000112500189844105957732041824 and 1.0000030422361049666869703351748 for speeds between 450,000 m/s and 740,000 m/s. However, over the course of 2 weeks this dilation factor for time would mean that the a "stationary" (quotes intentional) object would experience 1209600 and the space ship would experience between 1209596 and 1209599 seconds.
OK, so you're not that much younger than your twin brother, but you are by as much as 4 seconds.:>
Assuming the 2-week estimate is based on the minimum distance this means that it would take 336 hours to travel the 54,500,000 km for an average speed of about 45,000 m/s. If the acceleration of the ship could be held constant at 10 m/s^2 this means that a near Earth gravity effect could be achieved for about 75 minutes at the begining and the end of the trip. A near Mars gravity effect (3.7 m/s^2) could be maintained for over 3 hours on each end of the trip.
In order to maintain an Earth like gravity for the entire trip the ship would need to attain the speed of 740,000 m/s (accelerate at 10 m/s^2 half way out and then flip the ship around and decelerate at 10 m/s^2 the rest of the way). In order to maintain a Mars like gravity for the entire trip the ship would need to attain the speed of 450,000 m/s (accelerate at 3.7 m/s^2 half way out and then flip the ship around and decelerate at 3.7 m/s^2 the rest of the way).
Of course either 450,000 m/s or 740,000 m/s would give us measurable time/space/mass dilation problems. So you gain a little weight you get a little smaller and you age a littler slower -- basicly you would be young, short, heavy and hauling ass!!!
In the specs, it specifically states that audio quality will not be measured it just says that the audio must be understandable. What is to stop the RIAA from strong arming manufacturers of these devices into limiting MP3 playback rates to say 64 or 128 bits, regardless of the rate in which they were recorded?
Today MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube Announces that computers no longer need monitors. Thanks to Moore's law, computing power has been doubling every 18-24 months. As such we now have CPUs that operate at well above the 750,000,000,000,000Hz range, well above the range of visible light. However, due to the high frequency with which theses CPUs operate they can not be very large. Thanks to advances in parallel processing by MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube modern computers can be produced with millions of CPU's all working simultaneously. By arranging these CPUs in a square or rectangular pattern the computer's CPU grid becomes the computer's visual interface device. MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube has announced their next goal will be to make the worlds first parallel processing tanning bed.
Since PI is actually defined as the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter this value changes with the geometry.
Now I will not deny that finding the quadrillionth digit of this ratio in Euclidian/Plane/2-D Geometry can be a bit tricky. However, finding the quadrillionth digit of this ratio in "Taxi-Cab" geometry is quite simple -- it's 0. In fact this ratio is exactly 4!!! For that matter if they were working in 1-D the value of this ratio is exactly 2!!! Maybe they were working in "Taxi-Cab" geometry?????
{/HUMOR}
This message has been formatted for the humor impaired.
This perfectly fits the definition of an e-mail virus. I subsrcibe to MSN and everybody in my address book gets an e-mail inviting them to subscribe. If one or more of them do subscribe then everybody in their address books gets an e-mail and so on and so on and so on...
What you are suggesting doing, I classify as passive monitoring. In other words your employee has retrieved the data, he has formatted it as he sees fits and then sent it out onto the network where you are hoping to catch it. This is like trying to shut the doors after the cows get out. Even if you could reliably catch 100% of the inappropriate outbound traffic, your employees could simply write the information on a piece of paper or memorize it or anything like that. You will be very hard pressed to stop this.
What I suggest you do is active monitoring. Log the queries your employees make to your database. Log the information that they extract from your files. If you see an employee is extracting a lot of personal information, ask him what he is doing. If you see an employee is always looking at the same thing, ask him why he needs to be constantly updated on the status of this thing.
Now most of your employees will have true business uses for the information they look up and you should probably be able to develop some sort of pattern of information need and usage for each employee. Then when an employee starts looking at data that he doesn't ordinarily need to you can send a warning to his supervisor to check on his data queries.
This will probably be a much more effective approach. Oh, and BTW, as always be a good sys-admin and don't keep this practice a secret. Tell your employees that you will be monitoring their extracts. Most people don't really care if they are monitored at work, what really pisses them off is when the monitoring is done in secret.
The ComputerWorld article mentions Amazon.coms 30-day price guarantee. But, imagine that Amazon.com sets a cookie on your computer. This information could contain information on the item you purchased and the price you paid for it. Then when you dutifully check back on Amazon.com withing 30-days to check the price Amazon.com knows not to show you a price lower than it already quoted to you.
Does this price guarantee cross users. If I pay $10.00 for an item and a friend of mine is quoted $9.00 for the same item can I get my $1.00 back?????
I'm sorry you can't claim ROT14 as IP. I have prior art. Back in the 80's I wrote a program called "ROTer" for the PC that took two command line arguements the first wat the ROT offset and the second was the file name you wanted ROTted. Thus to encode a file you would type:
c:>roter 14 myfile.txt
and to decrypt you would type
c:>roter 12 myfile.txt
You may use ROT14 for a nominal licensing fee that we can negotiate privately.
If I were DC: I would focus more on my revenue stream. Since, after all, it's hard currency that "feeds the dog" not IP.
How is DC: going to make money?
Will they make money selling these scanners? NO!! DC:/RadioShack are giving these things away.
Will they make money selling their software? NO!! DC:/RadioShack are giving this away.
How is DC: going to make money?
Easy, DC: can charge advertisers, product producers, service providers, entertainment providers, et cetra a fee for listing their product/service/content in the DC: database.
DC: can then sell targeted marketing data back to these said producers/providers for a fee.
DC: can even demand a cut of all sells generated from referrals from their site.
But now lets think about this. In order for this service to look really good do corporations you will need a lot of market penetration. IOW a CueCat on every desktop (B.G. 2000???) Imagine now DC: can send it's legion of sales slugs out into the world and proclaim the thousands or even millions of CueCats already in the market place.
Even if a BIG COMPANY tried to compete DC: directly they would have a huge barrier to entry. Look at eBay, look at PayPal, these two companies have effectively become the market standard for the service they provide. I doubt even Micorosft could bring down eBay (unless it offered to let them use IIS for free heeheehee).
I found this thing so cool I have a couple of them, one for each computer I own. I have started inventorying my books thanks to software from readerware.com. I have told my friends to go to RS and get one of these things. Now I am sure that many of them will install the DC: software as well (I installed it on one machine that my wife uses because she really liked how easy it could make going to web sites).
Why did I do this??? Not because I own stock in DC:, but because I saw great potential for this device and for the cost how could I say no.
The people at DC: should quit with the jack boot tactics. Instead they should be high-fiving each other yelling "All right we got/.'ed We've got acceptance from the geek segment!!!!"
As for IP. I didn't even reverse engineer their encryption mechanism for the first program I wrote for the CueCat. I simply took a list of known bar codes and scanned them. I then used that information to create a look-up table of values and the character that value represents. Base-64, XOR aside a 13 year old could figure out how this thing works. But if the DeCSS rulings stand then I guess even VERY-VERY-VERY-BAD encryption will be acceptable.
DC: If you really wanted to make this thing hacker proof (if that's even possible), you would need to require a key-pair exchange from your web site at the time the user registered the software and everytime the CueCat was used. However, doing this would make it so that nobody used your hardware and thus your software.
DC: Start bragging on your web site about how great your scanner is. Start linking to all of these driver sites. Rember in order to get the scanner the user also gets the software. I'll bet the majority of people will install this software just because of kewl factor. This is where you guys will make your money.
INNOCENT RETRANSMISSION -- A provider of Internet access service that facilities of which are used only to handle, transmist, retransmit, or relay an unsolicited commercial electronic mail message transmitted in violation of subsection (a) shall not be liable for any harm resulting from the transmission or receipt of such message unless such provider permits the transmission or retransmission of such message with actual knowledge that the transmission is prohibited by subsection (a) or subsection (b)(1).
Does this mean that if I have an open SMTP server I can be held liable for junk e-mails flowing through my system? I'm not saying this is all that bad but do we really need the force of government to get people to secure their systems?
When it comes to paying somebody to create a site, I am reasonably sure that most people wouldn't give a flying wazoo (~O~ flying wazoo) about being the first to use some new M$-HTML extension.
When I pay for something now I want it to work NOW!! I doubt I am the only person with this opinion.
The answer to this question is YES. It is poor design to create a sight that is only usable with one browser. No I am not trying to imply that we must all make our site Lynx compliant. But there are large markets of people who do not use IE 5.5 (or IE at all for that matter).
When it comes to paying somebody to create a site, I am reasonably sure that most people wouldn't give a flying wazoo (~O~
Registrant: NICK TSOUFLIDIS (OLYMPIAKOS6-DOM) 708 ELMWOOD AVE BUFFALO, NY 14222 US
Domain Name: OLYMPIAKOS.NET
Administrative Contact, Billing Contact: Tsouflidis, Nick (NT2329) webmaster@MODERN-NET.COM Modern Networks 708 Elmwood Avenue Buffalo, NY 14222 none of your business (FAX) none of your business Technical Contact, Zone Contact: mydomain Support (MS311-ORG) support@MYINTERNET.COM mydomain Support Email to address provided Email to address provided BM +1 (888) 700-4087
Record last updated on 26-Jun-2000. Record expires on 07-Apr-2002. Record created on 07-Apr-2000. Database last updated on 13-Jul-2000 21:05:17 EDT.
It just does my heart good see one of my US Government Agencies actually doing something right for its citizens instead bowing to the desires of corporations
I am already drafting my letter of support to send to the FTC. All slashdoters may also do so (though I am sure they really only care about those who are US citizens) by sending a letter to:
1) From paragraph 1 we learn that "The FIN is a non-partisan effort..." however from paragraph 2 we are told "The FIN is open to all Microsoft customers...". How do you spell NON-PARTISAN -- MICROSOFT ???? 2) From Paragraph 3 we learn that "Membership is absolutely free." however from paragraph 2, once again, "The FIN is open to all Microsoft customers...". This implies that you have to pay Microsoft a licensing fee, or enter into some other type of financial relationship with Microsoft to be eligible for membership. How do you spell FREE -- MICROSOFT ???? 3) From Paragraph 3 we are told that "the FIN is a purely grassroots communications tool..." As mentioned in another Slashdot comment look at the Redmond, WA address on the postcard. Not to mention the fact that the director of the FIN has a microsoft.com e-mail address. How do you spell GRASSROOTS -- MICROSOFT ???? If you still don't understand check out this map which has MS corporate offices in the NE corner and the FIN offices in the SW corner -- about two miles apart. 4) This is more of a technical point, but in paragraph 3 we are told that the FIN "...does not provide financial support to candidates." However, from an Oct 1998 ZDNet artic le we see that Microsoft technology campaing contributors. How do you spell NO FINANCIAL SUPPORT -- MICROSOFT ???? 5) Looking at paragraph 4 we see that FIN members "have an opportunity to ensure that important public policy decisions will be made on the basis of reason and accurate information." First of all should "public policy decisions" always be made on these basis regardless of my membership in the FIN. Assuming not, how does membership in the FIN "ensure" that they will now. Thirdly this sentence does NOT state, though it is easy it infer from a quick read, that FIN members will be given any special access to to congress or the like. Quite differently, it does not bother mentioning exactly who this "spokesperson" will be -- perhaps MICROSOFT???? 6) Look at the large type under the US flag made from a computer. Read the sentence "We must ensure that no new burdensome regulations affect our industry's continued ability to innovate." Think DMCA/MICROSOFT, SOFTWARE PATENTS/MICROSOFT ???? 7) I love this one, on the back read the first two questions and answers quickly without stopping. Notice how in the first question/answer combo it is stated that the FIN will "...provide you the tools necessary to help your opinions be heard!", however in the second question/answer combo, if you don't agree with the FIN you can communicate with public officials "...in the manner you choose." In other words if you don't agree with us you're on your own. 8) In the 4th question/answer combo we are told "...you will determine your own level of involvement." This is neat because it sounds like you can work as much or as little as you want. But understand the work of the membership is not needed. Once you join the FIN your name will forever be in there database when they report to congress that "the FIN, with membership of 503,248 technology professionals support this bill." This gives the FIN implied backing by the citizenship whether you do any work or not. If you don't think a large number of inactive members is any good I advise you check out the AARP and what kind of lobbying power they have. 9) Always read the names and their positions on advertisements. There are 5 names on this flyer of which 1 claims to be an MS investor, 1 is the director, 1 is the MS COO. Thus at least 60% of the people on this card have a financial relationship with Microsoft. And the other two are un-verifiable so they are a complete waste of ink. And this is only after reading this for about a 1/2 hour after work.
What would happen if everybody in the Slashdot, Open Source, Linux, etc. communities joined the FIN Network and directed it accordingly. Imagine the FIN Network actively assisting the DOJ in the M$ lawsuit. Of course I'm sure B.G. (aka God) would just claim some sort of intellectual propery right on the FIN Network and claim that we are all in violation since we don't agree with him.
Slashdot Mirror
Though I am not a big audio/video file (I still have a 2 head VCR), just the idea that a remote company can have control over how I use my personal equipment scares me. All I really have to say is that hopefully, once this stuff really starts to hit the market in full force, the mass market will soon figure out that they're being led like calf to slaughter and all of this content control management crap will die a death of 1,000 DIVX's.
In every physical product you can simply toss thos demographic collection^h^h^h^h^h^h... warranty registration cards away and still use the product, completely anonymous to the manufacturer. However, with mandatory electronic authentication anonymity will be gone. Even if you try to block your caller-id packets with *67, 1-800 numbers still get your data. Even if you fill in bogus personal information (which I forsee M$ will interpret as fraud and thus a crime) they at least have your IP address and date and time of your connection which can easily be cross-referenced with your ISP (one litte subpoena is all it takes).
Now imagine Windows Update. Delete that cookie from your hard drive and you must re-authenticate or "NO SECURITY PATCH FOR YOU."
What was that word that judge used to describe Bill Gates? Ahhhhh yessssss NAPOLEANIC!!!!!
OK, so you're not that much younger than your twin brother, but you are by as much as 4 seconds. :>
min: 54,500,000 km (~ 34,000,000 mi)
avg: 78,000,000 km (~ 48,750,000 mi)
max: 401,000,000 km (~250,625,000 mi)
Assuming the 2-week estimate is based on the minimum distance this means that it would take 336 hours to travel the 54,500,000 km for an average speed of about 45,000 m/s. If the acceleration of the ship could be held constant at 10 m/s^2 this means that a near Earth gravity effect could be achieved for about 75 minutes at the begining and the end of the trip. A near Mars gravity effect (3.7 m/s^2) could be maintained for over 3 hours on each end of the trip.
In order to maintain an Earth like gravity for the entire trip the ship would need to attain the speed of 740,000 m/s (accelerate at 10 m/s^2 half way out and then flip the ship around and decelerate at 10 m/s^2 the rest of the way). In order to maintain a Mars like gravity for the entire trip the ship would need to attain the speed of 450,000 m/s (accelerate at 3.7 m/s^2 half way out and then flip the ship around and decelerate at 3.7 m/s^2 the rest of the way).
Of course either 450,000 m/s or 740,000 m/s would give us measurable time/space/mass dilation problems. So you gain a little weight you get a little smaller and you age a littler slower -- basicly you would be young, short, heavy and hauling ass!!!
In the specs, it specifically states that audio quality will not be measured it just says that the audio must be understandable. What is to stop the RIAA from strong arming manufacturers of these devices into limiting MP3 playback rates to say 64 or 128 bits, regardless of the rate in which they were recorded?
New MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube announcement
Today MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube Announces that computers no longer need monitors. Thanks to Moore's law, computing power has been doubling every 18-24 months. As such we now have CPUs that operate at well above the 750,000,000,000,000Hz range, well above the range of visible light. However, due to the high frequency with which theses CPUs operate they can not be very large. Thanks to advances in parallel processing by MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube modern computers can be produced with millions of CPU's all working simultaneously. By arranging these CPUs in a square or rectangular pattern the computer's CPU grid becomes the computer's visual interface device. MS-IBM-AOL-Time Warner-AT&T-Jiffy Lube has announced their next goal will be to make the worlds first parallel processing tanning bed.
Wow, Cary, North Carolina has 16777216 shit-holes!!!! BTW, how did you go about counting them?
The Fandom.com web site (http://www.fandom.com)
Fandom.com's dead trademark on Fandom Note:Dead May 01, 2000
Fandom.TV's Trademark Status Note:Application Oct 31, 2000
Fandom.com's suprisingly new trademark on Fandom Note:Application Nov 14, 2000
Most interestingly though from Merriam-Webster the word
FANDOMMain Entry: fandom Pronunciation: 'fan-d&m Function: noun Date: 1903 : all the fans (as of a sport)
The word is in the dictionary and it appeared around 1903, why is this word even allowed to be trademarked???!!!
{HUMOR}
Since PI is actually defined as the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter this value changes with the geometry. Now I will not deny that finding the quadrillionth digit of this ratio in Euclidian/Plane/2-D Geometry can be a bit tricky. However, finding the quadrillionth digit of this ratio in "Taxi-Cab" geometry is quite simple -- it's 0. In fact this ratio is exactly 4!!! For that matter if they were working in 1-D the value of this ratio is exactly 2!!! Maybe they were working in "Taxi-Cab" geometry?????{/HUMOR}
This message has been formatted for the humor impaired.
Actually, couldn't we just encode PI as follows:
PI is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.
I just encoded PI in 65 characters or 13 words.
7 LEDs -- That's only 4 :CueCats!!!!!!
This perfectly fits the definition of an e-mail virus. I subsrcibe to MSN and everybody in my address book gets an e-mail inviting them to subscribe. If one or more of them do subscribe then everybody in their address books gets an e-mail and so on and so on and so on ...
What you are suggesting doing, I classify as passive monitoring. In other words your employee has retrieved the data, he has formatted it as he sees fits and then sent it out onto the network where you are hoping to catch it. This is like trying to shut the doors after the cows get out. Even if you could reliably catch 100% of the inappropriate outbound traffic, your employees could simply write the information on a piece of paper or memorize it or anything like that. You will be very hard pressed to stop this.
What I suggest you do is active monitoring. Log the queries your employees make to your database. Log the information that they extract from your files. If you see an employee is extracting a lot of personal information, ask him what he is doing. If you see an employee is always looking at the same thing, ask him why he needs to be constantly updated on the status of this thing.
Now most of your employees will have true business uses for the information they look up and you should probably be able to develop some sort of pattern of information need and usage for each employee. Then when an employee starts looking at data that he doesn't ordinarily need to you can send a warning to his supervisor to check on his data queries.
This will probably be a much more effective approach. Oh, and BTW, as always be a good sys-admin and don't keep this practice a secret. Tell your employees that you will be monitoring their extracts. Most people don't really care if they are monitored at work, what really pisses them off is when the monitoring is done in secret.
The ComputerWorld article mentions Amazon.coms 30-day price guarantee. But, imagine that Amazon.com sets a cookie on your computer. This information could contain information on the item you purchased and the price you paid for it. Then when you dutifully check back on Amazon.com withing 30-days to check the price Amazon.com knows not to show you a price lower than it already quoted to you.
Does this price guarantee cross users. If I pay $10.00 for an item and a friend of mine is quoted $9.00 for the same item can I get my $1.00 back?????
I'm sorry you can't claim ROT14 as IP. I have prior art. Back in the 80's I wrote a program called "ROTer" for the PC that took two command line arguements the first wat the ROT offset and the second was the file name you wanted ROTted. Thus to encode a file you would type: c:>roter 14 myfile.txt and to decrypt you would type c:>roter 12 myfile.txt You may use ROT14 for a nominal licensing fee that we can negotiate privately.
If I were DC: I would focus more on my revenue stream. Since, after all, it's hard currency that "feeds the dog" not IP. /.'ed We've got acceptance from the geek segment!!!!"
How is DC: going to make money?
Will they make money selling these scanners? NO!! DC:/RadioShack are giving these things away.
Will they make money selling their software? NO!! DC:/RadioShack are giving this away.
How is DC: going to make money?
Easy, DC: can charge advertisers, product producers, service providers, entertainment providers, et cetra a fee for listing their product/service/content in the DC: database.
DC: can then sell targeted marketing data back to these said producers/providers for a fee.
DC: can even demand a cut of all sells generated from referrals from their site.
But now lets think about this. In order for this service to look really good do corporations you will need a lot of market penetration. IOW a CueCat on every desktop (B.G. 2000???) Imagine now DC: can send it's legion of sales slugs out into the world and proclaim the thousands or even millions of CueCats already in the market place.
Even if a BIG COMPANY tried to compete DC: directly they would have a huge barrier to entry. Look at eBay, look at PayPal, these two companies have effectively become the market standard for the service they provide. I doubt even Micorosft could bring down eBay (unless it offered to let them use IIS for free heeheehee).
I found this thing so cool I have a couple of them, one for each computer I own. I have started inventorying my books thanks to software from readerware.com. I have told my friends to go to RS and get one of these things. Now I am sure that many of them will install the DC: software as well (I installed it on one machine that my wife uses because she really liked how easy it could make going to web sites).
Why did I do this??? Not because I own stock in DC:, but because I saw great potential for this device and for the cost how could I say no.
The people at DC: should quit with the jack boot tactics. Instead they should be high-fiving each other yelling "All right we got
As for IP. I didn't even reverse engineer their encryption mechanism for the first program I wrote for the CueCat. I simply took a list of known bar codes and scanned them. I then used that information to create a look-up table of values and the character that value represents. Base-64, XOR aside a 13 year old could figure out how this thing works. But if the DeCSS rulings stand then I guess even VERY-VERY-VERY-BAD encryption will be acceptable.
DC: If you really wanted to make this thing hacker proof (if that's even possible), you would need to require a key-pair exchange from your web site at the time the user registered the software and everytime the CueCat was used. However, doing this would make it so that nobody used your hardware and thus your software.
DC: Start bragging on your web site about how great your scanner is. Start linking to all of these driver sites. Rember in order to get the scanner the user also gets the software. I'll bet the majority of people will install this software just because of kewl factor. This is where you guys will make your money.
Coffee without caffine is like beer without alcohol. Caffine and alcohol is why people drink this stuff.
According to Sec 5.(c).(2) of the bill passed by the house concerning UCE's:
INNOCENT RETRANSMISSION -- A provider of Internet access service that facilities of which are used only to handle, transmist, retransmit, or relay an unsolicited commercial electronic mail message transmitted in violation of subsection (a) shall not be liable for any harm resulting from the transmission or receipt of such message unless such provider permits the transmission or retransmission of such message with actual knowledge that the transmission is prohibited by subsection (a) or subsection (b)(1).
Does this mean that if I have an open SMTP server I can be held liable for junk e-mails flowing through my system? I'm not saying this is all that bad but do we really need the force of government to get people to secure their systems?
--Continued--
(teach me to use the button)
When it comes to paying somebody to create a site, I am reasonably sure that most people wouldn't give a flying wazoo (~O~ flying wazoo) about being the first to use some new M$-HTML extension.
When I pay for something now I want it to work NOW!! I doubt I am the only person with this opinion.
The answer to this question is YES. It is poor design to create a sight that is only usable with one browser. No I am not trying to imply that we must all make our site Lynx compliant. But there are large markets of people who do not use IE 5.5 (or IE at all for that matter).
When it comes to paying somebody to create a site, I am reasonably sure that most people wouldn't give a flying wazoo (~O~
Can I register ïëõìðéáêüò NSI or does the IOC also have a trademark on the Greek. How about registering olympiakos?
ATTN: IOC -- Legal Dept
Registrant:
Olympiakos A.E. (OLYMPIAKOS-DOM)
3643 Elder Oaks BLVD Suite 6209
Bowie, MD 20716
US
Domain Name: OLYMPIAKOS.COM
Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact, Billing Contact:
Georgiou, Kiriakos (KG120) kiriakos@UNFORGETTABLE.COM
Olympiakos A.E.
3643 Elder Oaks Blvd Suite 6209
Bowie, MD 20716
301 809 6157
Record last updated on 17-Apr-2000.
Record expires on 04-May-2001.
Record created on 03-May-1995.
Database last updated on 13-Jul-2000 21:05:17 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS2.OLYMPIAKOS.COM 207.176.88.85
NS1.TPC.INT 207.102.129.130
Registrant:
NICK TSOUFLIDIS (OLYMPIAKOS6-DOM)
708 ELMWOOD AVE
BUFFALO, NY 14222
US
Domain Name: OLYMPIAKOS.NET
Administrative Contact, Billing Contact:
Tsouflidis, Nick (NT2329) webmaster@MODERN-NET.COM
Modern Networks
708 Elmwood Avenue
Buffalo, NY 14222
none of your business (FAX) none of your business
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
mydomain Support (MS311-ORG) support@MYINTERNET.COM
mydomain Support
Email to address provided
Email to address provided
BM
+1 (888) 700-4087
Record last updated on 26-Jun-2000.
Record expires on 07-Apr-2002.
Record created on 07-Apr-2000.
Database last updated on 13-Jul-2000 21:05:17 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.MYDOMAIN.COM 216.34.89.1
NS2.MYDOMAIN.COM 216.34.89.2
NS3.MYDOMAIN.COM 216.34.89.3
NS4.MYDOMAIN.COM 216.34.89.4
It just does my heart good see one of my US Government Agencies actually doing something right for its citizens instead bowing to the desires of corporations
I am already drafting my letter of support to send to the FTC. All slashdoters may also do so (though I am sure they really only care about those who are US citizens) by sending a letter to:
Federal Trade Commission
CRC-240
Washington, D.C. 20580
1) From paragraph 1 we learn that "The FIN is a non-partisan effort..." however from paragraph 2 we are told "The FIN is open to all Microsoft customers...". How do you spell NON-PARTISAN -- MICROSOFT ???? 2) From Paragraph 3 we learn that "Membership is absolutely free." however from paragraph 2, once again, "The FIN is open to all Microsoft customers...". This implies that you have to pay Microsoft a licensing fee, or enter into some other type of financial relationship with Microsoft to be eligible for membership. How do you spell FREE -- MICROSOFT ???? 3) From Paragraph 3 we are told that "the FIN is a purely grassroots communications tool..." As mentioned in another Slashdot comment look at the Redmond, WA address on the postcard. Not to mention the fact that the director of the FIN has a microsoft.com e-mail address. How do you spell GRASSROOTS -- MICROSOFT ???? If you still don't understand check out this map which has MS corporate offices in the NE corner and the FIN offices in the SW corner -- about two miles apart. 4) This is more of a technical point, but in paragraph 3 we are told that the FIN "...does not provide financial support to candidates." However, from an Oct 1998 ZDNet artic le we see that Microsoft technology campaing contributors. How do you spell NO FINANCIAL SUPPORT -- MICROSOFT ???? 5) Looking at paragraph 4 we see that FIN members "have an opportunity to ensure that important public policy decisions will be made on the basis of reason and accurate information." First of all should "public policy decisions" always be made on these basis regardless of my membership in the FIN. Assuming not, how does membership in the FIN "ensure" that they will now. Thirdly this sentence does NOT state, though it is easy it infer from a quick read, that FIN members will be given any special access to to congress or the like. Quite differently, it does not bother mentioning exactly who this "spokesperson" will be -- perhaps MICROSOFT???? 6) Look at the large type under the US flag made from a computer. Read the sentence "We must ensure that no new burdensome regulations affect our industry's continued ability to innovate." Think DMCA/MICROSOFT, SOFTWARE PATENTS/MICROSOFT ???? 7) I love this one, on the back read the first two questions and answers quickly without stopping. Notice how in the first question/answer combo it is stated that the FIN will "...provide you the tools necessary to help your opinions be heard!", however in the second question/answer combo, if you don't agree with the FIN you can communicate with public officials "...in the manner you choose." In other words if you don't agree with us you're on your own. 8) In the 4th question/answer combo we are told "...you will determine your own level of involvement." This is neat because it sounds like you can work as much or as little as you want. But understand the work of the membership is not needed. Once you join the FIN your name will forever be in there database when they report to congress that "the FIN, with membership of 503,248 technology professionals support this bill." This gives the FIN implied backing by the citizenship whether you do any work or not. If you don't think a large number of inactive members is any good I advise you check out the AARP and what kind of lobbying power they have. 9) Always read the names and their positions on advertisements. There are 5 names on this flyer of which 1 claims to be an MS investor, 1 is the director, 1 is the MS COO. Thus at least 60% of the people on this card have a financial relationship with Microsoft. And the other two are un-verifiable so they are a complete waste of ink. And this is only after reading this for about a 1/2 hour after work.
What would happen if everybody in the Slashdot, Open Source, Linux, etc. communities joined the FIN Network and directed it accordingly. Imagine the FIN Network actively assisting the DOJ in the M$ lawsuit. Of course I'm sure B.G. (aka God) would just claim some sort of intellectual propery right on the FIN Network and claim that we are all in violation since we don't agree with him.