It may look like advertising, but it's not. The commercial references you see on this site are not really ads because we don't get paid for them! The only way we make any money is if you click on them and actually BUY something, so please do!
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"I get the feeling talking to other [security managers at other firms] that very few investigate computer security incidents because very few have the capability to do so. . . . I think there are a lot of companies that still believe there are no threats directed at their companies. This is why I've always said the greatest threat to the security of a company is a belief on the part of senior management that there is no threat." -- Mike Hager, vice president of Network Security and Disaster Recovery at Oppenheimer Funds, as quoted by ComputerWorld by News Wire Daily |
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There are factions out there who would love to destroy it. There are others whose greed simply overwhelms any concern for the survival of the Internet. Who are they, and what can we do to stop them?....(Read the article) |
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Practically Free Software That Works Like a Million Bucks March 26, 2002. Here are some short descriptions of software we have tested and found valuable: Pop-Up Stopper Pro from PanicWare: www.panicware.com. This component loads into your browser and prevents any web page from spawning pop-ups. So effective, I even licensed it for 19.95!! CuteFTP - makes loading files to your web site as easy as using the Windows Explorer, only faster and sans complicated configuration. Get it at www.globalscape.com LaBrea "Tar Pit" worm-eating software. This ingenious program creates virtual machines on unused IP addresses on your network when they are being scanned by possible malicious programs like the current Nimda virus. Get it at www.hackbusters.net/LaBrea PopUp Killer from xFXJumpStart does a great job of automatically closing that new scourge of the Web - uninvited browser sessions. Get it at software.xfx.net/utilities/popupkiller/index.html
Sorry, Gateway, We Liked IBM's Olympic Coverage Better February 11, 2002. If you didn't already know from the hundreds of cow commercials, Gateway is providing the computers and services for the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. The previous Summer Olympics in Australia featured IBM in a similar role. We're certainly not IBM "homers", but in this case the Big Blue People seemed to have produced a significantly better product than the neophyte Gateway crew. For starters, the web sites under IBM were much more up to date, informative and infinitely easier to navigate. The scores on TV seem to arrive slowly and the team flags are hard to make out. However, the fonts used on the numbers are easier to read than the ones IBM used. The worst part is that they don't seem to be posting enough winning scores for the American participants. Maybe they will get that part fixed in the next couple of weeks and we'll forget about everything else. U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! January 3, 2002. Lets have a toast for the dearly departed jobsites on our job page. According to eJob.com, which is going into a state of suspended animation, "most career sites are dying". We hope that is an exaggeration, as only 7 of the 25 we list have disappeared. They are eJob.com, jobkeys.com, theshortlist.com, careerqwest.com, jobvertise.com, icPlanet, and Denver-Jobs.com.
Before you call your broker, take a look at these new "millipede project" punch cards. Instead of paper, they're plastic and they will be able to store more than 3 billion bits of data in the same space as a single punch in the old style cards! IBM is claiming up to a trillion bits per square inch capacity, translating into a 15 gigabyte device the size of today's flashcards for starters! When these devices become available, portable devices will have capacities far in excess of today's desktops! What Do Programmers Want?
By Greg Hill or “Users? Who needs users?” From the dawn of time on Earth, humans have slowly risen to dominate the world through the use of perhaps mankind’s greatest trait – the ability to adapt. Now, as the computer age dawns, most non-programmers in the world want to abandon this adaptation thing altogether, at least when it comes to computers. From the programmer’s perspective, there are only a few elegant ways to accomplish the goals of any particular application. “Elegant” in programmer’s parlance means that perfect combination of hardware and software synergy where the brilliantly inspired code meets the shining, powerful steed of computing machinery and sweeps everyone involved to the land of Milk and Honey, sometimes referred to as the successfully implemented application. Achieving this higher state of software engineering requires that the user interface, or the part that appears on your screen, reflects the inner soul of the software itself. In short, whatever a program does, there is an efficient way for the user to communicate with it when necessary. Unfortunately, the user NEVER wants to communicate with the program in the best manner dictated by the application. They ALWAYS want to do it their way. Let’s talk about “their way” for a moment, shall we? “Their way” is never the most efficient way – we’ve already covered that. But it is not the least efficient way, either - in an odd way, programmers could deal with that, too - at least it would be consistent. No, “Their way” is always some inconceivable, inefficient, vile, vindictive, idiotic…..Suffice it to say, it makes little or no sense to the programmer. The “Their Way” User Interface (TWUI) is always the kluge machine that has to be attached somehow to the programmer’s brilliantly efficient code. In many cases, the programmer has to change his code to make it less efficient in order to accommodate the TWUI. So, from where does the “Their way” method come? The answer is complicated, but it can be summed up in two ways: 1. “That’s the way we’ve always done it” 2. “That’s the way he/she wants it done” The light comes on! The TWUI consists of either a desire to emulate the system of a bygone and non-computerized era or is the brilliant work of some self-styled efficiency expert. Both methods, of course are a disaster for all enlightened computer people. What almost always happens is that the technology is “dumbed down” to accommodate the TWUI. The developers go away shaking their heads and grumbling about evil in the world and the users gloat about how they had to smarten up those dumb bit-heads with no real-world knowledge. Once in a while, the programmer refuses to give in and produces elegant software with the original user interface. The program is usually rejected by the users or if it is commercial software, it is unsuccessful. Which returns us to our original point - programmers and the computer industry would have taken the world to unimagined heights by now, if the human race had continued its age-old tradition of adapting. But at some point, the human race changed their direction, stamped their feet, drew a line in the sand, held their breath, and demanded: “From now on we are doing it our way, there will be no more adapting!” And they did it just to make programmers miserable – there is no other explanation. It's sheer contrariness. Just don’t blame the programmers when the whole place crashes and burns. We tried, we really did. Until users are willing to go back to what they do best, namely adapting, they will just have to deal with the fruits of their stubbornness: slow, buggy, inefficient computer systems. Metro State Brings National Championship to Denver March 23,2002. The Metropolitan State College of Denver Roadrunners basketball team are the 2002 NCAA Division II Men's Basketball National Champions! And they did it in miraculous fashion:
We would like to take this opportunity to thank Metro State, coach Mike Dunlap, the team, and all of the people who supported them for bringing pride and excitement to Denver and Colorado! FreshBaked.com Crowns Oregon NCAA Football National Champions! Someday the national champion will be decided using a playoff system with the winners playing in the FreshBaked.com Bowl.....
Oregon Disqualified from 2003 FreshBaked.com® Bowl It's really discouraging to see how far the mighty have fallen. In this case, the mighty being the University of Oregon Ducks. Last year, as you may recall, the Ducks clearly should have been Miami's opponent for the National Championship, but they were jobbed by evil BCS conspiracy. As a result, we at FreshBaked.com overruled all of the other corrupt organizations and summarily declared Oregon the National Champs.
Now we have cause to regret that decision. First, we were appalled by the behavior of the Ducks' basketball team in the NCAA Championship Tourney. We didn't think any college team would be so crass as to attempt to humiliate other tournament teams that were not on their level, talent-wise. Oregon, the institution, along with the coaches and, especially, the players, thought otherwise. Enough said. We are glad now that they were bounced early from the PAC-10 tourney and decimated by Kansas in the NCAAs, after barely squeaking past Wake Forest and Texas.
But the worst was yet to come. Apparently, the NCAA has decided to right last years' wrong by making this year's mediocre Ducks' football team a winner with some referee "assistance". In the Fresno State game, which Oregon pulled out in the last minutes by a 28 to 24 score, the officials made a number of obvious mistakes that even had the announcers gasping in astonishment. First, they called a penalty on FSU after the punt for coming within two yards of the returner, which replays showed to be false. Next, when the Bulldogs held the Ducks and forced them to punt, the officials ruled that they had run into the punter, giving the ball back to the Ducks. This time, replays showed that the Bulldog player not only didn't run into the kicker, but he was being held and pushed by an Oregon player! Next, the officials gave Oregon two consecutive 4th down conversions by spotting the ball at least a yard further downfield than the runner's progress. In spite of all this assistance, the Ducks were only able to get a field goal and trailed 24-21. But there was still more! On the ensuing possession, the Bulldogs were driving down the field for what would have been the clinching score, when they stalled out and and were facing a fourth and inches at the Oregon 25 yard line. All they had to do was get the ball past the 25 yard line for a first down. On the play, the QB handed the ball to the running back, who clearly pushed the ball past the 25, nearly to the 24, an obvious first down for Fresno State that would probably clinch the victory. But, the officials moved the ball back to behind the original spot, effectively dealing the Bulldogs a loss on the play, turning the ball and the victory over to the Ducks. Now, most teams would have realized that they were being handed a victory by the officials, and would have accepted it, possibly being a little embarrassed by their good fortune. Not these Ducks! They celebrated every official-enhanced play as if they had just pulled off the greatest feat in the history of football. They brought shame to the school, the State of Oregon, the NCAA, and anything else they represent. The Bulldogs, on the other hand, who were totally jobbed by the officials and beaten by an inferior Oregon team, handled it with class and aplomb, at least as far as we know at this time. We wouldn't blame them for complaining to the NCAA, for all the good it will do them.
If there is any justice in the World, the Ducks will lose all the rest of their games, and hopefully in the same way FSU lost today. In any case, we won't be inviting them to play in the FreshBaked.com® Bowl. | |||||||||||
| Democrats Recognize Web, GOP Pondering. According to a CBS MarketWatch article, the Democratic convention will issue credentials to some "bloggers", based on "originality, readership level, and professionalism". Not to be outdone, the Republicans say they will allow some, too. It may not seem like much, but most newsworthy events don't consider web-only sites to be "legitimate" news-reporting entities and refuse to issue them credentials. In fact, the trend has been regressing lately, with high profile computer shows like COMDEX turning away web-only sources after admitting them for nearly a decade. At least the political parties are seeing the light in the face of the millions of dollars in revenue their own sites have been generating. | |||||||||||
| AT&T Must Hire the Stupidest IT People on the Face of the Earth. We all understand that there is a problem with spam, if only due to the sheer volume of it.
We also appreciate the efforts of service providers that block IP addresses that send large volumes of spam to their customers. What we don't care for are brain-dead, overzealous, ignorant administrators that block perfectly innocent IP addresses because they are the victims of spammers. Here is the scenario: Because our address is published in various places around the Internet, some spammers have decided to use it as the "From" address for some of their campaigns. This is actually a very common practice, based on the idea that recipients are more likely to read an email from a recognized or familiar source. It is also very easy to do - nearly all email packages will allow a sender to change the "From" address. However, they cannot easily change the IP address from which the offending missive originates. This is where the ignorance and stupidity at AT&T comes in. Because they have received spam with a "From" address of, say, "spamdevil@FreshBaked.com", someone at AT&T looks up the IP address of FreshBaked.com and adds it to their "blocked list". So, they block perfectly legitimate addresses from sending mail to their customers, while not affecting the spammers one single iota. But don't take our word for it, do a search for blacklist at&t and you will find literally thousands of complaints from frustrated victims of AT&Ts idiotic policies, including none other than PC Magazines Dan Dvorak, one of the most famous computer flacks on the planet, who says he is dropping his long distance service through AT&T, and recommends every current customer drop their service with the incompetent Telco. |
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They're
Killing the Internet!