Electronic Frontier Foundation

There are a lot of reasons for you and me to be concerned about how legislators, too many of whom are woefully uninformed about technolgoy and some of whom could care less, enact legislation that affects the Internet, particularly in the post 9/11 attempt to make our country more secure by making it less free . This morning, after neglecting it for a long time, I finally joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation. There's no cost for membership, but there is possibly a high cost for non-membership. I find myself in agreement with their objectives and their approach to making a difference. I'd recommend that, if you care about the future of the Internet, you examine their website and join too.

One particularly good set of recommendations can be found in this document, EFF's Privacy Top 12. I recommend reading the detail contained at the site under each of these recommendations (written by Stanton McCandlish, EFF Technology Director), but here they are in bullet form.

1. Do not reveal personal information inadvertently.
   
2. Turn on cookie notices in your Web browser, and/or use cookie management software or infomediaries.
   
3. Keep a "clean" e-mail address.
   
4. Don't reveal personal details to strangers or just-met "friends".
   
5. Realize you may be monitored at work, avoid sending highly personal e-mail to mailing lists, and keep sensitive files on your home computer.
   
6. Beware sites that offer some sort of reward or prize in exchange for your contact information or other personal details.
   
7. Do not reply to spammers, for any reason.
   
8. Be conscious of Web security.
   
9. Be conscious of home computer security.
   
10. Examine privacy policies and seals.
    
11. Remember that YOU decide what information about yourself to reveal, when, why, and to whom.
    
12. Use encryption!
    

- posted by Perry @ 10:07 AM 0 comments

 

A blogging milestone

In the New York Times Magazine section (registration required) this morning, William Safire acknowledges that Blog has made its way into the national lexicon. He doesn't say anything profound, but the fact that blogging has come to his attention is something of a milestone.
- posted by Perry @ 8:48 AM 0 comments

 

Blogs in Business

Meg Hourihan, who maintains a weblog called megnut and recently co-authored a book about blogging, has posted a chapter online. This chapter deals with "Using Blogs in Business," which is a topic gaining increasingly popularity. The online chapter is a thorough treatment of the subject that suggests many possible applications of the technology. A good read and a good advertisement for the book in my opinion.
- posted by Perry @ 6:08 AM 0 comments

 

Helping others teaches me

Today Paul Moor called for some guidance about why his correspondents kept getting returned mail as undeliverable from his account, a German ISP called T-Online.de. He wanted to understand better what happens from end to end when someone sends email to someone else over the Internet.

As usually happens when I get a question like this, I decided to turn first to Google. Already I knew that the appropriate topic was SMTP (Simple Mail Transport Protocol) so I simply looked up SMTP using the Google search engine. From that starting point I found the RFC (Request for Comments) page related to this particular protocol. While examining the various resources supplied, I found my way to this fascinating history of RFCs which documents the beginnings of the Internet and its development through dialogs and email exchanges between the founders. I would probably never have found and read this document had it not been for Paul's request for help. This byproduct of helping is one of the reason that I welcome pleas for help from friends. Helping them learn always results in my learning something I didn't know before they sought my help.
- posted by Perry @ 11:16 AM 0 comments

 

Progress at last!

If you are observant, you'll notice that, once again, I've changed templates, and now it appears that Blogger has gotten its act together and repaired the ability to publish the archives. I've gone back to the original template I used when I first started using Blogger, and now everything seems to be in order again. Perhaps, now I can get back in the practice of regular publishing.
- posted by Perry @ 7:24 PM 0 comments

 

Infrequent updates

Although the Blogger status page indicates their service is now repaired, it doesn't yet seem to have reached my house. I'll be posting only intermittently until this situation clears up.
- posted by Perry @ 6:13 AM 0 comments

 

An explanation at last

Well, by examining the status page I discovered the I'm not being singled out. Apparently Blogger is having a problem publishing archives for everyone. Also template editing isn't updating, so I'll just have to live with what I have for now. When everything is fixed, I'll edit the template for this blog so that the archive works and I can insert links where is appropriate. Be patient with me, and I'll try to be patient with Blogger.
- posted by Perry @ 6:14 PM 0 comments

 

Problems, problems, problems

As is obvious from the fact that I can even complain about it, I'm now able to at least begin posting again, but I had to switch to a new template (clearner, neater I will admit) so that I could get any text posted. However, even though I've "republished" the archives link, I still get no on-site references to the historic posts from this site. I'll keep exploring as time permits (which isn't right now) and eventually I will get everything going again.

This problem is typical of doing anything on the web. It is largely trial and error. When a problem occurs, it invariably leads to some new wisdom. "Experience is the best teacher, but the tuition is high."
- posted by Perry @ 6:21 AM 0 comments

 

Test

This is a test of the publishing capability of Blogger. I've had to publish using a new template to regain the ability to post at all.
- posted by Perry @ 7:03 AM 0 comments

 

A "No Win" Situation

Last night's All Star game was the first of what is likely to be many disappointing outcomes to the 2002 season. Bud Selig, the owner of the Milwaukee Brewers and the Baseball Commissioner, was a master of irony when he said, "I was in a no win situation." Whether there was nothing else he could do, given that the two managers had used all their bench players and used up all their pitchers, is a matter of some debate. He is clearly right that there was nothing else that he could do that fell within the scope of ordinary solutions, which were apparently the only one's he dared consider. As comissioner, he had the power to amend the rules of the game and allow the re-entry of the players into the game which would, of course, have been a dramatic departure from tradition for which he would have been roundly criticized, but he didn't. Curt Schilling proposed having a homer derby as a "tie breaker," which would have been starkly different than anything ever done in baseball (and of course roundly criticized) but it would have "solved" the problem in an very creative way. But the comish could not allow himself to be that creative and thus he fell victim to the assumption there was nothing else he could do. When people can't think creatively in the heat of the moment and don't plan creatively before the event, they are backed into the corner and suffer from "no win" situations. This lack of creativity and planning are what constitute the greatest threat to this season's integrity, what forebodes the probability of a strike, what foreshadows a disappointing end to a promising first half of the baseball season. The All Star game ain't what it used to be, and with the leadership currently in place in baseball, it may never be again.
- posted by Perry @ 6:42 AM 0 comments

 

SPEBSQSA, Inc. in the 21st Century

Last night I was up until 1:30 AM watching the live webcast of the Quartet Finals taking place in Portland, OR. It's a wonderful addition to the services the Society supplies to its members and to others who might enjoy their activities. I think it ironic that a Society whose primary purpose is to preserve a style of singing from the 19th Century has the wisdom to use the technology of the 21st Century to achieve their goal. This forward thinking irony will probably do more to extend Barbershop Singing to the world than just about any other initiative the Society has ever undertaken. It was a great idea, SPEBSQSA.

The 2002 Championship quartet is from Cleveland, TN -- 4 Voices. Congratulations guys!
- posted by Perry @ 10:17 AM 0 comments

 

Time to make the donuts

With a little over a month and a half before the Vernine and Associates Reunion here in Knoxville, it's time for me to get some concrete plans made. For instance the part of the weekend that most requires coordination is our dinner on Saturday night and our brunch on Sunday morning. Questions abound. How many people will actually attend the dinner? Will they bring spouses/partners? Will those who are not paired up bring dates? Will we order from the menu? How will we handle the bill?

Somehow all of this falls into my lap all because I said, "hey, why don't we get together for a reunion?" You'd think that after living this long I would have learned to avoid such entanglements.

Despite all that, I'm looking forward to the get together.
- posted by Perry @ 7:49 AM 0 comments

 

State Government Reopens

This morning's Knoxville News Sentinel reports that the state government will reopen when the governor signs the bill passed by the state's legislators yesterday. Whether this is the right compromise remains to be seen, but at least it is a compromise that will work for the moment.

The News Sentinel points out:

People with low income levels are hit the hardest by the levy, they said, and the higher rate will send more Tennesseans across state borders or to the Internet for shopping.

Rep. Ken Givens, D-Rogersville, said the penny-per-dollar increase translates into a 17 percent increase in the sales tax and predicted political opponents will quickly point that out. The bill also amounts to the largest tax increase in Tennessee history.

The present state sales tax rate is 6 percent and the bill will raise that to 7 percent - except on grocery food. On food items, the rate will remain at 6 percent. Local governments can add up to 2.75 percent in sales tax, putting the combined maximum level at 8.75 per cent now and 9.75 percent under the bill.

In Knox County, the local rate is 2.25 percent and the combined rate 8.25 percent. The bill will raise that to 9.25 percent.

The sales tax increase, which takes effect July 15, would produce an estimated $600 million.
- posted by Perry @ 6:06 AM 0 comments

 

Partial State Government Shutdown

Legislators in Tennessee "worked" late into the night only to remain deadlocked and unable to agree on a revenue plan for our beautiful state. So the government is in partial collapse this morning. I don't have enough time or adequate words to express the disappointment I feel in how miserably they have failed in handling this most basic function of government. Who needs soap operas? Not those of us in Tennessee.
- posted by Perry @ 6:48 AM 0 comments