CNN, Colorado (AP)-- Dave Hughes certainly doesn't look the part of a technology trailblazer. The burly, 74-year-old retired Army colonel could stuff a scrawny computer geek in his Stetson.

But Hughes has made a second career out of extending Internet-era benefits to overlooked people and places. And the man known as "The Cursor Cowboy" isn't about to ride off into the sunset just yet.

After a decorated military career that included combat in Korea and Vietnam, Hughes began exploring the Internet in the 1970s, when it was known to little more than a gaggle of scientists. Logging in from a neighborhood bar, Hughes spun countless tales about the Old West, becoming one of the first online celebrities.

In the 1980s, when many were using personal computers for such basics as word processing, Hughes showed neighbors in Colorado Springs and teachers in one-room Western schoolhouses the power of electronic bulletin boards.

A decade later, he was merrily ignoring the conventional wisdom that high-speed Internet access for out-of-the-way places was cost-prohibitive and technologically arduous.
Armed largely with grants from the National Science Foundation, Hughes set up wireless connections in small towns, an Indian reservation; the Wisconsin woods, the Mongolian steppes and Puerto Rican jungles. His pioneering in "packet radio" put Hughes far ahead of the current explosion in the wireless Internet.  more...

31 January 2003  |   permalink

Wired News--Xupiter is an Internet Explorer toolbar that installs itself without users' permission, and is designed to be difficult to uninstall. Once active in a system, it periodically changes users' designated homepages to xupiter.com, redirects all searches to Xupiter's site, and blocks any attempts to restore the original browser settings.

The program attempts to download updates each time an affected computer boots up, and has been blamed for causing system crashes. Several versions of Xupiter also appear to download other programs, such as gambling games, which later appear in pop-up windows.

Xupiter offers an uninstall utility, but many said that it didn't work, and in some cases made things worse.

"When Xupiter first appeared, we spent a week trying to figure it out," said Mike Healan, of SpywareInfo. "There's a monstrous thread with over 26,000 page views where a couple dozen of us tested it until we figured what it did and how to deal with it."

"Xupiter seems to have the ability to reinstall itself if each and every component is not removed," Olexa said. "Computer novices might never really get rid of it."

Healan recommended Spybot Search & Destroy to eradicate the program.  more...

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A friend of mine purchased a used computer and discovered that it contained medical records belonging to our city's Mayor. I thought it was pretty funny until I realized that the Mayor and I went to the same doctor...

NPR Radio-- "Guest host John Ydstie talks with Simson Garfinkel, a graduate student at MIT. Garfinkel and another MIT student recently purchased 158 used hard drives and found more than 5,000 credit card numbers, detailed personal and corporate financial records, numerous medical records, gigabytes of personal email and pornography."

 Listen here.  Requires Real Audio Player

30 January 2003  |   permalink

NEW YORK -- Chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov broke a spell in his contests against computers on Tuesday when he drew the second game of his 6-game match in New York against world champion program Deep Junior.

In the contest pitting human intuition and experience against the calculating power of the machine, Kasparov convincingly won the first game on Sunday. He leads the $1 million match, which is sanctioned by the International Chess Federation, by 1-1/2 points to a 1/2 point with the third game scheduled for Thursday. One point is awarded for a win and a 1/2 point for a draw.  more...

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We are going to take a look at 4 popular tools for administering computers remotely. Are you not a computer administrator? Sure you are!

There are many uses for remote administration. For example, I have a computer in my living room connected to my stereo and networked with my computer upstairs. From upstairs I can log onto the living room computer and start playing music, adjust the volume, etc. Using remote administration tools also allows me to log into Aunt Dorothy's computer over the Internet and do some troubleshooting for her. One of my clients has me administer his server in another country.

The first two packages that we'll look at are PC Anywhere and Windows XP's built-in Remote Assistance. In a nutshell: don't use either of these! They are both slow and buggy bloatware. I always disable XP's Remote Assistance using XP Anti-Spy.

I do recommend VNC (Virtual Network Computing). There are versions of VNC for Windows, Mac, and *nix. What I really like about VNC is that it allows you to log into a client computer using your browser ( http://your.ip.address:5800 ). Although this is convenient in some situations, for a faster connection it is better to use the VNC Viewer.

Finally, I highly recommend RemoteAdmin. Sorry, it runs on Windows only! It is very fast and very simple to use. You can easily install it as a system service so that it is always running, waiting for a connection. Unlike VNC, it also offers a quick means to transfer files between the host and client computers. RemoteAdmin has a 30-day trial version; a single license costs $35US and is well worth the investment.

Know of any other good Remote Administration programs? Please offer your comments!

29 January 2003  |   permalink

The web site belonging to the Recording Industry Association of America has been offline since January 24th. The site has been the victim of several defacements and denial-of-service attacks in the past few months. The FBI is currently investigating.

I have disliked the RIAA and its corrupt corporate attitudes since I was old enough to read interviews with some of my favorite musicians. I am a huge fan digital music distribution, and I find it painful to watch the RIAA try and save its dying industry through endless litigations against the march of technology.

Having said all this, however, I feel that this action against the organization is equally detestable. The individuals that are behind these attacks are obviously highly intelligent: do they think their actions will help to win public support for file-sharing services? Freedom of speech issues aside, I ask how this makes the Anti-RIAA lobby look?

Whoever you are, please realize that you are giving the US government, and indeed all governments, another excuse to enforce tighter controls on the Internet. In the end, we all lose.  more...

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I'll be sending out a newsletter twice a month starting Febuary 1st. Please sign up using the form on the left menu. And while we're on the subject of shamless promotion-- if you have any friends that you think might like this site... please refer them!

28 January 2003  |   permalink

This is an absolutely incredible site. You can look at the Earth from the Moon or the Sun in real-time. You can click on the image and pan anywhere around the globe. You can sit at your computer (as I have once or twice) and watch the sunrise and set. Who needs to go outside?

The imaging is highly configurable. The first thing I do when I click on either of the links above is scroll to the bottom of the page and set the image size to 600 pixels. I find that any larger and the image becomes pixilated.

This site was developed by John Walker, founder of Autodesk, Inc. and co-author of AutoCAD: one serious geek! Here is his home page.

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Sometimes called a "twiddle" or a "squiggle," the tilde key on your keyboard is surrounded by mystery. There it is, right above your Tab key; but what is it for, and where did it come from?

The tilde was originally introduced so that Spanish-typing typists could type the ñ. First you'd type a '~', then backspace, then an 'n'. Somewhere along the line, the tilde morphed into a general-purpose character with all sorts of geeky uses.

The most common use of the tilde these days is in Web address. Since users often keep personal or business Web pages on a server under their personal home directory, you will often see the tilde as part of a url. Such as: www.netidea.com/~achan (Achan's folder on Net Idea's server).

Lots of geeky chicks use the tilde in more creative ways:  ~ chick power ~

Here is a great article at suggests that tildes should not be used in web addresses: http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/tilde.html. Note that there is a tilde in the address!

For a more detailed history of the tilde, click here.

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It might be interesting to see how many companies by the Slammer worm affects when they turn on their computers today.

The worm crippled the Internet overnight Saturday in a denial-of-service attack similar to the Code Red Virus. The worm only affects servers running Microsoft SQL Server. It does not cause any permanent damage and is easily patched, but it overloads networks in an aggressive attempt to self-replicate.

Slammer earned its name when System Admin-types were called from the bar after midnight in Europe to deal with the threat.

More info on the Slammer, or read about Microsoft's "Trustworthy Computing" pledge.

27 January 2003  |   permalink

A lot of geeks have a habit of collecting fonts. What happens when you get too many? It's a hassle to scroll through a long list to find the ones that you commonly use. It also slows down your computer, because your comp has to load all of those fonts into memory at startup.

A solution is to use a type manager to view your font collection, and only install the ones that you'll be using. One of the best managers that I've seen is Sue Fischer's The Font Thing. It allows you to install or uninstall any number of fonts, view font information or print samples. Best of all, it allows you to browse fonts that are not currently installed.

To see all of The Font Thing's features, and to download it for free, click here.

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Google is the very center of the Internet. Use it. Here are some tips:.

• Google searches are not case sensitive. Therefore, seaches for New York Yankees and new york yankees will yeild the same result.



• Common words like 'the' or 'is' are ignored. the catcher and the rye will return the same results as catcher rye.



• To exclude pages that match a search term, proceed it with ' - '. Therefore, a search for random -house will return pages about randomness, but not about Random House Publishing.  However:



• Google returns pages that match all search terms. You don't need to (and can't) put AND or ' + ' between terms.



• To limit your search to a paticular site, use the 'site' command, such as site:yahoo.com news.
  
  Want to learn more? Click for Google Basic Search Tips or Advanced Search Tips.
  
  
  
  26 January 2003  |   permalink

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, Chairman of IBM, 1943

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons."
Popular Mechanics, 1949

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977

"640k ought to be enough for anybody."
Bill Gates, 1981.

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Traffic on the many parts of the Internet slowed dramatically for hours early Saturday, the apparent effects of a fast-spreading, virus-like infection that overwhelmed the world's digital pipelines and interfered with Web browsing and delivery of e-mail.

Dubbed the Sapphire Worm, or SQL Slammer, this exploit does not affect home computers; rather, it targets web servers running Microsoft's SQL Server. Although Slammer is not destructive to an infected host (like Code Red it only exists in memory), it generates a damaging level of network traffic when it scans for additional targets.

South Korea was hit particularly hard, with most of the nation's Internet users unable to access Web sites for nearly half the day, according to reports. Japan and other high-technology Asian areas were also hard-hit. In the US overnight, five of the Internet's 13 route DNS servers were down and two others had latencies of more than 10 seconds.  more...

25 January 2003  |   permalink

"Instant Messaging is the most convenient means of communications on the Internet today. Users connect to a central server which allows real time message delivery to and from other users. Text, graphics, and even video are utilized to make the IM experience stronger. Instant messaging fills a niche between a phone call and e-mail — it's fast, and not too intrusive.

Trillian's universal connectivity allows you to chat on all major chat networks, including AIM, MSN, ICQ, Yahoo!, and IRC simultaneously."

Trillian is a free download from Cerulean Studios.

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CNN: OSLO, Norway --A Norwegian teenager faces another trial on DVD piracy charges as local officials prepare to appeal against his acquittal earlier this month in a landmark trial brought by major Hollywood studios.

Jon Johansen, dubbed "DVD Jon," was cleared of charges on January 7 when an Oslo court said he had not broken the law by helping unlock a code and distributing a computer program enabling DVD films to be copied.

The Norwegian Economic Crime Unit said on Tuesday it would appeal against the court decision, seen as an important test of copyright protections.

Johansen, 19, created the DeCSS (De Contents Scramble System) program in 1999 when he was 15 so that he could view his DVDs on a Linux machine. DeCSS defeats the copyright protection system known as Contents Scramble System (CSS), which the entertainment industry uses to protect films distributed on DVDs.

But Johansen argued that since he owned the DVDs, he should be able to view them as he liked, preferably on his own computer. The court, citing consumer laws which protect consumers' fair use of their own property, agreed.  more...

24 January 2003  |   permalink

The letters at the end of a file name are file name extensions or suffixes: example.txt is a text file called 'example'.

We all know what an .mp3 file is, or a .jpg. Many people will recognize that a .psd file is a Photoshop Document. But what do you do if someone sends you a .rwx file and you don't know what it is or how to open it?

Here is a giant alphabetical list for referencing obscure file names.

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WASHINGTON -- The same power lines that bring electricity to televisions and toasters may become the next pathway into homes for high-speed Internet access, federal officials said Wednesday.
They said the technology offers an alternative to cable and telephone lines as a way to get broadband service, with its ability to quickly deliver large amounts of data and high-quality video signals.

"Every power plug in your home becomes a broadband connection," said Edmond Thomas, chief of the Federal Communications Commission's Office of Engineering and Technology. He said companies developing the technology have overcome many hurdles in the past year. more...

See my earlier post on the same subject.

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Microsoft today announced that it will be changing its name to "Moft" -- which will clear up space on user's hard disks. It is estimated that a typical Windows XP installation contains about 2,800,000 instances of the word "Microsoft", in copyright notices, end-user licence agreements, 'About' screens, etc. So, after the change, a user will save about 140MB of hard drive space. Stock prices of hard-disk manufacturers dipped slightly after the announcement.

"Well, yes, the end user will save significant hard drive space," said Bill Gates, CEO of Moft. "Our decision was more influenced by fear that future Moft operating systems will not be able to fit on a single compact disk, which will result in significant costs for us." Gates added that the junior programmer who discovered the potential savings has been rewarded with a free copy of 'Moft Off for Moft WinXP'.

23 January 2003  |   permalink

CNET--Linux software maker SuSE announced Tuesday the release of Linux Office Desktop, software that allows Linux PCs to run Microsoft Office. The software reworks the application programming interfaces (APIs) behind Office 97 and Office 2000 to allow the applications to run in the open-source operating system.

"You don't want to change the (operating system) and the office application at the same time--nobody wants to absorb that level of risk," said Holger Dyroff, North American sales director for SuSE. "This lets you phase things in."  more...

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The Mini-ITX mainboard from VIA is the world's smallest PC motherboard. Measuring only 170mm x 170mm, the Mini-ITX allows for the development of entry-level value PCs, Thin-Clients, wireless network devices, digital media systems, set-top boxes and more. With the I/O ports as the tallest components on the board (including the CPU cooler), the Mini-ITX mainboard is also becoming increasingly popular among the rapidly emerging enthusiast user group, seeing the small size, quiet operation and low profile as ideal for moving the PC to different parts of the home from stylish case modifications for the living room to in-car PCs.

Expect to see some tiny, very inexpensive and moderately powerful computers entering the marketplace in the near future!

More info:  VIA Technologies or Mini-ITX.com

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Three years ago convicted hacker Kevin Mitnick was released from Lompoc federal prison after serving four years, 11 months, and six days behind bars -- the longest sentence ever for computer cracking crimes. But as a part of Kevin's probation, he was not allowed to go online or even use a computer for a further 3 years.

On Tuesday, January 21, Mitnick celebrated his long-awaited re-entry into the online world by appearing live on The Screen Savers TV Show. He was joined by Steve Wozniak (Co-founder of Apple Computers) and Emmanuel Goldstein (Editor and publisher of 2600: The Hacker Quarterly). Thanks to the wonders of the Internet, you can watch it here.

Warning: requires Windows Media Player and a little patience. If it doesn't start, try dropping your firewall temporarily.

22 January 2003  |   permalink

In light of some of the findings in US courtrooms recently, it would seem that the mere allegation of copyright infringement is now good enough to wreck all privacy protections. It's enough to override common sense. The judiciary is buying the copyright cartel's arguments these days, without exception. Who will protect customers' rights?

"The Electronic Frontier Foundation is the leading civil liberties organization working to protect rights in the digital world. Founded in 1990, EFF actively encourages and challenges industry and government to support free expression and privacy online. EFF is a member-supported organization and maintains one of the most linked-to websites in the world."  more...

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CNET--A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Verizon Communications to disclose the identity of an alleged peer-to-peer pirate in a legal decision that could make it easier for the music industry to crack down on file-swapping networks.  more...

21 January 2003  |   permalink

Press Telegram, LOS ANGELES-- Today marks a milestone for a former 'Valley boy' once considered the federal government's most-wanted hacker.

That's when probation officially ends for Kevin Mitnick, now 39, who served five years in prison for hacking-related crimes.

The San Fernando Valley native was freed in January 2000, under a strict probation that did not allow him to go online and kept him from traveling outside Southern California.

The restrictions will end when his probation does.

"The truth is, I learned my lesson,' Mitnick told the Times. more...

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Independent News, LONDON--Amidst international demonstrations calling for restraint in the military-buildup against Iraq, 14 public figures speak up.

"There is a strong case for a 'regime change' in Iraq. The complicating factor is the US's approach which looks like bullying because, well, it is bullying. If the US reserves the right to attack any country it doesn't like the look of, then those who don't like the look of the US might return the compliment."

Salman Rushdie, writer

"As a commander, I would not want to lead my troops into battle unless I was totally convinced of its just cause and that all necessary resources had been made available. So far, this does not seem to be the case. And how will a war against Iraq impact on the global war against terrorism?"

General Sir Michael Rose

more...

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Situation:
You're ready to reformat your computer, but you need to back up your email so that you can restore it later.

Solution:
The following proceedures are simplified to work with all versions of Windows.

Part One: Backup

Open My Computer or Internet Explorer.
Go to: Tools | Folder Options | View and make sure that there is a check box beside "Show hidden files and folders". Click Apply and OK.
On the Start menu, click Search (or Find)

We will now search for the corresponding files for Outlook and Outlook Express.

For Outlook, you only need to locate one file, unless you have Archived material. Search the appropriate drive (usually C:) for *.pst

Outlook Express uses two files, one for email and the other for the Address Book. Search the appropriate drive for *.dbx and then *.wab

Once you locate the file(s) that you need to backup, you can copy them from the Search window and paste them into your backup folder.

Part Two: Restore

In Outlook, goto File | Import and Export | Import from another program or file... | Personal Folder File (.pst) and navigate to your backup files. Voila!

In Outlook Express, goto File | Import | Address Book and navigate to your backup files. Then go back to File | Import | select the version of OE that you were previously using | select "Import from a store directory". Snippity Snap.

One extra tip: If you created a backup onto CD, you may not be able to import the file(s). In this case, copy the files onto your hard drive, right-click and select Properties and de-select Hidden.


MacIntosh users running Eudora can find info on backing up email here.

20 January 2003  |   permalink

"Wireless connectivity, networked devices and portable power were the themes of the 2003 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week. Take a glimpse at the coolest gadgets coming out this year."

If anyone reading this wants to buy me any of the gadgets in this roundup, please realize that you don't have to wait until Christmas!

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I've been using Windows for years, as have most of my clients. I'm always wanting to play around with Unix and Linux more. Here is a cool (but huge) download that gives me the opportunity.

Knoppix Linux is a 700-Meg ISO image you can download here. The CD you create is bootable (installation not required), and it will make no changes to your hard drive. So it's a perfect way to try Linux if you don't have a spare system. It took me a few hours to download it, and about six minutes to burn it to CD. Then I popped it into a CD-ROM drive and re-booted. It was configured automatically, and I was up and running in a matter of minutes. Linux has come a long way!

The only manual intervention required at start-up was to specify the language (it defaults to German).

The GUI is much like Windows XP, so I felt pretty much at home. I was amazed to discover how much software is crammed on the CD: KOffice, Open Office, games, multimedia apps, editors, etc. etc. Apparently, the software is decompressed on-the-fly onto a RAM disk (which it creates). Overall, I was very impressed.

If you have any interest in Linux (and a fast Internet connection), give it a try. Thanks to Bill Winegarden (what a great sirname!) for encouraging me to post more items about 'nix.

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Few people will argue that Winamp has long been the best media player for PC's. Not only does it work great, but it continues to be free.

The latest version, Winamp3, incorporates some great new features. I love the ablilty to cross-fade tracks for that pro DJ sound. Winamp's support for video files makes it a great all-round media player. I also use Winamp to listen to Internet radio stations.

Winamp now has an alpha version for Macintosh computers.

Everyone else can grab Winamp here.

19 January 2003  |   permalink

From CNET: RIAA: ISPs should pay for music swapping:

A top music industry representative [Hillary Rosen, RIAA] said Saturday that telecommunications companies and Internet service providers will be asked to pay up for giving their customers access to free song-swapping sites.

"Let's face it. They [the ISPs] know there's a lot of demand for broadband simply because of the availability (of file-sharing)," Rosen said.

Rosen suggested one possible scenario for recouping lost sales from online piracy would be to impose a type of fee on ISPs that could be passed on to their customers who frequent these file-swapping services.

Yeah, right Hillary. The entire world revolves around your dying industry.  more...

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Are you sick of receiving junk e-mail? Me too. What can we do about it?

One approach is to try to keep known offenders off the Internet. If no one will sell them access, they can't send their "spam." Of course, this system breaks down if an Internet provider willingly sells access to a known spammer.

According to The Spamhaus Project, at least two big Canadian companies contribute to the spam problem. Spamhaus records show that Bell Nexxia and Shaw Cable are providing Intenet services to companies or individuals that are verified senders of electronic junk mail. There may be other Canadian companies on the Spamhaus list, but these are the only two I recognize.

Spamhaus asks, "Does your ISP profit from your spam problem?" If so, what are you going to do about it?

Visit Spamhaus.org to see if your ISP is on the list.

18 January 2003  |   permalink

I have no idea what this is, so don't ask me!

If you have 30 seconds to kill, why not watch desktop icons have a battle to the death?

(free Shockwave animation player required).

Turn on your speakers and watch it here.

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As you may very well know, Google's Translate Page is able to perform a rough machine translation of web documents and other text. For those who are really bored, this can be a minor form of amusement. For example...

Original English Text:

Super Fast Computer: news, trends, reviews, humor, and practical information, for better or for worse, from a technican's on-the-job experiences.

Original English, Translated to German:

Schneller Supercomputer: Nachrichten, Tendenzen, Berichte, Stimmung und praktische Informationen, für besseres oder für schlechteres, von den on-the-job Erfahrungen technicans.

German Translation, Translated to English:

Fast supercomputer: Message, tendencies, reports, tendency and practical information, for better or for worse, of the on-the-job experiences technican.

17 January 2003  |   permalink

In yesterday's post I talked about programs that start up with the computer and use up system resources. The question will arise: how does one identify which programs are necessary, and which are not?

A lot of programs (such as Kazaa or Quick Time) needlessly configure themselves to start up automatically. It is essential that other programs, such as Anti-Virus or Firewall software, do start up whenever you turn on your computer.

To assist people in determining how to configure these programs, I offer this list of common items that start up with Windows.

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Many things can cause problems with software, but isn't the Redmond-based company going too far with this explanation.

And speaking of amusing Knowledge Base articles, try Barney Starts Playing Peekaboo on His Own. Or how about this classic? You might like this. And this. And maybe even this.

I could go on and on. If you like this sort of thing, go to Jilly's Drive-In. Jilly has amassed a huge collection of amusing Microsoft Knowledge Base articles.

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Here is an awesome tool that should have been integrated into Windows a long time ago. As a tech, a lot of computers that I see have become sluggish over time. The most significant cause that I find is that too many programs start up with the computer (often without the users knowledge or permission). This takes up valuble system resources.

A lot of people are familiar with the "msconfig" utility that can help Windows users disable such processes from starting up automatically. There are several ways that a program can configure itself to launch, and msconfig is unfortunatley limited in what it can detect. It can also be awkward to use.

Enter Mike Lin's Start Up Control Panel. This program is a real gem, in my opinion, and I use it as standard practice. It finds all of the third-party software that starts up automatically, and it's very simple to use. It is one peice of software that I would not want to do without. And it is a free download. Mike has a number of useful programs on his site. Gamers should check out Startup Selector.

Download Startup Control Panel from Mike Lin's homepage.

16 January 2003  |   permalink

"We were all together late one night, kicking around lots of crazy ideas when I proposed it would be really cool if we could combine the warmth and depth - tonal realism, if you will - of the sound produced by an audio tube, with one of our state-of the-art motherboards" says Al Peng, product manager at AOpen America Inc., an audiophile for more than 10 years. "Laughter turned into raves a few months later when we did our first lab demo of our unique hybrid creation. The reproduced sound was absolutely amazing. It left everyone stunned. What we realized at that moment was how the limitations of typical audio output from a PC as we knew it, had come to an end - and what we were pioneering was a way to literally combine the best of two audio worlds - old and new." more...

14 January 2003  |   permalink

Situation:
New Year's Day 2003--- and all future holidays--- have disappeared from your calendar!

Solution:
Outlook 2000 stores a list of holidays in a text file. The outlook.txt file only includes holidays up until and including 2002. A new file is available with holidays until 2006, which you can download here. You will need to unzip this file and read the instructions.

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I like Windows XP. Having said that, whenever I set up XP for myself or a client, I usually spend about 10 minutes disabling a lot of features that I find intrusive and annoying. This includes disabling Windows Messenger, Remote Assistance, Balloon Tips, Error Reporting, Automatic Updates, etc.

A free download, XP Anit-Spy, is a one-stop script that takes care of all this for you. You choose which options you want it to perform, and then apply the settings.

Download XP Anti-Spy here.

13 January 2003  |   permalink

"Because it requires no new wiring, and the network adds no cost to your electric bill, power-line networking is the cheapest method of connecting computers in different rooms."

Links:

How Power Line Networking Works
PLN Comes of Age
more links

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old-computers.com

Featuring an old computer museum, video games, hardware and everything related. This site isn't easy to navigate, but it has a wealth of information about hundreds early desktop computers.

Check out this Apple 1 Computer, made out of wood!

12 January 2003  |   permalink

A Los Angeles federal judge has ruled that record companies and movie studios can proceed with a lawsuit against the parent company of Kazaa--the most popular online file sharing service--in the United States.

The Motion Picture Association of America and the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) applauded the decision in a joint statement. more...

11 January 2003  |   permalink

Once again, the web site of the RIAA has been hacked and defaced. In addition, it featured links to some 'recommended' file sharing apps -- which were stored on the RIAA's server.

As I write this, the site is offline. But somebody saved a copy.
As you may have heard, the RIAA wants the right to hack into YOUR computer and delete your MP3 files.

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Here are two pictures of Bill. The first is his famous mug shot from 1977. Not a bad looking geek. The other is from a press conference earlier this week. I guess one of the drawbacks to being the richest man in the world is that no-good punks, such as myself, feel totally free to take cheap shots at you. But, skip diggity, he UGLY!

10 January 2003  |   permalink

As a follow-up to the earlier post in which I mentioned that Microsoft will soon be limiting its support of Windows 98, here is a very useful link for users who are dedicated to that operating system. The link below is to the Windows Update "Corporate" site, which allows you to download files for installation at a later time (the usual Update site forces you to install your downloads right away). Get what you need and make backups while you still can!

http://www.microsoft.com/windows98/downloads/corporate.asp.

09 January 2003  |   permalink

  Solution:
  1. Open OE 6.0.
  2. Click Tools, point to Options, and then click the Security tab.
  3. Uncheck "Do not allow attachments to be saved or opened that could potentially be a virus."
  4. Click OK

08 January 2003  |   permalink

fiber optic backlit keyboard - ambient light sensor - superdrive - 17-inch monitor - 1440x900 pixels - 54mbps airport extreme - bluetooth - firewire 800 - 1ghz - GeForce 4   more...

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