IN CUSTODY Meet our potential MailBomb Boy: Luke John Helder.
Our friends at the FBI would like to talk to this little gentlemen. Luke John Helder was seen driving a gray or black '92 Honda Accord with Minnesota license plate Number: EZL 873. Helder turned 21 on Sunday. [Nice going Fred!] Here is the official FBI Wanted Poster. More pictures are on that site and Yahoo news. (It sure tops the standard birthday cards!)
According to the FBI's APB: Helder is "a person of interest that we would like to question in connection with the series of pipe bombs found throughout the Midwest,'' FBI agent Jim Bogner told reporters in Omaha, Neb. Translation: We want a piece of this little boys ass.
Earlier, Bill Morgan, a police spokesman in Lubbock, Texas, said an all-points bulletin described Helder as armed and dangerous. Bogner, however, said he could not confirm that Helder had a gun. Uh huh... and if he does have a gun, he could save us a whole heap of legal expenses.... Bogner said Helder is believed to be somewhere in Texas. And we still want to talk to him.
For a nice complete story hit this AP wire link. Damn sorry about this. Click on the Illinois map and it brings up everything.
Now Dad's getting in the act: MAY 07, 18:26 ET Dad of Bomb Suspect Makes StatementBy The Associated Press Statement from Cameron Helder, the father of Luke J. Helder, the 21-year-old college student wanted for questioning in the string of mailbox pipe bombs: Who is as clueless a parent as I've ever heard....On second thought I do feel pretty sorry for this guy. He looks shocked. I suspect it is going to turn to rage shortly.
"I really want you to know that Luke is not a dangerous person. I think he's just trying to make a statement about the way our government is run. I think Luke wants people to listen to his ideas, and not enough people are hearing him, and he thinks this may help." Tell that to my neighbors who were injured by your snotnosed brat's attempt to "talk to us little people."
"Luke you need to talk to someone." I know some of my neighbors would like to talk to him. eh. "Please don't hurt anyone else. It's time to talk. You have the attention you wanted. Luke, we love you very much. We want you home safe. Please call Mom, Jenna and I. We need you very much. We really do need our privacy. This is really tough. Please just let us try to cope with this. Thank you." ...He's all ready hurt enough people Mr. Helder. Those innocent people were my friends and neighbors. Hopefully you can afford to get this kid some help-- but I suspect he's going to be living with Ted K at ClubFed.
Oh yeah he's supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. However the evidence is piling up. Thanks for the great linking to Kathy at http://site-essential.com/
THIS JUST IN 5PM PDT: ABC NEWS and CNN Headline News are reporting that the FBI have Helder [ABCNEWS.COM Reports: May 7 — Law enforcement officials in Nevada have surrounded the 21-year-old Minnesota man the FBI is seeking in connection with a wave of pipe-bomb attacks in the rural areas of the Midwest, Colorado and Texas, ABCNEWS has learned. Officials say he is trapped in his car and has a gun to his head. It is reported he was on a cell phone talking to the FBI and his parents. Gee was all it took a little attention from Dad?
Correction: IN CUSTODY ABCNEWS.COM Reports: Nevada State Patrol officials said Luke John Helder was pulled over by Nevada State troopers on Interstate I-80 east of Lovelock, Nev. Public safety officials said a passerby spotted him driving his 1992 Honda with Minnesota license plate EZL 873 — the same car FBI officials earlier today said he was driving — and called the sheriff's department. Helder had a gun to his head, threatening to kill himself, but hostage negotiaters persuaded him to surrender peacefully. State officials said a bomb squad was on the way to inspect Elder's car for explosives.
Now the question du jour is: Did Helder put the pipebombs in the mailboxes in Texas? Or do we have a copycat? Inquiring minds sure want to know. Time to take out the map and start plotting.... Your comments?
While I rarely reprint press releases directly this one is important. Please spread the word.
TVWORLDWIDE.COM - PRESS RELEASE
International Webcasting Association to Rally Membership on Copyright Controversy with Two Webcasts, Live from Washington DC TVWorldwide.com Tapped to Stream Interactive Town Hall Meeting of Webcasters May 9, and Coverage of U.S. Copyright Office Roundtable May 10
Chantilly, Va. - Deploying the very technology that gave birth to the industry it represents, The International Webcasting Association (IWA), in cooperation with TVWorldwide.com announced a joint effort to produce two webcasts on important copyright issues that may change the face of the webcast industry. In an effort to unite and inform its members and the webcasting industry at large, the IWA will dedicate the second in a series of on-line Worldwide Town Meetings of Webcasters to the implications of the Copyright Office recommendations. This will be webcast on May 9 from 1PM-4 PM EDT. This will be followed the next day with live coverage of the U.S. Copyright Office's important roundtable discussion on the proposed guidelines for webcasters to give the required notice of copyrighted material they webcast and to maintain webcast records. The roundtable will be held May 10 from 9AM-5PM EDT.
Both webcasts will originate from Washington D.C. and be freely available at www.webcasters.org and www.tvworldwide.com. Event sponsors include Streaming Magazine, the nationally syndicated "On-Line Tonight" radio show featuring David Lawrence and other sponsors currently lining up to support the webcasts.
Visitors to the live Worldwide Town Meeting of Webcasters will be able to post questions to the panel and participate by submitting questions and comments chat and e-mail, thus providing a fully interactive forum for those unable to attend or who are simply interested in learning more about the issues.
Roger Dean, Chairman of the IWA said, "We're excited to be able to bring our industry together for these important events in a format that actually showcases the benefits from webcasting. We've again teamed with TVWorldwide.com to webcast the event because of their vast expertise in streaming successful interactive events via Internet TV."
"This is a defining moment for our industry," stated Susan Pickering, Executive Director of the IWA stated. "We're demonstrating the potential of the very medium we work in every day as we create awareness of these issues. Its crucial to ensure our membership and all webcasters have access to the process taking place surrounding the copyright issues."
"We're pleased to work with the IWA on this historical first in streaming video," stated Dave Gardy, Chairman and CEO of TVWorldwide.com. "We're getting a huge response to these events nationally and the U.S. Copyright Office has been very responsive in working with us to facilitate coverage of the roundtable. We look forward to once again working with the IWA as they practice what they preach in utilizing webcasts to serve their membership."
The 1998 Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) established that webcasters must pay "performance rights" fees to record labels for the music they play and instructed the Copyright Office to set the appropriate rate, which turned the matter over to a Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel (CARP) to propose what those rates should be. Industry observers have pointed out that the CARP's recommended rates are significantly more than 100% of most webcasters gross revenues. The Librarian of Congress has until May 21, 2002 to decide whether to accept, reject or modify the CARP's findings.
"If they accept the CARP panel's recommendation, many observers believe that the decision will effectively kill Internet Radio as an industry, as the decision could bankrupt all but the three or four largest webcasters," commented Pickering.
The event will be compressed and archived for viewing at www.webcasters.org and www.tvworldwide.com. Participants should have the free Real Player installed and should log on 15 minutes prior to each event. Questions can be directed to 703-961-9250, ext 223 before and during the events.
As a leading streaming video applications service provider, TVWorldwide.com is developing a network of video channels that is an affiliation of community-based Internet television stations, each underwritten by a strategic partner, "aimcastingsm" to targeted B2B and special interest demographic audiences worldwide. TVWorldwide.com works with strategic partners to develop the latest in live and archived state-of-the art video streaming content applications. TVWorldwide.com was recently named one of the streaming video industry's "Hottest Streaming Companies" by Streaming Magazine, www.streamingmagazine.com.
The International Webcasting Association (IWA) is a worldwide non-profit trade organization dedicated to the growth and development of the art, technology and commerce of webcasting and streaming media over the Internet and other networks. The IWA, headquartered in Washington, DC ( www.webcasters.org ), represents members throughout the United States, Europe, Asia, Canada and Australia. The IWA works to keep members informed, connected, and better prepared for the changes that are an integral part of the technology.
CARP PSAs: Rich Chadwick and the wonderful folks at MediaMan.com has produced two wonderful and educational CARP PSAs that will help to educate and call listeners to action. They are inviting you to download them and share them with your local webcaster.
Bill, who has been writing for the QC Times for as long as I can remember acts as the voice of the community. Bill is wise man who has ability to voice the quiet concerns and opinions of the community as few people ever have. Today his concern is how in the past four days our little area of America may have lost its innocence. Here's an slice of his article:
"And then, I stared down a side road and had a sinking feeling. There was a country mailbox, the hump-backed icon of the farm. Its flap-down door was open to hopefully assure the mail carrier and the owner of the box that no pipe bomb was inside.
One can only be stunned at this innocence lost. If anything was benign in this crazy life of ours, it was the friendly country mailbox.
...I could not get this out of my mind. The horror of the Twin Towers will forever be a torture to our minds, but all of that seemed so distant from this cornland. Did not 9/11 happen 940.6 miles away from Quad-City Land?
It would never seem possible that a terrorist nut would find his prey in the innocent person opening a mailbox ... someone with the benign faith that there is nothing so safe from harm’s way as a country mailbox, holder of the phone bill, circulars, cards from relatives or notes from children and grandchildren in college.
I drove on through blameless spring, my tires churning under gravel roads. It was a thud, a scare in the pit of my stomach to see country mailbox after country mailbox, with their doors open. This was fear in the farmland.
Once upon a long ago, farmers without exception were delighted to be given what Uncle Sam called RFD, or Rural Free Delivery. Before RFD, about the turn of the century in these parts, a farm could be isolated from mail for days, weeks, even a month, or until someone made it to town to pick up the mail. Then came delivery on the country routes. Farmers were no longer the country cousins; their service was as prompt as the city folks’.
The only priority for free mail delivery was an oval-topped metal mailbox. The configuration for a mailbox has been forever unchanged, always so amiable, safe beyond reproach.
As I passed one country mailbox after another, I particularly thought of the kids, and how anxious eyes would peer out the window, checking to see the mailbox on a post alongside the road:
"I’m going out, mom, and get the mail."
It is unthinkable, in our quiet countryside, that we may now fear the mailbox.
Bill's right. For a majority of my life I have lived that part in rural America. I have always felt safe there. But last Friday some over-egoed idiot decided my neighbors were insignificant people. This little self-centered tweeb thinks he is in charge of teaching the rest of us some-type of lesson. He has made it his mission in life to make our way of life something of a mockery. How pathetic. While we might have lost some of our innocence, and we might have to be a little more careful, this little tweebs days are numbered.
Incoming AOL CEO Richard Parsons: "We're the No. 1 movie company, the No. 1 online company, the No. 1 premium cable network company, the No. 1 cable network company, No. 2 cable company, No. 2 music company, " he said here in a panel discussion at the cable-television industry's annual convention. "Well, what am I missing?" Developers. [Scripting News]
This is the same man who when asked how he was going to bring the company all together, and was reminded of the Harvard MBA students winning strategic case study competition, who "suggested that AOL Time Warner essentially abandon the pursuit of synergy and instead focus on running its various units more or less independently."
"I'm always grateful for whatever help I can get from the press, or a bunch of business-school students, whatever," Mr. Parsons said dismissively. "There is really no analytic reason to think that disaggregating the company is somehow going to increase the value."
I hate to admit it, but I've worked with the AOL crowd. This is the most clueless group of people on the planet. Never worry about keeping their customers, or preserving their communities of loyal customers! Screw em! We've got their money! We don't need to support them-- and if they want to leave or cancel, make it damn near impossible for them to cancel. That's the wholesale attitude of the standard AOL employee. ...And their idea of marketing is carpet bombing AOL CDs out of the back of a B-52 bomber! (This from the Honey Graham Queen.)
In the past two years AOL has lost, fired, laid-off, paid-off or made it so impossible to work there (or in their other companies they swallowed wholesale,) some of the most talented developers and community leaders on the planet. It was is the most clueless thing I've ever seen a company do-- but then again, it's AOL.
IN CUSTODY Meet our potential MailBomb Boy: Luke John Helder. 
Fear in the Countryside
