Wednesday, July 21, 2004

HailStorm training wheels. Many folks wouldn't want to be reminded how easy it is to convert sparse input into a detailed profile that includes a phone number, a street address, a satellite photo, and driving directions. Re-entering the basic facts each time perpetuates an illusion of privacy. Yet the reality, for many of us, is that these facts are public. Since I haven't told Google (or any other directories) to delete my records, I've implicitly given permission for Web applications to use that data. Let me now make that permission explicit. I'd be happy if a Web form made intelligent use of public information about me. I'd be even happier if I could control the source of that data. Public information is a poorly defined concept, after all. There are online directories that still remember an address I vacated five years ago. I'd like to maintain the facts about me that I deem public. When applications need those facts, I'd like to refer them to a service that dispenses them. [Full story at InfoWorld.com] ... [Jon's Radio] 12:00:18 PM      Google It!.

Free UK access to Gale reference works. UK Colleges Receive Free e-Reference Books "In Perpetuity", Managing Information, July 21, 2004. Excerpt: "An agreement signed between JISC (the Joint Information Systems Committee) and the publisher Thomson Gale will mean that every college in the UK will be able to gain access to the free content of twenty-one top electronic reference titles in perpetuity. The titles included in the Gale Virtual Reference Library - including the Gale Encyclopedia of Psychology, the Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations, the six-volume Gale Encyclopedia of Science, and many others – have been specially chosen by representatives of the FE community for their quality and their relevance to the curriculum." [Open Access News] 11:57:44 AM      Google It!.

Shuttle unwraps 'fastest' SFF PC yet. Athlon 64 at the helm [The Register] 8:35:17 AM      Google It!.

John Dvorak: Why Microsoft won't change. "The stock dividend and buyback are the result of not being able to buy companies fast enough." [Scripting News] 8:28:13 AM      .

Journals: how to get Google to index your articles. The Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers (ALPSP) has released a most helpful document, Enabling Google to Index your Full Text Content. Unfortunately it's only available to ALPSP members. [Open Access News] 8:22:23 AM      Google It!.