01 December 2002

Incitement to Hatred and e-Mail GARRINGREEN HOTSPOT -- Under The Prohibition of Incitement to Hatred Act (1989) it is an offence "to publish or distribute written material ... likely to stir up hatred." Can we assume the Act covers transmission of e-mails? Each week, I receive dubious e-mails, purportedly humourous, that cross the line of disrespect. Read by the wrong person, they would encourage negative views of people.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

State of the Art of Reputation SMART MOBS -- Reputation is not something that's internal to you. You don't have a reputation with yourself per-se. Reputations only really exist within the context of your interactions with others, and therefore, a reputation can be viewed as existing in the space between you and others. While a reputation can be thought of as distinct, separate and external to us all, it is inextricably linked to us. Reputation doesn't exist outside of the context of the owner to which it refers. In some instances, a reputation can become so independent from us that it 'takes on a life of its very own.' In these cases, reputations can actually drive how we act, rather than the normal case of how we act dictating our reputation. For example, sometimes we find ourselves acting in uncharacteristic ways, many times unconsciously, just to support an external perception of who we are amongst others that is no longer true to our being. A reputation is comprised in part of what we say and what we do, over some period of time in some particular context of an interaction with others. As an individual, I might never know all of the different facets of my reputation, just as others might also never know every aspect of my reputation. Needless to say, reputations are important to us all because they affect us in very tangible ways, serving to make our lives easier or more difficult, depending on whether they are positive or negative.> [Kuro5hin and Howard Rheingold]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Video Conferencing Tips GARRINGREEN HOTSPOT -- Some tips for better videoconferencing. Coordinate the meeting schedule. Always introduce everyone in the room to one another and get acknowledgements that everyone can hear. Reposition the camera periodiclly. Don't drum your fingers. Pause for comments. Speak naturally. Make visual aids simple and in landscape. Mute the microphone when not speaking.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Using XFML to Handle Multiple Feeds Matt Mower -- When trying to handle feed from multiple blogs, "we will reach the situation where people using different words to mean the same topic. This will be a problem, but hopefully not as a big of a problem as it could be. It is for this reason that I have been tracking XFML so carefully. With XFML we have the ability to say 'A's topic X is the same as B's topic Y'. liveTopics already does XFML." [Scripting News]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

ICE Tech ICE Tech ie -- The company provides touch screen kiosk technology to the Irish public sector. It supplies solutions to both central and local government agencies, health authorities an semi-state bodies. Its kiosks enable users to access useful online information, view multimedia presentations, send and receive e-mails, bank online and make online purchases.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

DIY Home Cinema XI BLUE -- The digital media revollution has just begun, according to Tim Kirby, who believes that in five years' time, everyone will be creating mini-movies as part of everyday life. Kirby is perfecting ways people can videoblog. He also is devising training courses that would allow people to create mini-TV shows about their lives, using just Apple equipment and a DV camera.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Ireland's Attitude Towards Drunks GARRINGREEN HOTSPOT -- I like Eamon Dunphy, the controversial Irish presenter, because he brings things into focus. At the moment, he is focusing issues concerning drunken driving for me. Dunphy was recently convicted of driving while intoxicated, his ninth motoring offence. He has been put off the road for 10 years. Dunphy lives a pattern of questionable conduct. His drinking patterns and recreational drug use are common knowledge. The courts don't defer to him, they levy a sentence evenly weighted for the offence. So anybody with the same kind of pattern of driving while intoxicated would walk for 10 years when convicted by an Irish court. But they wouldn't serve a custodial sentence, because that's Ireland's attitude towards drunks. That's the same country where more than a million will tune in to hear Dunphy chat about current events or to analyse a football match. They won't tune out from disgust because they like Dunphy's attitude on most things and they'll accept his misconduct on other fronts.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Ireland Ending Writers' Tax Exemption GARRINGREEN HOTSPOT -- Ireland's finance minister Charlie McCreevy is considering taxing artists and writers. Defenders of this tax-free system point out that it has attracted hundreds of creatives to Ireland. Plus, most artists and writers don't hit it big, so their tax-free proceeds give them money to live without availing of welfare payments. It's worth noting that Ireland is the country that produced Yeats, Wilde, Joyce and Beckett. None enjoyed the artists' exemption.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Garringreen Hotspot BOARDS ie -- The guys in the IrelandOffline Forum don't believe we have home DSL service from EsatBT running in Kilkenny. I get a WiFi signal from a home with DSL service right now. It's always-on, even when the residents are out. I'm going to verify its speed and contract standard because we need to know if it was installed as a business or home connection.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Narrow Vision on Broadband THE SUNDAY TIMES -- Jane Suiter has tired of the rehetoric concerning how Ireland is supposed to become an e-commerce hub. She points out that "Ireland is still an effective wasteland for broadband services" and cites how "fewer than 2000 people in Ireland use broadband services." And why that? Because it's priced too high. Eircom says it's because people don't want broadband. As Suiter explains, Chris Horn from Iona Technologies doesn't buy this argument. And she says minister Ahern will correct the pricing structures with new pricing tables within weeks. The IrelandOffline community have been articulating these issues for nearly two years now. As David Long, winner of an IIA Net Visionary Award points out, there are a multitude of killer applications out there waiting for broadband carriage. Ireland needs to turn on reasonably priced always-on service options, which will show citizens a way towards new functions like collaborative hieroglyphics.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Filing on the Fly GARRINGREEN HOTSPOT -- If you Google already and you want to improve the way you save your precious discoveries, you should consider Copernic Professional. According to David Hewson, "if this top version cannot find something on the Web, then it probably does not exist." If Copernic finds something interesting, you can easily store the page using SurfSaver or Content Saver. Both create helpful databases of your Web pages that are easy to search, share and mine later.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Sighting: Software to Sniff Out Lost Files David Hewson -- One of the best computer search tools is The Sleuthhound. It indexes your folders, then searches the contents for any key words entered. The results pop up almost instantly inside a screen designed to look like a web search engine. If you file things on removeable media, spend €30 and download Ontrack's PowerDesk5 file manager. It puts two tiny icons in every open and save box, listing all the recent files and folders you have worked with. This help you navigate to documents you used earlier.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Doors Six-Point Action Plan to Fight Spam Danny O'Brien -- I pay around  €290 each month for spam I do not want. I believe these six points would combat the rise of electronic spam. Local politicians should complain to government that obscene spam crowds out e-mail from their voters. The government should give ISPs the power to fight back by suing spammers for damages. Service providers should pursue customers who abuse their systems and work with each other to stop the spammers abroad. Software makers must improve antispam software. The public should campaign for electronic postage stamps. Everyone should call for an independent watchdog to which we can report spam, where prosecutions are co-ordinated and evidence agains the most prolific spammers collated.   [Comment on Shoptalk]