Monday, August 19, 2002

[Asia Business News] QUOTE China Boasts It Will Beat the U.S. to Mars China expects to put a man on Mars in early this century.  Or so it claims, but China hasn't even placed a man in Earth's orbit yet.  As if to convince the general population of its feasibility, the Chinese space program has built a model of a Chinese base on Mars now traveling the country in an exhibition.  Let's hope it doesn't look anything like Shanghai's Pearl of the Orient tower!  UNQUOTE [Asia Business News] China does have a space program, as does Japan, India, Australia, and a bunch of other nations.  Some of them have specialized in cheap delivery of satelites into orbit, thus effectively competing with NASA.   7:26:07 PM

The Greenpeace Blog has lots of interesting stuff, and also a few design bugs.  I did a post to their comments area, and it still says zero comments.  Gilla asks for people to e-mail suggestions to her (him?) but where the e-mail link invokes my old AOL archives (I am now using Eudora for my e-mail). I can't figure out how to Radio subscribe to [http://weblog.greenpeace.org/ powered by Moveable Type] QUOTE a comprehensive list of safer ways to avoid invasions of indoor pests. "Spiders: Under ideal conditions, do not kill spiders because they help to control pests." Every web developer should read this book, since more and more people with disabilites access websites and they simply cannot be left out. also check out their zip code nuclear reactor finder UNQUOTE [http://weblog.greenpeace.org/] Lots more good stuff in their archives. I saw on C-Span not so long ago that 100% of the US nuclear power plants were tested for terrorist threats. 50% of them failed the test for NORMAL terrorist attacks. NONE of them passed any test for protection against cyber attacks. The problem is that control systems, like Air Traffic Control, Water Treatment, etc. were built as stand alone units, with zero consideration for any security other than physical security.  Now corporate and government managers are linking those instruments to their computer networks because they want to know what's going on, but many networks are brain brain dead on security, because after all, the information in the networks are not that important to protect, but that is not the case for some of these control systems. This management philosophy gave us the Challenger disaster. I fear we are overdue for another disaster.   5:16:21 PM

[Boing Boing Blog] QUOTE ISP blocks routing from the RIAA's site, turnabout is fair play?. An ISP has decided to ban routing to the RIAA's IP block from its network, on the grounds that the RIAA will attempt to hack its customers' computers. [Boing Boing Blog] apparently quoted from [Information Wave ISP] Due to the nature of this matter and RIAA's previous history, we feel the RIAA will abuse software vulerabilities in a client's browser after the browser accesses its site, potentially allowing the RIAA to access and/or tamper with your data. Starting at midnight on August 19, 2002, Information Wave customers will no longer be able to reach the RIAA's web site. Information Wave will also actively seek out attempts by the RIAA to thwart this policy and apply additional filters to protect our customers' data. Information Wave will also deploy peer-to-peer clients on the Gnutella network from its security research and development network (honeynet) which will offer files with popular song titles derived from the Billboard Top 100 maintained by VNU eMedia. No copyright violations will take place, these files will merely have arbitrary sizes similar to the length of a 3 to 4 minute MP3 audio file encoded at 128kbps. Clients which connect to our peer-to-peer clients, and then afterwards attempt to illegally access the network will be immediately blacklisted from Information Wave's network. The data collected will be actively maintained and distributed from our network operations site. End of [Boing Boing Blog] quote from [Information Wave ISP] With the RIAA suing backbones to block MP3 distribution sites in China and ISPs blocking access to the RIAA's IP block, you gotta wonder, is this the end of the end-to-end principle? Maybe if everyone blocked the RIAA's IP block, just sent them away into bad netizen coventry, the rest of the net could get on with it. Link Discuss (via MeFi) UNQUOTE [Boing Boing Blog] [Boing Boing Blog]'s Link to [Information Wave ISP] gives us the whole story from them, and their e-mail address. while Discuss is for people to comment on this news.  Thanks also for the link to [MeFi] QUOTE The MetaFilter Network is a collection of sites built with user interaction in mind.  UNQUOTE [MeFi] This place might also be worth revisiting. There's a lot of places worth revisiting starting with miscelaneous links on my own site.   3:32:36 PM

Here I correlate multiple stories about the West Nile Virus problem, that apparently is worse thanks to Humans who think they know what they are doing when trying to manipulate the Environment.  I have commented at other times and places about how come I think the Fires out West are largely a problem of our own making.  We collectively need an education in how not to manipulate our environment. [Bob Morris: The Politics of Water] QUOTE Are retention ponds breeding West Nile mosquitoes? Yow, attempts to clean up the water may be providing breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Public officials across the country are inadvertently creating vast breeding grounds for mosquitoes -- including those that carry the West Nile virus -- by installing stormwater retention ponds near businesses and homes in an effort to reduce the contaminants that collect in water. As concern over the mosquito-borne virus heightens, the effort to create new ponds and to clean up old ones has pit two environmental causes against each other. UNQUOTE [Bob Morris: The Politics of Water] Bob Morris's source is the [Washington Post]. Warning: the intensity of Pop Up ads is so fierce that if your PC is hurting for resources, like mine often is, you are at grave risk of the Bill Gates advertisement for more money spent on PC resources, popularly known as the Blue Screen Of Death. It is apparent to me, from the Washington Post story, that these government mandated West Nile Breeding ponds are needed for many reasons, and the people who operate them do not consider the West Nile virus to be a serious problem.  I think the solution to this would be for the families of victims of the West Nile to do a class action suit against the polluters. Simple cause and effect. Don't put the pollutants into the environment in the first place. So we don't need these ponds that invite mosquito breeding grounds. It does not matter if you cannot trace back which mosquito, that killed your loved ones, bred at which pond, which was needed because of which pollution. What matters is you find polluters with deep pockets. This then sends a chilling message to other polluters. Pollutants are not the only problem. I think a bigger problem, especially near where I live, are poorly designed drainage systems.  A city near where I live was recently sued because in the same trench in the ground they ran storm drain overflow, and sewage disposal, and drinking water.  They did that to save money on construction costs.  Sorry I can't cite a url on this.  I got the info from the real world grapevine. But let's not panic over how long this will take to resolve. I am paraphrasing [CDC FAQ on West Nile] Even in an area where there are infected mosquitos most of them do not have it, and of the humans who get bitten by an infected mosquito, only 1% of them are at risk. end of info I got from [CDC FAQ on West Nile] so if you get bitten by a mosquito, there is no reason to have a panic attack. I saw an interesting tip on the wee hours TV. You are out camping, bothered by mosquitos, and other small flying critters.  Put some mint on the side of your food plate, such as chewing gum unwrapped but not consumed.  It will drive away the bugs. Hmm, does chewing mint flavored gum keep them away from your face? I just learned a new use for junk food. [Adam Curry: Adam Curry's Weblog] QUOTE Now we finally know what mosquitoes do in the grand scheme of life. UNQUOTE [Adam Curry: Adam Curry's Weblog] Adam's link is to a story on USA states responding to Centers for Disease Control prediction that 1,000 people could be infected with this deadly miniature terrorist in the next year.  That AP story has additional links to more on this problem. Now combine Bob Morris story with [Boing Boing Blog] QUOTE Greenpeace blog. Greenpeace has a blog. It'd be great if NGOs around the world started doing this. In particular, it'd be great if some of the sustainable development NGOs like Youth Challenge International had blogging set up from their base-camps, so that project staff could make some notes about their projects while they're back at HQ. Geekhalla, the geek-house in Accra, Ghana, that the Geekcorps volunteers live in, has blog, but are there others? I'd love to read a blog maintained by the crews on Greenpeace's boats, too. Link Discuss (Thanks, Gillo!) UNQUOTE [Boing Boing Blog] If they are not already doing so, I think Greenpeace should be subscribing to Bob Morris on the Politics of Water. Incidentally, I found out about Bob Morris by randomly looking at recently updated Blogs, most of which were not of interest to me, but there are some gems out there that make the Blog Surfing worthwhile. What is the correct terminology for Blog Surfing? 3:24:43 PM

[Search Day Aug 19] has links to services that take those long urls and provide shorter substitutes.  They are all small companies that might not be around forever, so they might not be smart to use for permanent links. SnipURL http://snipurl.com/ TinyURL http://tinyurl.com/ MakeAShorterLink http://makeashorterlink.com/ 3:12:12 PM

[Civil Liberties Notes] QUOTE The Web-Annotated Constitution. An absolutely fantastic resource to the constitution. Pulls together hundreds of primary documents related to the constitution, as well as print listings. From Privacy Digest and lii.org Possible Resources Blog. UNQUOTE [Civil Liberties Notes] 4:45:24 AM

[Bob Morris: The Politics of Water] QUOTE Beware the crazed emu The drought in Australia has gotten so bad that emu, a large flightless bird, are grabbing food meant for sheep. I'd like a glass of radioactive water, please Water supplies in some New Jersey towns are contaminated with radium. The discovery in recent years of a new form of radium in underground water supplies is forcing towns throughout New Jersey to spend millions of dollars to remove the cancer-causing element from public drinking water. When radium is ingested, the body treats it like calcium and absorbs it into bones. It is known to cause bone and nasal cancers and is especially dangerous to children with developing bones. New Jersey DEP officials have told residents not to be overly alarmed by the findings. Um, why should they NOT be 'overly alarmed"??? Mercury in California water California gold miners used mercury to mine gold, millions of pounds of it.  It got into the water, and it's still there.  No one knows how to get rid of it.  It's very toxic. California’s effort to grapple with the problem is taking place against a background of increasing national and global mercury contamination, most of it linked to airborne emissions. Although there are many natural sources - volcanoes, evaporation from soil, weathering of rock - the largest single human-related source is coal combustion, which contains trace amounts of the element. California’s primary concern, however, is the millions of pounds of elemental mercury dumped directly on the ground or into streams. UNQUOTE [Bob Morris: The Politics of Water] 4:36:16 AM

I noticed on the bottom of one of my pages something odd about a date.  Incidentally I am currently on Radio version 8.0.7 © Copyright 2002 Al Macintyre. Last update: 11/13/2001; 7:04:00 PM. What I am wondering about is where the 2001 November comes from, since I originally downloaded this software in Spring of 2002. Sometimes my Win 98 clock gets stuck, because I am occasionally running applications from Win 3.1, Dos Games, and buggy state-of-art, but it has never been more than a few days off. 4:10:36 AM

Radio Wish for future enhancement of Post from Radio News Aggregation. It is really great that when we subscribe to changes on other Web sites that we can click on one area and have the whole thing for editing here and al link to the [source], but for many of us proper attribution is a learning curve.  We need to be better able to back track to where on that Web site did this or that material come from. What I would like to get is, link to the [source] home page (like we now get); link to the actual post anchor whatever; date (and time if available, which depends on the source software); subtitles (if they have been enabled ... this is another Radio topic I have yet to explore). I am wondering if Theme Templates offer some variation on how this stuff is handled. Another topic for me to explore, as my time permits. 3:44:47 AM

© Copyright 2002 Al Macintyre.