Notes to self: ECS EZ-Buddie Barebone case (original), $200. Celeron 1.7 GHz CPU (original), $57. A 256 MB RAM stick (original), $44. Linksys WMP11 wireless PCI card (original), $50. 80 GB Maxtor HD (original), $83. Total is under $450, and it makes a nice quiet little wireless MP3 jukebox.
The smack, it has been put down. ICANN just ordered VeriSign to fix the DNS by tomorrow evening (original), or else: Given the magnitude of the issues that have been raised, and their potential impact on the security and stability of the Internet, the DNS and the .com and .net top level domains, VeriSign must suspend the changes to the .com and .net top-level domains introduced on 15 September 2003 by 6:00 PM PDT on 4 October 2003. Failure to comply with this demand by that time will leave ICANN with no choice but to seek promptly to enforce VeriSign’s contractual obligations. ...
VeriSign, the curators of the .org and .com domains, just abused the living hell out of their power. As of this morning, any time you try to look up a domain name that doesn’t exist, you get an IP for one of their hosts. In layman’s terms, this means that if you mistype the domain portion of a URL in your browser — let’s say you type http://www.yankeeessuck.com — it’ll redirect to a VeriSign page. It also means that if you mistype the domain portion of an email address, your mailer will attempt to deliver that email to a VeriSign server. Most likely it’ll just bounce… but there’s no guarantee. Hope you weren’t trying to send mail to a user who happens to exist over there. ...
Jeremy Zawodny makes the observation that I’ve made a couple of times; namely, Google’s PageRank is broken. (OK, he’s said it more than once.) In the comments, Phil Ringalda defends Google on the grounds that Jeremy’s page is as good a result for the search terms in question as anything. He discusses the issue further on his own blog. I would just like to note that I am currently the top result for google://population+of+indianapolis.
If you’re interested in CafePress Publishing, you ought to check out this report (original) from someone who’s tried it. He’s pretty positive, on the whole, but he provides enough information so that you can easily decide for yourself. They still aren’t doing perfect bound books, and they still plan to put CafePress advertising in each book, though, so my interest level is pretty low at the moment.
To my vast amusement, the Koppel-Argamon Gender Predictor (original) believes Reese is female. Seriously! There’s some sort of gender-determining algorithm which looks way too simplistic from where I’m standing which is meant to determine whether the author is male or female. The latest Dear Brother tests as feminine. Link thanks to Kip (original), who I don’t know at all so why am I using his first name?
This entry exists solely for the sake of pinging Flutterby. The automatic Trackback RDF stuff doesn’t work yet, apparently — we’ll see if the discovery works better. (Answer: nope. Trying a manual ping…) Testing again, now that Dan’s tinkered a little. And one more time! (It worked.)
This (original) is my favorite picture so far from the blackout. New York by night. That’s not a picture you’re going to see very often. I like the grainy effect produced by the cell phone camera; it’s very post-apocalyptic. Mad Max was here.
By way of Warren Ellis, we have open phonecam NYC blackout coverage (original). News moves at the speed of people.
Short form of the controversy: Dave Winer and Harvard are throwing a one-day blogging convention at Harvard. The entry fee is $500; $250 if you’re a Harvard affiliate. This strikes some people as too high. Today, Dave explained why the fee was $500, as follows: 1. It’s absolutely non-profit. OK, good. Irrelevant to why the cost is so high, though. bq. 2. We will use the money to pay expenses for speakers and students who will get in for free, some of whom will have their expenses paid. ...