Cherry-Picking The Web Content Integrity6/5/2000; 7:16:10 AM April 18, 2000: Cherry-Picking The Web: "Metabrowsers let surfers select whatever content they want from anywhere on the Web and gather it all on one site." More integrity dissolution.And a small correction to the article:

CallTheShots cofounder and CEO Reza Moazzami contends – rather unconvincingly – that most Web sites should be delighted to have chunks of their content cherry-picked for a ComboPage, because when someone clicks on a link within an element, it will lead to the third-party Web site. "I'm sure there will always be situations where sites will express that kind of concern," says Moazzami. "What we try to do is make sure we address those concerns." He says his company, which is still in beta, has yet to receive a complaint from a third-party site.

Perhaps technically true, but a lot of sites just plain block CallTheShots' access to their servers, without making any particular kind of fuss in public. For instance, I don't think you can get Slashdot through CallTheShots.com. (BTW, I've talked about CallTheShots.com before.)

The digital divide is bunk Digital Divide6/5/2000; 7:15:23 AM April 17, 2000: The article provides a much needed dose of common sense into the debate, but it does overstate its case a bit.

"By far the most important factors facilitating or inhibiting Internet access are education and age, and not income—nor race/ethnicity or gender, each of which accounts for less than a 5 percent change in rates of access and is statistically insignificant."

See, there is a digital divide, but the true divide is between those who are online and those who aren't. That may seem like circular logic at first, but realize this is in stark opposition to the usual opinion on the topic, which insists it's the usual convenient race/gender/class excuses. Note: it's an excuse when you simply assume those are the causes, it's a valid reason when you have research and logic to back those reasons up... same standards as "the dog ate my homework"!Especially in this case, if you approach the problem as a race/class issue, and there's proof that it's not a factor, then you will accomplish precisely nothing... but I suppose you'll get re-elected doing it. There is a divide, but attack the root of the problem: Education. You can't do so much about age .

Can Napster be Stopped? No! Music & MP36/5/2000; 7:15:15 AM April 17, 2000: Well, to pick nits, yes, Napster itself can be stopped, as it depends on central servers. Maybe you can't stop it but you can make it as hard to use as it is to find FTP servers with warez, which for someone who is not "in the loop" is quite hard. Gnutella, on the other hand, is virtually provably impossible to block. If the protocol becomes encrypted or compressed, then the data it sends will look just like any other encrypted or compressed data, and the only other clue will be the traffic pattern, which I doubt will remain unique to Gnutella as others come up with perfectly legitimate uses for that protocol, like massive distributed processing.Update: Napster Takes a Nap: "Starting around 7 a.m. PDT Monday, servers and home pages for Napster, a popular service that allows Internet users to exchange MP3 music files, have been unavailable and disconnecting users." Napster's so easy to block it can even happen accidentally Thanks to Lawrence Lee for e-mailing me this link.

Real Work Personal Commentary6/5/2000; 7:15:12 AM April 16, 2000: I don't know why exactly, but I was thinking about my grandparents and what they think of my education in computer science.I was thinking of how to explain to them why what I do is hard enough to justify an education and that money they hear so much about. And I started wondering... if you could add up all of the person-hours spent on the processes invoked when you viewed this web page... from the web-browser and network connection you're using down to the silicon itself... how would that compare to the person-hours spent preparing for the invasion of Normandy, which I believe is still the largest military exercise ever (correction invited). My guess would be that the web-page view would be at least an order of magnitude greater, if not two or three. A bold claim, and I can't back it up. But who knows?(If you know enough to consider the question, draw the "technology tree" sometime that has everything necessary to create a web browser and a network to use it on. Don't forget the routers, the concept of a Turing machine, compilers, hardware, time to learn how to optimize the hardware, AND gates, OR gates, XOR gates, pipelines, caching, hard drives, RAM, fiber optics, modems/network, protocols, standarization, display technology, the science behind all of this stuff, input technology, time to test the technology, the list just goes on.)It's not that this is some startling revelation... but I think we should step back and think about how we got where we are sometimes. When I hit "Post Changes", how many millions of person-hours will I benefit from?If I have been able to see further than others, It is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants. - Sir Isaac Newton

French Group Takes Yahoo to Court Over Nazi Site
Country Watch: France
6/5/2000; 7:15:09 AM April 16, 2000: Missed this one, dated last Tuesday. Mostly interesting because of the line "LICRA did not say how access to a worldwide Web site could be blocked in France only." A concrete example of international laws in conflict.

Suck: Project Zapster
Humor/Amusing
6/5/2000; 7:15:06 AM April 16, 2000: Not a site I visit often, but this is good...

The Wired Word Technology & Sociology6/5/2000; 7:15:00 AM April 14, 2000: (a là array) "The egalitarianism of the Internet is appealing, but it rests on an untenable assumption: not merely that all of us are created equal, but that all of us are equally meritorious and interesting. Thus we have news Web sites in which the opinions of readers are solicited ("What's Your View?") and displayed in a format that gives equal weight to the informed and the ignorant; at last count Washingtonpost.com had registered more than (!) 2,600 "opinions" about gay rights in Vermont. "Wrong. The egalitarianism rests on no such assumption, it results from the empowerment of everybody with a voice that anyone can hear. Other whining: "In making publication available to all, the Internet bypasses the editorial process that attempts to separate the wheat from the dross, the publishable from the unpublishable. ... It has no standards, because none are required." Also wrong. Not every website is equally popular; you can find your way to good writing on the net!'Weblogs' are a part of that, of course, but hardly even the only way of finding good writing on the net. Usenet's still around, among other things.

BetaNews - Metallica Sues Napster, Universities, Fans Music & MP36/5/2000; 7:14:52 AM April 14, 2000: (another hit for "array"... I like this article better then the mainstream outlets) "This will be the first time a band has directly filed suit against Napster, and the first time universities have been sued for allowing students to trade MP3s. The case will set a precedent for what legal action can be taken against the spread of digital music. "It's been a trend this past two weeks; hold the network providers responsible for content.And I can't resist... "Metallica's Lars Ulrich said in a statement, '[It's] sickening to know that our art is being traded like a commodity rather than the art that it is.'" Nah, I think 'commodity' sounds about right. Now... back to my Mozart...

Gagging the net in 3 easy steps
Country Watch: Britain
6/5/2000; 7:14:45 AM April 13, 2000: "It's easy to censor the internet, and to prove the point, here's a little exercise."

ACLU's Filter Appeal Rejected
DVD & DeCSS
6/5/2000; 7:14:41 AM April 13, 2000: Is it just that I haven't been around long enough, or is the judicial system in this country becoming actively hostile towards the Internet? ACLU's Filter Appeal Rejected in the cphack case, and apparently quite summarily. The ACLU might as well start saving for the appeal right now. The judge had already ruled before the appeal was even filed, I think.