WINDING DOWN
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net and technology news
by Alan Lenton
Well Harry Potter has finally graduated from Hogwarts having finished off Sauron. He's given the Jewel of Judgement to the unicorn, destroyed the silver chair and returned the Orb of Aldur to Belgarion. Or something like that.
Which is by way of saying that I'm about to take a summer break for a couple of weeks. <cue Terminator style voice>I'll be back<end cue>, I hope, on Sunday 19 August with more material to entertain and inform you of happenings in the portals of dataspace.
And for this week...
Shorts:
It seems that NASA has managed to lose US$94 million worth of kit in the last decade. The excuses offered make 'the dog ate my homework' look positively believable. I particularly like the one claiming that astronauts had tossed the laptop out of the International Space Station and it had burned up on re-entry! The news of all this missing kit comes from a report to congress by the Government Accountability Office. The figure of US$94 million doesn't include kit lost because of mix ups between imperial and metric measurements...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/26/nasa_lost_stuff/
An American friend once told me that the US had the best politicians money could buy. After reading through the reports of the inanities at the Government Reform Committee hearings on peer to peer networks, and looking at the incoherent ranting of various members, I think my US readers should seriously consider asking for their money back!
We already know that congress people think information on the Internet travels in pipes. I can only assume they think that peer to peer (P2P) networking is a sort of self-assembly kit that allows foreigners (Polish plumbers?) to build pipes into top secret US government establishments.
Yes, world wide (especially in Japan) there have been a number of high profile leaks caused by installing P2P software on work or government computers. The problem is not the software, but the employees who fail to obey the security instructions for the organisation by which they are employed.
A lot of this could be dealt with by adopting the same position as New York State governor, Eliot Spitzer, who has banned state employees from taking their work computers home with them! If the computer is only used at work, for work, then there is no need for unsanctioned P2P software to be installed.
http://ct.news.com.com/clicks?t=39400961-18a32f6148453f76b7d88f6b914d69a0-bf&s=5&fs=0
http://news.com.com/2100-1029_3-6198585.html
Here's something fascinating that is a little out of the ordinary. ZDNet photographers recently visited HP's massive computer recycling centre in Roseville, California, and the results are on the web in the form of a fascinating picture gallery. Nice work HP, but I hope you are also working on ways to make less toxic machines in the future.
http://newsletters.zdnetuk.cneteu.net/t/217144/921984/409391/0/
The EU was due to file anti-trust charges against Intel on Friday. I haven't had a chance read the details, but I'll probably cover this as the case drags on for the next 20 years. You don't believe me? How about if I tell you that it's taken the EU six years to get this far!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/26/eu_files_antitrust_charges_against_intel/
This last week a large Chinese counterfeiting network was broken up by a joint operation involving the FBI, Microsoft and the Chinese Public Security Bureau. A large quantity of high quality forged software was seized, including a version of Windows Vista hacked to disable the 30-day failsafe technology. Microsoft claims the seized software was worth US$2 billion. Really? The FBI told Reuters that it was worth US$500 million. Quite a discrepancy. My theory is that the FBI discounted the Vista software completely, since regardless of the official price, no one wants to buy it :)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/24/microsoft_fbi_bust_counterfeit/
The Texas State web site is leaking sensitive information on hundreds of thousands of residents, including social security numbers and addresses. The information is still there since the state claim that under Texan public information laws the documents in which the information is contained have to be made public. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase 'Open Government', doesn't it?
http://newsletter.infoworld.com/t?ctl=183EE50:215D3E184FC552DC8958E377A722015FEFF29049075316B4
While on the subject of private information leaks, I note that the personal details of over half a million US service personal and their relatives may have been compromised after Pentagon contractor Science Applications International Corp, managed to transmit the whole shebang unencrypted over public Internet networks. What a bunch of dorks - hopefully heads will roll.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/23/whoops_sorry_have_a_complimentary_peanut/
Have you had the feeling recently that your e-mail is taking longer to arrive? You're right - it is. And the reason is a switch in tactics by spammers. Previously they used to send their toxic attachments as pictures, but for a while now corporate filters have been quite successful in cutting such spam out.
So, spammers have switched to sending toxic Adobe pdf files, since corporate filters have to let pdf files through because these are an industry standard type of file. They are also much larger than most picture files. Which, in turn means that not only is your e-mail server filling up with pdf crap, but it's also taking longer to download your mail to your computer.
The only upside of the whole thing is that it may result in a wholesale switch away from the cruddy pdf format to more sensible open formats that are just text, not executable code!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/23/spammers_switch_to_pdf/
Homework:
Do you give verbal presentation? Write reports? Then it would be worth having a look at a recent piece in Ubiquity. It's called 'The mathematics of Persuasive Communication' and it's by Phillip Yaffe. Don't worry, it's not got any mathematics in it at all. All the so-called formulae are not anything of the sort - they are just mnemonics to help you remember - for instance, Conciseness, which is defined as being as long as necessary and as short as possible, is given the mnemonic Co=LS. It's not a formula, it has no mathematical meaning.
However, the advice given on producing papers and talks is excellent, and I would thoroughly recommend the advice it contains.
http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/v8i28_persuasive.html
Scanner: Other stories
Power outage knocks out major websites
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/24/web_site_outages/
Microsoft and Ask call for heightened Internet privacy
http://www.physorg.com/news104508853.html
Embracing disruption as a way of (tech) life
http://ct.news.com.com/clicks?t=39398717-18a32f6148453f76b7d88f6b914d69a0-bf&s=5&fs=0
Mobile-mast danger is all in your head
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/25/mobile_sufferers_unaffected_by_turning_kit_off/
US patent reform clears House hurdle
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/20/us_patent_reform_bill/
Lies, damn lies, and click-fraud
http://newsletter.infoworld.com/t?ctl=183C10D:215D3E184FC552DCC7E5EFA77BAD2B93EFF29049075316B4
Hackers go to work on iPhone
http://www.physorg.com/news104429119.html
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/20/iphone_unlocked/
Acknowledgements
Thanks to readers Barb, Fi, DJ and Lois for drawing my attention to material used in this issue. Please send suggestions for material to alan@ibgames.com.
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
29 July 2007
Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist. His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html
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