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Journal 4/3: Dvorak on Model T; Ad banners; NaNoWriMo.

[Links] The TRS-80 Model 100, the world's first good laptop PC, can do the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard! Yay! [Links] It's obvious what's wrong with Web ads, and the solution is equally obvious. [Links] NaNoWriMo is still more than half a year away, but at the rate I'm going, I should start planning for it now. There's no way a 50,000-word novel will fit in 24K of RAM, but the 25-year-old TRS-80 Model 100 is among the best for banging out disjointed pieces of such a story.

TurboTaxed: Intuit Don't Want My Business Either.

[Rant and Log with Links] I tried doing my taxes this year through TurboTax Online, just like in years past. It did not go well. Out of need, I got to experience Intuit's customer support in three different ways. The short version: Intuit managed to make even Dell look good! I should've switched to something else years ago.

Journal 1/16: Pirates!; The most expensive liquids; DreamHost oops; the Disintegrator!

[Links] News about how the pirates of the Internet can't be stopped. [Link] Old story, but guess what the most expensive liquids in the world are. [Links] DreamHost accidentally overbilled most of their customers by a huge amount. [Links] Meet the Disintegrator, a 24-barrel rubber band minigun. If you ever get into a rubber band fight, bring this.

Journal 1/15: The EFF are the good guys: RIAA, ISPs, TSA websites, NSA, and DRM.

[Links] Mostly the EFF's writing, but they're loaded with links elsewhere, and I've linked to some of them as well. [Link] The RIAA want to claim that "attempted distribution" is proof of a crime. Again. The EFF says the law disagrees. Again. [Links] Leave it to the RIAA to muddy the clear answer to the simple question, "Are personal copies of digital music files legal?" [Link] Wired tried to get a straight answer about that out of the RIAA. See how straight their answer is. [Link] Comcast interfered with their customers' use of the Internet and lied about it. Would you believe that Comcast have supporters? [Link] Is your ISP interfering with your legal use of BitTorrent? Find out through the EFF's "Test Your ISP" project. [Links] The TSA Web site that was supposed to get your name off the secret terrorist watch list exposed your identity to theft as well. [Link] It's apparently budget time in Washington. The No-Such-Agency wants the power to spy on every American's Internet traffic. "Those who would give up essential liberties for temporary security..." [Link] The RIAA's member companies may have finally conceded that DRM is bad, but guess what failed ideology is coming next? [Link] Will ISPs become the copyright police? [Link] Tell the NSA/CIA/FBI/other TLA (three-letter acronym) agencies to wiretap this!

Journal 1/13: Fun links.

[Links] Mona Lisa in MS Paint; Walking wall; Rednecks build spider mech.

Journal 1/11: Life, and the return of NiGHTS.

Some notes about my work life. Nothing much, but worth writing about anyway. [Link] NiGHTS is back and on the Wii.

Journal 1/10: Online; The Mom Song; The Price Is Right; Nothing wrong with Vista.

Telephone problem fixed. [Link] The Mom Song. It's what a mom says in 24 hours compressed into three minutes. [Links] Memorable moments in Bob Barker's TV life. [Link] The LockerGnome says there's nothing wrong with Windows Vista. Watch and see what disagrees.

Journal 1/9: Offline.

DSL is great. On that note, if the telephone goes out, guess what else goes out?

Journal 1/5: Notscape; Ubuntu Linux pre-installed.

[Link] Don't you just love it when all your bookmarks, settings, and messages just disappear? It's even better once you learn it's a deleted profile, or that there was a profile at all. Best of all, it's barely documented at all where Netscape keeps its profiles. Or kept. [Links] There's a company out there selling computers with Ubuntu pre-installed. It looks like this is the way to go if you want to try Linux without having to install it.

Journal 1/3: Of spirits and bottle openers.

No more made-in-Red-China bottle openers for me, or anything looking nearly as cheap.

Journal 1/2: Windows and wine (no, the kind we drink).

[Links] I got a surprise gift: mead. I got another surprise today: Walley World's wine botle openers are not high quality.

Journal 1/1: Fireworks; Ubuntu; Encryption; Dell woes

I started my journal again, at last. Sorry about the absence. You haven't missed anything since October 16. [Links] Ubuntu out-of-box experience repeated with 7.10? Check it out. [Links] I'm now running off of a fully encrypted hard disk drive, and honestly it's not much different than running off an unencrypted disk. [Links] Ubuntu really amazes me, and I'm not alone. Dell, among others, agree. [Links] Speaking of Dell, how could they make their sales experience be as bad as their support experience? Read on, and be afraid.

Journal 10/16: Weedburger! Would you like some green fries with that?

[Links] Meet two stupid criminals. They pulled a prank last year at a local Burger King in which they served marijuana-laced Whoppers to two police officers. They're going to jail. They thought they were pwning the cops. LOL, wrong!

Journal 10/15: Sail ho! Looks like a patent troll! She's engaged Linux!

[Links] A company called "IP Innovation" filed a patent infringement suit against Novell and Red Hat. The patents: "User Interface With Multiple Workspaces for Sharing Display System Objects." The patent was filed in '87 and awarded in '91. The "invention" was obvious as late as '86. "IP Innovation": Innovation? I don't think so.

Journal 10/10: Taco Bell goes to Mexico; School shooting; Balloon Fiesta crashes.

[Link] Taco Bell is returning to Mexico. But the last time I checked, Taco Bell wasn't Mexican food. [Links] There was a high school shooting in Cleveland, OH. [Link] The Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta had a record number of balloon crashes in a single day.

Journal 10/9: Oldest Profession 2.0; Missed the Target; Fonts; Copycrime; Microsoft and Red Hat; The other patent troll.

[Link] Do prostitutes use the social Web better than corporate America? [Links] She wanted an iPod. You won't believe what she got instead. Twice! [Link] Top 40 Web fonts survey results. These are the fonts visitors are most likely to have. [Link] Playing the radio at a car repair shop is copyright infringement in the U.K. [Link] North Korea performed a nuclear test one year ago today. [Links] The abusive monopolist targets its patent threats at Red Hat. [Link] On the subject of patent trolls, Novell want their money from SCO.

Journal 10/4: PC security news... and opinions.

[Links] Security bugs that make me curious. [Link] DHS and Unisys scrutinized after data breach. Oh, joy. </sarcasm> [Link] TD Ameritrade knew about a security breach, which caused its customers to be flooded with pump-and-dump spam, and said and did nothing. I smell lawsuit. [Links] Embassy leaks highlight a pitfall in Tor, so the headline reads. Uh, no. It's what happens when you mistake privacy for security. [Link] Passive network analysis, anyone? [Links] The next leap for Linux? How about Dell's Ubuntu-preloaded systems making the front page of NYT's online edition paper?

Journal 10/3: Ubuntu 7.10 is coming!; PC repair == car repair?; Storm superworm; News involving porn.

[Links] Ubuntu version 7.10 is just days away from release, and it's got features that enhance the "wow" Microsoft woefully missed. Oh, and you can buy PCs with Ubuntu preinstalled for less than Windows. [Link] The PC repair industry has a severe problem. The perception is that PC repairmen are less honest and effective than car repairmen. [Link] The "Storm" worm poses a grave threat to PCs. It's not a new worm, but it's the first of a disturbing trend. It can be found and removed from your PC. Is it on your PC? How do you know for certain? [Link] A Chicagoland woman found her boyfriend's stash of pornographic CDs, then she went nuts and shot him until he was dead. The story has a very interesting twist.

Journal 10/2: Wrong way drivers and interchange design (rant); The SCO Show.

[Links] The Sheriff of Santa Fe County is looking for a wrong way driver who caused a near-fatal accident on Interstate 25. It could have been all but prevented by having just one little thing added at the interchange. [Links] SCO News.