I received the latest issue of Reason in the mail today:
Granted, my first impulse was to run for the hills, but inside, I discovered that they miscalculated my average commute time, that I can easily get a credit card (yeah, right), and that my congressman voted to stop police raids on medical marijuana users (Jon Porter is a closet libertarian?? Whodathunkit!?).
However, I just learned on the back cover that my townhome community is slated for eminent domain, so I’m somewhat contemplating that hillside run…
To those who’ve wondered why the blog gets sporadic every now and then, it’s been due to a major project at work that’s making news in IT/telephony circles.
So, if I’m not blogging (or relaxing), I’m busy doing my part to build a gigabit network backbone, as well as expanding my skills set for the future.
Symantec’s Internet Security 2004 (the product I recently upgraded for my home PC) is blocking a majority of pro-gun sites.
The problem lies with Internet Security’s parental control feature, which for the most part, is configurable — from unchecking common categories to unblock web sites to disabling parental control altogether (which is the current configuration for my PC). Most parents who choose to activate parental control may not be aware of the options on initial setup of the software.
However, the blocking issue is valid, as only anti-gun sites are allowed through the filter without question — giving the appearance of deliberate bias:
[The author's] rather informal test still raises the spectre that a large corporate entity may be clandestinely trying to sway you or your child’s political views by censoring content from one side of a political debate. This is indeed chilling, especially considering that such software is required to be used in libraries to protect children.
Agreed. And absolutely unacceptable.
MommaBear is encouraging Symantec users to stand up and tell the company that their alleged anti-2nd Amendment bias is unacceptable and will not be tolerated by consumers.
I gave Symantec my two cents too, in principle.
Although I have parental control disabled on my installation of Internet Security, who’s to say that the next edition will still allow that option?
(link via Instapundit)
Jay Allen has released MT-Blacklist 1.5, which now has more robust features to eliminate comment and trackback spam from Movable Type-based blogs. I installed it today, and I’m very impressed.
Also, for you MS Outlook or Eudora users, you may want to check out Norton AntiSpam 2004. On a whim, I downloaded the trialware and was so amazed by the near-100% effectiveness in filtering out unwanted e-mail that I purchased a license. It now replaces the previous spam filter, which had me doing most of the spam cleanup manually.
Norton AntiSpam also does a great job of blocking pop-ups, pop-unders, and banner ads.
I highly recommend both products.
Although I may disagree often with other bloggers whom I read on a regular basis, I think I can say with confidence the a majority of bloggers can agree on one thing.
We all hate comment spammers.
Recently, I’ve been receiving my fair share of comment spam, and just in the nick of time, Jay Allen has come up with a nifty anti-spam solution for Movable Type-based weblogs called MT-Blacklist.
More notes on MT-Blacklist are also available. Other MT blogs (including this one) are now using it, and Kevin Aylward has addtional blacklist templates available.
Well, it may not be new to others, but it’s definitely new to me.
After trying blogBuddy and w.Bloggar for Movable Type posting clients, I found both to be lacking in functionality and missing the robust features offered with the usual MT bookmarklet. Now, there’s a new Windows-based client that’s determined to fill that void — called Zempt.
I downloaded it and tried it on a posting and some entry updates. So far, I’m pleased with its ease of use and the availability of MT and HTML editing features at the local-client level.
If you’re looking for an MT posting client, Zempt is definitely worth trying.
Update: According to this discussion on Yuan-Chung Cheng’s blog, a Linux version of Zempt is also in the works.
However, Vin Suprynowicz did not. He attended, and later filed an op-ed:
Attorneys Joe Burton and Bill Reilly did an interesting presentation on Dmitry Sklyarov, the Russian “Elcomsoft” engineer busted by the feds after doing a presentation here at DefCon a year ago on how to decrypt PDF files, which the publishing industry interprets as a violation of its prized Digital Millennium Copyright Act.Basically, those amid the sea of post-adolescent faces that surrounded me at DefCon don’t believe any copyright holder should be able to charge what they see as outlandish prices for years and years for music or movies or any other piece of “intellectual property” if these young conventioneers can find a way to access and download it for free. These cybernetic enfants terribles laugh at the kind of security locks we gray-hairs try to build into these products — the roof tent broke out in peals of laughter when one speaker described the way the anti-copying protections on a typical CD can be defeated by simply marking up a part of it with a black Sharpie. (Whoops, by reporting that, did I just violate the DMCA? Is Dano even now on his way with the cuffs?)
