Oblomovka

2002-09-24»

There are a few net innovations that have far greater ramifications than you would, at first hearing, expect them to. Napster, at heart just IRC with a UI, was one. Google News is another.

In its first day, I've already noticed:

• The front page changes its editorial stance depending on where the earth's terminator is. So in the evening on the West Coast, Google News is lead by the South China Morning Post, and various Asian english-language papers. By the late evening, the BBC and European papers are kicking in.
• The site may be created by algorithms - but what about the choice of sites? The most arbitrary dividing line I see in Google's coverage is what is a news site, and what isn't. Slashdot is, for instance, as well as some very obscure newspapers. What about Blues News or Scripting News, though?
• Big companies spend mucho money paying "clipping services" that send them copies of any press coverage they receive. Clipping services are going to have to find some added value, very very quickly.

2002-09-20»

Neal Pollack proves the self-parodying can still be parodied.

Doc has the info on my close encounter - it was a Minuteman III missile launch from Vandenberg airbase. The bowl-shaped scattering patterns came from the first and second stage separations, I suppose. Greetings from the heart of the military-industrial-entertainment complex!

2002-09-19»

Want to brighten up your dull grey box? PC fans with colour LEDs, fifteen bucks.

We just saw the weirdest thing in the dusk sky above San Jose. Initially, it looked like a very brightly lit jet, with a thick vapour trail behind it. It seemed pretty high, but was far brighter than it should be that altitude. I thought perhaps the setting sun was catching a plane-wing at an angle. Then as we watched, a bowl-shaped vapour plume formed around the dot and behind it (a bit like the vapour blanket you can see forming around the plane halfway down this page, but I guess larger given the apparent distance). The dot carried on for a bit longer, then formed another bowl-shaped cloud. That bowl then appeared to contract in on itself, there was what looked like a scattering of debris from the dot, and the dot disappeared. The whole thing was over in less than a minute.

It was a pretty big deal - the vapour trailed crossed a sixth of the sky or more, about 40° from the western horizon. I'm sure we weren't the only people to see it. I always wonder where to look for discussions of these geographically constrained phenomena online. Guess I'll keep an eye on the local papers for a while.

2002-09-18»

Alright, now I've got my tickets, I feel safer telling you this: Philip Glass and the Glass Ensemble are performing a live accompaniment to a showing of Koyaanisqatsi in San Francisco next month. I'm a bit too excited.

Those who now hate me will be relieved to know that the DVD of the film is already out.

2002-09-15»

Woah. WiFi hotspots have been rolled out in Japan by ... McDonald's and Denny's? According to Trends In Japan, they are:

Wireless LANs Appearing in Schools and Homes

When wireless LANs first made their appearance, they could be found only in a few hotels or coffee shops, but this year many businesses have been installing wireless LANs for the convenience of their customers. One after another, such chains as McDonald's, MOS Burger, Mister Donut, Starbucks Coffee, and Denny's have been creating hot spots in certain model outlets. In addition, rail companies like the East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) have been creating hot spots inside of stations, and some districts and cities are now working to make their entire area a hot spot.

2002-09-12»

Infinite Matrix is a great online sf zine. It's having a fundraiser. Ursula K. Le Guin has donated a "lunch bag" for auction, embroidered by her own hand. '"You can only have lunch once," she says helpfully, "because it isn't washable."'.

If I was a zombie who developed my prose style by eating brains, I would eat Le Guin's brain first. You can read her latest short story, set in the Earthsea universe, for $0.91 here. (I know it looks like I'm being paid off by FictionWise, but I just want to applaud their promotion of uncrippled e-texts. For the record, I don't touch their "secure" editions).

After Ursula, I would move on to John McPhee's lobes.

2002-09-11»

Top W3C HTML honcho Steven Pemberton spoke on XHTML2 at BAYCHI yesterday, and included this great quote (from, it looks like, the linux-elitists mailing list).

"Google is, for all intents, a blind user. A billionaire blind user with tens of millions of friends, all of whom hang on his every word. I suspect Google will have a stronger impact than [laws] in building accessible websites."

"In a world where Google likely has a valuation several orders of magnitude higher than any chrome such as flash, graphics, audio, interactivity, or "personalization", I see a heady revision."

Karsten M. Self

Steven this HTML page as his presentation, transforming it into powerpoint-esque viewpoints (outline view, slide-per-page view) with a bunch of stylesheets.

2002-09-10»

Within a few hours of posting the correction to ZDNet's article on drive-by spamming, Adrian Wright, the original misquoted expert, e-mailed me. "Saw your comments on Oblomovka. Not exactly professional behaviour for a Sunday Times stringer", he wrote. I asked him what he thought was unprofessional. As yet he hasn't replied.

Meanwhile, the original misquote is already beginning to spread. News sources like ZDNet are seen as authoritative sources online and off. From miscellaneous Slashdot posters to Professor Ed Felten, there are now people who cite the piece as proof that there are recorded instances of drive-by spamming.

As far as I know - and more importantly, as far as Adrian Wright, the original source, knows, there exists no such evidence. The lead to the story, "'Warspammers' are taking advantage of unprotected wireless LANs to send out millions of junk emails" is simply not true.

Terry Schmidt, of NYC Wireless wrote independently to the ZDNet UK journalist, Graeme Wearden, asking in the light of the new comments by Adrian, admitting that he'd never seen a case of drive-by spamming in real life, ZDNet would correct the original story. Here's what Graeme wrote:

I asked Wright if he would like me to change anything in my story - he didn't.

I think that's because, even if he did say 'could happen' rather than 'is happening' (and sitting in the middle of that audience, I thought he was discussing something that is taking place, and that's what I wrote down), Wright thinks it very likely that drive-by hacking is occuring.

That looks like the truth. But it's very different from the original story. That article - still being spread, still being read - continues to mislead people into believing drive-by spamming is happening right now, and that Adrian Wright had seen it happen.

Misinformation like this has consequences. It encourages people to believe that having an open network is an uncivil thing to do; that they should cower in fear at the spammers stalking the streets, looking for outlets. It encourages people to believe that the only solution to their fear, uncertainty and doubt is to to hire security consultants with experience of this rampant menace. And the more the original misleading article sits there, the further the misinformation spreads.

This seems to be the opposite of what a journalist should do; and the opposite of what a security consultant is paid to advise. I'm not sure who is to blame here: but if anyone is being unprofessional, I don't think it's me.

2002-09-06»

Quote from Adrian Wright, the expert "quoted" in a ZD Net story which claimed spammers were using open WiFi points to send "millions" of unsoliticed e-mails :

It seems I've been everso slightly misquoted in that I actually said 'could' in this presentation. i.e. "These people COULD simply drive up to a building armed with their... Apart from that it looks like a good story!

Although I know of no hard evidence that this practice of wireless drive-by spamming is taking place, I would be surprised if it was not happening - given the increasing difficulties spammers face in retaining legitimate ISP access - within the more developed nations anyway.

My emphasis. In other words, "drive-by spamming" is still a something that some people endlessly predict will happen if you leave your AP insecure, but of which no record exists in the wild.

Adrian also said that drive-by spamming had been covered many times (true) and ZDNet was one of the most prominent new sources documenting the existence of this practice. Wait - you're using as an authority the very organisation who completely misquoted you? On the same topic? Is that wise?

2002-09-05»

Hmm. C|Net ZDNet UK is reporting that "millions of mails" are being sent by people who pull up to open wifi networks, and use them to anonymously spam.

Okay, I'm suspicious. Spamming through open networks was always a theoretical possibility (indeed, I remember people referring to drive-by spamming almost as early as wardriving was coined), but I've never heard of it happening in the wild. I've just left a message with Adrian Wright, the British security expert quoted in the article, to see if he has any concrete cases. I suspect either either he's pulling the examples out of his imaginary analyst hat, or he's been misquoted.

2002-09-04»

I'm not sure, but I think Americans believe more fervently in the saving grace of the almighty Law than the British. I occasionally reel off dozens of fantastically repressive UK laws (including the one that forbids gatherings that include "the emission of a succession of repetitive beats") to looks of perfect horror here. Then I end it all by saying "Of course, no one pays any attention! Ahahaha!", and watch everybody fall off their seats. In the US, there's a background buzz that nothing keeps your neighbour in check but the letter of the law and the iron force of the Constitution. Gotta keep the rule of law, or society will collapse in a hail of gunfire, trespassing, double-parking and moider. There's no pity for those who break the law. In Britain it's much more "Okay do what you want - but try not to get caught, alright?"

I've grown far more sympathetic to the American line over time, but I've never seen anyone state the alternative position quite as elegantly D² Digest. Bit too elegantly, in fact. If you read his work - including the entry on why Lessig is too damn sincere, and why drug laws don't work, and why we should keep them - you could conclude that they're the careful posings of a Economista Angry Young Arse. Not surprising - if you're going to insist that bad laws can have good effects (or Antinomialism, as he calls it), it always helps to be nice young Oxonian who can probably talk your way out of a tight corner with a Christchurch-educated judge when the need arises. But at least he's not a libertarian Angry Young Arse, right?

2002-09-03»

"Kinda public beta": official RSS feeds of the BBC News site.

RSS feed of the front page
RSS feed of technology news
RSS feed of UK news
RSS feed of World news

Aha! Mozilla 1.1 supports LINK tags out of the box - try clicking on the "View..." menu option then "Show/Hide", "Site Navigation Bar", and finally "Show Only As Needed". On sites that support it, a little mini-toolbar of navigation links will pop up at the top of the browser window whenever Mozilla spots them. You can also discover which sites have RSS feeds, thanks to Mark's RSS link suggestion (they'll be hiding under the "More" folder).

This feature's been in Mozilla builds for a while, but they never had any GUI options for it because slowed down page loads. I wonder if that's fixed? I'm still not sure I like it - ironically Mark's addition means that it pops up on more sites than it's really useful. In those cases it does eat a fair bit of real estate, and is a bit of a distraction.

Stuck for what to say on your livejournal today? Just enter "girlfriend" into the automatic journal entry generator. Also available in Polish.

Even though she seemed much better she still wasnt sure how much longer shed be around-and this was something that we were all aware of but didnt dwell on. She has the gift of making you love her even though she drives you totally batshit :> It was totally cool to be able to provide so much pleasure even though im just lying there and enjoying the feeling and the show ;> Its pretty sad that this is the only way i seem to be able to get along with my supervisors... Everytime i try to get along with him he does or says something to piss me off. Nice boy and im glad he and jo are such good friends but we differ in too many ways to get along. You amaze me and im glad were both on the same level! Some are on the same page as my good ones.

2002-09-02»

I've spent the last few days at ConJose, the 60th World Science Fiction Convention. It's like a bank-holiday weekend visiting relatives. Fandom is clearly closely allied to the people and sub-culture I know, but with its own rituals and relationships and strange, orthogonal paths. Like family, it's been by turns exasperating, entertaining, informative, irritating, and a bit wonderful. So far, the best bits have been listening to Vernor Vinge's presentation on the Singularity; the panel on nerdcore sf writing with Cory, Eileen Gunn, James Patrick Kelly and Charlie Stross; and the Hugo Awards.

The Hugos go to show how witty an awards ceremony can be if most of your winners are writers. It also has the side effect - given the underappreciated lot of most of them - of creating almost infinite gratitude in the recipients, which is much more fun to watch than the usual self-grooming celebs. Neil Gaman seemed genuinely amazed and moved to win Best Novel. His fine acceptance speech ended with him trailing off, staring at the statue, and saying "Fuck. I got a Hugo.".

The Hugo list, as I suppose is the plan, is now my reading list for the next few months. I've just read Ted Chiang's award-winning short story "Hell is the Absence of God", online at FictionWise. You can download it for free at that link. It's fantastic - a great short story, sf or not. And if you haven't already read Charlie Stross' Lobsters (again free online), you're missing a treat. Vinge's novella "Fast Times at Fairmont High" is the next on the list.

I was also supposed to be at ConJose to meet a trade mission of publishers to brief them about the EUCD, but someone at the DTI nixed that when they found out I was a journalist. You see? Just days into accepting the description, and I'm already getting excluded from all the best parties.

It turned out okay: Seth covered the meeting better than any journalist would, and instead that evening, I shared a ride with the man who plays Mr Shake Hands on the American version of Banzai.

2002-08-30»

I haven't seen this before (except from whence I stole the link, at web-graphics). It's Edward Tufte on the uses and abuses of Flash. He likes praystation!

2002-08-28»

Warren Ellis, comic author of the perfectly respectable Transmetropolitan, creator of the mighty hypercolumnist Spider Jerusalem, terrifyingly prolific prose writer, and unremitting booster of the comics economy now has a blog. As well as one the best domain names you can get these days, damn him.

die puny humans is my newsmine. I wanted a place to put my research that was accessible, searchable, and, crucially, not cluttering up my bloody computer. This is it. Means I can get to my stuff from anywhere with a web connection. Anything I find on my daily trawls around the web that interests me goes up here.

Via Technovia

Tom "plasticbag" Coates just had his machine fixed by a friend, remotely via ssh for the first time, and does appropriate double-backflips of delight. Unix is so cool that way.

2002-08-27»

Doc says that I'm being a bit hard on Apple and Microsoft, both of whom sell similar applications to the home server idea.

That's true - but they're not very heavily encouraged among home users. The very fact that I can't work out a way of explaining how to do this to Sunday Times readers is an indication of that. Running a PHP Webmail app, or a home iDisk, for instance, really isn't rocket science: it just doesn't fit either of these companies current business models.

One of the real albatrosses around the symmetrical net for now is that the principal big server apps for the computers on the edge of the Network is still file-sharing. Telcos feel they can legitimately complain about "bandwidth abuse" when it's conducted by suspected copyright criminals. As Doc says, they'd find it a little harder to moan if it was baby photo album sharing.

(I'm beginning to see the big hole in both Apple and Microsoft's thinking. Microsoft treats its customers as though they were businesses. Apple treats them as though they were consumers. What if we're neither?)

Recap: I've been looking for an all-in, no messing, Webmail app, file sharer, and Webserver that would run from my home machine - saving me from forking out on .NET, .mac, and .johncobblyandall services. Lots of people wrote in with partial suggestions. Nothing leapt out for me, although a couple of people wrote in to say that if I found what I was looking for, they'd buy a copy.

Barnaby James wrote to suggest Apache Tomcat with a fistful of java servlets. A nice, and integrated idea, but I'm not sure it's the point-and-click solution I was looking for.

Dave, as you'd suspect, suggested Radio Userland , which I'd certainly thought of - but it doesn't handle mail. Yet.

Doug Hacker suggested ACI's 4Dmail Mail app.

Azeem suggested a cheapo NetApp style standalong box, perhaps integrated with your router. Bit pricey currently, and I think it's the idea of linking directly to your desktop that makes this appealing. Still, it'd be nice if home routers let you set up at least a port 80 passthru to one machine on the home network.

Henry Minsky had a very profound suggestion, which he describes in detail on his Personal Virtual Server page. If I can horrifying cripple his thoughts by summary : your personal computer is boiled down to a portable state image, on which you can install different applications. You can move this image wherever you like. Keep it at home, or on a hosting service, or on your laptop or PDA. So you effectively run your PC and all its services wherever you go.

One thing I did thrash out over a few conversations was that you'd need at least one external Net service to get this working - DNS, probably with dyndns-like dynamic updating. Azeem also suggested an outgoing mail relay, but I'm not sure that's necessary. Direct SMTP connections are hard, true - but sendmail and its simpler cousins, once configured, is a commodity. And this is a very trivial sendmail setup.

Does the need for dynamic DNS spoil the principle push of this idea? I'm not sure. I did originally conceive of this home-based server as a way of shaking off the shackle of unnecessary Web service subscriptions. With dynanamic DNS, we're left with a single one-off sub. It's less ideologically pure, but I still think it's appealing. One of the things I dislike about all these other Web services is that while each of them is pretty cheap, it'd cost a huge amount to subscribe to all of them. And I hate the paying less for bundles when not everything in the bundle is the best in class. It's an unnecessary compromise.

Oh, and Lloyd pointed out another advantage to working your Web services from home. When you don't pay yours subs at a Webmail service, they suspend your access to your own e-mail.

I think there may be a market for a product here. That is, if Thomas C. Greene of the Register doesn't convince us to turn off our broadband connections in terror.