According to one professor, American’s media coverage has been “great at explaining what a tsunami is. But otherwise I can see why the rest of the world thinks Americans care about death and destruction only when Americans are involved.” He makes some very good points about the coverage. Full Story. Link from Barney.
Month: January 2005
Microsoft Blue Screens At CES Keynote
During a demonstration of digital photography with a soon-to-be-released Nikon camera, a Windows Media Center PC froze and wouldn’t respond to Bill Gates’ pushing of the remote control.
Later in the 90-minute presentation, a product manager demonstrated the ostensible user-friendliness of a video game expected to hit retail stores in April, Forza Motor Sport. But instead of configuring a custom-designed race car, the computer monitor displayed the dreaded “blue screen of death” and warned, “out of system memory.”
This isn’t the first time Microsoft has gotten a BSOD at a big show. It happened in 1998 at the spring Comdex when they were showing of Windows 98. Check out the video here.
The Rumors Are True
As I mentioned yesterday, there were rumors about SixApart buying LiveJournal. The rumors are true, confirmed by SixApart. Here’s their press release, and some FAQs. Mena Trott has posted a bit about it, as has Brad over at LiveJournal. If you want a more technical explanation about everything, MT’s ProNet site has a good article on it. Here’s a Merc-News interview of Ben and Mena.
Googleable Unsecured Web Cams and Printers
Anybody who likes to dig into and break things knows that Google can dig up quite a bit of stuff that people don’t realize. The latest trick? People are using Google to find unsecured Web and security cams (we’re talking Web cams that you can control, move around, zoom, etc…, potentially reading documents at an office).
Here’s the search links I’ve seen so far from here, here, here, here and here:
Link (root/pass works for the user/password on some of them)
People are having a great deal of fun with this, watching people’s reactions in the camera as they’re watching as the cam is moving around, acting funny, etc… . And there are piles of people hitting the same camera, so you sometimes can just sit there and watch while people move the camera around. It’s pretty dang fascinating, and bound to make people around the world wonder what the hell is going on. Some of these things even have sound.
Google can be used to search for unsecured printers and other networks as well. Check out these two articles for more Google hacks. Some people are using these kinds of searches to find printers, as well (I know I’ve already found quite a few using URL searches based on some of the ones in our office that are Web accessible). I won’t even point to some of unsecured network switches I came across (based on the unique URLs as some of the ones in our office).
On a side note, anybody whose “private” or “office use only” networks or Web cams that show up on here need to fire their IT guy.
Update: Here’s an easy to use UI for browsing open cams (with Geographic information).
New York Times States The Obvious
The Internet is cutting into TV viewing and socializing. Really, you don’t say?
SixApart to buy LiveJournal?
Obviously this is all in the rumor mill right now, but the rumor is that SixApart, the company that makes MovableType (the software that powers this site), is looking to buy out LiveJournal. Jeff asks some good questions like what it means for TypePad, the LiveJournal open source code, etc… . ? Matt thinks SixApart is going after LJ for its engineers, but the revenue certainly wouldn’t hurt. Danah brings up some good points about the cultural divide between MT and LJ users. Heck, I’ve even mentioned some local users before.
Obviously this is all rumor, but do take into account what happened last time SixApart bought a blog hosting service.
Links via everywhere, but mostly MovableBlog Asides.
Update on 1/6: It’s official.
You Knew It Was Going To Happen
Someone in a position to warn a crap load of people about their impending Tsunami doom tried his best, but he couldn’t reach anyone.
On a related note, the “official” death toll stands at 158,018 (though the number could potentially grow once they get to some other areas).
Access to GuruNet is Now Free
If you do any sort of research at all online, this is a happy day for you.
GuruNet, the very useful and formerly subscription-based ready-reference web database and client app, full of fast facts and other information from over 100 reference sources, has launched a new site: Answers.com and is now available for free.
That’s right, the complete database, is now accessible via a web interface or a “1-click” client app (Windows or Mac), is available at no charge. Here’s a directory of the sources available from Answers.com.
This is an incredible resources for researchers, so be sure to book mark it.
Oddball Taxidermy
Be sure to check out the photo gallery here.
MART– the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists — is a veritable rout dedicated to a shared mandate to advocate the showmanship of oddities; espouse the belief in natural adaptation and mutation; and encourage the desire to create displays of curiousity.
Thanks simplexr for the link.
Yahoo Offers Traffic Reports
It’s a neat little feature, but so far it’s hit and miss, however. For example, as of right now, it says the Portland freeways are at a stand still (assuming I’m reading that map right), but if you check ODOT’s site, the traffic is running fine (a bit slow in spots, but not bad). Yahoo says they get their data from a number of sources, but ODOT is apparently not one of them.