CNN.com - School laptops losing luster - Oct. 23, 2003

I don't know how I made it in school without a laptop. I especially love this quote..."learning is infinitely better than from a static page in a book" How do we learn from those book thingies??!!

Nasal Rangers sniff out odors at factory farms

Seems Iowa state employees havean interesting job...

The Scobleizer Versus Cerberus the Hound of Hades

More full story on Microsoft's Blog.

The Scobleizer LonghornBlog

The Scobleizer is making waves, blogging about a variety of Microsoft issues. He has another particular blog which focuses on Longhorn and his "How To Hate Microsoft" posting is getting a lot of attention. The reason? This blog just might shape the new OS.

Name that beard - a quiz from B3ta

Another site that'll trim some minutes from your day (got this from "The Pirate", mateys)

Amazon.com: Books / Search Inside the Book

I happen to look up a book last night and stumbled across Amazon's newest feature. You can now search the text inside books for keywords and find the book you want. Pretty valuable database!

DAILY ROTATION

Not much time to catch up on Tech News, use this page to scan all the headlines once you've tailored it.

SAFETY SIGN BUILDER

Need a quick Warning or Notice sign that meets OSHA specs? Generate a pdf on the fly with this simple online app.

Salon.com Technology | Neil Postman: A civilized man in a century of barbarism

A good man gone. You may not always agree with him, but he made you think about culture and its influence on our selves.

Bubble bursts for electronic books

I love books and I like ebooks. There will be a bigger market, just wait a generation.

AP Wire | 10/09/2003 | 20 pregnant cows killed by lightning

"Of course we as humans know that, but the cows do not know that," Resler said.

Don't you love it when reporters quote people...

In Defense Of the Microsoft Monoculture (Column, By Rob Enderle)

More sanity on this subject from a columnist who gets it right. Please note the following statements:

I'm not a big fan of diversity because so much the research I've done over the last decade or so indicates that by eliminating diversity you can dramatically reduce costs. Companies can minimize support costs by rolling out identical hardware and software to every desktop through big bang deployments. Going the other way in a knee jerk reaction to just one class of security threat seems poorly founded. A good chunk of my life was spent doing security audits. In my experience, diverse environments are less secure. This is because diversity leads to bad practices and it was those practices that exposed the site.

Plane Must Have Been Running Linux (slow download...may want to right-click and Save As and then watch)

SciFi TV MiniSeries In December

Let's kick some Ceylon a--! Extended Trailer.... Full SciFi Site

Is that Windows your using and what about here?

Microsoft's Longhorn 3D UI– More Info Emerges-- A sneak peek at the next version of Windows, Longhorn, probably out in late 2005.

Gartner echoes concerns over Microsoft 'monoculture' | CNET News.com

This recent spate of reports and articles seems to indicate to the public that we've all contracted "mono" and it will be the death of us. I believe it's time to begin to counter the arguments and illimunate just how complex this issue is.

Most of the stronger arguments center around the monoculture of Windows on the desktop. But I think all the claims about Linux/MAC security being safer because it's harder to violate, just don't make sense.

Windows makes it easy to use a PC. If I switch to Linux, my productivity decreases since I have to jump through the hoops of a more complex system. And if I don't change the mindset of the user, they'll embrace the more difficult process and replicate their insecure behaviors in a more complex environment. This is why other methods of controlling behavior in an enterprise negate the claims made in these reports/articles. Their presence in a competent enterprise dull the sharpest of blows. Since the probem is people, people's behaviors need to be controlled through restrictions, software policy, anti-virus and other defensive mechanisms to ameliorate the risky behaviors. For example, you can't run .exe files in a monoculture if you forbid them outright to be delivered in e-mail. This is an example of a restriction which instantly immunizes an environment from executable (.exe) attacks. A switch to a Linux environment would still require a prudent policy restricting files delivered by e-mail to be in place or the same risks will be encountered a la the people who will follow the Linux procedure to execute the file. Just one example of how the problem doesn't change.

What does make sense to me now in a Windows monoculture is the delivery of more and more easy to use Windows tools to control and limit user behaviors which cause the security problems. Making the Windows environment more secure is easier because of the complexities of Linux.

Others are picking apart these claims and we need to join the chorus.

Guardian Unlimited | Online | Why blogs could be bad for business

Are Neil's comments valid? Certainly some concerns are but I think he limits his imagination to the pragmatic instead of being a visionary who takes risks. Bloggers are taking a certain amount of risk by sharing information, some of which may be unique. But the return on investing in communicating with customers, business partners and the general public is worth it.

Fast Company: Blame It on Microsoft?

Would you blame the PowerPoint problem on Microsoft and setting people up for failure or would you lay responsibility at the feet of the user to learn how to present well, effectively communicate and use the proper tools? Join the fray.

Rough Landing

Gotta watch the Dutch...

The Dangers of WiFi??

Gimme a break!

Badgers, Mushrooms & Snake!

When you make Flash so easy to program and available to people, you get the above or a popular sandwich