onfocus

Remember accounting scandals? They're still happening. The SEC is going to sue KPMG for fraud in their audit of Xerox. (This is only the 2nd time the SEC has ever sued a major accounting firm. It's big news, and under-reported.) Our financial system is still a mess.

Situationism for Dummies.

(and The Situationist International Text Library.)

Did you buy a CD, cassette, or vinyl record between 1995 and 2000? If so, the music industry ripped you off. And though you were probably ripped off more than $5-$20 thanks to illegal price fixing, at least you can get $5-$20 back. It's a class-action lawsuit. Everyone vs. The Music Industry. Sign up now.

This latest Internet-wide DOS attack was harsh (BBC article). Jason wrote about his experience with the MeFi server which explains just how malicious this thing is. I noticed a problem with my server last night around 10 PST, and haven't been able to reach it until 30 minutes ago. I've installed the hotfix, and that seemed to stop SQL Server from eating up CPU cycles. If you run a server with SQL Server installed, be sure to patch it up. Of course the best way to be secure is not to run a server at all. Or if you do, keep it locked in your closet and don't connect it to anything.

Like a lot of people, I rely on the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer to keep me up to date with fixes. I guess I need to add a few more checks into my routine.

There is a new version of snapGallery available: snapGallery 1.5c. Beyond a few minor fixes, the big addition is support for creative commons licenses. After adding titles and captions to your pictures, you can choose a creative commons license from a handy drop-down menu. (Or not, if you're not into cc licensing...nothing is mandatory.) If you'd like to contribute your gallery of photos to the public domain (with restrictions of your choosing), this is a simple way to automate the process. snapGallery generates the proper metadata for each page based on the license you choose, and adds a link to the human-readable license from the index. viva la public domain!

I don't want to name any names, but someone in my house has wedding fever. I've never seen anything like it.

"Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude."

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Every few days I see a pair of deer hanging out behind our apartment. They're always very aware of my presence if I open the door to see them better. The other day we had a staring contest.



This past week has been amazingly clear and sunny.



It's been nice to see the stars at night. And the full moon.

Note to self: Photo-sharing sites prove popular.

Load of crap indeed. It seems like this sort of divisive posturing can only further hurt his approval rating.

This is a sad day for our collective culture and creativity. The Eldred challenge to the latest copyright extension was unsuccessful. I don't believe the framers of our constitution felt a "limited time" for copyright means 75 years after the death of the creator or 95 years for corporations.

This means we'll have to work even harder to explicitly place creative works in the public domain so we can have at least a portion of our shared culture that isn't controlled by corporations and commercial interests.

Lawrence Lessig, who argued the good side of this case, commented about the loss in his weblog.

Michael sent in a pointer to some waterproof bags for digital cameras. He has used one underwater and his camera is still working. They're a bit pricey, but better than MacGyver-ing something up every time you want to shoot in the rain, I suppose.