Hear Ye! Since 1998.

Archived Posts for June 2000

Please note: The posts on this page are at least 3 years old. Links may be broken, information may be out of date, and the views expressed in the posts may no longer be held.
27
Jun 00
Tue

Communal Crier

New
• Chunkster
• Inque dot net
• OLO
• sp0rk

Moved
• Diary of Girls (formerly UFofBSers)

Unmaimed
• Cyclohexane

  7:00pm (GMT +10.00)  •  E/N  •  Tweet This  •  Add a comment  • 

SMS

• “Go Stu’s mom! And i’ll drink to that.” –Irish
• “hi, ijust wanted to let you know that my prayers were with you rmom and i am glad things are ok *large hugs*” –nettie

  7:00pm (GMT +10.00)  •  SMS  •  Tweet This  •  Add a comment  • 

RFCs

Spot the anomalous entry in RFC1208. Hint: it’s under ‘B’ :) 1991… that’s going back a while. The future of IP number URLs is here. And of course, geeks make good poets (or not). There’s a missing RFC. Finally, there’s the infamous RFC1925 (The 12 Networking Truths). Here are the other 2685 RFCs (just in case you get bored).

Joke

A local United Way office realized that it had never received a donation from the town’s most successful lawyer. The person in charge of contributions called him to persuade him to contribute.

“Our research shows that out of a yearly income of at least $500,000, you give not a penny to charity. Wouldn’t you like to give back to the community in some way?”

The lawyer mulled this over for a moment and replied, “First, did your research also show that my mother is dying after a long illness, and has medical bills that are several times her annual income?”

Embarrassed, the United Way rep mumbled, “Um…no.” “–or that my brother, a disabled veteran, is blind and confined to a wheelchair?”

The stricken United Way rep began to stammer out an apology but was interrupted, “–or that my sister’s husband died in a traffic accident,” the lawyer’s voice rising in indignation, “leaving her penniless with three children?!” The humiliated United Way rep, completely beaten, said simply, “I had no idea…”

On a roll, the lawyer cut him off once again: “–so if I don’t give any money to them, why should I give any to you?!?”

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Another Use for Macs

Thanks to Tyson for showing another great use for Macintoshes.

Classic Quote

“I want your heart, I want to eat your children!!” (As Ty pointed out – ears don’t seem to be enough for that guy… and does anyone else think that Mike Tyson’s voice is a little high pitched?)

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Ls Test

Well here’s a rather questionable (as in, dumb) question from the test people in NSW need to get a learner’s driver’s license. In America the correct answer, of course, is, “Draw alongside him, wind down your window, pull out your firearm and start firing at him.” Thanks Shaf.

23
Jun 00
Fri

Communal Crier

New
• Dogbomb
• Lord-Smell
• Zoko Siman

Unmaimed
• 5 Unruly Janitors

Maimed
• SynNet

SMS

• “GIVE STU BACK HIS MOBILE YA BLOODY WANKER!” –Kyle
• “[1:21] <Inferno|study> just stuff w/o vocals (cont next sms)” –Alex
• “Try Astral Projection, it’s really good. No vocals, my favorites are trance dance and radial blur” –Alex (tip taken… good stuff, Astral Projection)
• “send your mom love and hugs from all your internet stranger friends…” –GStarr
• “I’m looking through your javascript source… nice work” –eod
• “Confidence builder: a woman I work with is nearly 70, she survived breast cancer. Good luck! Funny, later..” –Tom

Mouse With a Difference

This picture will be funny to about half the population on this planet :) Thanks Vic.

Tomorrow’s Cricket Results

In light of Hansie Cronje’s match fixing in the cricket world, I got sent this send up of the whole issue. I could not stop laughing after reading it :)

Haha!

This must be the only useful use for a Mac.

Linux Today

Renai’s been bugging me to plug Linux Today since he started writing for it :). I personally don’t agree with all his views about why all software should be open-sourced, but it does explain some of the incredible benefits that the open source paradigm has to offer.

On How Life Is

What a week.

After much nail-biting, queasiness and stress in general, Mum’s lymph tests came back with no trace of cancer. Thank God! And I mean that. Not in the bastardised, tagged-on-the-end-of-a-sentence, “Thank God”, but a conscious and emphatic, Thank God. The operation went well, resulting in the removal of the 1.5cm tumour. Mum was actually mobile and showering herself the morning after the operation (with a bag of blood that’s used to store the drainage from the wound hanging from her side, nonetheless). A biopsy was performed on 13 lymph nodes yesterday and all were found cancer free, which basically means we’re almost out of the woods. There are a couple more tests that will be returned on Monday to detect any stray cancer cells that may have been missed, but the main ones have come back with flying colours. She’ll remain in hospital for about a week until drainage finishes.

We’ve been really lucky that the results have been so positive. We’ve also been lucky to have got so much support from people (literally from all around the world!). Thanks again to absolutely everyone who gave us their support. Whether it was an e-mail/phone call from overseas to me, dad or mum, or sending her flowers (the hospital room looks like a florist’s shop!), or relatives and friends visiting her in the hospital ward – every bit was a comfort and greatly appreciated.

In other news, Session 1 of uni has finished with a botched exam (but I reckon I’ll pass – that’s that main thing). Pfft… whoever thought they’d test us on decomposition algorithms?

Friday was the last time I’ll have to wear a suit for a very long time (thank goodness). I finished up my time in tech support at Aspect with the department giving a nice 4 hour lunch (no one wanted to go back to work, evidently :) and with the manager giving me a really good rap on my student evaluation form. I actually have one week left of work at Aspect, but they are sending me on a TCP/IP course – hence, no suit. And it’s not really work :). I’ll be a very happy person come the end of this week, I reckon. Holidays! I can go back to bludging as a full time uni student hehe…

Ce/nsus results will be out these hols now that things are thankfully starting to quiet down.

As far as my stolen phone goes, I haven’t heard back from the cops, and I’m not expecting to. In the meantime, my Aunt has leant me her spare mobile and I’ve got a replacement Sim Card, so I’m contactable once again (the number hasn’t changed).

19
Jun 00
Mon

Quick Update

Mum goes in for her operation this afternoon. Wish her luck. She’ll be in hospital for about a week recovering, and also waiting for the tests on her lymph nodes to come back. Basically, this 2-3 hour operation, a radical masectomy, will remove the entire breast, and the cancer along with it. However, it is possible that the cancer has spread. The lymphatic system is the most likely place for it to go, so it will be a week or two before the tests on the nodes come back to determine if it has spread beyond the breast. If it hasn’t that’s fantastic news and we can breathe a sigh of relief and thanks. If it has, however, that’s not good news and mum will most be given chemotherapy/radiotherapy. This waiting about is excruciating. Better get back to studying… I have an exam tomorrow. Going to visit her in hospital on Wednesday after it.

BTW, are there any European readers who know about the Nokia 6210 phone having been released in Europe? Let me know please.

18
Jun 00
Sun

Communal Crier

New
• Cameron Kross
• That Thin Line

Moved
• The Sex Project (formerly Guruchild.com)

SMS

(Ones coming in now are being diverted to e-mail due to the absence of a phone)

• “BAMF is a monopoly on e/n!  I say we split them up into 2; one part content, one part news!  REVOLT!!!!!!!” –Surebrec (how about badass.com, and mofo.com?)

Component #3

Picked up a Soundblaster Live! Platinum w/Live Drive 2. I swear, nothing beats a uni computer fair. Everything there is… “duty free” :).

More Bad News

This is from an e-mail my Uncle sent out to the family (regarding my grandfather):

Good and bad news about Dad. Good news is that he had his angiogram done sucessfully.

Bad news is that he had 100% blockage in one of the artery and a 90% blockage in a second one. The 90% blockage was successfuly re-opened, but the 100% blockage artery could not be re-opened because there is no room to insert the catheter because it was completely blocked. There a by-pass operation is necessary (ie surgery that involve taking a vein from somewhere else, usually from the leg, and grafting it into the affected coronary artery bypassing the blockage.

If the info is correct, then it was just as well that Dad had the angiogram, cause the blockage is serious. There are 3 major arteries to the heart, if 2 are blocked, then the blood flow to the heart is really compromised. The chances of Dad having a fatal heart attack is really high, like a timebomb ready to go off at any time.

I guess the good thing is that the problem has been spotted, and a bypass operation these days, while still major, is a well known procedure.

Shit

Some absolute fucking wanker stole my mobile. I was at my cousin’s surgery in Narellan setting up his computer network, and three of us (the builder, my cousin and myself) happened to be in the back room for a few minutes. During those one or two minutes, someone had walked in and grabbed my mobile (and left the builder’s mobile there, which was sitting right beside it). Luckily, someone there had seen the whole incident, and even knew the name of the guy who stole it – seems he’s a “well-known” fucking heroin addict around the area. So if I ever bump into Brent Davies who lives around Richardson Road in Narellan, I’m going to fucking rip his head off and string him upside-down by his anal hairs (figuratively speaking, of course). I cancelled the Optus account and called the cops, but I don’t think that will do much.

Fortunately I only have one month left on my contract… I wanted to wait until the Nokia 6210 came out, but it looks like I can’t. Damn…

17
Jun 00
Sat

Before you ask me…

… no that wasn’t me who mailed Shlonglor. I don’t write like that.

14
Jun 00
Wed

Train Tales

Ok let me explain what triggered off the mobile phone post below. It started when I left work. You should use this map for reference :)
5.10pm – 2 out of the 3 lifts in the building are broken. 5 minutes of waiting and the lift comes. It’s full. Keep waiting. After another 5 minute wait, the lift finally came. I set off for a brisk walk.
5.35pm – Arrived at Town Hall Station. Walked to Platform 6 to the announcement that “trains to Macarthur have resumed.” Strange. Nonetheless, the main point was they were running. Interesting that the platform was less populated than usual.
5.45pm – Fell asleep on the train.
6.10pm – Woke up to an SMS from Burga saying: “from what i saw on the news you are probably waiting 2 hours to get a bus home from work….just go via granville in stead :]” Too late, mate… we were already in the airport tunnel :). I went back to sleep.
6.30pm – Woke up to the train crawling along at a snail’s pace somewhere past Kingsgrove and the guard saying that the train was running 40 minutes behind schedule because we were stuck behind an all stops East Hills train. Great. Couldn’t get back to sleep.
7.00pm – Normally, I would’ve been home by now.
7.10pm – We got past East Hills and finally started travelling at full speed. 5 minutes later we ground to a stop in the middle of nowhere. Well, not exactly nowhere, but somewhere between Holsworthy and Glenfield (which is as good as nowhere). The announcer came on again (he was beginning to get real annoying… he had the volume turned up and was shouting into the PA system) and said we were going to be stationary for 5 minutes while waiting for the train from Liverpool to pass. Real bloody smart. The Liverpool-originating train happened to be an all stops to Campbelltown so once again, our “express train” was caught up chugging behind it. “Chugging” comprised of inching forwards a bit, then grinding to a stop every 2 minutes. It was truly ridiculous. There were a few people in the vestibule area that started making quips at Cityrail:
7.20pm – “Hey, it’s not often you pay for a 60 minute train ride and get a 2 hours one! Freebie!”
7.25pm – Annoying PA guy: “Due to factors I have zero control over, we are now running 52 minutes late.” People start clapping. If there clapping could ever sound sarcastic, it did tonight. 
7.30pm – “Let’s get out and push… we’ll get there faster.”
7.31pm – “Screw pushing, I’m walking.”
7.40pm – Annoying PA guy: “For those who have missed the final connecting bus service home at Campbelltown, please go to the stationmaster and demand that he pay for your taxi fare home.”
7.41pm – Train stops again. “Haha…that guy doesn’t like the stationmaster… and the stationmaster probably heard that and stopped the train. We’re never going to reach Campbelltown now.”
7.50pm – “Hey dontcha feel sorry for the people going to Macarthur? They’ll probably say the train is terminating at Campbelltown for today only.”
7.58pm – Annoying PA guy: “Ladies and gentlemen, this train is not going to Macarthur and will be terminating at Campbelltown for today only. Alllllll out, Alllll change!”
7.59pm – Trainful of irate passengers (in unison): “Fuck off!!!”
8.00pm – Train pulls into Campbelltown.
8.20pm – I arrive home, a mere 190 minutes after leaving work.

And that is why they lock the driver and guard compartments on trains. Two weeks of work left! When I’m on holidays I guarantee you won’t hear a peep about trains (I know you’re all sick to death of my train stories, but you’ll just have to live with it, cos I have to :)

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SMS

• “they have been showing titan AE previews for over a year here :(” –Solo
• “About the movies: ASF solved that problem years ago :>” –Alecks (nothing compares to seeing something on the big screen tho! I won’t even mention the fact that by the time I’m finished downloading an asf, that the movie probably has come out on video by then)
• “I think it’s fly when girls drop down and give hummers. Toal w00tablility.” –Irish

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Communal Crier

Baefed’s back.

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Mobile Phone Transmission

FUCK YOU CITYRAIL!!!

13
Jun 00
Tue

Train Seats

From Plutonia:

Then, as I was travelling home on the train, I was on the window seat of a three-seater, with an Asian woman on the aisle seat. A bloke wants to sit down, and instead of acting logically and moving to the middle seat, the woman shrinks into her seat a bit so that the bloke has to squeeze past and sit in the middle.

Phil, this is quite a common occurrence. Most people have to clamber over the person sitting in the aisle seat to get to the middle seat – very few will slide across. The reasons for this can be seen in the general pattern people fill up the seats. The two-seater window seats are the first to go, followed by the three-seater window seats (with the rearmost-forward facing seats having preference to backward facing seats when you have Tangaras with fixed seating direction). Next, the three-seater aisle seats will get taken, then the two-seaters will be used, and finally the middle seat in the three-seaters. And even then, if people have a relatively short trip, they’d prefer to stand rather than get the middle seat (if they are the only seats left). People shy away from sitting with strangers – partly because of “personal space”. And it can get awfully squishy when someone obese decides to come by and plonk themselves next to you. [Whoops there goes a window cleaner swinging by outside the 11th story… heh I swear, the whole office stops and points for a minute whenever one dangles by :)] So, in view of this, the middle seat is particularly unattractive given you are sitting, quite squashed, between two people, and you can’t lean anywhere. This is compounded by the fact that there usually isn’t enough space to rest your shoulders on the seat, and you have to sit sorta hunched forwards. For reference purposes, here’s the schematics for Silver Rattlers & Tangaras. I really know too much about trains :/

Cinema Release Dates

No… they can’t be serious… Titan AE seems like it will not be in Australia till the 26th of December. Half a year after the US?! They’re showing trailers in the cinema for it now! Shanghai Noon comes out August 10? Hell… some of these Aussie film release dates are crazy.

Local Diablo 2 Server?

The day we Aussies don’t have to write up a petition (that is more often than not just ignored) to plead for a server on our continent, is still a long way off. Australian Diablo 2 server petition.

Mmm… Chunky

Take a look at what powers Terraserver.

Rumblings

One relatively small comment by Kottke, and it got quite a bit of a defensive response. See? Some in the weblog community think the genre may be going stale, in much the same way as that point of view has been expressed time and again in e/n. (A view I disagree with, with regards to either community, btw)

12
Jun 00
Mon

Communal Crier

Hey… G’s back and posting at Ramblings.

New
• Sooperfriends
• Sucks To Be Me

Moved
• Iggy_s Waste of Bandwidth
• Misunderstood

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SMSes

• “Hey there sexy baby!!!” –FA
• “Sorry about your Mommy.  Best wishes.” –Alex

  10:00pm (GMT +10.00)  •  SMS  •  Tweet This  •  Add a comment  • 

Cracked!

Part 5 of the story is out (see entry dated 1/6/00)

Did You Know…

There’s a dot after .com? That’s right, “hearye.fissure.org” is actually, in full, “hearye.fissure.org.” The trailing fullstop denotes the root internet server and is dropped simply because it’s always implied. I say this because Sucks To Be Me has a list of “silly questions” at the bottom of the page, one of which turns out to be not so silly after all.

Whine

Here’s someone having a bit of a whinge against technology. It better be tongue-in-cheek. :)

Mapping DNA

Finally, Celera Genomics completed mapping the human DNA.

Haiku

Where did haikus come from, anyhow?

  10:00pm (GMT +10.00)  •  Culture  •  Tweet This  •  Add a comment  • 

Memory

This article tells how loss of memory often isn’t. It’s psychological, in many cases.

Digital Camera .jpg Reprints

Dennis let me know of Shutterfly, but they only ship within the US. Kaber recommended Photoworks. I found a whole list of sites which reprint digital camera photos here at Epinions. However, interestingly enough, there was only one site that ships internationally (at US$5/shipment) which is Photoaccess. I reckon I’m gonna scam from them the “free 50 prints” they’re offering (on Kodak paper no less!). Pretty shoddy there’s only one site that does it… I mean, how hard is it to ship photos internationally?

The tip below would be more applicable for yanks, I think :)

Where I live you can take your digital pictures to Giant and they will develop them.  If there are no Giants around you, I suppose I should tell you theat they are our grocery stores.  There is just some crazy contraption right inside the door, and you slide your disk right in it.  It shows you a thumbnail of all the pictures on that disk and you pick which ones you want them to develop.  As I recall it is rather pricey –vit4077

And this tip is more local, but not exactly descriptive:

There is a place in Caringbah that prints photos out from digital format.  Only place in the state, or the 1st.  Not sure, it was on the window :-) –WaD

This tip from Kyp (yeah just had to rhyme that :) is more descriptive. I wonder if Camden has an Image Magic store? Mmm… technology in Camden… that would be impressive :)

Also, Kodak Image Magic stores usually have machines to process the photos (they accept floppy, SmartMedia and CD). Honestly, I think inkjet quality is better for the price you pay. There are a few stores in Victoria that have the machines, so I’d assume they have them in NSW too. –Kyp

Hmm could that be a business idea? “Proxy shipping”? Many US web sites only ship to US addresses, which is a shame because even with international shipping costs, many US goods turn out cheaper than Australia. I wonder if setting up a business that “forwards on” shipments from the US to elsewhere in the world would be a viable prospect?

For Those of You Still Doubting…

A cheque from All Advantage.

Bluetooth!

One of the first in a batch of Bluetooth appliances. Thanks Fuzz *”*!

Remote Disconnection Utility

This is such a useful utility! If you have a home network, and have a few computers hooked up to the net via a proxy/NAT server running on one computer, this utility is great. Although there’s always been on-demand dialing, I haven’t seen a way to remotely disconnect the modem on the server. Well, with RDU, no longer do you have to walk over to the server to disconnect the modem connection. It’s got various functions so that when a disconnection is requested, all client computers connected have to confirm whether to drop the connection. There’s also the ability to notify clients when a connection comes online.

Thank You

A very big thank you to everyone (whether personally known or not) wishing mum, and the rest of us, the best.

On reflection it’s not that strange posting her e-mail address up. Mum sees me on the net quite a bit, but never really knows what I’m actually doing. She knows that I keep a web page and that I communicate with people continents away that I’ve never met. As with most parents, she tends to be quite suspicious of “net people”. It came to her as a pleasant surprise then, that these people I spent all this time writing to, and communicating with (through this web page, or other form) cared enough so as to drop her (and me) an e-mail with some reassuring words. Thanks all, we definitely appreciate it.

Check out what Dennis put up in the top right of his site – what a nice gesture. Thanks man.

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10
Jun 00
Sat

Communal Crier

New
• ChrisHerring.net
• Inner Chaos
• (Bizarro) Roosh Net

Moved
• 911 Cafe (Formerly EMS)
• NFSV (Formerly girl.solosier.com)

Facelifted
• Brain Damage
• Value of X

Yes Yes

Diablo II has gone gold and I’m in the Stress Test :)

Trek Map

Jamie sent me a very nice map of the alpha/beta quadrants.

Crocodile’s Birthday

6 Meters?! Whoa, that’s one massive croc.

Mission: Impossible 2

Action, entertainment, they are both there. A bit quiet sometimes (action could’ve been a bit more sustained in some places). The only gripe I really have is about the stereotypical Aussie they threw in who says “mate” every second word. The groan from the crowd was audible when that guy first appeared. Nice shots of Sydney harbour :)

Bats

Don’t waste your money. This movie sucks. Ridiculous.

Microsoft Response

My comments in black.

Dude…What kind of hard drugs are you on?

Maybe if Micros~1 (sorry, that’s MS having to eat their own standards) is split up, then they’ll actually have (through competition) incentive to provide the public with software that is not incompetently made, and, well, simply second rate.

Show me a viable alternative to Microsoft software. And don’t tell me Star Office, because Sun also made a version for the Win32 platform.

I recently read a notice at school that said “School students now have the same discounts on Microsoft software as University students. You may now purchase a copy of Microsoft Office 2000 Professional Edition for just $269, $700 below the RRP.” I, as a yr. 12 student (or for that matter a uni student), can really afford that. No, really, that discount just makes it all worthwhile.

Look. How much software, Microsoft or not, have you actually bought? You can’t tell me more than half the software on your computer has been legally bought (and I’m sure you register all your shareware :P). Regardless, academic discounts are not restricted to Microsoft software. I mean, just take a look at Adobe Photoshop, or the Macromedia Suite. None of that is cheap, although with an academic discount it is significantly less expensive.

Look at Win2k. Back in 98, the rumour was that MS will merge Windows NT and Win 95/8, and from then on they will not have 2 separate operating systems: one “real” one, and one 2nd-rate one for the home user, but just one for everyone. Well, now they’ve released Win2k for businesses and Windows Millenium for the rest of us (and how much does it cost?). Wow! Look at that! HA!

Millennium is cheaper than Win 2000. I don’t know why they haven’t merged the two operating systems yet (sloppy scheduling? coders that don’t get things done on time? uh… but since when has any software company released anything on time?).

Finally, MS never release “corporate secrets” which would enable not only people who know what they’re doing to make their own alterations to their own copy of their OS, but even that would allow other OS developers to write in Windows compatibility! VFAT and NTFS specs were *never* released. Linux, for example, fully supports VFAT and supports reading NTFS, but only because someone reverse engineered them. Not that anyone that could avoid it would use VFAT, a vastly inferior filesystem and about the only one left that needs regular defragmenting.

I don’t dispute the fact that Microsoft unfairly competes. It does, it’s a monopoly. It’s in business.

BTW, with Win2K comes a built in disk defragmenter. NTFS4 was designed not to fragment, but over time, it did. NTFS5 now fragments like FAT does – but that can be fixed with the defrag program. The benefit of this is that NTFS5 gives better disk performance since it doesn’t have to search for contiguous blocks of space to write.

Did I say “own copy” in that last paragraph? Oh, I did, my mistake. Well, anyone who has actually *read* the Windows 9x EULA will find that it isn’t your own copy, but a license to use the software until such time as Microsoft says otherwise. Excellent.

I’m afraid that once again that this is quite common and not unique to Microsoft. That’s what a license agreement is: a license to use the software, although it still remains the property of the owning company. And realistically – have you ever heard of Microsoft revoking a legit license? (You do have a legit license, don’t you?)

Even Cityrail train tickets are merely a “license” to travel on their rail system. They can revoke that license if they want to – you don’t own a seat on a train – the ticket is just a symbolic thing stating that you have permission to travel.

Perhaps if Microsoft hadn’t made such low quality products, they wouldn’t have forced, firstly, many people to despair so much of getting anything good out of them that they decided to band together and do better, making their programs and code free to those who want them, and secondly, the US High Court to split up the monopoly.

Find me a viable alternative to Windows. Don’t tell me Linux because that OS has as much userfriendliness as trying to operate the Mir space station with an operating manual written in Sanskrit. It doesn’t look as pretty either (so it’s not as customisable, but how much toil do you have to go through to get your Linux desktop looking pretty?) and there’s always the WindowBlinds program.

Finally, if there is free source code (GPL) out there that is vastly superior to Microsoft’s own, why don’t they use all or part of it to improve at least some of their products? Because the only condition of the GPL is that anything derived from the code must also be released under the GPL. And releasing, say, IE under the GPL would kill Microsoft’s iron-fist monopoly grip on the web browser market, wouldn’t it?

I’m sorry, but it appears that the Internet has given rise to a generation of people who believe that all things should be made free. Microsoft is in business. Their job is to make money. Releasing their code to GPL is akin to giving away its products for free.

Linux is programmed in a decentralised fashion by a bunch of talented programmers around the world doing it because it’s their passion. They don’t make money out of it, and they don’t lose money from doing it. They do it for peer recognition. Unfortunately, you can’t run a business on peer recognition. Not in this reality anyhow. The decentralised fashion of Linux development is both a strong and weak point – although things can happen very fast, things tend to get disorganised.

I know I sound like a Microsoft weenie, but I’m not. I hate seeing people totally and blindly biased against something. I acknowledge Microsoft is a monopoly and is engaging in unfair practices. I believe that their business tactics do staunch innovation. I also believe that their products could be better. And, I absolutely hate their disregard for standards (referring to their move away from web standards in the next version of IE) . However, I do not think that splitting them up is a good way to go about things. The government is basically stepping in and chucking a spanner into their works just because they have been successful. Something like 90% of the computer market runs on MS OSes and in disrupting Microsoft, the DOJ is disrupting the computer market.

State of the Union

Viewable here. I would’ve liked to have been more involved in it, but I haven’t had any free time in the past few weeks. I sure had a lot more to say (for instance, there is so much more history behind it all than what was briefly touched upon) and also I agree that smaller sites that have been around for years and years should have got a more prominent mention. But as I said, I really didn’t have time (nor the mood), and there’s no reason why there can’t be a second version released in future. Cheers to TBA for setting the whole thing in motion to begin with.

Hard Copy

Ok, I have a few rolls worth of 1800×1200 jpgs sitting on my hard drive I took with my digital camera. I want to know if there’s any way I can get proper hard copies developed through a Kodak store, or some other photographic place. Do they accept SmartMedia cards or jpgs? (Don’t tell me to print them out on an inkjet printer – I want it on that paper they print real photos on) Does anyone know?

Hard Hitting

I make absolutely no apologies for lack of updates with any substance over the last week.

I discovered this week that my Mum has breast cancer.

As can be imagined I’ve been feeling pretty shit. It’s been graded as a “stage 2” tumour, which means it wasn’t detected very early, nor very late. Apparently the inch-big tumour hasn’t spread to the axillary lymph nodes, which is a good sign, but that can’t be confirmed until the operation which is Wednesday week. She’ll be undergoing a radical masectomy. She seems to be taking it well, although I can’t say the same about myself, or Dad. Life is surreal. It’s mostly normal, but everything to me is cast in light of Mum’s condition, and it’s inherently depressing.

A few weeks ago I wrote how the closer an event is to you, the more it makes you pause and re-evaluate life. Let me tell you that is particularly true in this case. It’s worse when the thought crosses my mind that it could be the last time I ever did something with her.

I am a strong Christian, and although I usually keep religious matters mostly personal (just because I’m a introvert), on this occasion I request that, if you are too, that you pray for her that the outcome will be favourable. If anyone (women readers?) has had any experience with breast cancer at all, I would be happy to get an e-mail if you have anything to say about it. She can be e-mailed here if anyone should wish to send her good wishes (hey, I saw Solo ask this when his mum’s birthday came along last year!).

7
Jun 00
Wed

Next Update

Next update – sometime tomorrow. I never realised how bad not being able to check e-mail for the greater part of the week could be… got this junk pile sitting in the mailbox I gotta go through :/

Mobile Phone Transmission

No way!! Microsoft has been ordered by US courts to break up into 2 companies. What a poor decision. Microsoft are appealing.

6
Jun 00
Tue

Mobile Phone Transmission

Two words: Fuck Cityrail.

Hahahah!

The Offspring are selling unlicenced Napster clothing off their web site. Damn that’s funny. Read more here.

Blah

Expect very few updates in the upcoming week – I have too much stuff due: an Oracle database, a test on Marxism, an essay on Postmodernism, and a presentation to the management staff at Aspect… The census results will be out in a couple weeks.

  9:03pm (GMT +10.00)  •  Life  •  Tweet This  •  Add a comment  • 

> c

Scientists have broken the speed of light?

4
Jun 00
Sun

This Week

I will be rarely posting from work this week. Reason is, I’m on a Windows 2000 course (1560 – Updating Support Skills…) and the lab environment is in an internal LAN. I can get access to the net, but I have to keep flicking between the static IP settings required for the labs, and the DHCP assigned IP needed for getting on the same subnet as the proxy server. So, it’s a bit of a bother.

1
Jun 00
Thu

Random Whois

skepticisms.com is available. Interesting, because most one-word domain names have been taken (skepticisms is also the longest word that can be typed with alternating hands).

And You Thought List-en was bad…

Everyone in my uni course is subscribed to a mailing list called bitwork (cos we’re all on 6 months of industrial training). It was set up so we could keep in contact with each other (the truth actually is – that it was set up because the majority of us have nothing better to do at work than e-mail each other). As the final week of work draws nearer, it’s started getting wacky. The last 50 mails I’ve got from it over the last 3 hours are all written in rhyme (mostly limer i cks, actually). Example:

Hey Renai, you’re such a joke
what did I ever do?
I didn’t even poke.
Stop your sledging
stop your poems.
GET BACK TO WORK
YOU FUCKING JERK.

Save me. I know these people.

Uh

What the?

RAID

Detailed candid discussion of RAID on Ars Technica.

Welcome to Winter

It’s frigging cold and frigging windy today.

Chick Tourney Reset

And out of beta too. Go and play. Damn thing is impossible to play over dialup :/



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