Worm and Virus Writers

Clive Thompson at the New York Times has an article on worm and virus writers called The Virus Underground. It is a lengthy well-researched read on this growing internet problem. Thompson points out that what youngsters initially think is simply fun can land them in jail.

Smack the penguin

Here is a game for anti-Linux users (?) Smack the penguin [steroids version]!!! which probably violates all kinds of SPCA regulations in spirit, but it is kind of fun, and no harm is done. Click the caveman once to get the penguin to jump and try to strike him like a baseball and send him on his way with the club which will give you a score - our top is 1200,1. Hint: a vertical trajectory gets more distance than a high flyer.

It is absolutely mindless entertainment but the fact that you have the motivation of obtaining a high score - as always - is catching.

Internet Replacing Television

Via Steve Hall's blog AdRants we discover that the Internet is in fact moving 18 to 34 year-old males away from Television to the World Wide Web. This in part massive and we expect continuing move of "viewers" from traditional TV to WWW will greatly change the media scene over time.

Hail to the Queen ! - Tim Berners-Lee to be Knighted

Tim Berners-Lee is to be knighted.

See the W3C under the title "W3C Director Tim Berners-Lee to be made Knight Commander, Order of the British Empire".

It is beginning to appear that those persons who are recently being "knighted" by Queen Elizabeth are looking very much more like a "Who's Who" of the world than those being honored by allegedly more illustrious awards such as the Nobel Prize, which - as in the case of the Nobel Prizes for Peace and Literature - appear to be very politically motivated and, in the case of the sciences represented, often go to persons who work in obscurity and remain obscure even after the award.

By contrast, the Knighthoods seem to be awarded to people who are visibly shaping our world.

Hail to the Queen!

Internet Governance by the UN ?

Internet Governance by the United Nations (UN) as a subject came via links at A Voyage to Arcturus to the the following websites

Financial Times
and the
ITU.

The idea of taking internet governance out of the hands of ICANN is not new - and certainly discussionable.

The idea of taking internet governance out of the US and putting it into the hands of the United Nations - to become a political football (?) in the General Assembly or Security Council - is new and has zero chances of implementation.

What is AAC?

MP3, AAC and general Audio and Multimedia standards such as MPEG explained.

What for example is AAC?

Go to the Fraunhofer Institut website at

Fraunhofer IIS - Audio & Multimedia - Home of Layer 3 and AAC

iTunes for Mac AND Windows

Time Magazine has an article entitled "The 99 cent Solution" at

TIME Magazine: Coolest Inventions 2003, Apple Music Store

in which writer Chris Taylor sings the praises of Steve Jobs and his simple solution to get around the problem of music piracy and illegal file-sharing.

See iTunes Music Store where this solution is now availabe for Mac AND Windows.

Our question is, we all know that the Mac Users have always had cash to burn, so it is no suprise that they are paying for music. But what percentage of the - on average - poorer Windows users will pay 99 cents per song?

Apparently, the start is good, according to the TIME Magazine article.