2005 November

There’s always an angle, right? Always a mechanism by which criminals can exploit the system for their own gain, often at the price of innocent consumers being hurt or defrauded. The rise of plastic gift cards that you see at stores like Victoria’s Secret and The Limited make it incredibly easy to give gift […]

It’s winter and that means that the real men who loved our coverage of the Hemi Grill need a wintertime outlet. Rest easy. Here’s one for the snow and sleet - a V8 Snowblower.
“Kai Grundt’s V8 snow blower raises the bar on the traditional snow blower in every respect. With electric start, electric block heater, […]

With most operating system upgrades, there are very few features you leave behind that you’d want. Most actually seem to be as much about security as features, but if you’re a fan of the Sony Playstation Portable (PSP) then you might have realized that any upgrade to your firmware past 1.50 means that you can’t […]

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
Personally, I use margarine, and specific brands, without trans fatty acids, mostly for health reasons. My mother-in-law swears by butter though. And one of her complaints is how hard the stuff is when she takes it out of the refrigerator. That complaint could be a thing of the past with the […]

As a member of the AdSense program, I get sporadic newsletters from Google that highlight all that’s new and good with the AdSense program. If you’re just starting out with AdSense - or perhaps having joined yet at all - it’s hard to know what’s new and what has been a part of the program […]

I recently received a rather sad letter from a small business owner who shared that just as they were about to move into the big holiday buying season they had a catastrophic store fire. Their inventory wasn’t damaged, fortunately, but she and her husband really need some advice on how to get some of that […]

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
A Dutch company has announced a Linux-based VCR-like device that can connect and download content from a variety of P2P services (Edonkey, Bittorrent, Kazaa, Gnutella and Overnet). It has a DVD burner (unclear from the site if it’s dual-layer) and various-sized hard drives; the cheapest version has 40GB of storage and […]

Mark Evans of RealTechNews writes:
It is not a good day for Blackberry-maker Research in Motion after a U.S. judge ruled a $450-million patent settlement reached earlier this year between RIM and NTP can’t be enforced. U.S. District court judge James Spencer will now decide whether and/or how to impose an injunction that could prevent RIM […]

Most longtime readers know that I long to fly and own some sort of cool ultralight plane. I’ve covered personal helicopters and flying cars and everything in between, but today I found a video of an ultralight crash that definitely made me stop and think.

The vulnerabilities are critical, allow system access from remote, and affect Java 1.3.1 and later on Linux, Solaris, and Windows - both the runtime (JRE) and the developers‘ kit (JDK or SDK).
There’s a new version of the Sun Java Runtime Environment out (what Microsoft called the Java Virtual Machine). Getting it and installing […]

Both of these are pretty hefty additions to the PSP. Having said that, I sort of saw RSS as being inevitable.

Parental controls on the console. I don’t think this is going to help when it is often the parents enabling the violent game play in the first place…

I spend a lot of time looking at the “big picture” with Internet companies, and there’s no company more interesting than Google. From free wireless installations to Java-based office clones to a VOIP solution to a new competitor for Craigslist, Google is a company with its fingers in many different market segments. But there’s a […]

Dr. Tony Phillips of NASA writes:
It’s often said (by astronomers) that Venus is bright enough to cast shadows.
So where are they?
Few people have ever seen a Venus shadow. But they’re there, elusive and delicate - and, if you appreciate rare things, a thrill to witness.

While I’m an unabashed fan of Google’s great Gmail web-based email product (and it’s free! That’s hard to beat) it’s not perfect, so when I received an email from a reader asking about why he might be seeing what I call the White Screen of Death, a stalled page load and a blank screen, […]

November 28, 2005
Bolax gummifera
Just like yesterday’s plant, I can’t help myself when I see this plant. I have to touch it. The sensation, though, is quite different - imagine (but I don’t suggest you try it) pushing down with your hand on a swath of keys on your keyboard. That would be very similar to […]

There’s a great website called The Orphanage of Cast-Off Mascots. It features a host of long-forgotten characters such as “Ima WantAd” (shown here), My Coffee Nerves, and of course, the imminently forgettable Plywood Pete. Which got me thinking, now that we have moved from the days when the Internet was this faceless scary concept that […]

In which I receive an optimistic, but unrealistic letter from someone seeking the shortcut to having a well-funded startup, hoping that it’s possible to jump directly from “I have a good idea” to “I’ve just gotten a huge infusion of cash from VC investors” without bothering with the actually creation and growth of the business. […]

While the social bookmarking site Del.icio.us has lots of fans, I’ve never really understood its appeal. But rather than bask in my own ignorance, in my sense that I just don’t quite “get it”, I asked a few colleagues for their inside scoop on the Delicious service and am happy to present a collective Q&A […]

One site that collected credit card numbers for Shadowcrew asked you to enter your card number to check if it was stolen. When you clicked submit, you got a message: ‘Well, it’s stolen now!’
Eric B. Parizo of SearchSecurity.com writes:
…During a rare and candid presentation at the recent CSI Computer Security Conference, Kimberly […]