links for 2005-11-23

links for 2005-11-22

The FBI Is Not Watching You.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation issued an alert Monday about a scam involving unsolicited e-mails, purportedly sent by theFBI, that tell computer users that their Internet surfing is being monitored by the agency.

FBI Warns of E-Mail About Surveillance – Yahoo! News

This looks a lot like a replay of the Sober.K outbreak from Feb. 2005.  At that time the FBI issued a press release that was virtually identical to the one issued today.  My scanner reported a copy I picked up as Sober.cf.  It is interesting that the major AV sites have not picked this up yet.

technorati tags: , , , ,

Dave Remembers XML-RPC

Scripting News: 11/20/2005It’s the fifth hit on Google for XML, ahead of some pretty famous sites. It’s by far the number one reason people go to the DaveNet site. I guess I pay too much attention to the critics who say that XML-RPC isn’t good enough for them.

XML-RPC is, I think, more significant than RSS in a number of ways.  Using XML-RPC allows me to give direct access to my data to developers so they can use it as they see fit.  In essence I can provide content and data (which I can do well) and let others worry about layout, design, etc (which I don’t do well at all).  I’m glad Dave is going to turn his attention back to XML-RPC.

technorati tags: , ,

Google Pods?

This shipping container is a prototype data center. Google hired a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box. We’re talking about 5000 Opteron processors and 3.5 petabytes of disk storage that can be dropped-off overnight by a tractor-trailer rig. The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a giant processing and storage grid.

Slashdot | Google’s Secret Plans For All That Dark Fiber?

Wow.  Needless to say the /. is rather up in a lather about one corporation weilding this sort of power.  I wonder if they would as upset if Google were still private or if it were a non-profit.  Is there something inherently evil in one  corporation exercising a large measure of control over all the info on the net?  Can’t say really.  All we have to compare something like this to are the monopolies of the last centruies.  And none of that ended well.

technorati tags: ,

Skype, Radio Shack Bring PC2PC VOIP to Consumers

Beginning Monday, Fort Worth, Texas-based RadioShack will feature Skype products in a special kiosk, including a new Motorola Inc. headset that uses short-range wireless Bluetooth technology to make calls via Skype, priced at $100. It will sell a $40 headset from Logitech and a $129 cordless phone from Cisco Systems Inc.’s Linksys unit.The RadioShack kiosk will feature Skype starter kits for $5 with a simple earpiece/microphone, software and 30 minutes of free Skype calling time to any number in the world. Sales clerks will offer training videos and software to customers.

Skype in U.S. Retail Distribution Pact

This is huge for Skype.  Retail placement in Radio Shack will put the next to cell carriers like Verizon.  RS already has some of the hardware with Skype included available here.  A geek bonus would be if this hardware could be reconfigured to work with SIP.  I’ll be looking into this.