While doing my daily rounds of the various tech news sites that provide the source for most of the articles you see here, I came across this blogging article on TheRegister.

The fact that 8000 new bloggers appear every day isn’t really news to my mind, neither is most of the other accompanying data. What struck me as the “real’ news in the story, is this quote: “while a staggering 12 per cent attract the attention of lawyers with their biting commentary”.

Twelve percent of bloggers get into legal trouble? Is it just me or is that an inordinately high percentage?

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Even if you’re not a Linux fan, you should have a look at this because it makes for fascinating reading.

People that know me, know that I am no fan of Microsoft, I make no secret of it.
I do admit however, that they played a significant part in making computers the commodity they are today (and have been paid handsomely for it), and that their software is often pretty good from a usability perspective.

The problem is that they have used some extremely questionable business practices in the last 20 years, crushing or buying the competition, getting busted for appropriating code and then settling out of court with a non-disclosure agreement as part of the deal (DR-DOS anyone?). There are literally dozens of cases of this and related issues. The United States government themselves found Microsoft guilty of anti-competitive behaviour, as did the European Union, the problem is that neither significantly punished them for it.

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Just an interesting sideline story.

Iraq is still in upheaval, with problems popping up all over the place, but in the shadow of all that, they have started their first Linux Users Group (LUG)
with the idea of showing people (particularly those in government) how to setup an IT infrastructure that doesn’t rely on the software or services of big multinational companies which always results in huge amounts of money heading offshore.

Right now, those few that are using software in Iraq, are using pirated versions, as obviously the average Joe over there doesn’t have the same financial situation as we do.
The big multinationals are very happy about the pirated software, because it means that if people get dependent on the software, and used to its quirks, then when the big piracy crackdown finally happens, they hope these people will end up being forced into buying the software legally rather then look around for a free alternative. (like Linux).

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Here is an interesting little trick.

Open your browser (any gecko based browser, this doesn’t work in IE, but since there are at least half a dozen ways to get to micro$oft from within IE, that doesn’t mean you have to miss out. 🙂 ), and type: http::// in the address bar.

If your experience is anything like mine was, Micro$ofts web page will open in your browser.
It’s also the first result that shows up in Google..

How on earth did http::// end up going to Micro$ofts web site? Should we all be tightening our tinfoil hats?

Or is it just a weird quirk of Googles ranking engine?

I’ll leave that up to you.

regards

Franki

Here is a pretty rare item, a security flaw that effects multiple browsers, in fact nearly all the popular ones in use today.
The affected browsers affected are:

Internet Explorer,
Pre 0.9 Firebird
Pre 1.6 Mozilla
Pre 7.51 Opera.
Safari 1.2.2
Konqueror 3.1

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Just for a change of pace, here is a security flaw that effects a browser other then IE, In this case it’s Mozilla and Firefox.

This is not a critical flaw as such, and in some quarters it’s viewed as a feature.
Its not a flaw that will compromise your machine, or steal your data, but what it can do, is start any application on your computer if you visit a page that uses a link with shell: instead of http:

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This is a neat site that explains in very simple terms many common things, including many computer concepts.