A Statistical Approach To Spam

Thanks to David Singer, IBM Distinguished Engineer, Internet Technology at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California for telling me about a very interesting approach to reducing spam. It uses a statistical model and sounds like it could be quite effective. There is a spam conference in Cambridge, MA, in January 2003.

eSuds

Reuters reported that IBM is rolling out new technology that may be powerful enough to stop college students from bringing laundry home to mom and dad for the weekend. The system is called eSuds and it was developed by IBM and USA Technologies. Instead of the usual chasing all over to find quarters, this new system allows students to swipe a credit card or punch a code into their cell phones to pay for the washing machines or clothes dryers. (read more)

Ocean City Surfing

I arrived in Ocean City, New Jersey for a visit with some family on Wednesday night. After dinner it was time to check some email and things on the web so I got out my RJ-11 phone cable and plugged it into the phone jack in the wall. Then it occurred to me to try Boingo instead.  (read more)

Some Good News On Spam

Mike Nelson at IBM reports that there are two new useful spam references..

O  Steve Wildstrom on personal spam filters:

O  Wired magazine on a new technique for fighting spam

The Hygrometer search

I previously wrote a story about my frustration in buying a thermometer/hygrometer online. One reader sent me an email telling me about a Canadian company that might have what I am looking for. I sent an email to the person he referred me to and received a quick reply which included some picutres and descriptive information about their products. At the end of the email reply it said "If you would like to purchase one, please feel free to call our inside sales desk at 1-800-XXX-YYYY ext. XYZ for a store nearest you.". Maybe a new kind of "link". Just call and you get driving directions. I really did like the product so I called. It was 5:30 PM and I got a message that said "We are closed. Please call back during our normal business hours...." (read more)

Kayak Jane

Today I took a kayaking lesson. So much to learn. Kayak Jane has a rental shop on Route 507 in Paupak, Pennsylvania on Lake Wallenpaupack. It looks so effortless and simple. I guess it is after you have mastered it but, like so many things, it requires a lot of practice. Keeping your arms straight and rotating your body as you paddle doesn't seem natural at first. I have a long queue of things I plan to write about e-business and Internet technology but hope nobody minds reading about some of the diversions and hobbies along the way. I also posted some pictures of other people in the photo gallery this morning.

Spammer Fine

It was heartening to see the report by Danny Freedman on the AP wire that the Federal Communications Commission had issued a record fine of nearly $5.4 million against a company for sending "junk faxes" to businesses and consumers.The fine was levied against fax.com, a company based in Aliso Viejo, California. It was the largest fine ever by the commission for violations of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. The law protects against unsolicited faxes, telemarketing calls and prerecorded messages. (read more)

Spam in Perspective

This story puts spam in perspective -- a very negative one. I continue to be hopeful as I see more and more startup companies bring solutions to market.

Digital Identity

There is a lot going on in the area of Digital Identity in both the private sector and in government. I recently posted a story about it. Seven power point presentations on the US initiative can be found here. There is also a recent paper on e-authentication.

IBM Multimodal Annotation Tool

A lot of interesting things come from IBM Research. Something new that I found particularly interesting is the IBM Multimodal Annotation Tool. The tool assists in annotating MPEG files with MPEG-7 meta data (both video and audio. Each shot in the video sequence can be annotated with static scene descriptions, key object descriptions, event descriptions, and other lexicon sets. Audio segments can be delimited and described as well. The annotated descriptions are stored as MPEG-7 descriptions in an XML file. The tool can also open MPEG-7 files in order to display the annotations for the corresponding MPEG file. (read more)

Gadgets 'R Me

Years ago I was into hot dog cookers, pasta makers, and other bizarre gadgets which my wife has gotten rid of at garage sales! Since my first TRS-80 Microcomputer in 1977 my gadgets have mostly been electronic. Gadgets go way back to the beginning for me. As long as I can remember -- tinker toys, Lincoln logs, erector sets, chemistry sets, and ham radio. Too bad they didn't have LEGO's when I was little. (read more)

New Gallery Up and Running

The Photo Gallery has been part of ibm.com/patrick since 1995 and is now part of patrickWeb. I have finally found a really good photo management program for the web called Gallery. It is free, open source, and loaded with features. (read more)

Two Percent

I was looking for a particular kind of digital thermometer and found it in a printed catalog I had received from Wine and All That Jazz. Item # in hand, I went to their web site to order it. There was no place on the site to order by item number so I did a search on the item number. The search yielded the item name and description but with no link to buy it! (read more)

Red Rabbit

You either like Tom Clancy's books or you don't and I am one who does. I have read every single one. You have to love a guy who really embraces technology; or at least he seems to. Clancy's latest book, Red Rabbit, is classic Clancy. It is loaded with intrigue and suspense and even a touch of reality. I really enjoyed it -- 618 pages that I couldn't put down until it was finished. It is now added to my list of favorite books.

Wi-Fi and free lunches

WiFi has captured my imagination and I have written a number of things about it here in the weblog. Today C|NET published a short story I wrote called Wi-Fi and free lunches. The feedback confirms the enthusiasm of many others.

Out Of Pocket

I'll be out of pocket for the next ten days. Since I "retired" at end of last year, I have been busier than ever and haven't had time for much of a break. The time has come and I hope to return from Alaska with some nice pictures to share. I have a long list of things I plan to write about for the weblog so please stay tuned -- patrickweb.com/weblog

Power To The People

Broadband service via either Cable or DSL is spreading around the world. However, there are many places where it is just not available. One of them is the Ruby Ranch neighborhood in Summit County, Colorado. Rather than wait until broadband service would be available -- which could be years -- the residents decided to take the matter into their own hands. (read more)

Tai Chi

I am getting convinced that chi qigong and tai chi are the natural way to achieve strength and health. Just finished a second book on the topic called Step by Step Tai Chi. The other book is my favorite books list.

Digital ID Conference

I got a lot of feedback on my short piece called Digital IDs: A Tool To Reduce Spam. Eric Norlin, Senior Editor at Digital ID World, told me about a conference coming up in October that sounds very interesting. Identity is destined to change the computing landscape and our personal interactions forever. Attendees will discuss and debate the technology and its social ramifications.

Some Very Nice Dance Music From The '20's and '30's

Thanks to Sophia Stern at NYU for telling me about a really neat music site where there are hundreds of old dance songs, done by a great jazz band in the 1920s and 30s. Try "Button up Your Overcoat" and "Forty-Seven Ginger-Headed Sailors."

What A Country!

My brother Bob and I decided to meet for breakfast in Sidney, New York. The motorcycle trip was about 100 miles for me and a bit less for him. Departure time was 6:25 AM and it was COLD. Unlike the trip up, the return trip back to Pennsylvania was unplanned. I aimed the Garmin GPS at Greentown, PA and just followed the arrow. (read more)

Archive of 2001 Postings Available

There is now an archive of all 2001 postings available.

Thanks For The Help

Thanks to Mike Nelson at IBM for finding a bad link to the the piece on spam  in the reflection about Digital IDs. I am trying hard to clean up any errors I made while consolidating my web sites and importing weblog posts from my old system. Most all of the internal links are fixed but there may still be some external ones like the one Mike found. I really appreciate it when people tell me about an error on my site -- I try to do the same for others -- and I apologize for any inconvenience.

History of Net Attitude

I think all of us have a book in us. Many people have asked me how long it took to bring out a book and how do those endorsements on the back cover work. In addition to the history you can read at the link, there are postings here in the weblog during the latter part of 2001. (read more)

Net Attitude Weblog Consolidated

The Net Attitude weblog was created in 2001 as an extension of my book, Net Attitude. The plan was and remains to use blogging as a way to reflect on things that changed after I finished writing the book. Needless to say, much has changed but I am sticking to my story -- that we are at the very beginning of what the Internet has to offer for our business and personal lives. I'll post some specifics here soon on the things I talked about in the book that happened sooner, or later, or not at all. 

Finished A Couple Of Books

Just finished a couple of books and added them to my book list on the site. The Biker Code - Wisdom For The Ride by Stuart Miller and Geoggrey Moss is a ten minute read with pictures and quotes from motorcycle riders. A lot of interesting perspective -- from the heart and from the road. The Healing Promise of Qi - Creating Extraordinary Wellness Through Qigong and Tai Chi Roger Jahnke, O.M.D. was very tedious reading (303 pages). Comprehensive but highly repetitive. Like reading an encylopedia but good way to gain total perspective on the subject. I am now reading another book on Tai Chi which looks much more practical.

A 56 Mile Errand

Friends and family would soon be coming to visit so I had to go run some errands. The weather was nice so why would anyone take the car for the five mile trip when they could take the motorcycle and make it a 56 mile trip? Good thing I had the GPS along. (read more)