Wireless Communities

I think by now we all know how fast WiFi is taking off. Rob Flickenger just published a very comprehensive article in PC Magazine. The most impressive link he referred to is Wireless Communities. I have written about the subject too. See Subway Surfing.

Did You Ever Wonder?

I just visited a very interesting site called "did you ever wonder?". Some of the topics included "How to rebuild the surface of a cell?", "How soil keeps the world in balance?", "About the invisible marvels of the nanoworld?", and "How to carve with light?". (read more)

Authentication working group

Yesterday was the first meeting of the Center for Strategic & International Studies authentication working group. This is a really important subject for the future of the Internet and I am quite honored to be able to participate as a member of the working group. I'll be posting more about this later.

Working For $1 Per Hour

eBay is a great place. Over the last few years I have sold things from my basement for amazing amounts. As they say, what is one man's junk is another man's treasure. It doesn't always work as expected though. (read more)

No Wonder My Knee Hurts

I am having a tough time with my knee; haven't been able to run since May a year ago. The surgery in July was going to fix things and I would be running again in six weeks -- ha. I won't bore my readers with the details of all the doctor visits, tests, and treatments. One thing for sure is that this week didn't help things.(read more)

More on GIP Spam Workshop

The Global Internet Project's (GIP) workshop: "Spam - Can It Be Stopped?" last week included keynotes by Internet architect Vint Cerf and Orson Swindle, Commissioner at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). In attendance were more than 100 participants representing some of the leading experts from government, academia, law, business, and the press. (read more)

Feedback on Subway Surfing

I have gotten a lot of feedback on my little piece about "Subway Surfing". Some said WiFi is already "meat and potatoes"; some were amazed to learn what is going on in the WiFi area. (read more)

Learning curve with Radio UserLand

I apologize for the broken links to some of my stories/reflections. I am quite enthusiastic about the Radio UserLand software as a tool to share and publish my thoughts. It is an elegant design. However, I must admit I am having some problems. I suspect it is the learning curve on my part that is mostly to blame. I hope that is the case. I still can't figure out why some of my postings are not getting published correctly. The email support from Lawrence Lee at UserLand has been great and I hope that by the end of the week that I will have a handle on all the issues I am having. Thanks for being patient (something I am not good at myself).

Global Internet Project press release

The GIP will be putting the following press release on the wire tomorrow.

Related links...

Other GIP press releases

The Glass Engine

There is a very interesting new approach to searching and interacting with information at....

http://www.philipglass.com/glassengine

Note: unfortunately it requires Microsoft Internet Explorer

I suspect you will be as impressed as I was when you see this remarkable technology prototype. It was developed by Mark Podlaseck at IBM's Hawthorne, New York Research Laboratory. The project started when Philip Glass, the composer, asked what his catalog of music might look like online. (read more)

Subway Surfing

I was driving down Main Street in a small New England town in early 2002 when I got a craving for a sandwich. I stopped at a Subway Sandwich shop and enjoyed a sandwich while looking at some offline email on my ThinkPad. Just before leaving I got the impulsive idea to fire up my Boingo software to see if there might be any wireless local area network signals in the air. To my amazement, a powerful signal popped up on my screen. (read more)

35th Reunion

Hard to believe that 35 years have gone by since I graduated from college. Surprising to me that less than 10% of graduates go back for their reunion -- even for those anniversary years which are multiples of five or ten. The 35th reunion at Lehigh University brought 40 of us back to celebrate. It was great to see fraternity brothers (Kappa Sigma) and curriculum mates (electrical engineering). Greg Farrington, the university president, came to our class dinner to accept a check for $186,000 that was contributed by class alumni. The best part of all was seeing fraternity brothers that I lived with for those fun -- and challenging -- years. I took some pictures which are in my photogallery.

P.S. Speaking of education, I wrote about e-learning in my book, Net Attitude.

Cloudmark's SpamNet

I wish I had known about Cloudmark on Tuesday at the GIP conference on spam. As I was quoted in the Los Angeles Times yesterday, "this is promising". CloudMark claims to have over 5,000 users already. They just came out of stealth mode on Wednesday. They also claim to have processed more than 4 million emails and "caught" about a million and a half spam emails. The software only works with Outlook Express -- not my favoriate email program. I hope they also produce versions for Linux, the Mac, Eudora, Notes, and other email platforms. As someone at the GIP conference said, "there are more of us than there are of them", referring to spammers. If CloudMark's SpamNet can do what they says it does indeed sound promising.

Related links...

Presentations made at the GIP workshop -- Spam: Can It Be Stopped?

The Spam Has Got To Go

You've Got Spam: How to "Can" Unwanted Email

Search goes on for ways to stop spam

Global Internet Project

Today, the Global Internet Project convened a workshop in Washington, DC called "Spam: Can It Be Stopped?".  The participants represented some of the leading experts on the subject from government, academia, law, and business. There was strong concensus that spam is a broad and deep problem and it is having significant negative economic and personal productity impact. That is to say nothing of the nuisance and privacy invasion factors. The other thing that emerged from the workshop quite clearly was that there is no "silver bullet" -- no simple solution. In fact, all the experts feel that spam will never be eliminated. The good news is that there was also consensus that much can be done. In particular, the following areas are already doing a lot but have the potential to do much more.

1. Internet Servcie Providers can take technical actions with regard to inbound and outbound email. It is not the total answer but is a key component.

2. Employers provide email services for millions of people around the world. They have the potential to take action on spam that arrives to employee email accounts. Many are taking action.

3. The user (consumer) is clearly in the best position to determine what is spam and what isn't. There are various technologies and web services that can help. Greater awareness is needed and ease of use needs to be better. This area has huge potential.

4. Governments are not irrelevant. Regulation won't work but prosecution of those who defraud can surely have a big impact. We have the laws -- now they need to be enforced.

The GIP is going to stay on the case -- keeping visibility of the subject at a high level. Keep your eye on http://www.gip.org/

The Spam Has Got To Go

I have been out on the lecture circuit for quite a few years, along with Vint Cerf and others, praising the Internet for all the good it can bring to the world. The GIP put out a paper in 1995 about how the Net would yield better education, improved world health, and better economic opportunity for the world's citizens. At this point I believe spam is an issue which endangers this bright future of the Internet. I wrote this Reflection about my personal experience with it in hopes of raising visibility. The Global Internet Project is conducting a workshop on the subject on June 18 in Washington, D.C. (see The Spam Has Got To Go)

My PhotoGallery

I started my first PhotoGallery in 1995 shortly after I built ibm.com/patrick. The nice folks at Kodak loaned me one of their new (at the time) DC-210 digital cameras and I began to take pictures all over the world. The PhotoGallery evolved from there. (read on) 

The Challenges of Security

We all want good security as we travel and after 9/11 most of us would agree that security is better than ever. I have said many times, as have others, that the inconveniences of security checks is a minor price to pay for the increase in security that we feel. At this stage I would have to admit that the "minor" inconveniences have at times seemed more than minor. I am still thankful for the increased security but am hopeful that more technology will be deployed to reduce the inconveniences. (read on)

Not As Easy As It Looks

I have been looking for a long time to find a motorcycle trailor that is really easy to use. On occasion it would be really nice to be able to tow a motorcycle somewhere and then ride it back home or visa versa or to tow it to a destination and then take a local motorcycle trip. I have a flat trailor made by Haulin which I bought at Home Depot. It was inexpensive and seemed like just the right thing. I made sides for the trailor from 2 x 6 planks with the idea that one of them would then serve as a ramp to drive a motorcycle onto the trailor. I found a bracket somewhere on the Web that mounted to the trailor bed which was designed to hold the front wheel of the bike in place. The final step in preparing this home made bike trailor was to have tie-down rings welded to the sides of the trailor. All set -- ready to use. What a disaster! (read on)

Experimenting with Radio Userland

I have been experimenting with Radio weblog software from Userland for a week or so now and I really like it. My current plan -- as soon as I master (learn some things would be a better way to say it) the features and details, is to consolidate my three main web sites....

ibm.com/patrick

patrickweb.com

netattitude.org

Hopefully, I will not get things too fragmented and, worse yet, broken in the meantime. I will appreciate your patience and of course your comments and suggestions.