archive
index
gp originals
google i
google ii
celebrating porn
idiot voters
| Notice: GeekPress is back up and running, thanks to Paul! It's still a not-so-serious tech news blog, but the format is significantly looser. Diana, having given up programming for philosophy, has her own philosophical blog NoodleFood. More of her work can be found at DianaHsieh.com. |
| Upgrading your hard drive |
| 12:31:21 am mst / 2 February 2001 found by paul / filed in hardware / source Dan's Data 149 hits / 1 comment / 0 e-mails |
| So you've got a new hard drive and you want to transfer all your data from your old "C:" drive to this one, making it the new "C:" drive. There are some pitfalls to avoid, and this tutorial takes you through the hardware and software subtleties. |
| Curse the Windows long filename handling system! |
| read 1 comment |
 |
| Will CNN Site Spoof Crash? |
| 1:35:25 am mst / 2 February 2001 found by paul / filed in legal / source Wired 50 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| Zach Exley created a site parodying the CNN financial site CNNfn called CNNdn ("the financial crash network"), with fake news stories. However, the lawyers for AOL-Time Warner were not amused and have been sending him threatening letters, accusing him of "cyberpiracy" and "cybersquatting". His site has copies of the nasty correspondence. |
| Interestingly enough, by not fully adopting the "it's just a parody" defense, he may be putting himself on shakier legal ground. |
|
| Proposed IRS rule may limit freedom to link |
| 2:46:47 am mst / 2 February 2001 found by paul / filed in legal / source NewsMax 26 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| TBTF pointed us to this NewsMax article which (in TBTF's words), "The US Internal Revenue Service is proposing a rule that might make it inadvisable for not-for-profit organizations to provide links on their Web sites to any political site." The full IRS document is available here. |
| Besides the obvious First Amendment issues, I'm also troubled by the fact that it would be extremely easy for the IRS to engage in selective enforcement of this rule, based on its definition of a "political website". |
|
| Dolphins stun their prey with sound |
| 4:55:27 am mst / 2 February 2001 found by paul / filed in science / source New Scientist 53 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| New videotape evidence strongly suggests that dolphins stun their prey with their clicking sounds. As one researcher described a dolphin's use of a low-frequency "bang" sound against her target, "She was aiming right at him. Pow, pow, pow." |
| Recently, some school officials in Arkansas must have been afraid that this might also work on humans -- they suspended an 8-year old boy for pointing a chicken finger at someone and saying, "pow pow pow". |
|
| MS Office Alternatives |
| 11:05:20 am mst / 2 February 2001 found by diana / filed in software / source ZDNet 82 hits / 1 comment / 0 e-mails |
| David Coursey, following his investigation into Microsoft's forthcoming anti-piracy measures, takes a look at ThinkFree, a lighter-weight office suite than MS Office. |
| Sounds like a pretty decent alternative, although $50 per year seems like a steep price. |
| read 1 comment |
|
| X Marks What? |
| 12:19:09 pm mst / 2 February 2001 found by diana / filed in business / source ZDNet 63 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| After the recent bizarre changes in the names of their OSes, MS seems to have decided to increase the confusion. The next version of Office (for Windows) will be called "Office XP," while the individual apps within the bundle will still use the year-based naming convention (e.g. "Word 2002"). And that's just the beginning... |
| For once, I think that Microsoft is confusing people due to incompetance rather than design! |
|
| Stock Options Free AOL From Taxes |
| 9:48:36 pm mst / 2 February 2001 found by paul / filed in business / source San Francisco Chronicle 17 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| Because AOL-Time Warner has been aggressive in granting stock options to its employees, they will be able to write off approximately $11 billion of federal taxes, which means the company probably won't have to pay federal tax for at least the next 4-5 years, and perhaps a lot longer. |
| I wish I could find a way to take advantage of the same accounting rules and grant myself a bunch of stock options! |
|