ian andrew bell

Begin forwarded message:

> From: “Meltsner, Kenneth”
> Date: Tue Sep 23, 2003 8:18:04 PM US/Pacific
> To:
> Subject: if there’s ever a Nuerenberg trial for food crimes, here’s a
> candidate….
>
> I’m appalled, and I’m living in Wisconsin — I thought nothing could
> surprise me in the fried/cheese-bearing foods category…
>
> Ken
>
> September 23, 2003
> Cheeseburger and Fries, Wrapped Up in One
> By TANIA RALLI
>
> If the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association has its way, beef will
> not be just for dinner anymore.
>
> Looking to emulate the success of Chicken McNuggets and fried
> mozzarella sticks, the group is hoping to inject some red meat into
> the American snack food diet with cheeseburger fries. The fries, which
> look like a squat version of standard French fries, are made of a
> meat-and-cheese compound that tastes — as the name suggests — like a
> cheeseburger.
>
> Breaded, then deep-fried and served with ketchup or barbecue sauce,
> cheeseburger fries have found their way onto menus in several states
> including Nebraska, Minnesota Read More

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Jeffrey Kay
> Date: Tue Sep 23, 2003 7:20:55 AM US/Pacific
> To: FoRK
> Subject: Verisign’s Domain Redirects
>
> Seems like DNS is in trouble yet again. This is a pretty interesting
> issue.
> One could argue that managing a root gTLD server is a public trust and
> Verisign is violating that trust.
>
> — jeff
>
> VeriSign stands firm on domain redirect
> Last modified: September 22, 2003, 6:07 PM PDT
> By Declan McCullagh
> Staff Writer, CNET News.com
>       
>
> VeriSign said Monday that it would not abandon its decision to point
> unassigned domain names at its Web site, but representatives did say
> the
> company would form a technical committee later this week to look into
> the
> problems caused by the change.
>
> During the last week, criticism has steadily grown over VeriSign’s ”
> SiteFinder ” service, which has caused problems for network
> administrators
> and confused spam-blocking utilities. A number of Internet standards
> bodies
> and administrative groups have asked the Read More

http://news.com.com/2100-1034-5079624.html

Putting a lid on broadband use By John Borland Staff Writer, CNET News.com http://news.com.com/2100-1034-5079624.html

Earlier this month, a Philadelphia Comcast broadband subscriber got a letter from his service provider, telling him he’d been using the Internet too much.

Keith, who asked to keep his full name private, said he’d subscribed to the service for four years and never had a complaint before. Now he was being labeled a network “abuser.”

Worse, he said, Comcast refused to tell him how much downloading was allowed under his contract. A customer service representative had told him there was no specific cap, he said, adding that he might avoid being suspended if he cut his bandwidth usage in half. But even then, the lack of a hard number gave Keith no guarantee.

What’s new: Cable Internet service subscribers are quietly capping the volume of downloading they allow their subscribers to do. So far, it’s only affecting the heaviest users.

Bottom line: As broadband providers strive for ever-speedier and economical service–and bandwidth-hogging features such as video on demand become more popular–these caps may become more common. And they may affect digital Read More

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/21/magazine/magazinespecial/ MFMERHANT.html

September 21, 2003

Waiting For Spielberg By MATTHEW ROSE

Unlike most urban legends, the one about the Iranian exile stuck at the Paris airport for 15 years is true. Surrounded by a mountain of his possessions near the Paris Bye Bye lounge at Terminal 1 in Charles de Gaulle International Airport, Merhan Karimi Nasseri is still there after all these years — a celebrity homeless person.

Planted on the 1970’s red plastic bench he calls home, and surrounded by stacks of newspapers and magazines, Nasseri, also known as Alfred or ”Sir, Alfred” (title and comma appropriated from a mistake in a letter from British immigration), has organized his life’s belongings into a half-dozen Lufthansa cargo boxes, various suitcases and unused carry-on luggage. On a nearby coffee table spotted with aluminum ashtrays, Nasseri’s universe includes a pair of alarm clocks, an electric shaver, a hand mirror and a collection of press clippings and photographs to establish his present and his recent past. He seems both settled — and ready to go.

To the pilots, airport staff, fast-food merchants and millions who have passed through the terminal on their way Read More

Begin forwarded message:

> Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 21:01:30 -0400
> Subject: Article: High-Tech Heroin
> From: Richard Forno
>
> High-Tech Heroin
> Richard Forno
>
> (c) 2003 by Author. All Rights Reserved.
> Permission granted to redistribute this article in its entirety with
> credit
> to author.
>
> Dostoevsky once wrote that “in the end they will lay their freedom at
> our
> feet and say to us, ‘Make us your slaves, but feed us.’” His prophecy
> is
> relevant when examining the modern Information Age — a dark,
> corporate-controlled society predicted by such artistic legends as
> Bruce
> Sterling, George Lucas, Ridley Scott, and William Gibson ­ and is the
> focus
> of this article.
>
> We want to be part of this information environment and feel more
> empowered
> with each new gadget, service, or digital connection in our lives. The
> concept of “information everywhere” provides instant gratification to
> satisfy our needs for books, music, porn, and digital interaction with
> others through web searches, e-commerce, wireless, instant messaging,
> e-mail, and streaming content over broadband. High-speed Read More

As predicted, Time Warner is attempting to divest itself of the AOL nightmare. After writing down AOL’s entire pre-deal capitalization, thus effectively declaring the unit that purchased the Old Media company worthless, the latest steps have been to drop the brand and the stock ticker symbol.

Don’t get me wrong — it’s not that AOL is worthless… but it is clear that it was never worth 75 billion dollars. Steve Case build AOL into a 75 billion dollar parasite and, as the internet bubble ventured well beyond irrationality, he searched for a host onto which to attach that parasite. Now, as the Steve Case love potion wears off, Time Warner realized the disease and is masking the symptoms. Time Warner should have bought AOL for $50 Million. That’s it.

-Ian.

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Tom
> Date: Wed Sep 17, 2003 9:08:13 PM US/Pacific
> To: fork [at] xent [dot] com
> Subject: Time Warner Sues Apt. Over Wireless Theft
>
>
> Time Warner Sues Apt. Over Wireless Theft
> By Harry Berkowitz
> Staff Writer
>
> September 15, 2003, 7:00 PM EDT
>
> Cable theft has evolved into piracy of high-speed Internet access, Time
> Warner Cable of New York claims.
>
> The cable company Monday sued iNYC Wireless and London Terrace Towers,
> a
> large apartment complex in the Chelsea section of Manhattan, saying
> they
> rerouted and resold Road Runner access without permission.
>
> They did so with the help of high-powered wireless-fidelity, or Wi-Fi,
> transmitters spread through the apartment complex, Time Warner Cable
> said in
> the suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.
>
> “iNYC’s theft and resale has unjustly renriched iNYC,” the suit claims.
> Customers of iNYC did not know about the illegal activity, the suit
> says.
>
> Jeff Schwartz, a lawyer for the London Terrace board of directors,
> said,
> “London Read More

*As proof that market dynamics can influence lawmaking, SBC has fallen into step with Verizon in putting up roadblocks to stop the RIAA’s maniacal tirade against P2P. The quote that says it all? * “We are going to challenge every single one of these that they file until we are told that our position is wrong as a matter of law”. Brilliant. And good marketing, too. If I lived in SBC territory I’d leap to join their network and sign up for ADSL. * -Ian.

—- http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20030916/ZNYT01/309160363

SBC Won’t Name Names in File-Sharing Cases*

By SETH SCHIESEL New York Times September 16, 2003

* • Discuss this story <Read More

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19860-2003Sep16.html

washingtonpost.com Software Aimed at Blocking VeriSign’s Search Program

By Anick Jesdanun AP Internet Writer Tuesday, September 16, 2003; 4:00 PM

NEW YORK — The developer of software that essentially guides Web surfers sought Tuesday to neutralize a controversial service designed to help users who mistype Internet addresses.

The Internet Software Consortium, the nonprofit organization that develops BIND software for Internet domain name directories, is writing an “urgent patch” for Internet service providers and others who want to block customers from a new Site Finder service from VeriSign Inc.

VeriSign, which keeps the master lists of names ending in “.com” and “.net,” launched Site Finder on Monday to steer users to likely alternatives when they type addresses for which no Web site exists.

Though VeriSign gets unspecified revenues from search engine partners whose technology powers Site Finder, company officials described the service as primarily a navigation tool to help lost Internet users.

Critics, however, say the service eliminates user choice, gives a private company too much control over online commerce and could violate longstanding Internet standards.

VeriSign’s service, which affects only “.com” and “.net” Read More

http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,3959,1261487,00.asp

September 10, 2003 A Letter to President Bush By  Tom Steinert-Threlkeld

Dear President Bush:

You probably don’t know Joel Phagoo. He is a 21-year-old college student who decided to go fishing in New York’s Jamaica Bay with his kid brother and a cousin. They ended up washing up just off Runway 4 Right at JFK International Airport, after the weather turned.

They wandered about the tarmac for an hour, then turned themselves in to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Police.

These were innocents. But their ability to move freely beneath the underbellies of jumbo jets just goes to show: Two years after the worst terror attacks on United States soil, repeat events are all too easy to envision.

An evildoer can still load explosives into a 20″ rolling travel case and ride into a major train station in any large metropolis—and blow it up. Shoulder-mounted missile launchers can, without much trouble, take down airplanes from the visitor center at the south end of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport or, as Joel Phagoo discovered, Runway 4 Right at JFK. A kayak could do the Read More