International Symposium on Online Journalism Home: "Welcome to the 5th International Symposium on Online Journalism! Check out the photo slideshow, research papers, and stories below to find out what the buzz was at the symposium."

Went to the 25th anniversary celebration of my elementary school on Friday night. This made it my third trip to the deep suburbs in three days. I'm using up my quota awfully fast. It is strange to go back to an elementary school and look at the pictures and realize how young many of your teachers were. I bumped into some teachers who remembered me but it is an awkward conversation. So, you got bigger, moved on to another school, then university, then work, I haven't seen you since I was 11. While have a nice day. I remembered the physical plant aspects more that the people. What the library looked like, the feel of the halls, how long it used to seem to walk from the school to the playground, the sloping tree we used to run up as a contest. It was worn smooth from generations of kids feet. Rushing to school in the morning on your bike to get the first slot in the bike rack. Riding my bike through the paths in the forest or going to a friends house for lunch. A short stroll down memory lane but interesting none the less. 

How I'm spending my morning. She's got the sitting up idea and only falls over about 60 percent of the time. Went out to Maple Ridge last night to play cards with friends and will be out there today for the 25th anniversary celebration for my elementary school. 3 days in a row - I'm going to use up my quota. :-) Also working on getting some resumes off, picking up the keys to our house, visiting grandma and getting some resumes and committee applications out the door. There's also the playing with my daughter. Idyllic lifestyle but the cash burn is starting to hurt.  

We started with peas yesterday. Think about only knowing three flavours. Formula, rice cereal and now peas. She was less than overwhelmed and possible felt slightly betrayed and alarmed. Some pretty strange looks and grunts and other associated noises.  

It was a fairly momentous day yesterday. We became homeowners. We met with the lawyer at 11:30 and signed everything in triplicate. I wasn't nervous before but I started getting shaky putting down my name. Mortgages, land survey, property taxes, utility fees, lawyer fees, drafts for large sums of money. 20 minutes and we were done and walking out again. We went out to Maple Ridge and dropped the baby with the grandparents. Dropped by the bank out there to transfer more money and then a celebratory lunch at the GM restaurant. Great indian food and belgian cheesecake for desert. It seemed like a full circle. My wife and I had one of our first dates 6 years ago at that restaurant. 6 years later we're married with a house and a kid.  

One of our favorite photos. Took our daughter to childrens hospital today to meet with the occupational therapist. Her head is flat on the back but thankfully not overly asymetical. We're looking at getting a orthotic helmet for her head. It will look a little strange but should make the head a little more round. :-) 

I found a new application that lets you easily upload photos to your blog. Google is leveraging the commodity hardware - free photo storage, 1000mb for email. Fun, fun, fun. Picture shot about a week ago.  

openDemocracy.net
is an online global magazine of politics and culture.

We publish clarifying debates which help people make up their own minds.

We seek the finest writing, the strongest arguments, the most compelling views and truthful voices on key issues, great and small.

We use the web’s potential to build and map intelligent discussions which we accumulate and index in our back pages which now include over 1,500 articles.

Written by and for people across the world, from South and North, from the powerless to the influential, we seek to bring together those who are not well-known with writers and thinkers of international repute.

It’s in our name: openDemocracy.net is dedicated to opening up a democratic space - free thinking for the world.

Elsewhere on this site we hope you will find ideas and arguments that engage, annoy, stimulate and surprise you.

You will be invited to take part - in the forums or by submitting your own material to the editors. You will be asked to engage with other sides of the argument, not just the ones that are popular - or promoted by the large companies who dominate the media today. You will be encouraged to draw on your own experience.

The Rebirth of the 'NYRB': "The manner in which Kiesling's letter arrived on these shores points to a significant new development in the higher echelons of American culture: the re-emergence of The New York"

CBC News - Viewpoint

Stumbled across a series of writers on the CBC website. Good writing, interesting viewpoints.

World is Green : Suhit Anantula's Blog on Rural India: Quote of the Day: "Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way.

"I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's concepts:

Whatever you do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."


Source: The Scottish Himalayan Expedition by W.H.Murray

Chaos in Washington

inDiscover - Helping artists get heard, and others to discover independent music.

inDiscover is a service designed to help bring independent music to new listeners. We appeal to both musicians and people interested in hearing fresh new music, by recommending songs based on our user's tastes. Songs are provided by independent artists from around the world in mp3 format (the artists themselves are responsible for hosting the mp3s).

By using a technique called collaborative filtering, we are able to predict how much a given user would like a specific song based on how they have previously rated other songs. After a user rates a song, they are presented with 2 playlists; one of songs that we KNOW that they like, and one of songs we THINK they will like.

By having users rate along different categories (eg. how well would a song be to listen to while working out?) we are able to compose playlists for each of those categories (eg. a playlist of songs we think you would like to workout to).

The Freenet Project - index - beginner

Paypal has frozen the account we use to accept donations over the web, they refuse to give any reason other than "use of an anonymous proxy", which suggests that someone at Paypal took a dislike to the goals of our project, since I have never used an anonymous proxy to access Paypal (this being the activity I assume they sought to prevent). It is fortunate that Johann Gutenberg did not rely on Paypal to fund his work on the printing press, which also allowed anonymous publication of information, since his account would probably have been frozen too.

The Globe and Mail

A Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections - National Information Standards Organization (NISO)

Putting this somewhere so I don't lose the link.

Blogger has updated their service. Note the addition of the comments link to the bottom of posts. Feel free to add....

Adult responsibility...

It's been a busy week and a bit. In no particular order...

Signed mortgage papers on Friday. What's several hundred thousand dollars between friends. Almost over all the hurdles around owning a house. Mortgage, line of credit, life insurance, house insurances, chocolate for reaassurance :-).

Spent Saturday moving two trailerloads of soil from my parents to the new house and piling it in the back yard. Sunshine, shovelling and compost. Set the baby in her car seat in the yard to watch us work. Talking with wife and dad and very friendly neighbors about trees to remove, stumps to dig out, ivy to strip, shovelling to be done, ramps to be built...and then there are the water features. Man does dad love those water features.

Submitted a proposal to company for a website redevelopment on thursday. First major potential commercial job. Work with a graphic designer and I'll handle all the coding etc. Thinking I should have put more time into the proposal for project management. Plan to get my own domain name, upload an open source content management system I found and build a business model on top of it. Felt good to make that first step. Also found a cold fusion based open source content management system. Could build business model on it for web design company.

Saturday put in application for teaching job in the urban studies diploma at harbour center. urban development, policy and planning... would be great... find out in june about that

ultimate is going well - we're .500 and the team is playing well together. Good mix of people.

baby is lots of fun. 2 teeth, slightly flat head :-) very joyful

life keeps moving along :-)

From: Bruce Schneier [SMTP:schneier@counterpane.com]
To: crypto-gram@chaparraltree.com
Cc:
Subject: CRYPTO-GRAM, May 15, 2004
Sent: 5/15/2004 1:46 AM
Importance: Normal

CRYPTO-GRAM

May 15, 2004

by Bruce Schneier
Founder and CTO
Counterpane Internet Security, Inc.
schneier@counterpane.com



A free monthly newsletter providing summaries, analyses, insights, and
commentaries on security: computer and otherwise.

Back issues are available at
. To subscribe, visit
or send a blank message to
crypto-gram-subscribe@chaparraltree.com.

Crypto-Gram also has an RSS feed at
.

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In this issue:
Warrants as a Security Countermeasure
Counterterrorism in Airports
Crypto-Gram Reprints
News
Counterpane News
Security Notes from All Over: Bypassing the USPS
The Doghouse: Markland Technologies
The Doghouse: IQ Networks
National Security Consumers
Comments from Readers

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Warrants as a Security Countermeasure


Years ago, surveillance meant trench-coated detectives following people
down streets.

Today's detectives are more likely to be sitting in front of a
computer, and the surveillance is electronic. It's cheaper, easier and
safer. But it's also much more prone to abuse. In the world of cheap
and easy surveillance, a warrant provides citizens with vital security
against a more powerful police.

Warrants are guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment and are required before
the police can search your home or eavesdrop on your telephone
calls. But what other forms of search and surveillance are covered by
warrants is still unclear.

An unusual and significant case recently heard in Nassau County's
courts dealt with one piece of the question: Is a warrant required
before the police can attach an electronic tracking device to someone's
car?

It has always been possible for the police to tail a suspect, and
wireless tracking is decades old. The only difference is that it's now
much easier and cheaper to use the technology.

Surveillance will continue to become cheaper and easier -- and less
intrusive. In the Nassau case, the police hid a tracking device on a
car used by a burglary suspect, Richard D. Lacey. After Lacey's
arrest, his lawyer sought to suppress evidence gathered by the tracking
device on the grounds that the police did not obtain a warrant
authorizing use of the device and that Lacey's privacy was violated.

It was believed to be the first such challenge in New York State and
one of only a handful in the nation. A judge ruled Thursday that the
police should have obtained a warrant. But he declined to suppress the
evidence -- saying the car belonged to Lacey's wife, not to him, and
Lacey therefore had no expectation of privacy.

More and more, we are living in a society where we are all tracked
automatically all of the time.

If the car used by Lacey had been outfitted with the OnStar system, he
could have been tracked through that. We can all be tracked by our
cell phones. E-ZPass tracks cars at tunnels and bridges. Security
cameras record us. Our purchases are tracked by banks and credit card
companies, our telephone calls by phone companies, our Internet surfing
habits by Web site operators.

The Department of Justice claims that it needs these, and other, search
powers to combat terrorism. A provision slipped into an appropriations
bill allows the FBI to obtain personal financial information from
banks, insurance companies, travel agencies, real estate agents,
stockbrokers, the U.S. Postal Service, jewelry stores, casinos and car
dealerships without a warrant.

Starting this year, the U.S. government is photographing and
fingerprinting foreign visitors coming into this country from all but
27 other countries. CAPPS II (Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening
System) will probe the backgrounds of all passengers boarding
flights. Over New Year's, the FBI collected the names of 260,000
people staying at Las Vegas hotels. More and more, the "Big Brother is
watching you" style of surveillance is becoming a reality.

Unfortunately, the debate often gets mischaracterized as a question
about how much privacy we need to give up in order to be
secure. People ask: "Should we use this new surveillance technology to
catch terrorists and criminals, or should we favor privacy and ban its
use?"

This is the wrong question. We know that new technology gives law
enforcement new search techniques, and makes existing techniques
cheaper and easier. We know that we are all safer when the police can
use them. And the Fourth Amendment already allows even the most
intrusive searches: The police can search your home and person.

What we need are corresponding mechanisms to prevent abuse. This is
the proper question: "Should we allow law enforcement to use new
technology without any judicial oversight, or should we demand that
they be overseen and accountable?" And the Fourth Amendment already
provides for this in its requirement of a warrant.

The search warrant -- a technologically neutral legal requirement --
basically says that before the police open the mail, listen in on the
phone call or search the bit stream for key words, a "neutral and
detached magistrate" reviews the basis for the search and takes
responsibility for the outcome. The key is independent judicial
oversight; the warrant process is itself a security measure protecting
us from abuse and making us more secure.

Much of the rhetoric on the "security" side of the debate cloaks one of
its real aims: increasing law enforcement powers by decreasing its
oversight and accountability. It's a very dangerous road to take, and
one that will make us all less secure. The more surveillance
technologies that require a warrant before use, the safer we all are.

This essay originally appeared in Newsday:
ory> or

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Counterterrorism in Airports


It's just a pilot program, but undercover security officers are roaming
Boston's Logan Airport, looking for suspicious people who may be
planning a terrorist act. It's got a fancy name, "behavior pattern
recognition," but basically it means "be on the lookout for suspicious
people."

I think this is the best thing to happen to airplane security since
they reinforced the cockpit doors.

I've long argued that traditional airport security is largely
useless. Air travelers -- the innocent ones -- are subjected to all
sorts of indignities in the name of security. Again and again we read
studies about how bad the checkpoints are at keeping weapons out of
airports. The system seems to do nothing more than irritate honest
people. (Remember, when airport security takes a pair of scissors away
from an innocent grandma, that's a security failure. It's a false
positive. It's not a success.)

Well-trained officers on the lookout for suspicious people is a great
substitute.

The devil is in the details, of course. All too often "he's acting
suspicious" really translates to "he's black." Well-trained is the key
to avoiding racism, which is both bad for society and bad for
security. But security is inherently about people, and smart observant
people are going to notice things that metal detectors and X-ray
machines will miss.

Of course, machines are better at ducking charges of prejudice. It may
be less secure to have a computer decide who to wand, or to have random
chance decide whose baggage to open, but it's easier to pretend that
prejudice is not an issue. "It's not the officer's fault; the computer
selected him" plays well as a defense. And in a world where security
theatre still matters more than security, this is an important
consideration.

For about a year now, I've been saying we can improve airport security
by doing away with the security checkpoints and replacing them with
well-trained officers looking out for suspicious activity. It'll
probably never happen, but at least this is a start.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/16/terror/main612369.shtml

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No Doubt?

Wired News: Sick of Spam? Prepare for Adware

Or why you shouldn't install kazaa on your computer...

Copyfight: Why Use DRM If It Doesn't Work?

OJR article: Surf's Down as More Netizens Turn to RSS for Browsing

hear you are --- [murmur]