A use for Cell phone cameras…

New York’s finest are currently hunting a “smirking sicko” who, having exposed himself on the city’s subway to a 22-year-old web developer, found himself exposed across cyberspace and the NY Daily News after the quick-thinking victim snapped him on her mobe’s* camera.

On 19 August, Thao Nguyen was at the receiving end of the unwanted attentions of the “degenerate” (NYDN’s choice of words - good show) when travelling on the subway in Manhattan after a job interview. According to the Daily News, she claims “a middle-aged, blond-haired man dressed in a black shirt and jeans sat down across from her”.

Nguyen takes up the story: “He kept staring at me. I could feel his eyes on me. I wanted to avoid eye contact so I looked away, but I could see his reflection in the window. I saw him massaging himself and then he unzipped and pulled it out. I thought, ‘I can’t believe he’s doing this in the middle of the day!’

“I turned on the camera. He was still masturbating. I aimed it and quickly took the shot. As soon as I took it, he zipped up and got off the train,” Nguyen explains.

It ends up the guy runs a health food store…. think about that for a minute!

I feel bad about what happened to New Orleans. So many people are writing about it they have a stupid shorthand tag for it already, NOLA.
They’re evacuating people by boats, helicopters, anything that can move people. And around it all are news choppers. Why aren’t they picking up people and rescuing them also? Is a news story more important than human life? If one person dies that could have been saved by a news chopper, the press has lost what is left of my respect forever.

While sitting in traffic all those times on I-95.

Sure, they have the picture of naked people on Voyager, but now you can at least send your name to Pluto. Sign up at the New Horizons mission page.

CNN has an article on the problems with biometric security. The money quote:

Although it is considered impossible to take an image’s minutia points and re-create the original, it is possible to concoct an image that shares those points and use it to trick a biometric system. This chicanery requires either hacking into a biometric-equipped network or using a low-tech scam such as making a fake finger out of something like latex or gummy bears.

Gummy bears? Can you imagine being the the infosec manager who has to report to the directors that the hackers managed to get away with gigabytes of confidential company data. And they did it using a piece of chewy candy?
Whatever happened to security? 10 years ago I used PGP. And now we have to ban IPods, USB memory sticks, cell phones with cameras, and candy from our offices.

This kids parents should be proud…

Man Accused in Civil War Vet’s Desecration

NEWBURYPORT, Mass. (AP) — A young man performing court-ordered community service in a cemetery has been charged with desecrating a Civil War-era tomb, pulling apart the skeleton, and posing for pictures with the skull and other bones.

“It’s bizarre, absolutely bizarre,” police Lt. Richard Siemasko said. “I can’t even imagine what was in his head. This is just a whole new level of weird for me.”

Of course, based on the final paragraph…

The crypt houses members of the Pierce family who died of tuberculosis between 1863 and 1899, including Civil War veteran Willard Balch Pierce. Police had trouble identifying the dismembered corpse because vandals who ransacked the crypt decades ago stole the silver nameplates that accompany each body, Siemasko said.

I can’t quite remember just how long tuberculosis remains contagious…

OK, I just want to say…

Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.
Veritas Backup Exec Sucks.

And oh yeah, did I mention it also blows?
Backing up your data is not supposed to be this difficult. They’ve only been doing it for oh… 40+ years now?

Dutch TV to air sperm donor reality show - Yahoo! UK & Ireland News
Dutch TV to air sperm donor reality show
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Billionaire television producer John de Mol, behind the pioneer show Big Brother, will test the limits of reality TV with a programme in which a woman searches for a potential sperm donor to conceive a child.
His new TV station Talpa, launched earlier this month, confirmed it will air a programme called “I want your child … and nothing else!” but gave no further details about the show due at 1830 GMT on Wednesday.
“The plan is that we visit potential donors and — of course on camera — decide which man is most suitable,” the 30-year old woman who will feature in the programme said in an interview with De Telegraaf newspaper.
“Afterwards there will be artificial insemination,” said the woman who was identified only as “Yessica” and who has bought a house with a room for a child.

I just have to wonder what companies will be advertising on this show…

You bastard.

All I can say is… it’s about time!

In 1972, Darren McGavin (who is probably best known as the furnace-fighting, major-award winning father from “A Christmas Story”) took up the role of Carl Kolchak… a wise-cracking, hard-biting newsman in a seersucker suit and a straw boater hat.  Sounds kind of uninteresting at first… but each episode inevitably brought him into contact with the paranormal or supernatural.  There were vampires, werewolves, aliens, zombies, witchcraft, and so much more!

His first appearance as Kolchak was in “The Night Stalker”, a made for TV movie.  This was followed up by a second television movie in 1973 entitled “The Night Strangler”.  This eventually led to a short-lived television series (which is soon to be released to DVD) called “Kolchak: The Night Stalker”.

For those of you out there who are unfamiliar with this series… let me recommend it.  If you loved the X-Files, then you should take a moment to check out Kolchak.  After all… “Kolchak: The Night Stalker” was the television series that inspired Chris Cater to create “The X-Files”.

Now… I realize that this classic television gem is only being released now in prelude to the new, upcoming Kolchak remake series.  However, I don’t care… I’ll take it any way I can get it!  As for the new series… I’ll check it out… but I’m a purist.

The original two television movies are already available on DVD.  It’s an inexpensive buy… and worth checking out at twice the price!

The television series is coming to DVD on October 4th, 2005!!!  Check out the original films… and you’ll be dieing for more!

I’m minding my own business when my phone starts to ring. I’m not completely sure what possessed me to answer it, but I did. That was mistake #1.

Anyway… on the phone was Joe User… and he wants to know why he can’t get onto the network. He opened a ticket with the Help Desk, but no one has called him yet… and he needs to get back to work. My second mistake was probably not transferring his call to one of our desktop support technicians.

For some reason I was feeling generous and decided to help him out. I found out where he was located, and went to see him. Upon arriving, the first thing I noticed was a complete lack of network cabling on his laptop. He wasn’t plugged in. OK… whatever… I told him that I’d go find him a piece of CAT5, and I’d be right back.  However, he declined… here’s how the conversation went.

Joe: No. I don’t want to be plugged in. I want to use the wireless network.

Me: I’m sorry. We don’t have a wireless network.

Joe: Of course you do.

Me: No. We don’t. That is a plan for the future, but has not yet been implemented.

Joe: Don’t lie to me. I know you have one. The other sites all seem to have wireless networks. Why wouldn’t you have one here.

Me: As I said, we don’t have one yet. It’s a plan for the future.

Joe: Look. I have a wireless network card in my laptop. I want to use it. Make it happen.

Me: OK… you got me. We do have a secret wireless network. However, I’m not allowed to just connect you to it. However, I can’t stop you from using it if you find it.

Joe: How do I find it?

Me: Just carry your laptop around the building. When it finds the signal, your network card will auto-configure itself for it and you’ll be able to work from anywhere.

Joe: OK… any suggestions on where I should start looking?

Me: Go walk through the Finance department… then try HR.

Joe: Thanks!

I just saw him walk by a few minutes ago… waving his laptop in the air frantically. I’m expecting another call in about 20 minutes… for which I’ve already dug up a piece of cabling for him.

No, I’m not that old. I remember reading about it in unsolved mystery books. And now they have an answer about Judge Crater’s Disappearance.

NEW YORK  The New York City Police Department’s longest-running unsolved missing-persons case  the bizarre and legendary disappearance of Judge Joseph Force Crater  may finally be solved.

Judge Crater  who vanished mysteriously 75 years ago  was killed by a city cop and his cab-driver brother and buried under the boardwalk in Coney Island, according to a handwritten letter left behind by a Queens woman who died earlier this year.

Lets see if I got this straight…
Military son: Bad
Military son dead: Good
Other son telling her she’s wrong: Bad
Other relatives telling her she’s wrong: Bad
Ailing Mom: Worth the time
Husband who is divorcing her: Not worth the time
Michael Moore: Good
Making part of the idiot public think she’s “Just a mom who wants a few minutes with the President”: Good
Part of the idiot public who sees her for the partisan hack she is: Bad

Service Technicians Can’t Snoop on Your Hard Drive for the Government
EFF Weighs in on Computer Privacy Case in Washington
Washington - Imagine if the law permitted the people who service your computer to share all the personal information on your hard drive with the police, without your consent and without a search warrant. A case on appeal to the Washington State Court of Appeals, State v. Westbrook, threatens to allow just that, turning your friendly neighborhood computer repair technician into a government informer.
Last week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the respondent, Robert Westbrook, arguing that citizens have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the contents of their computers, and that their Fourth Amendment rights don’t disappear when a computer is delivered to a technician for servicing.
When Westbrook dropped off his personal computer at a Gateway Computer store for servicing, a technician saw private files on the computer that he thought might be illegal. Gateway called the police, who searched through personal files on Westbrook’s hard drive looking for more evidence — before ever getting a warrant. The trial court found, and EFF argues in its brief to the appeals court, that this violated Westbrook’s Fourth Amendment rights.
“Customers who drop off their computers for servicing reasonably expect that their private data won’t be handed over to the police without a warrant,” said EFF Staff Attorney Kur

Sounds reasonable right? Well, change “computer” into “car” and change “possibly illegal files” into “body in the trunk.”
The car is dropped off to be fixed, and in the course of servicing the vehicle, the mechanic suspects something is wrong in the trunk and calls police.
No issue there, so what is the difference? There is nothing special about a computer that means it is special in any way.
In my career with computers I have seen many things that should not have been left on PC’s. I always personally enjoyed being the one to recover a PC of a terminated employee. Especially the one woman who left AIM chat logs of her S&M sessions right on the desktop. The entire IT support team laughed for hours on that one!

Early attempts at cyberpunk style virtual reality interfaces.

Why I couldn’t be President of the US—
I would drive out of the gates of my ranch, and flick off Cindy Sheehan in front of everyone. Maybe even moon her out of my limosine window. Call her the partisan hack that she is. But thats just me.

Take the quiz: “What Alcoholic drink are you”

rum
Arrrrgh you are with your crew and have rum after a great victory…ARRRGH!

Take the quiz: "Which Holy Grail Character Are You?"

Arthur, King of the Britons
Arthur, son of Uther Pendragon, from the castle of Camelot. King of the Britons, defeater of the Saxons, Sovereign of all England!

I love that I got King Arthur on this little quiz.

I picked the original link to this up off of TexasBestGrok.   Special thanks to JohnL.

Escape From Yesterworld
Via techfilter…

I know everyone is talking about “Able Danger”, a pretty damn cool codename, considering that most mission names in the military are randomly generated.Reuters

A U.S. military intelligence team identified four Sept. 11 hijackers, including ringleader Mohammed Atta, as likely members of an al Qaeda cell in the United States over a year before the 2001 attacks, a former team member and a Republican congressman said on Tuesday.

The classified eight-member team, code-named “Able Danger,” produced a chart with photographs of Atta and three other hijackers in 2000 and unsuccessfully sought to pass the information on to the FBI.

Of course, the article does not mention that a member of the 9/11 commission, Jamie Gorelick, was the one that came up with the “wall” policy that the information cannot be shared with law enforcement.