Home → Archives → by month → July 2002
Tuesday
Don't miss how vowe comments on the IBM / PwC Consulting deal.
Related entries:
July 31, 2002: Das Ende von Arthur Andersen
Permanent link :: 
Tell a friend :: 
Add to del.icio.us
Tomorrow Focus: Gemeinsame Sache mit Microsoft
"Um sich möglichst schnell wieder in die schwarzen Zahlen zu katapultieren, will Tomorrow Focus seine Internet-Aktivitäten mit dem Microsoft Online-Portal MSN zusammenlegen. Dem Kurs hat es nicht nachhaltig geholfen. Tomorrow Focus werde die redaktionellen Inhalte beisteuern und die Vermarktung der Werbeplätze übernehmen. Microsoft werde sich im Gegenzug auf die Online-Technologie und die Einführung neuer gebührenpflichtiger Dienste konzentrieren. Eine gemeinsame Vermarktung der Online-Portale beider Gesellschaften sei vereinbart, hieß es auf der Pressekonferenz in München. Die für fünf Jahre vereinbarte Partnerschaft tritt sofort in Kraft." - Spiegel Online
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Cronica de una muerte anunciada - Update
American-British invasion of Iraq might start in October, but Guardian says military commanders on both sides of the Atlantic are privately expressing deep unease about such plans. Washington Post reports many senior U.S. military officers contend that President Saddam Hussein poses no immediate threat and that the United States should continue its policy of containment. Also, both a former Oil-For-Food Coordinator and a former UN Chief Weapons Inspector in Iraq believe the West should not go to war, especially given likely profound effects on U.S. economy the New York Time reports on.
However, it does not look like the possible campaign lacks planning: "One oil strategist in London noted that United States government acquisitions for the reserve were accounting for more than half of the growth in demand for oil this year. With a capacity of 700 million barrels, the reserve could be used to disperse 4.2 million barrels of oil a day to jittery markets — more than enough to make up for the 1 million barrels a day of Iraqi crude lost because of military operations," which still won't help: "'Afghanistan is in turmoil, the Middle East is in flames, and you want to open a third front in the region? That would truly turn into a war of civilizations,' said a member of the Kuwaiti royal family in close consultation with Washington."
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia is teetering on the brink of collapse, fuelling Foreign Office fears of an extremist takeover of one of the West's key allies in the war on terror, Guardian says: "Unrest in the east of the country rapidly escalated into nationwide protests against the royal family that were brutally suppressed by the police. [...] The Foreign Office believes that the failure of Abdullah's recent Middle East peace plan could have terminally undermined his position. [...] British-based Saudi dissident Dr Saad al-Fagih said: 'There is now an undeclared war between the factions in the Saudi royal family.'"
"Saudi Arabia is everybody's nightmare. People are deathly afraid of any military campaign spreading to Saudi Arabia. That country contains one half of the spare production capacity in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries," New York Times says.
In other news, a Man Hijacks Al-Qaida Web Site - " but the FBI stumbles around for a week trying to find somebody with the technical abilities to take advantage of the site. By then, the site's militant Islamic visitors had discovered the ruse." Via Metafilter.
Already, nervs are laying blank: "Looking up stuff on the Internet - everybody has freedom to do that" - but in Florida, a Briton surfing bomb websites got arrested.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Das Ende von Arthur Andersen - Update
Der Name Athur Andersen wird vermutlich aus der Beraterszene in Deutschland verschwinden: die Partner der deutsche Arthur Andersen Business Consulting wechseln en bloc zum Konkurrenten Deloitte. "Zuvor hatte das 'Handelsblatt' berichtet, eine entsprechende Absichtserklärung sei bereits unterschrieben. Die Entscheidung zugunsten des Konkurrenten Deloitte, der eine Umfirmierung auf den Namen 'Braxton' angekündigt habe, sei gefallen, da die Deloitte-Geschäftsführung den Erhalt der partnerschaftlichen Strukturen geboten habe. So ist die Beteiligung von Führungskräften am Unternehmen weiterhin möglich. Beim Computerkonzern IBM, der sich ebenfalls für die Beratungsgesellschaft interessiert hatte, wären die Berater dagegen zu Konzern-Angestellten geworden, schreibt das Blatt weiter," so Spiegel Online.
Die US-Muttergesellschaft, der eine Mitschuld an dem Bilanzskandal des Energiehändlers Enron zugesprochen wurde, muss sich in den USA wegen des Vorwurfs, "tonnenweise" Dokumente und elektronische Aufzeichnungen vernichtet zu haben, vor Gericht verantworten.
Man selbst kleidet das Ende der Firma natürlich in positive Worte, schließlich schließe man "zu den Top-Unternehmensberatungen in Deutschland auf". Geschmeichelt, denn so wird aus einem Wirtschaftsprüfer keine Unternehmsberatung - zumal die es bekanntlich schon länger von der Dachgesellschaft Andersen Worldwide wegzog: Nach langem Rechtsstreit und Umfirmierung in Accenture war das geschäftlich eigenständige ehemalige Andersen Consulting den ungeliebten, weil kassierfreudigen Namensgeber zum 01.01.2000 endlich los, worüber man spätestens jetzt heilfroh sein wird.
"The latest news from Andersen" lautet nach wie vor: Our work for Worldcom complied with SEC and professional standards at all times. Deutsche Firmen sehen das freilich anders: keiner der 30 DAX-Konzerne ist mehr Kunde.
Da es sich bei dem heutigen Deal weder um eine Fusion noch um eine Übernahme, sondern lediglich um den gemeinsamen Firmenwechsel einer Gruppe von Mitarbeitern handelt, bleibt Deloitte eine wettbewerbsrechtliche Prüfung in Brüssel erspart und man kann sofort von der hinzugewonnenen Expertise profitieren. Was mit den Partnern aus anderen Ländergesellschaften wird, steht oft noch nicht fest. Die Reisswolf-Fetischisten unter ihnen dürften aber nur offiziell als schwer vermittelbar gelten.
UPDATE
Nachdem es mit Arthur Andersen nicht geklappt hat, reagiert IBM prompt und kauft PwC Consulting, das Beratungsgeschäft von PricewaterhouseCoopers: "[Man will] PwC Consulting für 3,5 Mrd. $ in bar und Aktien übernehmen. PwC hat unterdessen seine Pläne für einen Börsengang aufgegeben. Wie IBM am Dienstag nachbörslich mitteilte, soll die Übernahme - vorbehaltlich der Zustimmung der Aufsichtsbehörden und der PwC-Partner vor Ort - bis zum Ende des dritten Quartals abgeschlossen sein", so FTD. IBM News Report
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Enron und kein Ende
"Das System ist krank": Ex-Andersen-Partner Marek Wojcicki übt im Manager Magazin scharfe Kritik am weltweiten Oligopol der großen Wirtschaftsprüfer. Er sieht den Bankrott von Enron und die Verwicklung des Prüfers Andersen als "Beispiel für eine Krankheit, die die gesamte Branche erfasst hat". Die Krankheitskandidaten im Einzelnen:
DIE WIRTSCHAFTSPRÜFER
Erster Todesfall: Arthur Andersen - wir berichteten.
DIE BANKEN
"Bei den Untersuchungen des Milliardenbetrugs bei Enron wird die unrühmliche Rolle der Banken immer deutlicher. Mit komplizierten Transaktionen sollen Citigroup [This is Citigroup] und JP Morgan Chase geholfen haben, den anwachsenden Schuldenberg vor den Aktionären zu verbergen" und so das schmutzige Spiel zu decken, berichtet Spiegel Online. Die Kandidaten stehen somit offiziell unter Betrugsverdacht.
DIE INVESTMENTHÄUSER
"Um seinen Kunden entgegenzukommen, hat das Investmenthaus Merrill Lynch offenbar unbequeme Mitarbeiter abgezogen. Kaufempfehlungen bekam [man] praktisch auf Bestellung," so Spiegel Online.
DAS MANAGEMENT
"Problem isn't greed - it's not enough greed", the Philadelphia Inquirer says. "Far from being too 'greedy,' too many of America's CEOs are not greedy enough. They are pragmatic corner-cutters, who fail to recognize that there is far more wealth to be achieved by a consistent, long-range policy of honesty - by creating a good product and maintaining the company's reputation over many years - than by squeezing out some momentary advantage."
POLITIK UND BÖRSENAUFSICHT
From the ABC Clinton Interview: "We started back in '98 warning about the accounting problems and when my Securities and Exchange Commissioner tried to stop the Enron accounting practice of accountants being the consultants, the [Republican] party stopped us, and their main lobbyist was Harvey Pitt, who is now head of the SEC."
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Palladium I: A Business Overview
"There are many reasons why 'Palladium' will be of advantage to users. Among these are enhanced, practical user control; the emergence of new server/service models; and potentially new peer-to-peer or fully peer-distributed service models. The fundamental benefits of 'Palladium' fall into three chief categories: greater system integrity, superior personal privacy and enhanced data security."
Microsoft Whitepaper: 'Palladium': A Business Overview - Combining Microsoft Windows Features, Personal Computing Hardware, and Software Applications for Greater Security, Personal Privacy and System Integrity"
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Palladium II: Fragt sich nur, was hat der Verbraucher davon?
"'Was wollen Consumer, das sie nur mit Palladium haben könnten?', fragt Laura Koetzle, Infrastruktur-Analystin bei Forrester Research. 'Die Antwort ist: Nichts. Es fällt mir schwer, Palladium als Verkaufsargument zu sehen.' Das System mache Sinn für Microsoft, für PC-Hersteller und für Unternehmen, die digitale Inhalte kontrollieren, weil sie alle mehr von ihren Produkten verkaufen könnten. Für den Verbraucher aber sehe die Sache anders aus."
Computerwoche Artikel
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
"PHP soll kein Java-Clone werden"
"Java ist eine sehr mächtige Sprache für unterschiedlichste Anwendungen, vom Mobiltelefon bis zu Großrechnern. Man kann damit sehr viel machen, aber gleichzeitig ist Java nicht für alle Zwecke die beste Lösung. Für Web-Anwendungen, die sich häufig ändern, ist PHP besser geeignet. Ein in PHP geschriebenes Frontend kann mit Java-Programmen auf dem Server genauso kommunizieren wie JSP. [...] Der Schlüssel zum Erfolg von PHP liegt nicht so sehr in der Sprache selbst, sondern - verglichen mit Perl - in der hervorragenden Web-Integration. So weit ich informiert bin, ändert sich Perl 6 in dieser Hinsicht nicht wesentlich."
Zeev Suraski, Zend-Entwickler, im Computerwoche Interview über Java, Perl und PHP 5. Wir berichteten bereits im April.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
THE STORY OF ANDY'S COMPUTER
"Recently I got myself a new computer. I bought it as components because it was cheaper and I've been telling people that I assembled it myself. However, I can no longer live this lie. I must now reveal ..."
The Story of Andy's Computer
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
This and That
Apple is "removing any negative remarks posted in their discussion forums directed towards their new $100 a year .Mac subscription service, which will effectively wipe out at least a million email addresses," widk reports. Will this make more people switch than stoned chicks already do?
How Google beat Amazon and Ebay to the Semantic Web - "a fable about the future, the semantic web, google, love, death, failure, and robots. By Paul Ford." Via leuschke.org. Also check the annotated list of Semantic Web links.
"Venture capitalists are offering the companies they bankroll increasingly hard-knuckled deals that leave little wealth for a start-up's managers or original backers. Private companies are facing the most onerous terms from venture capitalists that we have seen in 20 years." People are playing hardball, N.Y. Times says.
More news on the Brave New World of DRM: Movie Studios Press Congress in Digital Copyright Dispute, N.Y. Times reports.
"The publisher of the Web site whose name is a vulgarism for "failed company" plans to spin off part of that site into a new unit. Drawing from a deep well of material sent by fans of corporate comeuppance, Philip J. Kaplan said he would roll out a new site, InternalMemos.com, this morning." N.Y. Times story via scripting.com. However, "unlimited access to all memos, for an entire month, is just $45" at internalmemos.com, while the mothership remains free.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Hollywood to hack your computer, Aimee Mann streams new album before release
"Imagine trying to boot up your computer and finding that a hacker had disabled it or destroyed your data, and then imagine that you had no legal recourse because the U.S. government sanctioned it.
That nightmare could become a reality if Hollywood executives get their way. A bill introduced into the House of Representatives would allow copyright owners to legally hack into peer-to-peer networks and disable PCs used for illicit file trading."
The New York Times (free registration required) and news.com report on the the newest threat the American administration is going to impose on freedom of information. Such things happen when people without the furthest understanding of computing and computer ethics meet politicans eager to turn short-termed coporate policies into state laws. Obviously, once all internet PCs containing MP3 and MPEG files are hacked, people will rush cheerfully to the next music store and drown those figures who just killed their computers in big money for crap productions. CD and DVD sales will soar, no doubt.
By the way, Aimee Mann, maker of legendary Magnolia motion picture soundtrack, decided that people can stream her entire new record 'Lost in Space' for free until its release date of August 27th in Real Audio, Windows Media and Flash formats. Perhaps it is because she doesn't produce crap.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Mannesmann-Zerschlagung: Nachwehen
"Nach einigen Jahren ist Knoten für die Demag Cranes & Components endlich geplatzt", so Geschäftsführer Dr. Helmut Franzen - das amerikanische Investmenthaus Kohlberg Kravis Roberts KKR erwarb 81% des Weltmarktführers bei Kranen und Hebezeugen. Der Verkauf ist Teil eines 1,7 Milliarden Euro Deals, mit dem Mannesmann Industrie/Atecs-Käufer Siemens ingesamt 7 Beteiligungen an ehemaligen Mannesmann-Betrieben im Rahmen einer strategischen Entscheidung abgestoßen hat. Siemens hält nun nur noch 19% an dem 2000 aus Mannesmann Atecs ausgegründeten Betrieb.
Vorstand, Betriebsrat und Belegschaft am Standort Wetter begrüßten die Entscheidung und machten eine "eine gewisse Erleichterung" aus, endlich "bei unserem neuen Eigentümer" angelangt zu sein, so Franzen. Man erwartet von diesem, "daß er uns schneller voranbringen kann, als das bisher unter dem großen Dach eines Konzerns möglich war".
Demag Cranes & Components, vormals Demag und als Mannesmann Fördertechnik sowie Mannesmann Dematic ehemals Teil des Mannesmann-Konzerns, erwirtschaftet mit fast 6.450 Mitarbeitern an 6 deutschen Standorten und in 19 Auslandsgesellschaften einen Jahresumsatz von 748 Mio. Euro. Davon werden 425 Mio. alleine am Stammsitz Wetter generiert. Man ist in der Region Herdecke/Wetter mit 2.600 Arbeitsplätzen, deren Sicherheit durch den Deal nicht gefährdet wird, größter Arbeitgeber.
Die feindliche Übernahme Mannesmanns durch eine wortbrüchige britische Telefongesellschaft und die anschließende Zerschlagung des ehemaligen Industrie-Riesens gilt als eines der größten Debakel der jüngeren Wirtschaftsgeschichte. Die Röhrenwerke, einst Kernstück des Konzerns, gingen zusammen mit dem Konzernarchiv an Salzgitter AG. Die anderen Industriebetriebe wurden unter dem Namen Atecs zusammengefasst und an Siemens verkauft, das wiederum die meisten der Betriebe Stück für Stück verschachert und die, die es behält, nur auf mäßig erfolgreichem Kurs führt. Gleichzeitig können die ehemaligen Vorstände Verdachte nicht entkräften, statt den Konzern zu retten einer Übernahme zugestimmt und dafür im großen Maßstab - über 300 Millionen Mark - kassiert zu haben, und die Affäre zieht ihre Kreise.
Archiveinträge zum Thema:
12.04.2002: Kongolomerate: Neues von Paul Achleitner
22.04.2002: Vodafone: heiter bis schmierig
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Minor Site Update
Finally, we added some sort of archives to this blog. The link in the footer of each post now takes you to individual archive pages that look at least somewhat like the main page. Just give it a try.
We also made some minor changes to the still hopelessly underdeveloped sidebar. Please note the BBC Radio Player link. Go, listen to John Peel.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Knoppix 3.0 released
Knoppix is a fully functional and usable Linux system running completely from a single bootable CD without requiring a hard disc or hard disc access due to on-the-fly decompression. It "can be customized as a rescue system, security scanner, platform for presentations and demos, or as a productive environment" and is very helpful when it comes to "'How can I test Linux without having to change anything on my computer?''
Technically speaking, "the underlying GNU/Linux base system is modified to boot non-interactively into runlevel 5 with a working X-Window and KDE configuration, with all auto-detectable devices configured, ready to (auto-)start applications." Practically speaking, it works just fine: booting is a matter of seconds, all components of my Dell Inspiron 4000 get properly recognised and configured (which includes the 1400 x 1050 pixel graphics mode of the Rage Mobility M3 chip), LAN and ADSL configuraion takes no efforts, and configuration can be saved to disc. As it puts a constant load of 100% on the CPU (sic!), not exactly made for mobile use though.
Version 3.0 of this Debian-based distribution comes with KDE/Konqueror 2.2.2, Mozilla 1.0rc2, Gaelon, Open Office 1.0 and - Suse-style - several hundred other, mostly superfluous applications and tools. As the official website hasn't seen an update yet, version 3.0 has its home at freshmeat.net where you can get this ISO of roughly 700 MB.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
This is Citygroup
A trillion Dollars in assetts.
And just as many ways to wreck the Earth.
This is Citygroup.
Und unter Betrugsverdacht steht man auch noch.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
.NET for Apache
"Today at the O'Reilly Open Source Convention, Covalent Technologies announced Apache 2.0, as available in Covalent Enterprise Ready Server, is now compatible with Microsoft ASP.NET. Using Covalent Enterprise Ready Server (ERS), customers will now be able to use the world's most widely deployed Web server - Apache - with Microsoft .NET technologies."
Read Press Release or get the White Paper
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
RCDS: Nicht besser wie die Grossen
Beim CDU-nahen Ring Christlich-Demokratischer Studenten (RCDS) fliegen die Fetzen: "Unter dem Knatsch um eine Dienstwagenaffäre schwelt ein Konflikt zwischen zwei verfeindeten Fraktionen: stramm konservative 'Pickelhauben' gegen die 'Lesben- und Schwulenunion' - und mittendrin statt nur dabei eine extravagante Adlige als Vorsitzende." Im Dunstkreis von Amigos, brutalstmöglichen Aufklärern, Erfindern jüdischer Vermächtnisse, Hütern des Schatzes im Süden, Verfassungsbrechern und sonstigen Ehrenmännern hält sich die Führungsriege wohl an ein altes Credo: "Am Besten machen wir alles so wie die bei der Mutterpartei: keine Experimente."
SPIEGEL Online berichtet
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Presseschau II: VW Phaeton - keine Freude am Fahren
"Dank Allradantrieb lassen sich seine PS fast immer und überall problemlos in Vortrieb umsetzen - ein wesentlicher Vorzug, auch wenn man beim Phaeton das Angebot abseits gut ausgebauter Pisten gern auf sich beruhen lässt. In schnell gefahrenen Kurven plagt den kopflastigen Phaeton nämlich kräftiges Untersteuern, wobei die Neigung zum Geradeausschieben bei Nässe beängstigende Ausmaße annehmen kann.
Auch die beschleunigte Fahrt auf ondulierten Fahrbahnen ist keine Lust, denn dann beeinträchtigen langhubige Vertikalbewegungen das Wohlbefinden, und aus den Tiefen der Radaufhängung dringen dumpfe Poltergeräusche (VW verspricht diesbezüglich Nachbesserungen an der Hinterachse).
Der Griff zur serienmäßigen Dämpferverstellung hilft da wenig. Die beiden härteren der vier Wahlmöglichkeiten bieten zwar geringe Vorteile im Handling, runieren aber das Ansprechverhalten der Federung. Die Lösung: langsamer fahren und den Phaeton soft genießen."
auto motor und sport 16/2002 über den VW Phaeton. Phaeton, eigentlich Eridanus, Sohn des Helios, gilt als erster Amokfahrer der Geschichte. Im Automobilbau beschreibt der Begriff Phaeton traditionell an open (sic!) four-or-five-seater tourer (Beispiel).
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Presseschau I: Klärende Gewitter
"Die Strokes waren die beste Band des letzten Jahres mit der besten Platte, aber sie waren erst der Anfang. [...] Es ist egal, ob man die Hives oder die Vines für überschätzt hält wie früher die Bands des Britpop - die Garage ist jetzt wieder der genuine Ort der Musikentstehung. So wie Punk die Reaktion war auf Pump & Circumstance, so reagiert die neue Schmuddeligkeit auf die Produktionsexzesse von HipHop, R&B und New Metal. Dabei geht es nicht um England gegen Amerika, sondern um das Anarchische gegen das Artifizielle, das Wüste gegen das Verzopfte, das Stürmende gegen das Saturierte. Wenn allenthalber, gerade in der Musikindustrie, gespart und reduziert werden muss, dann ist diese Entwicklung nur logisch. [...]
Seit dem Ende von Nirvana hat man auf dieses Gewitter warten müssen - und Bands wie Pearl Jam waren eher Teil des Problems als dessen Lösung. Der brachiale Furz-, Gewalt- und Jammerlappen-Rock dominierte die letzten fünf Jahre. Die neue Welle wird tätowierte Einfaltspinsel nicht sofort wegspülen. Aber warten Sie auf die Libertines!"
Rolling Stone Magazine, August 2002, darüber, daß "es wieder Bands gibt, die ähnlich laut, spitz und sardonisch sind wie damals The Clash, Buzzcocks und Wire". Die beiliegende Rare Trax CD Nr. 23 Funk Off! - Black Grooves from the 70's läuft derweil in der Kategorie "way too super-cool".
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Variatio delectat - Update
RDBMS
What to do if your application has outgrown MySQL, but you want to stay with open-source (and free-of-charge) systems? Check out SapDB and Firebird. Via iX.
UPDATE
SapDB also ships for free on a full-featured CD-ROM, delivery takes 1-2 days within Germany.
FILE SHARING
As the donkey becomes more and more a mainstream utility, it is time to watch out for new networks, protocols and tools - like Overnet and FurthurNet. "Overnet is the new serverless version of the donkey. It uses the same download mechanism but you no longer have to try and connect to a server." Warning: the Windows GUI version requires the .Net Framework to be installed - think twice before doing so. The Command Line Client might work fine, too.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
How Bush made his millions
"It is the story of a man who has been rewarded for repeated failures by having money shot at him through a fire hose. It is the story of a man who talks with a straight face about having "earned" a fortune of tens of millions of dollars, without having ever done an honest day's work in his life."
A short story. Via Metafilter
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Oh brother, where art thou
Nahezu ein Jahr nach den Anschlägen vom 11. September versucht US-Präsident George W. Bush das Land in eine Gesellschaft voller Spione zu verwandeln. Im August startet die Operation "TIPS", seine neueste Waffe im Kampf gegen den Terrorismus. Sollte sich das Pilotprojekt bewähren, wird die Spitzel-Quote in den Staaten bald höher sein, als sie in der DDR je war. Nach Angaben des Zentrums für Verfassungsrecht in New York soll auf 24 Amerikaner ein Informant kommen, der für das Justizministerium Augen und Ohren offen hält.
US-Präsident George W. Bush versucht die patriotische Stimmung im Land zu nutzen. Ihm schwebt vor, dass alle Amerikaner etwa zwei Jahre ihres Lebens in den Dienst der Sicherheit des Vaterlandes stellen - in 4000 Einsatzstunden verteilt über ihre Lebenszeit. Die Behörden wollen vor allem Personen gewinnen, die an Schaltstellen des öffentlichen Lebens tätig sind oder an Schnittstellen zwischen öffentlichem Raum und Privatsphäre. Die gespeicherten Informationen sollen für Polizeistationen und Geheimdienste zugänglich sein. Betroffene Bürger sollen über ihre Mappe nicht benachrichtigt werden.
Das Terrorpräventivprogramm ist ein weiterer Schritt im Rahmen des Patriot Act, die individuellen Freiheitsrechte einzuschränken. Die New Yorker Verfassungsrechtlerin Nancy Chang fürchtet, das Vaterlandsgesetz führe dazu, dass immer mehr Bürger auf Grund ihrer ethnischen Herkunft oder ihrer ideologischen Überzeugung ins Visier von Profilern geraten. Die demokratischen Werte würden plötzlich über den Haufen geworfen, indem die Überwachungsmöglichkeiten der Polizeiorgane und die Kompetenzen der Geheimdienste ungeheuerlich gestärkt werden.
Nicht einmal von der obersten Hüterin der Grundrechte, Supreme-Court-Richterin Sandra Day O'Connor, sei zu erwarten, dass sie sich voll für die Freiheitsrechte der Bürger einsetzen werde. Als O'Connor am Ground Zero stand, sagte sie: "Wir werden möglicherweise eine stärkere Einschränkung der Freiheit des Einzelnen erfahren als jemals zuvor in diesem Land."
Ausführlicher SPIEGEL Online Artikel
Der Bush-Timer: As of today, only 2 years 183 days remaining.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Haiku the blog
We are now redirecting you to Haiku the blog where "all posts are in the form of haiku and contain links to other weblogs as well as news stories".
As far as weblogs are concerned, Among other Things has some nice Movable Type plugins. Also, this is where we learn important stuff like "The spray WD-40 got its name because there were forty attempts needed before the creation of the 'water displacing' substance".
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Ares, Shareaza and other friends
Ares and Shareaza are new or updated Gnutella clients. zeropaid.com, the filesharing portal, has loads more on the subject, while computersound.de links to several hundred tools satisfying all your audio sharing, converting and editing needs.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Today in history: Bloody Friday
By the end of the today, 30 years ago, the IRA's Belfast brigade had detonated at least 20 bombs across the city. In just 75 minutes of violence, nine people were dead and some 130 more were mutilated, injured and mentally scarred by what they had witnessed. The day became known as Bloody Friday.
Earlier in 1972, the IRA had experienced a massive propaganda and recruitment boost after the Parachute Regiment killed 13 protesters during Bloody Sunday in Derry. Many joined believing that they had no other way to defend their communities. Within 10 days of the attacks, the army moved in to the Bogside area of Derry to take control of a part of the city that had become out-of-bounds, marking the beginning of a long war of attrition by both sides.
Bloody Friday was by no means the last atrocity of 1972. It remains the bloodiest year of the conflict in Northern Ireland. By the end of 1972, 496 had been killed, 258 of them civilians.
30 YEARS LATER, IRA SAYS SORRY
Earlier this week, in an unprecedented move the IRA has apologised to the civilian victims of its campaign of violence. In a statement in the republican newspaper An Phoblacht (Republican News), it said it offered "sincere apologies" to the families of those killed on Bloody Friday, and sources of all parties say "it is an apology of unprecedented strength".
The father of a 14-year-old boy killed by the IRA on Bloody Friday has said he believes the organisation is prepared to see that what they did was wrong: "They have made a tremendous stride, they have gone from killing people to apologising for doing so."
Read the full BBC News story and the BBC history feature on what is called The Troubles.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Movable Type updated
Migrating this Movable Type installation from Berkeley DB to mySQL while updating from version 2.0 to 2.21 was a mess. "placement_blog_id cannot be null" became my special friend, and it was my luck that I hardly made use of categories before: deleting the Berkeley DB part holding the entry-category-relations seems to be the only "patch" available at this point. Let's hope the introduction of Trackback to this site will run as smoothly as this excellent piece of software normally uses to do.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Amazon API examples, wrappers, stuff
AND NOW FOR THE REALLY COOL STUFF: SIMILARITY MAPS
If you thought the Google look-alike thing is cool (as we did), you didn't see the Similarities Map application yet: search for an item and see its immediate similar neighbors clustered together in a dynamic image. We think this example is pretty impressive.
AMAZON VIA PHP I: URL, ARRAY BUILDER
PHP Amazon Search is intended as a starting point for PHP developers who want to go the REST-way. The provided classes contain functions for constructing URLs with developer key, associate ID and search term, retrieving search results, and parsing the XML into PHP arrays. Especially the latter might be of good help.
AMAZON VIA PHP II: WRAPPER
Daniel Filzhut has an extensive set of PHP functions for interacting with the Amazon API, too. They are free for non-commercial use.
PYTHON WRAPPER
Mark Pilgrim has written PyAmazon for this.
OTHER APPLICATION EXAMPLES
Weblog XML feed, Google API and Amazon API combined: Book Watch "retrieves an XML feed containing the books most mentioned in current weblog updates, finds relevant links at Google, item information at Amazon and as the result presents a constantly changing list of book that are generating buzz around the weblog community".
Mockerybird has a constantly updated list of applications using the new API.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Blogrolling - Update
Looks like it is summer: Scott Andrew has a very serious case of summeritis and won't update his blog before somewhen in September. Mr. Zeldman regrets than he cannot chat these days and makes pretty things in Photoshop instead. Incentive for living in Dortmund, West Germany, these days however is suffering from ridiculously high humidity and getting drowning in neverending rain. In other news:
WEB SERVICES
Amazon now has a Web API. So did they go for SOAP or for REST/XML over HTTP? Wisely and unlike Google, which opted for SOAP, they go for both and leave the choice of technology up to you. This API comes with some seriously interesting features and is by no means as limited as their first attempt was. However, Jeremy points out that "you can add items to a wishlist, but there's no way to search for, query, or download the contents of a wishlist" at the moment, which poses a certain limitation. Stay tuned for more information. If you are into Python, take this for the moment.
WEB SERVICES - UPDATE
So there a first demonstrations of the Amazon API capabilities is: Amazon light = Amazon API + Google UI. Too cool. Via dienstraum.com.
FLASH
Go, don't miss the Flashforward Notebook at What do I know. Even contains a link to "a good reminder to those inventing the future that the past may have already leisurely been where we're in such a rush to go", as Jason puts it.
FLASHY
hebig.org's Haiko Hebig is now directing you to hebig.com's Heiko Hebig, who in turn directs you to glorious Need to know, saying that Yahoo! is replacing words in HTML emails. No, it's not another attempt to make you write politcally correct mails full of appropriate language terms, it is an "fantastically clumsy attempt to prevent cross-site scripting". (Heiko, when will you get Trackback going?)
CUESHEETS
So you need an audio CD cue sheet? Cuesheet Heaven queries the freedb database, and some PHP string operations turn the result into a .cue-file (Improvement: putting the "Performer" tag into each "Title" section, too, would make writing CD-Text to audio CDs easier)
WASTING TIME
tekzoned.com could occupy you for a bit. Spank the monkey or play other Flash games.
VOLITION
Recently, I didn't read Acts of Volition much - undeservedly so. Planning for life as a wealthy eccentric, An open letter to the web design community and other classics are still listed in the site's sidebar.
No wise last words for today. Instead, go and browse the Quote Cache.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Pilot ot the Airwaves
Pilot of the airwaves
Here is my request
You don't have to play it
But I hope you'll do your best
I've been listening to your show
On the radio
And you seem like a friend to me
Late at night I'm still listening
Don' t waste my time chasing sleep
People say I look weary
But that 's just the company I keep
Ooooh, you make the nighttime race
Ooooh, I don't need to see your face
You're sounding good (sounding good)
Sounding good to me
Oh, I've been listening to your show on the radio
And you seem like a friend to me
Charlie Dore
Pilot of the Airwaves
Oh what a perfect song to hear on the radio when heading back home alone on the highway, the roof opened, the sun rising, and an evening coming to an end.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
This and that
Lycoris is an interesting new Linux distribution, and its Win XP like user interface might help to make Linux more popular on desktop machines. David Watson has a review, which might overstress the buggy PCMCIA/WLAN implementation a bit, given that Lycoris still is in beta stage.
PDA Your Movable Type Blog
How to render XML in PHP using XSLT templates: "Using XSLT for FireSite in PHP - This article describes how to use the XSLT feature of PHP together with FireSite. If you don't use FireSite just ignore that part and I think you will find the article useful anyway."
PHP Princess - a weblog on PHP
A List Apart revisited: Rewriting URLs in Apache
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Palladium: Control Your Identity or Microsoft and Intel Will
"Society must either give up on copy protection or the general-purpose PC and the Net." And no matter how hard Hollywood tries, Ed Felten, the Princeton University security guru, argues, society will eventually choose the latter because "the sheer value of the Net and computers is so much greater than any value that copy protection can provide."
But spam, I'm afraid, will be Palladium's toe in the door. If spam is the fulcrum issue that will motivate the masses to accept a change, let's offer a solution based on a voluntary framework of trust. We'll like the alternative mandatory scheme a lot less.
O'Reilly Article
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Perl & the Microsoft .NET Framework
ActiveState lecture notes on Camel Crossings: Perl & the Microsoft .NET Framework (Powerpoint link): "Microsoft's Brad Merrill will start with an overview of the .NET framework, the assembler, and MSIL. ActiveState's Jan Dubois will explain how PerlNET integrates Perl with the .NET Runtime. He'll show how to use .NET objects from Perl and how to create new .NET components written in Perl. ActiveState's Eric Promislow will demonstrate using Visual Perl to build a Windows application consisting of both a C# and a Perl component. He'll provide examples of how Visual Perl helps both in building the complete application and also in its debugging, single-stepping from C# into Perl code."
More on ActiveState Lecture Series
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
youngpup.net: adventures in XML
youngpup.net has some seriously cool components (not only) for building menus which degrade gracefully in older browsers. I really like ypXmlTree, though it basically builds a huge table and always loads the whole tree, not having heard much about download-on-demand yet. From a technical standpoint, the whole site is seriously cool, basically a huge and very elaborate XML-transformation: in Internet Explorer, you are presented a genius application-like UI (given you've got some screen resolution and not sticking with 1024 x 768 or such peepholes), in Mozilla, you are presented a website employing DOM and CSS, and in Netscrap 4, all content is presented feature-free, though not too boring. So if your client still doesn't get what the whole XML/XSLT-thing can be about, perhaps show him this site.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Beispielhafter Schröder
Ergebnis eines professionellen Vergleichs der Rhetorik der Wahlparteitagsreden von fünf Spitzenkandidaten zur Bundestagswahl:
TOPS...
Die Rede von Bundeskanzler Gerhard Schröder beim SPD-Wahlparteitag: als "brillant und beispielhaft" charakterisiert
Als "innovativ" wurde der Redestil des Grünen-Spitzenkandidaten, Außenminister Joschka Fischer gelobt
... UND FLOPS
Stoibers Rede beim CDU-Wahlparteitag: "stark verbesserungswürdig"
Der Auftritt von PDS-Chefin Gabi Zimmer: "dröge und verkniffen"
"Enttäuschend" nennt die Untersuchung den Vortrag von FDP-Chef Guido Westerwelle
Die Untersuchung wurde vom "Verband der Redenschreiber deutscher Sprache (VRdS)" am Mittwoch in Berlin präsentiert: FTD-Artikel
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
in other news - update
USEFUL STUFF
SAPRFC is a PHP 4 extension module for calling ABAP function modules in SAP R/3 from PHP. It can be used to create client side applications with connectivity to SAP R/3 and for writing RFC server programs in PHP that call PHP functions from SAP R/3.
TouchGraph GoogleBrowser, possibly the coolest invention since Google. I start liking kartoo.com, too, though.
LineDraw, possibly the coolest bookmarklet ever. Could be of use for client presentations even. Requires IE5.5+
David Watson revisited: Google SOAP API via C++, Java, VBA, VB Script. What does the Google API mean for regular folks? And: Swingin' Google! - The end of the browsers as we know it A graphical software application that provides an alternative user interface to Google's search capability without using a web browser.
READING, USEFUL OR NOT
Cap Gemini Ernst & Young Study Der Markt für Web-Services - Erwartungen, Treiber, Investitionsabsichten - download as PDF and PPT (German language link).
Forrester Research: Press release on True Cost Of Strategic Web Services, saying it will get expensive.
Nu-Scrap-Sphere An Introduction to Web Services Enabled with PHP (PDF link)
Trackback explained (German language link)
NOT NECESSARILY USEFUL STUFF
The Thin Red Line: Stanford Researchers establish Link between Creative Genius and Mental Illness
The Big Book of Sign Language - Reproduced for the first time since its initial printing in 1972, The Gaping Maw is proud to present its revised, expanded, fully up-to-date illustrated manual of contemporary American sign language, sometimes referred to as "finger spelling".
GIF2TXT takes the URL of a GIF image and converts that GIF image into ASCII text or colored HTML. Neither very new or very useful, but pretty cool. The cool examples are here though.
Terragen is a landscape rendering software that's free for personal and non-profit use. Meanwhile, formerly famous Blender 3D may see revival as free software.
Waste your time, fly the helicopter.
How to survive without Audiogalaxy
FINALLY
We added The Morning News to the Exit Gallery.
Remember Blinkenlights? Wish I had seen this when visiting Berlin in January this year.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Shades of Grey
"Sometimes things aren't exactly black or white, when it comes to accounting procedures." - George W. Bush, defending accounting procedures of his private enterprises
"Accounting should be black and white." - Head of New York Stock Exchange
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
The Last Defender of the American Republic? - An Interview with Gore Vidal
"The second law of thermodynamics always rules: Everything is always running down. And so is our Bill of Rights. The current junta in charge of our affairs, one not legally elected, but put in charge of us by the Supreme Court in the interests of the oil and gas and defense lobbies, have used first Oklahoma City and now September 11 to further erode things."
Gore Vidal, now 76, has made a lifetime out of critiquing America's imperial impulses and has - through two dozen novels and hundreds of essays - argued tempestuously that the U.S. should retreat back to its more Jeffersonian roots, that it should stop meddling in the affairs of other nations and the private affairs of its own citizens.
Read L.A. Weekly interview
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Erdumrundung: Fossett ist durch
Als erster Mensch hat der Amerikaner Steve Fossett die Erde allein in einem Heißluftballon nonstop umrundet. In seinem Gefährt "Spirit of Freedom" benötigte Fossett 14 Tage.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Namenssterben, nächster Streich: Preussag heisst jetzt TUI
"Nachdem am vergangenen Mittwoch die Hauptversammlung der Änderung der Firma zugestimmt hat, ist die TUI AG heute in das Handelsregister eingetragen worden" - mit diesen schnöden Worten verschwand gestern der Name Preussag, heute wurde auf der Firmenzentrale der alte Schriftzug durch das TUI-Logo ersetzt.
Der Umbau des traditionsreichen Industriekonzerns in eine Touristikfirma begann mit der hundertprozentigen Übernahme der TUI-Deutschland AG am 1. September 2001 und fand erst vor weniger als einem Monat mit dem Verkauf des 30%-Anteils an Howlandtswerke-Deutsche Werft AG (HDW) seinen Abschluss - eine Gelegenheit, die auch Babcock-Borsig nutzen wollte, seine Anteile loszuwerden, was sich zu einer Schlammschlacht ausweitete, die den Babcock-Chef seinen Job kostete und das weltweit führende deutsche Know-How im Bau brennstoffzellengetriebener U-Boote direkt in amerikanische Hände trieb.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Movable Hype
MT 2.21 has been released with a very important bug fix to the MySQL schema. If you have already upgraded to 2.2 and you are using the MySQL support, you are advised to upgrade to 2.21. Plugins are another important new feature of MT 2.2, easily overseen in the recent Trackback-hype though. Benjamin and Mena Trott also set up a MT resources site, linking to third-party MT extensions and modifications, and a MT tutorials link site is said to be coming up soon.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
inside the apple iPod design triumph
Electronics Design Chain Magazine article
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Microsoft takes admin privileges on your box; outlook on TCPA/Palladium is rather bleak, Lerdorf says
Microsoft will Recht zum Direktzugriff auf private PCs und etabliert damit erstmals einen echten Push-Dienst, mit dem ohne direkte Benachrichtigung und Zustimmung des PC-Besitzers im Prinzip beliebige Software auf den Zielrechnern eingespielt werden kann, ohne daß der Besitzer davon erfahren oder der Installation zustimmen muss. Bisherige Windows Updates erfolgen, auch wenn sie automatisiert ausgeführt werden, als Pull-Service und damit auf Anforderung des jeweiligen Benutzers bzw. Rechners. In der Praxis heißt das nicht anderes, als daß sich Microsoft Admin-Rechte auf allen Windows-Boxen genehmigt.
Read more
Show full entry
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Java Dead? Three articles
"Java is getting squeezed on two fronts. One, it's never put forth a succesful desktop platform. Don't talk to me about applets. They are cool. But that's about it. And Swing is too hard for the Windows VB and Delphi influenced world. And too damn slow. Why no desktop compiler that optimizes performance for the platform? That won't damage write once run anywhere. Idealism be damned. Why no VB like IDE? Now there *is* progress on that front, but maybe it's too late. Two, you now have .NET attacking Java where it has found a huge degree of adoptance, server side apps, and it will surely be simpler and easier to use. J2EE is extrememly powerful, but complex. No, I don't think Java is dying. Far from it. But I hope to see some real progress made on those these fronts in the future. I really think the Java platform is becoming bloated, the focus has been to encompass as many functionalities in it's APIs as possible, and if the focus would shift to the big fundamentals - ease of development, ease of deployment, and speed (on the desktop - server side apps are just fine thank you), well Java would be really kick ass and it's future secure."
paradox1x has three articles on this.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Asbury Park, NJ, revisited, new album set for July 30 release
Bruce Springsteen's new album "The Rising" is set for July 30 release on Columbia Records, and the title track can now be heard on his website - the whole thing, not just a 30 second sample!
Release is the first album of new songs recorded with the E Street Band since 1984. 'The Rising' special limited edition deluxe package includes the CD in a hardcover book with a 40 page, full color booklet filled with extra photos, handwritten lyrics and more. The CD single for "The Rising" will be released on July 16, 2002, and available only for a limited time.
In a rare live TV appearance, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band join the "Today" summer concert lineup. "Today" will hit the beach for a complete broadcast live from Asbury Park, NJ, on Tuesday, July 30 - Asbury Park, NJ, revisted!
See official site for details.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Dilbert, alternative lyrics
Dillhole. Would care to not mess those up with original lyrics Dilberts when preparing a proposal or presentation.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Ever wondered what's going on in China?
Check Richard Eriksson's China Weblog.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
