Google to Go Spying?

Here is a CNET News.com story about Google buying a company that produces web-based software that allows people to view satellite images. It will be interesting to see what becomes of this.

Spread Firefox Ad Campaign Update II

Here is an update to the earlier items I posted about Spread Firefox's Ad Campaign to promote the 1.0 release of Firefox. In ten days, the campaign far exceeded its goal, acquiring $250,000 and more than 10,000 names.

A Question of Character

Does character matter in Presidential elections? Is a politician's prior record an adequate indicator of future behavior? Jeff Jacoby addresses these questions in an op-ed in today's Boston globe.

All thinking people change their minds occasionally. But it is one thing to alter an opinion because of new information or further reflection. It is something very different to do so out of a compulsion to tell each audience what it wants to hear. Kerry has many gifts, but political courage is not among them. As president, could he take a tough stand and stick with it, even if there were a price to pay for doing so? All the evidence to date says no.

George W. Bush is far from perfect. He refuses to admit mistakes. He resists constructive criticism. His humor can be petty or cutting. His administration is secretive and self-righteous -- traits that presumably start at the top.

But Bush, unlike Kerry, has the courage of his convictions. He can take a strong stand and not run away from it when the political winds shift. On the big issues, the crucial issues, he is a decisive man who means what he says -- and isn't afraid to say it even when his listeners disagree.

For a nation going to the polls in wartime, no issue matters more than character. Kerry has much to recommend him, and Bush's flaws are many. But Bush has the character and backbone of a leader. And Kerry doesn't.

Mark Steyn on John Kerry

Mark Steyn:

It's only a day or so now till the chad-dangling round of Campaign 2004 begins but, when the lawsuits are over and the bloodletting begins, serious Democrats need to confront the intellectual emptiness of their party, which Kerry's campaign embodies all too well. The Dems got a full tank from FDR, a top-up in the Civil Rights era, and they've been running on fumes for 30 years. Their last star, Bill Clinton, has no legacy because, deft as he was, his Democratic Party had no purpose other than as a vehicle for promoting his own indispensability. When he left, the Democrats became a party running on personality with no personalities to run. Hence, the Kerry candidacy. Despite the best efforts of American editorialists, there's no there there.

Republicans Are More Tech-friendly

CNET News.com compiled a voter scorecard for technology related issues, which reveals that GOP lawmakers were more friendly on high-tech issues. The scorecard covers a period of a decade.

One key finding of the study related to the votes of John Kerry and John Edwards:

Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, scored in the bottom half of senators with a lifetime voting rating of 44 percent--thanks in part to his votes on Internet taxes and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. On average, U.S. senators received a score of 53 percent.

Kerry's running mate, John Edwards of North Carolina, was in office long enough to vote on only six of the 10 technology-related bills in the Senate that were ranked in the scorecard. Edwards' rating is 50 percent.

Bin Laden Video On-line

MSNBC has made portions of the message from bin Laden available.

More Thoughts on the Bin Laden Video

Roger L. Simon shares his views on the Bin Laden video, Wretchard's comments on Belmont Club and the idea that the video might not be genuine.

This is a follow up to my earlier post.

UPDATE: Donald Sensing thinks that the video represents the beginning of the end for al Qaeda.

The words on the videotape are not the words of a man who thinks the light at the end of the tunnel is anything but the headlight of the proverbial oncoming train. This was the tape of a man who knows his tail is getting whipped from one end of the world to the other. He's now out of ideas and even out of new threats. The extensive quotes of the Quran as in tapes of yore seem AWOL now.

Parroting the Talking Points

A poster to Roger L. Simon's blog points out the similarities between Bin Laden's video and the Democratic talking points.

Professor Reynolds Is Back!

Glenn Reynolds has returned with thanks to the replacement bloggers and asking them to continue on through the election. I think that is a great idea. I have enjoyed the additional voices on Instapundit during the week.

Although, Nikita Demosthenes doesn't agree.

Bin Laden Video - Transcript

Here's a link to a partial transcript of the new Bin Laden video.

(From: LGF)

UPDATE: Belmont Club has the transcript as well as commentary on the video.

UPDATE II: Here's an interesting take from a person who is in Afghanistan commenting on Roger L. Simon's blog.

UPDATE III: More on this topic.

Pro-Bush Video

Protein Wisdom, INDC Journal and the Daily Recycler present: The Choice.

You Don't Say...

Bin Laden is a fan of Michael Moore.

Just Look on the Bright Side

Charles Johnson gives an excellent reason to vote for George Bush:

After being so certain for the past three years that Osama bin Laden had been atomized by the blast of a daisy cutter in Tora Bora, I admit to some disappointment that he’s still consuming oxygen and frightening small children.

But look on the bright side. Instead of never knowing the truth, now we may get to see this creature captured or killed for good and all.

If Bush is re-elected.

Political Bohemian Rhapsody

Is this the next "This Land"?

(From Virginia Postrel)

Voter Fraud and Voter Intimidation

Republican vigilance about keeping illegal voters from voting is democratically equivalent to Democratic vigilance against Republican attempts to suppress the legal vote. Republican vigilance has the semi-intended side-effect of suppressing likely Democratic votes. And huge Democratic registration and GOTV drives have the semi-intended side-effect of canceling out a large number of Republican votes with illegal ballots. I bet I can tell from your party affiliation which you think is worse.

Voter fraud is similar to voter intimidation. That's the conclusion Will Wilkinson comes to as he looks at legitimacy and integrity in the democratic process.

And Bill Hobbs has an archive of incidents of reported and suspected election fraud.

What Will President Kerry Do?

Alexander Cockburn writes that John Kerry will disappoint his anti-war supporters, if he is elected.

Like Jimmy Carter back in the 1970s, President Kerry will be well aware that what shoe-horned him into the White House was an entirely negative public emotion, hostility to George Bush. Just as Kerry consistently disdained his eager and all-forgiving left supporters before November 2, he'll redouble his public and private displays of rejection thereafter, contemptuously wiping Michael Moore's moist kisses from all his cheeks. The constituencies President Kerry will be eager to placate and to satisfy will be exactly the ones he has courted the whole of this election year: the Neocons in Washington, and the bankers in Wall St.

(From Hit & Run)

No Danger Yet

I hope this never happens to me.

Terrorist Tape Is Aired

After delaying its release, ABC News has aired portions of the video tape in which a man claiming to be an American member of al Qaeda threatens future attacks on the United States. I am inclined to think this is just pre-election saber rattling by an al Qaeda drone to scare Americans into voting for John Kerry.

Donald Sensing thinks it was intended as an audition or practice tape, and adds that the delivery leaves something to be desired.

And, I am glad to see Donald Sensing back.

Voter On-line Habits Survey

Here's a story about a survey looking at the browsing habits of voters.

Craig Barrett on Intel's Future

My boss attended the Gartner Symposium/ITXPO last week in Orlando, FL, and heard Craig Barrett, Intel's CEO, deliver a keynote speech about the future direction for Intel. Just now, my boss handed me a copy of the current eWeek Magazine, which features an interview with Barrett. Although, the on-line version is different than the magazine version of the interview. The magazine interview deals more with Intel's shift away from higher speed processors, towards making the current processors more efficient. And the effort Intel is spending on incorporating wireless technology into its chipsets.

Winning Isn't Everything

It seems winning a World Series isn't everything after all.

I think the same thing happened to Tennessee fans after 1998. First, with beating Florida and getting off the short end of the series, the rivalry hasn't been as rowdy since then. Mostly, I think, due to the competitiveness of the games lately. Also, winning the National Championship removed the perennial underdog status, for a little while at least, although in recent years, as the program has slipped a bit, the underdog status has somewhat returned.

Early Voting Changes Campaign Strategies

The New York Times has a story today detailing how the increase in early voting has affected both Presidential candidate's campaign strategies down the stretch.

The Real Cultural Divide

Victor Davis Hanson on the cultural divide in America these days:

Yet the true nature of our loud divisiveness is rarely remarked upon. In the last three decades, there has been a steady evolution from liberal to moderately conservative politics among a majority of the voters, whether gauged by the recent spate of Republican presidents or Bill Clinton's calculated shift to the center. Now the House, Senate, presidency and the majority of state governorships and legislatures are in Republican hands. A Bush win will ensure a conservative Supreme Court for a generation.

In contrast, the universities, the arts, the major influential media and Hollywood are predominately liberal — and furious. They bring an enormous amount of capital, talent, education and cultural influence into the political fray — but continue to lose real political power. The talented elite plays the same role to the rest of America as the Europeans do to the United States — venting and seething because the supposedly less sophisticated, but far more powerful, average Joes don't embrace their visions of utopia.

Missing Iraqi Explosives Update

I haven't posted about the story of the Al-Qaqaa missing explosives (some background details, more details, still more details, and even more details) before, but here are two new developments.

Bill Gertz writes in today's Washington Times that Russian soldiers were responsible for helping Saddam's forces move weapons out of Iraq prior to the U.S. military action. In addition, the Russians were to destroy evidence tying the Russians to Saddam's government.

A second defense official said documents on the Russian support to Iraq reveal that Saddam's government paid the Kremlin for the special forces to provide security for Iraq's Russian arms and to conduct counterintelligence activities designed to prevent U.S. and Western intelligence services from learning about the arms pipeline through Syria.

The Russian arms-removal program was initiated after Yevgeny Primakov, the former Russian intelligence chief, could not persuade Saddam to give in to U.S. and Western demands, this official said.

A small portion of Iraq's 650,000 tons to 1 million tons of conventional arms that were found after the war were looted after the U.S.-led invasion, Mr. Shaw said. Russia was Iraq's largest foreign supplier of weaponry, he said.

However, the most important and useful arms and explosives appear to have been separated and moved out as part of carefully designed program. "The organized effort was done in advance of the conflict," Mr. Shaw said.

The Russian forces were tasked with moving special arms out of the country.

Also, ABC News is reporting that Iraqi officials may have over reported the amount of missing explosives.

The Iraqi interim government has told the United States and international weapons inspectors that 377 tons of conventional explosives are missing from the Al-Qaqaa installation, which was supposed to be under U.S. military control.

But International Atomic Energy Agency documents obtained by ABC News and first reported on "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings" indicate the amount of missing explosives may be substantially less than the Iraqis reported.

The information on which the Iraqi Science Ministry based an Oct. 10 memo in which it reported that 377 tons of RDX explosives were missing — presumably stolen due to a lack of security — was based on "declaration" from July 15, 2002. At that time, the Iraqis said there were 141 tons of RDX explosives at the facility.

But the confidential IAEA documents obtained by ABC News show that on Jan. 14, 2003, the agency's inspectors recorded that just over three tons of RDX were stored at the facility — a considerable discrepancy from what the Iraqis reported.

PoliPundit.com on the election

A couple of items on the election from PoliPundit.com:

• First, Jayson gives his over/under on the Senate races. He thinks the GOP could pick up at least 4 seats. While I'd like to see things turn out that way, I'm thinking that his appraisal is overly optimistic.
  
  Real Clear Politics has the Senate races in South Dakota(Daschle/Thune) and Florida(Martinez/Castor) for the Republicans, but both by razor-thin margins. Jayson figures that in Alaska(Murkowski/Knowles), Murkowski will hold on to her seat, because "...we’re not even hearing much if anything from the liberal media about the Murkowski-Knowles race, which must mean, by definition, that Murkowski is poised to hold the seat", whiich is a dubious proposition since Real Clear Politics shows Knowles ahead in every poll, although the margin is shrinking. In the Louisiana(Vitter/John/Kennedy) race the lastest polling data Jayson points to is promising, as it shows Vitter clearing the 50% hurdle to avoid a runoff election, but the same article also points out that in the 2003 governor's race, Bobby Jindal lost an 11 point lead in the polls in the last four days to lose by 4 percent. He makes a good point about the Colorado race(Coors/Salazar), drawing a comparison to the 2002 Senate race in Colorado. This is possible since Bush is polling well in Colorado and has the coattails to help Coors, and Salazar seems to be avoiding John Kerry.
  
  
• Next Lorie Byrd posts on the "Myth of the Undecided Voter". Consider this bit of conventional wisdom, like so much other conventional wisdom this year, debunked.

Comparing Bush and Kerry

Pete Du Pont on why Bush will win:

President Bush is not going to win because of Mr. Kerry's style or Boston blue blood, as out of sync with most Americans as they may be. He is going to win because he believes in things, while Mr. Kerry is a candidate of concern, consensus and compromise.

Mr. Bush believes in the "transformational power of liberty"; that "freedom is on the march"; that the spirit of liberty that created America in 1776 has brought freedom and opportunity to Afghanistan and will bring it to Iraq and every other nation that grasps its principles. It is a powerful message that Americans understand. Mr. Kerry believes we are imposing democracy on people, instead of which we must bring everyone together in international forums where America's decisions must pass a "global test." As the New York Times noted, Mr. Kerry "sees himself as an ambassador president," intending his first act in office to be a speech to the United Nations to recast American foreign policy.

Mr. Bush believes free nations should have the right to make their own decisions about trading with America; he has negotiated trade agreements with 12 countries and is working on 10 more. Mr. Kerry is against free trade because he believes America must "establish core labor rights around the world." He would repeal Nafta and other trade agreements until he decides what the wages and working conditions of the citizens of Chile, Mozambique and other nations must be.

Mr. Bush believes in an ownership society in which individuals have the resources to improve their lives, owning their own health-care and retirement accounts. Mr. Kerry is against such individual ownership, believing a wise and benevolent government should have the tax revenues to make the decisions it believes are best for you.

And

The presidential analogies would be Harry Truman and Woodrow Wilson. Truman dropped the atomic bomb to end World War II, gave aid to Greece and Turkey to stop the expansion of communism, established the Marshall plan to rebuild Europe, launched an enormous airlift to keep Berlin free, and had a sign on his desk saying "The Buck Stops Here." Truman was a strong man; like Bush, he believed in things.

Mr. Kerry, on the other hand, thought "communism was not a threat to our country," probably would not have used the atomic bomb without international approval, and would likely have thought the Berlin airlift too threatening to the Soviet Union. He is more like Woodrow Wilson, who after the Germans sank the Lusitania, killing 128 Americans, did not respond, saying he was "too proud to fight." He committed U.S. troops to World War I, but through his 14 Point Plan and League of Nations proposal sought "peace without victory." And of course Wilson imposed America's first income tax after the ratification of the 16th Amendment. The Kerry analogies abound.

Read the whole thing.

CBS Tries Again

If at first you don't succeed...

News of missing explosives in Iraq -- first reported in April 2003 -- was being resurrected for a 60 MINUTES election eve broadcast designed to knock the Bush administration into a crisis mode.

Drudge Report has more.

This from the network that won't conclude its investigation into how fake Texas Air National Guard memos were used as part of a Sixty Minutes II report until after the election, "so as not to interfere with the presidential race".

Getting Out the Vote

As we continue down the stretch in this election season, OpinionJournal has a look at the Bush and Kerry campaigns' get out the vote specialists.

With all indications being a tight race this year, GOTV efforts could make the difference for either candidate.

Good News from Iraq

Arthur Chrenkoff has a look at two weeks worth of good news from Iraq.

Colorado's Amendment 36 Still on the Ballot

Amendment 36, a proposal to allow proportional distribution of Colorado's electoral votes has passed its first legal hurdle today. A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against the measure, citing jurisdictional reasons.

Interesting Poll

Here's a view of the Electoral College as determined by the traders at Tradesports.

USMC Gets an Upgrade

The United States Marine Corps is updating its supply chain and logistics system.

The Corps announced it had begun the process of replacing five aging supply systems with software made by Oracle. The plan--Global Combat Support System-Marine Corps/Logistics Chain Management (GCSS-MC/LCM) program Block I--will retire a mix of mainframe and client server technologies, some of which have been in use since the 1970s. Replacing them will be elements of Oracle's E-Business software package, including the software maker's supply chain planning, procurement, logistics, maintenance and service applications.

Napoléon is often credited with saying, "An army marches on its stomach." That maxim is truer than ever today; although, it is necessarily broader, since the modern military depends not only on food; but also, on fuel and ammunition as well to function effectively. Our military could not function efficiently without its incredible supply system. It is good to see that it is being modernized, just as the weapon systems are. After all, what good does that fancy JDAM do you, if you can't get it to the right airfield?

Enter the Treo 650

Yesterday, palmOne announced the Treo 650. Here's a link to a video and an early review of the new device.

Looks like palmOne kept the form factor the same as the Treo 600. Some of the changes include:

• 320x320 high-res screen
• Removable battery
• Faster processor
• Built-in MP3 player
• Improved camera (mirror for self-portraits; captures video; works in low light)
• Supports IMAP or POP email
• Bluetooth

James Lileks on the Guardian

James Lileks comments on the (now disappeared) Guardian column which called for the assassination of President Bush.

The original article contained this last paragraph:

On November 2, the entire civilised world will be praying, praying Bush loses. And Sod's law dictates he'll probably win, thereby disproving the existence of God once and for all. The world will endure four more years of idiocy, arrogance and unwarranted bloodshed, with no benevolent deity to watch over and save us. John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr - where are you now that we need you?

Now, the entire article has been replaced with this semi-apology.

...[H]is closing comments were intended as an ironic joke, not as a call to action - an intention he believed regular readers of his humorous column would understand.

Oh, I see now, it was only a joke--oh, okay, ha, ha, silly me.

UPDATE: The entire column has been reposted by William Teach at Pirate's Cove.

No Riots "if we win"

And I thought the brownshirts were supposed to be Republican.

C-SPAN cameras captured spouse Elizabeth Edwards making the startling comments to a supporter during a Kerry Campaign Town Hall Meeting in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Supporter: Kerry's going to take PA.

Liz Edwards: I know that.

Supporter: I'm just worried there's going to be riots afterwards.

Liz Edwards: Uh.....well...not if we win.

From Drudge Report (includes a link to an audio clip of her comments).

Jim Geraghty of Kerry Spot thinks it was "a typical, off-the-cuff, unthinking comment".

Ronald Reagan on John Kerry

Via KerrySpot, here's a powerful ad from Americans for Peace Through Strength, which uses Ronald Reagan's own words, criticizing Walter Mondale in a debate in 1984, to compare John Kerry with Mondale.

I think Kerry opened himself up for this kind of attack when he invoked Reagan's name in the first Presidential debate this year. (The ad begins with footage of Kerry's comments from the debate.) It was foolish of Kerry to mention Reagan, since he opposed Reagan at just about every opportunity. Nuclear freeze? Contras? (Where his famous Seared in my memory line came from.) Any new weapon system?

Who Will Win if Bush Loses

Here's an editorial from the Daily Telegraph making the case for President Bush's re-election.

So who gains if Bush loses? The Labour Left, of course, and the political power of the European Union, the Guardian readers who have been writing magnificently counterproductive anti-Bush letters to the voters of Clark County, Ohio, and every twerp who says with a trembling lip that Mr Bush and Mr Blair have "blood on their hands"; not to mention every corrupt, undemocratic, "pragmatic" government in the Middle East that longs for a return to stasis.

But some rather more fearsome people gain too, such as the man who said of Americans in a document discovered earlier this year "...these are the biggest cowards of the lot, and we ask God to allow us to kill, and detain them, so that we can exchange them with our arrested sheikhs and brothers". He is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and it is probably he who killed Ken Bigley. Such men believe they have already changed the government in Spain; they will claim at once that they have done the same in the United States. They will be right.

And who loses? Iraqis about to have real elections of their own for the first time, Afghans who have already voted with more than expected success, Iranians trying to assert their own democracy against its clerical corruptions. And us. What one can see in each twist of the Iraq story - don't send the US Marines into Fallujah, don't send the Black Watch to help the Americans, do give in to Ken Bigley's kidnappers - is exactly what is meant by defeatism, an actual longing to lose. Whatever you think of the war, why would you want that?

Google Guess of the Month

Last month, there was speculation around the web about Google web browser. This month, the speculation has turned to a Google branded instant messaging client. See InsideGoogle for more information.

On a related note, Google fixed a security issue related to Google Desktop Search. Athough, the hole might not be entirely patched.

Firefox Ad Campaign Update

Earlier, I posted about Spread Firefox's ad campaign to announce the 1.0 release of Firefox. In just three days, the campaign has been a run-away success.

More stories about the impending release of Firefox 1.0 in Technology Review and internetnews.com.

About Me

I figured I should put up a little blurb about myself. I suppose I'll update this from time to time.

I am a Internet developer for the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Since February of this year, I have been the lead programmer in Web Services for myUT.

A few weeks ago, my most recently completed project was launched: the University Calendar of Events. It hasn't been up for a month, and already I am working on version two. Besides working on some performance improvements, one of the ideas I am adding to it is an XML feed, which will allow us to publish events, similar to an RSS feed, for other university departments and people to integrate into their own websites.

Last year, I was primarily invovlved in the redesign of the university's website, and the creation of templates for departmental use based on this design. Another project I have been heavily involved in over much of the last year has been development of the university's Institutional Improvement program. The program has two goals: one is for the university-wide accreditation through the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), and the other is the long-term identification of strategies for institutional improvement of the university. I built a good bit of the data entry and display pieces for the program, and just like the events calendar, I am currently working on version two. I also have several other projects underway, most of which aren't near completion or require access to myUT to use them, so I won't bother to mention them. Although, I will probably update this post as more projects are finished.

Some Personal Details

I played alto saxophone and baritone saxophone throughout junior and senior high school. My favorite saxophonists are Branford Marsalis, Gary Mulligan and Paul Desmond. I also composed a short piece for concert band, which was performed by my high school band a couple of years after I graduated. I wrote the piece in 1991 to commemorate the bicentennial anniversary of Mozart's death in 1791 and the passing of Leonard Bernstein in October 1990. I juxtaposed the styles of the two great composers. For Bernstein, I chose to use modern jazz melodies, rhythms and Instumentation. And for Mozart, I choose to use a sonata form, which was a common musical form used by Mozart and his contemporaries in the Classical period. When I have some time, I'll digitize the recording and put a link to it up here.

In August of 1992, my parents, older brother and I were living in Miami when Hurricane Andrew came through town. We had chosen to stay in our home and ride out the storm. Big mistake!!! We were in the house when a big boom sounding like a howitzer came from our living room. It turns out that part of the roof of our house was violently removed by the wind and the windows of our living room were actually blown out of place. We spent the remainder of that night huddled in a bathroom-the only room in our house with no windows in it. And despite the recent hurricanes which criss-crossed Florida, my family refuses to leave South Florida. I am happy to report that this time around nothing remarkable happened.

Lately, most of my reading has consisted of non-fiction. I am currently reading An Army at Dawn by Rick Atkinson, about the Allied campaign in North Africa, the infancy and growth of the U.S. Army in World War II, and the decline of the Axis powers in Europe. I also recently finished two books by Victor Davis Hanson, Carnage and Culture and Ripples of Battle. And before those, I read Simon Schama's three-volume History of Britain. My father-in-law, who is a retired naval officer, managed to get me a copy of Shadow Warriors: Inside the Special Forces by Tom Clancy and Gen. Carl Stiner (ret.), which Gen. Stiner was kind enough to autograph for me. I've also been known to enjoy books by Issac Asimov, Larry Niven and J.R.R. Tolkein.

My other hobbies include hiking, bicycling, photography and travel. On a recent trip to Las Vegas with my wife, I managed to combine a few of these and hiked a lot in Joshua Tree, Death Valley, Yosemite, Sequoia & King's Canyon National Parks, and Mojave National Preserve, among other places.

Locking Up the Teen Vote

Well, President Bush has the teen vote wrapped up. By a wide margin in the mock election's electoral college: 393 to 145. (From LGF.)

The Curse Is Broken!!!!

Congratulations to the Boston Red Sox, who defeated the Evil Empire New York Yankees, 10-3, to advance to the World Series. The win completed a historic turn-around, as Boston won four straight games to overcome a three game deficit in the ALCS.

The Difference between Crime and Terrorism

William Stuntz explaines why we should not fight terrorism like we treated organized crime.

Kerry thinks America's seventy-year-long battle against the Mafia was a success story. He is wrong. Tolerating Mob bosses (which is what we did for most of those seventy years) was very costly. Tolerating terrorism -- or leaving it to police and prosecutors, which amounts to the same thing -- would be a disaster.

Ashley's Story

Not all political advertising is composed of attack ads. This has to be the most positive political ad I can remember.

UPDATE: While I was just flipping through the channels on TV, I caught this ad on FOX News Channel.

Firefox Ad Campaign

The Mozilla Foundation is planning a marketing campaign for the release of Firefox 1.0.

Let’s mark the launch of Firefox 1.0 with a community marketing campaign that will take the buzz around Firefox to the next level: the first-ever, full-page advertisement in a major daily newspaper created and paid for by the open source community.

There is also a story on eWeek:

The Mozilla Foundation is getting ready to take the browser wars to a new front: the advertising pages of The New York Times.

The open-source development group on Tuesday plans to launch an online campaign to raise money to fund the ad, along with other marketing initiatives for the November launch of its Firefox Web browser.

For more details, or to contribute see Spread Firefox.

UPDATE: In just one day the contribution campaign (see green sidebar) has exceeded the goal of 2500 names. Way to go!

UPDATE II: More media coverage fom CNET and ZDNet UK.

Well That's One Way to Get a Vacation

Via Joanne Jacobs, I noticed a story from the local ABC affiliate about a Knoxville High School English class viewing Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11. Earlier this evening, I happened to watch a follow-up to the story from another local news program.

These are some big trees!

My wife and I recently visited Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Parks, where we marveled at the Giant Sequoias. I think this photo provides an adequate sense of how incredibly massive these trees are.

This particular tree is named Auto Log. It is a fallen giant sequoia large enough for a car to park on. Unfortunately, the log has begun to deteriorate and the log can no longer support the weight of vehicles. Too bad!

Spiraling Down, Down, Down...

Looking down the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. Just playing around with the Hello BloggerBot. Pretty Cool!

Interview with Eric Meyer

If you are a web designer, no doubt you've heard of Eric Meyer. Eric is a CSS guru and evangelist. When I started my feeble attempts at web design, one of the resources I used to learn HTML was Eric's HTML Tutorial at Case Western Reserve University.

Apple's website has an interview with Eric Meyer, "Turning the Tables Using CSS". In the article, Eric discusses when he recognized the power of CSS for web design and remarks on the advantages of using CSS.

Where do we get such men?

From the Guardian, of all places...

Perez, 21, lost his leg to a roadside bomb in Iraq more than a year ago, but despite the phantom pains that haunt him, he says he is determined to prove to the Army that he is no less of a man - and no less of a soldier.

"I'm not ready to get out yet," he says. "I'm not going to let this little injury stop me from what I want to do."

Perez is one of at least four amputees from the 82nd Airborne Division to re-enlist. With a new carbon-fiber prosthetic leg, Perez intends to show a medical board he can run an eight-minute mile, jump out of airplanes and pass all the other paratrooper tests that will allow him to go with his regiment to Afghanistan next year.

Wow!

Nothing to see here. Move along...

Just testing the Mail-to-Blogger feature.

Better late then never!

Well, this is my first post to my blog.

Late to the party, as you can see. But as the title says, better late than never.