February 2000

• Homeless on $50k a year in Silicon Valley. Looking back on my first year running Polaschek Computing, I realize there's no way I'd have gotten the business running successfully in Silicon Valley without having already sold a portion of it or done something to get financing.
• Unique Approaches to the Housing Crunch in Silicon Valley. Even if you've got the money to buy a house, that still doesn't mean you can. Unique Approaches 2 is another attempt to deal with the problem.
• The Outsider comes inside - The Silicon Valley Outsider has moved to Silicon Valley.
• The Dirty Harry Tour of San Francisco takes you through the movie, telling you where the various sights are.
• The Night Cabbie has some good stories about driving cab in San Francisco.
• Jamie Zawinski is trying to Free the night life! in San Francisco.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 28, 2000     February 28 in History

• In one of the dumber moves of the year, MS claims victory over hack attack. I wonder how their servers will be doing now that they've taunted hackers. Also relating to Microsoft, the San Jose Mercury News analyzes the End Game in the Microsoft Trial.
• Rising Tensios in Kosovo Worry NATO. Funny, I don't remember the tensions ever really easing. It's The unfinished war, and while the cameras have left, the killing hasn't stopped.
• Viral marketing adds spam to your mail offers another good reason not to use Windows. I'm sure such a thing could be done on the Mac too, but it hasn't yet, and it'll be trickier without ActiveX around.
• CodeCatalog.com claims to be The Open Source Code Search Engine. I'm not sure an automated search engine is the right answer (compare to Yahoo vs. Google), but there's a lot of Open Source, and it's gotta be indexed somehow so this is certainly a good thing. I'm just not sure it's a Good Thing yet.
• Eazel is making a desktop for Linux. They've got the right people on board, which is certainly a good sign. Given what I've seen of Aqua, maybe it's time for the good user interface torch to pass out of Apple's hands.
• Need to know the weather on the sun? Solar Max 2000 is presented by The Exploratorium. It'll be interesting to see what gets messed up by the extra charged particles the Sun is throwing our way. It's also kinda cool to be able to see the northern lights without having to drive somewhere dark.
• The AR15 - Banned in CA, Legal in Russia points out how we're living in the land of the free. But at least we're safe from Godless Communists, right?
• A libertarian link I missed on Monday. In The American Lenin, L. Neil Smith compares Lincoln to V. I. Lenin. L. Neil's not one to mince words.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 25, 2000     February 25 in History

• Why Harry Browne's running for president. On a lighter note, Uncle Duke will do Whatever it takes.
• Check out the Lysander Spooner Pages. You might call him an anarchist, rather than a Libertarian. You might be right.
• Find out How To Avoid 'Wasting Your Vote' by voting for a third party.
• Or if the Libertarians are too wimpy for you, Think really different with The Revolution.
• Have I mentioned End the War on Freedom yet? I don't think I have, even though I meant to. Another crypto-anarcho-libertarian (even if he only admits to being a libertarian) is a good addition to the circle.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 21, 2000     February 21 in History

• The godfather from Dallas ends the party. Kicking Jesse Ventura out of the Reform Party probably destroyed the chances of them having any effect on the presidential election this year. Sigh.
• Bush bobs, McCain weaves, Keyes wins. It's probably not going to be enough to win him any primaries, but it's nice to see an article that actually covers the third Republican candidate.
• Super Racy tells how Honda's superbike team use PowerBooks to improve performance. Cool.
• Way Too Personal takes a look at the world of internet personal ads. It is to laugh.
• FBI director says crypto must be controlled. To quote The Register, Send this clown to Ireland....
• Northwest Airlines is End-running the 4th Amendment with a civil suit.
• goodexperience.com is a blog that focuses on finding a good experience. This usually means on online customer experience (as their tagline says), but can include things like a good work experience or dealing with net-millionaires.
• I've updated Dave and Brian's Excellent Vacation . All the pictures are in now.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 18, 2000     February 18 in History

• The Privacy Page collects resources and is a good place to start.
• Yahoo Security and Encryption has a ton of links, nicely categorized.
• Simson Garfinkel talks about Privacy and the New Technology and argues that they don't have to be mutually exclusive.
• The Right To Privacy is the 1890 article by Samuel Warren and Louis D. Brandeis in which the right to be let alone was discussed. It's served as the basis for a lot of privacy law since then.
• Reno, FBI feast on bad network security which is just what I've been afraid of with the denial of service attacks that started last week, and rather than encouraging people to keep their own networks clean, the feds are likely to make new laws. One could indeed theorize that the attacks were started by the FBI in order to justify increased spending.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 14, 2000     February 14 in History

• Software company wins round in fight with Sony. Congratulations to Conenctix. The full text of the verdict is at Sony V Connectix 99-15852, and includes some fine quotes. This is one where the judge actually seems to understand what the issues are, and that's rare enough when software is involved that it's noteworthy.
• geek chicks: second thoughts digs further into the question of why there aren't more geek chicks.
• Salon talks about The best game ever.
• Clinton was born to be a dot-com guy. "We will launch our product on time."
• The Y2K links continue to roll in. This week, it's Quantum Chemical Analysis Of Y2K Molecule.
• The Orphanage of Cast-Off Mascots is another feature by James Lileks.
• American Mile Markers has 3504 pictures, one taken every mile on a trip from New York to San Francisco.
• The Sierra Times is a new news service on the net. I'm waiting to see how they'll turn out, but their 20 reasons not to be here suggest it might be some fun for me to read.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 11, 2000     February 11 in History

• Moms 4 Guns are a voice for RKBA, as is KeepAndBearArms.org.
• Bill Clinton is not -- Clinton pushes national gun ID card in his State of the Union speech.
• Jesse Ventura Calls Gun Control Advocates Ignorant, which probably wan't the most tactful, but that's our guv.
• And then there are all the folks Creating hysteria over guns. John Lott points 'em out.
• Deaths by firearm rank low in U.S. and Al Gore Wants Women Raped are recent articles advocating RKBA.
• Never put down your arms, brothers is Vin Syprynowicz's message to the IRA.

Weather in Minneapolis for February 7, 2000     February 7 in History

• U.S. regulators float tough financial privacy rules. It's about time.
• CERT warns of Malicious HTML Tags Embedded in Client Web Requests. Yet another reason to shut off Javascript, even though it can be useful.
• What's wrong with Microsoft security? Mostly the fact that they don't design products to be secure.
• The Path to Peace in Ireland is an collection of articles by the Irish Times. It's got a bit of bias in spots, but is pretty good overall. There are also links to the latest news.
• Europe ponders total US meat ban. We'll at least have the UK for company in being banned, and with more Mad cows discovered in France, the french are going to be eating a lot of the other white meat.
• The Sacramento Bee: A high-tech exodus looms as growth chokes California. About Silicon Valley talks about the area I lived in. Page two talks about the cost. There's also You Know You Live in Silicon Valley When.., which just about says it all.
• Dan Savage (who writes Savage Love) was Stalking Gary Bauer in Iowa. Now there's The firestorm over Stalking Gary Bauer. Wanna know more about the man? All About Dan will help.
• When Net Nanny gets into the sherry tells just how effective censoring software is (not very).