A story in The Register reports that Diebold automated teller machines at two financial instiutions were infected with the Nachi virus. The affected ATMs were new “advanced” ones running Windows XP Embedded. As the ATM industry seems to be moving away from the old reliable OS/2 to the latest bugware from Micro$haft, we should probably… Continue reading A Preview of the Future?
Month: November 2003
Fighting Unemployment
From a Computerworld article: State Agency Cancels Controversial Outsourcing Deal An Indiana employment agency has canceled a controversial IT deal that would have brought in up to 65 Indian contract workers to develop a new unemployment claims processing system. You gotta wonder why nobody wondered what was wrong with that picture before it ever got… Continue reading Fighting Unemployment
This is more like it
It might be the cooler weather, or some other reason, but the campus crime reports are once again beginning to have a certain level of amusement. This week’s log has a couple of amusing entries.
Hot Hunting
Just a brief horseplay report. After a couple of weeks of rained-out hunting, today looked like the best opportunity for a while. With today’s temperatures more like October than almost December, it was a little too warm, but the prediction for tomorrow was even worse, with a temperature of 70 or above, so this morning… Continue reading Hot Hunting
Spam Rage
I can sympathize with this guy. A Wired article reports that a Californian has been arrested, and faces a maximum of five years in jail and a $250,000 fine, for threatening spammers. Maybe he overreacted a little bit, but the spam problem has gotten so bad that it might be tough to find a jury… Continue reading Spam Rage
Wow! I’m finally trendy!
Thanks to Tara for passing along a letter she recently spotted in the Washington Post indicating that, without even realizing it, I’ve joined the latest trend sweeping the Beltway. In the letter, Michele Dyson says “the surprise gold-medal winner, the most talked-about topic in the circles in which I travel, has been the comic strip… Continue reading Wow! I’m finally trendy!
Perfect Match?
In a recent forum, my favorite presidential candidate, Dennis Kucinich, jokingly discussed his marital status (or lack thereof) and his Fantasy First Lady: “a dynamic, out-spoken woman who was fearless in her desire for peace in the world and for universal single-payer health care and a full employment economy.” In an attempt to prevent the… Continue reading Perfect Match?
Wonderful Weekend
The weather here is beginning to seem more like November, or maybe even December with sub-freezing temperatures a couple of nights last week. That makes the scenery on campus a little less revealing, but it’s better hunting weather. Since any hunting day is a good day, this weekend was doubly good.
Extraordinary Rendition
Extraordinary rendition … can you guess what it is? It’s the CIA’s term for seizing a citizen of another country (e.g. Canada) as he is just passing through a US airport en route to his home, and deporting him to a country where he can be tortured (e.g. Syria, and aren’t they our enemy right… Continue reading Extraordinary Rendition
What was he thinking?
There’s been a disappointing lack of both creativity or stupidity among the campus criminal crowd this semester. In the past, when things got boring, I could usually rely on the campus newspaper’s weekly crime log for at least one entry that was either bizarre or amusingly stupid. This fall, it’s been mostly routine theft, intoxication,… Continue reading What was he thinking?