Readers make INQUIRER blush

Here's why I read The Inquirer every day:

1.) You actually post news. Yes, as in things I actually haven't heard before, unlike the CTRL-C, CRTL-V press release lemmings who call themselves "news" sites.

2.) You listen to your readers. I have never sent an email to The Inquirer without getting a response. Granted, I've only emailed a few times, but it's nice to know you listen!

3.) You have personality. Wit? Other sites have heard of it. Only The Inq. consistently displays refinement above the elementary school level.

4.) Did I mention that you have actual news? I don't know where you get that stuff, because no one else seems to have any.

5.) You have culture. The word coinage, intelligent quotes, and gripping original sagas (articles) of our time all point to a composure of mind beyond the mundane states most journalists can muster.

6.) You have no fear. Indeed, who gave us Itanic, Volesoft, Carly's flying luxury suites, and other corporately embarrassing headlines with nary more than a nod toward being austere?

7.) You have a sense of humor. Who else but the Inq. offends the delicate sensibilities of PR bunnies just to watch them hop?

8.) You tell it like it is. What does a clueless hack get when he signs an NDA? No Damn Article. Once again, the superior wisdom of the Inq. shines through in your continual ability to release stories without a spinmeister's approval.

9.) You cover what matters. While other sites are salivating over the release of a chip with 0.1% amazingly faster performance than the previous one, the Inq. calmly reports on a roadmap that shows why the chip won't even matter three months from now.

10.) You set the standards. If other sites aren't parroting you, they're gossiping about your latest story and writing hateful articles to cover their stupidity of signing suffocating NDAs. Jealous back-stabbing is the sincerest form of flattery!

Fredric Echols

Grantsdale, DOS, and games

Hi Mike,

I own about 250 games. A large fraction of these games simply does not run with MS-DoS eXtra Pain. These games require MS-DoS 98, thanks to the Vole. I use my MS-DoS Play Console (PC) exclusively to play games. Fortunately not every hardware manufacturer is as aggressive as Intel. I guess the folks at Intel are all happy with their Itanium success story. Cough.

Henry

Spamster Hamsters

Hi Mike,

It is easy to get rid of SPAM.

Just ask all ISPs to turn on SMTP authentication (existing feature in almost all running SMTP servers).

Only thing left after that would be for everybody to set their user/pass in their email client software and thus also enable SMTP authentication.

They already use user/pass for POP3 access don't they? The same could be used for SMTP (sending) -- it is an existing but not enabled feature.

Someone would say that SMTP auth. sends cleartext user/pass pairs over the net so it is a security risk. So what? POP3 user/pass goes in plaintext too and nobody considers it as a security risk. I haven't yet seen an ISP which enforces or at least allows use of APOP protocol for POP3 authentication which is also an existing feature in all POP3 mail servers.

As long as ISPs see the revenue from their client sending SPAM in gigabytes they won't do a thing against it. They should face penalties for every SPAM message from their netblock -- as soon as they get hit at the pocket they will ban spammers forever.

Just my 2 cents
Igor

Dalek traffic cones
Daleks take over traffic control

A step in the right direction, but not far enough. The positions of the traffic cones need to be transmitted to city webpages which should map where construction is taking place, so that commuters can be warned ahead of time. Furthermore, it would be nice if the cones could warn car GPS systems of their presence within a certain radius so that drivers could avoid the excess traffic caused by lane reductions. In this way the robot cones would be serviceable to drivers as well as saving construction workers labor. (of course, car GPS would have to be more common that it is now for my ideas to be useful to enough people)

Michaela Stephens

Stars in the EU's eyes
Hi Eva,

http://www.europa.eu.int/abc/symbols/emblem/index_en.htm

"The number of stars has nothing to do with the number of Member States. There are twelve stars because the number twelve is traditionally the symbol of perfection, completeness and unity. The flag will therefore remain unchanged regardless of future EU enlargements."

Contrast with your: "Not only has the European Union got bigger today - the marketing buzzword is enlargement, but it has also acquired a new HP like slogan as well as a bigger flag with 25 stars."

Which source, in your opinion, I'm going to trust the most with respect to this topic? Yup, exactly. Not that this little bit of fact-checking was specially difficult, it took me a grand total of twenty-nine seconds.

Best Regards
Cyrille

British secret service warns business of security threats

I've just ploughed through the MI5's page on "Electronic Attack" ( here), searching in vain for the simple sentence which says "make sure your PCs are fully patched". It does say "Seek regular security advice from system and service providers and make sure you act upon it - pre-empt attacks rather than wait for them. If you do discover an attack, seek advice immediately" which might well mean the same thing but I don't think Joe Public or Bill Businessman will read it like that.

Sighs,
Phil

Real Networks: Unreal

Mike,

Just a note on the piece you ran about RealNetworks - we did not say that we wanted to make our music files playable on Microsoft Windows Media format (most certainly we are not seeking their 'help') - we are a true believer in universality but to say we are actively pursuing Microsoft's technology for our music services is a huge stretch.

Erika Shaffer
Director PR
Real

BBC pot calls INQ kettle black

I work for BBC News. The machines on the newsreaders' desks are Dells. Our desktop PCs are made by Compaq. Only our designers and some picture editors have Macs, which is a tiny proportion of the huge number of computers being used by the BBC.

Your article was poorly-researched in the extreme.

Nick Tarry

The BBC

Just wanted to let you know how much I appreciated your story on the BBC going over the top praising APPLE products. It's nice to see a writer present a piece that is well balanced, and not choosing one side over the other. Your very intellectual insight just pours from the beautiful words that spew forth from your keyboard(probably an infiDELL) GET A LIFE. BLOODY WANKER!!!!

KRismiller

BBC News
You obviously do not read the BBC new regularly, as I constantly read the technology pages, and I read a balanced review of Apple and PC technology, with most articles concerning PCs. But, I have always thought the BBC anti-apple, as I constantly read misleading information and negative criticisms placed prominently in their work. Each article has an element of - this is good, BUT...

I do not understand what this article is about, just seems unnecessary and poorly informed - based entirely on a recent article which is positive, and disregards the history of considered criticism and even down right hostility at times.

Leon Baird

The INQUIRER and Jack Schofield

So if you take the Beeb's gushing, and balance that with the sniping that Apple get from the likes of you and the unsurpassable Jack Schofield, it works out about right, eh?

Dave Williams

Apple

Mike,

You mean the BBC is displaying more pro Apple bias than the anti-Apple slop regularly slammed onto the tray at your site?

But then, you're not on the public dole, are you? I guess that makes you more honest.

RT

More Macs at the BBC

You couldn't be further from the truth. Macs are fast disappearing from within the organisation as cheaper Windows boxes flood the market. It's something of a tragedy as far as I'm concerned as I am forced to work on these inferior systems. If only there was a more Apple biased world, it would be a much happier place in which to work

Colin Minchin
Editor
BBC Post Production

UK businesses are badly organised

I'd have to agree with Timothy [Stone, earlier letter, the INQ], in comparison to the US most British businesses are so pathetic and badly organised that they're not even trying to sue anyone! How many law suits have you filed?

Cheers
Ben

More Daleks

What happens if you nick the shepherd Baby Dalek? will the other ones follow it?

Pearce

Fair Use

Hi Mike,

Today I read two articles that got me thinking. One was a very interesting interview of a very successful lobbyist for the MPAA by MIT. here.

The other was the Inquirer Staff article about the recording industry of Japan's 600,000 threatening letters mailed. Here.

While I knew the DMCA was bad for the U.S., as is the broadcast flag, I didn't realize that building your own HDTV would become illegal. I'm not likely to build one myself, but having the act of building a TV become illegal? Somehow, that's unAmerican!

Likewise, I didn't realize that simply playing, not copying, a rented DVD on a Linux computer was illegal. I hope this doesn't apply to DVD install disks from some Linux distros, otherwise I have to admit that I have broken the law. (and I know ignorance of the law is no excuse)

It seems to me that governments are granting businesses the rights to things that should never be given. (like permission to use the "broadcast flag" as a "standard" for some broadcasts, even though not all equipment can use that flag.)

Too much of this disgraceful stuff is happening. Perhaps it's time for something different?

Just as we have MANY people around the world help out with open source software, perhaps we need some venue for ordinary citizens to help stop some of the abuses by businesses that governments seem unwilling to do. I'd think citizens could help bust copyrights that should never have been given. We also ought to be able to help point out bad for the consumer business practices. Some folks could bring that stuff to the attention of the media.

Ideally, a country ought to have websites for reporting this type of thing. Some do. I've reported some things to the FTC or the DOJ, although they seem slow to act. However, it does appear that some private resources would be useful for reporting things that some very influential and partially corrupt governmental officials might be able to squash in governmental channels. For instance, wouldn't it be nice if, after the RIAJ sent out 600,000 threatening letters to Japanese citizens, that 1,000,000 Japanese citizens sent out threatening letters to that body, with CC's to their government, for infringing on some aspect of Japanese law? Shouldn't the MPAA of the US have a class action lawsuit against them by Linux users for not being allowed to play DVD's?

I know people use the legal term, "fair use." Isn't it past time for people to begin to demand that companies and governments be "fair."

Joe