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Wednesday, July 24, 2002
• Standby
mode
Due to a job change for me, NetRunner is powering down
to standby mode for at least a few months. I'll be returning to my print
journalism roots next week when I start writing and editing for The Providence
Journal's business section. The need for me to
boot up quickly in the new job means there will be less time for browsing
and blogging.
Hopefully, after a transition period, I will be able to
return to writing NetRunner. It's been great fun despite several interruptions.
In meantime, for your blogging fix, be sure to check out Subterranean
Homepage News by my projo.com colleague Sheila Lennon.
This latest career change reminds of what I wrote about
myself in the projo.com
staff directory: "I
love this job. I have no idea where it will take me next."
More true than I ever could have imagined.
Now, a few thoughts before I go ...
AP photo
IN CUFFS: John Rigas, founder and former chairman and CEO
of cable television giant Adelphia Communications Corp., is led
from New York's main post office building by U.S. postal inspector
police.
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• Wired before the cuffs went on
I can't claim any great foresight about the stock market
collapse these last few weeks. But I knew when Adelphia
started making Enron-like headlines, I had better hurry up and get my
home wired for broadband.
And today's
arrest of founder John Rigas and two of his sons, makes me glad I
did. Otherwise, I might be waiting years for high-speed Net access.
I live in a community served by Adelphia, and the company
finished upgrading its network in town just as the Adelphia name became
synonymous with corporate fraud.
After Global Crossing but before WorldCom, I called Adelphia's
toll-free number and prayed it had not been disconnected yet. Luckily,
somebody answered the phone. Within days a friendly service technician
was running cable along my basement ceiling.
So far, the service is great. And everytime I use it,
I'll think of John Rigas in handcuffs.
• Wired for speed
Parents, if you're teenage son or daughter suddenly expresses
an interest in Case Western Reserve University, here's
why. Just one warning: They'll never again settle for an AOL dialup
account.
• A Wi-Fi update
A couple weeks ago, I wrote an item
about an effort to establish a free wireless network in Providence. At
the time, I sent an email to one of the contacts. I never heard a thing
back from RI WiFI, and the group's
Web site appears not to have been updated since May.
Like me, maybe they were distracted by the Buddy
trial.
Wednesday, July 3, 2002
•
The beach beckons
Vacation starts in a couple hours. Check back after July
15. Until then, I'll be at
the beach, digging clams on the flats and, if I'm lucky, buying a
new laptop.
Tuesday, July 2, 2002
• Internet
mag to shut down
Yahoo! Internet
Life magazine -- one of the lighter tech publications put out by Ziff
Davis Media -- will fold after the August issue, according to Jim
Romenesko's MediaNews. A Ziff
Davis memo posted by Romenesko praised the magazine for its "heart,
wit and spirit," but said after the tech market collapse "the
magazine did not generate enough marketplace support."
Here's an additional report
from CNET News.com.
Monday, July 1, 2002
• Wi-Fi: Threat
or opportunity?
The spread of free Wi-Fi networks is making the cable
titans nervous. Time Warner Cable of New York City last week sent warning
letters to cable-modem subscribers who operate free wireless networks,
the
New York Times reports (registration required). Small ISPs, however,
sense an opportunity and are promoting themselves as Wi-Fi friendly.
Other cable operators, meanwhile, are considering charging
"bandwidth hogs" extra for their Net access, according to Washington
Post Net columnist Leslie Walker.
• Waiting for Wi-Fi
in Rhode Island
Time Warner Cable's letter noted above sent me off on
a search for free wireless networks in Rhode Island. None exist yet, according
to the Personal
Telco Project's Wireless Communities page and 802.11
Hotspots.com. But there is a group called RI
WiFi is striving to create one. I've fired off an e-mail to see where
they stand.
Friday, June 28, 2002
• A blogging comeback
Maybe you noticed, maybe you didn't. For the last month,
NetRunner has been on hiatus as I covered the
trial of Providence Mayor Buddy Cianci for projo.com.
That meant little time for blogging, but the
trial is over -- except for one
crucial hearing next week -- and I'm ready to prowl the Net and report
on what I find. Below is what I found on a brief
online trip today.
• Are you like Mike?
After 11 weeks on the Buddy beat,
I'm getting ready for some vacation time. Before I go, I plan to reread
a
timely column by Detroit Free Press tech columnist Mike
Wendland about technology addiction.
"My wife asked me the other day what's the longest
I've gone in the past few years without checking e-mail, not counting
sleeping hours," Wendland tells his readers.
Wendland's answer: About 12 hours, but that was only because
he was flying to Hawaii, where he had already arranged for a month of
Net access:
"I logged in before we even unpacked our bags."
Sound familiar to anyone?
• This weblog
thing is really catching on
Can't get enough of the latest corporate implosion? Then
check out the the WorldCom blog: As
The WorldCom Turns.
• Happy I didn't
send resumes there
CNET Networks,
the premiere online source for tech news, is cutting
about 200 jobs, leaving it with about 1,700 workers, according
to the Associated Press. That is still well above the 700 that worked
for the San Francisco-based outfit at the end of 1999.
And the end could be near for Salon, the pioneering Web
publication that hasn't been able to turn a profit. The company was down
to its last $1.5 million as of March 31, report AP
and Reuters.
That money was expected to last just three or four months.
Friday, May 31, 2002
• Six weeks
and counting
The trial of Buddy Cianci is one
of the best assignments a reporter could ever imagine, and I'm having
a blast covering
it for an online audience. But there is a downside: Very little time
to write a weblog.
The aim here is to keep track of the latest, most interesting
Net news and trends shooting around the digital universe. Because of the
trial, I've fallen way behind. Here's my best effort to catch up quickly
after a short day of testimony in U.S.
District Court in Providence.
•
It's unanimous
Three federal judges ruled today that forcing public libraries
to use Net filters to block access to smut violates the First Amendment,
AP
reports. The ruling follows a two-week trial in Philadelphia in April.
The Children's Internet Protection Act would have required public libraries
to install filters by July 1 or risk losing federal funds. The law had
been challenged by American
Library Association and the American
Civil Liberties Union. Of course, both groups are celebrating
today.
Read the
decision in full.
• A tech redirect
One of my favorite tech news Web sites disappeared while
I wasn't watching. Newsbytes.com was a poor man's version of CNET's
News.com owned by the Washington Post Co. Despite a small staff, Newsbytes.com
stayed on top of the tech world, and I linked to it more than once.
It was swallowed up into a new Washington Post Co. site
called TechNews.com. Yet, when I visited TechNews.com
I was taken directly to washingtonpost.com
and a clicking I had to go to find the new
site as promised. And there is no mention of Newsbytes.com in this
editor's
letter.
That changed over the course of the day, however, as it
so easily can in the Web world. By 5 p.m. today, a trip to
newsbytes.com lead to a brief message about its incorporation into
the broader technology site, then a quick -- don't blink -- redirect to
the new page.
Guess I'll be relying on News.com for the time being.
• Hurry up and wait
Silicon Valley's hometown newspaper, the San
Jose Mercury News, reports on an
explosion in online film piracy sparked by the release of Spider-Man
and Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones. Maybe I'm getting
too old to understand, but I have just one question: Who wants to spend
six hours downloading a movie?
• Commercial blogging
A good
article on the emerging commercial side of weblogging from Paul Andrews,
a Seattle-based freelance tech writer. Andrews himself is a regular
blogger. He cites a
Wired News story and commentary
from megnut blogger Meg
Hourihan.
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