[11885] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
"Ask Dr. Internet" for December, 1997
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Michael S. Hart)
Wed Dec 17 22:57:57 1997
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 1997 18:04:20 -0600
From: "Michael S. Hart" <hart@prairienet.org>
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
Reply-To: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU>
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
This is the "Ask Dr. Internet" Newsletter for December, 1997
This issue answers questions sent in up to December 17, 1997
CONTENTS
1. Dr. Internet Plays Santa Claus With Old Macs And PCs.
2. We Need Contacts For Possible Presentations In Europe--
For May, 1998.
3. Avoiding Download Problems With Large Files Such As MSIE,
Netscape, Etc.
4. Micropolis Drives Can Be Had At Bargain Prices.
5. Copyright Extension Efforts In Congress Have Failed Long
Enough For One More Year [1922] To Enter The Public Domain.
6. Headlines From Edupage.
7. We Are Running From A New Listserver. . . .
***
Many of the questions we received in the past 6 weeks have
been similar to each other, or to ones we answered earlier
so there are only half as many in this issue. However the
time has been twice as long between issues so there were 2
times as many headlines of interest. Be sure to look thru
our archives at promo.net once in a while, to see previous
issue of "Ask Dr. Internet."
***
** 1. Dr. Internet Plays Santa Claus With Old Macs And PCs.
I am playing Santa Claus for a family in a town some distance
from here, and am asking for your assistance. I have built a
Mac Classic for them, and if you have any software for it, or
hardware, perhaps you could send it to:
Jorian Heal
715 West Main
Shelbyville, IL 62565
Anything would be appreciated, especially games for kids.
*
We will also be doing the same with IBM clones, so if you had
anything for those, we would appreciate you sending them:
*2. 2. We Need Contacts For Possible Presentations In Europe--
For May, 1998.
I have been invited to give a presentation in Germany in May,
but they don't have enough money to defray all the expenses--
so if any of you can arrange any other presentations, I could
perhaps get to the break-even point, so I wouldn't lose money
by accepting the invitation. I would be willing to speak for
organization in nearly any European country if it would help.
This would be for Project Gutenberg as well as Dr. Internet.
*
3. Avoiding Download Problems With Large Files Such As MSIE,
Netscape, Etc.
***More reasons to learn FTP.
Many of our readers have been complaining of spending really
huge amounts of time trying to download the latest versions,
whether it would be of MSIE 4.x, Netscape 4.x, or any of the
other very large files that are getting very popular.
You have seen me refer to FTP as the best way to download in
a number of past issues of "Ask Dr. Internet". . .here is an
explanation of how and why FTP can be of use to you.
As referenced by a number of our users recently, download of
huge files often terminates in the last 1% of download time,
and this can happen half a dozen times in a row. If you can
FTP that file to your local ISP first, several things happen
that can save you time. First, if the file is incomplete or
there is trouble reading the end of the file, you would find
out more quickly, as the slowest FTP speeds are often faster
than the fastest modem speeds, and the fastest FTP speed can
be over 200,000 bytes per second, a megabyte every 5 seconds
which reduces those pesky large files to a minimal hassle.
If the file never gets to an ISP [Internet Service Provider]
then you find out in less than a minute and you save lots of
time finding out the same thing via modem. When worse comes
to worst, you at least have the file somewhere that you will
be able to contact someone to ask if they can find out where
the problem is. . .sometimes they can actually test the file
for you. . .or you can even test it yourself, as with .zips.
Don't hesitate to call or email your ISP gurus to ask for an
assist in getting these files, they often have ways to check
and to get files that are better than what you get to use.
We would also suggest that you only download files that your
friends have successfully downloaded, and even to get a file
from them when possible, because you know it worked, and was
not an instant virus or Trojan Horse.
*4. 4. Micropolis Drives Can Be Had At Bargain Prices.
Micropolis 9G drives are available for $350 since chapter 11
. . .I bought another brand for $500 because I thought about
operating temperature as my main factor. Several others had
the same conclusion for different reasons, but if you should
need the best possible price, this is probably it for now.
*
5. Copyright Extension Efforts In Congress Have Failed Long
Enough For One More Year [1922] To Enter The Public Domain.
Apparently efforts to extend copyrights of one million books
plus an extra million newspapers, magazines, movies, records
and other types of media have failed for 1997, which means a
publication from 1922 should enter the Public Domain in 1998
as of midnight January 1. The law still has no opposition--
of a powerful nature--and is expected to pass once the major
political and Hollywood players decide how to divide up pies
they never created in the first place. . .that is the issue,
as I have heard it. . .not whether or not to remove any work
from the Public Domain, THAT has already been decided: they
just can't decide how they are going to try to do each other
in on this. . .not how they are going to do US in. . . . It
is obvious to all Congress-watchers that, barring a serious,
perhaps more than serious, public intervention, copyright in
the United States will once again be voided and reissued, to
eliminate another 1 million books will be deleted from where
the public can have free access to them, and will instead be
used on a pay-per-view basis. Included will be a million of
the Newspapers from the 1920's and 1930's, as well as movies
and records, and other materials.
*
6. Headlines From Edupage.
NIELSEN PEGS INTERNET USERS AT 58 MILLION
[Notice How North Americans Still Think They Dominate The World]
[No wonder lots of places don't want me to mirror their sites]
A new survey by Nielsen Media Research in cooperation with CommerceNet,
based on interviews with more than 9,000 people, indicates that some 58
million adults in the U.S. and Canada are now online. This is the largest
number estimated so far of adult Internet usage, and indicates a 15% increase
over the 51 million estimated by Nielsen six months ago. Several other
market research firms, using older data, have put the number at 35 million
to 45 million adult users in the U.S. alone. In addition to overall user
numbers, the Nielsen survey indicates that the number of people who've
bought something over the Internet has increased 50% in the past six months,
to nearly 10 million. More than half the respondents said they'd been
online within 24 hours of the interview, and about 20% to 25% of Web users
said they go online every day. (Wall Street Journal 11 Dec 97)
ISP NUMBERS STILL GROWING [This one only from the United States]
Despite predictions of an imminent shakeout in the Internet service provider
(ISP) market, the number of providers has almost tripled in the past 18
months to 4,000. Industry observers say the increase is fueled by large
increases in online users: "Access revenues will be growing rapidly because
more people are getting online," says a senior analyst with IDC/Link. The
number of online households is expected to rise to around 40 million by
2001, up from 13 million in 1996. (Investor's Business Daily 13 Nov 97)
JUDGE'S TEMPORARY ORDER: MICROSOFT CAN'T BUNDLE BROWSER
A federal judge in the U.S. District in Washington issued a temporary order
declaring that Microsoft may no longer bundle its Internet Explorer browsing
software with the Windows operating system, until such time as the judge
receives a report to the court from a Harvard Law School professor who will
serve as a "special master" to study the complex legal and factual issues
the case presents. Though refusing to impose the million-dollar-a-day
penalty against that the Justice Department had requested, Judge Thomas
Penfield Jackson wrote: "The probability that Microsoft will not only
continue to reinforce its operating system monopoly by its licensing
practices, but might also acquire yet another monopoly in the Internet
browser market, is simply too great to tolerate indefinitely until the issue
is finally resolved." Industry analysts are predicting the basic dispute
over placing limits on Microsoft's power will not be resolved for a number
of years. (New York Times 12 Dec 97)
NADER JOINS ATTACK ON MICROSOFT
A conference put on by consumer advocate Ralph Nader is taking a look at the
way Microsoft, "not content with its enormous market share in PC software,
wants to hold our hand as we navigate the information highway, and to push
us -- not so subtly -- toward its own partners and subsidiaries." One of
the conference speakers is Microsoft-hater Scott McNealy of Sun, whose talk
is entitled "No One Should Own The Alphabet." Microsoft refused an
invitation to the conference, saying that it was stacked with rivals.
Microsoft defender Tony Williams says: "Nader doesn't speak for consumers.
He speaks for Nader. But certainly he is one who is very media savvy and
has an ability to cause heartburn to American corporations." (AP 12 Nov 97)
MASTERING THE NET
Marlboro College in Vermont will begin offering two new graduate programs in
January -- a master of arts in teaching with the Internet and a master of
science in Internet strategy. "Knowledge-making is changing in every field
because of this technology," says the college's president. "We're not
focusing just on the Internet, but how people can use this kind of cardinal
technology in a broader way." The programs will focus on teaching teachers
how to incorporate the Internet into the classroom experience, and teaching
managers how to oversee an organization's Internet strategy. (Boston Globe
14 Nov 97)
LAPTOPS SEEN BY SENATE AS THREAT TO DECORUM
The Senate Rules Committee has rejected a request by Mike Enzi (R.,
Wyoming) to be allowed to use a laptop on the floor of the Senate. Enzi
had earlier said: "The laptop was a necessary tool for me, since you do
not have any staff in Wyoming. I found I could take notes and write
speeches, and during debate I could write down the issues that I need to
respond to. I could look up documents that support that and be sure I had
the facts right." But a number of other Senators spoke against the idea,
including Wendell Ford (D., Kentucky): "I don't want to appear to be
standing in the way of progress and technology. This committee will
continue to wrestle with the trade-offs of allowing members to take
advantage of new technologies while preserving the history and decorum of
the Senate chamber." (News.Com 5 Nov 97)
DEFINING INFORMATION
The Computer Science and Telecommunications Board of the National Research
Council is information technology literacy issues. Sets of questions have
been developed for computer and communications scientists and engineers,
employers and labor professionals, librarians, K-12 educators, etc. about
the nature and scope of information technology literacy, and you are invited
to submit your answers to those questions in the form of a short position
paper. See < http://www2.nas.edu/cstbweb/549a.html >
DO CELL PHONES AFFECT LEARNING?
European regulators are taking a hard look at research by University of
Washington professor Henry Lai that indicates exposure to microwave
radiation hampered the ability of lab rats to learn a maze. Lai found that
exposing the rats to 45 minutes of microwave radiation similar to levels
that might be absorbed by a typical cell phone user slowed the rats' ability
to master the task. The effects of the waves could be ameliorated by
pretreating the rats with drugs that target two neurochemical systems in the
brain -- the endogenous opioid system and the cholinergic system, leading
Lai to propose that these systems are affected by microwave-frequency
fields. The Wireless Technology Research Group, an industry-funded group,
is now planning its own experiments. Meanwhile, at least one company in
Germany already began advertising "low-radiation" cell phones this past
summer. (Scientific American Dec 97)
DESIGNING FOR THE WORLD WIDE WEB
[OH. . .NOW THEY WANT US TO BE PC [POLICALLY CORRECT FOR ALL NATIONS]
[There isn't going to be anything left we ALL can say or do!]
Because most Web users tend to be North American, many Web designers are
oblivious to the subtle cultural connotations that language, colors and
design can take on in a foreign setting. Companies wishing to
internationalize their sites should be particularly sensitive to language
(no colloquialisms, such as using "wicked" to mean "good"), colors (white
denotes purity in Western countries, but death in many Asian nations), and
the gestures made by models (showing the palms, as in a wave, is considered
an insult in some Mediterranean countries). "Color takes on enormously
different overtones from one country to the next," says one corporate
globalization consultant. "That doesn't mean you can't use those colors.
It just means you want to rethink what the visuals look like on your pages
and on your links." (CIO Web Business 1 Dec 97)
AOL NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR MALICIOUS POSTING
In another case involving liability of Internet service providers, a federal
appeals court has ruled that a man who received death threats after some
anonymous enemy posted false and malicious information about him could not
hold America Online responsible. Noting that the federal Communications
Decency Act of 1996 immunizes Internet and online providers from lawsuits
over material that comes from third parties, the Court said that, if
Internet service providers were held responsible for such messages, they
would "have a natural incentive to remove messages upon notification,
whether the contents were defamatory or not. Liability upon notice has a
chilling effect on the freedom of Internet speech." (AP 14 Nov 97)
EDUPAGE EXPOSED AGAIN TO CENSOR'S KNIFE
Because we used a "red flag" word, the last issue of Edupage was rejected as
salacious by the filtering software used at one U.S. institution of higher
learning. The offending word was found in the sentence: "The new bill is
more narrowly focused than the CDA, and is targeted strictly at impeding the
flow of commercial pornography on the World Wide Web." (Of course, because
of the same filtering software, some of you out there will never read this
issue of Edupage to know why you were unable to read the last issue of
Edupage. Oh well.)
INTEL CONFIRMS LATEST PENTIUM FLAW
An Intel spokesman has confirmed that a flaw in the company's Pentium and
Pentium/MMX processors has been discovered. The "F0 bug," as the glitch has
been dubbed, involves a sequence of illegal opcodes -- instructions not
normally intended for use with the Intel chips. "These opcodes are supposed
to create an exception, where the processor raises a flag telling the
program that something's wrong," says one software expert. "This particular
sequence, instead, causes a loop and locks up the processor." Users are
unlikely to run into the problematic sequence by accident, he adds, saying
it is more likely that the flaw was found by an Intel competitor looking for
undocumented instructions on the chip. (EE Times 10 Nov 97)
COMPANY MARKETING PENTIUM BUG FIX
A small company called Freedom Fighter says it has developed a fix for the
latest Pentium chip flaw. The F0 Fighter software is designed to work with
Windows 95 or NT operating systems and detects and deletes the
problem-causing code before it causes any damage. Meanwhile, Intel says it
is still working on a fix, and expects to have some answers early next week.
(InfoWorld Electric 12 Nov 97)
APPLE TO SELL VIA INTERNET
Apple will begin selling its systems over the Internet, allowing purchasers
to have systems built to their individual specifications and delivered by
UPS or Airborne. Interim chief executive officer Steve Jobs says that
Apple's newest computers will use the new PowerPC G3 chip developed by
Apple's alliance with Motorola and IBM. Jobs surprised industry analysts by
not announcing a rumored deal with Oracle to develop stripped-down "network
computers," with Oracle offering the server software to support them. (New
York Times 11 Nov 97)
which WAS:
MAC NETWORK COMPUTER
Apple will make new-product announcements that include a stripped down
"network computer" called Macintosh NC, new models at the mid-range and
high-end computer line, and a new PowerBook laptop. The Mac NC, which is
expected to ship in the first half of 1998, will use database-server
software from Oracle. Apple is also planning to begin selling its computers
via the World Wide Web. (Wall Street Journal 7 Nov 97)
and
POWER/APPLE MERGER IN LOW GEAR
The merger of former Macintosh clonemaker Power Computing into Apple
Computer has been delayed by a federal antitrust review that a Power
Computing attorney thinks is just a ploy by U.S. attorneys to get evidence
for their anti-trust investigation of Microsoft. (AP 6 Nov 97)
IBM OFFERS $999 PC
Recognizing that it had underestimated the demand for PCs in the sub-$1,000
category, IBM will now try to compete with rivals such as Compaq by selling
a $999 Aptiva E16 assembled for IBM by Acer in Taiwan. The system will
come without a monitor but will have a 166 mhz processor and features
comparable to other low-priced PCs.
(Wall Street Journal 6 Nov 97)
Edupage is written by John Gehl (gehl@educom.edu) & Suzanne Douglas
(douglas@educom.edu). Telephone: 770-590-1017.
NIELSEN PEGS INTERNET USERS AT 58 MILLION
A new survey by Nielsen Media Research in cooperation with CommerceNet,
based on interviews with more than 9,000 people, indicates that some 58
million adults in the U.S. and Canada are now online. This is the largest
number estimate so far of adult Internet usage, and indicates a 15% increase
over the 51 million estimated by Nielsen six months ago. Several other
market research firms, using older data, have put the number at 35 million
to 45 million adult users in the U.S. alone. In addition to overall user
numbers, the Nielsen survey indicates that the number of people who've
bought something over the Internet has increased 50% in the past six months,
to nearly 10 million. More than half the respondents said they'd been
online within 24 hours of the interview, and about 20% to 25% of Web users
said they go online every day. (Wall Street Journal 11 Dec 97)
ISP NUMBERS STILL GROWING
Despite predictions of an imminent shakeout in the Internet service provider
(ISP) market, the number of providers has almost tripled in the past 18
months to 4,000. Industry observers say the increase is fueled by large
increases in online users: "Access revenues will be growing rapidly because
more people are getting online," says a senior analyst with IDC/Link. The
number of online households is expected to rise to around 40 million by
2001, up from 13 million in 1996. (Investor's Business Daily 13 Nov 97)
U.S REGAINS SUPERCOMPUTER LEAD
A study by researchers at the University of Tennessee and the University of
Mannheim indicates that the U.S. has built 16 of the world's 20 fastest
supercomputers, with the other 4 built by Japanese companies. A year ago,
the Japanese had the 3 fastest supercomputers and 10 of the fastest
supercomputers were made in Japan. Currently, the world's fastest computer
is a massively parallel processing machine built by Intel using 9,152
Pentium P6 processors and capable of a speed of more than 1.3 trillion
mathematical operations per second. In parallel processing, a large problem
is broken up into many small pieces, and the various pieces are solved
simultaneously ("in parallel") by a massively large number of small
processors. Only one of the 20 fastest computers is a traditional vector
machine which has one or several high-speed processors. (New York Times 17
Nov 97)
RANDOMLY GROOVY
Scientists at Silicon Graphics have taken the mesmerizing flow of the lava
lamp to the next level of utility -- using the favorite fixtures of the '60s
to generate truly random numbers, something computers cannot do. The
process involves using a digital camera to snap periodic shots of six oozing
cylinders, combining those images with electronic noise and converting it
into 1s and 0s, and then using the Secure Hash Algorithm from the National
Institute of Standards and Technologies to compress and scramble the binary
string to create a seed value for a standard random-number generator.
(Scientific American Nov 97)
MICROSOFT DOUBLES SHARE OF BROWSER MARKET
Over the past nine months, Microsoft has doubled its share of the Internet
browser market to 40%, up from 20% at the end of 1996, according to a
Dataquest survey. Arch rival Netscape still leads with close to 58%, but
that's down from 73% earlier. "If Microsoft's growth in browser share
continues, Dataquest projects Internet Explorer to reach parity with
Netscape Navigator as early as the second quarter of 1998,'' says a
Dataquest analyst. "The important battle to watch is the change by version
-- particularly, will Navigator version 3 users move to Navigator version 4,
or will they choose Internet Explorer, or both?'' Microsoft is currently
under investigation by the Justice Department over the bundling of its
Internet Explorer 4.0 software into its Windows operating system. (AP 18
Nov 97)
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IS NATION'S LARGEST INDUSTRY
A study based on Commerce Department data and sponsored by the American
Electronics Association (AEA) and the Nasdaq stock market says that the
field of information technology (including both computing and
telecommunications) is now the nation's largest industry, ahead of
construction, food products, and automobile manufacturing. And the AEA's
president took the occasion of the study's release to urge lawmakers to
learn more about technology: "Whether we like it or not, high-technology
issues are going to be front and center in Washington and in state capitals
during the next few years. At the state and national level, policy makers
have a lot of positive impressions about the high-technology industry, but
often very little knowledge of it. The biggest public policy threat to the
high-technology field is the ignorance of technology and of how these
industries work." (New York Times 18 Nov 97)
TEXAS EDUCATORS SEE LAPTOPS AS THE $1.25 SOLUTION
Faced with $1.8 billion in projected costs for textbooks over the next six
years, the Texas Board of Education is seriously considering replacing
textbooks with laptop computers that would be lent to the state's 3.7
million students for a cost of $300 million a year. Board Chairman Jack
Christie, who says "there's no way it would not improve student learning,"
asserts that "a year ago we replaced social studies books that still had
Ronald Reagan as President, the Berlin Wall standing and the Soviet Union as
one country. With laptops, you can upgrade that for $1.25." (New York
Times 19 Nov 97)
AOL REACHES TEN MILLION SUBSCRIBERS NOW
America Online has exceeded the 10 million-subscriber level by adding more
than 3 million members in the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan over
the past year. Forrester Research Inc. in Cambridge, Mass., says AOL's new
numbers give it about 20 percent of the world's online population and half
of the online households in the United States, making it a very attractive
advertising medium. (AP 18 Nov 97)
NETSCAPE DISPUTES BROWSER MARKET DATA
Netscape says data compiled by online search engine sites, including Yahoo,
Excite and Infoseek, indicate its Web browser has maintained a 67% share of
the market, contradicting data released earlier from Dataquest indicating
Netscape's portion had fallen to 57.6%. (Investor's Business Daily 28 Nov 97)
7. We Are Running From A New Listserver. . . .
Don't forget that you might well be receiving this from other lists.
Dr. Internet shares a listserver with Project Gutenberg, apologies
to those who have to delete one to get the other.
There are TWO Project Gutenberg Lists. . .volunteers will also want
to subscribe to the "gutvol-l" list AND the "gutnberg" list, simply
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Thanks!!
Happy Holidays!
Michael S. Hart
[hart@pobox.com]
Project Gutenberg
"Ask Dr. Internet"
Executive Director
Internet User ~#100
