] California (Reuters) -- A company calling itself Lover
] Spy has begun offering a way for jealous lovers -- and
] anyone else -- to spy on the computer activity of their
] mates by sending an electronic greeting, the equivalent
] of a thinking-of-you card, that doubles as a bugging
] device.
]
] Computer security experts said the Lover Spy service and
] software appeared to violate U.S. law, but also said the
] surveillance program pointed to an increasingly common
] way for hackers to seize control of computers.
]
] Marketed as a way to "catch a cheating lover," the Lover
] Spy company offers to send an e-mail greeting card to
] lure the victim to a Web site that will download onto the
] victim's computer a trojan program to be used for spying.

Illegal e-cards to spy on your lover

] Sept. 30, 2003 | JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) -- A
] 2-year-old girl survived on ketchup, mustard and dried
] pasta for nearly three weeks after she was left home
] alone while her mother served time in jail.

] The little girl had been left alone since her mother
] was jailed Sept. 10 for aggravated assault and petty
] theft. The mother was charged Monday with child abuse,
] and was being held Tuesday on $20,000 bond.

Salon.com News | Toddler recovering after 2 1/2 weeks alone

] ATLANTA -- Here's a way to really target a consumer.
]
] Next summer, Coca-Cola plans to use satellites to find
] U.S. buyers who happen to purchase special cans of Coke
] products.
]
] They will be winners in a giveaway that will feature
] Hummer H2 sport-utility vehicles. The giant vehicles will
] be presented in person, using satellites to locate the
] recipients. And in a promotion tied to the Summer
] Olympics, Coke's prize is likely to be $1 million in
] gold, again awarded on the spot.

neat

GPS will pinpoint Coke prize winners

] Commentator Rush Limbaugh resigned Wednesday night from
] ESPN's Sunday NFL Countdown amid a firestorm that erupted
] over the controversial statements he made this past
] weekend about Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan
] McNabb.
]
] Later Wednesday, the National Enquirer and New York Daily
] News reported that Limbaugh was under investigation in
] Florida for illegally buying and abusing prescription
] painkillers.

LMAO!!!

] "My comments this past Sunday were directed at the media
] and were not racially motivated. I offered an opinion,"
] Limbaugh said in a statement released by ESPN. "This
] opinion has caused discomfort to the crew, which I
] regret.
]
] "I love NFL Sunday Countdown and do not want to be a
] distraction ... Therefore, I have decided to resign," he
] said.
]
] "We accept his resignation and regret the circumstances
] surrounding this," said George Bodenheimer, president of
] ESPN and ABC Sports.
]
] Limbaugh said Sunday that McNabb received undeserved
] credit for his team's success that came from media
] outlets with "social concern" and "very desirous that a
] black quarterback do well."

Who the hell at ESPN woke up one day and decided "Ya know, America isn't subjected to enough of this blow-hard on the airwaves as it is. Lets expand his soap box and make him a sports commentator."

Weird.

LB

Limbaugh quits NFL show amid race flap

Museum security guards stood by nervously Thursday as curators -- joking they hoped the gem's storied curse wouldn't rub off -- allowed a reporter and photographer to hold the diamond briefly after it was removed from its case for scientific study.

What does it feel like to hold such a priceless gem, one of the most famed in the world?

The first thought that comes to mind is "Wow!"

It's like holding a bit of ancient India, the French Revolution, Georgian England and Gilded Age America in one magnificent moment.
You cradle the 45.5-carat stone -- heavier than its translucence makes it appear -- turning it from side to side as the light flashes from its facets, knowing it's the hardest natural material yet fearful of dropping it.

Once part of the French crown jewels, the fabled gem is now the star of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. It normally resides in a special protective display case in a secure room.

For the testing it was taken to a museum laboratory, reachable down winding corridors and through three locked doors. It was only the second time in 20 years the Hope has been removed from its necklace setting, where it is surrounded by bright clear diamonds that intensify its blue color.

National Gem Collection Curator Jeffrey Post ordered the lights turned off and focused an ultraviolet beam on the Hope Diamond. Then he switched off the beam and, in pitch dark, the diamond glowed bright orange-amber.

It's that strong color, which lasts for several seconds after the diamond is exposed to ultraviolet light, that intrigues scientists. What causes the gem to fluoresce remains a mystery. Post speculates it's related to chemical impurities that give it that blue color.

But the Hope Diamond has inspired legends over the years and some may prefer those to sheer science.

Some say, for instance, that the glowing color reflects the blood of royalty spilled in the French Revolution and the trail of bad luck said to have followed the stone over many years -- including the bankruptcy of the Hope family for whom it is named and the death of the young son of later owner Evalyn McLean.

Hope Diamond glows with mystery

] In a hotly contested lawsuit before a federal appeals
] court, two peer-to-peer companies are about to gain a
] vast army of allies: America's librarians.
]
] The five major U.S. library associations are planning to
] file a legal brief Friday siding with Streamcast Networks
] and Grokster in the California suit, brought by the major
] record labels and Hollywood studios. The development
] could complicate the Recording Industry Association of
] America's efforts to portray file-swapping services as
] rife with spam and illegal pornography.
]
] According to an attorney who has seen the document, the
] brief argues that Streamcast--distributor of the Morpheus
] software--and Grokster should not be shut down. It asks
] the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold the April
] decision by a Los Angeles judge that dismissed much of
] the entertainment industry's suit against the two
] peer-to-peer companies.
]
] Among the groups signing the brief are the American
] Library Association (ALA), the Association of Research
] Libraries, the American Association of Law Libraries, the
] Medical Library Association and the Special Libraries
] Association. The American Civil Liberties Union, in one
] of the group's first forays into copyright law, has
] drafted the brief opposing the Motion Picture Association
] of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association
] of America (RIAA).

Librarians to the rescue!

BusinessWeek Online: News from C|Net.com

] Activists have also questioned the political affiliations
] of the leading voting companies. Late last year, Harris
] found that Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, used
] to run the voting company that provided most of the
] voting machines in his state. And in August, the
] Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that Walden O'Dell, the
] CEO of Diebold, is a major fundraiser for President Bush.
] In a letter to fellow Republicans, O'Dell said that he
] was "COMMITTED TO HELPING OHIO DELIVER ITS ELECTORAL
] VOTES TO THE PRESIDENT NEXT YEAR."
]
] But the problems Harris found in Diebold's system are
] perhaps the best proof yet that electronic voting systems
] aren't ready for prime time. Indeed, the vulnerabilities
] in the software, as well as the internal memos, raise
] questions about the legitimacy of the California recall
] election. In its ruling, the 9th Circuit Court put the
] election on hold until the six counties that currently
] use punch-card systems -- six counties that comprise 44
] percent of the state's voters -- upgrade their systems.
] On Monday, 11 judges on the 9th Circuit reheard the
] recall case; they may very well allow the election to go
] ahead on Oct. 7. If the recall vote is put on hold until
] March, however, many may wonder whether to trust the
] results: Four of the six punch-card counties -- including
] the largest, Los Angeles and San Diego -- have plans to
] upgrade to Diebold machines by March.

Very good article, with links to Diebold's internal memos, on the electronic voting systems.

Salon.com Technology | An open invitation to election fraud

] A federal judge in Oklahoma has ruled that the Federal
] Trade Commission overstepped its authority in creating a
] national do-not-call list against telemarketers.
]
] The ruling came in a lawsuit brought by telemarketers who
] challenged the list, comprised of names of people who do
] not want to receive business solicitation calls. The
] immediate impact of Tuesday's ruling was not clear.
]
] U.S. District Judge Lee West sided in favor of the
] plaintiffs, U.S. Security, Chartered Benefit Services
] Inc., Global Contact Services Inc., InfoCision Management
] Corp. and Direct Marketing Association Inc.
]
] The telemarketing industry estimates that the do-not-call
] list could cut its business in half, costing it up to $50
] billion in sales each year.

Tough shit if they lose money. Its an iffy business model anyway - call huge volumes of phone numbers until you find a sucker who will buy your crap? Ummm... doesn't that sound an awful lot like SPAMMING? And I'd think this list would actually HELP their business - weeds out the people who do not want these calls.

I wonder how much this judge was paid off by the telemarketing industry?

LB

Court blocks 'do not call' list

] Gaiman sees himself as part of the age-old profession of
] storytellers, but unlike a lot of the tiresome people who
] go around referring to themselves that way, he's right.
] His fiction, in its various media (he also writes screen-
] and radio plays), induces that blissful, semi-hypnotic
] state most of us first experienced as children, when the
] power of a book seemed to erase the world around us, and
] when reading felt almost like a drug. Gaiman is
] interested in all the traditional forms of storytelling
] -- legends, folk and fairy tales, myth -- and not just in
] the stories themselves, but the ways they get told. Not
] surprisingly, the hero of the Sandman epic is Morpheus,
] the King of Dreams, who also presides over stories.
]
] Gaiman certainly wasn't the first comics writer to draw
] on ancient myths, but he could be the first to really
] understand how myths work, not just as motifs but as
] nodes of meaning that gain new layers as we attach new
] experiences to old stories. For example, the Egyptian god
] Osiris, the Norse god Balder, Jesus and John F. Kennedy
] are all very different figures and yet -- in some
] fundamental way having to do with how we understand them
] -- also the same. As the British writer C.S. Lewis (a
] major influence on Gaiman) pointed out, a myth is a story
] that can be told and retold in very different ways and
] yet remain essentially intact. There is no original or
] correct version of the Orpheus myth, just countless ways
] of revealing it, and even people who haven't heard the
] traditional Greek version recognize it as something
] powerful when they meet it in another form.

Anything dealing with Neil Gaiman is worth reading. Salon takes a crack at trying to explain the mass appeal of Neil, despite the fact that he continues to go back to the medium of comic books. I have been an avid fan of his since 1988 when The Sandman began and am constantly trying to introduce his works to more and more people.

The enchanter

] According to ACLU legal papers, local police, acting at
] the direction of the Secret Service, violated the rights
] of protesters in two ways: people expressing views
] critical of the government were moved further away from
] public officials while those with pro-government views
] were allowed to remain closer; or everyone expressing a
] view was herded into what is commonly known as a
] protest zone, leaving those who merely
] observe, but express no view, to remain closer.

American Civil Liberties Union : Secret Service Ordered Local Police to Restrict Anti-Bush Protesters at Rallies, ACLU Charges in Unprecedented Nationwide Lawsuit