That's right. You read the title correctly. Porn wine. You've heard of ice wine, but never "vice wine", right? Groan. If you subscribed to the NY Times you may have read the article about porn star Savanna Samson, whose claim to porn fame is her gyrations in the X-rated "New Devil in Miss Jones." Samson (aka Natalie Oliveros) has launched a signature brand of Italian wine labeled Sogno Uno ("Dream One").

Now, you want to hear something interesting? Wine critic Robert M. Parker Jr. loves it! Yes. The Robert M. Parker, wine critic gave the wine 90 points! Parker claims it is "luscious and oppulent." Yes Mr. Parker, but what about the wine?

Now, how does one go from porn star to vintner?

Odd. Hey you got the $, do what you love, or is it love what you do?

Porn Wine

An important summer project this year involves giving FWD (formerly, Free World Dialup), my 12 year experiment in participatory communications, new life as a standalone self-sustaining membership organization. Nearly one million people participated in FWD activities over the years as the project evolved from tinkering with firmware on PC sound cards to provisioning 700,000 SIP accounts. FWD initiatives include the first VoIP-PSTN interconnect (1995), H.323 interoperability (1998), SIP registration services (2002), SIP Peering (2003), FCC's Pulver Order (2004), pulver.Communicator with video (2005), and prior art for VoIP patents (2007).

FWD represents yet another example of the Internet disrupting the status quo by inserting "participatory" in front of a word like communication or democracy, journalism, and culture. The communication options offered by telephone companies in 1995 started and ended with plain old telephone service (POTS). POTS remains the primary business of the telephone company in 2007, but a long and expanding list of Internet enabled communication options exist for anyone motivated enough to make them work. FWD provides a participatory platform in finding ways to make Internet communications a viable option.

The work of FWD puts it at odds with the telephone company, because telco profits depend on controlling the availability of communication. The desire of people to communicate that makes the telephone companies so profitable comes from the same human need preventing people from accepting limitations to their communication options. Communication serves to build human relationships not to mention provides an essential input to economic activity. People join FWD projects because the telephone company scarcity business model conflicts with the need for six billion people on Earth to communicate.

Existing FWD services will remain free, but implementing a membership model will allow us to fund new services and make FWD self-sustaining. My funding of FWD over the last 12 years departed from any investment logic long ago. The membership fees will not provide a return for the investment, by I hope they remove the limitation my resources have on FWD reaching its potential. Support and maintenance needs of existing FWD services people tell me want can be liberated from my interest in spending on new services. The membership idea represents an experiment in itself in testing whether people will contribute a nominal amount as the price for communication freedom.

I asked Daniel Berninger (dan@danielberninger.com, fwd-12908, pstn- 1.202.250.3838) to lead the next phase in the life of FWD. Dan participated on the founding FWD technical team while still at Bell Labs (I was an IT manager on Wall Street) in 1995. Participatory Communications looks likely to keep the telco's on the defensive judging from the people that have already joined as paid members. One new member runs an Asterisk TrixBox 2.2, a MV-370 Portech gateway to GSM cellular networks, and several Atcom AG-168V single line POTS gateways provisioned to FWD. Suzanne Bowen, VP Super Technologies, Inc and DIDx joined as a business member. Suzanne understands her rapidly growing businss exists as a part of a new communication ecosystem that FWD's participatory communications platform helps evangelize and expand.

Relaunch of FWD community

Under their most recent contract, full-time, port clerical workers earned about $37.50 an hour, or $78,000 a year. They also receive a pension, health care benefits free of premiums, and 20 paid holidays a year.

Berry said Monday that employers' latest offer included raises that over the life of a three-year contract would bump the employees' hourly pay to $39.50; the union is seeking increases that would equal $53 per hour by the last year of the contract.

Go on strike? $37.50 an hour? Damn! I am in the wrong job...

Los Angeles ports facing strike threat

The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has launched the Digital-to-Analog Converter Box Coupon Program (Coupon Program), as authorized in the Digital Television Transition and Public Safety Act of 2005.

Between Jan. 1, 2008, and March 31, 2009, all U.S. households will be eligible to request up to two coupons, worth $40 each, to be used toward the purchase of up to two, digital-to-analog converter boxes, while the initial $990 million allocated for the program is available. If NTIA requests the additional $510 million already authorized by Congress, then coupon requests during this "contingent period" will be limited exclusively to over-the-air households. Details on how to apply for the Coupon Program and our 1-800 number will be established later in 2007.

Digital-to-Analog Converter Box Coupon Program

Goths are well known to be a troubled, sombre people. They are common in our cities, schools and even universities, dressed in black, the colour of evil, and forming strange cliques that no normal person can penetrate or even understand. As the many incidents of school violence in America today have shown, Goths can be very dangerous, because they worship a certain type of evil and have no respect for the rule of law.

ha ha.. I have nothing against the "Goth" lifestyle but this is funny... And to the people who live like this... (Intentionally blank)

Goths and Vampirism - A final solution?

The SoftRock is a small, low-cost, good performing "software defined radio" receiver/transmitter that plugs into a computer USB port and delivers I-Q audio signals to the computer's sound card. It was designed by Tony Parks, KB9YIG and Bill Tracey, KD5TFD as an "SDR sampler project" for hams everywhere to easily try out software defined radio.

These kits are low cost, easy to build, and just plain cool....

The softrock: small, low-cost, good performing 'software defined radio' receiver/transmitter...

Driving across the Bay Area every day, you can't help but hear the great news: HD Radio has arrived! There are now secret stations hiding between the stations you can hear. All you have to do is go out and buy a new HD Radio and you'll hear your old stations in crystal-clear digital, plus secret ones that you've never even heard before. All with no subscription!

But after an investigation of HD Radio units, the stations playing HD, and the company that owns the technology; and some interviews with the wonks in DC, it looks like HD Radio is a high-level corporate scam, a huge carny shill. Do not tune in until your unit comes standard on that used Honda Civic you buy in 2015.

Between the high prices, poor listening options, homogenized content, and a decade and a half of FCC dealings that went into this monopoly, critics are calling the move to digital radio a "catastrophe" and a "complete giveaway" to behemoths such as CBS. Moreover, HD is pretty much a done deal.

Welcome to New Radio, boys and girls. It stinks just like Old Radio, except the smell comes in clearer and there's more of it.

Almost 100 radio amateurs participated in TNCAT '07, the largest and most comprehensive exercise ever conducted by the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA). The exercise, conducted over a 3 day period from June 19-21, was based on a presumed 7.7 magnitude earthquake along the New Madrid Seismic Zone. TEMA's Operations Chief Hank Koebler, Jr, N3ORX, said he was very impressed with the response from the amateur community. "I anticipated a top-notch performance from them, but they exceeded those expectations by far." Throughout the exercise, ARES and MARS continued to provide the bulk of the emergency communications. At the State Emergency Operations Center in Nashville, ARES and MARS operators were set up side-by-side to handle the communications load -- ARES handled voice on VHF/UHF and HF links into the disaster area, while MARS handled all Winlink traffic via HF. In the affected counties in West Tennessee, ARES operators performed damage assessments, provided the sole means of communications for the county Emergency Operations Centers and were the communications workhorses for TEMA's Regional Center in Jackson, Tennessee.

Amateurs Play Key Role in Tennessee Earthquake Exercise

The 2007 Global Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Conference (GAREC-07) is scheduled for Thursday and Friday, August 16-17 in Huntsville, Alabama. GAREC-07 registrants will participate in emergency communications-themed presentations, discussions and demonstrations. The conference will be held just before the 2007 ARRL National Convention and annual Huntsville Hamfest, which take place on Saturday and Sunday, August 18-19.

In 2005, current IARU Region 1 Emergency Communications Coordinator Seppo Sisatto, OH1VR, organized the first GAREC meeting in Tampere, Finland. Tampere was the site of an intergovernmental conference where the Tampere Convention was adopted -- an international treaty that facilitates the use of telecommunications in humanitarian assistance. In 2006, GAREC met in Tampere for the second time, in connection with the International Conference on Emergency Communications (ICEC-2006) and the United Nations Working Group on Emergency Telecommunications.

According to IARU International Coordinator for Emergency Communications Hans Zimmermann, F5VKP/HB9AQS, "…GAREC wants to be a forum for the exchange of information. Many IARU Member Societies and specialized emergency communications groups have developed and implemented emergency concepts. Many others want to benefit from their technical, operational and, not the least, their administrative or even 'political' experiences when establishing the necessary cooperation with partners in emergency and disaster response. GAREC also developed new concepts, such as the 'Center of Activity Frequencies,' meanwhile adopted by the IARU Region 1 and 3 conferences."

The packed GAREC-07 agenda includes reviews of advanced digital technologies and their applications to emergency telecommunications. The ARRL Alabama Section, Zimmerman said, "leads the way" with respect to D-STAR repeater systems, activities and users. There will also be a demonstration of the Automatic Packet Reporting System (APRS), another capability of the Amateur Radio Services. Zimmerman noted, "A demonstration of [APRS'] capabilities found much interest among the delegates of the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Turkey last November."

Zimmerman added that EchoLink and eQSO are "yet more such tools, and specialized groups have developed emergency applications for these modes. More technologies are being developed or have become available already. The two days in August will be packed with practical information, and experts will arrange demonstrations of the capabilities of 21st century Amateur Radio!" Emergency communication vehicles and equipment will be on hand throughout the conference.

Huntsville to Host Global EmComm Conference in August

"If you arrange to provide patent protection to some of the people who get the software from you, that protection is automatically extended to everyone who receives the software, no matter how they get it," Smith said in a statement. "This means that the patent protection Microsoft has extended to Novell's customers would be extended to everyone who uses any software Novell distributes under GPLv3."

Microsoft sees things differently.

Microsoft tries evading new GPL grasp | Tech News on ZDNet