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Daynotes Journal

Week of 20 September 1999

Sunday, 26 September 1999 10:47

A (mostly) daily journal of the trials, tribulations, and random observations of Robert Bruce Thompson, a writer of computer books.


 

 

 

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Monday, 20 September 1999

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Barbara is back, thank goodness. She'd told me that the bus would arrive between 5:00 and 7:00 p.m. I got there about 4:45 p.m. to find Barbara, her sister, and her parents standing in the parking lot waiting for me. We packed their luggage in the back of the Isuzu Trooper. If I drove anything smaller we wouldn't have been able to get all the people and all the luggage in. After quick side trips to drop Barbara's sister at her house and Barbara's parents at their house, we headed home.

My mother is delighted, the dogs are delighted, and I'm delighted. No more peanut-butter and jelly sandwiches for dinner. We'll have meals again.

* * * * *

I've dispensed with using the <meta http-equiv="pragma" content="no-cache"> meta tag. I'd gotten zero feedback from people who wanted to keep it, and a couple of messages from people who didn't like it. So away it goes.

* * * * *

Here's some more nastiness from Network Solutions, those obnoxious dot-com people. I received a spam message from them the other day. The following vicious little warning was at the bottom:

If you do not wish to receive e-mail from Network Solutions, click on this e-mail address <mailto:netsolremove@integram.org> and type "remove" in the subject line. PLEASE NOTE: by opting to be removed from this list we will not be able to communicate to you, in real-time, on issues regarding your account.

Now isn't that something? They're claiming the right to spam me unless I refuse to accept any mail from them at all, including mail relating to my account, which is the only thing I'm interested in hearing from them about. The sanctimonious bastards. I hate NSI more than I hate Microsoft, and that's saying something.

* * * * *

Brian Bilbrey posted a query on his page yesterday, asking what favicon.ico was, and why browsers kept asking for it. I'd wondered the same thing myself. I did a quick search on Northern Light and found this page, which explains it all. As it turns out, it's a new feature in IE5. When someone bookmarks a page, IE5 requests favicon.ico to associate with that bookmark. That allows webmasters to display a custom icon next to the bookmarked entry, which in theory makes people more likely to re-visit the site. I played around with it a bit, but couldn't get it to work properly, at least on my local copy of this site. Perhaps it will work better when I publish.

Favicon.ico has some strict limits, including a 16 X 16 pixel size in only 16 colors. I didn't have an icon editor handy, so I used IrfanView. As the basis for my test icon, I used my photo from the upper left corner, which is 120 X 120 pixels in 256 colors. I won't say that it's still recognizable when crunched down to 16 X 16 X 16, but you can kind of tell what it is if you've already seen the full size picture. Not bad, given that it's reduced to about 2% of its original size and 1/16 the color depth.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary M. Berg [mailto:Gary_Berg@ibm.net]
Sent: Sunday, September 19, 1999 11:52 AM
To: Robert Bruce Thompson
Subject: Question on Email

Bob,

I've got a query about setting up an email-forwarding domain. I'd like to have my wife and I have a shared domain name, myowndomain.com for example. Similarly to what you do at least for Barbara, I'd like to have that domain forward the email on to my current POP3 address.

Now, I can do this with bigfoot.com, and also the iName.com (or has the name changed), but, of course, I can't randomly select the domain name.

I ran across mydomain.com, which seems to offer pretty much exactly what I would like, and was wondering if you (or any of your readers) have had any experience with them. They'd let me have up to 5 forwards plus a catch-all address.

I'm not looking to host a web site, so I'd really like to keep the costs down to just the InterNIC fees if possible.

Are you aware of any services which provide this sort of capability for a small fee?

In order to have your own domain name, you need someone to provide primary and secondary DNS. Any web hosting company can do that, but if you want to avoid significant setup and monthly charges, you'll have to check the policies of web hosting companies until you find one that provides what you want for what you're willing to pay. pair Networks, for example, would require their Basic account at $10 setup and $8.95 a month to accomplish what you want to do, but I think you can do better than that. In my travels on the web, I've seen places that are willing to provide domain name hosting and mail forwarding services for something like $10 setup and $4 a month, but I can't remember which ones do that. You might check my links page for the various sites that rate hosting services (TopHosts.com, etc.) and check some of the hosting services they cover. Also, one of my readers may know a better way.

Incidentally, if all you want is a domain name to consolidate your mail, you can avoid paying InterNIC $70 for the first two years and then $35/year by getting a geographic domain name (e.g. thompson.winston-salem.nc.us) for free or close to it (or at least you could the last time I looked).

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Svenson Sjon [mailto:sjon@svenson.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 19, 1999 2:36 PM
To: Robert Thompson
Subject: Toolfree cases +

Actually tool free cases are better build than your average cheap case. First someone had to think about how the thing will be setup and secondly, because the snap on and snap open bits cannot be designed to support forces in all directions the design must be such that stresses are directed to other parts. Tool free cases are better designed because they have to.

Of course tool requiring cases can be well designed as well only, you don't see that on cheap boxes.

One of the best cases I have come across recently are the A-Open cases. Well built, no sharp edges, removable supports. I have never seen a PPC case of course :-/ .

Regards,
Svenson

True. A well-designed tool-free case may be more rigid than a poorly designed conventional case. My real point was that a well-designed conventional case is probably inherently more robust than any case that is not secured with screws. I have no experience with AOpen cases, but I've heard enough good things about them from readers that I'm prepared to concede that they're probably pretty good cases.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: WlshWizard@aol.com [mailto:WlshWizard@aol.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 19, 1999 6:49 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Re: ATX Testbed

You'd think we would all have learned about using the cables that come with the cards... The other bane of my life is trying in some way to clean the dust out from inside a CDROM... they make those things like Fort Knox. And to what end??

I have been very impressed with the improvements in design with the ATX desktop format - enough room to swing a cat; but they still haven't solved the problem of putting IDE, floppy, parallel and serial connectors too close together on the motherboard. As for the convoluted, rollercoaster rides through which my drive cables take themselves... perhaps Firewire or IEEE1394 is the answer to my prayers, let's wait and hope...

All the best,
Mike.

Every CD-ROM drive I've ever seen has been sealed up tighter than the proverbial drum. I suspect it's required by law because of the laser it contains. I've never had much luck cleaning filthy CD-ROM drives. You can sometimes use a vacuum cleaner to suck out some of the dust. Years ago, back when CD-ROM drives were fairly expensive, I successfully cleaned a filthy one by swishing it around in a bucket of rubbing alcohol and then letting it dry thoroughly. One guy told me that he dunked his in his ultrasonic cleaner with good results. But I can't recommend either of those procedures.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: David Yerka [mailto:leshaworks@iname.com]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 8:33 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: re. Bootable CD's

Tom Syroid wrote:

Is there anything stopping me from making a "bootable" CD-R? Stop me anywhere I'm wrong here, but:

A CD auto-runs when it finds a file named AUTORUN.INF, right? And AUTORUN.INF is just a text file, right? So I put command.com and a few other incidentals on the CD, and add an AUTORUN file to point to command.com Plus I put the BIOS update on it Reboot, and if I get the AUTORUN.INF right, it loads command.com The notebook doesn't know whether I've booted from a floppy or a CD (yes, no?) I then run the BIOS update file (an EXE), which, in theory, Should update my ThinkPad's BIOS.

See any holes here? Does the AUTORUN file have to be in any particular position on the CD?

Actually it isn't quite that easy. The AUTORUN.INF file is a Win9x animal--it is designed to work in the GUI enviroment AFTER Window's has booted. Most BIOS upgrades want "clean machine" installation: nothing booted but Command.com in "real mode".

You can use Adaptec's software to create a bootable CD. It basically consists of creating an image of a bootable floppy's information on the CD. You get 2 "image" files created on the CD as a first step in the burn of the CD and then the rest of the files you designate are burnt. Note that there can be some problems here--those first files are copied off a bootable floppy which needs to be in the floppy drive. Considering floppy transfer rates this can lead to buffer under-run and the creation of a "coaster". Be VERY sure to test first before burning. Also be sure to use ISO format and 8.3 names.

Of course, this is one of the reasons the CD appears as drive A. In effect, to gain booting, we are turning the CD into a (very large) floppy drive that is readonly.

I've seen inconsistant results with this procedure also. For some strange reason, some computers don't like CD-R's as bootable CD's. Several of my clients use Emachines and I've found that while they are O.K. with their own recovery CDs (bootable image restores) a "home burnt" image doesn't always work.

David Yerka

BTW: If the machine is a lucky one you can even create bootable CD-RW disks (in ISO format, of course.)

Good points. Thanks.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 6:41 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Directory listing

If I go to http://www.ttgnet.com/daynotes/ I get a directory listing, and can go up a level too - you may not mind this, but I've tried to avoid it as I don't want people getting that sort of access. It's a server setting I think, or maybe a FP thing to turn it off. Nope, it's an IIS thing here so I assume there's some server setting to stop it if you don't want it to happen.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk/

Thanks. I don't have direct control of my server (my site resides on a pair Networks server in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), but perhaps there is an Apache configuration file or something that I could create or edit to stop this behavior. One way I do know to stop it is to put an index.html file in each directory. You'll note that if you keep going up the directory tree on my site, once you get to root it displays the home page for the site rather than a directory listing for root. I suppose I could put a dummy index.html page in each directory to prevent people from browing the underlying files, but I've never considered it worth the bother. Perhaps I'm missing something. My readers may be able to tell us if there are any significant drawbacks to leaving the directories world readable.

* * * * *

The following exchange with Chris Ward-Johnson (Dr. Keyboard) started with my reply to his journal entry for Saturday, 18 September, where he noted that he didn't usually get to watch anything starring Rowan Atkinson, whom his wife loathes:

Fortunately, my wife thinks RA is as funny as I do. We have the whole BA series on tape. She actually bought them for me for Christmas a few years ago.

I must say, though, that Mr. Bean left us both flat. All except for the one where he turned out overhead light by shooting it.

I've been reading about you and guns recently. I suppose you also liked the bit in Independence Day where the newsreader appealed to the denizens of Los Angeles to stop shooting at the alien spacecraft. Being a wishy-washy liberal, I have to deplore the use of guns, of course. Pass the tofu, darling.

I can't remember if I saw Independence Day or not. I don't watch many movies. I wait for the book.

If that was the one where the black guy (Will something-or-other?) punched out the alien and then dragged him, that was my favorite part.

Liberal, huh? That's one of the reasons I like being a libertarian. I have common ground with either a liberal or a conservative if I'm in a polite mood, and something to argue with either of them about if I feel like arguing.

P.S. I understand that your Lancasters originally tried dropping tofu on Mr. Hitler and his friends, but that didn't work. Or perhaps it was propaganda leaflets.

P.P.S. Okay, a liberal is "knee-jerk" and a conservative is "hide-bound". So what is the generally accepted pejorative for a libertarian?

Yeah, that was Independence day. Not sure if there's a book of the film, there sure wasn't much plot to fill out more than a couple of chapters. It's only an allegory for Americans' fear of Commies anyway, with aliens replacing the Cubans/Nicaraguans/Some Other Third World Peasants Armed With Bolt-Action Rifles And Sticks.

Libertarian, huh? My only personal encounters with libertarians were during my student days, when the student wing of the Conservative party (then prop. M. Thatcher) was taken over by people who called themselves libertarians but who really wanted anarchy. They were the Federation of Conservative Students or FCS, which we re-named in my Commie-backed student paper (printed on the presses of the Socialist Workers Party, no less) the Fascist Confederation of Students (humour has never been a strong suit of the left). Got them disbanded, too, when we goaded them over the top into saying something dreadful which now slips my mind about Mrs T. Several are now senior Members of Parliament, government advisors, media figures and so on. Mind you so are many of the communist/socialists who were student leaders at the time, and everyone now has remarkably similar politics (i.e. shut up, this is harder than we thought, no I never had principles, when's the next junket somewhere warm?)

As for the Lancasters well, I'm just grateful that the good old US of A jumps in to save our ass halfway through the important wars (I, II, Falklands and Desert Storm - oops, last two not officially wars), it's just a pity you can't win the ones you start yourselves, har har har. Well, not since you whupped us, anyway.

Liberals over here (with a small l, as there's a real political party called The Liberals) are wishy-washy, not knee-jerk. Conservatives are hide-bound though, and much more too. Don't know about libertarians, I'll ask my Australian socialist friend what he reckons.

Hey, we should do the hand-gun debate some day, now that they're illegal in most of Yoorp. I'll say how evil they are, you can say how banning them means only the bad guys have them and we can take it from there. France is different to the UK - even traffic wardens carry side arms here, whereas in the UK they're giving less and less coppers guns. Now they're in (a very few) special cars with the guns locked in armoured safes in the boot which can only be unlocked when they get special orders from a Chief Constable, a bit like the submarine commander receiving his 'push the button' orders I guess.

As far as winning the ones we start, someone once observed that we'd never lost a war when we had a Department of War, and have never won one since we've had a Department of Defense.

I'd be happy to engage in the handgun debate with you. But to make it more interesting, how about if we switch sides? I'll do the "handguns are evil" part and you can defend them. On second thought, no. I can debate either side of most issues, but not that one.

* * * * *

18:35: Steve Tucker has a nice little bit on the "Irhe Papieren, Bitte" routine one has to go through to board an airline flight nowadays. I like his idea of giving the Nazi salute and clicking his heels. "Jawohl, Herr Kommissar! An Ihren Ordnungen!" But I'm afraid he'd end up late for his meeting if he did that. Yet another reason I won't get on an airplane.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 9:44 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE: Directory listing

Do an index.html with an automatic redirect back up to somewhere sensible, perhaps, like your root index.html - that way you could just make the page once and copy it into the relevant directories.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk/

Yep, that's an idea. Or I could just cobble up a standard "Access Denied" page and use that as my index.html in all but root.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Scott McIntyre [mailto:smcintyr@mail.com]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 10:52 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: favicon.ico

Hi,

Here's a cute postscript to the favicon.ico explanation for all Microsoft haters. Apparently MS didn't bother to add any check for the validity of the icon. So if you bookmarked a page that had an invalid icon, it would crash IE. Oops. Once upon a time, I tried it and it worked. I'm just not sure whether that was with the beta or with the release version. Anyway, here's a link I found about it:

Also, here's the official MS page on the whole favicon thing. 

Scott

Thanks. Frankly, I think this whole favicon.ico thing is kind of dumb. I mean, if readers don't have a better reason to keep coming back to my page than that I have a cute icon, I should probably give it all up.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Werth, Timothy P [mailto:timothy.werth@eds.com]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 10:57 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: favicon.ico

Bob,

Yep, I can see your VERY small head on the icon now. Like you said it is recognizable if you know what you're looking at.

L8r,
Tim

Yeah, if I really cared about this I'd have to come up with a better icon. I wonder who it is at Microsoft that makes the decision to waste time and coding resources implementing stuff like this when the core products are still buggier than hell.

 


 

 

 

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Tuesday, 21 September 1999

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The main bad news about the earthquake in Taiwan, of course, is that it killed and injured thousands of people and did billions in property damage. Beyond that, however, it is also likely to have a noticeable impact on availability and pricing of many computer components, this just in time for Christmas.

The earthquake interested me particularly, coming as it did only a couple of days after I finished 8.4. That was a really bad novel, but it did remind me of one thing I'd forgotten. When people think about earthquakes in the US, they think about California, which experiences mild to moderate earthquakes continually, moderately severe earthquakes periodically, and severe earthquakes often enough to be worrisome. But, because of the underlying rock structure in California, earthquakes are relatively localized. That is, even a severe earthquake doesn't do much damage beyond a 100 mile or so radius. A really severe earthquake, one the level of the book's title or more (similar to the Alaska quake of 1964), could destroy Los Angeles and kill tens or even hundreds of thousands of people. But its severe effects would not be likely to extend much beyond the LA metro area.

The worst earthquake area in the US, in terms of potential for truly catastrophic quakes, lies in the central US, centered on the New Madrid Seismic Zone in the bootheel area of Missouri. This is the area that experienced three extremely severe quakes within a one month period in 1811-1812. These quakes are acknowledged by nearly everyone to have been 8+ on the Richter scale, and have been estimated by some to have been as high as 9.0. Almost certainly they were the most severe quakes to hit the US since Europeans arrived here.

The underlying rock in that area is old and hard. That means that a severe quake would have effects far beyond the local area. The 1811-1812 earthquakes, for example, were felt in Boston and Toronto, and broke windows in Philadelphia. Another 8.5 quake in the NMSZ could cause massive destruction over a huge area, one that encompasses many major cities, including Memphis, St. Louis, Indianapolis, and even possibly Chicago.

I don't know how good that author's earthquake science is (the rest of his stuff was plagued by technical inaccuracies), but I do recall reading years ago about the NMSZ and its potential threat.

* * * * *

We have another Border Collie coming to live with us for a week or so. Skye, a seven month old male, has already been adopted, but his master has to travel out to Colorado for a week, so Barbara offered to keep Skye here. She hates the idea of having a pet dog put in a kennel.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Holden Aust [mailto:hausth@netscape.net]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 9:42 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Computer Speakers or real HiFi speakers?

If you haven't already gotten some speakers for your new computer (or maybe even if you have already gotten some) check out the Cambridge Soundworks Model 6 speakers at www.hifi.com. They're on sale now for $199 a pair and I don't think you can find better sounding speakers for anything close to that price. They were designed by Henry Kloss, who was a co-designer of the original AR speakers, then he was the "K" of KLH, then he founded Advent, and developed the Dolby-B audio cassette and projection TV and Cambridge Soundworks is his most recent company. They are guaranteed for 10 years and they offer a 30-day trial with a money back guarantee (I bet they don't have to take many back). Cambridge also makes a couple of excellent Sub-Woofer/Satellite speaker systems for PCs, the Soundworks and the Microworks, which are very good sounding self-contained systems, although I don't think they sound as good as the Model 6s.

If those are too large, try the NHT Super One or Super Zero speakers, available from Crutchfield. They are smaller than the Model 6s and do not have as low a bass response, but they sound pretty good, too. I've read an interview with the designer of the NHTs (Now Hear This) who also designs some of the AR speakers (they are both owned now by the same conglomerate). He said he designed the ARs so that 90% of your CDs would sound great, while he designed the NHTs so that 90% of your CDs would sound like the crap that they are, i.e. the ARs would smooth out the poor engineering of the average CD and the NHTs would mercilessly reveal their flaws. On the other hand, when you have a really good recording the NHTs will reveal all its glory.

I agree with your thoughts on the superiority of a receiver and conventional speakers over typical "computer speakers". No contest, plus if you get a decent CD player, like the Philips or Marantz CD players (all CD players do NOT sound alike, despite what some people allege), you'll have a very listenable hifi.

Thanks. The NHTs are a bit out of my price range for a set of computer speakers, but the ARs are a real possibility. I think a set of truly good speakers would be overkill, given the poor audio environment in PCs. But a real home audio amplifier coupled with a decent set of bookshelf speakers would certainly sound a lot better than typical computer speakers.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: bdenman [mailto:bdenman@ftc-i.net]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 10:49 PM
To: Robert Bruce Thompson
Subject: airport security

Bob,

I know you grit your teeth against much government bureauracy, rules and waste and I agree that some airport security questions do seen inane and inappropriate. But I do appreciate what they are trying to do and I am sure the airline employees hate asking those questions as much as you (or Steve) does. Perhaps the feds should back off and modify it for non-international traffic. But in my mind equating that security routine to Hitler and Nazism is a bit much. But, that is only my opinion.

Flying is indeed sometimes an adventure. My trip in May to Alaska got off to a bad start when Delta canceled the flight from Atlanta that was to do a turn around at Columbia and then go back. They did not say but am fairly certain it was weather related due to thunderstorms around Atlanta. From Atlanta I was to catch another Delta flight out to Utah and on to Anchorage. Local agents were able to reroute me on USAIR westward (through Charlotte) with little delay so all ended up well. Delta did teach me there are always alternatives...even from here :)

Later

Bruce

ps: got a chuckle out of your 16x16x16 icon <g>

Well, I certainly don't appreciate what they are trying to do. What they are doing is violating the Constitution's prohibition against warrantless searches, as well as First Amendment guarantees of free speech, and probably other things that don't immediately come to mind. And in exchange for what? A false sense of security, at best. And as I have observed many times, those who are willing to trade their freedom for an illusion of security end up having neither.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: bdenman [mailto:bdenman@ftc-i.net]
Sent: Monday, September 20, 1999 11:51 PM
To: Robert Bruce Thompson
Subject: More airplane stuff

Bob,

As luck would have it, I just ran across a newspaper article from this past Sunday in "The State" (Columbia, SC) titled: "Flying today has become huge mess" and talks about the horrendous mess at US airports. 

The author Grant Jackson had a horror story in line with Steve's...botched scheduling, etc. Quoting his closing sentence: "As for arrivals, 67.1 percent of the arrivals in Columbia were on time, which is just about in line with most airports." ouch

Bruce

Hmm. We should just be able to buy a ticket and get on the plane. No searches, no questions, no nothing. Smoke if you got 'em.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 4:50 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE:

I've never said I like tofu, in fact I hate the stuff. When asked, I always say I'm a carnivore and regard the sausage as an honorary vegetable.

I meant unhealthy in the way I have an unhealthy interest in computers and foie gras - the former keeps me up until 3am and the latter will kill me. I meant it jokingly, sorry if it wasn't funny. I realise that you have a huge problem over there with handguns. It would be fine if everyone was responsible and grown up about using them, but - at least from what we see on TV over here - it sure doesn't look that way. Is it correct that once you've bought a handgun there's no sort of register whereby those who'd like to know can't find out who owns what?

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk/

Sorry. I thought your comment, "Pass the tofu, darling" meant you liked it. I can't imagine how anyone could, but de re gustibus and all that.

I don't think we have a huge problem with handguns over here, other than that they're too hard to get and tightly controlled. It used to be that one could simply walk into a hardware store, plunk down the cash, and carry the pistol home. Nowadays, there are all kinds of forms to fill out, background checks to be made, waiting periods before one can get possession of the pistol, and so on.

Even worse are all the ridiculous laws about carrying a pistol. With the sole exception of Vermont, which is the only state with rational gun laws (that is to say, no gun laws at all), all states make it difficult or impossible to carry a concealed weapon for personal protection. So we end up with a situation where law-abiding people are disarmed and criminals, who have bigger things to worry about than violating gun laws, are armed. It is no coincidence that Vermont is at the bottom of the lists by state of crime in general and violent crime in particular.

That also holds true more generally. Those cities and states with the strongest gun control laws have the highest crime and violence rates. The correlation is undeniable. Neither is it a chicken-and-egg thing. That is, it's not a situation where cities or states with "naturally" high crime rates passed stricter gun control laws in response to their crime problems. Comparing two comparable cities with greatly differing gun control laws always shows that the city with the stricter gun control laws has a higher rate of violent crimes. Similarly, cities that have liberalized their gun control laws find that violent crime drops precipitously.

I remember reading several years ago about one city in Florida that liberalized gun laws. They made it very easy for women to get permits to carry a concealed weapon, and in fact offered training course. The rate of rapes, muggings, and other violent crimes against women immediately dropped to something like 25% of what it had been. The other interesting thing was that accidental shootings and shooting during domestic disturbances (which anti-gun people always claim go up when gun laws are loosened) in fact dropped. And such accidents are always lower in areas with looser gun control laws.

* * * * *

12:45: Skye has arrived. Think of the Tasmanian Devil, but faster. It's going to be an interesting week. At least Barbara will be able to cut down on Duncan's walks. Both Duncan and Skye have spent the last hour charging around the house at top speed, with occasional thirty second breaks to get a drink. Getting enough exercise isn't going to be a problem for them. They've just now settled down for a quick nap as I write this. Recharging the batteries, I'm sure. It'll soon be back to roaring around.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 10:50 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE:

Sorry, 'Pass the tofu' was British Irony, indicating the sort of thing a vegan tree-hugger would say and I wouldn't.

I understand what you're saying about guns, and I think the situation is most politely described as 'regretable'. It would be my first choice to have no guns for anyone but, as they say in Ireland (the peaceful part in the south, when asked for directions), you can't get there from here. There's some film where a mugger pulls out a gun to mug someone on the New York subway and immediately everyone else in the carriage pulls out their weapons, whereupon he surrenders. Amusing but a sad position to have reached. Unfortunately, too, it can only work where everyone is armed, and armed better than the criminals, and then you get into escalation; today we all have revolvers, tomorrow Uzis, the day after Bren guns (aside: there was an amusing incident several years ago when I worked at the News of the World, Britain's leading scumbag gutterpress tabloid newspaper which sells about 6 million copies every Sunday. The Chief Crime Reporter got into an argument with the editor about how easy it was to buy guns on the streets of London, and I told him about a pub on the Old Kent Road near where I'd lived where the landlord boasted you could buy anything. He went down there and tried to buy a hand gun and was taken around the back of the pub by a chap who opened his car boot and offered him a selection of Bren guns. He bought one for £600, about $1000 and brought it back to the office to be photographed with it before going to the cops. Last year a film came out in the UK called Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels in which one of the villains uses a Bren gun instead of a sawn-off shotgun). The problem with the escalation is, where and how can you stop it? 'Arm us' only works if everyone is armed, because those without arms now cannot rely on the forces of law and order to protect them, clearly, and I have to ask - if I live in a country which wants to call itself civilised, why should I have to carry a lethal weapon just so I don't get my wallet ripped off every time I pop to the corner shop for 20 Rothmans?

What's the answer? More cops? More guns? I don't think I know, but I equally don't think that many are entirely happy with the way things are going at the moment. Like I said, you can't get where I'd like to be from here. It's interesting what you say about the checks, which were introduced, I presume, to stop the crazies getting hold of guns. Well clearly that hasn't worked, like it didn't work in the UK. Our government said, after the last mass killing (Dunblane where a gun club member killed, I think, about 14 primary school children and a teacher) that enough is enough and now no one can legally own a handgun of just about any kind.

The problem with this sort of measure is that you can never be sure it has worked, only that it hasn't worked the next time someone goes mad. And how do you stop the same crazies running amok with a machete instead? You can't, but they don't kill as many people - as was proven when, a few months after Dunblane, a crazy ran amok in a school in London and was beaten off by the teacher who, although she sustained serious but recoverable injuries, managed to disarm him after he'd only hurt, not killed, a few children. So you can still go crazy but not with such lethal effect.

Well, I'll take issue with your statement that everyone has to be armed. That's far from the case. All that needs exist to discourage criminal activity is that the criminal believe there is a fair chance that he will encounter an armed person. When I spoke of the frequency of rapes dropping to 25% of the former level, that had to do with rapes of all women. Of course, the rate of rapes against armed women probably dropped to near zero, but even those women who chose not to arm themselves benefitted from the Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt that was engendered in the minds of prospective rapers by the fact that many more women were now going armed.

As to what is to be done, I suggest two things:

First, eliminate all gun laws, and allow people to arm themselves for self-defense. Better still, actively encourage law-abiding citizens to arm themselves. Offer training courses in safety and combat pistol shooting.

Second, eliminate the legal pitfalls associated with using a gun to defend yourself, your family, or other innocent bystanders. At a minimum, truly presume the innocence of anyone who uses a gun in self-defense. Use rational means to do so. For example, if a solid citizen shoots someone with whom he was not previously acquainted, and if the shootee has a criminal record, the strong presumption should be that the shooting was fully justified. The shooter should not even be charged, let alone have to prove his innocence, as is the case now. Better still, outlaw (in the original Olde English sense of making that person a wolf's head) anyone who commits a violent crime against a stranger. As I'm sure you know, but some of my readers may not, outlawing a person removed all of the protections of the law from that person. Anyone was free to do anything to an outlaw without fear of legal reprisal.

I also take issue with your characterization of what is and is not civilized. The situation I describe is civilized. The situation you seem to want is about as far from civilized as I can imagine.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Farquhar [mailto:farquhar@lcms.org]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 11:10 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: 1811 quake

Hi Bob,

The New Madrid (we pronounce it "MAD-rid" here in Missour-ah, not "mad-RID" like the city in Spain) fault is a tremendous concern to local geologists who say we're way overdue for another quake on that fault. We've had two very small quakes along that fault this decade. The smaller of the two (in the fall of 1990) felt like a sonic boom from a fighter plane flying lower than it should. The bigger one (in late 1994) was more noticeable; it sounded like a train running through the middle of the house. I remember it happened mid-morning on a Saturday or Sunday and I was still in bed, and while the vibration didn't knock anything off the walls it was substantial enough to wake me up. I was in St. Louis for both of those; of course both would have been a bigger deal closer to the fault line. A geologist by the last name of Browning, long since dead, predicted "the big one" in 1990. The quake we got wasn't even close and Browning was dismissed as a quack. But I remember my geology teacher at the time telling us that when the quake did hit (and he emphasized that it's not a question of if, it's a question of when--that Browning was right about that part), the best thing to do was to go find a doorway and stand in it. I think he even made it a test question.

The area just south of St. Louis used to be a huge lead mining area; something like 70 percent of the munitions used by the Allies in WWI was made from Missouri lead. If you tour the biggest of the mines (in tiny Bonne Terre, Mo., about 50 miles south of St. Louis), there's a point in the mine where you can look up and see the fault. The tour guides point it out, then remind you that the last time it blew, it rang church bells in Boston. Makes you pretty eager to get out of there.

At work last week someone was asking why any sane person would live in an area prone to hurricanes; I responded by asking why any sane person (myself included) would live in an area long overdue for a tremendous earthquake. You can, afer all, get some advance warning on a hurricane and run further inland. There is no advance warning of an earthquake. St. Louis isn't prepared for it, and I imagine the other cities that would be affected aren't any better off.

Dave Farquhar

Exactly. It's the unpredictability of things that worry me. That's why tornadoes frighten me more than hurricanes. And even with tornadoes, one usually gets at least some warning. The thought of living somewhere that was subject to an 8+ quake at any moment would scare me silly.

 


 

 

 

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Wednesday, 22 September 1999

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Barbara is off to the North Carolina Library Association convention, which is being held in Winston-Salem this year. She hopes to make some business contacts there. That means I have custody of the dogs. Fortunately, Duncan and Skye have come to an accommodation, and things have settled down to a dull roar. Maybe I'll actually be able to get some work done today.

* * * * *

This from a reader who asks to remain anonymous:

I don't know what to think about the Y2K problem. Some people say nothing much will happen and others say that it will be nothing short of Armageddon. What do you think will happen? What are you doing about it?

I don't know what will happen. No one does. There are simply too many variables and too little reliable data. But I think both of those extreme positions are likely to be wrong. Since you've put me on the spot, I'll give you my guess. But a guess is all it is. Note that my estimates refer to the US. Other countries which are much less prepared are much more likely to fall into the more severe scenarios.

< 1% - Little or no impact from Y2K problems.

~ 35% - Isolated problems; short-term (< 1 week) loss of power or other utilities in scattered locations. Minor economic impact. Some temporary shortages. Some companies fail, especially small businesses and those in industries with poor Y2K preparation.

~ 50% - Moderately widespread problems; mid-term (1 week to 1 month) loss of power and other utilities affecting < 10% of the population. Moderate economic impact, with moderate to severe recession lasting several months; shortages more widespread and severe, due to pervasiveness of JIT inventory systems and trickle-down failures that result from them; many business failures; extreme drop in stock prices of many companies.

~ 15% - Very widespread problems; long-term (1 month+) loss of power and other utilities affecting 25% or more of the population. Widespread severe shortages of some essentials; isolated food riots; law enforcement loses all control in some inner-city areas. Large scale deployment of National Guard. Severe economic impact, with severe long-lasting recession; widespread business failures, lay-offs and similar disruptions; greatly increased taxes to pay for large-scale government efforts to help those in the areas worst affected.

<< 1% - catastrophic widespread problems. mass unemployment. widespread rioting in the streets. starvation. martial law. revolution; war. complete loss of government authority in large areas; recovery will require years, because there will be no one left to help those in the worst straits.

As far as what I'm doing about it, I'm straddling a middle course between the extremes. I don't plan to do nothing, but neither do I plan to sell my house and head for the hills. I have a generator and will have fuel to provide several hours of power per day for a month or more. We will have enough food and water stored to keep us for at least a couple of months. We'll have firewood. If things get really bad, I'll be prepared to defend myself, although I don't think that's likely to happen.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 1:08 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE:

I wonder if we're having the same discussion; I don't disagree that, right now your suggestions would be the best course for the United States. But I don't get a sense that you think this, I get the feeling that you think this is the best course, period. As in, you see no point in trying to work towards an ultimate goal where no one has any hand guns, as has happened in the UK and other European countries.

As for not everyone being armed, well, where are you going to draw the line? A criminal walks onto a bus, pulls a gun and says 'Hands up'. If anyone pulls out a gun he surrenders immediately, and has only committed the crime of threatening with a weapon. In your situation, the innocent citizens could kill him on the spot and, whilst threatening citizens with a deadly weapon is serious I don't think the punishment for it should be innocent

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk

You're right. I do think it's the best course, full stop. Not only do I see no sense in working toward a disarmed society, I think it's the worst possible course. All that you accomplish by doing that is making the weaker subject to the stronger, and making it easy for evil people to prey on good people. There used to be a common saying in this country. "God made men, but Colonel Colt made them equal." And that is indeed true. An unarmed woman (or older man) cannot hope to contend physically with a young male attacker. An armed person of whatever age can defend himself on equal terms.

I have lived in an armed society and a disarmed society, and I can tell you that an armed society is indeed a polite society. Civilized, in other words. By taking your suggested course and disarming all of us, all that we do is encourage crime and discourage politeness.

In the situation you describe, the criminal has initiated force against others, and those others are entitled to respond. I would hope that someone on that bus would shoot the criminal dead. That's no more than he deserves. And, when you think about it, my suggested course does a great deal to reduce the level of violence. Before long, no one would be walking onto a bus and drawing a weapon to threaten other riders with. Most potential criminals would soon realize that that was not a healthy course of action. Those too stupid to realize that would be six feet under. Either way, buses would be much safer places.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 1:41 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE:

If not everyone has to be armed, where do you draw the line? Everyone who wants a gun can have one? Even the criminals? Or you can't have one if you already have a criminal record? For all crimes or just serious ones? What about driving offences? Burglary? And if people are to be encouraged to arm themselves how do you decide who is or isn't law abiding? I seem to remember Al Capone was only found guilty of tax evasion, so if he (or his modern-day equivalent) and you were to get into a gunfight, who'd decide who's the innocent victim? The cops? The lawyers (actually perhaps we can agree here and now that they should be the first against the wall)? The politicians? Under your system, anyone without a rap sheet is able to arm themselves, take combat pistol shooting courses and feel free to shoot anyone they feel is threatening their life. Now, I have a criminal record from my mis-spent youth for stealing a blank insurance form, value one penny, which I used to try to persuade the police that I really did have insurance for the car which I was driving. Fine £10 and don't do it again, very sorry your honour. But, were I to be involved in such a shoot out with Al Capone's modern-day equivalent - ie someone whom 'everyone' knows to be the bad guy but who has no rap sheet - under your criteria I'd be the bad guy and outlawed. An extreme case, I grant you, but you have to define these things in a way where there's no ambiguity.

And what if a 'solid' citizen is the one who decides today's the day for a little target practice from the top of the nearest tower block? In my earlier case, s/he has to go mad with a machete. Under your criteria they can buy semi-automatic hand guns and all the ammunition they can carry, presumably, to use as they will until some other solid citizen draws their weapon and shoots them back. Or the cops arrive.

I don't disagree that, right now, in the situation in which the United States finds itself, your methods are really the most sane. What I think you're missing is the next step, an ultimate aim where there is no need to have anyone owning hand guns. It may well be a very long way in the future, but I see no harm in being idealistic.

And I'm sorry but 'civilised' is not an epithet I could apply to a situation where, were we to live in the US, I'd have to seriously consider buying guns to protect me and my family. In fact, when we were looking to move out of London and the realisation came to us that, in fact, my job allows us to live literally anywhere in the world where one can plug a computer into a phone line, we looked at the US. And this fact, the preponderance of gun ownership, was what put us off - both the number of criminals habitually using them for all kinds of crimes and the necessity to seriously consider gun ownership yourself for self-protection.

As I said, you can't get where I'd like civilisation to be from here, not quickly anyway, but I don't think that an ultimate goal of having no guns at all is a bad aim.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk

As I've said, there should be no gun laws at all. None concerning purchase, possession, carrying, or any other aspect. So, yes, that means that I believe criminals have the right to own and carry firearms. In fact, it says so right in our Constitution. Neither does the government have the right to pass laws against certain classes of firearms or associated items. If I want a fully automatic weapon, a sawed-off shotgun, or a silencer, that is my affair and no business of the government's. Or, for that matter, if I want a Stinger or a Scud. The Bill of Rights guarantees me the absolute right to keep and bear arms of my choice. The fact that our government has repeatedly infringed that right does not alienate that right.

I did not say that there would or should never be a trial to determine the facts in a shooting incident, merely that rational means should be allowed to be used to determine who was the aggressor. As things stand now with our judicial system, evidence of prior crimes cannot be introduced, on the theory that it is not pertinent to the crime being tried and may prejudice the jury. So, if I have an encounter with someone who has literally a dozen arrests and convictions and who has spent half his life behind bars, my attorney could not bring those facts to the attention of the jury. If someone must be tried to determine the facts, fine. Try him. But afterwards, make him whole. Pay back all of the costs, direct and indirect that he incurred in defending himself. And don't try him if that venerable legal concept, a Reasonable Man, thinks it's not worth having a trial.

As far as the view many Europeans have of the US as an armed and violent society, it just isn't so. I'm 46 years old and belong to the Middle Class. I have never been the victim (or attempted victim) of a violent crime, nor do I know anyone personally who has. Violent crime in this country is largely confined to the inner cities. Once you get outside those cities, you are probably at least as safe from violence as you would be living anywhere in Europe. I arm myself because I think it is the responsibility of any man to be able to defend himself, his family, and his friends if the need arises. But I don't expect to have to do it.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 2:23 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Speakers

Just read the discussion about speakers. I've an AWE64 card which has proper phono-out sockets (I believe one of your correspondents may have referred to them as RCA (?) sockets) which allows me to plug the computer sound output into my office hi-fi. I've teamed this up with a Music Match 4 combined CD player/MP3 ripper (http://www.musicmatch.com). This allows me to play CDs on the PC, get the CDDB information on the disc which tells me what the tracks are, organise my playlist by genre and so on, and get fairly decent sound out of the whole shebang. Obviously the CD-ROM isn't up to the quality of a 'proper' CD player, but I like the additional information I get out of the setup and, in any case, the office isn't the best place to listent to 'quality' hifi.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk

Good points. In particular, the fact that an office isn't a very good listening environment. I don't actually listen much in my office anyway. I used to play classical music while I was writing, but I often found it distracting. Probably something about the classical music requiring the same hemisphere as the creative writing or something.

I've done a few experiments with MP3, CDDB, and so on, but nothing serious yet. I do plan to bring up an A/V server with gobs of disk space to store audio and video data, so we'll see what happens.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Holden Aust [mailto:hausth@netscape.net]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 3:13 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Re: [RE: Computer Speakers or real HiFi speakers?]

If the NHTs and Cambridge Model 6s are too pricy, do check out the Cambridge "Soundworks" Sub-Woofer/Satellite speakers. They have a powered subwoofer which also drives the tiny satellite speakers and they plug directly into the line-out or speaker-out jack on your soundcard (or the headphone jack of a CDROM or Walkman or Boombox, for that matter). They are amazingly good sounding speakers for $99 and I think you'd have to go up the the Cambridge Model 6 or NHT Super One or Super Zeros running from a receiver to better the sound. The Cambridge "Soundworks" speakers sound considerably better than the speakers that most people have have with their "stereo" systems. NECX sells them for $89, I think, Cambridge themselves sell them for $99 at www.hifi.com. Cambridge offers a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can try them out at home (I don't know whether that applies if you buy them from NECX). I'm not familiar with the AR speakers, but I would be surprised if they were as good as the "Soundworks", which are excellent, and I only recommend the Model 6 or NHT speakers over the "Soundworks" because they are even better.

I may do that. Thanks.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Lieber [mailto:aslieber@Princeton.EDU]
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 1999 7:30 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Another perspective on gun control

I believe Mr. Ward-Johnson was correct when he said we "can't get there from here," in terms of guns in the US. To get to an unarmed society, the criminals would have to unilaterally disarm, because no one else would be willing to do so first.

From a game theory perspective, there are two Nash Equilibria for armaments in a civilian population.. (1)when everyone is armed, and (2)when no one except perhaps the extremely responsible are armed. Armed criminals and disarmed civilians is an unstable situation.

I think that most people prefer not to carry guns and so would prefer (2). However when presented with the possibility of having armed felons around oneself, it would probably not be wise to be unarmed. Thus, the current state of affairs with armed criminals and restricted law abiding citizens is the worst possible outcome.

This of course neglects the fact that anyone who really, really wants a gun can still get one, but may explain the underlying trend towards more guns in the hands of the innocent.

Just an economist-in-training's view,

Adam Lieber

Exactly, thanks. Incidentally, I studied economics under Hans Sennholz more than 25 years ago. Do economics students today even know of such giants as F. A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises, or has Political Correctness banished them from curricula?

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Rudzki [mailto:rasterho@pacbell.net]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 2:58 AM
To: Robert B. Thompson
Subject: Handguns, crime and demographics

That is a most interesting discussion on handguns and crime in general recently on your daynotes page with a bunch of Europeans who hate guns in general unless their Army is murdering the people in the next country over the border or channel.

Vermont, Arizona, Idaho, the Dakotas, Montana, Oregon, Kansaw and Missourah, can there be a common factor as to why their gun laws are relaxed and their violent crime rate so low?

Let me clear my throat:

New Yawk City, Detroit, Washington DC, Miami, Chicago, East Saint Louis, Newark, Oakland, East Palo Alto, San Bernardino, Chula Vista. Can there be a pattern as to why their violent crime rate is high and the gun laws so strict?

I heard the New Madrid earthquake of 1814 made the Mississipi run backward for several hours!

Robert Rudzki
rasterho@pacbell.net
http://home.pacbell.net/rasterho
Since Latin siglines are becoming popular on certain sites...

"Vidi, Vici, Veni"

Well, yes, but to be fair you have to normalize the data. Otherwise, anti-gun folks will (rightly) point out that New York City is not comparable to, say, Idaho. But the fact is that one can choose "matched pairs" of cities or regions whose demographics are quite similar but whose gun control laws differ dramatically. When you run the numbers, you invariably find that there is a statistically significant correlation. Stronger gun control laws = higher violent crime rates. Period.

I've heard before that the river ran backwards, and I believe it. In terms of energy release, a major quake is probably the most significant natural event there is, exceeding even such things as major hurricanes or the Krakatoa and Thera catastrophes.

* * * * *

15:30: I've gotten quite a bit done today, although little new written. Right now, I'm relocating my main ATAPI test-bed system from a no-name case to an Antec. So far, things are going well. The Antec isn't quite as good as a PPC case, but it's a lot better than the no-name cases I've seen. At about $65 street price with a 250 watt power supply, it offers good bang for the buck. No sharp edges at all, except on the twist out slot covers and drive bay covers. That's easily remedied with a quick pass of the file.

I just installed an Hitachi ATAPI DVD-RAM drive. I was debating which 5.25" drive bays to put which drives in until I unpacked the Hitachi. It actually has a tiny cooling fan on the back panel, powered directly by the drive itself. That guy is definitely going in the top drive bay, where it will have the best heat dissipation and where the rising heat won't cook other drives. The only trouble is, I'm also putting a CD-RW drive in that system, and CD-RW drives aren't known for running cool either. Well, I'll leave a vacant bay between them and hope for the best.

* * * * *

Well, so much for the new dog rope. Barbara went out yesterday and bought a 10 foot nylon dog tie because she was concerned that Skye, not being familiar with being on a rope, would end up getting tangled. I just went out to let the dogs in and found that Skye had chewed through all but one strand.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chuck Waggoner [waggoner at gis dot net]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 11:50 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Guns & HiFi

I am in 100% agreement with your analysis and position regarding guns. And I am dismayed at the pervasive European view of the States as still an unsafe, gun-toting Wild West society. For the last 27 years, I have visited relatives in the UK and Belgium almost yearly, and visions of the lawless Wild West is also their impression of the US (too many exported cowboy movies in the 40's and 50's, I suppose).

Since graduating high school, I have lived in Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana; St. Paul, Minnesota; Evanston, Illinois (first suburb north of Chicago); and Melrose and Natick, Massachusetts (suburbs of Boston). Never, in any of those places, was my home broken into--and in two houses, there were no working locks on the doors.

However, my British relatives' home in Goldersgreen, London was broken into repeatedly (always a more difficult second story job, too); and while they have not had the home invaded since moving to the South Coast, neighbors on both sides have had burglaries within the last few years.

I can't speak about France, but I think Mr. Ward-Johnson would find himself and family every bit as safe, if not more so, by moving to the US. We need more people over here who can use the English language properly.

There's an interesting book by one of his countrymen, Lord William Rees-Moog (with whose politics I'm sure Mr. Ward-Johnson disagrees) which posits that the great economic spurts of civilization have come at times when the masses' access to efficient weapons has put them on equal footing with the overlords and King's men. This 'equality' insured that others could not steal the fruits of their labor.

It's sad that throughout recorded history, there are some who have used every means available to rob and control others--but that is a fact. Disarming societies is only a BIG step in ensuring that those dastardly beings will have less resistance in the path towards gaining an upper hand over others.

In societies that herald equality, no one should be forced to face an armed thug without possessing equal power to defend himself, if so desired. And--unfortunately for Utopia--there will never be the day when the criminal element can't obtain firepower--legally or, as already is very often the case in this country, illegally.

Regarding HiFi for computer, I have one of Cambridge Soundworks' powered subwoofer and satellite systems for the PC. I paid $99 about 2 years ago, but saw the same item in the Cambridge Soundworks' store at the mall for $49 a few weeks ago. My advice is don't spend any more on a basic computer sound system--this one is not recording studio quality, but is super sound for the money, and easily the equal of any basic PC sound system I've heard that costs more money.

--Chuck Waggoner [waggoner at gis dot net]

Thanks. I couldn't have said it better.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Lieber [mailto:aslieber@Princeton.EDU]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 12:48 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE: Another perspective on gun control

I have heard of them, but I would not say they are closely studied.

Adam Lieber

Thanks. Somehow, I am not surprised. I'd recommend that you read Human Action by von Mises, and just about anything by Hayek. On second thought, perhaps you should wait until after you have your degree. Reading books like that may cause you to flunk when you accidentally respond rationally to test questions rather than regurgitating the Keynesian party line. Good lord, do they even read Adam Smith or David Ricardo any more?

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chuck Waggoner [waggoner at gis dot net]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 1:48 PM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Ha, ha, ha, ha

This is so funny, I almost passed out laughing!! Ho, ho, ho, ho!

Get this--hee, hee, hee,--Bill Gates has bought a company--oh, ha, ha, ha, ha--that intends to make Linux work on Windows--ho, ho, hee, hee--to "bridge the gap" to those who want to move from--ha, ha, ha--Linux to Windows.

Ho, ho, ho, ho! What a killer that Gates is! Who writes his material? Ha, ha, ha, ha.

--Chuck

And to think I've heard it said that Gates has no sense of humor. Thanks.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Frank A. Love [mailto:falove@home.com]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 3:11 PM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Missippi River Running backwards

The story about the river running backwards is perfectly true as i've heard it. The quake formed Reelfoot Lake and the Mississippi river ran backwards for three days to fill it! (Just had to put my two cents in.) :)

Frank Love

Yes. I'm afraid that people who have not seen the Mississippi River will not understand just how hard it is for us to grasp even the concept of it moving backwards. The Mississippi is to ordinary rivers as King Kong was to ordinary apes. Kind of like seeing the sun setting in the east.

 


 

 

 

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Thursday, 23 September 1999

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The Register reports more bad news for AMD and the Athlon. The motherboard situation keeps getting worse. At first, it was that K7 motherboards were significantly more expensive than Pentium III motherboards, and in very short supply. Then, it was that many K7 motherboards had design flaws and simply don't work. Now, the Taiwan quake means that the supply of K7 motherboards may dry up completely, just in time for the Christmas selling season.

This was exactly what AMD didn't need. Things are starting to look dark for them. Despite the flurry of PR about how fast the K7 is, the fact is that AMD desperately needed a smooth rollout of the K7 with a fast ramp-up to volume sales. They haven't gotten it. Everything that could go wrong has gone wrong. Gateway's announcement that they're abandoning AMD is probably not hugely significant monetarily, but is yet another piece of bad news that AMD didn't need.

I know that some people view me as being pro-Intel and anti-AMD, but nothing could be further from the truth. It's true that I wouldn't consider using an AMD processor in one of my own systems, but that's simply because Intel makes better, more cost-effective processors. A computer based on a $65 Celeron/400 is more than Good Enough for 99.9% of users, including me. Spending anything more than that buys rapidly diminishing returns for any but the most demanding applications. Heck, I'm still running a Pentium II/300 in my main system, and that's substantially slower than a Celeron/400. Fast enough is fast enough.

But I hope that AMD succeeds, simply because their presence as a viable competitor to Intel keeps Intel honest. Not just in terms of CPU pricing, although that's certainly a factor. Beyond that, AMD pushes Intel to keep innovating instead of resting on their laurels. That's good for everyone including, ultimately, Intel itself.

Barbara is off again today to the NCLA convention. That means I'll be pup-sitting. I hope to be able to get some writing done at the same time.

The testbed system is now in the Antec case, although it's not working at this point. Probably a cable connected backwards or something. I haven't had time to deal with it. Things are interrupt-driven around here.

And now, some mail. We've probably beat the gun control issue to death by now, and should move on.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Lieber [mailto:aslieber@Princeton.EDU]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 8:45 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE: Another perspective on gun control

At the risk of answering a rhetorical question, yes we do read Adam Smith and David Ricardo, but largely in introductory courses with emphasis on their failings. Upper level courses handle all sorts of models based on all sorts of premises ranging from neoclassical to neokeynesian (normal keynsianism's reliance on the Phillips Curve is a near fatal flaw) to rational expectations theory to (perish the thought) supply side economics. Economists and mathematicians such as Krugman, Eichengreen, Nash, Dixit, and Kenen are hailed nowadays. At least we can ignore Galbraith.

Overall, I haven't found much to complain about, although I do take breaks from economics to pursue my minor in computer science! Now I just need to find JP and thesis topics that mesh the two fields...

Adam Lieber

I haven't read economics seriously in nearly 25 years, and it seems that things have changed. I assume these models you refer to must be macroeconomic, because surely microeconomic models must devolve into Chaos Theory.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Jaydonalds@aol.com [mailto:Jaydonalds@aol.com]
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 1999 8:04 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Fwd: Guns in the USA

Mr. Thompson,

The primary purpose of the Second Amendment is self protection! At the time it was adopted, This fledging country was a very wild place. Indians, wild carnivores, border disputes with the European Powers were all a part of the frontiersman's life. These did not effect the life of the average citizen in Boston; or Charleston; or any "large city" in the new Nation.

However; many of the frontiersmen were the Veterans of the War of Independence, having gotten land on the "western frontier". These Veterans remembered what the War was about. Defending liberty.

Our European friends did not learn this most important lesson: "To have Liberty one must be able to seize it."

I am not a "gun nut", I do not own a handgun. I am not a member of a "militia unit". I only know that the Founding Fathers were wise for their time and beyond. Remember; the Second Amendment allowed the US to respond to almost every war (except for the most recent ones). I offer the Civil War; WWI, WWII and Korea. All of these (among others), allowed the US troops to get into the field quickly.

The last reason for a "militia" is to keep the government from getting too big for it's britches". If there is an armed populace around; the Government will think before doing something rash (witness WWII).

Thanks for your time;

John D. Vogt

jaydonalds@aol.com

P.S. I called your last weeks site up at work and your theory about pixel viewing doesn't work. I had no problem, other than to scroll left to right. Could it be the processor? (I am only a 486.) At work I use a P1 processor with W95; Office97; and 640X480, 256 colors@72MHz refresh rate.

P.P.S. you may edit this as you see fit if it is too long.

The old saying goes that an armed citizenry is a free citizenry, and that is the primary reason that I am armed. As I've said elsewhere on these pages, I have little fear of criminals, but a great deal of fear of my own government. Fortunately, millions of other Americans feel the same, although many, perhaps most, would not put it into words. As history shows us over and over, a disarmed men sooner or later become slaves.

As far as the horizontal scrolling problem, it is as far as I can tell solely an artifact of screen resolution. If you view at 1024 X 768 or higher, there's no scrolling ever. If you view at 800 X 600 or less, some pages scroll.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: David Yerka [mailto:leshaworks@iname.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 12:06 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Gun Control

Bob:

The gun control discussion is fascinating. I lean toward you but I do have some caveats.

The "right to bear arms." We should bear in mind that our founding fathers had different ideas of a citizen than we do. Their society designated a citizen as one who was responsible and informed and expected to participate in government. This was also a basic idea for the person who would hold the "franchise" i.e. would be a voter. If you study the writings of Jefferson, Adams, and their peers the idea of freedom is tied to responsibility. They expected the individual to earn the "franchise." How many individuals today in the US show enough responsibility to "bear arms?" A majority? We can't even get a majority to vote in most local elections.

Gun "control." Most laws don't have to do with control but with denial and removal of guns and that is wrong.. I despise the NRA, et.al. for reducing the gun issue to our "right to bear arms." I also despise most of their opposition for assuming that problems will "go away" if guns go away because it is just a knee-jerk reaction. We don't have a dialog on how to fix the problem-each side just wants to be the most holy in the eyes of society. We have a problem: Gun are too easily ending up in the hands of those who shouldn't have them. Just because we have a "right" to something doesn't mean we all are "responsible" to exercise it. I am less scared by the "criminal" than by my "neighbor" who is having a bad life and has a grudge. And yes I have been mugged-an addict with a knife and I gladly gave him my wallet: discretion before valor. And yes a college friend of my was shot dead 15 years ago in a "domestic quarrel."

I learned to shoot through NRA classes as a 12 year old. My father introduced me proper gun handling but felt the NRA classes would teach that his (my Dad's) rules were expected of all hunters. Those teachers were strict and demanding - you didn't load a round until you knew exact procedure and could "think first, react second." I stopped hunting 15 years ago when, over a 2 week Deer hunting season, I was shot at 3 times by "hunters" who couldn't tell the difference between a man in a bright red hunter's vest in an open field and a white tailed deer. God forbid that one of THEM with a handgun is in the store with me when the robber arrives. (Of course my 12 gauge is still available if someone decides that my house is his shopping mart. Short barrel/no choke good spread much more effective than a handgun.)

So, make it hard to buy a gun, demand waiting periods, require training. If you want a gun demonstrate your responsibility. In the US you can't have a license to drive a car until you demonstrate you understand the rules and your responsibilities but you can go to a gun shop and within a week get an equally dangerous weapon without demonstrating more than you haven't been caught in a crime. Perhaps (God forbid!) we should require a person owning a gun to be able to get insurance for it just as on a car. Take a look at the way people drive-now imagine most of them with guns, also.

Robert Heinlein wrote that the only cure for stupidity was death. The problem is that these days too many of the stupid are taking the rest of us with them.

David M. Yerka

A right is no longer a right if the government has the ability to pass laws restricting it. That's the progression we've been seeing and will continue to see. Our Second Amendment rights will soon be so diluted as to be meaningless. And the First Amendment is heading that way as well, beginning with Oliver Wendell Holmes' bogus arguments about crying fire in a public theatre. Each of the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights were put there for a single purpose. To protect the citizens from their own government. Putting that government in charge of "interpreting" those rights is putting the fox in charge of the henhouse.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Jan Swijsen [mailto:qjsw@oce.nl]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 4:59 AM
To: Robert Bruce Thompson
Subject: Joke.

Bob,

Maybe you already knew this.

When I read that I thought you had writen it.

Regards,
Svenson

Tweren't me, but I find myself in sympathy with the thought. Thanks.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 5:12 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Guns

The hand gun discussion has illuminated the subject for me, thanks to you and the others who've taken part.

It's interesting that your American correspondents complain that the Europeans are painting the US as a land of violence, and point to their European friends who are robbed/mugged much more often. Yet you in the US are the ones who are going out to buy guns to protect themselves even though, like you yourself, they haven't been the victims of crime and don't know anyone who has been.

Would I find myself as safe in the US as in France? I suppose it would depend on where we lived. We did actively consider moving to the US, as I said, and I personally was genuinely concerned that the person with whom I might have a traffic altercation could be armed and resort to using their weapon instead of their voice to abuse me. Now, this fear may well be simply a non-real media-induced fear, but if it's so safe in the US I repeat - why are you and your other correspondents arming yourselves? Just in case? In case of what? In case, I presume, you are attacked by an armed criminal - but then the US is a safe place to live, I'm assured. Aren't I? You can't have it both ways.

I understand that you and your correspondents see arming yourselves as the only way, right now, to protect yourselves and your loved ones, and I respect that choice. However, you are only doing this because you have what Europeans consider to be ludicrous gun laws. You complain about how hard it is to buy a gun now because you have to fill in a form and wait. It's now impossible to buy any sort of handgun in the UK, period. Before the ban, you had to apply to the police for a licence, and they would check you, your background and even visit your home to ensure that you had a lockable, steel gun cabinet in which to keep your gun to prevent criminals stealing it. Similar laws still exist for those like farmers who buy shotguns for pest control. However, despite these measures the latest estimates say there are now one million illegal guns on the streets of Britain, and on average one person a day is killed with one of them. What's our reaction? We're spending more, but not enough, on the police. And whilst more of them are being armed, they have stricter controls on when and how they use their weapons, as I mentioned the other day.

The banning of hand guns in the UK has only removed them from the hands of those who, by and large, used them for sporting purposes, largely target shooting. Anyone who previously had a licence to carry a concealed weapon for self-protection - politicians in Northern Ireland, for example - will still have that licence. Very few of the criminals handed in their guns, as I'm sure you'd be the first to point out.

Guns are readily available, for a price, to those who go looking for them, as I mentioned the other day when our reporter went out in London and came back to the office with a machine gun. The question I want the police to answer is, if a reporter can do this why can't they? What do the police spend their time doing?

Training and arming the citizenry in the UK and the rest of Europe isn't a realistic option, in the same way that getting everyone in the US to hand in their weapons is not possible. What is the answer? I don't know, but I'd be glad if someone could tell me.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk

Well, I can't speak for others, but I have no expectation of becoming a crime victim. Neither do I expect my house to burn down, but I maintain fire insurance just the same.

* * * * *

13:45: This report from David Silvis, MD [HUPPNUT@aol.com]:

NASA

Scientists at NASA had developed a gun built specifically to launch dead chickens at the windshields of airliners, military jets and the space shuttle, all traveling at maximum velocity. The idea was to simulate the frequent incidents of collisions with airborne fowl to test the strength of the windshields. British engineers heard about the gun and were eager to test it on the windshields of their new high speed trains. Arrangements were made. But when the gun was fired, the engineers stood shocked as the chicken hurtled out of the barrel, crashed into the shatterproof shield, smashed it to smithereens, crashed through the control console, snapped the engineer's backrest in two and embedded itself in the back wall of the cab.

Horrified Britons sent NASA the disastrous results of the experiment, along with the designs of the windshield, and begged the US scientists for suggestions.

NASA's response was just one sentence: "Thaw the chicken."

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Chuck Waggoner [mailto:waggoner at gis dot net]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 11:50 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Just one more...

Might I add for Mr. Ward-Johnson's benefit, that although I do not agree with limiting gun ownership in any way, I do not own a single gun myself. I am not a correspondent who has armed myself for the specific purpose of protection, and I know of few here in the US who have. Generally, it's not required for personal safety in this country--but, like your mention of insurance, it's a help.

As youngsters, my brother and I were quite active in various forms of target and skeet practice through Scouting and NRA programs, using the guns at the range or one of my dad's. While I enjoyed that immensely, other interests and activities long ago moved me away from the range before I was earning enough money to purchase firearms for myself.

You accounted well what is the point of having and keeping the right to bear arms, and I do not despise, but applaud the NRA for specifically focusing on that. As you pointed out, it's not primarily about transgressions of safety or the criminal's use of guns--from the beginning of time, what thug didn't use the best weapon he could lay hands on? It's about freedom from the tyranny of governments, which become the criminals themselves. That was the whole purpose of founding The United States of America, in the first place. Apparently that's a lesson only learned by actually going through the experience, like our founding fathers did. Lacking that, it doesn't seem to be grasped by very many. We've inherited the bounty, but forgotten the cost.

And guns certainly aren't the only weapon of which to be wary in traffic altercations: Jack Nicholson did quite a bit of damage with a golf club.

--Chuck Waggoner [waggoner at gis dot net]

Precisely.

* * * * *

And yet another sequence of exchanges between Chris Ward-Johnson and me concerning guns:

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Bruce Thompson [mailto:thompson@ttgnet.com]
Sent: 23 September 1999 16:52
To: Chris Ward-Johnson (E-mail)
Subject: Ethics from the Barrel of a Gun.html

Not to prolong this debate, but Eric S. Raymond has written an essay that states my position better than I could hope to.

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Ward-Johnson [mailto:chriswj@mostxlnt.co.uk]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 1:05 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE: Ethics from the Barrel of a Gun.html

I can be a man, a moral man, without carrying a gun and without wanting to carry one. I employ others to do many things for me that I would prefer not to do myself: process my human waste; kill my meat; police my neighbourhood. I have other things which I would rather do than do these myself. I am not trying to denegrate those who do these jobs; indeed, I have the highest respect for people who are prepared to do jobs like this, to put themselves in harm's way on my behalf and to shield me from my own cowardice. I retain the means to defend myself against my government by the use of my vote at the ballot box, and it is voting - not the bearing of arms - which should now become compulsory.

And I'm afraid that to say 'We bear arms because our constitution gives us the right to do so' is an invalid argument. Laws are made by men and can be changed by (rational) men. Because it was right then doesn't make it right now. In any case, as I understand it your constitution is ambivalent about who may bear arms. Is it not militias who are given this right? I am ready to be corrected on this point, but my larger point remains this: I do not wish to be forced to carry a gun, I wish those whom I delegate to protect me to do that instead.

Regards
Chris Ward-Johnson
Dr Keyboard - Computing Answers You Can Understand
http://www.drkeyboard.co.uk

I'm sorry if you took the article as saying that you were immoral or in any way at fault because you do not choose to arm yourself. I don't believe that was Eric's intent, and it was certainly not what I took his essay to mean. I think his point was that arming oneself causes one to consider the implications and is an aid to developing strong personal principles and morality. But I don't believe he by any means meant to say that it is a requirement. (If this keeps up, we'll be getting into the Pelagian heresy debate.)

As far as voting as a means to defend yourself against tyranny, that may work, but only up to a point. The German people did, after all vote for the Nazi Party in very large numbers. And during Soviet elections, participation was nearly 100%, almost entirely for the Soviet candidate. George Washington observed that government, like fire, is a dangerous servant and a terrible master. Thomas Jefferson, a true revolutionary, observed that the tree of liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of tyrants and patriots. He suggested in all seriousness that his new country should have a revolution at least every 20 years.

The purpose of our Constitution (and, more particularly our Bill of Rights) is to set in concrete terms what the government is permitted and not permitted to do, and how they are permitted to do it. The Framers intentionally made it very difficult to modify, believing that these fundamental precepts were so important that they should not be changed lightly. A mechanism exists to add new amendments, including those that repeal older amendments, but has not be used to repeal the Second Amendment. Such an effort would fail miserably.

As far as the Second Amendment itself, it's meaning is completely clear. Anti-gun folks constantly try to obfuscate the intent of the Framers, using the claims you mention. The first part of the Amendment is explicatory--why they considered the prohibition so important. The second part states what it is that the government is prohibited from doingitself. The Second Amendment reads:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

The word "Militia" does not refer to the National Guard, the Reserves, or any other such body that is controlled by the government. A Militia is an armed body of citizens who gather and organize in their common defense and that of their country. The Founding Fathers opposed having a standing army. Washington's statement, "A standing army is the instrument of tyranny." is perhaps the best-known, but Jefferson, Madison, and many others made similar statements.

 


 

 

 

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Friday, 24 September 1999

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The skyrocketing cost of memory has led to some sharp practices. Kingston has announced that some web resellers are taking orders for Kingston RAM and delivering generic memory instead. You can expect more of this kind of fraud as the price of memory continues to climb. Expect it to go much higher than it is now. My guess is that memory prices won't start to fall again until at least the first of the year, and it may well be six months or more before RAM prices start to drop.

The proliferation of new area codes means that it's tough to keep those in a contact list up to date. I just looked at my own Contacts folder, and find I have many records for contacts here in Winston-Salem that list 910 (our former area code) and 919 (the original area code we had before 910). One possible solution to this problem is DialRight. It scans Outlook Contacts folders to locate records with mismatched area codes, presumably by checking the city and state or zipcode.

There are free downloadable versions for Outlook 98 and Outlook 2000, each about 5.8 MB. They're limited to scanning 2,500 records per contact folder, which shouldn't be a problem for most people. Rather bizarrely in my opinion, the company also says of the free version, "... since we're giving DialRight For Outlook away for FREE you're going to have to put up with a few banner ads. These banner ads will bring in revenue and help fund additional development of DialRight For Outlook."

I haven't tried this product, but it sounded like something some readers might find useful. If you decide to try it, let me know what you think of it.

Micron announced that they will forego using the Intel 820 "Camino" chipset and Rambus RDRAM in their new line of PCs, which ship next week. Instead, these new models will use a Via chipset and PC133 SDRAM, which a Micron spokesman said would deliver "Rambus-like performance for $200 to $300 less than other systems." This seems particularly significant to me, because Micron via their Crucial Technology subsidiary is a major producer of Rambus RDRAM, and might therefore have reasonably been expected to be the first of the big mail-order PC vendors to support the 820 and RDRAM.

This news comes immediately before Intel's official announcement next Monday of the 820 chipset, and cannot make Intel happy. Many PC makers are balking at adopting the 820 chipset in general and Rambus memory in particular. That, combined with the extreme shortage of Intel 440BX and 440ZX chipsets, means that the door is wide open for Via and other alternative chipset makers. Intel may have shot itself in the foot on this one.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Jerry Pournelle [mailto:jerryp@jerrypournelle.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 1999 8:54 PM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: RE: A story that may be true

Story goes back to pre-NASA days, when the FAA and NACA did tests, and everyone I know knows it, and I never met anyone who had any indication that it was true.

I figured as much. One can accuse the Brits of many things, but being too dumb to thaw out a chicken isn't one of them.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Mathew A Fuller [mailto:mjpi7maf@fs1.ce.umist.ac.uk]
Sent: Friday, September 24, 1999 8:44 AM
To: webmaster@ttgnet.com
Subject: Libertarianism, guns and sci-fi

I have recently discovered the author James. P. Hogan, who writes quality hard sci-fi. (Even Robert Rudzki might like him!) This weeks' mail has reminded me of his novel "Voyage from Yesteryear" in which he describes a meeting between an extreme libertarian society (a human colony at a nearby starsystem) and one more similar to our own. The colony was established using robots and human embryos, and so grew without any preconcieved notions about law, status, hierachy or government. The result was a people who were into personal freedom and personal responsibility to a degree beyond any I've heard proposed. (When the colonists were asked how they coped with repeatedly and deliberately obnoxious individuals in the absence of any laws, the reply was "They don't tend to last very long.... someone usually ends up shooting them.") I've read the book several times and I still can't decide whether the world he describes would work, but it certainly made me think! It's worth looking at. James Hogan's home page is at

http://www.global.org/jphogan/index.html

if you want to sample any of his stuff.

Matt Fuller

Thanks. I've never read any of his stuff that I can recall, so perhaps I'll give it a try.

* * * * *

11:10: The ill-starred Intel Camino chipset and Rambus RDRAM have just taken another major hit. Before you buy a new PC, read the article that Paul Robichaux refers to below.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul Robichaux [mailto:paul@robichaux.net]
Sent: Friday, September 24, 1999 10:34 AM
To: Bob Thompson
Subject: Oops: Rambus goes kerflop

http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-123024.html

Cheers,
-Paul
--
Paul Robichaux, MCSE | paul@robichaux.net | http://www.robichaux.net
Robichaux & Associates: programming, writing, teaching, consulting

Bad news indeed. I'm inclined to believe the problem is as serious as represented--100,000 to 1,000,000 newly manufactured PCs that will have to be scrapped. Note that the source quoted throughout the article is Peter N. Glaskowsky, a frequent contributor to Pournelle's page. Anyone who's considering buying a new PC needs to look at this report before doing anything.

 


 

 

 

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Saturday, 25 September 1999

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The Register reports that Intel has delayed the introduction of the 820 "Camino" chipset indefinitely. It's beginning to look like the Christmas PC season may be a disaster. The 820 won't be available until some unspecified future date, 440BX and 440ZX chipsets are in very short supply, Athlon motherboards aren't shipping in volume (and many don't work anyway), and the price of RAM has quadrupled. What's a prospective PC buyer to do? Buy a Via-based system with not much RAM, presumably.

* * * * *

Okay. Everyone else is publishing the results of their Un-Intelligence test, so here are mine:

The Test Results Are In! "You're normal!"

For the record, you are:

64% Un-telligent!

which is normal since the current average is 60%.

Your evaluation is unique, however, so keep reading.

Here is the custom report of your personality that led our team of geeks to conclude (with confidence) that you are bordering on mediocrity, yet more exciting than others:

"The subject shows a very high level of intelligence, and his sense of observation is one of his best qualities. Considering this, he shows a lot of potential, but that's only part of the equation.

"In addition, the subject exhibits brave tendencies, and that does a lotfor his score.

"But what concerns us most about him is his sinister and violent attitude. While we almost find it amusing that the subject would rather kill something than suffer a minor inconvenience, it effectively destroys his ability to survive tight situations. Our study suggests there is a 96% chance that he will end up in prison!

"Finally, the subject displayed a healthy (better than most net freaks anyway) sense of humor, a fair and productive sense of morality, and a hot shot self-confidence. The balance of these three traits is important; high levels of confidence, medium levels of morality, and a good level of humor make for the strongest individuals."

Final Score: 64% Un-telligent

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Matt Beland [mailto:mbeland@itool.com]
Sent: Friday, September 24, 1999 11:16 AM
To: Thompson@Ttgnet.Com; Jerryp@Jerrypournelle.Com
Subject: Frozen Chicken Gun

Actually, there is a (small) grain of truth to the story. But it didn’t happen with the British, it didn’t happen with a train, and it was immediately apparent what had happened.

My Father-in-law was there.

They were testing the new R model KC-135 tankers in various conditions. You may already know that the only structural change between the older models and the R model is the engines; the R model has bigger, more powerful GE turbofans, that are not only more powerful and more fuel efficient, but also quieter. This required a recertification of the engines in all kinds of flight conditions. My father-in-law was one of the pilots responsible for “flying” the aircraft inside the hanger where testing was taking place, and it was decided to see how well the engines would handle ingesting foreign objects, to assess the aircraft’s vulnerability to Foreign Object Damage.

Apparently, the engines performed well in all respects, until they tried the extreme climates; tropical conditions and arctic both seemed to affect the engines, particularly the fan blades. While the engineers were trying to figure out what was happening, the pilots asked an innocent question – wouldn’t the brittle fan blades make the engines more susceptible to FOD? So it was decided to test it.

The entire hangar was cooled to well below zero, the engines were turned over and warmed up, and the engineers were getting ready to throw the chickens (Tyson Whole Chickens) into the engines (no guns) when someone realized their mistake. The chickens had frozen while sitting on the hanger floor waiting for the test.

So, no, there was no damage; the mistake was caught before the test was made. There was no cannon, the engineers weren’t British, and there was no train. But there is still a small grain of truth to the story.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: The Moores [mailto:themoores@the-i.net]
Sent: Friday, September 24, 1999 6:38 PM
To: Lois Stephens
Subject:

BILL GATES BUYS A HOUSE

Bill: "There are a few issues we need to discuss."

Contractor: "Ah, you have our basic support option. Calls are free for the first 90 days and $75 a call thereafter. Okay?"

Bill: "Uh, yeah... the first issue is the living room. We think it's a little smaller than we anticipated."

Contractor: "Yeah. Some compromises were made to have it out by the release date."

Bill: "We won't be able to fit all our furniture in there."

Contractor: "Well, you have two options. You can purchase a new, larger living room; or you can use a Stacker."

Bill: "Stacker?"

Contractor: "Yeah, it allows you to fit twice as much furniture into the room. By stacking it, of course, you put the entertainment center on the couch... the chairs on the table... etc. You leave an empty spot, so when you want to use some furniture you can unstack what you need and then put it back when you're done."

Bill: "Uh... I dunno... issue two. The second issue is the light fixtures. The bulbs we brought with us from our old home won't fit. The threads run the wrong way."

Contractor: "Oh! That's easy. Those bulbs aren't plug and play. You'll have to upgrade to the new bulbs."

Bill: "And the electrical outlets? The holes are round, not rectangular. How do I fix that?"

Contractor: "Just uninstall and reinstall the electrical system."

Bill: "You're kidding!?"

Contractor: "Nope. Its the only way."

Bill: " Well... I have one last problem. Sometimes, when I have guests over, someone will flush the toilet and it won't stop. The water pressure drops so low that the showers don't work."

Contractor: "That's a resource leakage problem. One fixture is failing to terminate and is hogging the resources preventing access from other fixtures."

Bill: "And how do I fix that?"

Contractor: "Well, after each flush, you all need to exit the house, turn off the water at the street, turn it back on, reenter the house and then you can get back to work."

Bill: "That's the last straw. What kind of product are you selling me?"

Contractor: "Hey, nobody's making you buy it."

Bill: "And when will this be fixed?"

Contractor: "Oh, in your next house, which will be ready to release sometime near the end of next year. It was due out this year, but we've had some delays..."

Thanks. I remember seeing something like this years ago, but I don't know the original source.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Rudzki [mailto:rasterho@pacbell.net]
Sent: Saturday, September 25, 1999 12:38 AM
To: Robert B. Thompson
Subject: Rambus problems and trashing 1000's of new mobos, Libertarian approaches to residential living

I seem to have heard that when using Rambus you had to insert terminator cards into any unused dimm bank/slots. Is that no longer the official party line and 2 banks/slots is all that is allowed?

As far as Hogan I have not yet read him or indeed know anything about him, but I will give him a shufty.

Imagine my shock when Asimov died, and I discovered the man was deathly afraid of flying and airplanes! He apparently missed many conventions and gatherings especially overseas since business travel by ship is really not feasible unless you have no time line and really don't care how long it takes to get to your destination.

I mean that's like learning Charlatan Heston and Elmer Keith both secretly hated guns and did not own any or allow them in the house... =8^-)

I have been registered as a Libertarian until recently when I gave the County Registrar notice I no longer wished to vote for anything since I believe the franchise has been so diluted by illegal aliens and just plain unthinking and ignorant voters it has become meaningless. Just how did Clinton win 2 White House occupant elections?

I have often wondered how a true Libertarian society would deal with, say, barking dogs in a residential neighborhood? Just shoot them?

I live in an area of the city where the houses were built in 1911-1913 on narrow 50' x 110' lots. Some still have the old carriage houses, all the driveways and garages were added later in the '20's and '30's since no one in this price range in 1912 likely owned a car.

Within a 100 metre radius of my house there are at least 20 dogs distributed in yards within earshot of each other, most people have 2-3, some 5 and some only 1.

[Riverside is unique among American cities of its size, 253,000 population, in that there is no legal limit on the number of dogs you can own, even the County has a 4 dog limit although it is rarely enforced. There is one house by the Golf Course next to the Santa Ana River they have more than 100 dogs, they don't need a kennel license and the smell of fresh dog shit in the morning, along with the flies and the barking is awesome! Code Compliance has a 2" thick folder of complaints but of course their hands are tied...]

Of these 20+ dogs, there are times when 12 to 14 are barking at each other through chain-link fences, and on garbage days all 20+ bark at the garbage truck in the alley even though it has come twice per week for many decades.

Unlike Irvine and some local communities, in Riverside if you have a complaint about a barking dog you call Animal Control [which is run by the County] give the address of the dog's house and they send him a form letter explaining the section of the Municipal Code that prohibits excessive dog barking, they have it under "noisy animals" which includes roosters and other crowing fowl. The owner of the dog gets 10 days to do something about it which is usually nothing. As one dog-owner neighbor said hey that's what dogs do, they bark!

After 10 days when nothing has changed except sometimes they let the dog out to bark more often just to show they are not going to be intimidated by Animal Control, you call again and they note the complaint and send you more forms to apply for a hearing where you and the dog owner can appear and present your cases in front of a panel which has a City Hall civilian, a Police Lieutenant and a Fire Captain and they will rule in favor of one side or the other.

If the plaintiff wins, the next time the dog barks you all get to go to real court this time and a local judge rules on the matter several months later. Most people who work for a living just give up at this point, who can take this kind of time off work to go to hearings?

In the mean time you get to listen to the dogs morning, noon and night... The County will send out an investigator to check on the dog's living conditions but only in County areas, the City is considered to be a more benign environment.

The local Police specifically exempt themselves from dog complaints, other cities if they show up and the dog is barking you get a citation, get enough of them and fines begin to outweigh the 'joy' of owning a dog that barks a lot...

But what the hay, this is America, a free country!

Limitations on the number of dogs one can own is news to me. If there's such a limitation here in Winston-Salem (population something like 175,000) I don't know of it. We have a barking dog ordinance, but I suspect it's seldom invoked. The police here will respond (eventually) to a complaint of a barking dog, although I expect that they aren't surprised if a dog barks at the house when they show up.

I'm surprised that you're surprised that all the dogs bark at the garbage truck. That's their job. In fact, if I ever saw a dog that didn't bark at the garbage truck, I'd suspect it was really a cat in drag. Our vet explained to us why dogs bark at postmen and other delivery people. A dog assumes that anyone approaching the house is an intruder, unless it knows that person to be accepted by the master. The postman comes to the house every day, the master doesn't let him in (confirming the dog's opinion that the postman is an intruder), and the dog drives him away with his ferocious threat display. Postmen are stupid, though, as far as dogs are concerned, because they never learn the lesson and keep trying to break in.

Dogs are brave, too. When they hear that UPS truck growling viciously, they're ready to go out and do battle with it, even though it's 1,000 times their size.

* * * * *

-----Original Message-----
From: J.H. Ricketson [mailto:culam@neteze.com]
Sent: Saturday, September 25, 1999 4:50 AM
To: thompson@ttgnet.com
Subject: Economics

Bob -

As an economics amateur who has never lost interest since 4 semesters @ U. of Pennsylvania too many years ago, I highly recommend Jude Wanniski's daily article at: http://www.polyconomics.com/ It has long been a daily read for me. The man makes a LOT of sense, both economically & politically, although he will definitely cause you to think - even more than you already do. He has the consummate gall to recommend the gold standard & dismantling the IMF. Including excellent reasons why.

Regards,

JHR
--
culam@neteze.com [J.H. Ricketson in San Pablo]

Well, I'm certainly in favor of returning to the gold standard and abolishing the IMF (not to mention the Fed, fractional reserve banking, etc.).

 


 

 

 

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Sunday, 26 September 1999

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Yesterday, I finally got a few spare moments to spend finding out why my test-bed system stopped working when I moved it from the no-name case to the Antec mid-tower the middle of this week. When I applied power, the fans and drives spun up but nothing else happened. My first guess was that I had a cable mis-connected or that had gone bad. I checked every single cable, to no avail. I replaced the IDE and floppy cable. Same thing happened. I started up the system with no drives connected to the motherboard. No joy.

At that point, I was beginning to think perhaps the Antec power supply was DOA. Then I noticed that the power supply was selectable for 115V or 230V, and the slider was set to 230V. I suppose that makes sense as the default. Connecting a power supply that expects 230V to 115V mains power does no harm, but the converse is not true. Still, I think Antec (and every other manufacturer) should spend an extra penny to put a sticker across the power connector that says "Set the red slider for your local voltage". That would have saved me an hour or more At least the test-bed works fine now.

I also installed Windows 2000 Professional RC2 on the test-bed system, using it to upgrade an earlier build. After several minutes of intensive compatibility testing with Solitaire and FreeCell, everything appears to be working fine.

* * * * *

We went over to Steve and Suzy Tucker's house last night for dinner and to give Katie her 12th birthday present, only a week late. While we were there, of course, Steve and I decided to see if we could break one of his computers. He was complaining of frequent crashes on one of his systems, an NEC Ready 9712 running Windows 95. We decided to upgrade it to Windows NT Workstation 4, and the troubles began.

As I was sitting watching Steve work on the system, I noticed a Seagate ST15150N SCSI hard disk sitting on the desk. I asked him if it had died, and he replied that the drive was fine but that he'd given up on SCSI hard disks for his personal systems. I have a bunch of IDE hard disks at home, but only three or four SCSI hard disks, so I asked him if he wanted to trade his 4.3 GB Fast SCSI-2 drive for a 10 GB UDMA IDE drive. He agreed, and we ran over to my house to do the swap.

When we arrived back at the Tucker's house, I warned Steve that unless we installed a BIOS upgrade, the NEC system (an old Pentium/166) would probably recognize 8.4 GB at most of the new hard disk. Sure enough, that's what happened. So I went off in search of a BIOS upgrade. The NEC web site at first glance appears to be comprehensive and well-organized. Nothing could be further from the truth. We knew the model number of his machine. We knew the manufacturer's part number of his machine. We knew the serial number of his machine. We knew the motherboard part number of his machine. All of this was not enough to allow us to find the proper BIOS update for that motherboard. It may be that no such upgrade exists, but we're not even certain of that. So Steve reconciled himself to using only 8.4 GB of the 10 GB capacity.

So I now have a 4.3 GB, 7,200 RPM, Fast SCSI-2 Seagate Barracuda 4 drive sitting on my work bench. I'll probably put it in theodore, Barbara's main system. That box already has an Adaptec SCSI adapter, which serves her Plextor CD-ROM drive and Tecmar NS20 tape drive. Her box is the main data store for our network, so having an additional 4.3 GB of Fast SCSI-2 drive can't hurt. Also, that box has a Maxtor 91000D8 7,200 RPM Ultra/33 ATA drive in it, so comparing performance between the two will be interesting.

 


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