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Internet Surveillance

I started reading the report The Internet Under Surveillance 2004 from Reporters Without Borders, and thought that the topic, Internet Surveillance would be a good one to use in lectures and class activities in my course The Internet: Technology, Information, and Issues this fall.

In some related searching I was lead to a few other reports.

  • Internet Surveillance Law After the USA Patriot Act: The Big Brother That Isn’t ” This article argues that the common wisdom on the USA Patriot Act is wrong. Far from being a significant expansion of law enforcement powers online, the Patriot Act actually changed Internet surveillance law in only minor ways and added several key privacy protections”
  • Milking the Internet surveillance cash cow “Pundits and policy-makers are arguing over the legal implications of the FBI’s recent petition to the FCC (http://www.cdt.org/digi_tele/20040310fbipetition.pdf) about how to implement the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act. But the Bureau’s push to get broadband providers covered under CALEA, which currently applies only to telecom carriers, stands to benefit more than just government spies: a domestic eavesdropping industry stands waiting to sell Internet wiretapping tools and services to cable and DSL companies.”
  • Internet and e-mail surveillance at the workplace ” In Switzerland, large numbers of employees have access to the Internet and e-mail from their workplace – essentially for professional reasons, but sometimes for private use also. What use is permitted, and how surveillance may be carried out, is clarified here. “

I also came across The Register – a great site for Internet and IT related news.

2004 07 11 ernie Interesting Web Sites Comments (0) Permalink

Weather Forecasts for Europe

We’re getting closer to leaving for our trip to Zurich,Tecknau, Lucerne, Lugano, Venice, Guarda, and Reinach. It looks like its going to be fun and naturally we’re interested in getting weather forecasts.

Getting a weather forecast for the major cities is relatively easy. Take a look at Weather Underground or Weather.com. Even the BBC weather spot only gives information about major cities: you can find the weather forecast for Zurich but not for Lucerne. One thing these sites have is that you can get the temperature in Celsius or Fahrenheit.

That’s nice, but I still can’t use these to get the 5-day forecast for Lucerne, Guarda, and lots of other places in Switzerland. Until, I found Wetter.com. It’s great. You search by the town’s name and you get a 5-day forecast. There are a couple of drawbacks – the temperature is in Celsius and everything is written in German. The site provides lots of forecasts, and I’ve had the chance to learn the German term for precipitation – Niederschlag.

2004 06 16 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink

Books to Pick Up Again

We’re leaving for a two-week trip in a few days and so we’ve go to return our books to the Library, because they can only be checked out for two weeks. We love our library – The Central Rappahannock Regional Library. It has a great collection and a very good online presence. It has been the recipient of several awards, as well. Still, whenever we take a prolonged trip we try to gather up the books that we’ve been renewing and renewing for many months and return.

Some that we’ve had checked out are great cook books, some are used for reference, and some, for one reason or another, we have been taking a very long time to read. So this entry, and maybe some others will list some books, that I’ll want to check out again when we return.

The Dream Machine by M.Mitchell Waldrop. A great account of J.C.R. Licklider and his influence on the development of the Internet, and time-shared and personal computing.

Some cookbooks:

2004 06 15 ernie Books Comments (0) Permalink

Some URLs to remember

OK. I’m using my blog to share some bookmarks for access later. A bad idea? Not in the right spirit for a blog? Whatever.

Buy the JVC XVN55SL – JVC Progressive Scan DVD Player, DVD Players and VCRs and other consumer electronics at circuitcity.com

This one is at BestBuy

Philips Progressive-Scan DVD Player with DivX, MPEG-4 and DVD+R/+RW Playback
Model: DVP642

A couple for links for class –

The 46 Best-ever Freeware Utilities

Top 10 free and cheap content management systems

Gotta go!

2004 06 09 ernie Interesting Web Sites Comments (0) Permalink

Finding Hotel Accommodations in Italy

Our upcoming trip is also going to include some time in Italy.

We’ve used several resources to find accommodations and rates. Some of the more useful ones that included links and/or reviews were Fodors Mini Guide to Venice, EuroCHEAPOs Guide to Cheap Hotels in Europe , Slow Travel Italy, Worldinabag – Venice, Rick Steves Italy, and tripadvisor.

In the end it all comes down to writing emails to the various hotels, checking on rates and availability. So far, this seems to have worked fairly well.

2004 06 02 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink

Airport guides

Looking for information about the Zurich airport I came across some comprehensive sites that included links to all major airports. One is World Airport Guide (WAG) and the other is International Airport Guide. WAG appeals to me more and I think it is done better. It’s implemented in ASP (no benefit there), and it shows what you can accomplish with a data driven site.

2004 05 28 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink

Getting information from Switzerland Tourism

I had some questions about buying a Swiss Flexi Pass at the train station at the Zurich Airport. Searching through the usenet Group rec.travel.europe I read that others had the same questions. I called MySwitzerland.com Switzerland Tourism at 1-877-794-8037, and got some useful information. The person I spoke with said that it was possible and also told me when the train station was open on the day I’d be arriving. I was also able to order some brochures about the cities I’ll be visiting. Very easy and very nice!

The site Switzerland Tourism has lots of useful information about visiting Switzerland.

2004 05 28 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink

Strindberg + helium

Congratulations to Eun-Ha Paek, Erin Bradley, and James Bewley for Strindberg + helium! Great animation and content. The site contains a collection of short films that are great to watch and enjoy.

An article in the NY Times ‘Strindberg and Helium,’ a Sweet Flowering of Youthful Creativity gives a good review of the site.

2004 05 28 ernie Interesting Web Sites Comments (0) Permalink

items to remember about Zurich

Some things to keep in mind about visiting Zurich:
Get a Zurich Card at the Airport train station. (Hopefully they’re open on Sunday)
See about going on a tour. Best of Zurich includes a boat ride, it looks like its done by bus or Stroll through the old town – a 2 hour walk
Generally check out the site Zurich Tourismus

2004 05 27 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink

Looking for hotels in Zurich

We’re going to Zurich at the end of June and will be leaving there at the beginning of July. Finding a hotel (that’s affordable) isn’t too hard, but it has taken some time — talking with friends, reading books, and checking into Web sites. I started with Fodor’s guide to Zurich to get an overview of the city and some hotel options. They have, what seems to me to be a good listing and rating of hotels. Some of the entries have a URL for a hotel, but others don’t. Searching on the name using Google sometimes brings a link to a site for the hotel, but also brings up a number of options for making reservations. I really don’t like most of them, because they’re too general, and, franky, too commercial for my liking.

Lynn picked the place we’ll stay when we leave – Limmatblick. It looks interesting, has a good location downtown, and seems to be fascinated with Dada. I picked the Limmathof. It turns out it is very near the other hotel, and unlike the Limamtblick, it’s listed in Fodor’s Guide. Strangely enough, some friends who have been to Zurich several times suggested we try that place, and I had written for reservations just that afternoon.

When we leave we’ll be there for at least one night of Züri Fäscht mentioned at the Lonely Plant site. it looks like it’s a big festival with fireworks to boot. The official site for this is Zuerifaescht

2004 05 27 ernie Travel Comments (0) Permalink