Robert Accettura's
Fun With Wordage

Me: I think on a larger scale than most
Nick: yeah
Me: you’d think I’d be compensating for something… but I think I’m complementing something
Nick: it happens

What sucked more? The chicken or the egg?

Boy, I’ve been doing so many different things the last few days, to finish up this semester it’s sickening.

Will take a week off to cleanup, relax, and cram out Project Aquarius. With my current time frame, I should have a beta-launch sometime this summer. I can’t be much more specific than that. Could be as early as late-May, or as late as August. That’s assuming I greenlight to put it into production.

Seems like saved some of the ugly stuff and put it off for some time. I think that will be my first task. Finish up the worst. Then the endless tweaking, polish phase begins.

And yes… Project Aquarius has never been described to anyone. Nobody knows exactly what it is… but it’s coming soon (hopefully). More hints may become available at some point in the future.

And here’s a great example of that theory. Yea right. Voluntary Collective Licensing VCL is about as legitimate as the “Universal language” many Linguist experts have been working towards for generations. It’s a system that will never work because it’s fundamentally flawed. What makes it so moronic is that people know it’s flawed, and they market it as perfect. So they blame Apple, a who recently entered this disaster as a failure. Yet having that much penetration in such a large market, and against all odds is rather substantial. Especially considering iTunes was Mac only for quite some time. And it’s competing against something that has no charge.

This is hysterical:

The vast majority of file sharers are willing to pay a reasonable fee for the freedom to download whatever they like, using whatever software suits them. In addition to those who would opt to take a license if given the opportunity, many more will likely have their license fees paid by intermediaries, like ISPs, universities, and software vendors.

Yea, come on guys. I’m positive even the author doesn’t believe that one.

A much better idea would be to create one open sourced DRM based network that is legalized.
(more…)

No doubt by now most have been reading up on the future of the Mozilla Foundation and the GNOME Foundation. A whole bunch of things are circulating. Some look very official, some sound official, some I question.

I’m personally 100% for the idea of GNOME and Mozilla Foundation working together. I think together they can avoid duplication, and more efficiently accomplish many things. Rather than work separately, and perhaps reinvent the wheel.

The idea has also come about that the two should perhaps merge. Personally, I’m not very confident that would be in the best interests of either foundation, and the web community in general. Here’s my personal reasoning, just to create discussion:

• GNOME is focused on Linux. Mozilla is focused on cross platform. Being cross platform is one of Mozilla’s greatest assets. Neither should blur that focus. Both are important. Merging is a step towards Linux orienting, rather than orienting towards OS-neutral, which is where Mozilla should be.
• Mozilla needs to keep focused on the web. GNOME needs to keep focused on the desktop environment. While they ultimately will meet at development, there will be separation for quite some time. Until then they should meet for the overlap. Each needs to focus on their specialization. There is overlap, but without question they are still separate, and won’t be 100% merged for years still. Remember, several years back we were all promised web kiosks. Still hasn’t happened.

Where could they really work together?

• Well, remember that web kiosk? Think how well GNOME’s usability and UNIX experience could team up with Mozilla Gecko. It’s a match made in heaven. It’s the way it should have always been done.
• XAML/Avalon - it’s quite a large undertaking. And both would benefit from a shared implementation. But again, each should orient towards their own (platform independence and GNOME’s desktop environment).

Ultimately, there is a lot to share, but I’m a bit hesitant to believe they would benefit from joining 100%. I think the alliance would be best as Apple and KDE over KHTML. They should share and share. But each has a different target. And each works towards their target. But when there is overlap, they do together. I’m hesitant to think that merging would be effective. A group can only have so many goals. I think some would have to be sacrificed in a merger. By staying separate they can harvest the benefits of cooperation, but still achieve their goals.

Mozilla as a browser on all platforms can convince many that they don’t need commercial apps, and break the windows ties. GNOME is apparently the next step in going Open Source in the workplace. See together they can complement each other. But as one, I’m not sure they would be able to cover all the bases. A baseball team doesn’t put all the players together. They spread out. But when needed, they help each other out, covering bases, etc.

Anyway. This is just my personal reflection thinking out loud. I’m curious what others think. This will change the industry in one way or another. I’m positive on that.

One more week of CLASSES.

Then FINALS

Then…. ah… sweet summer.

So yes, I’m busy. When I’m not involved in academic work, I’m working on project aquarius. And yes, that’s slated for this summer (I hope).

Oh, a side effect of a biology presentation resulted in Wolf Pr0n for your own enjoyment. And you thought having your dog hump your leg or lick peanut butter off your body was kinky.

Well, AOL’s now doing what they said they would. IMAP access. Also note XHTML Transitional code for that help page. Interesting since AOL said it would be looking to put more stuff in HTML.

But no mention of Thunderbird. Any AOL employees out there who can make a few calls? Evangelism Team?

For those who prefer Aladdin Stuffit on Windows, here some tips:

The following registry key will associate .jar files to that you can expand them with ease. A nice trick to have.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.jar]
"PerceivedType"="compressed"
@="StuffIt.Zip.Archive.View"
"CONTENT TYPE"="application/x-stuffit"
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.jar\CompressedFolder

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.jar\CompressedFolder\ShellNew]
"Data"=hex:50,4b,05,06,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.jar\OpenWithProgids]
"CompressedFolder"=""

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.jar\PersistentHandler]
@="{098f2470-bae0-11cd-b579-08002b30bfeb}

Provided at your own risk.

Save the contents into a text file with the extension .reg. Then open it.

You can also go into the preferences and save without compression. Then just right click, and zip.

Well, somewhat…

CNET news is reporting that AOL is to announce IMAP access, as rumored a few months ago. This could greatly reopen the market on email. AOL has millions of customers, and has been fighting spam for sometime (Tbird has a spam filter). AOL customers

Also interesting is the announcement that Netscape (another member of the family) is hiring and an update to Netscape.

Seems like the new business plain is in full swing.

Well, it’s a great goal they have in go through all the Evangelism bugs. That should make some real ground in making sure Mozilla not only meets, but kicks IE’s royal butt everywhere.

What I found interesting was the Alexa Query for the Top 100 English Sites. If you look at those websites, most will never work in Mozilla, and it’s a good thing.

I’m shocked how many spyware/adware/parasite websites made it in:
Offeroptimizer.com
Gator.com
Hotbar
AdultFriendFinder
Internet Optimizer
etc.

Just an interesting note. I’m glad Mozilla is incompatible with that garbage. It ain’t a bug, it’s a feature. And proudly so.

If this isn’t pathetic, nothing is.

Do people have any self respect? I guess not.