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CASCADES project: Cost-effective Outbreak Detection in Networks ( a study by School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University): "Rankings are based on the following question: Which blogs should one read to be most up to date, i.e., to quickly know about important stories that propagate over the blogosphere?
Budget=100 blogs: If I can read 100 blogs, which should I read to be most up to date? Unit cost (each blog costs 1 unit), optimizing the information captured -- population affected (we want to be the first to know about something with many people blogging about the story after us) read more »
I just entered the promotion code h24870p43h8037 for the Cheerios Helping Hearts promotion that was inside the box of Cheerios that I had just finished. Then I figured that while I was at it I'd enter the promotion that was in the box I hadn't opened yet. Imagine my surprise when I opened the box flap and found the same promotion code h24870p43h8037.
At first I thought it was a printing mistake, but when I entered the code again. The site said that it was accepted and that a dollar was being donated. Hopefully that is what actually happened.
I wonder if its true for all the codes?
I was also happily surprised that no name and address information was required to activate the code.
I just wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year ! Here's hoping that next year is even better than this one. read more »
NORAD tracks Santa with Google - Via Official Google Blog :
Now Dasher! Now Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen! On, Comet! On, Cupid! On, Donner and Blitzen!We're counting down the hours until Santa's flight around the world. On Monday, December 24th, starting at 1 am PST, visit noradsanta.org to track Santa with NORAD on his annual trip.NORAD will use Google Maps to track several hundred of Santa's stops in over 200 countries and territories, and will embed videos of Santa's stops captured on their Santa Cams on the Google Map and post the videos on the NORAD Tracks Santa YouTube channel.Want to see more of Santa? NORAD will also provide a downloadable Santa Tracker file to track several thousand of Santa's stops in Google Earth. Santa's visits are only a few seconds long, and then -- poof, he's off to the next location. Click on the gift icons in Google Maps or Google Earth to learn more about the cities that Santa visits.Happy holidays from all of us at Google!
(Read Original Article - Via Official Google Blog .)
I just wanted to wish my readers who celebrate the holiday a Happy Thanksgiving !!
Remember, even with all the screwed stuff going on, we still have a lot to be thankful for.
This entry has nothing to do with Privacy, but relates to one of the non-profits I work with. For people who have an association with CIBC World Markets it's a way to benefit a non-profit that won't incur any out of pocket expense. So if you have any affiliation with CIBC World Markets and approve of the goals of Sunflower Children's Fund, please consider actively participating in their Miracle Day 2007 program and please designate Sunflower Children Funds as the beneficiary of your net commissions.
Mark Your Calendars for Wednesday, December 5th! Sunflower Children Funds to participate in CIBC World Markets Miracle Day 2007 read more »
For those of you in the U.S.A. don't forget to reset your clocks for Daylight Savings Time. It was relocated this year, so be sure and check all your electronics (especially any older ones) they may be following the older rules and be confused.
Spring ahead and Fall back !
It seems that Leopard is officially coming out on October 26,2007 and it has a few features that people concerned with privacy and security might find of interest. Some are listed below in no particular order. read more »
Editor: OK this has nothing to do with privacy, but I wanted to let those of you located in the New York City area know that a charity I work with is having a benefit on Thursday September 27,2007. It is being held at The Capitale (in Manhattan) Come join us and help some children.
Save the Date: Thursday, September 27,2007
Sunflower's Global Fund - Sunflower Children Heroes Benefit
Presenting Sponsor: Paul Touradji, Touradji Capital Managementc read more »
I was a bit curious where my last 100 readers were coming from, so I plotted their IP addresses out on a map. They can easily be off by miles(I am listed as being two counties away). But it does give a bit of visual clue of my readers diveristy.
It looks like my readershipt in Europe is larger than I thought. Looks like I'll have to setup a link to the Google translate function so they can have the option of reading the site in their local language. read more »
Due to the large number of scraping sites out there, I have decided to switch the RSS feeds to Teaser mode. But the good news is that I will not be defaulting to just a single sentence or two. I will have the default set at a long enough string so that you will be able to get a real feel for the entry, and some (of the shorter entries) will still pass thru in full text. read more »
I am trying to get an idea of who my readers are. Prior to my upgrade of the site to my new CMS, the two groups of people I heard from the most were Lawyers and Security Managers. Since the upgrade and the corresponding increase in Google referrals, I seem to be hearing much more from the general public. Each of these different groups would have an interest in different types of content.
As part of my quest to find ways for this blog to be self sustaining(ie. not cost me money) I am investigating different ways to generate a bit of cash. I'd like whatever method(s) to be as unobtrusive, or maybe even beneficial as possible.
It looks like the BlogAds Network is used primarily by opinion making sites and might be a good fit. Unfortunately you need an invitation before you can join. I could just send in an e-mail and see if I get lucky. But since I seem to have a rather diverse audience, I thought I'd check to see if any of you are already part of their network and might be able to help me out read more »
Besides being a popular Holiday, today is also the 8th Anniversary of Privacy Digest. Eight years ago I split this content off from its original location as part of a blog I had on MacRonin.com and I gave it it's own domain. It had been becoming obvious that the issue was becoming more important and deserved a platform of it's own.
So in honor of the ideals that got the United States of America started, I choose the Fourth of July as the birthday for Privacy Digest.
We have grown a lot since then. Especially since my switch to a new CMS. The traffic has increased greatly and the number of readers of the RSS streams keeps growing steadily. I hope that you have been finding this site useful and keep coming. If you would like to help out please visit http://www.PrivacyDigest.com/faq/how+can+we+help for some ideas, or just be sure and tell your friends (and enemies) about us so we can keep people informed. read more »
Administrivia: So far Verizon is living down to my expectations. After having intermittent problems for the last two months, the problem was finally consistent enough that I could get a tech on the phone to finally admit that things might not be perfect. He was very well indoctrinated by Verizon and kept trying to describe a connection that was often 100% dead as "Maybe not as fast as it should be" This was on Thursday. read more »
Administrivia: My updates my be erratic for a few days since i am currently having problems with my DSL line from Verizon. When things are working they are fine, but when there are problems its another story. Its been flaky for 2 months but its finally gotten consistently bad enough that they have admitted that something is wrong with the line, as opposed to me plugging in the wrong wire or needing a new DSL router(which I would have to pay for)
My current DSL status report says my line speed is:
DSL Connect Rate (Down/Up) 32 KBits/Sec by 448 KBits/Sec
For you early morning folks - Sorry for the outage this morning, but it is currently under investigation
Due to the large number of scraping sites out there, I have decided to switch the RSS feeds to Teaser mode. But the good news is that I will not be defaulting to just a single sentence or two. I will have the default set at a long enough string so that you will be able to get a real feel for the entry, and some (of the shorter entries) will still pass thru in full text. read more »
Death at Virgina-Tech | Following the news from the shootings at Virgina-Tech 2007: "I have created another site that will be following the news from the shooting at Virgina-Tech 2007.
The site has just been started and has minimal entries so far. The site ( http://www.DeathAtVirginiaTech.com/ ) is set-up to allow the users to enter content that will be made available after it goes thru moderation." read more »
Security-Related April Fool's Jokes:
My favorite so far: "Window Transparency Information Disclosure." read more »
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