Reading Nick's post here reminded me just how lax some companies are with peoples data and information.

Very recently I was email spammed by some jokers who used an embedded 1x1 image to track whether a blank email sent out to me had been read (Yep, sure lots of firms do this I know..) Anyhow, I looked at the tracking url (was bored and felt a little inquisitive) and noted an interesting aspect of the processing url

Rogerd has a plaintive thread over at WMW's temporary home (they are still off-air). What alternatives are there if your dns goes awol?

His OP poses the question well, and most of us (particularly me) know we should be doing something, we know the alternatives, but inertia and the thought that "it will be back up in 10 minutes anyway" lead us to not bothering to go beyond primary and secondary nameservers on the domain registrar. Its not a sexy subject, but WMW's continuing plight shows me that I really should do something about the alternatives for my sites.

It's a Friday afternoon so what better way to end the week than by playing a game of Brewster Jennings Protects America. This new game merges the Google Maps API with the classic "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego" game.

The Bangkok Post today is reporting from New Dehli that Google have offered to talk with the Indian government over the government's concern with the publication of the hi-res photos. The article mentions that "There was no sign of a similar offer for Thailand, which has also complained about the detailed imagery."

Now that's a very good catch for Y!.

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Ever since Seth recommended Presentation Zen a few weeks back i've been an avid reader and fan. It's quite amazing what you can get out of reading about the way good presenters operate. You can apply that knowledge to all kinds of things, even if you don't ever have to speak publically. Today's post takes a look at Steve Jobs' recent presentation. Steve is a master, without a doubt, and the post gives some good insight into why he's the master.

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Alex posts with the title you know it's bubble2.0 when... that links to this eMarketer report on internet growth.

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It seems once again, what's old is new again. Today i learn of trafficgeni.us from CashKeywords. It's pretty much a clone of the old Trafficology site that had readers submit new ways to get traffic to their sites, and would publish a paid newsletter featuring the best of them. That site went to pot when it was sold, apparently the new owners are shite, but never fear, the CK one is free, so it may be worth a look...

Source Title: In Search of Stuff Source Url: http://www.insearchofstuff.com/2005/10/grandpa-simpsons-letter-to-dmoz.php Story Text:

We all know how difficult it is to get into DMOZ these days, and quite frankly I'm sick of hearing about it on the various forums I visit. But who knew that even Grandpa (Abe) Simpson was also upset about it?

Source Title: Robotic racers achieve milestone Source Url: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4322542.stm Story Text:

The BBC reports that Stanford University have won the race across the Mohave Desert for driverless cars. They think one day all cars will be automatically driven, and Congress has legislated that 1/3 of all US military vehicles must be capable of driving themselves by 2015. 23 cars started, and had to be able to complete the course at above 15 mph. Last year no entrant got further than 7 miles, whereas this year number managed the full 131 miles.

Source Title: Proper coding for HTML Email Newsletter Source Url: http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum21/11135.htm Story Text:

There is a thread at WMW , that is just like the "good old days" with someone who knows their stuff giving good factual advice. Don_Hoagie poses and answers this dilemma in message #7 "You want to send a spiffy HTML/CSS laden email to a base of 'customers', but you’ve heard around town that different email applications treat HTML in their own quirky ways."

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I was talking to Duncan Riley earlier this morning, we talked a bit about B5Media, his co-owned blog network that launched the other week and gave us all a lot of enjoyment ripping apart the business model. Apparently they've been inundated with applications from folks wanting to blog with them. The phrase "everyone and his dog has a blognetwork" came up more than once.

Source Title: Breaking America's grip on the net Source Url: http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,16376,1585288,00.html Story Text:

Clearly unimpressed by the U.S. refusing to give up governance of the Internet's root server top level control, the EU and other countries have joined forces to take control of the internet whether the U.S. like it or not.

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I got one of those free exibit hall passes (I think that was what they called it) for eComXpo and today I got an email saying "We noticed that you register using the Firefox Computer. Please note that access to the eComXpo show requires the use of a Windows PC and Internet Explorer version 5.5 or higher.". And sure enough I checked their site and around the bottom of this page: it also says

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Whether you're designing a blog template, or building a shopping cart, it helps to define user scenarios in order to engineer the process of conversion, or at least guide that process. That conversion may be simply to sign up for a newsletter, or subscribe to a web feed (yes, that's a conversion!) or it may be to purchase a combine harvestor, it doesn't make a lot of difference in general, the point is, that you should be aware of how the process should, could and does work in order to maximize a sites effectiveness.

Source Title: Get in on the CustomScoop Blog/News Search Private Beta Source Url: http://www.micropersuasion.com/2005/09/get_in_on_the_c.html Story Text:

Caught mention of a new Search tool that monitors for queries across blogs and news channels via Steve that I thought you might find interesting. It's called CustomScoop and you can get an invitation code for the personal edition beta by emailing personalbeta@customscoop.com and mentioning Threadwatch.

Source Title: Engadget Labs launching October 15 Source Url: http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/archives/2005/09/engadget_labs_launching_octobe.html Story Text:

Congratulations to Peter Rojas and the Engadget crew, they're about to get spiffy new offices, a "testing lab" and podcasting suite. Lucky buggers.. :)

Source Title: eDonkey throws in the towel Source Url: http://p2pnet.net/story/6408 Story Text:

Following the Grokster ruling in June, the RIAA have sent out C&D's to seven major p2p networks demanding they block copyrighted material on their networks. dDonkey president Sam Yagan has had enough, and has thrown in the towel.

Source Title: UK Netmarketing Source Url: http://www.chinwag.com/uk-netmarketing/ Story Text:

What with all the talk of big players getting older in our business, I have just found out that the UK Netmarketing Email list is 10 years old.