Spam

Paul Graham: A Plan for Spam. I've found that you can filter present-day spam acceptably well using nothing more than a Bayesian combination of the spam probabilities of individual words. Using a slightly tweaked (as described below) Bayesian filter, we now miss less than 5 per 1000 spams, with 0 false positives.
Bayespam: The q-mail spam filter than learns. An implementation of the above.

Ars Technica: Peer to peer spam killing. Article about Cloudmark SpamNet, spam-fighting software for Outlook/Win32. I've been using it for a few weeks now and have found it to be significantly less effective than Outlook's own (ineffective) filter.

Eric Kidd: SpamAssassin is a highly accurate open source spam filter. [via Scripting News]
Adam Cury seems to like the spam filter in Apple's new mail program.
Mac Night Owl: The Jaguar Report: Apple Mail is the Best Junk Mail Fighter. [via MNJ]

CNET: You've got spam, and more spam.
CNET: If it's spam, the message is "delete".
O'Reilly: Cory Doctorow on "What to Do About Spam?"
Infoworld: The Death of E-mail. "Spam will go away -- with the death of e-mail." [via Scripting News]

Freedom to Tinker: Keystone SpamKops. Earlier this week, my ISP shut off this site, because the site had appeared on a list of "spammers" published by an outfit called SpamCop. [...] Naturally, I was not allowed to see the accusation, or to learn who had submitted it, or to rebut it, or even to communicate with an actual human being at SpamCop. You see, they're not interested in listening to complaints from spammers. [via gammatron (phase ii)]
Dan Gilmor: Spam fighters shouldn't tread on the innocent and Spam's Other Victims.

Slashdot: Utah's Anti-Spam Law In Action

Lighter side

Dennis spams himself. [via kottke.org]
Matt Mower just got his first spam on a fresh address.

3:36:51 PM | Comments: | Topics: linux osx spam 

CNET: Microsoft throws DVD kit in with Xbox. Buy an X-Box and DVD Kit between now and November 30th, get a $30 rebate.

Are X-Box sales that bad?

2:24:26 PM | Comments: | Topics: dvd x-box 

DVD Burning

Ars Technica: Pioneer DVR-A04 DVD-RW drive review. This is what Apple sells as the SuperDrive. It can be found for under $250 on Price Watch, and DVD-R/RW media can be had for a buck each in 50-packs.

CNET: New spec adds speed to DVD race. 4x DVD+R.
PCWorld: Sony to unveil multi-format DVD drive. Supports DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW. Covered by: Slashdot, NFN, Ars Technica.
NFN: Toshiba, NEC Enter Next-Gen DVD Format Fray. Blue laser formats, 15-23GB

OpenBSD Journal: DVD+RW tools for OpenBSD
Slashdot: Burn a DVD-AC3 Compatible CD-R

2:17:54 PM | Comments: | Topics: dvd 

Apple Stuff

I'm an Apple watcher. At one point, I wanted to replace my Dell laptop with a TiBook and Mac OS X in a bad way... I'm a Windows guy who has had to live in a Unix world, a BSD-ish OS with real apps running on sexy hardware had serious appeal. Apple lost the sale over one little thing: no Terminal Services client. On the road I could live without Visual Studio, but not being able to log into my servers was a deal stopper.

Microsoft finally released one last month, but now I have little need and no budget for a new laptop. Someday...

Anyways, here's a bunch of Apple stuff that has been clogging my aggregator.

Tom Negrino: Apple's going to sell a lot more iPods in the next quarter. New Windows version of the iPod has a much higher sales ranking on Amazon than the Mac version. Steve didn't wait for the Windows iPod. I want one, but I already have an MK I Nomad Jukebox (crappy), Dell-badged Rio Receiver (mediocre), and two Rio Cars (excellent). [via Scripting News]

O'Reilly: Mac OS X Switcher Stories. Linux may be the big loser.
John Gruber: Unix Switchers. Commentary on above. In other words, from a Mac users’s perspective, Mac OS X still has rough edges; from a Linux user’s, it’s the Hope diamond. Mac OS X is clearly the world’s best desktop Unix — unfortunately, that isn’t saying much.
NFN: Cult of the Mac -- Is Anyone Switching?
osOpinion: This Cat Roars. In part, the tale of a user who tried to switch to Linux from Windows, reverted back, and now has moved to OS X.

Slashdot: Apple releases security update for Jaguar. That was fast.

CNET: Apple gives break to multi-Mac homes. $199 for up to five Macs in a single household.
DDN: Jaguar Upgrade Journal. List of post-install steps for MySQL, PHP, Apache, etc.
Dan Gilmor: OS X Jaguar -- Early Impressions.
MacInTouch: Reader Reports on Jaguar.
Dive Into Mark: 101 Jaguar Links.

New Power Macs: Dual 867MHz, 1.0GHz, or 1.25GHz CPUs, DDR SDRAM, SuperDrive and 167MHz bus on GHz systems, 2MB L3 cache on the 1.25GHz. $1699, $2499, $3299. Covered by: CNET, Slashdot, Ars Technica
Slashdot: New Power Macs have crippled DDR?

CNET: Mac OS X gets an AOL Update. Now includes Gecko.

Apple uses DMCA to halt use of iDVD with non-Apple drives: Over at Ars, one reader suggested that this may be illegal tying. Covered by: Ars Technica, CNET, Slashdot.

Wired: Apple's Newton Just Won't Drop [via MNJ]
Wired: Newton's Return: A Hit and a Myth [via MNJ]

The Register: Sony, Apple make phone dream team
NY Times: Apple's Chief in the Risky Land of Handhelds
Slashdot: Apple iPhone Rumors Resurface

1:01:27 PM | Comments: | Topics: apple mp3 osx pda_convergence wireless 

Clearing out my aggregator...

12:21:17 PM | Comments:

Halo Legends

I finally beat Halo! But not on that wimpy Normal level or even Heroic. That's right baby, Legendary. Only took me a month :p I must be getting old. [Justin Rudd]

I tried playing a level on the Legendary setting once, the enemies were swarming and I ran out of ammo before I'd killed half of them...

2:47:32 AM | Comments: | Topics: x-box