The Telecom Digest for August 21, 2010
Volume 29 : Issue 226 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
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Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2010 23:53:12 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Teacher resigns over Facebook posting
Message-ID: <p0624087ac893ac559d73@[10.0.1.3]>
Teacher resigns over Facebook posting
Called Cohasset residents snobby
By Sydney Lupkin, Globe Correspondent | August 19, 2010
When the Cohasset School Committee discovered this week that an
administrator had posted Facebook comments disparaging residents of
the South Shore town as snobby and arrogant, the reaction was swift.
Unhappy parents e-mailed the committee, alerting members to the
postings by June Talvitie-Siple, said Alfred Slanetz, vice chairman of
the committee. Talvitie-Siple was asked to resign within 24 hours,
and she stepped down Tuesday.
"The unfortunate thing is that it's a lesson that we try to teach our
kids about use of the Internet,'' Slanetz said yesterday. "It almost
doesn't matter if it's on the Web or in a newspaper these days. . . .
It's all out there.''
Talvitie-Siple was the supervisor for engineering, math, science, and
technology at Cohasset High School. She had just received a $4,000
raise, boosting her salary to about $92,000, said School Committee
member Linda Snowdale.
Talvitie-Siple's Facebook profile was no longer publicly available
yesterday, but the Patriot-Ledger of Quincy reported Wednesday that
Talvitie-Siple wrote she was "so not looking forward to another year
at Cohasset Schools,'' calling residents "so arrogant and snobby.''
...
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/08/19/teacher_resigns_over_facebook_posting/
***** Moderator's Note *****
As a longtime Boston-area resident, I can truthfully say that
residents of Cohasset are no more arrogant and snobby than anyone else
who lives on the "Irish Riviera" -
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Shore,_Massachusetts).
Since the Irish are God's chosen people, I submit that we are big
enough to take a little ribbing from a school teacher, but also
entitled to be mad about her salary. The Cardinal (pun intended) Rule
of Civil Service is to keep out of the limelight: as the legions of
teachers, administrators, assistants, supervisory assistants, and
assistant senior administrative assistants will attest, it's nice work
if you can get it, but you must never forget whose name is on the
door.
Bill "Not Mine" Horne
Moderator
Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2010 09:24:37 +1000
From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Teacher resigns over Facebook posting
Message-ID: <pan.2010.08.20.23.24.34.589124@myrealbox.com>
On Thu, 19 Aug 2010 23:53:12 -0400, Telecom Digest Moderator wrote:
..........
> Since the Irish are God's chosen people, I submit that we are big enough
> to take a little ribbing from a school teacher, but also entitled to be
> mad about her salary. The Cardinal (pun intended) Rule of Civil Service is
> to keep out of the limelight: as the legions of teachers, administrators,
> assistants, supervisory assistants, and assistant senior administrative
> assistants will attest, it's nice work if you can get it, but you must
> never forget whose name is on the door.
All this technology allowing so many of us to make our opinions known in
so many places, and yet even though it seems there is no issue in actually
having the opinion, you get into strife for using the available
technology to express it.
Is the actual problem the technology or the fear (and inconvenience) of
having opinions made known?
If this keeps up, a new school subject will be on how not to use all
the new technology foisted upon us - starting with the old-fashioned
telephone and working up to the newer toys.....
--
Regards, David.
David Clayton
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Knowledge is a measure of how many answers you have, intelligence is a
measure of how many questions you have.
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2010 23:57:10 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: In battle of smartphones, Google has the right answer
Message-ID: <p0624087dc893ad62dc60@[10.0.1.3]>
TECH LAB
In battle of smartphones, Google has the right answer
Company's decision to distribute Android operating system widely
gives it an edge
By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff | August 19, 2010
The war for smartphone domination is pretty much over, and the
reasons are sitting on my desk.
There's the Vibrant from Samsung Group, a sleek, four-ounce beauty
with a dazzling color screen. Next to it sits the hulking, half-pound
Streak from PC maker Dell Inc., the biggest cellphone I've seen since
NBC canceled "Miami Vice.''
Each, in its own way, is delightful. And both are built around
Android, the smartphone operating system from Google Inc. that's
outselling Apple Inc.'s in the US smartphone market.
Apple and its excellent iPhone will do fine, but Google will seize
most of the market because it has adopted Microsoft Corp.'s old PC
playbook. By selling Windows software to any computer maker,
Microsoft flooded the world with Windows machines.
Today, there are just three iPhone models, all from Apple, and
available in the United States through just one cell carrier: AT&T.
There are more than 20 Android models, made by a host of companies,
and available from every cell carrier. Of course Android wins.
The Android approach encourages phone designers to create innovative
devices to target particular niche markets. So we're getting products
like the Vibrant and the Streak, devices that have almost nothing in
common except the software they run.
...
http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2010/08/19/in_battle_of_smartphones_google_has_the_right_answer/
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2010 00:22:21 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Simplifying the Lives of Web Users
Message-ID: <p06240885c893b33b3b56@[10.0.1.3]>
Simplifying the Lives of Web Users
By DAVID POGUE
August 18, 2010
I'm about to make your life better. No need to thank me.
But first, a warning: On the way to understanding how your life will
get better, you'll have to read about some technical, fairly arcane
topics. Trust me: it'll be worth it.
In this case, the topic is your Web browsing, and the magic wand is a
free service called OpenDNS.
You know how every Web site has an address, like www.google.com or
www.nytimes.com? Turns out that's just a fakeout. It's a convenient
crutch for you, the human with limited brain capacity.
Behind the scenes, the actual address is a string of numbers (called
an I.P. address, for Internet protocol) that looks something like
this: 74.125.53.100. (That happens to be Google's address.)
Nobody can remember those addresses, though they are no longer than a
phone number, so the Web's thoughtful designers came up with a
secondary system: plain-English addresses like www.whatever.com. When
you type that into your browser, a computer at your Internet provider
performs a quick lookup. "Aha," it says to itself in its little
digital way, "you just typed www.google.com. What you really want, of
course, is 74.125.53.100. Please hold; I'll connect you."
That, in a nutshell, is how D.N.S. works. (It stands for domain name
system, in case that helps.)
Unfortunately, from time to time, your Internet provider's D.N.S.
computer goes down. To you, it seems that the Web itself has gone
out, because you can't pull up any sites at all. In December 2008,
for example, 1.2 million Los Angeles citizens thought that the entire
Web had gone offline, because of a crashed Time Warner D.N.S.
computer.
...
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/technology/personaltech/19pogue.html
***** Moderator's Note *****
<pedantic mode>
DNS does not says "Please hold; I'll connect you." It says "Here's the
real, numerical address for the site you wanted", and the rest is up
to you, or actually, to your computer, which uses the IP address
provided by DNS to access the site you wanted.
</pedantic mode>
<Old Curmudgeon Mode>
The way Mr. Pogue gushes about this rather pedestrian innovation,
you'd think he was usurping Al Gore's position as Inventor of the
Internet. For all the supposedly great features that the OpenDNS
company offers, there is a hidden, and high, price: they get to
collect your IP address, and to keep track of every site that you
visit. That information, which is easily linked to your actual name
and address, can be used to accomplish a wide and frightening variety
of tasks: everything from shaming you about your membership in
<pick-your-least-favorite-group> to telling your boss that you've been
visiting sites about childbirth - or cancer treatment.
Be careful what you recommend, Mr. Pogue. Internauts have long memories.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2010 20:00:36 EDT
From: Wes Leatherock <Wesrock@aol.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Simplifying the Lives of Web Users
Message-ID: <b958f.5dd6a7fa.39a07124@aol.com>
In a message dated 8/20/2010 12:21:23 PM Central Daylight Time,
Telecom Digest Moderator writes:
> ***** Moderator's Note *****
>
> <pedantic mode>
> DNS does not say "Please hold; I'll connect you." It says "Here's the
> real, numerical address for the site you wanted", and the rest is up
> to you, or actually, to your computer, which uses the IP address
> provided by DNS to access the site you wanted.
> </pedantic mode>
I thought it was the Domain Name Server, not D.N. System that had the IP
addresses.
Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com
wleathus@yahoo.com
***** Moderator's Note *****
The system is made up of all the servers and their programmed
interactions: while A server withing THE service will deliver an
IP address your computer can use, it is the service as a whole that I
was speaking of. The Domain Name Service does NOT connect your
computer to its intended site: the Internet does that.
FWIW. YMMV.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: 20 Aug 2010 02:47:28 -0000
From: John Levine <johnl@iecc.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: film "Executive Suite"
Message-ID: <20100820024728.73111.qmail@joyce.lan>
>In one scene, they're trying to reach an executive who has left for
>his weekend cabin. They decide to phone the turnpike interchange to
>see if he can be intercepted when he passes through. Now, I'm not
>sure how much traffic there was on interchanges in the 1950s, but I in
>2010 most interchange toll booths have many lanes and long lines of
>drivers, and such an intercept request would be laughed at.
On the upstate part of the NY Thruway there are plenty of exits where
there was one tollbooth staffed by a single employee. It is my
impression that at some of them where they had separate booths for the
eastbound and westbound exits, late at night there'd be only one
employee, they'd put a barrier across one of the booths, and you had
to use a buzzer or a phone to summon the attendant from the other
booth.
On the Connecticut Turnpike, the easternmost toll barrier was one or
two booths in a slightly wider bit of the road.
Calling the tollbooth is hokey, but it's not implausible.
R's,
John
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2010 20:09:05 EDT
From: Wes Leatherock <Wesrock@aol.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: film "Executive Suite"
Message-ID: <b9ad5.732d2461.39a07321@aol.com>
In a message dated 8/20/2010 5:51:56 PM Central Daylight Time,
johnl@iecc.com writes:
> On the upstate part of the NY Thruway there are plenty of exits
> where there was one tollbooth staffed by a single employee. It is
> my impression that at some of them where they had separate booths
> for the eastbound and westbound exits, late at night there'd be only
> one employee, they'd put a barrier across one of the booths, and you
> had to use a buzzer or a phone to summon the attendant from the
> other booth.
> On the Connecticut Turnpike, the easternmost toll barrier was one or
> two booths in a slightly wider bit of the road.
> Calling the tollbooth is hokey, but it's not implausible.
The same thing is true on many of the less-used entrances and exists
on Oklahoma tunrpikes. At ome of those there is only one actual toll
booth, between the lanes.so one toll taker could serve both
directions.
At some of the least active, it is exact change only, with a basket
and no live toll taker at all.
Of course, at all of them you can use your "Pikepass" (called
different things in eash state) which bills you automatically with no
need for a toll taker. One notable toll gate has the "Pikepass"
dedicated lane marked "Ramp Speed 75."
Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com
wleathus@yahoo.com
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