November 17, 2003

There were 2 posts published on November 17, 2003 (this is page 1 of 1).

Beautiful Portsmouth, VA…..not.

What a difference a weekend makes. Friday morning, I was waking up early to see the sun rise over a Pacific beach. This evening, I’m in that crack pipe of a city: Portsmouth, Virginia. It’s a place that makes some of those shady ports of call I made in my Navy days seem tame. I kind of expected this place to be an armpit, but the city just outdid itself. It seems like every street I passed had a cop making a traffic stop. I think the producers of the TV show COPS have a permanent room rented at the hotel. It’s a place that shirtless drunk guys could call home.

Next time, I’ll let the reseller pick the hotel. This sucks. I think my traveling fun has reached an all-time low.

I’m meeting my buddy Clint and our reseller in a few to go out to eat (there’s safety in numbers, you know). Then I’m bolting the door and hunkering down until tomorrow’s 9 AM meeting. Maybe my days living on Clanton Avenue in Raleigh will come in handy and I can remember how to sleep through gunfire.

Spam Prevention

An article in today’s News And Observer alerted me to one congressman’s plan to eliminate spam by taxing email. If this plan was on Fark, it would have the “asinine” tag in front of it.

Spam sucks: there’s no question about it. But politicians like Dayton don’t know a mailserver from a hole in the ground. Most politicians still are under the misconception that the Internet is a US-only network, subject to U.S. law.

Here’s a clue to the clueless inside the Beltway: taxing spam won’t work. Outlawing spam won’t work. In fact, few if any laws would have any effect on the Internet, because it’s GLOBAL.

Internet traffic routes around stupid laws. If its designers were truly brilliant, Internet traffic would stay the hell away from Washington.

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