Presidential Ramblings

 

Issue 1.9

February 2004

 

These computer things are just about the coolest things since… well, since the K-Man Band. Were any of you fans of the K-Man Band back in the eighties? The K-Man Band started as Brother Jump and played local bars all over Connecticut. I followed Tony Richards and his bands from about 1978 until the band dissolved in the early nineties –about 13 years – and have been wondering what happened to Tony and the other band members. So I used some of Jamie’s search techniques (yes, there is a DACS connection here) and, low and behold, found a couple of current web sites with works by Tony Richards.

My web searching success led to another first – I downloaded my first mp3’s! Yes, yes, I know I’m a “little” behind the curve in some areas, but a start is a start. Now that I’ve downloaded these new songs, I really need to get my old Brother Jump and K-Man albums (vinyl and cassettes, I missed the CD) into digital format. Let’s see… that’ll be project #3487 on the list of things to do.

All this has been a round about means to say that Jamie Yates did a great presentation at the January general meeting. Jamie’s talk filled the entire meeting time so we can still call on Bruce Preston to do what was supposed to be part of January’s presentation on Google images. Bruce was unable to make it to the meeting due to the road conditions that nite.

Well, not to change the subject, but the political season is upon us once again. It’s hard to believe that all of last year’s news coverage of the Presidential candidates was just the preliminaries! Now it starts for real! Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, our Congress people are still at work doing many things that affect our civil liberties, privacy, and digital rights. There is certainly much to discuss on these topics here in the land of the free and home of the brave. One place to keep up to date on such things is the Electronic Frontier Foundation (www.eff.org). Regardless of your personal views on such things as the renewal of the horribly misnamed USA Patriot Act, EFF is working to preserve your right to say what you mean. A really good way to keep up on events that affect these issues is to subscribe to the free EFF Action Center. The Action Center sends out a monthly email that summarizes legislation and other events. The Action Center web site makes it easy for you to tell your Congresspeople your opinion on these matters. Here are the EFF’s “7 To Do List”:

  1. The Public Domain Needs Your Help!
  2. Linux Users Unite: Stop SCO!
  3. Verify the Vote: Tell Congress to Fight for Secure Elections!
  4. Verified Voting Gains Momentum: Contact Your Senator!
  5. Stop the DirecTV Dragnet!
  6. Support Fair Labeling for Copy-Protected Media!
  7. War on P2P: Congress Tries to Make File-Sharing a Felony!

If any of these items sound interesting, visit the EFF web site to learn more.

Jim Scheef
dacsprez@dacs.org


BackHomeNext

© Copyright Danbury Area Computer Society, Inc. 1998-2003 All Rights Reserved
Web Site Terms & Conditions of Use