we saw that...

uss ronnie raygun underway

via: twitter @navynews

110104-N-1722W-068 SAN DIEGO (Jan. 4, 2011)

The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76) departs Naval Air Station North Island.

Ronald Reagan is on a scheduled underway for training and certification in preparation for a deployment in early 2011.

(U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Trevor Welsh/Released)

michael hoffman: in defense of robert e lee

link to audio download page

In response to the Jan. 3 nationwide broadcast by PBS "public" television of a documentary on Confederate General Robert E. Lee, Michael Hoffman appeared on the Jeff Rense Radio program, Jan. 4, 2011, discussing General Lee and the antebellum South.

state senator rob marionneaux threatens to sue the daily kingfish blog

daily kingfish had ran a check of outstanding parking and traffic tickets on the city of new orleans official website nola.gov and found over $2,000 worth of unpaid parking/traffic tickets linked to what they thought was state senator rob marionneaux's legislative prestige license plate "LA17" and posted it.

not long afterward, daily kingfish received "several vaguely threatening emails from the senator's senate committee staff regarding the parking tickets issue."

eventually, dk received an electric letter from senator marionneaux himself threatening legal action unless dk retracted its post.

a few minutes ago wst... ran a check from nola.gov for unpaid traffic tickets registered to license plate "LA17"

12:04 pm cdt 03 january 2011

gannett paywalls coming

here's something interesting we stumbled across this morning:

www.tallahassee.com
====

"the loss of a teardrop diamond" hotel bentley scene

====

symantec detects fresh instant messenger worm exploiting facebook.com

spamfighter.com news:

Symantec Detects Fresh IM Worm Exploiting Facebook.com

Symantec the security company has detected a worm that's relatively new and is called W32.Yimfoca, which has an unprecedented method of operation to spread across Facebook viz. via exploiting the website's surveys.

Describing this modus operandi, Symantec's security investigators say that whenever a contaminated user visits the top page of Facebook.com, he encounters a pop up presenting the surveys that state that the user's account stands deactivated, however, it can be activated if he answers any of the online surveys.

Nevertheless, during the course of answering, the user finds a progress chart that comes with a warning that he must complete the survey in 3 minutes failing which he'll lose his account's access.

Incidentally, each filled out survey yields the scammers a maximum of $1, while the user apparently gains his account's access. But if he doesn't fill out the survey, a PC worm will prevent him from operating his account and the threat will reappear during his system's rebooting, the warning specifies.

Remarkably, according to the security researchers, the worm prevents the user from accessing Facebook merely when he browses in Internet Explorer.

Symantec notes that the social-networking website continues to be accessible through Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox though.

Furthermore, the said worm proliferates through spam in different languages that are dispatched via MSN Messenger, ICQ, Google Talk, Yahoo Messenger, Skype, Paltalk, or Xfire. It contaminates USB drives too.

Meanwhile, Stephen Doherty security researcher at Symantec, after studying the worm suggests that when anyone suddenly gets a web-link from a friend via an IM, he can always reply that message while asking of the link and thereby ensuring it isn't some sort of malware spreading.

Thetechherald.com published this on December 21, 2010.

Eventually, as found in the above malicious campaign, Facebook surveys yield scammers huge money, while innumerable scams associated with the website have been reported during 2010.

As per one instance, Sophos another security company said that numerous users of Facebook, during the 3rd-week of December 2010, were found attacked with a scam, which asserted that it could provide them quick admission into a Facebook electronic mail id.

SPAMfighter News - 01-01-2011

perez hilton attempting to make reggie bush out to be "homophobic"

fortunately, perez hilton commenters have more sense than he does -- however, one commenter does point out that bush "dated kim kardashian so he obviously isn't too bright." lol

air force mascot "the bird" goes awol at independence bowl

awww that's such a shame.

The Air Force Academy's live mascot, "The Bird," took advantage of his usual pregame flight around the stadium to flee the premises ahead of the Falcons' 14-7 Independence Bowl win over Georgia Tech, leaving Independence Stadium behind ... read more

what are your most shared pages on facebook?

someone sent us this link earlier. we checked it out and it appears legitimate. in other words its not a malicious site. whois: likebutton.me

also a cursory google search of likebutton.me shows that its been around since april 2010 and has been mentioned on mashable as well as cnet and others..

copy and paste into your browser's address bar:

====
click picture to enlarge
it should resolve to something like this.
====

against the odds: jailhouse lawyer argues his way out of prison

now this is a great story!

wall street journal excerpt:

By SEAN GARDINER

Each morning for 5,546 days, Jabbar Collins knew exactly what he'd wear when he awoke: a dark-green shirt with matching dark-green pants.

The prison greenies of a convicted murderer, he says, were "overly starched in the beginning, but as time wore on, and after repeated washes, they were worn and dull, like so many other things on the inside."

For most of those 15 years, Mr. Collins, who maintained his innocence, knew the only way his wardrobe would change was if he did something that's indescribably rare. He'd have to lawyer himself out of jail.

There was no crusading journalist, no nonprofit group taking up his cause, just Inmate 95A2646, a high-school dropout from Brooklyn, alone in a computerless prison law library. ~ read more

yahoo! sports: saints disrespect falcons with celebration

click picture to enlargesaints celebrate their win by standing on the falcon's face
====