Tech Talk Radio
Sponsored by Stratford University
June 24, 2000 Broadcast
Microsoft's Support of Interoperability
Special Offer to Join the Internet Society
Dot Matrix Symphony
Stages of Life Virus
CookieGate
Atomic Clock Time Server
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Microsoft's Support of Interoperability
     Microsoft scored a small victory his week when Judge Penfield Jackson issued an Order for Certification of Direct Appeal to the Supreme Court in which he decreed "that the Final Judgment of June 7, 2000 is stayed in its entirety until the appeal therefrom is heard and decided, unless the stay is earlier vacated by an appeal court." This order increases the probability that the Supreme Court will hear the case and may accelerate the final outcome.
     Tech Talk has discussed this case on several prior shows (June 10th, May 13th, April 29th, and April 8th). Tech Talk supports the Court's finding of anti-competitive behavior, but vehemently opposes the proposed remedy that would divide Microsoft into two companies. Tech Talk hopes that this stay will give the Court time to modify its position and seek behavioral changes and monetary settlements only. Tech Talk believes Microsoft should be required to open its Application Program Interfaces (APIs) and use open standards to interact to other software vendors.
    Microsoft has been moving in this direction for some time and has adopted many open standards. In order to bolster this case, Tech Talk invited Microsoft to discuss its support of interoperability, portability, and open standards. Our special guest was Microsoft's Andrew Coupe. Andrew is Principal Technology Specialist with Microsoft's Business Solutions Group. Tech Talk agreed not to ask Andrew about the Department of Justice antitrust lawsuit. In particular, we discussed the following topics:

     The implication is that open APIs and Interoperability are superior to a breakup of Microsoft. In order to facilitate this discussion, Andrew has provided the following links to supporting materials.

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Special Offer to Join the Internet Society
    On the June 17th Show, our guests were Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn, creators of the protocols and architecture of the Internet, and Don Heath, President of the Internet Society (www.isoc.org). Bob and Vint started the Internet Society ten years ago and Vint served as the first President. The Internet Society is a nonprofit organization tasked with preserving and propagating the Internet throughout the world. Tech Talk is a strong supporter of this organization and encourages all Internet users to join. In particular Tech Talk offered to send a tape of the June 17th show featuring Vint, Bob, and Don to anyone who joins ISOC prior to close-of-business, June 30th. Individual memberships are as low as $35.00. Student memberships are $25.00. Just mention Tech Talk to qualify for this special offer. The Internet Society can be reached by phone at (703) 326-9880 and by fax at (703) 326-9881.
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Dot Matrix Symphony
     On the April 29th Show, we discussed the delivery of audio over the Internet including MP3 files. Since that show, many listeners have commented that they are sound card challenged and need some alternative delivery method. As always, Tech Talk responded to listener requests with the revelation of the Dot Matrix Printer Symphony. Using this method, music is created by the ra-ta-tat of the dot matrix print head. We found this form of music fully described on the Slashdot site (www.slashdot.org) in a discussion chain titled, Symphony for Dot Matrix Printers. This discussion includes printer quartets, 9-pin printer, and 24-pin printer symphonies. Some even have words. Now the accounting department can listen to music while printing financial statements!
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Stages of Life Virus
     The latest virus to be released in the wilds of the Internet is called VBS.Stages.A. This virus/worm has been reported by the Computer Emergency Response Team (www.cert.org) in its current activities log. The virus began circulated on June 20th. By 11:18am of that day, CERT reported over 1700 hosts had been been infected. VBS.Stages is an e-mail virus/worm with one of twelve titles and an attached payload named LIFE_STAGES.TXT.SHS. The virus sends mail to as many as 100 addresses from the Outlook address book and modifies the system registry, regedit.exe, and mirc.ini. The SHS file is a Microsoft Scrap Object file. These types of files are executable and can contain a wide variety of objects. The SHS file contains VBScript code that is executed by the Windows Scripting Host. It may or may not begin with "Fw:". The subject will contain either "Life stages", "Funny", or "Jokes" and may or may not be followed by "text." The virus opens Notepad and displays "sexual stages of life" jokes while it sends copies of itself to those listed in the Outlook address book. The virus does not delete any critical files, although it does hide regedit.exe. Tech Talk received a copy of the virus and reviewed the code and the jokes. The jokes could not be aired on WMAL.
     All Tech Talk listeners are advised to install the latest security patch to Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express (see June 20th Show). In addition, Tech Talk advises all listeners to disable the Windows Scripting Host (see May 20th Show discussion "What Can I Do?).
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CookieGate
     The Office of National Drug Control Policy is using cookies to track visitors to their website. The cookies are being placed by the DoubleClick company. Many believe that this constitutes an invasion of privacy and is in violation of the Privacy Act of 1974. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (www.epic.org) has requested a Congressional investigation (see EPIC Press Release).
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Atomic Clock Time Server
     AtomicTime98 is a 32-bit Windows Internet application which will connect to the Atomic Clock Time Server in Boulder, Colorado (USA) and fetch the current atomic clock time value. If you have entered your time zone, it will change the clock in your computer to the correct local time. This shareware program is $10 when downloaded and $20 on disk. It can be evaluated for 30-days without charge. This program, written by Bruce Adelsman, is one of Tech Talk's favorites. We have been using it for the past couple of years to keep the clocks at Stratford University accurate. It can be found on the AtomTime Website (www.atomtime.com).
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