by [TC]²
A monthly column of technology rambling, rumination and reality
By: Jud Early, Corporate Vice President, Research, [TC]²
April 2004 Edition
The Latest In The Great Spam War
If you are reading this from our e-mail newsletter, you will have noticed a different look. AOL newsletter subscribers are seeing a plain text version with specially formatted hyperlinks to other news articles and the continuation of this column on our web site. Readers with e-mail provided by other ISP's should receive the HTML with graphics and hyperlinks.
Web site viewers will see the same look, HTML format with fonts that provide a bit more character.
If you use AOL mail, and are reading this, it is no small miracle that you are able to do so. Thanks to our web master and dedicated IT professional, Walt McKinney, we are able to send e-mail to AOL accounts. This has not been an easy task, and we will continue to work on bringing you a fully formatted e-mail newsletter. Walt has been working with AOL to establish a mail format that will go through their spam defenses. Last month we asked for a “fresh” opt-in from our faithful readers, and the faithful responded. This was done to establish a qualified list of people who wish to receive our e-mails, and to allow conformance to the CAN-SPAM law that took effect last December.
With the huge volume of spam and viruses that are flooding the public Internet today, businesses and consumers alike are being deluged, and the Internet Service Providers are working to stem the tide and restore the original usefulness to e-mail. Some ISP's are more aggressive than others, but AOL, Earthlink and Yahoo among others are filtering what you see, and our newsletters have been caught up in the spam net. For those who actually wish to receive our mailings, we are trying our best to get them to you. Two weeks ago, in a test mailing, it appeared that with plain text and special formatting on hyperlinks, the mail would go through. As we prepared to send the newsletter, our Web Master, Walt made another test to ensure success. No Good! The mail was being stripped of any links, so the headlines were all that were visible. With much back-and-forth with the tech support people Walt kept the pressure on. Guess what? AOL made adjustments to their filtering algorithms and another test was successful. There is no assurance that next month's mailing will get through to all of you, but we are hopeful that a compromise solution has been devised. For a formatted version, see our web site.
Are You A Writer?
The Techexchange library contains a large amount of useful information. Much of the information has been written by people from the industry. We are seeking articles of relevance in technology areas, and will post them with full attribution, and will provide feedback from readers from time to time.
If you are a writer, and are going to Material World SPESA Expo in Miami in May, and would like to be paid for writing, we are seeking writers to cover some of the seminar topics being offered by the sponsoring organizations. This may be a way in which some of your expense in attending can be offset, and if your writing commands high praise from our readers, could be the opportunity to spread your writing wings with Techexchange. Contact Jud Early at 919-380-2174. You can also submit your information through the “Ask Jud” section of the web site. I'll call to discuss details.
SizeUSA Report Is Published
The compilation of more than two million individual measurements is now done, and is published for use by those with a need to know what the current US population looks like. The SizeUSA survey, using 3D body scanning technology, acquired data from more than 10,000 people in thirteen cites. The data may be sorted and analyzed in many ways to assist new product developers from apparel, automotive, furniture and other industries in which human size is an important factor. For more information, call Jim Lovejoy, 919-380-2184.
Facelift Planned
Frequent visitors to the Techexchange site will notice a few changes over the coming few weeks. We will be working to improve the usefulness of the site, with new library organization, the ability to search within a section of the library, or to do a global search for all instances of a search term, whether appearing in an article, a database listing, or in informational text relating to a feature of the site. Alternative navigation from the home page will improve access to the entire site, and will also allow the search engine spiders to better identify and index key words and phrases. For those who have the library start page saved as a favorite or bookmarked page, we plan to leave the location as it is, so as to minimize any extra effort on your part.
Ask Jud
Web site visitors are familiar with the Ask Jud feature, where questions or comments may be submitted for answer by Jud, or one of the many colleagues and contacts throughout the world. I have been enjoying a good bit of traffic, with questions from many countries and from students doing research or exam cramming. The submit page originally had check boxes to allow anyone who wished to 1) Remain anonymous and 2) Request that the question not be published. The e-mails I receive would be interesting for our readers, and would provide (or provoke) some dialog among our readers.
Over the past several months I have helped connect people with other people, provided answers to questions that were of no possible relationship to techexchange, and have had a few pieces of fan mail, thanking me for the answer. In an effort to broaden the dialog and to develop a community of folks who had points of view or answers to problems that others were experiencing, I removed the check boxes from the submit page, eliminating the chance to remain anonymous or to not have the question published. Wham!!! The questions have stopped abruptly. Either there are a number of folks out there that want a private pen pal, or there is an awful lot of secret activity that people are not willing to share. Let me hear from you. Do you feel that we should continue to try to get a community discussion going? Is there a reason to spend time on direct answers to one questioner, to the exclusion of others? The goal is not to create another blog site, where anyone can rant and rave about anything, but to provide a place where, for a brief moment, competition is forgotten, and a helping hand is offered. Technology questions, or questions relating to business needs, operations, or strategies would surely be of interest to all, and would not jeopardize proprietary interests. The fate of this feature may be up to you. Take a moment to share your ideas. You'll find me on the home page, or copy and paste this URL into your browser…
http://www.techexchange.com/askjud.html
What's next?
The end of April is the Spring Meeting of the AAFA's Enterprise Competitiveness Council. I will be attending and will cover the meeting and the planned interesting content for our readers around the world. The May newsletter will carry the story as well as other technology related ramblings. See you all here next month.
Jud