Finally, it looks like Intel has admitted to having a program to make x86-64 chips. The rumors have long been flying that Prescott has 64-bit extensions, and I really hope so. This would be a huge win for people like me, who want an x86-64 computer, as the competition with Hammer will only drive the price down. The real question is, does AMD have enough of a lead to keep in the game?
So, the latest virus, MyDoom, has come and gone (well, it going), and yet again, I had more problems with messages from AntiVirus programs telling me I sent mail with a virus that with the actual virus. Of course, I didn’t send the virus, because I’m running Linux, which can’t get this virus. In addition, the “from” addresses don’t exist, and have never been used before. This means that a spammer got infected.
At any rate, it appears that the warning messages from the AV software may be Spam under teh CAN-SPAM act. They have misleading subjects (“Your message had a virus”), and advertising (links to the AV site and the product name), and no opt out policy. The kicker is that, in order to update the AV software so that it can block the virus, the AV companies have to do enough work to know that the virus is faking addresses, so they know the bounce messsage is going to the wrong person! This is what makes it spam, ultimately. Now, all we need to do is convince the FTC to stop the bastards from sending us all that junk…
At least I can’t really get the virus. My sister has a virus/trojen right now that’s likely forwarding spam. She can tell, because every time they connect to the internet, their link gets saturated. Fortunately (?) they have dialup. If they had broadband, they wouldn’t ever know. And, they have up-to-date AV, which says their system is clean. Go figure. Give me Linux all the way.
My grandfather died over the weekend, so yesterday, today, and tommorow are all funeral-related events. Now, I’m not going today (I can’t miss that much work), but I went yesterday and I’m going tomorrow.
This manages to break up the week horribly, and to completely confuse my sense of time. I really have no idea what day of the week it is. Why is that? Why can’t our minds re-set/re-arm our inner clocks by, say, looking at a calander?
Anyway, funerals are very strange things. Odd combinations of groups laughing and groups crying. The old pictures we scanned/cleaned up/brought were a huge hit, with people trying to figure out who was who 60 years ago.
It’s amazing how much we used to see these people, and how little we’ve seen them recently. I guess when the unifying figure of an extended family, in this case my great grandmother, dies, that family fragments into the next most unified segments. Now, my last surviving grandparent has died, and I’m wondering if this will fragment my family futher. I certainly hasn’t happened on my Mom’s side, as there’s a strong bond between my mom and her siblings, so I can hope that it won’t happen on my dad’s side either. Although, in the past 2 years or so, I’ve basically never seen any of my extended family on my dad’s side without my grandfather being present, so you never know. We did used to get together with my mom’s family without her parents being there some of the time. I guess we’ll see. It’s now up to my uncle, as the eldest surviving member of our family, to make sure we do events at least yearly. We’ll see if he can pull it off.