With Philadelphia’s recent decision to charge bloggers a $300 business privilege tax, battle lines are being drawn on Blogging as a First Amendment Free Press activity.    There is no attempt to determine which blogs are “businesses” and which are simply the hobby of local writers.   Instead, Philadelphia’s government has declared that ALL bloggers in the city to be businesses, whether they are hobbyists who have never made a cent blogging, or are professional bloggers working for Public Relations firms.

Philadelphia’s Mayor’s press secretary commented that “Philadelphia has always had a business privilege tax, and anyone who makes money has to pay”.  The flaw with this thinking is that not all bloggers make (or even attempt to make) money.  In fact, of 20 Million Bloggers in the United States, only 8.5% (1.7 million) make any money at all blogging, and only 2.25% (452,000) make enough to call blogging their career. (Numbers from the Wall Street Journal)  Extrapolating from these national numbers, it looks like the city of Philadelphia wants to shake down over 90% of the bloggers in the “City of Brotherly Love” who make no money at all.  For hobby bloggers who may pay a few hundred dollars a year for hosting, domain names, and such, and make no attempt to earn any money from their blogs, adding an additional $300 Business Privilege Tax may well force them to silence themselves.

Recently, I have been accessing a sharing forum which some posters use MegaUpload as a host. Well with my internet connection being limited I was satisfied downloading one at a time at 167Kbytes/sec… well with fiber coming to my area soon I decided to use a faster network to try out MegaUpload Premium for 9.99 a month (Via paypal) Your speed limit is removed and you can download more than one file at a time. You also get an MegaVideo Premium access along with it removing the 72minute restriction. Is it worth the money? … Yes it is worth the money if your download speed is high.

Lately as I have been surfing the internet I have noticed certain areas getting slower and slower. This is to be expected as more and more people use the internet. What I am saying is, maybe these increased latencies are due to certain viruses that are starting to spread rampant? I base this theory on a case study I am performing on the computers I work on for people. About 79% of the computers I have worked on have had the same identical virus. This virus installs itself as a system level service and starts sending spam to people, all while crippling the antivirus (atacks multiple varieties of antiviral solutions).

My suspicion is with more and more people using social network mediums, the more viruses that will attack through those sites. The internet has become a dangerous place for the novice PC user. Most people who surf the internet should be using a firewall with at minimum an updated antivirus.

Good security practices:

• Practice Safe Hex: Keep your antivirus up to date. If your subscription on your current antivirus has expired and you need one you can find one at http://free.avg.com
• Keep your data backed up: When you get done editing a document put it on a flashdrive, then put the flashdrive up for safe keeping.
• Be suspicious of every link on the internet and in your email: Just because you receive an email from someone claiming to be from your bank, do not send them any information or click any link on the page, just print the email and bring it to your local branch and make an inquiry about the message, or open your webbrowser and type the address to your bank in by yourself.
  • Your bank will never ask for information over email.
• Be careful of those links on sites like myspace and facebook, if anything tries to make you install a toolbar or an addon other than Macromedia Flash Player or Macromedia Shockwave player, treat it with skepticism.
• Keep your operating system up to date.
• If something on the internet does not look legit don’t click it. This includes those “You Have Won!!!! XXXXXX” banners.

Other than those just don’t put too much information on the internet. Post your GeoTagged photos when you get home, but dont geotag the ones taken at your home, because anyone who has access to that picture can see exactly where you live thanks to gps.

Pinin' for the Fjords

Life has been hectic for a few months… There’s been flooding in Nashville back in May, and lots of life changes that have put this blog on the back burner.   We’ve had a few guest writers, but the lack of fresh new content is purely my fault.

I apologize for not having published anything in a while, but things happen, and time slips away.

That being said…

Everyone has their prediction as to how many seats the Democrats will lose in November.  Given what we know right now about, well, everything, I have my own prediction as to what will happen come Election Day.

While you may find the title a tad confusing, I have a very good reason for it.  Sure, most of us by now are feeling some sort of “buyer’s remorse” over voting for Obama.  There’s a lot of anger and resentment over people’s perception of being fooled, and that is totally understandable.  Not to mention, the American public at large (irregardless of party affiliation) do not like having federal legislation shoved down their throat without knowing full well what they are getting.  Obamacare as the President wants it is, for all intents and purposes, dead.  It’s not going to pass Congress, but that may not be a bad thing for Obama.  You see, Obama knows full well the unpopularity of this bill, knows of the anger and resentment building in the public, and yet he insists on ramming this thing through.

There are multiple reasons for this.

Nashville, Tennessee isn’t known for it’s winter snows.  Usually we’re lucky to get a dusting of snow, that’s gone the next day. But, thus far this winter, we’ve had two “serious” (for Nashville) snows.  Right now, I’m inside with a steamy warm beverage, looking out at six inches of snow.  It’s still flurrying on-and-off, and it’s so still and quiet outside.

It’s blowing slightly, enough that walking into the wind is a very cold affair.

There are so many things I’m thankful for, this Thanksgiving Day, 2009.  Not just the obvious things, like a new fiance’, or that I’m still happily, gainfully employed.  I’m thankful for the blessings God has granted me. My beautiful, intelligent children.  My mother being put on the list as a candidate for a lung transplant.  All of the people I communicate with daily, using this marvelous Internet.   And of course, not the least, though I have listed it last, my health.

I look forward to seeing my son, and his new wife, this evening, as they come visit, on their merry rounds, trying to keep all the new in-laws happy.