Woke up this morning to over 1000 bounce messages in my inbox, and a steady stream being added as I deleted them. Seems that once again somebody has decided to use my domain name for their spam, sending out thousands of emails (no doubt using a network of unprotected machines running that garbage that Microsoft calls an operating system and claims is the most secure out there, confirming how little they understand about security). Some of those messages are being blocked by spam filters and bounces returned to me. Others, I’m sure, are getting through.

All the ones I’ve looked at so far are using jewbluedonkeygox as the sender’s email address, although if this abuse of my domain name follows the pattern of previous ones they will start to change that soon.

Something needs to be done about this kind of behaviour, and the only obvious place to strike is the seller of the garbage being advertised in the spam. They are obviously funding these messages, either directly or more likely via referral codes. That kind of activity needs to be made so expensive for them that it is not worthwhile. Allowing them to just block the one referrer does nothing; most of these spammers have enough referral codes that they will not really notice a single one being blocked.

A shot of a segment of my PowerBook’s keyboard, glowing in its night mode. It looks totally different by day, and in fact most of the time at night since I don’t tend to use it in rooms that are pitch black dark.

Of course, if I did, it is nice to know that the keyboard would glow so that my fingers would be able to find their way to the correct keys… you know, using the little eyes that are there in every fingertip…

The SEC announced this morning that is was suspending trading in a number of stocks that have been affected by the email stock scams going around. The other day though I received something that looks remarkably like those emails, only it was in the form of a glossy four page brochure through the regular mail.

You can read the whole thing (PDF), but perhaps the most amusing part of the whole four page document is the start of the disclaimer block on the last page:

This is not an offer to buy or sell securities. This four page information package is for entertainment purposes only, don’t rely on any information in it, verify all information from third party sources.

Or, in other words, this whole thing is a bunch of lies we made up to try and pump a stock we invested too much money in. I have already reported it to the SEC. If you have received similar mailings, perhaps drop a line to them at enforcement@sec.gov and let them know you received one too. Perhaps they’ll suspend this one before too many people get burned taking this “entertainment” seriously.

This inflatable astronaut was standing in Justin Herman Plaza tonight where they seem to be setting up a free promotional concert for Windows Vista. The concert features Jefferson Starship and will be at noon tomorrow (February 7, 2007).

Sorry the frequency of posts here has been so low recently. I’ve been kinda busy with a new thing for work which launches its public beta tomorrow with a new web site, a new service and software for four different platforms (downloadable for free). Stay tuned for details tomorrow, and hopefully after that I can get back to posting more things here too.

While most news sites have been talking about all the people lining up for sales that opened at 5am or 6am and finished around noon on the so-called Black Friday, it would seem that nobody has been thinking of the manikins. These three, in the Serramonte mall’s Macy’s, clearly had a stressful morning.

Remember, remember the fifth of November. Today is Guy Fawkes day, and people across the UK would have been celebrating the foiling of the plot to destroy the Palace of Westminster in 1605. Here in California, this celebration of an early success against terrorists went unnoticed by most people.

To put that date into context, it is two years before the first English settlement in North America (Jamestown, Virginia, founded by Captain John Smith in 1607).