ptalk > June 2004

Even Microsoft sez MSIE is bad 4U

This article: Are the Browser Wars Back? - How Mozilla's Firefox trumps Internet Explorer. By Paul Boutin, published by Slate (an on-line magazine owned by Microsoft) advises that you not use Internet Explorer and recommends Mozilla Firefox instead.

It's interesting that Firefox is a descendant of Netscape, which Microsoft essentially wiped out a decade ago. The article admits that installing Firefox takes a little effort, but suggests that it may be worth your while to protect yourself against evil doers.

As the article says, the problem is that Internet Explorer is too successful. Its success makes it the target of crackers, who are constantly finding holes in its security system. The latest hole allowed a Russian site to actually monitor every key you typed, even after you had long since left the site.

Read the full article for more details.

US Gov sez MSIE Bad 4U

The U.S. government's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) is warning Web surfers to stop using Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) browser.

Nigritude Ultramarine

What the heck is Nigritude Ultramarine? A challenge to see if people can outwit Google and cause their website to be ranked the highest when someone searches for 'nigritude ultramarine' (which had no links before the contest started).

Reminds me of a game we used to play in Google, to see if we could find two words that returned no answers from Google. It’s not as easy as you might think. I have two that still work, but clearly I can't tell you them!