Must reading: Vint Cerf interviewed in The Australian.

Google Adsense launched a new method for advertising today. In short, you can now specify that you want your ad to run on this weblog. I took the Google ads down recently because they weren’t corresponding very well to the content. Let’s see if that changes now that ad buyers have choice.

What I don't quite understand yet is why the content of the ads is distinctly different between blog.lextext.com and icann.blog.us. It's essentially the same content; the icann Blog is simply a subcategory of the main blog.

Steve Metalitz, working in the Whois Task Force: “I have taken a shot at revising the recommendation on a procedure for handling asserted national law conflicts.”

Maria Farrell: “The final task force report on Recommendations for improving notification and consent for the use of contact data in the Whois system has bee published on the ICANN website for public comments.” The Public Comment Forum is here. Last day for public comments is 12 May 2005.

Speaking of Whois, whatever happened to the ICANN President’s Standing Committee on Privacy? The President's Committee was "to be responsible for monitoring the implications of existing and proposed ICANN policies on the handling of personal data." The two Whois reports linked above are exactly the things that the committee should be monitoring. 

Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG): “The WGIG held its third meeting in Geneva from 18 to 20 April 2005. Consultations open to all stakeholders were held on 18 April. The Output of the real-time captioning for the Open Consultations is now available.” Morning Session Transcript (4 references to “ICANN”). Afternoon Session Transcript (21 references to “ICANN”).

Next up on the WSIS conference tour: “UNESCO, in partnership with the African Academy of Languages (ACALAN), the Agence Intergouvernementale de la Francophonie (AIF) and the Government of Mali and other international institutions, is organising a Conference on “Multilingualism for Cultural Diversity and Participation of All in Cyberspace” in Bamako, Mali, on 6 and 7 May 2005. The event is one of UNESCO’s thematic meetings in preparation for the second meeting of the World Summit on the Information Society (Tunis, Tunisia, 16-18 November 2005).” This looks good.

From Groklaw (via Slashdot): "Peeling Away the FUD Wrapping on Linux/Windows 'Studies'." A good post, well worth reading. I have four principal work stations: a Windows PC at the office, an IBM Thinkpad (for work), a Macintosh G5 desktop at home, and a RedHat Linux box at home. For 95% of what I do (word processing, e-mail and web), I don't notice a difference. Most data these days is platform agnostic.

Brinkster Press Release: "Brinkster, a popular web hosting company that grew to fame by offering free web hosting without ads, today announced it is offering free domain names for life when signing up for a web hosting plan."

BONUS LINK TO FINE PRINT: "To get the free domain names one year prepay is required. lDomains will continue to be free of charge as long as they are used within a Personal, Professional or Developer hosting plan at Brinkster that is paid at reguar price and the wholesale cost of the domains does not go above costs as of April 2005. Cannot be combined with any other offer. Void where prohibited by law, see Terms of Services."

P.S. This is another post via Blogjet. So far, so good.