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Ben Rothke writes "While Terminal Chaos should be shelved in the current events or business section of a bookstore, it could also be placed in the modern crime section. After reading it, one gets the impression that the state of air traffic today could only come due to criminal neglect or mischief. If one looks at pictures of airline flights from the 1960s, you will see well-dressed passengers enjoying their flight. In 2008, barely a day goes by without an incident of air rage, from irate passengers in the terminal, to those in the air causing flights to be diverted. Today's airline traveler considers it a near miracle if his flight arrives on time with his baggage." Keep reading for the rest of Ben's review.

HairyNevus writes "The Washington Post has an article detailing Google's request for international privacy standards. Google is taking this matter all the way to the U.N., arguing that a hodge-podge of privacy law unnecessarily burdens Internet-based companies while also failing to protect consumers. Although Google is currently under investigation by the EU for its privacy practices, the company claims it has been a crusader for protecting consumer privacy. Google's privacy counsel Peter Fleischer called America's privacy laws 'too complex and too much of a patchwork,' and the European Union's laws 'too bureaucratic and inflexible.' The alternative? Something closer to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation's framework which 'balances very carefully information privacy with business needs and commercial interests', according to Fleischer."

Pissed Off Charter Communications Customer writes "People I know who use Charter Communications in the upper Midwest have been unable to send email from their home clients (Outlook, Thunderbird, Eudora, etc.) since Saturday. All get a "connection refused" message from Charter's mail server. When pressed by irate customers on day 4 of this ridiculous outage, a Charter supervisor blamed "incompatible Microsoft software" and said that it could be "a month" before any service might be restored.

I didn't want to sign up for Charter in the first place out here in the hinterlands (AT&T seemed to be the only other choice), but I'm thinking they're going to lose a few thousand customers just like me this month.

I can't help but wonder if this is related to Charter's recent company-wide roll-out of Vista. This "Vista Bug Costs Users In Swedish Town Their Internet" article may also be related:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/02/122320 9

Sorry — no official URL; I haven't gotten anyone at Charter to put the "we blame Microsoft" bit in writing yet and they sure haven't told anyone who doesn't pry about the massive and sustained outage."

athloi writes with a link to an editorial by John Dvorak over at the PC Magazine site. Rather than his usual tilting at windmills, Dvorak turns his attention to possibility of another big internet economy 'pop': "Every single person working in the media today who experienced the dot-com bubble in 1999 to 2000 believes that we are going through the exact same process and can expect the exact same results — a bust. It's déjà vu all over again. Each succeeding bubble has been worse than its predecessor. Thus nobody is actually able to spot the cycle, since it just looks like a continuum. I can assure you that after this next collapse, nobody will think of the dot-com bubble as anything other than a prelude." It certainly seems like another burst is imminent; will this one be worse than the original, or have less of an impact?

ramboando writes "In an article on the ZDNet site 'chief culture officer' and HR boss Stacy Savides Sullivan describes the kind of traits that she's looking for in potential Google employees. If you're thinking about applying, she also goes over what kind of questions one might be asked in an interview, Google's 'happiness survey' and the best perks that makes employees tick and stay with the company (Google ski-trips or paid paternity leave, anyone?). 'I think one of the hardest things to do is ensure that we are hiring people who possess the kind of traits that we're looking for in a Google-y employee. Google-y is defined as somebody who is fairly flexible, adaptable and not focusing on titles and hierarchy, and just gets stuff done. So, we put a lot of focus in our hiring processes when we are interviewing to try to determine first and foremost does the person have the skill set and experience potential to do the job from a background standpoint in addition to academics and credentials.'"

Esther Schindler writes "Not just another 'why big companies should adopt Macs' article, CIO is running a piece assuming that Macs are already on the way in the door. Hi, I'm a Mac, and I'm Your Enterprise Computer offers advice to IT managers about how to integrate Apple systems into the existing IT infrastructure, and offers hints from leading Mac OS X experts on configuring those systems once they've arrived. '[A] key element in corporate Macintosh adoption is the importance of third-party software and custom solutions. They can help smooth the way for integrating Macs onto the network. While specialists say they wish third-party support were greater, the openness of the Mac makes correcting issues possible. Don't discount the lure of the well-worn path that draws and then traps your IT staff into familiar habits.'"

cloudscout writes "The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped over 400 points today. While there were various valid financial reasons for such a decline, some of the blame is being placed on computer systems that couldn't keep up with the abnormally high volume at the New York Stock Exchange and the resulting tremor as they switched over to a backup system."

in2mind writes "The BBC News is reporting on the completion of a design for a 'doomsday' vault ... that will house seeds. All known varieties of food crops will be represented in the structure, which will be constructed by the Norwegian government. The vault aims to safeguard the world's agriculture from future catastrophes by building into the side of a mountain. On a remote island. Near the North pole. The Svalbard International Seed Vault will house the seed samples at a preservative -18C (0F), and could be used by post-apocalyptic people to feed a hungry planet."

narramissic writes "A new Apple technical support document confirms that none of the company's Windows Applications are compatible with Vista. Affected applications include: 'QuickTime, the iPod shuffle reset utility, Bonjour for Windows, AirPort for Windows, the iDisk utility, AppleWorks for Windows, and Apple Software Update for Windows. The stand-alone iPod updater for iTunes 6 for Windows also isn't ready for Vista.'" The article refers to an Apple tech support document dated "today" (02/08) — without providing a link — but a search turns up only this one from 02/02.