Michael Gracie

“The humble improve” - Wynton Marsalis

Unfortunately, not everyone is humble, so we now have to deal with this.
Read more »

As if casino gambling wasn’t already the best way to put you in the poor house, now you may be able to add data theft from casinos to the list. A new system is on the market (to casinos) which will automatically grab data off your driver’s license when you hit the window for a cash advance.

Lets hope casino data security systems are better than Choicepoint’s.

Splogs are being called a great new tool for spammers, but a least RSS feeds don’t include trojan file attachments that spy on you, trash your system, or empty your bank account.

At least not yet.

The old saying “its not what you know, its who you know” is losing steam. In a world on instant startups and flourishing home offices of one, what you know is becoming much more important. But it isn’t all important. How you use that knowledge is what really counts.
Read more »

Goodmail Systems, developers of an email certification platform, recently inked a deal for $8 million from Doll Capital Management and Emergence Capital Partners. The Company has brought in two new board members from the VCs as well.
Read more »

Seth Godin doesn’t need to give away his work (and neither do his colleagues), but that is essentially what he is doing. And for all the right reasons, as far as I am concerned.

It IS about being different.

Plato call the four political virtues wisdom, temperance, courage, and justice. I am hard pressed, off the top of my head, to think of a politician who holds them all dear, so I will break it down…
Read more »

…meaning spam too! According to BusinessWeek, Asia is the spam factory of the world. While the US still leads in spam production, folks like the Chinese and South Koreans are catching up fast.

None of this bodes well for the holiday season. Warnings are floating around that November is going to be a really bad month, which means all those spammers won’t be putting together all those cell phones, game consoles, wide screen TVs and Barbies that you want for Christmas. Get ready for a panic run on big box retailers.

You would think that a company like Refco, seriously down on its luck right now, would look like a good buy at a miniscule percentage of its original IPO market cap. But no. Qualified bidders are backing off, and others are swarming.

Meanwhile, they are all pissing and moaning about the breakup fees. Sounds to me like the company is D E A D, dead.

Help! I am dwelling on all the computer security issues I have to think about for Spamroll: spam, spyware, phishing, id theft, and all the bickering going on around companies and politicians. Luckily, I don’t know jack about any of this stuff, so I just type happily away on my Mac behind multiple firewalls, and all is well. Or is it?
Read more »