Should spam be illegal? Brady Johnson examines state and federal efforts to cut back on unsolicited commercial email and the practical implications of regulating spam. Plus, Adam provides comprehensive details about keys you can hold down to control your Mac’s startup process. We also note the availability of AOL 5.0, Palm Desktop 2.6, and Virtual PC 3.0.3; Apple’s free release of iMovie; and major Internet security issues found in FileMaker Pro 5.
Government Recommends Microsoft Breakup -- In the latest move in the ongoing antitrust action against Microsoft, last Friday the U.S. government proposed breaking Microsoft into two separate companies for ten years
FileMaker 5 Internet Security Holes -- Blue World Communications has published a FileMaker 5 security alert outlining serious Internet security issues with FileMaker Pro 5 and FileMaker Pro 5 Unlimited's XML publishing and email capabilities
Apple Offers Free iMovie Download -- Citing popular demand for iMovie, Apple has made its entry-level desktop video editing program available as a free download for owners of PowerBook G3 (FireWire) and Power Macintosh G4 machines
Handspring Releases Palm Desktop 2.6 -- Handspring, Inc. has released Palm Desktop 2.6 for the Macintosh, which is compatible with the Visor handheld device and fixes a USB synchronization problem introduced in Mac OS 9.0.4
AOL 5.0 -- America Online has released AOL 5.0 for Macintosh, which includes a new calendar feature, the capability to retrieve messages you've accidentally deleted within the last 24 hours, support for Apple's text-to-speech technology to read messages aloud, and more
Virtual PC 3.0.3 Update Released -- Connectix has released Virtual PC 3.0.3 Updater, which improves compatibility for Windows 2000 and Red Hat Linux 6.1
Dartmouth Spins Off Software -- Three popular network monitoring and troubleshooting tools developed and sold by Dartmouth College have been transferred to Dartware, LLC, a newly formed New Hampshire company
Poll Preview: Collateral Spammage -- This week brings the conclusion of Brady Johnson's look at anti-spam legislation in the United States, and his article prompted us to wonder how serious the spam problem is for you
In last week's quiz, we asked what you hold down at startup to eject removable media from your Mac. The correct answer is the mouse button, which about two-thirds of the 2,150 quiz respondents knew
TidBITS has published a variety of articles about how to deal with unsolicited commercial email (UCE), more commonly referred to as "spam" (see "Responding to Spam" in TidBITS-442)