AT&T finally released the source code to Plan 9, their experimental operating system. It’s released under its own license (rather than a standard license like BSD or GPL), and I was too lazy to read it. If I get bored I may try to install it, but my only impression at this point is that they have a cooler mascot than Tux or Duke. Is that thing a bunny?

Dave Winer’s most recent DaveNet piece, What the Web Wants, suggests a much more sensible remedy in the Microsoft case than Judge Jackson came up with. As I’ve said here before, all I wanted in this case was for Microsoft to be found guilty, I didn’t want the company demolished or longstanding behavioral remedies that would be unworkable in a practical sense.

The struggles continue over at Salon. They just laid off 13 people, and the article says that they’re going to cancel some columns. If it were up to me, they’d fire David Horowitz and Camille Paglia, perhaps hire a conservative who’s not a provocative moron, and then stop paying people to write ridiculous articles about sex.

Phil Greenspun’s seminal photography site photo.net has been yanked forward into the twenty-first century with a table-based layout, JavaScript powered dynamic menus, and more. Needless to say, some of the users hate it.

Here’s an online copy of Norman Matloff’s testimony before congress on the IT labor shortage, or they myth of it anyway. You may or may not know that Dr. Matloff has made a career of attacking proponents of increased allocations of H1B visas over the past few years. I’ve read arguments from both sides of this debate, and I’m still not sure where I come down. I can say that I’m having an awfully hard time finding qualified applicants for the jobs we have open where I work. I can also say that there are many unethical employers who exploit people working under H1B visas terribly. My gut feeling is that the debate needs to be expanded beyond the simple question of whether or not we should increase the pool of H1B visas.

Judge Jackson has rendered his decision, and unsurprisingly he has ordered the breakup of Microsoft (pending appeals, of course). All of the industry news sites have multi-story packages on the decision, and Steve Ballmer is already moaning about how this will hurt “innovation”. The court has a Web site where the official documents are posted in a nice, easy to read format. The Memorandum and Order is Judge Jackson’s rationale behind denying Microsoft’s motions for more hearings and issuing the judgement now, and the Final Judgement contains the Judge’s ruling.

Why 100% Pure Java is a Crock.

A domain name does not a business make. Even so, business.com has launched a sorry Web site on the back of their $7.5 million payout for their domain name. A quick survey of the most successful Internet businesses finds them using names like yahoo.com, ebay.com, and amazon.com. A tip for would-be Internet entrepreneurs … what you need is a business plan, not a URL.

The latest moronic media company to crack down on its biggest fans is FujiTV. They’ve sent cease and desist letters to the webmasters of Iron Chef Web sites for violating their intellectual property. Harrassing your fans, reducing your exposure, and eliminating free advertising are all great strategies for long term success. Morons.

Unsurprisingly, Napster has rescinded the cease and desist order sent to Offspring that ordered the band to stop selling Napster-branded merchandise. I don’t think this makes them less hypocritical, it just means they’re not total idiots.