Tomorrow (Wednesday, June 18, 2008) from 2 to 4 PM, at the Los Alamos Public Schools administration school board meeting room, Dean Obermeyer has scheduled a "town meeting" for Qwest to present their product QMOE and the possibility of making it available in Los Alamos.
The e-mail that Dean sent May 21 (and Kevin Holsapple of the Los Alamos Commerce and Development Corporation forwarded minutes later) has further details.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
meeting with Andrew Cohill in Santa Fe today
I should have posted this last night when I received it, because now the lead time is so short maybe nobody will see it in time, but read Richard Lowenberg's announcement of an open discussion with Andrew Cohill at the new Santa Fe Complex, 632 Agua Fria, this afternoon from 2:30 to 4:00. Also mentioned is another session they plan to have in Albuquerque Friday.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Citilink seals a deal with Albuquerque
Thanks to Richard Lowenberg on the 1st-mile list for the news that the Albuquerque City Council has approved an agreement with Citilink. And thanks to John Osmon for the clarification that the agreement grants Albuquerque city and schools access to fiber, not free internet bandwidth. And thanks to Gary Gomes for the link to a draft of the franchise agreement. Maybe I should wait for a few more shoes to drop on 1st-mile, but, no, I'm posting this now.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
May flowers
Warmer weather has had some problems staying around, but at least it has returned for another year. Winter moisture was good and we have an absence of trees due to the Cerro Grande fire eight years ago. I hope that lowers our risk of another fire. Seems to me May 4 was the day that was 93 degrees F and the National Park Service lit Cerro Grande.
The ground has been thawed for nearly two months, and working outside sometimes doesn't involve shivering. I drilled a hole under my backyard last weekend. I need to enlarge it a little soon so the 2-inch conduit I intend to put in it will fit. The hole is 16 feet long and I spent about 4 hours drilling, so I averaged 15 minutes per foot. When LA Commnet hired Albuquerque Drilling in 2005, they sometimes went 10 feet per minute. Maybe it's worth using equipment that costs tens of thousands of dollars instead of scrimping on much more manual tools that total only a couple of thousand dollars. In a cramped space, though, the big stuff is just too big to fit.
Since last weekend I set up two more wireless links to test how well they work. They are supposed to be about six times as fast, and they do seem to be reliably four times as fast, as what we've been using for about 4 years.
I waited on both projects until the colder days of early April were past. I have some trips to take this summer for family events and a college reunion in September, but between those I hope to use the warm weather to expand internet capacity.
I like warm weather. Once I fill the trenches in my backyard, I would even welcome some rain.
The ground has been thawed for nearly two months, and working outside sometimes doesn't involve shivering. I drilled a hole under my backyard last weekend. I need to enlarge it a little soon so the 2-inch conduit I intend to put in it will fit. The hole is 16 feet long and I spent about 4 hours drilling, so I averaged 15 minutes per foot. When LA Commnet hired Albuquerque Drilling in 2005, they sometimes went 10 feet per minute. Maybe it's worth using equipment that costs tens of thousands of dollars instead of scrimping on much more manual tools that total only a couple of thousand dollars. In a cramped space, though, the big stuff is just too big to fit.
Since last weekend I set up two more wireless links to test how well they work. They are supposed to be about six times as fast, and they do seem to be reliably four times as fast, as what we've been using for about 4 years.
I waited on both projects until the colder days of early April were past. I have some trips to take this summer for family events and a college reunion in September, but between those I hope to use the warm weather to expand internet capacity.
I like warm weather. Once I fill the trenches in my backyard, I would even welcome some rain.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
tewacom.com
Sunday's Monitor had an ad from tewacom.com, as wide as the full Monitor page and probably the bottom quarter or third of the page.
I just checked the tewacom.com web site, and this is a company based on San Ildefonso Pueblo RUS (Rural Utility Service) grant funds from the US Department of Agriculture. They are using Motorola Canopy 900 MHz wireless hardware. They offer $24.95 per month 512 Kbits, $59.95 2 Mbits and $99.95 over 2 Mbits service, including pretty much throughout Los Alamos County's populated areas.
I just checked the tewacom.com web site, and this is a company based on San Ildefonso Pueblo RUS (Rural Utility Service) grant funds from the US Department of Agriculture. They are using Motorola Canopy 900 MHz wireless hardware. They offer $24.95 per month 512 Kbits, $59.95 2 Mbits and $99.95 over 2 Mbits service, including pretty much throughout Los Alamos County's populated areas.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Where's the Enthusiasm?
I realize that the few who have visited this blog in the six weeks or so that it has been around lose interest in the blog itself when my posting interval stretches out to six or seven days.
But ...
If we can't get a dialog going here (meaning the readers have to show enough interest to post a comment, or at least tell somebody else who will comment to read the blog), I think that means there really isn't much interest in improving internet access in Los Alamos.
That the County should not waste its time even thinking about building a fiber network.
That I should not waste my money and time buying a wireless link to Albuquerque to bypass Qwest's overpriced circuits.
That we Los Alamos citizens will let LANL have the only decent (and for LANL, per-capita it's still pretty sub-standard for large-urban America, and way behind Japan, South Korea and the like) internet access outside Albuquerque (and Albuquerque is still pretty sub-standard compared to, say, Denver, Phoenix, San Antonio, Dallas, probably Salt Lake City, etc.) in New Mexico.
Come on, pipe up, get the word out, or we're sunk.
But ...
If we can't get a dialog going here (meaning the readers have to show enough interest to post a comment, or at least tell somebody else who will comment to read the blog), I think that means there really isn't much interest in improving internet access in Los Alamos.
That the County should not waste its time even thinking about building a fiber network.
That I should not waste my money and time buying a wireless link to Albuquerque to bypass Qwest's overpriced circuits.
That we Los Alamos citizens will let LANL have the only decent (and for LANL, per-capita it's still pretty sub-standard for large-urban America, and way behind Japan, South Korea and the like) internet access outside Albuquerque (and Albuquerque is still pretty sub-standard compared to, say, Denver, Phoenix, San Antonio, Dallas, probably Salt Lake City, etc.) in New Mexico.
Come on, pipe up, get the word out, or we're sunk.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Business Week's Keith Epstein on 4/11/08 C-SPAN Washington Journal
This is about some of the internet stuff that goes on that probably isn't advancing the cause of well and good on our planet.
E-spionage.
"The New E-spionage Threat," that's the Business Week cover story this week. Mostly it's about an e-mail that arrived at Booz Allen, supposedly about fighter aircraft for India. But that e-mail was probably really from mainland China. It contained a program that does keystroke logging and sends the results to a host in 3322.org, a China domain. And another program that subverts passwords in the recipient's Microsoft Access databases. As the article goes on to expose other anecdotes, the emphasis remains on China. I think maybe China is just the tip of the iceberg. Consider what's going on between US companies doing industrial espionage on each other. Also consider the botnets that at a minimum harvest addresses to use as targets for spam. All those are facts of life on the internet, but then again they present puzzles to be solved, too. I'm sure many in Los Alamos are thinking about those puzzles and solutions.
Links:
C-SPAN
Epstein appearance video
Business Week
Business Week E-spionage article
Business Week podcast (mp3) about the E-spionage story, beginning with the theme from the Dr. No James Bond movie
I noticed as I watched the C-SPAN appearance over the web (I saw it live over satellite, too) that one caller mentioned something he called "the minnow and barksdale" incident. That second time, I thought, "what did he mean by minnow?" Well, I think he meant Minot, which I think is pronounced my-not, not me-know, the North Dakota city and Air Force base. I guess he had read about it, and hadn't heard someone talk about the story. Barksdale is an Air Force base in Arkansas, and the incident was about nuclear weapons in a B-52 that were not the usual empty shells and were armed, unbeknownst to the B-52's crew and I guess a very serious violation of Air Force policies.
There are lots of links in the Business Week article, too, plus reader comments.
Isn't it amazing how well C-SPAN has packaged the video of Epstein's appearance? The Business Week mp3 is pretty amazing, too, compared to what we had pre-internet.
E-spionage.
"The New E-spionage Threat," that's the Business Week cover story this week. Mostly it's about an e-mail that arrived at Booz Allen, supposedly about fighter aircraft for India. But that e-mail was probably really from mainland China. It contained a program that does keystroke logging and sends the results to a host in 3322.org, a China domain. And another program that subverts passwords in the recipient's Microsoft Access databases. As the article goes on to expose other anecdotes, the emphasis remains on China. I think maybe China is just the tip of the iceberg. Consider what's going on between US companies doing industrial espionage on each other. Also consider the botnets that at a minimum harvest addresses to use as targets for spam. All those are facts of life on the internet, but then again they present puzzles to be solved, too. I'm sure many in Los Alamos are thinking about those puzzles and solutions.
Links:
C-SPAN
Epstein appearance video
Business Week
Business Week E-spionage article
Business Week podcast (mp3) about the E-spionage story, beginning with the theme from the Dr. No James Bond movie
I noticed as I watched the C-SPAN appearance over the web (I saw it live over satellite, too) that one caller mentioned something he called "the minnow and barksdale" incident. That second time, I thought, "what did he mean by minnow?" Well, I think he meant Minot, which I think is pronounced my-not, not me-know, the North Dakota city and Air Force base. I guess he had read about it, and hadn't heard someone talk about the story. Barksdale is an Air Force base in Arkansas, and the incident was about nuclear weapons in a B-52 that were not the usual empty shells and were armed, unbeknownst to the B-52's crew and I guess a very serious violation of Air Force policies.
There are lots of links in the Business Week article, too, plus reader comments.
Isn't it amazing how well C-SPAN has packaged the video of Epstein's appearance? The Business Week mp3 is pretty amazing, too, compared to what we had pre-internet.
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