I think someone needs to put together a special day (today would be good) called the Global Tax Anti-Piracy Day!

Tax Piracy is when you have a company in one country, but then setup a sham company in another country so you can avoid paying your fair share of taxes. These Pirate companies plunder the benefits of the real country of origin, taking advantage of all the infrastructure benefits such as schools, roads, and police - but pay for very little or any of what they take by loopholes in their real country's tax system!

Just think of the billions of dollars lost by honest companies, and their lost innovation because of these Tax Pirate Companies. Think of the increased taxes that honest companies must pay. Think of the children who can't go to good schools because Pirate companies plundered the public coffers! This is a threat that must be stopped, and the pirate company's officers punished!

Here's an idea for improving moderation for the Slashdot Editors.

Ask the members what Slashdot Topics they are experts in. This data could then be used for two things that would be useful to Slashdot, improving moderation, and targeted advertising.

Improving moderation might only be useful if that data is verified, but Slashdot could get verification with a large number of users with data they already have - email addresses. If the member has an ibm.com or sun.com email address, verify them for Unix, Software, Networking, etc. Similarly, an oracle.com or postgresql.org email would verify the user for databases and software. cs.university.edu addresses would verify other areas. With verification comes extra moderator points in those topic areas, with extra authority. They would not get so many points that no negative comment is ever seen about apple or gnome again, and keep the bonus topic specific so that one topic's expert moderators can be reigned back without punishing the experts from all topics. If it is successful, you can look at ways to verify moderators in ways other than by email address.

Better targeted advertising should be obvious....

A large problem with spam is the collection of zombie systems (mostly Microsoft home computers) on residential broadband lines that act as relays for spam. Most of these users have simple firewalls supplied by their broadband providers that they never really configure that provide DNS proxy services, among other services. Is it not about time to start pressuring these ISPs to upgrade these firewalls to also block port 25 outgoing by default and proxy outgoing SMTP to the ISP's mail servers? For advanced users who modify their firewall settings anyway, it would only be one extra setting to configure, but it would provide an extra hurdle in the form of a choke point for spam for anyone wishing to run a zombie of spam relays off unsuspecting user's computers.

It's kind of discouraging when you never get anyone you vote for elected.... Just can not see voting any other way though. I just wish we could get rid of the real scoundrels - how does Orin Hatch or Ted Kennedy stay in power? (No, thankfully, I do not live in Utah.) I guess it's the old boys network? But maybe there has never been more integrity in politics, and I am wishing for something that has never actually been?

Noticed in RMS's blog that ASUS basically told him that Free software is not a big enough market for them. I really am looking forward to the day where published hardware specs are the norm, but I guess I will have to stop buying ASUS products for awhile anyway.I really wonder if they just don't get it, or if they see some advantage I can not understand.

I am encouraged by Matrox's new support of open source drivers though. I always did like Matrox, not the fastest at 3D, but more than enough for any of my (and most business application's) needs. They always seemed more reliable to me as well, which somehow has always been more important to me than fancy pixel shading tricks. Guess I'm just not big enough of a gamer.