Free Republic

SNIPPET: "RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Increasing numbers of English-language Web sites are spreading al-Qaida's message to Muslims in the West. They translate writings and sermons once largely out of reach of English readers and often feature charismatic clerics like Anwar al-Awlaki, who exchanged dozens of e-mails with the Army psychiatrist accused of the Fort Hood shootings. The U.S.-born al-Awlaki has been an inspiration to several militants arrested in the United States and Canada in recent years, with his Web-based sermons often turning up on their computers."

(NaturalNews) The US government has issued a new report that recommends blocking access to popular websites during a pandemic outbreak in order to preserve internet bandwidth for investors, day traders and securities clearing house operations. The concern is that a pandemic would cause too many people to stay at home and download YouTube videos and porn, hogging all the internet bandwidth and blocking throughput for investment activities, thereby causing a stock market meltdown. This isn't an April Fool's joke. It's all based on a public report issued by the Government Accounting Office (GAO), available from their website at http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d108.pdf In...

First Amendment: Diversity czar Mark Lloyd's FCC votes Thursday on the issue of net neutrality. Advertised as providing access to all, it will do to the information superhighway what Lloyd proposed for talk radio. Not much was said when $7.2 billion was included in the stimulus bill "to accelerate broadband deployment in unserved and underserved areas and to strategic institutions that are likely to create jobs or provide significant public benefits." The administration has big plans for the Internet — like controlling it. Susan Crawford, the so-called Internet czar, told the Wall Street Journal in April that the broadband billions...

Security: A Senate bill lets the president "declare a cybersecurity emergency" relating to "nongovernmental" computer networks and do what's needed to respond to the threat. Didn't they just collect our e-mail addresses?We wish this was just a piece of the fictional "Dr. Strangelove" that fell to the cutting-room floor, but it's not. It is a real piece of disturbingly vague legislation sponsored by Sens. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine. Senate Bill 773 would grant the administration emergency powers (where have we heard that before?) in the event of a cyberemergency that the president would have...

NLPC has uncovered a plan by the White House New Media operation to hire a technology vendor to conduct a massive, secret effort to harvest personal information on millions of Americans from social networking websites. The information to be captured includes comments, tag lines, emails, audio, and video. The targeted sites include Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr and others – any space where the White House “maintains a presence.” In the course of investigating procurement by the White House New Media office, NLPC discovered a 51-page solicitation of bids that was filed on Friday, August 21, 2009. Filed as Solicitation...

(CNSNews.com) – Anyone who posts comments on the White House’s Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Twitter pages will have their statements captured and permanently archived by the federal government, according to a plan that the White House is now seeking a contractor to carry out. The Executive Office of the President is looking for a private contractor to capture and archive comments and information posted on social networking and new media sites where the White House has established a presence. While the Presidential Records Act (PRA) generally requires that the administration preserve information generated by the president and his staff, the...

Hey Freepers, I need your help if any of you web experts have the time. I want to build a website. I have: --a macbook pro, purchased from the libs at Apple 2 years ago. --a godaddy.com domain name registered, as well as their free hosting --new version of iWeb --a tentatively built iWeb site I want to: --update my site often and use it as a blog --allow comments if possible I wonder: --should I get a different web host? Every one I've looked into seems to have several comments disparaging it for being a rip off/ scam etc....

On the Internet, he's a god. In real life, he's an out-of-work 21-year-old, $20,000 in debt, living in his mom's Westchester apartment. Meet Christopher Poole, known to his online fans as "moot," the mind behind 4chan.org, one of the busiest - and strangest - discussion boards on the Web. Poster child, perhaps, of the Internet economy, where you can influence the lives of millions and still not cover the rent. 4chan.org's users, and there are, on average, 5 million a month, engage in mindless, usually vile, nonstop banter that often percolates beyond the service itself with books, political kerfuffles and...

Just go to the link.

FACEBOOK has launched a tool that allows users to see what their "friends" have been doing on other websites. The new application, Facebook Connect, allows members to log on to other sites using their Facebook login details. Privacy watchdogs are on alert over the new tool, which is being rolled out by the social networking giant with a number of partner websites in the coming weeks. Among the first sites visitable through Connect will be the Discovery Channel, social news site Digg and video site Hulu.

"Following Calls For Attacks On Islamist Websites, Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiyya Asks Supporters To Refrain From Violent Operations To Free 'Blind Sheikh'" ARTICLE SNIPPET: "In a communiqué, the Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiyya organization called on its supporters not to undertake any armed operation aimed at freeing Sheikh Omar Abd Al-Rahman. The communiqué followed official warnings in North Carolina and Minnesota about attacks to be carried out by extremists with the aim of freeing the sheikh. The warnings came in the wake of calls for attacks that appeared on Islamist websites." SNIPPET: "Source: Egyig.com, November 22, 2008; Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, November 24, 2008"

"Efforts in both chambers of Congress have Republicans wondering why Democrats seem to fear free speech. Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA) has proposed limitations on how Representatives can post information to the Internet in a time when we should be demanding more transparency, not less. According to a source in the Senate, Dianne Feinstein has begun her own campaign to force Senators to seek permission before communicating over the Internet." "In the Senate, the problem gets even worse. Feinstein (D-CA) would have the Rules Committee act as a censor board, forcing members to get approval for the act of communicating on...

I haven't been sleeping much lately, my husband is somewhere on the other side of the world and I haven't spoken to him or received an email from him all month! Anyway, I was just doing some surfing and I thought I'd ask my FRiends for some of their favorite web sites (other than FR of course) so that I can get some new surfing ideas. So what are your favorite web sites that you regularly visit or have found recently? My top ten can't miss sites are: 1) FR (of course) 2) Weather.com (Don't know why) 3) ebay.com (what's...

WMAL just updated and improved their web site last week. Next to the "What's Hot" red tab section, there's an "Insider Central" red tab on the right side of the screen. I see nothing inside that Insider Central box, which is perhaps 2" x 3", except a blank powder-blue colored box. I was told that I should see a 7-tab slide show under "Insider Central". In the "What's Hot" box I see all kinds of things going through -- Top News, Local News, G&A, Chris Plante & Insiders ( a 5-tab slide show). I contacted Comcast customer service (I have...

The Internet is even more useful than you think. As more and more programmers and developers race to create the next killer app, some end up gaining momentum while others haven't quite caught on yet. We've slogged through the undiscovered masses to bring you ten websites that are informative, handy, or simply downright cool -- before they enter the zeitgeist.

TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian authorities banned five Web sites that comment on current events for "poisoning" public opinion ahead of the crucial mid-March parliamentary elections, the state radio reported on Thursday. The move came two days after Iran's hard-line constitutional watchdog reinstated more than 280 candidates, including 70 reformists, for the polls. Reformists have complained the reversal was insufficient to ensure a fair election. In the past, the authorities have occasionally closed down some of the hundreds of private Web sites that comment on Iranian news and politics. But this was the first time they closed down five at once...

The online worlds of Kim Jong Il, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other notorious unfriendlies Free speech means different things in different countries. In Canada, referring to the Jews as a disease can get you two trials—possibly three—and, upon conviction, a $1,000 fine. In the United States, you can put the same sentiment in a song and take your twin daughters on the road to sing it, with no fear of official sanction. On the Internet, meanwhile, you can publish anything a web host is willing to let you—subject, in theory anyway, to the laws in whichever country it's located. But it's...

Barack Obama was the most sought-after Democratic presidential candidate in 2007, while Fred Thompson finished first among the Republican contenders -- at least, in terms of whose name was entered most often in the Ask.com search engine. No significance was attached to Ask.com's summary, released Wednesday. Obama finished first overall, with fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton second. Thompson came in third, well ahead of the other GOP contenders. Here's the complete list: 1. Barack Obama 2. Hillary Clinton 3. Fred Thompson 4. John Edwards 5. Mitt Romney 6. John McCain 7. Ron Paul 8. Rudy Giuliani 9. Mike Huckabee 10. Dennis...

Here's your chance to make a cameo appearance in Fred's Presidential campaign. Make a video telling us why you support Fred Thompson for President and upload it using the form below. We'll share these videos with all of our supporters on Fred08.com, and allow you, and them, to pick the best one. Here's your chance to be a star. Submit your video now. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sure, Fred Thompson is an accomplished lawyer, prosecuting criminals in Tennessee before serving as counsel on the Watergate hearings. And yes, he served the people of Tennessee as a common sense, conservative Senator for eight years....

Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson is winning the War of the Web – his campaign site on the Internet is attracting significantly more visitors than any of his GOP or Democratic rivals. Thompson’s site, fred08.com, received a projected 635,000 unique visitors in September, the latest month for which figures are available from The Nielsen Company’s NetRatings Inc. That was more than seven times the number of visitors to leading GOP candidate Rudy Giuliani’s site. Barack Obama was the leader among Democrats. His campaign site drew 433,000 unique visitors in September. Here are the numbers of unique visitors for each of...

Going by unique visitors, Fred Thompson easily leads among the presidential candidates from both parties with 635,000 for fred08.com easily beating second place Obama's 433,000 for whatever his site is. Surprisingly, Ron Paul, whose supporters have nothing better to do than hang out on the internet all day, rank's third among Republicans and sixth overall. I think Fred Thompson's site would get even more traffic if it had like some cool flash games where you control Fred Thompson shooting terrorists and communists in the face and then have a bonus round where you cut taxes with a machete. The first...

Former Senator Fred Thompson topped the presidential campaign site traffic charts in September, surpassing all other presidential candidate sites. The TV star pushed Congressman Ron Paul out of the number one position held by his site among Republican candidates since May, while longtime site traffic leader Barack Obama maintained his top ranking among Democratic presidential hopefuls. Notably, according to exclusive information provided to ClickZ News by Hitwise, while Yahoo and Google drove about a third of the traffic to the top Republican and Democratic candidate sites, some site traffic to RonPaul2008.com actually arrived from the site of his opponent, Mitt...

Mullah Krekar linked to pro al-Qaida sites The web site Dorbeen.com, which is linked to pro al-Qaida web sites, is registered in the name of the wife of controversial mullah Krekar. A photo of mullah Krekar is accompanied by an email address and his wife's phone number on the web site. Dorbeen.com is an Islamist news portal that reports on American setbacks in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as linking to sympathizers of the al-Qaida terrorist organization. Despite Dorbeen.com being registered in his wife's name, Krekar told an Oslo court last month that he "in the name of God, did...

Over the last few months here at RWN, my favorite blogs have been ranked, I've had other people rank their favorite blogs, and I've regularly listed the web pages that send me the most traffic. Today, I thought it might be interesting to see which political websites actually receive the most traffic. So I picked a number of popular political websites from both sides of the ideological spectrum, sprinkled in a generous helping of popular blogs, and then I went to Alexa.com and ranked the 50 political websites that I came up with. Do keep in mind that... 1) Every...

A Republican Party Web site has been hacked, and for some time it has been spreading a variation of the long-running Storm Trojan horse to vulnerable visitors, a security researcher said Friday. This is the first time that Storm has taken to the Web for its victims, said Dan Hubbard, head of research at San Diego-based Websense Inc. "The big news is that Storm has added infecting sites to its arsenal," said Hubbard. Storm debuted in January but only cracked the top malware lists early this summer, and has become infamous for its ability to adapt its infection strategies. "They...

Hitwise, the leading online competitive intelligence service, today announced that Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson's website, www.fred08.com, was the most visited website among all presidential candidates for the week ending September 8, 2007. Fred08.com received 34 percent of US visits amongst all the presidential candidate websites for that week. Barack Obama's website, www.barackobama.com, received 13.49 percent of US visits for last week, the second most visits among all candidates. Following Obama's website was Republican candidate Ron Paul's website www.ronpaul2008.com, which received 12.88 percent of visits. Top Visited Presidential Candidate Websites Weekly US Market Share of Visits --------------------- Weekly rankings for...

The most popular 100 conservative political websites and blogs for 2007 are listed here. Read who made the list and who surprisingly didn't. Here is a ranking of the top 100 conservative political websites and blogs. Other than sifting and sorting through directories like alexa’s, there’s no easy to determine what are the most popular conservative websites. John Hawkins of rightwingnews has ranked all political websites in order of popularity in the past, but hasn’t put out an updated list since 2004. I have attempted to create an updated list of the conservative websites for 2007, using alexa’s directory and...

Where Are the Islamist/Jihadist Websites Hosted, and What Can Be Done about It? Today, in a briefing on Capitol Hill hosted by Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia and Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), ranking member of the Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, MEMRI's president Yigal Carmon spoke about Islamist/Jihadi websites. The briefing was based on a study prepared by MEMRI which highlighted the fact that all Islamist/Jihadi websites are hosted directly or through subservers by Western - primarily American - Internet Service Providers...

Think that all of the great Web sites have already been invented? Think again. The Internet is evolving in new and inventive ways thanks to mashups that pull data from all over the Web and to AJAX-based interfaces that give sites the same degree of interactivity and responsiveness that desktop apps possess. To keep you ahead of the curve, we've rounded up 25 innovative Web sites and services that are well worth watching. Some of them help you design your own personalized Web site mashups; others enable you to create video mixes, build wikis, share personal obsessions, and more. But...

MySpace-style websites perfect for disaster survival 19:00 15 February 2007 NewScientist.com news service Celeste Biever Dialling emergency services when a major disaster strikes is a typical first response. Now US computer scientists are recommending useful follow-up: logging on to a social networking site, such as MySpace, to share information and survival tips. A bird flu outbreak among humans or a major earthquake will leave emergency call centres quickly overwhelmed, say Ben Shneiderman and Jennifer Preece at the University of Maryland, US. They came up with the idea of creating a web-based emergency alternative, along similar lines to social networking sites...

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has filed a lawsuit against the Department of Defense and the Army that seeks more information on a military web censorship unit called the Army Web Risk Assessment Cell (AWRAC) after the DOD failed to answer the EFF's Freedom of Information Act request in an expedited fashion.

SAN JOSE Web sites that publish inflammatory information written by other parties cannot be sued for libel, the California Supreme Court ruled Monday. The ruling in favor of free online expression was a victory for a San Diego woman who was sued by two doctors for posting an allegedly libelous e-mail on two Web sites. Some of the Internet's biggest names, including Amazon.com, America Online Inc., eBay Inc., Google Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo Inc., took the defendant's side out of concern a ruling against her would expose them to liability. In reversing an appellate court's decision, the state Supreme...

Was just watching BB, and they were saying that the general impression that the Internet is awash in :Liberal websites and posters, but in fact, while ther may be more Dim/Lib websites..the statististics show that the top 5 Repub/consevative websites/blogs, get more than twice as many "hits" as the top 5 Dim/Liberal sites...whod'a thunk??? Yes, FR was one of them! :-) Sorry no link availiable..i checked BBs page, but nothing.

In the photograph, the model is shown rising out of a bubble bath, suds dripping from her body. Her tight panties and skimpy top are soaked and revealing. She gazes at the viewer, her face showing a wisp of a smile that seems to have been coaxed from off-camera. In just over seven months, the model has become an online phenomenon. She has thousands of fans from around the world, membership lists show, who pay as much as $30 a month to see images of her. According to the posted schedule, new photographs of her — many clearly intended to...

---snip---7. drudgereport.comFounded: Matt Drudge, 1994, USUsers: 8-10m page views per dayWhat is it? News siteWhat began as a gossipy email newsletter has, since its first post in 1994, developed into one of the most powerful media outlets in American politics. Today the Drudge Report has evolved into a website, drudgereport.com, and its threadbare, no-frills design belies the scale of its influence. It received an estimated 3.5 billion hits in the last 12 months; visitors regard it as the first port of call for breaking news.Fedora-wearing founder Matt Drudge monitors TV and the internet for rumours and stories which he posts...

Jerusalem Israel July 17, 2006 Followers of the controversial author and politician Obadiah Shoher retaliated against the Moroccan hackers (Team Evil) who defaced hundreds of Israeli websites on June 28 this year. 380 websites hosted by the Moroccan provider Omihost.com were completely erased, and their front pages read, We support SamsonBlinded. Team Good. The Shoher’s group denies prior knowledge of the cyberattack, but praises the hackers’ efforts. The Samson Blinded’s founder Obadiah Shoher said, “That was a laudable application of the eye for an eye principle. Breaking the websites is a relatively simple job, and I’m sure that our unknown...

Seven Web sites set up by friends and families of eight Camp Pendleton troops accused of kidnapping and murdering an Iraqi civilian are getting thousands of page hits ---- and raising money for their defense. The supporters also are planning auctions and hosting barbecues in their attempts to raise money to pay the bills of the civilian attorneys the men have hired, bills that are expected to be as much as $100,000 or more per man. Seven Marines and one sailor are charged with murder, kidnapping, conspiracy and related offenses in the April 26 death of 52-year-old Hashim Ibrahim Awad....

Major Israeli websites hacked More than 750 Israeli websites hacked in recent hours. Among them: Soldier’s Treasury Bank, Rambam Hospital, and Globus Group ticket center. Hackers: You’re killing Palestinians, we’re killing servers Gal Mor, Ehud Kinan Unprecedented number of Israeli websites hacked: Hundreds of websites were damaged by hackers in recent hours, following IDF activity in the Gaza Strip. The hackers are members of the Moroccan “Team Evil” group, responsible for most of the website damage in Israel in the past year. This is the largest, most concentrated attack on Israeli websites in recent years. A Ynet investigation revealed that...

HTML Graphs: an update The impact of the little HTML graph applet blows my mind. Here's what has happened in one week: In the last five days of may, I had 114'579 unique visistors on aharef.info. As I write this, 345'117 networks have been created. According to technorati, 1'686 blogs link to aharef.info (aharef.info is not even two months old, so all the links are due to the HTML graph applet). Technically, this makes aharef Switzerland's most technorati - linked blog, but I'm not even on this list (not that I care ;-) Massive coverage on del.icio.us, Digg and other...

My internet connection is via Comcast Cable. For the last few weeks I have not been able to connect to many political websites... namely "www.powerlineblog.com", "www.captainsquartersblog.com", "www.hughhewitt.com" and "www.biglizards.net" (and some others). Be it known that almost any other wiebsite is reachable. I know the problem does not lie in my computer or with the sites themselves. If I take my laptop (which cannot get to these websites from home) to a Panera, Starbucks or my office, it can connect to them just fine. Bottom line... IS COMCAST FILTERING OUT THESE URLs?

See for example this thread first. Again, adult topics and situations, so clear the kids out of the room. And for those who are not computer geeks, ICANN is the "Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers". They have something to do with defining and assigning internet domains and suchforth. ICANN has announced it rejects The web domain called .XXX (If you surf with one hand I'll bet you understand) ...but you still could type "Google" and "Sex"

WASHINGTON - Political comedy often is intended to stir controversy, but this doesn't usually involve broadcasting rights and the public affairs network C-SPAN. The cable network asked two Internet video providers, YouTube and IFILM, to pull clips of Stephen Colbert's April 29 performance at the White House Correspondents Association dinner from their Web sites. C-SPAN said it contacted the companies because the copyrighted material was posted online without its permission. Both YouTube and IFILM complied with the request. Colbert hosts a satirical current events show on Comedy Central and performed his comedy routine at the correspondent's dinner. YouTube posted the...

Peter Demers says growing a business is tough enough “without being trampled over by a media giant.” Demers publishes the AmericanDad.com Web magazine out of a small office in the South End. The site, described as “an online resource for guys with kids” has offered parenting tips, advice on academics, ideas for hobbies and activities for children and other resources for dads since August 2003. It’s a small operation. The site gets about 1,800 to 2,000 visits a day. Demers says AmericanDad is trying to create a brand and community around fatherhood, and has ramped up marketing efforts recently to...

Frequently readers post comments with racial slurs such as “raghead” and “mooselimbs,” racist anecdotes, castration, charges of a low intellect, wiping their rear with the Koran, calls for a new crusade, violence towards and mass murder of all Muslims, the destruction of Islam and white supremacist-esque language like “It’s time we asserted our culture” and “moral and cultural superiority.” It seems that liberals are now by definition terrorists and labeled as such. They speak of Arabs and Muslims in much the same ways that a racist southerner would speak of blacks in the 1950s. Responsible? Not quite.

In the brutal world of Washington politics, it pays to keep your friends close -- and your potential critics even closer. Was that President Bush's strategy last week when he repeatedly lauded the work of Colonel H. R. McMaster of the Third Armored Calvary Regiment?

Website attacks are increasing in frequency and ferocity, hammering DVD sales and disrupting online payment services. Called "distributed denial of service attacks" (DDOS), they bombard sites with so much data that legitimate traffic can't get through. They've been around for years. But they're now more powerful, and they're taking down more than just intended targets. In recent incidents, companies providing Web-hosting services for victims - as well as hundreds of their customers - have been caught in the cross-hairs, creating a wave of collateral damage.

A Web site collects information on 1,200 sites that have been closed to the public by militaries and governments -- from Roswell to the Bushehr nuclear facility in Iran. But the highlight is a 3D model of the Guantanamo prison camp. Christoph Wachter and Mathias Jud have been collecting data about the world's restricted military zones for more than five years now. The two Swiss citizens, who live in Berlin, have collected their findings on Zone Interdite, a Web site with more than 1,200 sites that are all linked to Google Maps and data they have collected about every site...

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) - On MySpace.com, teenagers can find kindred spirits who share their love of sports, their passion for photography or their crush on a Hollywood star. They can also find out where their online friends live, where they attend school, even what they look like. And so can adults. Parents, school administrators and police are increasingly worried that teens are finding trouble online at sites like MySpace, the leader of the social-networking sites that encourage users to build larger and larger circles of friends. Police in Middletown, Conn., are investigating recent reports that as many as seven...

The neo-conservative political satire website "Communists for Kerry" beats out the leftist run website "Billionaires for Bush" Communists for Kerry - 1,850,000 Billionaires for Bush - 440