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Got a research paper or thesis to write? Want to research using the Internet? Good luck. There’s a lot of junk out there — outdated pages, broken links, and inaccurate information. Using Google or the Wikipedia may lead you to some results, but you can rarely be sure of accuracy. And what’s more, you’ll only be searching a fraction of all of the resources available to you.

Google, the largest search database on the planet, currently has around eight billion web pages indexed. That’s a lot of information. But it’s nothing compared to what else is out there. Google can only index the visible web, or searchable web. But the invisible web, or deep web, is estimated to be 500 times bigger than the searchable web. The invisible web comprises databases and results of specialty search engines that the popular search engines simply are not able to index.

Do you think your local or university librarian uses Google? Sure, but certainly not exclusively. In order to start researching like a librarian, you’ll need to explore more authoritative resources, many of which are invisible. Note: Although some of the following resources are visible and indexed, they have all been included here because of their authoritative nature.

Woa. Now, that’s a useful list….

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It used to be such a simple job.

The 14-year-old girl would pick up the pamphlets at a warehouse in Artarmon and deliver them around Lane Cove.

Not any more. Last Saturday she turned up at the warehouse to find that she would have to strap a global positioning system around her waist.

Her employers would be able to track every step she took, ensuring not only that she visited every house she was paid to, but that she followed the route devised by management to save time, and that she did the deliveries within the set time frame. Instead she quit.

By the end of next month every delivery person, or “walker”, handing out flyers in Sydney for PMP, the country’s largest distributor of unaddressed mail, will be tracked by satellite.

The walker who spoke to the Herald, who did not want to be named, said she felt as though her employers did not trust her.

“Both my parents think its stupid. They think it’s bad that a tracking device has to be issued just for delivering pamphlets,” she said.

John Robertson, the secretary of Unions NSW, is so angered by the use of GPS to track workers that he has called for the NSW Government to amend the Workplace Surveillance Act to have it outlawed.

“It’s outrageous that the first experience a child has of earning a dollar is to be treated like a criminal,” he said.

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Shawn Hogan has received plenty of attention in the last year for his decision to fight the MPAA over the lawsuit they filed against him, claiming he had shared the movie Meet the Fockers via a file sharing program. The problem? Hogan didn’t actually share the movie, has never downloaded it, and actually owns the DVD of the movie in question. The MPAA made it clear that if he just paid them $2,500, they would forget the whole thing — which certainly has the feel of extortion. So, Hogan decided to fight the case in court to prove they were wrong, and said he wouldn’t let them back out and run like they’ve done in other cases. All this, despite the fact that it would probably cost him over $100,000 in legal fees. Hogan decided it was worth it on principle. However, in preparing for the case, it looks like Hogan and his lawyer discovered that the studio might not actually have the rights to the movie. The explanation is a little confusing, but it appears that there are two separate organizations involved: Universal City Studios Productions LLLP and Universal City Studios LLLP (you can see why this gets confusing). The first (we’ll call them “Productions”) is the one who sued Hogan. However, it was the other (“plain old Studios”) who filed the copyright registration. So, in preparing for the case, Hogan and his lawyers went looking for proof that plain old Studios had transferred the copyright to Productions — which they got. The problem, however, is that the notice transferring the rights happens to occur two months before plain old Studios actually registered the copyright. In other words, they handed over the rights before they even got them — making the whole thing a bit of a mess. Apparently, it’s messy enough that Hogan and his lawyer hope to have the whole case dismissed. Unfortunately, having such a case dismissed on what appears to be a (stupid and careless) technicality won’t help much in dealing with other cases where people are falsely accused (assuming this thing isn’t that common) — but it should save Hogan a lot in legal fees. Either way, it’s yet another example of the somewhat reckless abandon with which the industry seems to file these lawsuits. Why bother making sure (a) the person did it or (b) you own the copyright before suing? That takes all the challenge out of suing your customers.

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On Monday, we wrote about how it suddenly appeared that e-voting concerns were going mainstream, not even realizing that HBO was preparing to show a documentary called “Hacking Democracy.” In that post, I linked to a Fortune article that is actually somewhat more encouraging about e-voting’s number one target: Diebold. Beyond giving the history of the company, it suggested that the company more or less recognized that they had been both “stupid” and “naive” in getting into the e-voting business, without understanding anything about it. It also noted that almost all of the companies top execs have recently been replaced — and even said that the company is considering getting out of the e-voting business altogether. All of these suggest that the company actually recognizes that they’ve screwed up big time. That’s a big step forward, since every time a new problem comes up they react by brushing it off (often with outright lies), attacking their critics or simply cracking jokes about their security problems. And, by now, it should be clear that the security problems are very, very real.

So, with all of that, perhaps it was wishful thinking to hope that the new Diebold management would be a bit more willing to engage in discussion over issues, rather than just attack. Of course, given all of the recent problems the company has had, followed by the same old, same old response, it seems clear that the company hasn’t learned a thing. To make that clear, rather than dealing with the problems, they’re working hard behind the scenes (and failing) to convince HBO to cancel the documentary. They claim that the documentary is filled with false and inaccurate statements — which would be more believable if (a) the company ever owned up to any of its mistakes and (b) they had actually seen the movie (which they haven’t, apparently). In fact, the points that Diebold raised in their letter apparently refer to an entirely different film called Voter Gate, which has nothing to do with the documentary HBO will be showing. Diebold claims it’s by the same people, but it’s not. Now, isn’t that a surprise? Diebold can’t even accurately figure out who’s involved in a movie about them.

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Spotted on 10/19, by an eagle-eyed Wonkette reader: The Mid-Atlantic Shredding Services truck making its way up to the Cheney compound at the Naval Observatory.

Fun fact: Mid-Atlantic Shredding Services has been contracted by the Secret Service for our Executive Branch’s record-not-keeping needs.

The present contractor providing Pickup & Destruction of Sensitive Waste Material services is Mid Atlantic Shredding Services and the current rate is $0.095 cents per lbs.

You better get crackin’, Dick — that evidence won’t destroy itself!

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The federal government’s “no sex without marriage” message isn’t just for kids anymore.

Now the government is targeting unmarried adults up to age 29 as part of its abstinence-only programs, which include millions of dollars in federal money that will be available to the states under revised federal grant guidelines for 2007.

The government says the change is a clarification. But critics say it’s a clear signal of a more directed policy targeting the sexual behavior of adults.

“They’ve stepped over the line of common sense,” said James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit that supports sex education. “To be preaching abstinence when 90% of people are having sex is in essence to lose touch with reality. It’s an ideological campaign. It has nothing to do with public health.”

“stepped over the line”??? They left common sense several zip codes ago…

A few years back, Bush’s press secretary Ari Fleischer announced that he, never married and in his mid-forties, was engaged to be wed. Imagine one member of the press corps stand up and ask him this question: “Mr. Fleischer, are you looking forward to having sex for the first time in your life?”

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In a televised address to the nation Monday, President Bush announced that the U.S. is in “desperate need of thousands of registered Democrats” to conduct what he called an “extremely important mission” to begin immediately and continue at least until the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.

[..]

Although details were limited, an unnamed administration official revealed that, on Wednesday, November 1, registered Democrats will be asked to report to designated government rendezvous points such as post offices and military recruiting centers. Once there, they will be registered, fingerprinted, and issued one-piece jumpsuits, bedding, and canteens of drinking water, then directed to board brown school buses bound for an undisclosed location or locations.

“Certainly it will mean sacrifice, and possibly a prolonged absence from your families,” Bush said. “We need at least 40,000 Democrats, but more are always welcome.”

“Our very way of life depends on it,” he added.

While Bush said any registered Democrat is eligible to participate, those who reside in Arizona’s Fifth, Ohio’s First, and Pennsylvania’s Eighth Congressional Districts are most needed to ensure the mission’s success. Democrats from New Jersey, Missouri, Tennessee, and “especially Virginia” were also strongly encouraged to volunteer.

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De verstandhouding tussen jongeren in Haarlemmermeer en de politie is dringend aan verbetering toe. Dat zeggen raadsleden van Leefbaar Haarlemmermeer, PvdA, CDA en in iets mindere mate VVD naar aanleiding van een bekeuring voor de 21-jarige Hoofddorper Vincent, wiens achternaam op zijn verzoek onvermeld blijft.

Hij en drie vrienden moeten ieder 75 euro boete betalen wegens ‘nutteloos rondhangen’ op het parkeerterrein van het Muiderbos, nabij het winkelcentrum ‘t Paradijs in Hoofddorp, afgelopen zaterdagnacht.

Wat moet ik me daar eigenlijk bij voorstellen? Dit?

The author of Dilbert writes:

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I think about the history of ATMs when I hear all the nervous Nellies wetting their pants over electronic voting machines. I believe those worries are totally misplaced. Now don’t get me wrong – there’s a 100% chance that the voting machines will get hacked and all future elections will be rigged. But that doesn’t mean we’ll get a worse government. It probably means that the choice of the next American president will be taken out of the hands of deep-pocket, autofellating, corporate shitbags and put it into the hands of some teenager in Finland. How is that not an improvement?

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A diabetic man fell into a coma because airport staff refused to let him take his insulin on board a flight from Auckland to Christchurch.

Qantas yesterday apologised to Tui Peter Russell, who had a severe attack on the plane and was in hospital for two weeks.

Mr Russell said check-in staff at Auckland Airport told him he could not take his medication on board because it was dangerous.

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Screeners at Newark Liberty International Airport failed 20 of 22 security tests conducted by undercover U.S. agents last week, missing an array of concealed bombs and guns at checkpoints throughout the hub’s three terminals, federal security officials familiar with the results said.

The tests, conducted Oct. 19 by U.S. Transportation Security Administration “Red Team” agents, also revealed significant failures by screeners to follow standard operating procedures while checking passengers and their baggage for prohibited items, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because it is against TSA policy to release covert-test results.

“We can do better, and training is the path to improved performance,” said Mark Hatfield Jr., Newark Airport’s federal security director, declining to address specifics. “Test results are not a grade or a scorecard; they are a road map to perpetual improvement; any other characterization is simply misleading. We have to challenge ourselves to do better every day and be relentless in that pursuit.”

But the good news is that no passengers were able to bring their own drinks to the plane.

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Je zou het voor de grap weer eens een dag lang moeten doen: alles omrekenen. Zou je f4,40 overhebben voor een bloemkool? Als je een dagje gaat rekenen merk je dat bepaalde bedragen lastig zijn. Twee euro is dus f 4,40, en drie euro is f 6,60; dat is simpel. Maar €1,59? En € 3,29? Wat na gedegen inspectie ook opvalt is dat het bedrag € 1,79 bijzonder vaak opduikt. De reden?

De commerciële partijen hebben het vermoeden dat wij hele bedragen makkelijk even omrekenen naar de gulden. Bedragen ónder de twee euro, daar kleeft het oude goedkope guldengevoel aan. Die bedragen voelen nog als vrij goedkoop. Het omslagpunt ligt bij € 1,79. Dat is het hoogste bedrag dat goedkoop aanvoelt, én dat niet makkelijk is om te rekenen. Bijna alle producten die nieuw op de markt komen kosten € 1,79. De koffiepads, de theepiramides, de schudflessen voor pannekoekbeslag.

Now this is how you use Flash. I’m looking forward to 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Here is an article about the score.

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Open up the Date and Time control panel and go to the Time Zones tab. Notice anything wrong with the world map? Take a close look at northern Europe.

Depending on what version of Windows you have, you might see a body of water where Poland should be. Windows 95 didn’t have this problem, but Windows 2000 did. And whether your copy of Windows XP has this problem depends on precisely what version you have.

Where did the great Polish Sea come from?