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On Monday, Mozilla announced the release of version 0.8 of their standalone browser, formerly named Mozilla Firebird. Version 0.8 carries a new moniker: Mozilla Firefox. The name took a few minutes to grow on me (after I got over the initial question, Why a name change?). “Firefox” is apparently another name for the Chinese red panda.

I’ve downloaded the new browser on my work and school computers (haven’t done it at home or on Janene’s computer, yet), and so far there aren’t a whole lot of differences other than a spiffy new logo and icon set.

One thing worth mentioning is the new download manager, which can be set by default to download things directly to your desktop (or any old place) so you don’t have to click through two or three dialog boxes to get a file you want. Like the previous download manager, it also keeps a list of previously downloaded items and has the ability to pause and resume downloads.

Another enhancement is that version 0.8 has a Windows installer. While this dumbs down the process of installing the program (I’m not sure how smart you have to be to unzip something, but whatever), it has given me a little trouble on my school computer because I don’t have admin privileges. I get an error every time I start Firefox at school, complaining that some-such DLL file is missing.

With the new branding, they are really starting to market Firefox. Consequently, this release has caused a lot of downtime on Mozilla’s web-servers. I was able to get the program and all of my favorite extensions yesterday at school (extensions aren’t compatible between milestone releases), but today the extension room seems to be down.

I’ve put up a new site theme for Valentine’s Day, but all the graphics and stylesheets kept the same names. If the logo graphic looks funny or if you are still seeing the blue background, try a hard-refresh (Ctrl+F5, which reloads all the graphics, ignoring anything that may already be in cache) or try clearing your cache altogether. Sorry for any inconvenience. 🙁

A bunch of people have asked me lately, “Why haven’t you posted anything about [insert recent personal event here]?” The reason is that when I combined my two blogs back on September 25, 2003, I decided that I would stop posting personal information (mostly because I felt like my life was boring everyone). I’ve instead been focusing on technology and Internet related stuff, current events, movie and article reviews, and any other things that catch my interest.

Now that people are asking, I’ve decided to reconsider my ban on personal information. I’ll start posting major things that happen to me, and possibly a few funny or ironic situations I feel are worth mentioning now and again. I just don’t want to fall back into the somewhat boring details that make up most of my everyday life. [As an aside, when I say “boring details” I’m talking about things that I don’t think other people would find particularly interesting or fun to read. I am not trying to say that I think my life is boring.]

So, without further ado, let me announce for those of you who may not know (what rock have you been hiding under?), Janene and I got engaged on Christmas Day, 2003. We are anticipating a wedding on February 5, 2005, though the exact date hasn’t been finalized. We want to give ourselves time to finish some school, get pre-marital counseling from our pastor, and save up money so we will be as stable as possible when we combine our finances.

In addition to becoming a fiancé, I also became an uncle last month. Lindsay Joselyn was born on December 3, 2003. She is a beautiful little bundle. Excluding dirty diapers, “new baby smell” beats “new car smell” hands down. Congratulations, Steve and Merissa, and happy birthday Lindsay. I love you guys!

The 76th Annual Academy Awards are scheduled for February 29, 2004, and the nominee list was just released this morning. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King was nominated for a whopping 11 Oscars!

I’m not sure how many nominations the first two LOTR movies got, but the winnings have been pretty sparse. Fellowship took in four academy awards (for cinematography, make-up, best original score, and visual effects) and Two Towers only took in two (for sound editing and visual effects).

So, it looks like Return of the King may be a shoe-in for visual effects (although it’s up against Pirates of the Carribean, so I’m not holding my breath), but will it get best picture? It did get the Golden Globe award last week for best motion picture drama, along with three others (best directing, best original score, and best original song), so I think it’s got a fighting chance. Only time will tell…

Microsoft has gone off the deep end again. This time they’re going after a 17 year old who owns a small web-design business called MikeRoweSoft. The teenager’s name is Mike Rowe, and he thought it would be funny to tack the word “Soft” to the end of his name. He registered the domain back in August 2003.

This month, Microsoft noticed the domain and sent him a letter ordering him to turn the domain over to them. He refused, asking for a settlement that would compensate him for lost business. They offered him $10 for the cost of registering the domain. He demanded $10,000 half-jokingly (not to mention, illegally). Apparently this kid is pretty bold.

Microsoft’s argument rests on the assumption that Mr. Rowe purchased the domain with the intent to sell it to Microsoft for top-dollar, a practice known as cyber-squatting, and that Mr. Rowe’s $10,000 counter-offer is proof in the pudding. However, Mr. Rowe claims he had no intention of ever selling the domain, and it appears as if he truly has been building his business around the name for the past six months. He feels that Microsoft has no right to take away his name because it really is his name. He also points out that no confusion of goods and services has been created, since he is building websites, not operating systems.

Microsoft has since stated that they may have been a little too harsh with the boy, and will try to treat him fairly through the remainder of the negotiations/court proceedings.

Read more:

# Teen fights to keep MikeRoweSoft.com
# Microsoft stuck with MikeRoweSoft mess
# Microsoft: We took MikeRoweSoft too seriously