Man Crashes, Burns SUV at Kahului Airport

Breaking News: The AP and local media outlets are reporting that a 52 year-old male drove a sports utility vehicle into Kahului Airport on Maui – the second-busiest airport in Hawai’i. The driver immediately lit a can of gasoline on fire with a lighter.

TSA officials arrested the man immediately, and closed the airport to outgoing flights for 10 hours. Arriving passengers were allowed to retrieve their bags.

The FBI said in a statement that the incident did not appear to be an act of terrorism.

The Monkeys Are No More

Webmonkey has long been one of the most consistent how-to sites on the ‘net for web design and engineering. For both the technically illiterate and IT staff making 3 figures, the site was a welcome resource. The fresh style sounds more like your friendly neighborhood geek (albeit much slower) than a typical technology how-to. It’s also very reminiscent of the Dummies book series.

Alas, Webmonkey is no more. Their parent company, TerraLycos, will be pulling the plug due to (wait for it) declining ad revenue. The remaining staff will be at SXSW on March 15th to share a toast with their fans.

I wish all of them luck, and hope that TerraLycos at least has the decency to leave 8 years of valuable resources available to the public.

For the Love of Family

Amazing…Fox can occasionally put out good programming after all.

As is typical for me and reality shows, I didn’t watch the middle of My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiancé – only the beginning and end. I don’t endorse toying with the sacred covenant of marriage like the producers did, but I think the end justified the means.

Throughout the show, I was impressed by Randi’s humility. She was after the money not for her, but for her family. Despite the occasional profanity, she seemed level-headed and mature throughout the show. Good for her. I wish her the best.

Now, as for Forever Eden and Playing It Straight, I will not be watching these shows to comment on them here. I’m sure you’ll be able to find plenty of other places to read about this trash.

Bluetooth’s Demise Predicted

An interesting column by eWEEK columnist Rob Enderle is forecasting the death of Bluetooth now that tech giant Intel has abandoned the standard. Bluetooth, for those of you who are unfamiliar with it, is a type of Personal Area Network, or PAN. In a nutshell, it allows wireless devices in close proximity to talk to each other.

While Enderle may feel that the time is right to move to Wireless USB, I’m a bit more skeptical. While the high bandwidths proposed are staggering, the spec is just a twinkle in the eyes of its engineers. In contrast, Bluetooth is widely deployed. Some devices include:

Yes, Intel may be a major force in the technology sector, but it’s not the most important. Despite its relatively small market share, Apple remains a trend-setter:

Apple was the first to build in Ethernet, one of the first to build in USB, the first to build in FireWire, and the first to build in 802.11 wireless networking. Now we’re offering a Bluetooth solution that actually works and is easy to use. (InfoSatellite, Mar 26 2002)

Sorry Intel, but you don’t make the rules.

(Original link via Slashdot.)