Remember that our monthly meeting next week will
be taking place at the Largo Cultural Center instead of
Clearwater Central Catholic High School. I think we've done our
best to make everyone aware of the change, but I expect a small group will
be wandering around the high school parking lot that evening - please
don't be one of those who forget to go to the new venue. Need a
map:
http://tampa-bay.org/boardbiz/bulletin/2003/0105.htm.
We'll be hosting 2 of our favorite speakers that night:
Dave Gussow & John Torro from the Tech Times magazine
that appears every Monday in the St. Pete Times. John writes
the "Solutions" column, and Dave is the editor of the Tech Times.
Not only will we have popular and entertaining speakers
that evening, we'll be sending some lucky attendee home with a copy of
Windows XP Professional, and the center will be serving lattes
- I ask you, "How can you go wrong?"
Our meetings are always open to the general public so
please feel free to bring a friend or two with you and join in the
festivities.
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Some new worms/viruses have been released recently.
Please make sure that you update your virus
definition files immediately if you haven't done so within the last week!
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Avril Lavigne Worm (aliases: Avril, Lirva & Naith)
Avril Lavigne is a fetching 17-year old pop singer who just received 5
Grammy nominations. Forget those Grammys though - you know she's hit
the big time when she's had a virus named after her (a la Anna Kournikova,
Britney Spears, & Jennifer Lopez).
This dastardly virus forces users to visit Lavigne's Web
site - okay, that's not so bad, but it does attempt to disable your
antivirus and firewall protection once you're infected, and mails copies
of itself to any email addresses it finds on your computer so that you can
infect all your friends too!
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Winevar Worm
This virus is capable of severely damaging infected machines. When
you reboot after being infected, it displays a message that says, "What
a foolish thing you have done!" It can then delete all the files
on your hard drive. I hate it when my worm is sassy!
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Iraq Oil Worm
This one doesn't appear to do much damage. It mainly exists to
propagate copies of itself through Windows NT, 2000, & XP
machines using Shared Folders. It should not propose much of
a threat to most of our users.
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A Malaysian computer hacker who is suspected of being
involved in the release of at least 5 computer viruses has threatened to
release a megavirus (wow, is this the "mother of all viruses"?) if
the United States launches a military attack against Iraq.
Interesting isn't it? You can read more at:
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,107205,00.asp
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Monday, January 13, 1-3pm
Internet SIG. Roger
Clark
rlc@usa.net
Monday, January 13, 7-9pm
Photoshop SIG. Led by Stan Ashbrook
bashbro1@tampabay.rr.com
We'll be working with the Sharpen Filter -
everything you ever wanted to know about sharpening images. I’ll
also introduce you to some free filters and a way to clear up noise in
digital camera images. - Stan
Tuesday, January 14, 1-3pm
Novice SIG. Led by Jan Norman. EVERY Tuesday
afternoon.
lnorman1@tampabay.rr.com
Lots of Windows basics info presented here.
Tuesday, January 14, 7-9pm
Internet
Development SIG. Led by Mark Hammock
markham@tampabay.rr.com
Wednesday, January 15, 6:30pm
Board of Directors
meeting.
Open to our members. Takes place at the Resource Center.
Thursday, January 16, 7-9pm
Genealogy SIG.
Led by Howard T. Smith
htsmith1015@yahoo.com
Saturday, January 18, 2-4pm
Microsoft Office
SIG. Led by Margaret McMullen
Margaret_Mcmullen@msn.com
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Saturday,
January 18th, 10am - noon
Seminar:
Using Windows
Dave Dockery teaches Windows basics. It doesn't matter which version
of Windows you're using, the information will be helpful. It takes
place at the Palm Harbor Library, and is free & open to the public; no
registration required. You will find a map at:
www.palmharborlibrary.org/AboutUs/library.htm.
Thursday, January 16th, noon - 1pm
Webinar: Spam-Free in 2003: Your Look at the New
Anti-Spam Technologies
Webinars are online seminars. Here's a free
one that's a great opportunity to see how easy it is to learn from the
comfort of your home. I would expect that this seminar will be
slanted more towards the need of business users than home users, but
should have information of interest to all.
You use your web browser to access the online content
(generally a slide show), AND you use your telephone to hear the speaker
(yep, if you only have a single phone line for your Internet connection,
you won't be able to attend). I've attended almost a dozen of these,
and they are generally excellent.
Placeware is the company that hosts this event.
You can find more info and/or register by going to:
http://main.placeware.com/demos/seminar_intellireach.cfm
Coming Up:
Wednesday,
January 29th, 10am-5pm
Seminar:
Photoshop: Down and Dirty
Photoshop guru, Scott Kelby, will be teaching a 1-day Photoshop
seminar at the Tampa Convention Center for $99. I understand Scott
is an excellent teacher so you Photoshoppers are expected to learn a ton
of technique that day. You can get more info and register at:
http://photoshopseminars.com/ddclass.html.
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