I have been a lurker on the digest version of this list. But the manner in which the media has gone overboard on this issue is sickening.... I know for a fact that the vast majority of people who work in Fortune 500 IT depts are inept. I have seen them give up on issues and proclaim "it's a virus, etc.". Prime95 may have caused some problems, and the gentleman involved may have overstpped his bounds, but the manner in which the media controls the story must be stopped... We must manipulate the media rather than the opposite. Tomoorow they will reporting how many millions of $$$s Mr. Blosser cost US West, a company I must add made over 1billion in profits last year along with the other Baby Bells. I chose to call David Beigie, US West's director of communications. His name was in the original, error-ridden Denver Post story and the AP wire version carried on www.cnn.com, etc. His number is (303) 896-5528. I politely called during the night and left a message on his voice mail. In my message, I politely explained that the GIMPs project is not a one-man obsession, but a project of sentimental value to mathematicians, prfessional and amateur alike. While problems like this could be solved on supercomputers, no official bodies would fund such purely intellectual work. I also added that the GIMPs software was designed to run at a level not to affect user productivity. While not excusing unauthorized use, perhaps US West should research the problem before announcing "a hacker intrusion affected our QoS" with such authority. I then politely left my name and phone number if he had any questions. Surprisingly, he called back today personally and left a message on my answering machine. He said that he agrees the GIMPS Project should not be belittled (he used the word "noble"). However, he feels that they must pursue full prosecution because a precedent must not be set. US West's computers are asset's dedicated solely to their business mission. While I understand this fully, I agree with others that a better PR move would be to punish Mr. Blosser internally and then arrange for GIMPS to continue to use US West computers in a manner that does not affect their performance. Unfortunately, corporate knee-jerk is now in full swing. Mr. Beigie added that he agrees the media is hyping this story by using the word hacker. Later, a reporter for the Rocky Mountain News called me. My name and phone number were passed on fro US West. I explained that I was anobody in the GIMPS project (ranked 5000+). I described the errors in the Denver Post article. I directed him to www.mersenne.org. I tried to explain the basic premise of the various distribited projects on the web and how spare CPU cycles were being used. I tried to stress that this story was not the story of a hacker obsessed with numbers. I mentioned the recent movie "Pi" and how this story is being written with a similar theme. He basically let me ramble on and on while I heard him clicking notes in the background. I ended by telling him to be fair and not hype this story. Unfortunately, he said that an FBI search warrant is a serious thing and is news. Perhaps some of you in the top 10 should call John Akala(sp?). His phone number is 303-892-2666. I'd first ask him to prove he understands what a Mersenne prime is. But most of all, please be polite... hopefully the article won't say: Matthew Lewis, another gimp hacker, also like to search for the next 350-year old prime, when he's not downloading serialz and crackz from top-secret, kewl warez sites. mlewis Iteration:5225200/5478241. Clocks: 9655915=0.483 sec.
