Previous Columns
8:30 AM Friday, May 13, 2005: The stockmarket is doing awfully because the economy is slowing and because traditional measures -- such as the Dow Jones Index -- are obsolete.

The Dow Jones Industrials reflects the stocks your father invested in -- not the ones you should own. Of the 30 in that index, 23 are down this year. Of the seven that are up, only Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) looks sufficiently interesting to own. And the only one I own is GE which doesn't seem to be dong anywhere, despite higher sales. Moreoever, some stocks in the Dow have taken big hits this year -- AIG, Home Depot, IBM and Verizon.

What's most fascinating about this list -- apart from the fact that it lists all the stocks you don't want to own -- is the strange weighting it gives when compiling the index that everyone worships onTV screens and newspaper headlines.

The economy is slowing: Growth is what the stockmarket cares about. It worships growth. Without earnings and sales growth (but primarily earnings growth), there is no growth in stock prices. The stockmarket continues to be sluggish because of growth fears. At Smith Barney's recent Strategic Investors Conference, the company asked its clients about fears and found their primary concern to be slowing earnings growth followed by uncertainty about the impact of higher interest rates. Here are the results:

Clients are not the only ones worried. Economists are also worried. Today's Wall Street Journal reported that the 56 private economists who participated in the Journal Online's May forecasting survey sliced their expectations for second-quarter gross domestic product by one-half percentage point. They now forecast growth at a 3.2% annual rate, down from the 3.7% they forecast in a survey conducted last month.

In short, cash remains king.

BroadVoice sucks at present: Some of us are experiencing truly awful service from BroadVoice, the VoIP phone company I recommended highly. You don't want to hear the full story. BroadVoice's chief technician described it as "the worst case scenario coming true." In short, his biggest nightmare. For now, I'd stay away from BroadVoice.

It's important to keep Firefox upgraded. I like Firefox as a web browser because it's safer and has neater features than Microsoft's Internet Explorer. But you must keep it updated. Here's how:

• Enable update checking. In Firefox, click Tools, Options, Advanced. Ensure that the selection for Periodically check for updates is on, both for Firefox and for My Extensions and Themes. This is the default setting, so most Firefox users will automatically get notices of updates.

• Check for upgrades manually.. You should see a dialog box informing you of new updates as the Mozilla Foundation releases them. There's a random delay, however, so every user doesn't try to download a new version on the same day. To check whether there's an update that applies to you, click the red up-arrow in the upper-right toolbar of the Firefox menu area.

• Download the latest version. If a dialog box tells you an update is available, close the window, then open Firefox's download page. It's no longer necessary or recommended to uninstall Firefox before upgrading to a new version.

CounterSpy wins another 3 reviews. I stole this from Brian Livingston's Windows Secrets newsletter:

I can't recall the last time I've seen an emerging product take 1st place in so many different computer reviews. CounterSpy, the antispyware application from Sunbelt Systems, has probably set some kind of record. After being judged the best available product in recent months by PC World and eWeek (as described in item 5, below), it's just scored three more wins in the past two weeks.

For individual users, Laptop Magazine's May 2005 issue gave CounterSpy 1.0 an Editors' Choice award and a perfect score of 5.0 out of 5.0. The magazine gave lower ratings to Microsoft's AntiSpyware 1.0 beta (4.5), Webroot Spy Sweeper (4.0), McAfee AntiSpyware (3.0), and StopZilla (2.5). The editors didn't bother to test Lavasoft Ad-Aware and Spybot Search & Destroy, which used to be everyone's favorites but have poor detection rates of late.

For businesses, Windows IT Pro Magazine's April 2005 issue gave its Editors' Choice to CounterSpy Enterprise, a version of the program that adds centralized management features. CounterSpy received a rating of 4.0 out of a possible 5.0, losing a point largely for omitting support for Windows 9x clients. Other business products tested were eTrust PestPatrol Anti-Spyware Corporate Edition (3.5), DynaComm i:scan (3.0), Omniquad Antispy Enterprise Edition (3.0), and SpyCatcher Enterprise (2.0). Not tested were competing products from Microsoft, Symantec, McAfee, Webroot, Intermute, and X-Cleaner. These companies didn't have their enterprise editions ready or were between revisions.

CounterSpy and Microsoft AntiSpyware were re-tested head-to-head by PC World in its June 2005 issue. The magazine had tested different builds of the two products in its April 2005 antispyware roundup, making direct comparison meaningless. When the two apps were put up against each other using spyware databases of the same date, PC World found that Counterspy was once again the champ, detecting "an excellent 92%" of the target spyware. MS AntiSpyware detected 89%, missing two major adware programs CounterSpy caught, the magazine said.

These findings reinforce the four elements of the Security Baseline that currently make up a top-rated set. They are the Linksys or Belkin hardware firewalls, the ZoneAlarm Security Suite, CounterSpy, and an update-management tool of your choice. See details below.

		1. Hardware firewall. For wired home and small-office networking, the 4-port Linksys BEFSX41 firewall (photo at left, about $65 USD street price) with NAT and SPI boasts PC Magazine's Editors' Choice award. For wireless networking, the new Belkin Wireless Pre-N router ($120) also offers NAT and SPI as well as WPA and is currently top-rated at CNET.
		2. Software firewall. ZoneAlarm Security Suite (left, $60) holds PC Magazine's Editors' Choice as the best all-in-one software firewall, antivirus program, and antispam filter. For software firewall protection only, ZoneAlarm Pro ($35) is number one according to several testers, including PC World's Best of 2004 awards.
		3. Antivirus program. Trend Micro's PC-cillin Internet Security 2005 antivirus suite ($45), which also includes a personal firewall, recently won head-to-head comparisons in PC World and CNET against McAfee's and Symantec's offerings. Note: If you have ZoneAlarm Security Suite (see above), you don't need a separate antivirus program.
		4. Antispam program. Cloudmark Safetybar (available in versions for Outlook and Outlook Express, $30) is currently rated as a PC World Best Buy and a PC Magazine Editors' Choice. Note: If you have ZoneAlarm Security Suite (see above), you don't need a separate antispam filtering program.
		5. Antispyware program. Sunbelt Software CounterSpy 1.0 (left, $20) is the most effective remover of spyware, according to reviews in PC World and Laptop Magazine. When used with the free HijackThis program, PC World says the two apps caught 100% of the nuisances tested. HijackThis is an advanced program that's supported by free technical forums. For small to medium businesses, Sunbelt CounterSpy Enterprise ($255 for 10 machines) is top-rated by both eWeek and Windows IT Pro as a centrally managed program.
		6. Update management. For small to medium networks, Microsoft's free Software Update Services is currently the best way to automate the downloading of critical Windows patches, according to a Network Computing review. (Microsoft announced last month that its release date for an upgraded SUS, renamed Windows Server Update Services, will be in June.) SUS, unfortunately, doesn't scan PCs for problems or distribute fixes for applications. GFI LANguard Network Security Scanner (left, $375 for 25 users) builds on SUS, checking your network for vulnerabilities and pushing out updates. LANguard NSS is top-rated by WindowSecurity.com and MCSE World. The latter site also publishes a helpful tutorial on augmenting SUS with LANguard NSS or Shavlik's HFNetChkPro ($620 for 25 users). Individual users should simply turn on the auto-download features of Windows Update and any installed apps they may have. If you're reading this with Firefox, please keep scrolling.

The young priest
A young priest was asked by a funeral director to hold a graveside service for a man who died with no family or friends.

The funeral was held way back in the country and the young priest got lost on the way.

When he arrived an hour late, he saw a backhoe and crew, but the hearse was nowhere in sight.

The workmen were eating lunch. The diligent priest went to the open grave to find the vault lid in place, but still he poured out his heart and preached an impassioned and lengthy service.

Returning to his car, the young preacher felt that he had done his duty and he would leave with a renewed sense of purpose and dedication, in spite of his tardiness.

As he got into his car, he overheard one of the workers talking to another worker: "I've been putting in septic tanks for 20 years, and I ain't never seen anything like that before.

"Sort of gives new meaning to the term, "Holy Shit!"

Harry Newton

This column is about my personal search for the perfect investment. I don't give investment advice. For that you have to be registered with regulatory authorities, which I am not. I am a reporter and an investor. I make my daily column -- Monday through Friday -- freely available for three reasons: Writing is good for sorting things out in my brain. Second, the column is research for a book I'm writing called "In Search of the Perfect Investment." Third, I encourage my readers to send me their ideas, concerns and experiences. That way we can all learn together. My email address is . You can't click on my email address. You have to re-type it . This protects me from software scanning the Internet for email addresses to spam. I have no role in choosing the Google ads. Thus I cannot endorse any, though some look mighty interesting. If you click on a link, Google may send me money. That money will help pay Claire's law school tuition. Read more about Google AdSense, click here and here.
Go back.