The Mykonos Secure Web Application Framework provides application teams with a full range of critical capabilities for coding, compiling, deploying, and maintaining the most secure Web applications.

For developers, these include a Web-based interface design suite, a large component library, and the widest range of security capabilities: input validation, XSS filtering, encryption, transport layer security, session management, authentication, logging, and code obfuscation.

For Administrators, a push service keeps production applications secure using Mykonos Managed Updates, a service that provides updates to the application layer, including security patches and new functionality.

The Mykonos Developer Kit is available today for free to developers, under a license that enables them to use Mykonos for application development and testing.

Visit the Mykonos Software website for more information.

It could only be better if it was called “Pixelpunk IPA”. It’s a nice-and-hoppy classic Scottish IPA with a spiky, bitter finish (with a slight taste of tropical fruits). It has an ABV of 6% and produced by BrewDog Brewery in Fraserburgh, UK.

It’s on tap now at the Tap & Mallet on Gregory Street in Rochester, NY. Ask for Kim, she’s a pretty awesome bartender and a great sport for letting me snap the photo.

This year’s luncheon will feature our 2008 Marketer of the Year, Mark Ruszczyk, Senior Vice President, Marketing and Sales, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield.

The luncheon will recognize the outstanding work of our 2009 Marketer of the Year finalists.

• Allendale Columbia
• Catholic Family Center
• Element K
• ESL Federal Credit Union
• Excellus BCBS
• QCI Direct
• QDental
• Scene Genesis
• Shear Ego
• University of Rochester
• Xerox Global Services

While all of our finalists will be recognized for their work, the four overall award winners will be named at the luncheon at the Rochester Riverside Convention Center. The event is scheduled to take place from 12:00pm-1:30pm.

Visit the RAMA Web site to register.

Dana is a visionary speaker, technology leader, and marketing savant who helps B2B marketers reach and keep customers through emerging marketing technology.

Dana was a pioneer in the blogosphere with his company BlogSavant™ in 2004 and continues to be a leader and innovator in social media, internet marketing, and sales technology today. A thought leader, Dana continually changes the perception of marketing to attract the brightest and the best.

The event will be held at Mario’s Italian Steakhouse from 11:30am – 1:30pm.

Click here to register.

Emily will take you on a journey through the wonderful world of social media. Discover why sites like LinkedIn, FaceBook, and Twitter can no longer be ignored. How do you get started or keep up in this new online world? Whether you are just starting out, or trying to keep up, you will walk away ready to take action and start creating a buzz for your business using available social media tools.

Emily is a Web Whiz and avid networker.  She posts her weekly networking schedule on her D&C Blog, Networking Matters and you can also follow her on Twitter.

Refreshments will be served and seating is limited.  Please RSVP by calling BlueTie at 586-2000 x1001.

http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/0901ouabdcaw/event/index.html

I designed & coded the website, and managed the online marketing for Transcat.com while I was employed by Innovative Solutions. In 2008, the website was named a Rochester Business Journal “Best of Web” finalist.

Jim Walker, Transcat’s Director of Sales and Marketing, had this to say about my contributions to the site:

“Results tell it all. With Mike’s combined expertise in both web design and online marketing, our online business tripled after one year. It was also a pleasure working with Mike.”

It’s been one year, and BlueTie has successfully filtered over 9600 junk emails from ever hitting my inbox. The bad news? One legitimate email (out of nearly 10,000) was mistakenly flagged as spam and 2-3 junk messages a week still fly under the radar and end up in my inbox.  Spammers are constantly devising new ways to sneak past filters. I get that. I can live with 2-3 a week, believe me.

Of course, I’m not your typical user. My email address is very easy for spammers to guess and I have multiple (also easy-to-guess) email addresses pointing to a single account. I’m also a marketing and technology guy, which means I’ve signed up for hundreds and hundreds of fly-by-night Web 2.0 beta applications and marketing newsletters over the past few years. Who knows what these companies did with my private information when they went belly-up. My point is this; I get significantly more spam than the average person.

To give you an idea of how bad this world-wide junk mail problem has become, I was told by our engineers that BlueTie actually blocks 90+% of spam messages before they even enter the BlueTie system to  be processed and filtered. These are completely invisible to the end user and never even see the light of day.

The only way for my current inbox to receive less spam is to change my email address and start over, but the cost of ‘switching’ is way too high for me. Too many friends and business associates already know my email address, and my email address is also my username on over a hundred websites I’ve registered with. It would take weeks to switch and it would be a real pain-in-the-the ass, to boot. And how am I supposed to move gigabytes of data and thousands upon thousands of emails into an new inbox? In any case, as soon as I start using a new address, the cycle of spam starts all over again if (read:WHEN) it falls into the wrong hands.

So considering the total cost of switching, I think can live with BlueTie’s 99.9% filtering accuracy.

Full disclosure and disclaimer: I work for BlueTie, so obviously I am biased; but our junk mail system is doing a remarkable job by any measure.  Also, this little experiment of mine was not approved or authorized by BlueTie in any way. These were the results from my email account. Your mileage may vary.

EDIT: The 9600 number shown in the screenshot above is the number of unread spam messages, not the total number of messages in the folder itself, which is higher.

Update: An hour after I wrote this post, Skyblue2u, created this beautiful pattern based on my Windsor Cottage palette. Wow!