Internet

UPDATE: Check out a photo gallery of images from Joe Flacco's wedding here. The photos can also be found on the website of photographer Jason Prezant , but the site has been inaccessible due to the high interest in the Flacco pictures. . Joe Flacco's wedding photos have been posted out in the blogosphere, and simply put, they are amazing. The photos, which were published to the blog of wedding photographer Jason Prezant, shed a little light onto what the Ravens quarterback is like away from the television cameras and our microphones.

The U.S. Senate recently passed a bill that would allow states to require Internet retailers to collect sales taxes on behalf of local governments. This bill has flaws, but they could be fixed in the House. It should be passed. I don't like the idea of the state and local governments collecting more taxes - they know no limits to their capacity to tax and squander our hard-earned dollars - but the current situation is unfair and bad economic policy. (Also, Marylanders stand to gain from this legislation in another way, because of a state law that will reduce future increases in gasoline taxes if taxing Internet sales is allowed.)

Up to half of sexually active young people will get a sexually transmitted disease by the time they are 25, yet many don't seek testing because it may be difficult, costly or embarrassing. Public health officials nationally and in particularly affected cities like Baltimore, however, say they've found a method that seems to address the major hurdles — a website that supplies free in-home testing kits for three of the most commonly reported STDs. "The highest prevalence is in young adults, and we knew we had to reach these kids," said Charlotte A. Gaydos, a professor of infectious diseases at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

In 1998, when President Bill Clinton signed the bipartisan Internet Tax Freedom Act, which prohibited state and local taxation of Internet access and Internet-only services, the purpose was to promote the commercial potential of the Internet, especially for start-ups and small businesses. Congress extended the bill three times, the latest until 2014. Now there's the Marketplace Fairness Act, which, writes The Washington Post, "would allow states and local governments to require large Internet retailers and other 'remote sellers' with sales over $1 million annually to collect sales taxes and send the revenue to the appropriate location.

The Blast has partnered with B2 Networks to broadcast the team's remaining 10 home games live via the Internet at www.B2TV.com, the team announced. To access broadcasts, fans can go to www.baltimoreblast.com or www.B2TV.com free of charge. To watch the games, a high-speed Internet connection and a current version of Microsoft Windows Media Player is needed. The Blast's next home game is at 7:35 p.m.. Saturday against the Philadelphia KiXX.

Sports columnist John Eisenberg will participate in a live Internet chat today from noon to 1 p.m. Go to http://www.sunspot.net/sports to join in or follow along.

I've been trying to figure out what to say about bullied bus monitor Karen Klein for four days now -- just watching the viral video of her being bullied to tears by middle-school students in New York last week left me so discombobulated I could barely speak. The boys' vile, relentless verbal attack of her, I finally realize, feels like the personification of every Internet troll I've ever run into online. I've seen horrible personal attacks from anonymous (and sometimes not) posters that had the exact same tenor, and seen commenters gang up in the exact same way, while gaining strength and bravado hiding behind their keyboards.

Banking via the Internet took a step closer to commercial viability as MCI Communications and First Union Bank announced plans yesterday to test a service that would give First Union customers simplified access to electronic banking services.The collaboration on an 18-month test pairs one of the nation's leading providers of Internet services with the nation's ninth-largest bank.Vinton Cerf, an MCI senior vice president who is known in the industry as the "father of the Internet," described the move as a "giant step" toward popularizing the worldwide network of networks as a vehicle for banking.

If you live in Maryland and order a box of $5 stogies over the Internet this summer, you might get busted for accepting an illegal tobacco shipment. Or you might not. Comptroller Peter Franchot says he doesn't want to enforce a prohibition on Internet sales of premium cigars that took effect May 1. The ban was "an unintended consequence" of 2010 reform of wholesale tobacco commerce, he said in a letter to legislative leaders dated Monday. He asked their permission to suspend enforcement of the law until the fall, when the General Assembly meets again.

A deeper look into this case and the law enforcement issues related to it appeared in Thursday's newspaper. Click here for that article.  There can, in fact, be a corrective mechanism when it comes to the mob mentality of the Internet.  This week, a video was posted online of a seemingly lost and disoriented man being swarmed by a group of young people, then sucker punched, robbed, and stripped naked of his clothing on...

When first-time mom Sarah Dorman has a parenting question, she often turns to a Facebook group of Baltimore women before her own mother. Her mother's probably not available at 3 a.m., and not familiar with the latest rules regarding infants and organic fruit or fretting over the contradictions in all those advice books - unlike some of Dorman's online peers. "It all goes through fads of what's the popular thing. What was really popular when our parents were doing it might now sound psychotic," said Dorman, 31. Three decades ago, for example, parents were told to place babies face-down to sleep, a distinct no-no today after doctors realized it increases the risk of sudden infant death syndrome.

It's Europe Day! (Yeah, we didn't know that either.) Welcome to your trends report for Friday, May 10. You're not alone if you were in the dark about the EU's annual holiday: Apparently, very few Europeans know that it exists. Nonetheless, between that, soccer championships and some market-related news articles, Europe managed to get some major attention on Twitter this morning. Also getting heavy traffic -- mostly on Google search -- was the NBA. This weekend's matchups include Heat-Bulls and Warriors-Spurs.

[ SITES ] Sun smartphone and tablet site (smartphones and tablets) Touch.baltimoresun.com , specially designed to be interacted with on touch screens, automatically adjusts its presentation according to your device. Readers visiting baltimoresun.com on smartphones like iPhones and Android phones and on tablet computers like iPads and Kindle Fires are now being automatically redirected to touch.baltimoresun.com. They can still access baltimoresun.com by going to http://www.baltimoresun.com/?

I see in the Sunpapers that Maryland wants to tax us on the things we buy on the Internet ("Bill to require sales tax for online purchases advances in Senate," April 22). Don't we pay enough taxes now? The state seems to tax everything that is not nailed down. We need to vote these people out of office. Who are these people telling us that the gas tax will be lower? You know that will never happen. Our motto for Maryland should be, "The state that taxes us to death. " Gerald Yamin, Pikesville Text NEWS to 70701 to get Baltimore Sun local news text alerts

Servers that host internet service for more than 30 state agencies are vulnerable to a cyberattack, according to a legislative audit released this week. The Maryland State Archives, which oversees the five servers, did not update the operating systems in more than five years, auditors found. Without the protective software patches and updates, Internet service for nearly the entire state government could be at risk, Legislative Auditor Thomas J. Barnickel III said. Auditors said there was no evidence of hacking, merely a weakness in the system that could hypothetically knock most state agencies offline or direct state Internet traffic to malicious sites.

Imagine you are a benevolent monarch and you have the power to institute a sales tax. (Even benevolent government has to be financed, after all.) Would you set one up that gave preference to sellers located outside your kingdom and penalized your own subjects? Would you go further and discourage those outsiders from even setting up shop in your country? Of course you wouldn't. That would be crazy. And while there are plenty of examples of insane heads of state, they aren't usually beloved by their people.

Key senators on the committee that handles casino-related matters rejected the notion of taking up the issue of Internet gambling during next week's special session, saying there isn't enough time to weigh the implications of a step that could, in effect, put slot machines in Maryland homes. Four Democratic members of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, each a supporter of other forms of gambling expansion, said Friday that they are not prepared to sort through the complex issues surrounding online gambling in a session that is expected to last less than a week.

AT&T has announced the expansion of its mobile Internet network at Aberdeen Proving Ground, extending access for advanced mobile services, devices and applications to federal government customers who work at or are visiting the post. "Demand for wireless speed is growing rapidly, and these network enhancements on the grounds of the Aberdeen Proving Grounds, a key military facility, are just the latest examples of AT&T's significant infrastructure investment in this region," said J. Michael Schweder, president of AT&T Mid-Atlantic in a press release.

Your browser does not support iframes.   When Orioles first baseman Chris Davis flailed at a changeup in the dirt Tuesday for the last out of the third inning, he says he was really frustrated. So he snapped. And so did his bat. Over Davis' knee in one quick motion. "It was misbehaving, so I put him in timeout," Davis said about snapping his bat. "It's not something I am proud of. It's not something, 'Hey, I can break a bat over my knee.' But in that situation out there, I knew I wasn't going to get a lot to hit and I still continued to swing at a ball in the dirt.