Posts by Chris C

re: head in sand

"- download DVD, watch/burn at home

I can only assume that they think the physical model offers more in the way of secure DRM. Will they never learn?"

Perhaps... Or perhaps they realize that many people specifically DON'T want to download movies and DON'T want to watch movies on their small computer monitors. Also, while many people have "unlimited" high-speed internet plans, there are also many people who have speed- AND bandwidth-limited internet access. Those people probably wouldn't want to download a movie if that one download would fill their bandwidth quota for the month. Give me the choice between a physical product and a download, and I'll choose the physical product every time (providing the price was relatively close). It's portable (yes, I can take it to a friends house to watch on their TV), and given the choice between my 19" monitor and my 52" TV, take a wild shot in the dark which one I would choose.

Why?

Why is it that 'we" think that only "we" should have WMDs (yes, a nuclear bomb is a WMD whether it's "us" or "them" using it)? It is because "they" are different than "us"? Are "we" actually considering the outright cold-blooded murder of thousands or millions of innocent people in order to prevent something that a few people *MIGHT* do (and then again, something they might *NOT* do)? Imagine how "they" might think knowing that "we" have nukes aimed at "them" with an itchy trigger finger. If you were in "their" shoes, might you want to develop something to protect yourself? After all, "we" do have a history of killing those different than "us", with and (often-times) without reason. And before you say that "we" are better and more trustworthy than "them", take a look at history and see how both the U.S. and U.K. have treated foreign people (especially foreign nations) and the wars both countries have waged (internally and externally).

This world (specifically, the U.S. and U.K.) truly is using 1984 as an instruction manual, and that's damn scary.

As for the AC who's so offended by AJ's comment, get over yourself. Perhaps AJ did consider that the human species could not procreate without men and thinks that the elimination of the human species is in the best interests of the planet (the way things are going, that's certainly the way I think). Or perhaps AJ was just pointing out the lunacy of the typical man (you know, the "manly" man, the aggressor, the "I'll show you how strong I am" type), and pointing out that these men certainly should not be in a position to murder millions of innocent people (if not cause the destruction of the entire planet).

Still not good

"It did tell us there had been a security risk in Vista that had prevented Redmond from relaxing its licensing terms."

That's just pure crap. The only thing that could prevent a company from relaxing its licensing terms is third-party licensing or agreements with a third-party supplier.

As for changing the EULA to allow virtualization, that does literally nothing for the people already running Vista. Old copies of Vista were shipped with the old (no-virtualization) license, so any changes to the EULA are not available to users of those old-license products.

Huh?

So this woman voluntarily chose a profession in which she voluntarily takes her clothes off and poses nude, with the intention of people drawing her nude form. So my logical mind comes up with:

1) She voluntarily removes her clothes and poses for people to draw her. If that does not "violate [her] privacy", then why do people taking pictures? Is it that the pictures are an accurate representation and not the artists' representation? If you've agreed to pose nude, you agreed to give up your privacy while posing, whether there are 5 people present or 500.

2) She's upset that she doesn't get paid 25 euro per hour for sitting naked, literally doing nothing? Guess what, I'm upset I can't get that, too. But some of us work for a living. Don't get me wrong, I can imagine that it is a difficult or uncomfortable job, but it's not like it requires a whole lot of skill. Strength and fitness, yes, but skill, no. Also, let's not forget that 25 euros per hour is 50,000 euros per year at a typical 8-hour-per-day 50-week-per-year job.

3) Do any other kind of models get a fixed annual salary (fashion models, billboard models, TV models, etc)? No. So why should nude models? Fixed annual salaries are for people who work consistent hours (typically M-F 8-5 here in the U.S.). Almost nobody gets a fixed annual salary for limited, infrequent, or intermittent work.

re: KSW... omg!

"Every course begins with the same Hubbard Policy Letter, Keeping Scientology Working, which establishes the infallibility of Hubbard's so-called 'technology.' In that PL, Hubbard boldly states, 'What I say in these pages has always been true, it holds true today, it will still hold true in the year 2000 and it will continue to hold true from there on out.'"

"We are at war with Eurasia. We have always been at war with Eurasia." Is it me, or did that PL take a lesson from 1984?

Guilty unless proven innocent (and then, quite possibly, still guilty)

Doesn't the U.S. proclaim that suspects are "innocent unless proven guilty"? Actions like this one are directly contradictory to that. Forcing a suspect to reveal the contents of their computer, home, safe, or whatever else in order to prove there is no usable evidence against them can only be interpreted as the suspects having to prove their innocence. In other words, guilty unless proven innocent. We've known for a long while that that's the way people have been treated, but this shows it with astonishing clarity.

re: I wish it was UK law

You (and others like you) may prefer that your country had a law such as this, a law which forces all sellers to sell at the manufacturer's suggested price. This would insist on what some people would consider fair selling. But please, don't blame the big chains for ruining your country.

I sympathize with you. Here in the U.S., we have virtually no department stores anymore. If I want to buy something, I have to go to Wal-Mart or Target. That's all that's left. But I don't blame them (entirely). It's my (and your) fellow citizens who have done this to us. They voted with their wallets by buying from the cheapest seller.

If I can afford it, I'll go to the local hardware store instead of Home Depot or Lowe's. I buy from the local music shop instead of the big chains. I'll gladly pay more to support the local shops if I can afford it. The problem for me (and you) is two-fold: 1) many people can't afford to pay the higher prices of local sellers because the people are paid so low they can barely (if at all) survive; and 2) most people just don't care, if they can save money, they will.

Stupid

This has got to be one of the stupidest ideas I've ever heard. Fortunately, I don't live in California. Regardless, I would absolutely refuse to give somebody else control over the heating and cooling that I pay for. Especially to give control to the people who are selling the service. "Hey Joe, it looks like our sales are down this month." "No problem, just lower the temp in everyone's home, which will draw more power for A/C, and we'll be back up to quota in no time." Not to mention the security implications of giving remote access to your environmental controls, possible health care issues for various people (such as those who can't deal with cold temps for age or medical reasons), and the associated cost of the thermostats and the remote connection.

Has anybody actually thought of adding power capacity? Unless they outsource a large percentage of their workforce, the power requirements of the state are only going to grow over time. So invest in additional capacity and be ready for it instead of trying to cut back on usage now and being unprepared later.

Seldom-used?

Are you actually trying to say that using port 9100 to send jobs to a networked printer is seldom used? If so, I suggest stepping into the real world. Virtually every person and company I know who has a print server (whether a separate device or integrated) uses port 9100. It's called "Standard TCP/IP Printing" by Windows, and every print server supports it, for a reason. It's about as seldom-used as using port 80 for WWW traffic.

And what is this "termination" you speak of? Do you mean sending a print job by sending data to the port?

In order to utilize this "attack", the attacker would first need to gain control of the user's computer. If they have that level of control, there are far worse things than your printer printing spam.

Turn of autorun!

There's an easy solution to this: turn off the bloody autorun "feature"! There is really no reason to have autorun. What was so difficult about opening My Computer, selecting the CD drive, then selecting the setup.exe file? Why did Microsoft have to make a way (turned on by default, no less) to automatically run a program upon insertion of a disc/device? Any idiot can tell you that automatically running unknown (and hence untrusted) code upon insertion of a disc/device is a stupid idea and is bound to cause problems.

Stupidity on a whole new level

So this woman became addicted to crystal meth at age 13th, was addicted for 6 to 7 years, then kicked the habit for 8 months. She then (by her own admission) voluntarily started using the drugs again.

1) Where does a 13-year-old through 19-year-old get enough money to feed a crystal meth addiction?

2) By her own admission, she did this voluntarily. As such, it is entirely her own responsibility. Nobody forced her to do it, so nobody else is to blame.

As for her brilliant statement "I have gotten sober. I think that's taking responsibility for my actions. I don't think I should have to take responsibility for both of our actions. I think he should meet me half way. That's what this lawsuit is about.", I completely agree with the second part. The dealer needs to accept responsibility for selling the drugs. However, SHE needs to accept responsibility for voluntarily BUYING and USING the drugs.

The first part of her statement is complete rubbish. Getting sober has no relation to taking responsibility for your actions. If I use a knife to cut off my fingers, then I get rid of the knife, do you consider that taking responsibility for my actions? Of course not. This is the same thing. Eliminating the source of your problems is complete separate from accepting responsibility for your actions.

The bad part is that this will tie up court systems which are already overtaxed with stupid and frivolous lawsuits. The good part is that the drug dealers (or there associates/partners) will likely kill the "victims" in cases like this, so that might send a message to others to not pursue the same course of action.

As for the "Daily Mail" comment above -- if she was able to afford a crystal meth addiction starting at the age of 13, I doubt very much that she "has not had a very easy life". Regardless, I *DO* deserve to have a holier-than-thou attitude. I take personal responsibility for all of my actions and decisions, the good and the bad. I don't look to blame others. So yes, that *DOES* give me the right to take such an attitude. But I will agree with you that all drug users are victims. I just happen to think that, unless they were forced to become addicted by another person, they are victims of themselves, and as such, have only themselves to blame.

Resolution

I don't think you have to worry about upscaling HD images to resolutions higher than 1280x1080 (1080i) or 1920x1080 (1080p) for a long time. Look at how long it took them to get that high. Am I the only one amused that a 52" television is now capable of 1920x1080, whereas my 19" CRT from 10 years ago could do 1600x1200?

re: Give him a job!

"OK: he might be a bit young - but he sounds like someone with a brain that works."

How do you figure? Because he was able to break into the depots, retrieve the necessary specifications, and was able to read them? I know that both the US and UK have education problems, but certainly the ability to read should not be interpreted as "a brain that works", even by today's standards. Nor should it be reason for praise, awards, or anything else.

His actions were unethical, illegal, and dangerous. He should not be awarded, he should be punished.

Point of reference?

What are they using a point of reference? Their PCs of 2010 will consume 25 percent less energy than WHAT? 25% less than a PC using an Intel Itanium? Xeon? AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ (125W)? Athlon 64 3800+ (35W)? Are they talking business PCs with lower-end integrated video or gaming PCs with high-end, high-power video cards?

They can already make that claim now. Build two systems -- one based on the Athlon 64 X2 6000+ at 125W, and the second based on the Athlon 64 3800+ at 35W. The second system will use roughly 49% less power than the first system (assuming the other components use a combined power of 60W). They could even use a VIA processor such as the C7 to reduce the power even more, though most people probably wouldn't like or accept the performance hit.

It's all in your point of reference. Stuff like this is nothing but marketing talk, signifying nothing.

I give up

After reading some of the "words" listed in this article, I officially give up on the human species. Was there really anything wrong with using real words instead of making up this stupid-sounding shit? Between this and the incessant need of people to use text-messaging "words" and formatting in non-text-messaging scenarios, it's a wonder these people can even communicate. It certainly is a prime example of why education (more accurately, educated people) is at an all-time low. I shudder and silently weep when I think these are the people who will be running the world when I'm a senior citizen.

Still somewhat wrong

I would respectfully point out that the real issue not really whether or not Comcast is throttling traffic (though this is certainly an issue for a number of people, I would think). The REAL issue is whether or not Comcast is spoofing (forging) packets to make it appear as though they came from another system (the seeding system, in the BitTorrent case). From the AP reports, Comcast does spoof RST packets. This may or may not run afoul of certain laws and regulations (though I doubt anything would be done even if any agency or attorneys decided to do something about it).

re: Compensation?

"If it didn't go off, what the hell's he paying $81k in compensation for?"

Probably for scrubbing the system. Once you find malware in your system, and especially once you realize it's your sysadmin who put it there, you can no longer trust the system. A that point, you must do a thorough validation of everything in the system, every file, every script line-by-line. That is most likely what the $81k was for. And considering they probably wanted/needed it done ASAP, there was probably a lot of overtime, so $81k probably isn't unreasonable.

They need to be physically separated

While it MAY be possible to build the two systems so that limited data can be passed back and forth, I would still be very wary of such a system. At any rate, the two networks absolutely MUST be physically separated. At the very most, use a special device to link the networks, a device which will disconnect the non-essential (passenger) network from the essential (navigational) network upon non-normal conditions. Using the same physical bus results in unnecessary vulnerabilities, even if the two networks use different subnets or even network types (TCP/IP vs IPX/SPX, for example). The reason is that one malfunctioning device (or a device explicitly made to "malfunction") can disrupt the sending/receiving and/or cause latency for all other devices on the bus. Not exactly a good idea when some of those devices are keeping the plane in the air.

Let's get quality monitors first

Before we worry about quantity, can we please worry about the quality of the monitors being produced? The last time I checked, LCD monitors were still pathetic compared to CRT in terms of resolution, and widescreen monitors have made this even more clear. My KDS 19" CRT can go up to 1600x1200, and yes, that's the resolution I used with it. Since I "upgraded" to a Samsung 19" LCD, I'm limited to 1280x1024. 1440x900 ("WXGA+") now seems to be the standard for widescreen, and 1280x1024 still seems to be the standard for non-widescreen. Even 22" monitors only go up to 1680x1050 ("WSXGA+"). Throw that on top of the problem of dead pixels (either always-on or always-off), both from delivery and introduced over time, and it doesn't look good for quality.

@BitTwister

You have been misinformed. Audio data is recorded onto an audio CD at 150Kbps (notice the capital K). Put into the kbps notation of compressed audio, an audio CD is encoded at 1200kbps. An audio CD contains 150 kilobytes of audio data per second (75 samples per second at 2KB per sample).

re: More anti-American sentiment...

Exactly what I would expect from a southerner or mid-westerner (read: republican). Yes, I'm sure there are many intelligent people in those areas, but the idiots seem to outnumber them about a million to one.

No, Jeff, this wasn't an anti-American article. It was an article about the government abusing its power. In the United States, there USED to be a thing called "Checks and Balances". That was the reason the government is comprised of three branches (executive, legislative, and judicial) -- so that none of the branches is powerful enough to abuse its power. Unfortunately, the judicial branch has been crippled so as to be useless in protecting the citizens against their rulers (the government), and the two-party system has rendered the legislative branch completely ineffective (because the parties often vote against each other, not based on valid reasoning, but out of spite). And the executive branch does whatever the hell it wants without regard to petty things like laws or facts.

The "State Secrets" pledge was enacted to protect the country's national security, not to prevent it from embarrassment or to hide the truth.

The same is true for classified documents. JFK was assassinated in 1963. The government claims it was an individual (Lee Harvey Oswald) that killed him. And yet the documents regarding his death are still classified. It's the same now as it was then -- the government will do whatever it wants, it will cover up whatever it wants, and the people are powerless to stop it. Welcome to 1984.

re: Not Bricking

It depends on what you mean by "brick" and "you can reinstall". Considering that HP laptops no longer come with installation or recovery CDs, reinstalling may not be an option. If remote computers are given full access to a system, they can most likely wipe out the files on the recovery partition, leaving nothing to recover from. So yes, you can reinstall if you have the knowledge and a copy of the necessary software. But for most people (read: HP's primary audience), the laptop would become a brick (especially since the cost of repair/reinstall would likely be seen as uneconomical compared to the cost of a new laptop, depending on the model).

As for me, I disable or uninstall all that crap on any system I get no matter who makes it. It's nothing but a resource hog.

Bad design flaws

This is, in my opinion, the result of two glaringly obvious design flaws.

1. According to the article, a cross-site scripting "attack" can inject variables into a Flash object. If this is true, it's because variables can be set in the HTML code or as part of the request. This is a huge security problem in and of itself. When you create a program (applet, application, whatever) you design it (or at least should design it) so that it is a closed system except for an input parameter string, and your program should parse and process the parameter string. You should not process the parameter string without validating the input, and you most certainly should not allow variables to be set from outside the program.

2. This is the big one. From the beginning of the browsers (at least as far as I am aware), browsers have been stupid about sessions. Browsers assume that from the moment the browser is opened to the moment the browser is closed, any visit to a website is the same session, no matter which window or tab is making the request. This is, in my opinion, another huge security problem. This is the reason cross-site scripting works -- because browsers are stupid about sessions. A session should be a single window/tab, and any children of that window/tab (so a session can contain multiple windows/tabs, but only ones spawned by the original).

Let's say I open two Firefox windows. I go to my online banking site in one window and pay some bills. Keeping that first window open, or closing it (without using my bank's proper logout procedure), I then go to exploitmenow.com in the second window. Because the browser executable has not been closed, the browser treats this as the same session as the first window. There is no reason for that second window to be able to access my banking session details or be treated as the same session. But if, in that second window, I then go to my online banking site, I'll go right in without authenticating because it's treated as part of the same session as the first window.

Now, I understand there are issues with separating sessions. And I understand PHP sessions are probably treated the same (or similar). But it still doesn't make it right. In order to secure our browsers, we first need to secure our sessions. And the way to do that is to treat every window/tab (except for children) as individual sessions.

Additionally, one window/tab should not be able to access the content of another window/tab unless it has a parent/child/sibling relationship.

Lastly, a "pet peeve" of mine. In recent months, it seems that the editorial staff (if there is any) at El Reg have quit proofreading the articles. Articles are released with multiple spelling and grammar errors, and I'm not talking about UK English vs US English; I'm talking about missing/added words and missing/added letters. I'm not singling out this article, because it seems to be a regular occurrence now. This article was just the "final straw" due to the number of errors I noticed upon a quick reading (3 errors -- "tens of thousands websites", "vulnerabile", and "completeley"). I know that content is typically considered more important than presentation, but it makes it more difficult to read, not to mention it just looks bad.

What would worry ME

"What I don't know at the minute is whether this cocaine has been sent for destruction, or to a court or to a forensic science laboratory and the paperwork has not been done properly or it has been stolen. I am very worried if it is the latter."

He's "very worried" if the cocaine had been stolen. So he's not worried if it was sent out but the paperwork had not been done properly? THAT would worry me almost as much.

My two cents

If the Google guys are so smart, why don't THEY design lower-power hardware? I'm not a hardware engineer, but here's my two cents anyway:

Hard drives -- What consumes the most power in a hard drive? The motor to keep the platters spinning. Without the platters spinning, the drives are useless. And it takes a relatively long time to go from stopped to spinning (not to mention each transition cuts down on the remaining life due to wear).

Memory -- DRAM needs to be constantly refreshed or it "forgets" the data it was holding. There's no way around this. You might be able to use SRAM, but it's expensive, and it may actually be slower than DRAM at this point (haven't read much about SRAM in many years).

Networking -- You might be able to do something here, but keep in mind that latency is a killer. And if transitions to/from a lower-power mode result in lost packets or require resent packets, there may be a net loss instead of a net gain because of additional work for the device sending data and for the switches, etc passing the data.

What about audio? I wouldn't mind shutting down my audio circuity once I turn off my speakers.

One area nobody seems to mention (that I've noticed, at least) is video. In a data center, video is almost never used. And consider how much time your home or office computer sits with nobody paying attention to the video. Yes, we have power saving modes for the video output (the monitors as well as the video signal to the monitors). But what about power-saving features on video cards? We have high-powered graphics cards spending a lot of time in non-intensive graphic modes (typical O/S GUI). There's no reason to have 128MB or 256MB of graphics memory used/available when doing standard office work (with possible exceptions for CAD, etc). You also don't need a 500MHz graphics processor for standard office work. And considering that graphics cards are probably the second or third largest power consumer in a computer, it might be a good idea to see what can be done here. I imagine this is the reason some of the Tyan server boards still come with the ATI Rage XL 8MB video chipset.

Completely useless

I'm sorry, but if a DATABASE is not CONSISTENT, then it is, indeed, completely bloody useless. If you are not guaranteed to read what you have written, it is useless.

But it sure does explain a lot about the Amazon shopping and ordering experience (such as an item being "In stock, ships in 24 hours" when you purchase it, then you get an email saying "Out of stock").

My two cents

I've always been torn on the capital punishment issue. Most times, though, I'm for it. In cases where there is absolutely no doubt that the convicted suspect is guilty of a violent crime (murder, rape [no, I'm not including consensual sex labeled as "statutory rape"], torture, etc), I'd personally be willing to execute the criminal. Putting someone in prison for life is meaningless. Most prisoners have better lives than a large portion of our non-jailed citizens. Putting people in jail for life just results in overcrowded prisons and drains on the economy.

As for you idiots saying 'if someone was wrongly convicted, they can be released and move on with their life', you obviously have no brains. Go ahead and try moving on with your life. You'll have to deal with the media, people harassing and possibly injuring or murdering you (depending on what you were convicted of), and you'll have an incredibly difficult time getting a decent job (especially if you spent any considerable amount of time in prison, which basically makes you obsolete when you're released). That doesn't even go into the psychological effects and, for most people, the now-instilled desire to kill those who wrongly put you in prison and took away a good part of your life. Not for me, thanks. Given the choice between spending years in prison and then released somewhere down the road when they realize I'm innocent, and being put to death, I'll choose death. But alas, that is one of the freedoms we don't have in this country -- the freedom to choose whether to live or not live.

Point?

Look, I hate Wikipedia as much as the next person, but what's the point of this article? To single out an individual for further harassment and abuse? To say that convicted felons should no longer be able to get jobs? To point out that Wikipedia's lawyer doesn't know how to run a background check? This is not newsworthy at all. Would you run the same story if you were notified of a similar scenario at IBM, Microsoft, or Mozilla? It sounds like the individual concerned is a scumbag, no doubt, but there really is no purpose for this article.

Code modification is irrelevant

I'd just like to point out that whether MPAA modified the code or not is irrelevant. They distributed it. The GPL states that if you distribute the binary, you must distribute (or offer) the source as well, regardless of whether or not you modify the code.

re: @ian

AVATAR? Last I knew, AVATAR was a way of controlling a text terminal (positioning, colors, etc), much like ANSI. But that was a long time ago in a galaxy far away. What those guys could do with ANSI art was truly amazing.

re: Vote with their feet?

You want Comcast's customers to "vote with their feet"? How so? By going back to dial-up? What many people don't realize is that this "competition" the world thinks we have is a complete myth. The only competition for high-speed (non-dial-up) internet access is your cable company (Comcast, Cox, Charter, etc) or your phone company (Verizon, AT&T, Qwest), with the possible exception of the satellite companies (HughesNet) who (because of speed and capacity limitations) aren't really an option for many people.

Cable company: cable internet.

Phone company: DSL, fiber, DS-x (T-x) such as DS-1, DS-3, etc.

And with the way web designers design their sites now, you *NEED* high-speed internet. Otherwise you'll be spending 60 seconds or more waiting for each page to load.

Well-known?

Really, how well-known are the Romantics? I can only remember two of their songs -- "What I Like About You" and "Talking In Your Sleep". That's it. And the only reason anyone even remembers "What I Like About You" at this point is the Amanda Bynes / Jennie Garth 2002 sitcom of the same name.

Somebody should tell this idiots that "cover song" often means "sound-alike". A lot of bands try to get it as close to the original as they can. Very few bands try to put a distinctive edge on a cover. So when they say the defendants did not have a license to create a "sound-alike" recording, they're outright lying. Not that that surprises me at all. And how were they "damaged"? I would love to know what the 'injury to the band's "identity, persona, and distinctive sound'" is when they themselves say the song sounded exactly like their version.

This is just a pathetic attempt by a now unknown band to try to reclaim some of the cash and fame they had at one time. And really, when you only had two hits in your entire career, you need to do everything you can.

Re: RE: re: WTF?

"so what did you do about your 'compensation'? chalk it down to experience and forget it?"

Exactly. I really had no right to compensation anyway, since I don't use text-messaging. Though I do wish you could turn it off so you don't have to pay for unwanted incoming messages. I don't use my mobile phone much anymore, so I had already decided to downgrade my plan to the $45/mn plan, so the $15 and $30 credits wouldn't be available. And there's no way in hell I was going to give them more money if I could help it. So I downgraded my plan, kept my phone (which seems to be a unique experience when changing plans nowadays), and just disregarded the settlement.

Waste of taxpayers money

This is a huge waste of taxpayers' money on both sides of the pond. As for the President, maybe he should just get an Airbus A380 since he obviously needs such grand accommodations. Personally, I don't see why he needs a bathroom in his helicopter. Let him shit out the window. The American people are used to getting shit on by the president anyway. Imagine what we, as a scientific society, could do with the money wasted to shuffle about these useless meatsacks.

Oh my

This "entertainer" needs to take himself out of the gene pool now (no pun intended). He's not going to make music because he doesn't know if he'll get paid or not, and then he has the balls to say it's still all about the music? Biohazard said it best in their song "Business":

"If you think for a minute this song's about you / Step the fuck back, cuz it's probably true / The message in the music is the reason that we're in this / That's what matters to us, not business / Music is for you and me, not the fucking industry / Try to tell us what is cool, we come from different schools / It only matters what you say, not the fuckin' games you play / Full of shit, it's plain to see, the whole damn fuckin' industry"

I can sympathize with an artist wanting to get paid. Contrary to popular opinion, not all artists want to tour. Take Filthy Thieving Bastards (side project from two of the guys in Swingin Utters), for example. They have families and jobs and from what I've heard, they don't really want to tour because they want to spend time with their families. But they still make good music that people want to hear. Should they not get paid for their work? And what of the songwriters who write for other people? Restricting payment to tour merchandise is not the way to go.

I personally like how Mr. Ego thinks Radiohead and Trent Reznor are to blame for the music industry's problem. How dare they decide to release their music in a manner they see fit, a manner which is not consistent with the extortionate and illegal practices of the mainstream music industry! How dare they value their fans and their fans' input like that. Last I knew, there was a lot of free music and free concerts in the sixties. Did the music industry come crashing down as a result? Obviously not.

re: "Old News" comment above -- "A entertaining guy, but I wouldn't want to share a room with his ego." I don't think you could fit into a room with his ego. I don't think this world is big enough for his ego. And I thought the guys from Metallica had huge egos now...

Reasons for buying

Yeah, people in the U.S. buy products made in China because they're cheaper. Sure. Someone should tell those who wrote the report that the reason we in the U.S. buy products made in China is because that's all that's bloody available! Nearly everything you buy (certainly all electronics) have those little "Made in China" stickers. What the hell do U.S. companies actually make anymore, aside from agriculture (which I fear will decrease in order to use the land for "biofuels")?

re: BitTwister

"> Attempting to contact the various people affected would have been the proper thing to do.

But isn't that what he did - to be met by a deafening (and presumably disinterested) silence?"

No, that isn't what he did. From the original article ("http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/08/31/embassy_email_accounts_exposed/"):

----------

Egerstad's decision to publish the account details online is sure to reignite the frequent debate about whether such full disclosure is irresponsible because it simply allows a broader base of people to misuse the information. He says he's well versed in the merits of responsible disclosure but decided that posting the login details was the only way to get the attention this problem deserves.

"I don't have time calling all over the world to tell them something they won't understand or listen to," Egerstad said. "I'm probably going to get charged for helping to commit a crime. I don't really care."

----------

He made no attempt to contact the people. He simply posted their login credentials, knowing full well the implications and consequences of doing so. This wasn't about him trying to help those people. It was about him showing off his 'leet skillz'.

re: Not the first

Comcast isn't doing it here in western Massachusetts. At least not yet.

Don't these companies understand the problems they cause when they start messing with DNS? There's a reason ICANN never instituted a global response. It's because users and programs need to know when the requested domain doesn't have a DNS entry.

On a separate note, I wonder about the legal liabilities of this. As in trademark infringement. If they're offering their own data on close-but-misspelled domains (especially a search which may show competitor's products), they may be liable for trademark infringement. For example, if they hijack targwt.com and redirect you to their own search which advertises for Wal-Mart. Throw that possible liability onto the questionable nature of their "common carrier" status since they're now "managing" BitTorrent traffic...

re: Brown is doin it over here too

"Dont forget that they are now upping detention without charge for suspicion of dropping a bit of chewing gum, or any other offense they care to pretend is terrorist related to 50 days over here now."

Ha! I spit on your 50 days! Over here in the Land of Good Old Democracy ("Land of GOD"), we keep people in detention forever without charge. We don't need to restrict ourselves to no stinkin 50 days. Won't somebody over there think of the children?

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine

First, to the commenter about the GPL -- yeah, like the U.S. military would/will abide by the terms of the GPL. Riiiiight. "Duh, well, the GPL v4 said we couldn't use it for military purposes, so we done and got rid of it. Now we got no software to make out sooper dooper sekret killbot go vroom bang bang." Sure.

To the commenter defending TCP/IP -- TCP/IP probably was probably seen as secure back when DoD was the only one using ARPAnet, and they didn't have anyone trying to take over their systems. The problem with IP (and possibly/probably other protocols, as well) is that it's damn easy to virtually take a system offline, just (D)DoS the IP address. Even if it's on a private network, all it takes is one system connecting to that network to become infected with something.

Lastly, a question: What will we call a hacked fleet of robotic military machines (assuming SkyNet is retained for the eventual "rightful", official botnet). We've already used "botnet" for something else. Maybe KillBotNet?

More purchases

I got into MP3s late in the game, probably late 2000 or early 2001, starting first with mp3.com and then AudioGalaxy, Limewire, Kazaa, and WinMX. Last year, I ripped all of my CDs onto my computer in .OGG format, and I organized all the files I downloaded from mp3.com into their own folders. That left the other-downloaded songs. I just counted, and of the music I've downloaded, I've gone out and purchased 133 CDs. I still have a lot left, but I buy them when I can afford to (and when the songs are actually available on CD [not out of print or never released on CD]). I'd go out and buy all the CDs to replace my downloads if money was no object. Unfortunately, money doesn't grow on trees. And since I don't listen to radio, the only CDs I buy are those to replace my downloads and others that Amazon "recommends".

Property

A domain is simply our "property", our "real estate" on the internet, right? Here in the U.S. (not sure about elsewhere) you have to publicly register your real estate holdings. That means that all houses and businesses have their owners' name and address in public records. Why should the internet be any different?

Pros for whois: Used for domain info/transfers (as stated above), used for finding out the owner of a domain (to see if it's a known "bad guy", or to see if the same company owns two domains, for example), to find contact information for the domain's administrator (to report abuse, spam, problems with their web pages, etc).

Cons for whois: Used by spammers for address harvesting, and "I wanna remain anonymous!".

The pros seriously outweigh the cons, in my opinion. While I understand people's desire to be anonymous on the internet, it'll never happen. You are never anonymous. Give up the illusion now. WHOIS is far too beneficial to simply get rid of it in an attempt to keep up the illusion of anonymity.

re: Phil

"Lewis Page, you are sick.

"Hapless meatsacks slaughtered by flying mechanoid"

That's *real* people, killed dead. Imagine that it was your mother, or your son. Please show some respect."

Did it ever occur to you that maybe Mr. Page is not "sick" as you claim, but is making a statement? I seriously doubt he considers people to be "hapless meatsacks", but that *IS* how the various military and government agencies view their enemies. And that *IS* how the machines view us. And since this is part of ROTM (though confusingly not marked as such), it does fit. I viewed his words as a statement of the sick and deplorable nature of war. But I guess we each see things as we want.

Do I sense a bias?

The article's author says "Whatever the case, it seems clear that Facebookers are more interested in heavy-handed TV comedians than serious political candidates."

Do I sense a bias here? Seems like someone who is likely a republican, and in either case prefers the status quo. That quoted sentence, to me, is just as accurately read as "Whatever the case, it seems clear that Facebookers are more interested in intelligent people who question stupidity than serious money-fame-and-power seekers."

I'm not a Facebook user. To be honest, I'm still not quite sure what it is. I'm not a Myspace user, either. Or Youtube. I'm also well above the age of their target demographic. But I would vote for Colbert and/or Stewart (or Jesse Ventura, if he was willing to run) in a second. Why? Because as Gareth pointed out above, I've been disenfranchised by the system of politics we know and hate. It's not a government by the people, and it's not a government for the people. It's a government by the powerful for the powerful.

The simple truth is that Colbert (and Stewart and Ventura) are (or at least appear to be) intelligent and honest people. Call me crazy, but I value that. These men also are not afraid to point out (and mock) the idiocy of politics and politicians. They're not afraid to question things.

You say Colbert is a "heavy-handed TV comedian". That may be true, but he's also more-or-less one of the voices of the intelligent american public (yes, I know, that does seem like quite an oxymorom), especially Gen-X and younger. And isn't that what the government is supposed to be -- the voice of the public?

re: yeah, right

I'm so sick and tired of your kind. People like you are constantly blaming the users when MS does something like this, saying stuff like "Well it's your fault for using Windows". Contrary to what you probably believe, most companies use Windows because that's what's required by the software they need. The software simply isn't available for your precious Linux or Mac. I'll be the first to admit it's a catch-22 situation. Most vendors won't write for Linux/Mac until they have more market share, and companies can't switch to Linux/Mac until their software runs on it. But don't try to make it out like Linux/Mac is the answer to everything. Most software packages, especially industry-specific (read: high cost and most important) software packages, are Windows-only. And while the company *CAN* choose to say "No, we'll go with Linux/Mac instead, even though it doesn't run the software we need, so it'll be completely bloody pointless", it's usually not a good idea. It's about using the required tool for the job. If I'm trying to screw in a slotted screw, I'm not going to grab a philips-head screwdriver or a socket wrench.

Now, are there a lot of FOSS software packages out there that can be used in place of some proprietary software? Of course there are. But don't try to make it look like all proprietary (or otherwise Windows-only) software has a FOSS (or otherwise Linux/Mac-capable) equivalent, because it doesn't. And until it does, those companies that require that software will be stuck with Windows.