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Poster is known malware writer and troll who is advocating slowing your machine to a crawl with a 15Mb HOSTS file which will ONLY stop static ad banners.

Much better solution is to simply blacklist the Comodo certs if you aren't on Windows, and if you are on Windows you should have already been given the cert blacklist update, checkable by going MMC...add snap in...certifications and looking under untrusted certificates. Funnily enough if one is using the Comodo browser Comodo Dragon this is also not a problem, as the extremely short TTL they use on certs had these certs dead just a couple of hours after the hack and before the attacker could use them.

That, of course, depends on how you define reasonable. According to Rufus Pollock, he determined that about 14 years is the optimal balance point for copyright. I think at that point the author has earned about 97% of the copyright rents that can be earned from most works.

It's part of the Castle, or for you ESR fans part of the "Cathedral".

Google has essentially closed off the open-source Honeycomb project to outside development. I think /. is out of the loop. The fact wasn't even covered here.

Read all about it here

Also, there's a funny parody account on Twitter exposing Google's hypocrisy by withholding the source for honeycomb.

Specifically because they're out of addresses for their Internal network.

It was just a month ago that FBI proved they had 10-years worth of Backdoors in Theo De Raadt's BSD operating system without his knowledge.

Actually, an audit was done, and the opposite was proven - that there are no secret backdoors. I hope that doesn't strain your reality too much. OpenBSD is still the supreme overlord of security, even from the over-zealous security crowd.

The relevant visible parts of MacOS are pretty anti-unix actually.

Erm, no, Mac OS X is quite definitely 100% certified Unix. This has nothing to do with the "visible parts" (you mean the GUI I assume), this is all about the underlying kernel and other subsystems of the OS, as well as some of the userland tools.

At some point developers will start to do the math and see that they can drastically increase profits by going low price on digital only.

Some of them have. Namely Valve.

They have a pitch-perfect strategy:
- Sell games at full price for a while. Massive profit from day-one customers.
- Sell at a drastically reduced price. Massive profit from thrifty customers.
- Hold seasonal sales with huge publicity, attracting even more customers, making even more money.
- Repeat forever.

Sony sells those, they cost a LOT more than a PS3 though, and I don't know if they'll sell them to just any joe schmoe who wants to run LInux on one. In fact, I'm not for certain they can run YDL. They have more RAM and a second hard drive too!

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2009/03/sony-announces-lower-cost-ps3-dev-tools.ars
http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/release/090324e.html

Funny how much people think Andriod is winning here like Charlie Sheen.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/03/iphone-os-still-dominates-mobile-web-android-on-the-way-up.ars

shows iOS still King...and andriod is still a long way off even with so many second ratr phone makers and fragmented store ....

much bias here?

Here's an update from the same website:

Android tops everyone in 2010 market share; 2011 may be different

on google maps http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/google-maps-300tb-of-real-world-internet-speeds.ars

I don't agree with the article for mainly one reason. To me, and as far as I can tell Apple, they intend for tablets to be more like appliances. This in opposition to the common laptop which inherits the philosophy of - how can we make a desktop computer portable. In the philosophy of appliance vs. general computing device, Apple has stripped away all the "unnecessary" parts of the A4/5 chipset (for energy saving and maybe speed). Leaving a unitasker, or sorts. Whether I agree or not, it is what it is, take it or leave it.

I suppose I should insert the obligatory ZFS reference here. I'm going to that for my huge collection of books and documents although I have been heading into video-land now. Given the fact that the versions I've been looking at here have inline de-duplication, who cares if something is filed under one, five, or two-hundred directories. The built-in RAID characteristics make it interesting as well, although it isn't going to be magically fast (without serious hardware).

For those of the Mac persuasion, I was over on Ars-Technica and came across a reference to a version for Mac in beta with a release target sometime around Summer. I don't do Mac, but the author has targeted it for media library use. Z-410

I hope someone mods you up, because nailed it! The OS _itself_ should support better meta-data support -- live queries and tagging.

I can't find the main arstechnica review that goes in depth about meta-data but this might help the OP.

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/06/the-beos-filesystem.ars
http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2007/10/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/7
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems.ars/7

I hope someone mods you up, because nailed it! The OS _itself_ should support better meta-data support -- live queries and tagging.

I can't find the main arstechnica review that goes in depth about meta-data but this might help the OP.

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/06/the-beos-filesystem.ars
http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2007/10/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/7
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems.ars/7

I hope someone mods you up, because nailed it! The OS _itself_ should support better meta-data support -- live queries and tagging.

I can't find the main arstechnica review that goes in depth about meta-data but this might help the OP.

http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/06/the-beos-filesystem.ars
http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2007/10/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/7
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems.ars/7

No, there's more to it than that. UIWebView cannot compile arbitrary code, but Safari's JavaScriptCore (Nitro nee "Squirrelfish Extreme") does. http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2011/03/confirmed-some-web-apps-not-seeing-ios-43-javascript-speedup.ars

Japan's recent disasters have unfortunately drawn away the public eye from the middle east and now this. Almost a shame that way. The public (and the media) only have so big of an attention span. There's just too much going on around the world right now for everything to get the coverage it deserves.

Makes me wonder if wikileaks had intended to publish this leak some days earlier and postponed it when Japan jumped the charts?

And then we have that Hollywood Patriot Act that is going to fly completely under the public's radar.

All quite a shame really...

At Chernobyl, this actually happened inside the containment vessel and the resulting explosion ruptured the vessel, leading to a serious release of core radioactives – though this has had basically zero effect on the world in general nor even much impact on the area around Chernobyl.

*faceplam*

I'm pretty pro-nuke/anti-hysteria, but this is just irresponsible. If you want the straight-up story, go to the IAEA page or see the analysis by Ars.

I believe the cat was out of the bag a month ago when ArsTechnics was reporting on HBGary?

Meh, I'm still unconvinced that the "extremely sophisticated attack"

That used to be a good assumption to make until the steps required to manufacture the stuxnet worm were revealed.

The penetrator likely has eyes on a very specific secondary target, and grabbing this information was a preliminary step.. Imagine the resources that could have been applied. I'm betting physical access was required at RSA.

Seth

I wasn't aware of this trend. Let me clarify my position. Macs are over priced. From an economic stand point I have no idea why anyone would purchase one.

From a fashion stand point I totally understand why they sell. No comment there and as with anything based purely on taste you can't judge what someone does or doesn't like.

"This iOS bug will be fixed" Apple disagrees with you.

"Apple is aware of the issues, which are currently filed as bugs. But according to Matt Asay, who is vice president of business development for mobile Web framework maker Strobe, Apple supposedly has no plans to fix them. Instead, they are marked "not to be fixed by exec order," suggesting that a higher up at Apple is preventing engineers from fixing the problems."
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2011/03/confirmed-some-web-apps-not-seeing-ios-43-javascript-speedup.ars
http://twitter.com/#!/mjasay/status/47786214966837248

Apple is no longer a computer company. They're a media company. They're more similar to the music industry/Hollywood/mainstream news/movie studio than they are to a software or hardware company. Apple came up with a new way to sell old stuff. Like any media company they strive for lock in and closed formats/distribution channels to protect revenue streams. Why can't you put music on an ipod without their shopping program?

This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. They're using a 300 year old business model.

Let's recall this is the company in the 80s which provided vital parts of the DOS "OS" under undocumented function calls, leaving competitors with crippled options (technical or business wise): http://www.htl-steyr.ac.at/~morg/pcinfo/hardware/interrupts/inte8980.htm . I was reverse engineering much code at those times, only to find out that Microsoft was using the undocumented calls, games were using them, any virus around was using them, ONLY competitors were left in cold! It is also the same company which cripples content, on recipient basis: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/95555 . It is also the same company which does not honor even its own standards, with an incredible impact on consumers (and crippling their freedom): http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/04/iso-ooxml-convener-microsofts-format-heading-for-failure.ars & http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Open_XML -> Compatibility_between_versions . If you don't get this, check well the attachments in your mailbox. Is tampering with government and standards bodies "ethical" "business" "attitude"? I think Ethisphere Institute has no place near any ethical list.

And its illegal to use OTA for public display of sporting events. I realize sports aren't big to slashdot users, but if you've ever watched any major sporting event like a NFL or MLB game, or a big race ... the first thing you hear and see is a 'no rebroadcasting without permission'.

No, it's not. First, showing it isn't rebroadcasting.

Second, the ban on public display is only for screen sizes of 55" and greater. Don't you remember the fuss about churches being told that 55" screens were too big for watching the superbowl ?

Places are prohibited from charging admission to watch the Super Bowl, and the law prevents them from showing the game on a TV bigger than 55 inches.

That rule has been done away with now b/c of all the flack they got from coming down on church parties. It's been legal for the past 2-3 years.

[citation needed]

After all, I was kind enough to provide links in my original comment, and I'd love to learn that I'm wrong, and that someone actually did something middling reasonable :-)

Citation given: although a clarification that the rule waiver is for churches as referenced in your link. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/01/will-your-big-screen-super-bowl-party-violate-copyright-law.ars http://www.copyrightsolver.com/dn2/pt/blog/default.aspx?id=27&t=Churches-Can-Now-Legally-Host-Super-Bowl

Already happened in some locales: Telco wouldn't install fiber network, sued to prevent city from doing so (Another Article: we sue because we care)

It seems that Monticello's FTTH initiative must have succeeded, as they now provide fiber to the home, and with fairly reasonable residential pricing, such as 30/30 Mbps for about $50/month.

Already happened in some locales: Telco wouldn't install fiber network, sued to prevent city from doing so (Another Article: we sue because we care)

It seems that Monticello's FTTH initiative must have succeeded, as they now provide fiber to the home, and with fairly reasonable residential pricing, such as 30/30 Mbps for about $50/month.

Do you even think before you post, or is it all just knee-jerk reaction for you?

Nothing particular came to mind. As you mentioned a minute later:

At least in America, there are no real monopolies to broadband, and this guy proves it. All you naysayers who complain about Comcast or other ISPs need to STFU and GTFO.

You shouldn't brazenly accuse others of something you're obviously prone to.

I'd love to know myself, as it has occurred at least twice. See here and here.

I'd love to know myself, as it has occurred at least twice. See here and here.

Already happened in some locales:
Telco wouldn't install fiber network, sued to prevent city from doing so (Another Article: we sue because we care)

Louisiana Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Fiber-to-the-Home Plan

Already happened in some locales:
Telco wouldn't install fiber network, sued to prevent city from doing so (Another Article: we sue because we care)

Louisiana Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Fiber-to-the-Home Plan

A custom HOSTS file.

"Now if there was just a decent ad blocker available, rather than the TPL's that only block 3rd party scripts and images." - by GrBear (63712) on Tuesday March 15, @09:48AM (#35490740)

See above... & it's ESPECIALLY NICE when you combine it with IE9's "tracking protection" lists (TPLs - because they "blockout" the small frame ads sit in that IE "oddly" still leaves when using HOSTS files, whereas other webbrowsers do NOT have that "issue").

Together, in combination, TPL's + IE's "restricted zones" & popup blocking work GREAT together for added "layered security" and yes, added speed online too.

APK

P.S.=> Some notes on HOSTS files that you may or may not be aware of that lend themselves to YOUR ADVANTAGE online:

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) Bad news: ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD t

A custom HOSTS file.

"Now if there was just a decent ad blocker available, rather than the TPL's that only block 3rd party scripts and images." - by GrBear (63712) on Tuesday March 15, @09:48AM (#35490740)

See above... & it's ESPECIALLY NICE when you combine it with IE9's "tracking protection" lists (TPLs - because they "blockout" the small frame ads sit in that IE "oddly" still leaves when using HOSTS files, whereas other webbrowsers do NOT have that "issue").

Together, in combination, TPL's + IE's "restricted zones" & popup blocking work GREAT together for added "layered security" and yes, added speed online too.

APK

P.S.=> Some notes on HOSTS files that you may or may not be aware of that lend themselves to YOUR ADVANTAGE online:

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) Bad news: ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD t

Unity is not, primarily, a tablet environment, it's designed to work with very different hardware -- medium to (multiple) extremely large displays

It was originally designed for netbooks.

Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth unveiled a new lightweight user interface shell called Unity. The new shell is designed to use screen space more efficiently and consume fewer system resources than a conventional desktop environment. It will be a key component of the Ubuntu Netbook Edition and a new instant-on computing platform called Ubuntu Light.

In other words, it's designed for a dying market - netbooks, squeezed out on both sides by tablets and cheap laptops.

And there's no reason why the current tablet environments can't use a mouse and keyboard, same as the current desktop environments can use a touchscreen.

...is linking to an article that fails to mention how McCarthy has made made over $90,000 in ad revenue from his website.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/03/illegal-tv-streamers-heres-how-the-feds-will-hunt-you-down.ars

His website was dedicated solely for the purpose of copyright infringement

Why is copyright infringement an issue of homeland security? It is a federal law, it has to be assigned to someone, and The United States district courts has exclusive subject-matter jurisdiction over copyright cases. IMO, you should learn about copyright law and history - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_copyright_law

From Ars Technica's discussion on the subject from last year it looks like Apple is actually considering open source in its license. The GPL is a special case, and IMO the solution should be similar to YouTube and copyrighted videos. That is, there should be a channel for the FSF or others to complain about GPL apps and for Apple to remove them as a result.

That's a good analogy. There's more about it in this ArsTechnica article: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/11/fda-sidesteps-safety-concerns-over-tsa-body-scanners.ars

I've been reading about this on the Bioware forums, and another bombshell hit me: apparently SecuROM has been put on DA2, even though it was declared to be free of it by EA.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2011/03/dragon-age-ii-features-hated-securom-despite-previous-ea-claims.ars

Personally, I'd say I'm boycotting EA over this, but really I'm merely continuing to boycott them over how I was punished by them in multiple ways for daring to buy the first Dragon Age, and this.

First off thank you for intelligent dialogue with factual responses! This is a pleasant debate.

As far as the broad public, that is Mac users. They liked it.

No they didn't. Early versions of OS X were shunned due its atrocious performance and (to many) inferior - albeit pretty - UI. Heck, Apple themselves didn't even use OS X as the default option on their systems until the beginning of 2002, and the first version of OS X that wasn't borderline-unusably slow was 10.2 (it was still slow, but at least not frustrating to use).

I was using Windows2000, Linux and OS 10.1 regularly. I certainly did not find OS 10.1 unusably slow or even problematic. It might have been on bad hardware, I was using a dual core 500mhz G4 system which was better than average (though not by a ton). I multitasked heavily, several large apps cutting and pasting between them. You can read John Siracusa's review of 10.0. He finds the performance, relative to OS 9 a mixed bag. http://arstechnica.com/reviews/01q2/macos-x-final/macos-x-5.html. Which is pretty shocking considering we were talking a brand new OS and he was running apps in classic, being compared to a highly optimized mature OS. As an aside in reading his 10.1 review, the upgrade was free from 10.0 to 10.1 if you went to a retailer to get a CD. I will say though that looking at the reviews most people were not excited about 10.0.

Yes but in reality I'm a pretty good case study. I ended up buying 10.2 and 10.6.

Most Mac users I know have bought every OS X upgrade since release (even the ones that stuck with MacOS 9 until ca. 2002). Snow Leopard has been the only one they've hesistated with (though nearly all eventually cracked).

You may have misunderstood. The context here was that most get the OS with new systems. So the only ones I had to buy were 10.2 and 10.6. I've bought a bunch of computers in the last 15 years.

This was not helped by Apple's (typical) bad attitude to legacy support, with older versions of OS X quickly being completely deprecated and unsupported, not to mention incapable of running newer versions of apps and games.

I actually like the everybody has to upgrade. Legacy support is a PIA in the Windows world. But I will agree Apple does make it hard to stay on old versions. But... for example I use 10.4 on a secondary laptop quite comfortably.

10.0 or 10.1 - $129
10.2 - $129
10.3 - $129
10.4 - $129
10.5 - $129

OK gotcha. Now reality (my example):

10.0 free
10.1 $10 for media
10.2 ~ $100 I think
10.3 included / free (new machine)
10.4 included / free (wife's machine got free upgrade) otherwise would have had to pay
10. 5 included free (got a new machine)
10.6 ~$25 but I could have gotten it for free if I had known my daughter was going to want a mac
10.7 I will probably get a new machine again.

b) I had the equivalent of power shell with OS shells, and frankly better. With Applescript I had application level easy scripting.

Applescript is indeed nice, though I would argue that few use it.

I agree that most don't use it. But for example, my non programmer wife used it. She wrote her own semi custom extension creating foot pedal support for quicktime (which isn't standard). She used it to create a Safari / Excel app tying an internet grading system into her spreadsheets. That's two apps by someone who doesn't know what a for loop is. She's done a bunch of minor stuff.

Take a look at Machints you'll see a bunch of Applescript references. Also in things like MacRuby you'll see its application layer controls are basically a wrapper around Applescript interfaces.

Well if it isn't little poor wittle Petey, aka the HOPES guy, aka the legend in his own mind. Did you program the space shuttle in your badly written Delphi as well? Hell you make VB coders look like kernel developers Petey, that is why everyone made fun of your "apps" on Ars. Any apps in the app store? Oh thats right Apple takes fart apps but not "batshit crazy" apps, sorry Petey.

And I guess you're afraid to touch any of my comments that are attached to current stories huh? Must make you awful sad at how many laughed their asses off at your little HOPES rants last time, but that's what you get when you tie your crazy to a tech older than an 8-track and just about as useful. You really should talk to Twitter, he does it SOOOO much better than you do, pretty sad to be third rate even as a troll.

The simple fact is this: no matter how many times Petey says "1+1 = 3" the math simply proves you wrong and THAT is why all you can do is throw insults. You have 190,000 to 340,000 infected websites at this very moment and that list will change by the thousands per minute as sites are cleaned, new sites are infected, new vulnerabilities found, etc. Now for his HOPES file to actually be a REAL protection and not just a woobie? It will have to dynamically scale and keep up with that ever changing list of infections. Now even if he had twenty fingers and subscribed to every security list on the planet his HOPES file will ALWAYS BE OUT OF DATE and behind the curve. Always.

So please, keep posting APK, I do so enjoy pointing out the total uber fail of your magical woobie so. I also personally consider it a public service to point people to solutions that actually work instead of relying on magical woobies and anecdotes. And of course bitch slapping your around is also quite fun!

I for one am fine with that. To me the bigger question is: can Linux systems cater to the average end-user who has no intention of ever understanding how the system works, without losing everything I love about Linux? You just can't do that without dumbing-down the system. Not "dumbing-down" like smart people vs. stupid people, but "dumbing-down" like technically inclined versus not technically inclined.

You're right, no one could ever be successful in selling a Unix certified operating system to the non technically inclined.......

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2007/08/mac-os-x-leopard-receives-unix-03-certification.ars

Safari 5.04 is still vulnerable to the same attack.

Apple released Safari 5.0.4 a day ahead of the competition, patching some 60 security holes in the browser. However, this year the rules have been altered: the configuration was frozen a week ago, hence the competition being run against Safari 5.0.3. Under the new rules, pwning (and hence owning) only needs to succeed on the frozen version. However, to receive prize money (in addition to the hardware), the flaw must also exist in the newest release.

In VUPEN's case, the team will be winning both the hardware and the money. In spite of Apple's last-minute patch, their attack still works.

"Ever since I've installed a host file (http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm) to redirect advertisers to my loopback, I haven't had any malware, spyware, or adware issues. I first started using the host file 5 years ago." - by TestedDoughnut (1324447) on Monday December 13, @12:18AM (#34532122)

FROM http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1907528&cid=34532122

Now?

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD that does nothing but cache IPAddress-to-domainname/hostname resolutions via NSLOOKUP, PINGS, &/or WHOIS though, regularly, so you have the correct IP & it's current)).

6.) HOSTS files protect you vs. DNS-poisoning &/or the Kaminsky flaw in DNS servers, and allow you to get to sites reliably vs. things like the Chinese are doing to DNS ->

"Ever since I've installed a host file (http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm) to redirect advertisers to my loopback, I haven't had any malware, spyware, or adware issues. I first started using the host file 5 years ago." - by TestedDoughnut (1324447) on Monday December 13, @12:18AM (#34532122)

FROM http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1907528&cid=34532122

Now?

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD that does nothing but cache IPAddress-to-domainname/hostname resolutions via NSLOOKUP, PINGS, &/or WHOIS though, regularly, so you have the correct IP & it's current)).

6.) HOSTS files protect you vs. DNS-poisoning &/or the Kaminsky flaw in DNS servers, and allow you to get to sites reliably vs. things like the Chinese are doing to DNS ->

"Adblock has worked for at least the past 3 betas, and that's the one I care about." - by Skarecrow77 (1714214) on Thursday March 10, @08:53AM (#35442076)

Then, you're using an INFERIOR solution (at least by itself)... how so? Ok, take a read (it's long yes, but, with GOOD reason(s)):

"Ever since I've installed a host file (http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm) to redirect advertisers to my loopback, I haven't had any malware, spyware, or adware issues. I first started using the host file 5 years ago." - by TestedDoughnut (1324447) on Monday December 13, @12:18AM (#34532122)

FROM http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1907528&cid=34532122

Now?

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD that does nothing but cache IPAddre

"Adblock has worked for at least the past 3 betas, and that's the one I care about." - by Skarecrow77 (1714214) on Thursday March 10, @08:53AM (#35442076)

Then, you're using an INFERIOR solution (at least by itself)... how so? Ok, take a read (it's long yes, but, with GOOD reason(s)):

"Ever since I've installed a host file (http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm) to redirect advertisers to my loopback, I haven't had any malware, spyware, or adware issues. I first started using the host file 5 years ago." - by TestedDoughnut (1324447) on Monday December 13, @12:18AM (#34532122)

FROM http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1907528&cid=34532122

Now?

20++ ADVANTAGES OF HOSTS FILES OVER DNS SERVERS &/or ADBLOCK ALONE for added layered security:

1.) HOSTS files are useable for all these purposes because they are present on all Operating Systems that have a BSD based IP stack (even ANDROID) and do adblocking for ANY webbrowser, email program, etc. (any webbound program).

2.) ADBLOCK CAN BE DETECTED FOR: See here on that note -> http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

HOSTS files are NOT BLOCKABLE by websites, as was tried on users by ARSTECHNICA (and it worked, proving HOSTS files are a better solution for this because they cannot be blocked & detected for, in that manner), to that websites' users' dismay:

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT FROM ARSTECHNICA THEMSELVES:

----

An experiment gone wrong - By Ken Fisher | Last updated March 6, 2010 11:11 AM

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/03/why-ad-blocking-is-devastating-to-the-sites-you-love.ars

"Starting late Friday afternoon we conducted a 12 hour experiment to see if it would be possible to simply make content disappear for visitors who were using a very popular ad blocking tool. Technologically, it was a success in that it worked. Ad blockers, and only ad blockers, couldn't see our content."

and

"Our experiment is over, and we're glad we did it because it led to us learning that we needed to communicate our point of view every once in a while. Sure, some people told us we deserved to die in a fire. But that's the Internet!"

Thus, as you can see? Well - THAT all "went over like a lead balloon" with their users in other words, because Arstechnica was forced to change it back to the old way where ADBLOCK still could work to do its job (REDDIT however, has not, for example). However/Again - this is proof that HOSTS files can still do the job, blocking potentially malscripted ads (or ads in general because they slow you down) vs. adblockers like ADBLOCK!

----

3.) Adblock doesn't protect email programs external to FF, Hosts files do. THIS IS GOOD VS. SPAM MAIL or MAILS THAT BEAR MALICIOUS SCRIPT, or, THAT POINT TO MALICIOUS SCRIPT VIA URLS etc.

4.) Adblock won't get you to your favorite sites if a DNS server goes down or is DNS-poisoned, hosts will (this leads to points 4-7 next below).

5.) Adblock doesn't allow you to hardcode in your favorite websites into it so you don't make DNS server calls and so you can avoid tracking by DNS request logs, hosts do (DNS servers are also being abused by the Chinese lately and by the Kaminsky flaw -> http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/082908-kaminsky-flaw-prompts-dns-server.html for years now). Hosts protect against those problems via hardcodes of your fav sites (you should verify against the TLD that does nothing but cache IPAddre

The organizers said that the software configuration was frozen a week ago. Nobody was allowed to do last-minute updates (like it was last year)

This is my reply

Chrome got to use the built in auto mechanism just before the contest started (source 1, source 2, source 3) which is probably why the contestant registered to try to beat Chrome did choose not to try.

Granted, there was a spelling mistake, it should have said "built in auto update mechanism" but why mod me down?

Chrome got to use the built in auto mechanism just before the contest started (source 1, source 2, source 3) which is probably why the contestant registered to try to beat Chrome did choose not to try.

Next to fall was 32-bit Internet Explorer 8 on 64-bit Windows 7 Service Pack 1, beaten by security researcher Stephen Fewer of Harmony Security. Just as with Safari, the first contestant to attack the browser was successful in exploiting it, and just as with Safari, this was demonstrated by running Windows' calculator program and writing a file to the hard disk. Fewer says that the successful exploit required use of three separate vulnerabilities: two to achieve successful code execution within the browser, and then a third to escape Internet Explorer's Protected Mode sandbox.

So it appears you may be the one whose smugness is unwarranted. :D

Sadly it's Slashdot summary have a tendency to be sensationalist, misleading and sometimes even wrong. For comparison, consider Ars Technica's headline: "pwn2own day one: Safari, IE8 fall, Chrome unchallenged" — it's neutral and contains more information.

Well that headline is misleading at best I'd say. I suggest reading pwn2own day one: Safari, IE8 fall, Chrome unchallenged in which it states that both Safari and IE fell at the first attempt, clearly it was a matter of nothing more than the ordering. Apologies for disturbing all the anti-apple ranting but both systems are weak. Please feel free to resume posting uninformed comments now.

There is something strange about how this is worded, as the first hacker - taking down Safari/MacOS - won 15k$. It sounds really strange if that price was decided just by the ordering of attempts.