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"We don't condone the practice of Google bombing, or any other action that seeks to affect the integrity of our search results, but we're also reluctant to alter our results by hand in order to prevent such items from showing up. Pranks like this may be distracting to some, but they don't affect the overall quality of our search service, whose objectivity, as always, remains the core of our mission." -- Marissa Mayer, Director of Consumer Web Products for Google, Sept 2005.

It wasn't till January of this year that they started taking steps to fix it, 8 years after the problem started. http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/01/quick-word-about-googlebombs.html Yet as we saw this week, people are still getting hit with malware sites.

302 Jacking was another problem that Google was warned of for around 2 years, and it wasn't fixed (well sort of fixed, still somewhat exists) till Google themselves got hit: http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/050526-084634

Now we have Google Proxy Hacking. They were warned of this in June 2006, still hasn't been fixed, and they have made no indications of doing so. http://www.seofaststart.com/blog/google-proxy-hacking

So yes, let's just sit back and trust that they are putting some of their vast resources into fixing a problem, but exactly what have they done to earn this sort of good faith?

discussion of the evolution of corn.

odd corruption.

Comcast sells the Internet, not some Internet like service. Their willful failure to deliver reliably might not sit well with local regulators either. At minimum, they should be forced to be honest and up front about their tampering with P2P applications before you purchase their service. and where there are no other options because of Comcasts government granted monopoly, there should be a way around it.

Try telling that to Comcast. They "claimed" we were using the Internet too much but refused to reveal what their bandwidth consumption limits were. Only that we had to "drastically" reduce our usage. They quoted two different numbers of what our usage had been for the month of December 2006. So which is it?

I think they are just making crap up on the spot. That our usage with P2P and other protocols was far less than they were willing to admit. Hell, I even asked how I could validate their numbers. You can't of course. Just... trust us yeah that's it. We couldn't do anything bad to you right :D

The company is soo used to lying it's second nature. At least that's my experience with them thus far. So now I'm blogging about it to get the word out. What's funny is Comcast is making my job soo easy and even providing fuel for the fire. I've been pushing for Network Neutrality and a fiber Infrastructure since then (going back to February 2006). It would allow a free market to dictate who's business succeeds and who's dies. The only way they are doing so well is their Government granted monopoly. If it wasn't for that, Concast would have serious issues when it came to their stockholders :-)

Must be what they mean by "It's Comcastic!!"

First there ARE laws that make what the employees did illegal and Best Buy liable. It varies from state to state, but Washington, DC has both Consumer protection legislation that requires Best Buy to adopt reasonable safeguards against the theft of personal information and a privacy breach notification law that requires Best Buy to notify customers of potential security breach as soon as they become aware of one. 39 states have similar legislation, including Minnesota, where Best Buy is headquartered. Best Buy itself claims to adhere to these in its privacy policy. That said, I unfortunately have learned the hard way that policies and laws do no good not enforced, and believe that Best Buy has not done enough to clean up its act. The short story is that a laptop that I entrusted with Best Buy DC store for repair was stolen from the store (I believe by an employee). I endured 3 months of lies about its repair status before one employee finally saw fit to fess up and tell me that there was no record it had ever shipped from the store. Not only did Best Buy fail to protect my property, but they failed to disclose that the computer was missing and that I was risk of identity theft the entire time. Now I'm stuck paying for identity theft protection and credit monitoring for years ahead. Despite Consumerist's efforts, Best Buy's privacy protection system is broken across the board. I filed a lawsuit and have launched a blog detailing the background and motivation for the lawsuit, if anyone is interested. http://bestbuybadbuyboycott.blogspot.com/ RC

I'm a fan of YouTube (who isn't), but hadn't logged into my account for awhile and forgot the password when I tried commenting on a video. I had a reminder sent to my comcast e-mail account a day or two ago -- and it's been about 36 hours, and it never arrived! Assuming something was hosed with my YouTube account, I decided to create a new account, still no activation e-mail sent.

I then changed my YouTube preferences to my GMail account, and the confirmation e-mail arrived within like 2 minutes. No surprise, since Google owns both GMail and YouTube. But my curiosity was now aroused, so I changed the e-mail preferences on YouTube to my work account (I'm an open source programmer at a Big-10 university). Again, the YouTube confirmation came within like 2 minutes or so.

I logged into comcast.net under my main subscriber e-mail account today -- and deactivated ALL spam/filtering on that account. I then went back to YouTube and switched preferences back to my comcast account. It's been about 4 hours and, of course, there's been no e-mail from YouTube.

Anyone else notice this oddness between YouTube / Comcast? It irked me enough to create a little web site of it this afternoon, and post it on my blog as well (http://paulbramscher.blogspot.com/).

> Oregon a redstate? Not a chance. A bunch of granola eating, tree hugging, hairy legged druids.
> Well, not literally, but the spirit is definitely there

          In most of the world that would be considered red. It is only here in the US, and even there only recently, that the colour red has come to be associated with conservatism. 'Tis a wierd country that I live in.

http://mrsquid.blogspot.com/

Free the Art
Copyright drew Roberts, 2007
Creative Commons BY-SA 3.0 US

Free the Art and
Free the Artists
Let's break loose and
Let's get started

Change the world and
Make it better
There may be crying but
We'll cry together

Tired of waiting on
Promised changes
Come together and
Let's rearrange it

drew
http://dangernovel.blogspot.com/
Danger - A Safe Bahamian Novel

I exchanged email with Hyperion Power Generation (the maker of the new power generator). They indicate that the Sante Fe reporter made a mistake. The output is about 25-17 MW ELECTRIC [This statement was also consistent with the patent which talked about tens of MW in electricity.] They also said that the containment vessel will be dense enough that no radiation will escape even if it is not buried in the ground. So in addition to the regular electric generation there would be probably double that amount of thermal power. Which could be partially converted to electricity using thermoelectronics. 30-66% with better technology like powerchips. This is not radioisotope thermal generation. I have looked at the patent and it is a simplified variant of solid core nuclear reactors. Up to 50% of the fuel would be burned. It would provide for 20-50 times more efficient use of Uranium and allow for the use of Thorium. This technology make it three times cheaper and faster (less infrastructure and piping) to tap 1.1 trillion barrels of oil that is in the form of oil shale in the USA. Increasing US oil reserves by 30-40 times and perhaps eliminating the need for oil imports in 10-15 years. Helping to more economically unlock global oilsands and oil shale. Plus it would at the same time allow up a 100 year transition to a lot more nuclear power and renewables. It would be possible for a shorter transition with less air pollution and fossil fuel use as well by eliminating coal. Edward Teller tried to make Uranium hydride bombs but was only able to get the equal of 200 tons of TNT to explode. A nuclear power generation system would not have the bomb optimizations that Teller had so the reactors would be far safer. I have also examined using this reactor to power Vasimr plasma rocket engines to send rockets to Mars in 39 days.

I exchanged email with Hyperion Power Generation (the maker of the new power generator). They indicate that the Sante Fe reporter made a mistake. The output is about 25-17 MW ELECTRIC [This statement was also consistent with the patent which talked about tens of MW in electricity.] They also said that the containment vessel will be dense enough that no radiation will escape even if it is not buried in the ground. So in addition to the regular electric generation there would be probably double that amount of thermal power. Which could be partially converted to electricity using thermoelectronics. 30-66% with better technology like powerchips. This is not radioisotope thermal generation. I have looked at the patent and it is a simplified variant of solid core nuclear reactors. Up to 50% of the fuel would be burned. It would provide for 20-50 times more efficient use of Uranium and allow for the use of Thorium. This technology make it three times cheaper and faster (less infrastructure and piping) to tap 1.1 trillion barrels of oil that is in the form of oil shale in the USA. Increasing US oil reserves by 30-40 times and perhaps eliminating the need for oil imports in 10-15 years. Helping to more economically unlock global oilsands and oil shale. Plus it would at the same time allow up a 100 year transition to a lot more nuclear power and renewables. It would be possible for a shorter transition with less air pollution and fossil fuel use as well by eliminating coal. Edward Teller tried to make Uranium hydride bombs but was only able to get the equal of 200 tons of TNT to explode. A nuclear power generation system would not have the bomb optimizations that Teller had so the reactors would be far safer. I have also examined using this reactor to power Vasimr plasma rocket engines to send rockets to Mars in 39 days.

Censorship is everywhere. Governments usually decide what is ok and what is not and media usually tries to stay within legal confines. Yahoo can take down any video they want. Injustices can be pointed out by media as long as they are within the confines of what the government/big business dictates. Let's also keep in mind that morality is very subjective. In Sudan a british teacher who allowed a student to name her doll Mohammed is being jailed for 15 days while Sudanese Islamists ask for her death. A french singer who murdered his girlfriend has recently been released from prison after just 3 years because "the people" felt he'd done his time and wanted him back in the music scene. Yes both of these cases are extreme but it's an example of how relative morals can be. My Blog

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sp1-performance-dud.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/windows-xp-sp3-yields-performance-gains.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/update-re-testing-vista-w2gb-ram-office.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/how-to-make-vista-run-like-xp-sort-of.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sp1-performance-dud.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/windows-xp-sp3-yields-performance-gains.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/update-re-testing-vista-w2gb-ram-office.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/how-to-make-vista-run-like-xp-sort-of.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sp1-performance-dud.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/windows-xp-sp3-yields-performance-gains.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/update-re-testing-vista-w2gb-ram-office.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/how-to-make-vista-run-like-xp-sort-of.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sp1-performance-dud.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/windows-xp-sp3-yields-performance-gains.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/update-re-testing-vista-w2gb-ram-office.html

http://exo-blog.blogspot.com/2007/11/how-to-make-vista-run-like-xp-sort-of.html

> NASA doesn't have a choice. HSPD12 (which is causing this) is a Presidential Directive (hence the
> "PD" in HSPD12). All Executive Branch agencies are required to comply.

          Actually, what NASA is doing goes far beyond what is mandated by HSPD-12.

http://mrsquid.blogspot.com/

Other NASA centers are being forced to do this as well, and the employees are getting pissed off. See this blog for JSC employees that are fuming: http://hspd12jsc.blogspot.com

According to the Official Google Blog, there has been little decrease in spam, except for the amount in users' inboxes.

Perspective 101 for Defeatists.

Better get that white flag up fast before the US wins.

It's much worse than an over-reliance or mis-application of technology, or having the means justify the end, it's mistaking a means for an end.

Jeff Huber just put up an excellent essay on this which can be summed up by the two quotes by Clausewitz:
"Policy is the guiding intelligence and war only the instrument, not vice versa."
and
"If we do not learn to regard a war, and the separate campaigns of which it is composed, as a chain of linked engagements each leading to the next, but instead succumb to the idea that the capture of certain geographical points or the seizure of undefended provinces are of value in themselves, we are liable to regard them as windfall profits."

The most efficient "kill-chain" won't do squat unless there is a clear and achievable objective. The other problem is that the "kill-chain" that is being used is purpose built for set piece battles between great powers basically 2nd generation warfare (web 1.0) versus 4th generation asymmetric warfare.

You don't even need Clausewitz, Powell will suffice. To use a shortened version of the Powell doctrine:
- Do we have a clear attainable objective?
- Have the risks and costs been fully and frankly analyzed?
- Have all other non-violent policy means been fully exhausted?
- Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement?
- Have the consequences of our action been fully considered?

A few other very interesting features were released this week for Google Maps... and I'm sorry that this story is all we got on /. so far. Here's a copy from the site in my sig.

Google Maps Adds Terrain
Google Lat Lon Blog announces the addition of terrain to their free Google Maps site. In addition to adding the Terrain button, they've removed the Hybrid button. They explain, "You may notice in this screenshot that the handy "Hybrid" button, which shows satellite images overlaid with labels and roads, seems to have gone missing. Don't worry -- this view can now be accessed by clicking the "Satellite" button and checking the "Show labels" check box that will appear under the "Satellite" button."

New Google Maps Features Launched Including Collaborative Mapping
In addition to the important new terrain layer announced yesterday, Google Maps received a few significant updates, first, Google Maps searches are now providing a thumbnail of the related street view photo, second, the My Maps feature somehow becomes Our Maps, allowing to collaborate directly on someone else's My Maps, this has a lot of potential of getting big, and last, you can more easily share KML and KMZ files and GeoRSS feeds through My Maps. From the Our Maps announcement: "Just click the "Collaborate" link and enter the email addresses of the people you want to invite. They'll receive an email invitation with a link to the map. Once they open the map, they should be able to edit it, as long as they are signed into a Google Account that's associated with that email address. You can also open your map to the world so anyone can edit it by selecting the "Allow anyone to edit this map" checkbox."

A few other very interesting features were released this week for Google Maps... and I'm sorry that this story is all we got on /. so far. Here's a copy from the site in my sig.

Google Maps Adds Terrain
Google Lat Lon Blog announces the addition of terrain to their free Google Maps site. In addition to adding the Terrain button, they've removed the Hybrid button. They explain, "You may notice in this screenshot that the handy "Hybrid" button, which shows satellite images overlaid with labels and roads, seems to have gone missing. Don't worry -- this view can now be accessed by clicking the "Satellite" button and checking the "Show labels" check box that will appear under the "Satellite" button."

New Google Maps Features Launched Including Collaborative Mapping
In addition to the important new terrain layer announced yesterday, Google Maps received a few significant updates, first, Google Maps searches are now providing a thumbnail of the related street view photo, second, the My Maps feature somehow becomes Our Maps, allowing to collaborate directly on someone else's My Maps, this has a lot of potential of getting big, and last, you can more easily share KML and KMZ files and GeoRSS feeds through My Maps. From the Our Maps announcement: "Just click the "Collaborate" link and enter the email addresses of the people you want to invite. They'll receive an email invitation with a link to the map. Once they open the map, they should be able to edit it, as long as they are signed into a Google Account that's associated with that email address. You can also open your map to the world so anyone can edit it by selecting the "Allow anyone to edit this map" checkbox."

A few other very interesting features were released this week for Google Maps... and I'm sorry that this story is all we got on /. so far. Here's a copy from the site in my sig.

Google Maps Adds Terrain
Google Lat Lon Blog announces the addition of terrain to their free Google Maps site. In addition to adding the Terrain button, they've removed the Hybrid button. They explain, "You may notice in this screenshot that the handy "Hybrid" button, which shows satellite images overlaid with labels and roads, seems to have gone missing. Don't worry -- this view can now be accessed by clicking the "Satellite" button and checking the "Show labels" check box that will appear under the "Satellite" button."

New Google Maps Features Launched Including Collaborative Mapping
In addition to the important new terrain layer announced yesterday, Google Maps received a few significant updates, first, Google Maps searches are now providing a thumbnail of the related street view photo, second, the My Maps feature somehow becomes Our Maps, allowing to collaborate directly on someone else's My Maps, this has a lot of potential of getting big, and last, you can more easily share KML and KMZ files and GeoRSS feeds through My Maps. From the Our Maps announcement: "Just click the "Collaborate" link and enter the email addresses of the people you want to invite. They'll receive an email invitation with a link to the map. Once they open the map, they should be able to edit it, as long as they are signed into a Google Account that's associated with that email address. You can also open your map to the world so anyone can edit it by selecting the "Allow anyone to edit this map" checkbox."

A few other very interesting features were released this week for Google Maps... and I'm sorry that this story is all we got on /. so far. Here's a copy from the site in my sig.

Google Maps Adds Terrain
Google Lat Lon Blog announces the addition of terrain to their free Google Maps site. In addition to adding the Terrain button, they've removed the Hybrid button. They explain, "You may notice in this screenshot that the handy "Hybrid" button, which shows satellite images overlaid with labels and roads, seems to have gone missing. Don't worry -- this view can now be accessed by clicking the "Satellite" button and checking the "Show labels" check box that will appear under the "Satellite" button."

New Google Maps Features Launched Including Collaborative Mapping
In addition to the important new terrain layer announced yesterday, Google Maps received a few significant updates, first, Google Maps searches are now providing a thumbnail of the related street view photo, second, the My Maps feature somehow becomes Our Maps, allowing to collaborate directly on someone else's My Maps, this has a lot of potential of getting big, and last, you can more easily share KML and KMZ files and GeoRSS feeds through My Maps. From the Our Maps announcement: "Just click the "Collaborate" link and enter the email addresses of the people you want to invite. They'll receive an email invitation with a link to the map. Once they open the map, they should be able to edit it, as long as they are signed into a Google Account that's associated with that email address. You can also open your map to the world so anyone can edit it by selecting the "Allow anyone to edit this map" checkbox."

Actually, Ron Paul has sponsored several laws and Constitutional amendments to ban abortion. On the federal level. He might claim to be for states rights, but try looking up some of the laws he has sponsored. Seriously. Just because a candidate knows how to talk to you doesn't mean you should ignore his actual record. Ron Paul is all for legislating his personal morality, and his record shows it.

...He's against network neutrality, he's tried to repeal federal health and worker safety laws twice, he's tried to repeal the minimum wage, he's tried to weaken unions, he's tried to get rid of anti-trust law, to permit federal kickbacks, and much, much more. I haven't been able to find anything about his stance on privacy, but given his record I'm fairly sure he's entirely opposed to federal privacy laws.

Please -- look up Ron Paul's record before you talk about what a great guy he is.

I'm glad again that Riverbend is out of Iraq now after anonymously using Blogger for four years. Considering the danger that revealing her IP would have entailed is pretty frightening.

This also means that, evil or not, we should rely on Google at most for easy access to information, not for our privacy. Bloggers in countries with dangerous censorship laws rather need to be informed about and able to access anonymizing services like Tor.

You do know that we got our idea of a Republic from the Iriquois Confederacy, right? Obviously, you didn't get very accurate or in depth "native American heritage".

I haven't ever heard that, but admittedly I don't know a whole lot about Native American heritage. I assumed that our idea of a Republic came from Greek, Roman, and European sources. What evidence is there that it stemmed directly from the Iroquois?

• "In 1727 political theorist and scholar Cadwallader Colden wrote of the Iroquois Confederacy: "The Five Nations have such absolute Notions of Liberty that they allow no Kind of Superiority of one over another, and banish all Servitude from their Territories."[3] The five nations of what is today the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York--the Onondagas, the Senecas, the Mohawks, the Cayugas, and the Oneidas--had ended their intertribal warfare and formed a federal union in approximately 1200. The constitution uniting the nations was called Kaianrekowa, the Great Law of Peace. Recorded and preserved in wampum, this document codified laws for each nation, rules for the confederacy, and consistent rights protection for all citizens. National membership remained open, and other peoples joined the confederacy. The northeastern body eventually became known as the Six Nations after the formal addition of the Tuscaroras around 1714."
• "Book Review: Great Law v. Handsome Lake Code"
• Mohawk Nation News: Great Law and the Handsome Lake Code

The idea of the form of government came from the Iroquois Confederacy however while the Iroquois also had liberty the liberty envisioned by the USA's Founding Fathers especially with Thomas Jefferson was grounded in the Age of Enlightenment in Europe.

No. NX by itself cannot defend against an attack. If you mark some memory non-executable, an attacker can just do a return-to-libc attack and evade the protection. NX is one layer of security that needs to be used in conjunction with other layers like ASLR. Apple products do not take advantage of the aslr support on Vista so these attacks are still possible.

These links were posted earlier and do a good job of explainig it.
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-rtsp-quicktime-flaw-affects-both.html
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/apple-quicktime-rtsp-update.html

No. NX by itself cannot defend against an attack. If you mark some memory non-executable, an attacker can just do a return-to-libc attack and evade the protection. NX is one layer of security that needs to be used in conjunction with other layers like ASLR. Apple products do not take advantage of the aslr support on Vista so these attacks are still possible.

These links were posted earlier and do a good job of explainig it.
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-rtsp-quicktime-flaw-affects-both.html
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/apple-quicktime-rtsp-update.html

Hitler didn't gas anyone himself, either. It's not about who's hand pulls the trigger, it's about who's running the ship.

http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/apple-quicktime-rtsp-update.html
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-rtsp-quicktime-flaw-affects-both.html

Standard buffer overflow protection doesn't work, Symantec was wrong. It seems that parts of Quicktime are not enabled for ASLR making these attacks possible.

http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/apple-quicktime-rtsp-update.html
http://erratasec.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-rtsp-quicktime-flaw-affects-both.html

Standard buffer overflow protection doesn't work, Symantec was wrong. It seems that parts of Quicktime are not enabled for ASLR making these attacks possible.

Well they've tried to rectify that.

I think USC and every other college targeted by the RIAA's illegal procedures has a duty to do what the University of Oregon did.

IT workers and their know-it-all attitudes.

I agree. The biggest roadblock is the computer geeks themselves. Computer science is controlled by a bunch of aged computer geeks who still have the mentality of Charles Babbage and Lady Ada when it comes to designing and programming computers. Here are some more roadblocks:

Half a Century of Crappy Computing
Parallel Programming, Math and the Curse of the Algorithm
The Age of Crappy Concurrency: Erlang, Tilera, Intel, AMD, IBM, Freescale, etc...
Parallel Computers and the Algorithm: Square Peg vs. Round Hole
Killing the Beast

IT workers and their know-it-all attitudes.

I agree. The biggest roadblock is the computer geeks themselves. Computer science is controlled by a bunch of aged computer geeks who still have the mentality of Charles Babbage and Lady Ada when it comes to designing and programming computers. Here are some more roadblocks:

Half a Century of Crappy Computing
Parallel Programming, Math and the Curse of the Algorithm
The Age of Crappy Concurrency: Erlang, Tilera, Intel, AMD, IBM, Freescale, etc...
Parallel Computers and the Algorithm: Square Peg vs. Round Hole
Killing the Beast

IT workers and their know-it-all attitudes.

I agree. The biggest roadblock is the computer geeks themselves. Computer science is controlled by a bunch of aged computer geeks who still have the mentality of Charles Babbage and Lady Ada when it comes to designing and programming computers. Here are some more roadblocks:

Half a Century of Crappy Computing
Parallel Programming, Math and the Curse of the Algorithm
The Age of Crappy Concurrency: Erlang, Tilera, Intel, AMD, IBM, Freescale, etc...
Parallel Computers and the Algorithm: Square Peg vs. Round Hole
Killing the Beast

IT workers and their know-it-all attitudes.

I agree. The biggest roadblock is the computer geeks themselves. Computer science is controlled by a bunch of aged computer geeks who still have the mentality of Charles Babbage and Lady Ada when it comes to designing and programming computers. Here are some more roadblocks:

Half a Century of Crappy Computing
Parallel Programming, Math and the Curse of the Algorithm
The Age of Crappy Concurrency: Erlang, Tilera, Intel, AMD, IBM, Freescale, etc...
Parallel Computers and the Algorithm: Square Peg vs. Round Hole
Killing the Beast

IT workers and their know-it-all attitudes.

I agree. The biggest roadblock is the computer geeks themselves. Computer science is controlled by a bunch of aged computer geeks who still have the mentality of Charles Babbage and Lady Ada when it comes to designing and programming computers. Here are some more roadblocks:

Half a Century of Crappy Computing
Parallel Programming, Math and the Curse of the Algorithm
The Age of Crappy Concurrency: Erlang, Tilera, Intel, AMD, IBM, Freescale, etc...
Parallel Computers and the Algorithm: Square Peg vs. Round Hole
Killing the Beast

I dont have boot camp (did install it quite some time back in the past though). It still broke in the middle. If it does not boot like it happened for me, this link got me back on track: http://net3x.blogspot.com/2007/03/macos-x-1049-update-killed-my-mac... What happened with me: - Incremental (not Combi) update with Software update failed in the end - Rebooted and saw the spinning wheel of eternity - Booting in Verbose mode showed "Load of /sbin/launchd, errno 88" - Booted from Installation CD and ran Disk Repair and saw that permission issues were all fixed - Downloaded the combi update and followed the instructions on link above - just had to change the version number. Well now I am back on with 10.4.11 and everything seems fine.

Apparently the EeePC has an Atheros wifi chipset which can only be run using the hacky "ndiswrapper". There's a good FSDaily post detailing some of those issues including an apparent claim that if you replace the RAM then you void your warranty. Why Asus weren't smart enough to choose a wireless chipset with Free drivers boggles the mind. There's hope that a Free driver will appear "soon", but having been in the situation of playing with proprietary modules for hardware which I bought hoping that someone would reverse-engineer the driver sometime soon I'd rather not touch this. Ndiswrapper sucks if you're going to be keeping your machine reasonably current for security reasons. Too bad. I love the look of these things.

"That's an interesting idea, but it's a bit like the flat tax: the large-scale pirates would get off easy, and the little guys would get the rough end"

See this post by someone else for a possible way to answer that:

http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=371395&cid=21489371

For some thoughts on possible changes to the copyright laws that could benefit the people and the artists, check this link:

http://zotzbro.blogspot.com/2007/04/some-thoughts-on-copyright-offensive.html

all the best,

drew

For some good reading on the constitutionality issue, I recommend Cam Barker's article in Texas Law Review, "Grossly Excessive Penalties in the Battle Against Illegal File-Sharing: The Troubling Effects of Aggregating Minimum Statutory Damages for Copyright Infringement"

Just out of curiosity, has anyone on Slashdot been on the receiving end of an RIAA suit, or possibly a lawyer dealing with a client who has been? Or not even directly involved, but just know someone who's been through this ordeal?
...
Is there an existing repository for information like this, or is it time people like us Slashdotters created one?

The story submitter is a Slashdotter/lawyer who has a site dedicated to this sort of stuff. Of course, for legal advice that's not technically advice, I pay attention to whatever cpt kangarooski has to say. Because he has a cooler name and a lower UID.

this means that a lot of wrongs are ignored by potential plaintiffs, just as a matter of tradition, convenience and politeness, just as they

That was the main point of the article, it shows you how some of those things which where "traditionally" or "conveniently" ignored (such as passing copies of songs to other people) before are now being actively prosecuted by the plaintiffs (see Recording Industry vs The People. Like that, in 10 years such politeness, ignorance and convenience might be totally suppressed when such companies find that suing people is a more profitable activity than their current buisness model.

- nuisance, trespass, assault** (especially among children), etc..... Nobody goes around saying "Look at how many acts of trespass you committed today. We need to fix trespass law."

And then you actually read about the coffee-Mcdonalds lady or the robber who sued the owners of the home he was robbing.

In my opinion, highly likely. Their clients are already starting to get punished.

In my opinion, highly likely. Their clients are already starting to get punished.

We are early in the game. It's happened here and is happening here. It's only a recent development that a significant number of people have been fighting back.

We are early in the game. It's happened here and is happening here. It's only a recent development that a significant number of people have been fighting back.

According to the Office performance benchmarks, Windows XP SP3 is also considerably faster than Vista SP1. "None of this bodes well for Vista, which is now more than two times slower than the most current builds of its older sibling," said Barth.