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I think you're confused on the point of "attack".

For example, I can post a link to this page. Google can now see the page. Of course, it could get to that page from within shopper.cnet.com, anyway, but the robots.txt file or NOINDEX/NOFOLLOW tags may be warning it off. (So Google has to walk the URL back up to http://shopper.cnet.com/robots.txt, to make sure, and it may not see http://www.shopper.com/robots.txt, by the way.)

More to the point, I can post a link to this page of a search result on shopper.com. Then Google can see that search. And, in an hour or two, it might show up in a google search of "wall wart servers", which would be useless, but anyway.

I can post a link to this query, however, and, not only might Google's spider collect it (from here), but it might not even have to get it from here. I'm probably not the first person to search shopper.com for "Small office home office server".

I can't see there being an ethical issue here, because those links feed people to shopper.com. In fact, cnet likely has some agreements with Google on that. And many such search sites (well, smaller ones) deliberately use Google's search engines to save themselves a bit of infrastructure cost.

Google, on the other hand, may prefer not to put some of those small search sites results on their general search pages, but that's a side issue.

Now, how do you suppose that bing picks up a query like, "m4-7734-6al 63363r"? Unless someone posts that (like I just did), how does bing get that query just from my using it in a Google search a few minutes ago?

To say this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black, you'd be accusing google of planting code in Chrome that watches for bing search results and feeds them back to google's search engine optimizer on the sly. (A new way for a browser to call home!) And/or of making deals with the Mozilla team. But the evidence you mention doesn't really support that, as someone else points out.

I think you're confused on the point of "attack".

For example, I can post a link to this page. Google can now see the page. Of course, it could get to that page from within shopper.cnet.com, anyway, but the robots.txt file or NOINDEX/NOFOLLOW tags may be warning it off. (So Google has to walk the URL back up to http://shopper.cnet.com/robots.txt, to make sure, and it may not see http://www.shopper.com/robots.txt, by the way.)

More to the point, I can post a link to this page of a search result on shopper.com. Then Google can see that search. And, in an hour or two, it might show up in a google search of "wall wart servers", which would be useless, but anyway.

I can post a link to this query, however, and, not only might Google's spider collect it (from here), but it might not even have to get it from here. I'm probably not the first person to search shopper.com for "Small office home office server".

I can't see there being an ethical issue here, because those links feed people to shopper.com. In fact, cnet likely has some agreements with Google on that. And many such search sites (well, smaller ones) deliberately use Google's search engines to save themselves a bit of infrastructure cost.

Google, on the other hand, may prefer not to put some of those small search sites results on their general search pages, but that's a side issue.

Now, how do you suppose that bing picks up a query like, "m4-7734-6al 63363r"? Unless someone posts that (like I just did), how does bing get that query just from my using it in a Google search a few minutes ago?

To say this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black, you'd be accusing google of planting code in Chrome that watches for bing search results and feeds them back to google's search engine optimizer on the sly. (A new way for a browser to call home!) And/or of making deals with the Mozilla team. But the evidence you mention doesn't really support that, as someone else points out.

I think you're confused on the point of "attack".

For example, I can post a link to this page. Google can now see the page. Of course, it could get to that page from within shopper.cnet.com, anyway, but the robots.txt file or NOINDEX/NOFOLLOW tags may be warning it off. (So Google has to walk the URL back up to http://shopper.cnet.com/robots.txt, to make sure, and it may not see http://www.shopper.com/robots.txt, by the way.)

More to the point, I can post a link to this page of a search result on shopper.com. Then Google can see that search. And, in an hour or two, it might show up in a google search of "wall wart servers", which would be useless, but anyway.

I can post a link to this query, however, and, not only might Google's spider collect it (from here), but it might not even have to get it from here. I'm probably not the first person to search shopper.com for "Small office home office server".

I can't see there being an ethical issue here, because those links feed people to shopper.com. In fact, cnet likely has some agreements with Google on that. And many such search sites (well, smaller ones) deliberately use Google's search engines to save themselves a bit of infrastructure cost.

Google, on the other hand, may prefer not to put some of those small search sites results on their general search pages, but that's a side issue.

Now, how do you suppose that bing picks up a query like, "m4-7734-6al 63363r"? Unless someone posts that (like I just did), how does bing get that query just from my using it in a Google search a few minutes ago?

To say this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black, you'd be accusing google of planting code in Chrome that watches for bing search results and feeds them back to google's search engine optimizer on the sly. (A new way for a browser to call home!) And/or of making deals with the Mozilla team. But the evidence you mention doesn't really support that, as someone else points out.

Wyden to Block Telecom Bill Without Net Neutrality(2006)
Protecting mobile privacy(now)

I got to vote for him too.

However, the Kim family was only rescued after they were spotted walking on a remote road by helicopter.

I know the wikipedia article says that, but it's a perfect example of why wikipedia is not a reliable source. The wife and children were actually spotted at their vehicle as noted in this article. It's a bit lengthy, but the relevant passage is "At about 1:45 p.m. PST on Monday, rescuers were notified that a vehicle and a female waving an umbrella were spotted by a helicopter search crew." As I recall she had only gotten out of the vehicle specifically to try to flag down the helicopter.

The husband left to try to walk to a town, and therefore took much longer to find. If he would have stayed with the vehicle he probably would have survived

Sometimes people get really lost and a GPS could have saved them.

In particular I am thinking of the story of James Kim and his family. In December 2006 they were driving south in Oregon, and they missed their planned exit. It was almost an hour of driving later before they realized they had missed the exit. Not wanting to waste another hour by doubling back, they got off the highway and took a road that looked okay on their map, but was pretty much impassible in winter. (In fact there was supposed to be a gate closing off the road with a sign saying "Closed in Winter".) They ended up stuck, completely outside cellular phone coverage areas, with nobody having any clue where to look for them, and no emergency food or clothes in the car. After a week (a week! no food, only snow for water, two adults and two children, imagine how horrible it must have been!) Mr. Kim made the decision to set out on foot and try to find help. He froze to death, but fortunately a search helicopter spotted the car and the rest of the family was saved.

I have always figured that a GPS could have prevented this tragedy; with a GPS they wouldn't have missed their exit, and if they did they would have realized it immediately and would have simply gone back and taken the intended exit.

Now, while I have no desire to say anything disrespectful about Mr. Kim, I do also wonder at their common sense. According to one report I read, they found the road to be difficult going, and they had to stop and get out of the car and move obstacles out of the road (fallen trees? I don't remember the details). Their common sense should have told them that this road was a bad idea, and they should have just turned around and backtracked before it was too late.

So, common sense could have saved them, or a GPS could have saved them.

The sad irony is that Mr. Kim was an editor on CNet and he reviewed gadgets like GPS navigators. But he didn't have one in his car.

P.S. Blindly trusting a GPS is also increasingly leading to trucks trying to go under low bridges, as in this story.

steveha

Also, most teleconference equipment is more set up to have the lead(teacher) be the remote party, not one of the students. With the robot he has additional ability to participate.

Personally, I'm surprised that nobody brought up the guy who telecommutes to work via a robot he built himself. I know it's getting old, but it's still a precedent.

You will read of the details of this elsewhere, but I 'know a guy' at Intel, and this was slam-dunk gotta-fix-this for them, despite the cost. It was evident from the beginning that this had the makings of a legendary fail for them, and they bit off the $1B and just fixed it.

I'm hoping to get some tidbits on the actual cause, but for now it's pretty tight over there.

Not often that Intel makes these mistakes, and this is one they seem to be handling with integrity. Not like Nvidia.

Google phone app?

That's exactly right:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10417247-83.html

Hopefully these things will use more secure communications.

Vizio is adding OnLive gaming to it's Internet suite for the HDTV.
Which already includes thirty or so free and subscription services like Facebook, Netflix, Rhapsody, Pandora, Picassa and Twitter.

The geek needs to be paying attention.

His wife won't tolerate the mod or hack that bricks a $5000 investment in home theater hardware on Super Bowl Sunday. His kids won't take well to being cut off from on their online gaming and social networking accounts.

He'll be sleeping in the basement for real - and it won't be the RIAA that puts him there.

The PS3 supports a webcam and printer. The Internet "app" can be built into any piece of hardware. The Denon receiver that supports digital broadcast and satellite radio. The Samsung Blu-Ray player.

What matters is that the general-purpose PC and the "standards based" browser is no longer part of the equation.

Content protection - "rights management?" No problem. Flash animation? No problem. The licensed HVEC decoder that delievers 1080p video or better and multichannel theater sound at half the bit rate of H.264 or WebM? No problem.

The sponsor of the "app" can do anything he wants with any tool he wants.

The geek can fret and fume but he has no say.

_____

Vizio emerged from Walmart to become a major player in HDTV:

Nearly every Rhapsody function is included in the app, turning the Vizio into a celestial jukebox for subscribers (starting at $10 per month; the TV doesn't count as a "device" against your total) and begging for connection to an external audio system (analog and digital audio output is supported). Searches for artists, songs, etc., came up quickly, and autocomplete kicked in as we typed the first few letters. We assembled a playback queue, called up Rhapsody's channels and our own custom playlists, and enjoyed cover art on the big screen.
Vizio's secret weapon, found on no other TV remote we know of, is a full slide-out keyboard with dedicated keys for letters, numbers, and symbols, just like on a smartphone.
Best of all, it's included with the TV for free, not as an expensive option like some other Internet-friendly remotes.
The keyboard worked on all of the apps we tried, and although we found it more cramped and somewhat less responsive compared, say, with the keyboard on a typical smartphone, it's perfectly usable and makes Tweets, Facebook status updates, and username/password sign-ins so much easier than the standard remote/onscreen keyboard combo.
Bluetooth means the remote works without needing line-of-sight, and also promises future functionality. Although we didn't test it, Vizio says the TV can pair with other Bluetooth devices like a full-size keyboard or stereo headphones.

Vizio XVT553SV [Updated Oct 2010]

Oh, he's more than new here.

Don't care who proposes it, "internet kill switch" is bad legislation.

Vacume [sic] tubes

Lots of tube amps still around - For example:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13645_3-10423476-47.html

I think the "it" being referred to is proposed legislation that would give the president to shut down the Internet during a "national cyber emergency". http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20029282-281.html?tag=mncol;txt

Actually this was news Friday morning... And it is not really a "surprising cameo" when SNL was trying to get him to come and we knew about it beforehand...
That said, it is a shame that SNL has lost its mojo, it used to be an amazing show.

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-20029974-36.html

In that case, our government seems to be sending a mixed message by adding the internet kill-switch back into proposed legislation...

Sensationalist headlines aside, care to point out where the aforementioned bill says anything about shutting down communications? From my reading its about isolating the networks on which high value infrastructure is located, not shutting down anyone's communication. More reading, less rhetoric please.

What you don't seem to get that is that "isolating the networks" is exactly how you shut down communications. How else would you do it, besides pulling the plug entirely?

Also, the other important piece here is that according to the blll, Judicial Review is explicitly denied

A company that objects to being subject to the emergency regulations is permitted to appeal to DHS secretary Janet Napolitano. But her decision is final and courts are explicitly prohibited from reviewing it.

So if anything can be declared "critical infrastructure" and isolated without benefit of the courts, any communication can be shut down. The attempt to avoid judicial review is on page 403 of the bill, if you care to read it yourself.

Schedule weekly backups of your data and have the admin hand them over to you. Also any admin should be legally responsible for any damages inflicted on purpose. If you make that clear nobody's gonna bother damaging your data out of anger or revenge and risk being arrested

You are licensing the eBook. Not buying it.

Amazon recalls (and embodies) Orwell's '1984'

http://news.cnet.com/Microsoft-admits-Office-2003-mistake/2100-1012_3-6224917.html Some of us use critical thinking and look at facts before raging against the machine.

I think 3D is inevitable, Just as silent films gave way to talkies which led to color then widescreen and HD. Each generation has brought discussion about how it's trivial and not needed. When 3D is developed to the point that you don't need special glasses to view it as with Toshiba's new system it too will become ubiquitous

And someone needs to add to the firehose (I apparently am a horrible writer, as mine never get picked) just to balance this out and show BOTH sides suck the big wet titty that the GOP is pushing for ISP spying again by having every single thing you do retained by the ISP for later perusal by law enforcement "for the children".

If anyone needed proof that both parties are a bad joke and we have NO representation in congress this article plus TFL should end all doubts. Because I really can't see the average American for 150+ year copyright laws and busting kids and grannys for music anymore than I can see them being for having every single thing they do tracked and handed over to police, can you?

Without a third party that actually has a chance your vote is worth about as much as the hot air the Ds and Rs spew. And for anyone that says "but but but...that was his FORMER job!" oh please. This is a "gift" from Obama to those writing the big fat checks, his way of saying "Hey pal, see what I did? I put one of your guys right at the top!". This is no different than the way the corporate lobbyist has cushy jobs set up for those that "play ball" waiting for them when their constituents finally get tired of being ignored.

We need to push our family and friends to vote straight Green party across the board in 2012. It doesn't matter if they have never heard of them (which they never will, as the MSM is all for the status quo) and frankly it doesn't matter if you support their current policies or not, because as long as we only have two parties we have nothing but two sides of the same rotten coin. BOTH are for bigger government and more control over your life, BOTH are for "socialism for the rich" in the form of bailouts, too big to fail, and looking the other way at tax dodges like the double dutch, and BOTH happily sell out America and the American people if those that write the big fat checks tell them to. Voting for either the Ds or the Rs anymore is nothing but that popularly quoted definition of insanity in action.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10024163-38.html [cnet.com]

"By choosing Joe Biden as their vice presidential candidate, the Democrats have selected a politician with a mixed record on technology who has spent most of his Senate career allied with the FBI and copyright holders, who ranks toward the bottom of CNET's Technology Voters' Guide, and whose anti-privacy legislation was actually responsible for the creation of PGP."

So a former vice president gets credit for inventing the internet, and this vice president can get credit for the creation of PGP! Wonderful.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10024163-38.html [cnet.com]

"By choosing Joe Biden as their vice presidential candidate, the Democrats have selected a politician with a mixed record on technology who has spent most of his Senate career allied with the FBI and copyright holders, who ranks toward the bottom of CNET's Technology Voters' Guide, and whose anti-privacy legislation was actually responsible for the creation of PGP."

sorry, my bad. It only use SSL / TLS for login, not for the actual data :(

Found a nice overview at http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-9962106-38.html though. Seems like AIM (yikes), Google Talk (via download client or https web client) and Skype have encrypted chats.

Fast forward a year or two : "This guy must be a terrorist!" - "Why?" - "He use the google!"

Fair enough, but in that case, I'd point to GPL3 adoption; a 2009 article claims about 50% adoption, at least of active projects on Google Code. That's not bad, I think...

Remember, when you measure success or failure, don't think in binary terms - world domination is not necessary for success.

In fact according to the article, Windows is open source to China among other governments BECAUSE Linux is open source and they were going to switch.

So when the first real cyber warfare starts happening (Ghostnet, Stuxnet are two that we know about). You'll know its Microsoft greed and our dependence on Microsoft that lost it for us. Selective open sourcing where none of the white-hats that aren't on the MS payroll get to see the code while nations that, at the very least, want to build an arsenal against it do see the code is worse than closed source.

Bill Gates, 1998: "About 3 million computers get sold every year in China, but people don't pay for the software. Someday they will, though. As long as they are going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They'll get sort of addicted, and then we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade."
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1023-212942.html

Bill Gates, 2007: "It's easier for our software to compete with Linux when there's piracy than when there's not."
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article2098235.ece

Steve Ballmer, 2001: "Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches. That's the way that the license works."
"Microsoft CEO takes launch break with the Sun-Times" (1 June 2001) Chicago Sun Times

Barack Obama, 2011: "So we were just in a meeting with business leaders, and Steve Ballmer of Microsoft pointed out that their estimate is that only one customer in every 10 of their products is actually paying for it in China. And so can we get better enforcement, since that is an area where America excels -- intellectual property and high-value added products and services."
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/01/19/press-conference-president-obama-and-president-hu-peoples-republic-china

The numbers, 2009: http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/19/software-piracy-in-china/


Microsoft wants hegemony in China over free (and freedom-respecting) options like GNU/Linux. It has always viewed piracy as a way to achieve this goal, but it doesn't have any real plan to turn those pirated copies of Windows and MS Office into revenue. Are they changing strategies and trying to muscle China now? Or is the U.S. gov't playing hardball for its own reasons? Or is it all just bullshit sabre-rattling? A real crackdown on Windows bootlegging would almost certainly make GNU/Linux the dominant platform in China. Parts of the Chinese gov't have pushed the Red Flag Linux distro in the past (specifically to avoid Windows licensing costs in Internet cafes), and there has been plenty of talk about the arrogance of Microsoft and the West, along with fears of potential backdoors in Windows. I'm sure the Chinese would prefer to be distributing a homegrown distro rather than having to pay up when Microsoft and the U.S. gov't come to collect.

Apple installing safari automatically (but apple is already evil so that wasn't too much of a surprise).

Apple never automatically installed Safari on Windows machines. When you use Apple's updater it will have Safari checked as an additional, optional install but you can uncheck that and Safari won't be installed. It's not hidden or automatic, the user can check or uncheck the box as they desire.

You are wrong, sorry:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9901006-7.html

When they first introduced the tactic, it was not listed under "optional installs", but right alongside iTunes under "updates" or whatever, so it looked like an update to something you already had. For years, I just clicked "yes" to the apple updater, because it was always just there to update software I had (iTunes). And then one day, it said Safari needed an update, even though I didn't have it installed. Well, *I* noticed this, but plenty of other people didn't.

After a little while, they moved it from "updates" to "additional installs" or whatever, but it was still checked by default. People had to pay attention, and normally with software updaters, you just say yes - its an "update".

You build a certain level of trust with a user that your "updater" will only be used for updates, and it is an abuse of that trust to use it for installing new software without making it extremely clear that something has changed (like not having it checked by default, or having a prompt that is different from the usual software's behavior).

You may say it would be my fault for getting duped, but what about my mom? She doesn't have a lot of money, so her computer is a few years old. She's also not very computer savvy, so she falls victim to every one of these things, and her computer is constantly loaded up with extra junk. All she wants to do is log onto facebook to message her children, and her computer is so slow she can't really do that anymore.

The bottom line is:
*When someone like Apple tricks a user into installing new software, they're cheating old ladies out of communication with their loved ones just to pump up their install base.*

That is true sleezeball move.

Besides being listed as a supporter of WebM, do you have any evidence they are actually working on it?

How about the Rockchip RK29xx, which was demoed in multiple devices at CES 2011?

He says he can't. Different thing entirely.

Unless all the developers of any code specifying a version number of GPL come around then he most certainly can't change the license, and given the response from a number of key devs that is unlikely to happen.

That survey is almost 5 years old. A lot changed in the interim. GPL v3 got widespread uptake, showing the mood of the developer community, and a number of companies have taken high profile and flagrant advantage of apparent loopholes in GPLv2. It's usually a mistake to speak in absolutes about what Linus will or won't do. There is nothing stopping change of license for *new submissions* in files where all authors of that file agrees. If Linus rules this is allowed, then it will be allowed. And bad actors like Motorola are just bringing that day closer.

He says he can't. Different thing entirely.

Unless all the developers of any code specifying a version number of GPL come around then he most certainly can't change the license, and given the response from a number of key devs that is unlikely to happen.

Ernie Ball also went totally Microsoft free after the BSA screwed them for $100,000:
http://news.cnet.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html

When I installed Ubuntu, I found that it worked seamlessly with all other software. Works well too. No 'freezing desktops', no jittery applications, no 'oh, you have too many applications open, just close two or three and then all will be well again' nonsense. When I consider user downtime, time that is wasted re-imaging a computer, time lost because 'the computer is down', (and with Ubuntu or Slackware, or Fedora, or RHEL there is no 'the computer is down'), and then people start talking about 'more expensive', people whos systems frequently freeze, crash, and in general kill productivity, I'm amazed they have anything to say at all. When people are inspired with ideas, its usually like lightning in a bottle, either you catch it and put a stopper in it, or it goes quickly. The computer is that bottle. When the bottle is broken, the lightning goes. When the stopper doesn't fit in the bottle, the lightning goes. With Open Source software, the stopper fits and the bottle isn't broken. I suppose the one difference there is between the 'free' software and the 'non-free' software is care. When 'volunteers' do something, they usually care about the quality of the job they are doing. They have a passion for the work they are doing (otherwise they wouldn't be doing it). I've seen paid-for software companies in action. There is a list of bugs, and a list of features. People vote based on the size of their contract, on what bugs they want fixed and what new features they want. Some bugs don't get fixed. Other companies have sales people who have targets. If the software isn't ready, its declared ready anyway, and shipped. Money comes in and sales targets are always hit. When the complaints come in, the sales team points to programmers and say 'its their problem'. Slapdash solves all. There is a reason why the US Department of Homeland Security ran an analysis of both 'Free' and 'Non-Free' operating systems with the Coverity code checker. They wanted to see what they were getting. To no ones surprise, the 'Free' software came out 20 times 'cleaner' that is 20 times fewer bugs than 'non-free' software, and the bugs that the 'free' software had were all 'low priority', as opposed to the 'non-free' software which has high numbers of 'critical' and 'severe' bugs. Go see for yourself, the US government paid for it. Here is where they started their effort. Coverity lists all I have already stated. Go ahead, look for yourself.

The BSA has a reputation as a extortion racket. What a great business model, sue your own customers! Only in tech. Once again, an anti-anti-piracy screed misunderstands what a "customer" is. A "customer" buys something. The guy who sneaks into your bookstore with a portable scanner and makes a copy of a book and leaves without buying anything isn't a "customer."

Really? Meet Ernie Ball. He makes a pretty case of it being a racket.

Linux is developed by about 70% paid employees.

Wrong. 70% of the development (i.e. 70% of the commits) is done by paid employees. See also: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13846_3-20024219-62.html

There's a much better article on this in Cnet, by the excellent Chris Matyszczyk:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20028638-71.html?tag=mncol;title

Are you sure it uses MJPEG? According to the spec part in reviews 1 2 3 they all say that the Sony DSC-W350 encodes video only in MPEG-4 (which is also owned by MPEG-LA). Even Sonys website for the camera states (under Features) that it records video in MP4. It takes photo's in JPEG, but according to all 4 of these sites, its videos are in MPEG-4 format.

I seem to recall when modems with lights were still in use, that a video tape of the flashing lights on the modem could be slowed down enough to read the stream of bits. Granted 3mb/s is a great deal faster than 56kb/s, but video technology is faster now, too. I would presume there is encryption on both ends, but I see a small IR led "bug" left on top of a computer, cube wall, file cabinet, etc. serving as a middle man pickup of the stream while it is decoded on the other end.

Doesn't have to be modems. You can recreate network traffic from reflected flashes from a network switch, although this report claims that it is, probably, restricted to 56kbps modems, not 10/100mbps ethernet cards.

Since neither of us are able to come up with figures I'll concede that perhaps people aren't 'embracing' 7 in droves in the same way they were with XP, but they absolutely are NOT rejecting it as the earlier poster stated, it has certainly been very successful even in light of the economic crisis and significantly slower growth (if any) of the PC market.

Apologies, I did find figures. I was kinda busy at the time though, and didnt post the links. Sorry about that.

In a month and a half, XP: "They've already done 10 million licenses, so they're well on their way to beating the first-year totals for 95," Gillen said.
-Read more: http://news.cnet.com/2100-1001-277211.html#ixzz1AnXkgsnN"

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1210067,00.asp
34% marketshare in a year and 4ish months, putting it in the lead (due to the plethora of other Windows versions out that ate the rest, such as Win98, WinME, Win2K and Win95 holdouts).

At the 11 month mark: "Microsoft's Windows XP is gaining market share among Internet users, according to analyst firm WebSideStory. The year-old operating system is now being used by 20 percent of client computers on the Internet, making it the second-most popular, trailing Windows 98, which is on 37 percent "
http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-26285775_ITM
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Microsoft+Windows+XP+Captures+20%25+Market+Share+on+the+Internet+in...-a092261099

In four and a half years, WinXP took over 95% of the Windows marketshare... in four years, Vista has... umm... bombed - and even comparing Vista and Windows 7 COMBINED, the 43% is nowhere near the 95%+ that XP gained in a near similar time frame.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/media/article675138.ece

As long as its not you spending the entire day verifying user accounts for almost no money right? How does one manually verify that an account isn't intended to be a spam account anyway?
--
windows media codec

So when the RIAA sues someone, it's $80k per title for infringement, but when they are infringing, they set aside $167 per title?

Not to defend it, but in the RIAA's case, there's statutory damages of $750-$150000 available because they registered their copyrighted material. Here, it's likely that those songwriters did not register - accordingly, they only have actual damages available, rather than statutory damages. Actual damages could be more - see Apple v. Psystar - or they could be much less, like here. The statutory damages aim for the middle ground.

So when the RIAA sues someone, it's $80k per title for infringement, but when they are infringing, they set aside $167 per title?

Finland and France say it is. As more government information and services are being offered online, the more of a basic right it becomes as you can't shield people away from knowing and participating in government offerings and legal information that concerns them.

You even admit that three of them collapsed together, yet you insist that computers are becoming disposable? Huge year on year growth in Apple laptop sales during a down economy totally disposes of that argument. People seem more willing to pay for quality products now than they ever have been, because they've seen cheap and it wasn't pretty (and it didn't last. People already hate buying computers, so buying them again is something normal people avoid like the plague.

Actually, they didn't collapse together - They purchased each other (Acer bought Gateway bought eMachines). Dell even went so far as to purchase Alienware, for all intents and purposes a high-end, "quality" computer company. I actually think that increases in Apple sales are something of a good indicator for what I'm talking about, too. Apple's business model isn't to sell people one good machine and let them keep it for five or six years before moving on (though they promise two OS revisions to any hardware sold) - Just like the iPods, iPhones and now the iPads, Apple's major driving force in their business model is the idea that, even if there's really nothing wrong with the device you currently have, you absolutely have to have the new models. While I'm sure that not everyone is hooked this way (at the very least, people with half a brain), there do exist a fairly strong base which do follow this trend. To that end, think of the users that are causing Apple's growth: PC users switching to Apple because they supposedly "have no viruses" and other lovely things, regardless of the fact that it's virtually the same components inside (Hitachi hard drives, for example). They are switching for the OS - Not for the machine.

WTF. Let me ponder for a moment, and repeat; WTF.

How are USED computers worth more in a world where computers are becoming disposible? In said world computers that were at all used would be unusable. That's practically the definition of "disposable" - when my razor blades are done I don't donate 'em to Good Will!

Used markets for anything are very lucrative markets - Buy for dirt and sell for a generous percentage and you have a lot of pure profit going for you. The computer market hasn't yet truly become disposable; You don't toss it in the trash when you buy a new one if the old one still "works." You offload it onto someone who will pay you to take it. Compared to your razors, I'm pretty sure people won't be lining up to take those off your hands!

Yes, just ask Sony how easy it is to lock people out of systems they physically control. Oh that's right, it's totally impossible which is why on OS X systems Apple doesn't and NEVER will try, and on iOS Apple puts up the thinnest veneer of prevention over the hardware which they could improve but they don't even bother.

Actually, it would be fairly easy. Sony's PlayStation 3 has only recently been cracked open, and that's because of a static root key for software signing. If every generation of computer that coincided with an OS release by a company who really wanted to do this were set up with a different key (and with a bit more security than that Sony placed into the PS3), or more severely, change the key at will via protected software updates (they could get away with this because their software is the only software they want you to run), that would effectively A) remove the ability for earlier machines to use new OSes, requiring more frequent hardware purchases - Apple's big money-maker, and B) Stop cold attempts to run unapproved software on the machine. As stupid and needlessly complex as that may sound, Jobs and the Apple crew have a fairly extensive history of wanting to rule over their devices with an iron fist - Remember not long ago when they were telling people that jailbreaking their iDevices violated copyright law? It might be a veiled threat, but it also outlines their view on control over their devices. It isn't that big a stretch, quite frankly, and if they could find a way to make it work, I have no doubt in my mind that they would.

A few years ago they changed the rules to be even more Kafkaesque in that it was OK to forget your ID, but if you deliberately refuse to show it, then you can't fly. I know that doesn't explain what happened to that guy, I just wanted to share.

I am less worried about flight duration than the sensor payload that Honeywell is installing for Miami-Dade. IR, Thermographic, NightVision, and HD cameras at the very least to make the drone "useful". TFA only mentions "cameras" not what type.

This statement by police says it all. "It gives us a good opportunity to have an eye up there. Not a surveilling eye, not a spying eye. Let's make the distinction. A surveilling eye to help us to do the things we need to do, honestly, to keep people safe," said Miami-Dade Police Director James Loftus.
Hmm. "Not a surveilling eye," then "A surveilling eye to help us..." Maybe a typo, but still telling.

We knew this was coming. http://news.cnet.com/Drone-aircraft-may-prowl-U.S.-skies/2100-11746_3-6055658.html

Time to start-up my own residential sheilding supply and installation company. Any investors interested?

Why can't they list these as a requirement? If the customer already has a significant investment in these products, requiring new contracts to use existing technology, infrastructure,

In the context we are talking about a bid to provide these software solutions. In other words we are not talking about a contract to add (for example) an encryption layer to the e-mail system, we're talking about contracting an e-mail system.
Yes, once you have an e-mail system it's not unreasonable to require that the encryption system works with your existing e-mail system or that the proposed bid can cover all the costs of replacing the e-mail system as well as provide the encryption.
Hopefully at this point the solution you buy is based on open standards or better yet open source software such that if you do change e-mail systems you can continue to use the same encryption solution, or (pay to) update the encryption to work with the new solution, or (due to the open-ness) migrate to a new encryption system with little headache. I note that one of the first and most common tools for git is a conversion-from-svn tool. The openness of svn means that they can't hold your data hostage; and for customers this is a pure win. Your goal (to decrease costs) is to limit the amount the vendor can lock you in. So just because you are running Windows due to some legacy app that only works on Windows, you are not constrained to run MS Exchange/Outlook as there are open mail servers and clients to choose from. This means that the key isn't to specify just where it must run (in order to work today) but you must also specify the open nature so that you aren't subjecting yourself to additional lock-in.
The bottom line is that it's never convenient to migrate away from the vendor who has you locked-in: that's the point of vendor lock in. At some point you need to look at the long-term vs. short-term cost of staying locked into this vendor. By migrating to open standards and open source products on an as-can basis, and by meeting all new needs with open products you begin to decrease your long-term costs.
It took years to get this locked-in, and unless you're really pissed off, it may take you years to get back out, but in the interim getting more locked-in doesn't help.

Try http://download.cnet.com/mac/
Set to Purchase and have a look at the shareware.
All the $10-$40 options to do or save in, convert or work out ect some ~ small Mac task thats standalone or feeds into a larger set of tools.
Thats the fear. WoW or MsOffice are safe for now on the Mac.
12,000 downloads for a $10 app that might exist on ios for a few $.
The Mac software cartel is over. Its time for the $99 basement code app that phones home a bit too much :)

1. Windows XP still has more market share (57%) than Windows Vista (12%) and Windows 7 (21%) combined. More to the point since Vista and XP are affected, more than three quarters of Windows systems are affected. They should care. We sure as hell care. If all Microsoft cares about is W7, that tells us a lot about their commitment to support and security. It's not 2002 any more. It's now 2011, and if being "all in" in the cloud and "all in" in mobile, and committed to "Dynamics" (whatever the heck that was) has distracted from their commitment to security, then we need to know because WE USE THEIR SOFTWARE for more than a year or two.

2. Windows is a brand. A label. A blank symbol. It's not, and never was an operating system. It has been an operating environment for some time, or as some would say, several. It doesn't, and can't, "give a flying fuck" about anything. Windows is a brand that's owned by a legal fiction, a "corporate person". Since there is some fictional personhood attached to the legal entity Microsoft, and some history, we may be able to ascribe some motivation to that with the understanding that anthropomorphizing soulless corporations is in itself a trap. Some here would probably say that Microsoft is the cruel bargainer the devil himself hopes to be someday, but at least we're agreed that it has some personification to hang motivations on. Please don't say "Windows" when you mean "Microsoft" it confuses many issues. They also make very good mice. Ok, they don't actually make the mice, but you should get my drift.

And yeah if it drives adoption of their new product off of their old product without too much escape to actually good product as a goal, we'd all have thunk it. Because that's what they do. The prevention of actual progress is their goal.

Mate, I do agree that they didn't need to "jail-break" the hardware, they only needed to "break the protocol/encoding". However, it still seems that MS is "royaly not amused":

To support your case, you link to a statement Microsoft made prior to the release of the opensource driver. A statement that was made explicitly about "product tampering."
But look what slashdot reported two weeks after your failed scavenger hunt -- Alex Kipman, Xbox Director of Incubation:

The first thing to talk about is, Kinect was not actually hacked. Hacking would mean that someone got to our algorithms that sit inside of the Xbox and was able to actually use them, which hasn't happened. Or, it means that you put a device between the sensor and the Xbox for means of cheating, which also has not happened. That's what we call hacking, and that's what we have put a ton of work and effort to make sure doesn't actually occur. What has happened is someone wrote an open-source driver for PCs that essentially opens the USB connection, which we didn't protect, by design, and reads the inputs from the sensor.

But yet you insist that Microsoft is "royally not amused" and will involve "law enforcement" (bold-face makes things sound scary, amiright?)
So with that said, can you please stop the attempts at pedantry?