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Changes may not be that great. Late last year Rogers AT&T announced they were dropping AT&T from their name so the two aren't as closely linked as they once were.

AT&T currently holds a 34% stake in Rogers Wireless. Cingular will either keep that share or sell it back to Rogers (or the open market).

The most obvious change will be that roaming in the US will now cover a larger area (assuming they keep their roaming agreements).

I think we're concentrating on renewables instead. They're cheap, they work, and they don't mess with your genes.

Yes, the levy is simply a cash-grab.

gotta go through the Canadian ripoffs of it... like PureTracks

It's no wonder that people are starting to refer to PureTracks as "PureCrap". It really is as bad as you've described. Unfortunately, we don't have any other choices (except to use P2P clients or get our American buddies to buy music from iTMS for us) until Apple completes its negotiations with the organizations that oversee music licensing in Canada. One of those organizations is the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency (CMRRA) and the other is...

...the Canadian version of the RIAA (whatever the hell they're called)...

...the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA). So, far, the CRIA hasn't been doing all that much about music piracy. Most of their efforts have been half-hearted, at best. For example, see this Globe And Mail article covering the way that the CRIA has been dealing with music piracy (or not dealing with it, as the case may be). Some of their efforts are just plain silly.

Perhaps the folks that we should be more worried about are SOCAN (which was recently mentioned in this Slashdot thread related to the responsibility of ISPs in regards to the transmission of copyrighted music) and the CPCC (the rat-bastards that instituted levies on recordable media in Canada, and are now trying to get levies put on MP3s players here (as described in this Slashdot thread)).

D.

All this happens, and then SCO suddenly becomes 'victimized by all these EVIL Open Source people', virtually guaranteeing the press won't report on SCO's other misfortune because it's 'unimportant' compared to this. Morover, they get to make Open Source people look like terrorists and bad people, and try to make it look like people should not be using software developed by these 'evil people'.

• Copyright Board Freezes Private Copying Levies for 2003 and 2004
• Copyright Board freezes music-media levies

Now we get this 'quick fix' press release that gets to paint the Linux community as a bunch of criminals and thugs. They know full well the press won't bother to check facts, and it should be enough to distract from the negative things that have been happening. They get to look like a victim in the press, and they can do so without any proof what so ever.

It seems others have done a good job at refuting you already, I'll just add two quick things:

Rather than directing people to other posts or to Google, here are some direct quotes:

From http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20030924.gtnintendosep24/BNStory/AtPlay/

"Sony's PlayStation 2 still leads the market, with nearly 54 million consoles shipped as of early August. Nintendo had sold about 9.6 million GameCubes by the end of the summer.

Sales have been so slow this year that Nintendo temporarily stopped production of its GameCube in August and said it wouldn't make any more until Fall in order to eat up excess inventory. iSuppli said the company shipped just 80,000 units during its most recent quarter, which ended June 30.

Kyoto-based Nintendo did not disclose the amount of excess inventory on hand in August, or how many consoles are normally produced at that time of year. The company has also maintained that its target is to sell six million machines this fiscal year (ending in March 2004), saying sales generally pick up during the holiday shopping season.

With this in mind, Nintendo is also increasing the pressure on the software front to appeal to gift-giving shoppers. It has vowed to boost the number of GameCube titles to 320 by the end of the year, and has hinted that there will be special promotional deals through the lucrative holiday shopping season.

The promise of a slew of new GameCube titles comes despite reports from the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) show in Los Angeles earlier this year that several top game development companies and publishers were reconsidering the number of GameCube titles they plan to produce in the wake of declining sales for the console."

From http://technology.nzoom.com/cda/printable/1,1856,2 23621,00.html:

"A number of game publishers have curtailed or ended production of GameCube games, citing the platform's disappointing sales. Analysts were quick to caution that Nintendo was likely to benefit most from the news.

"Although this is a positive announcement with respect to Nintendo, we do not expect this price drop to have a dramatic effect on our expectations for the third-party publishers in our universe," Harris Nesbitt Gerard analyst Edward Williams said in a note.

Of the 10 best-selling games for the GameCube in August, according to research service NPDFunworld, six were published by Nintendo - a far higher proportion of first-party games than on any other console.

While the console has been stronger in Japan and Europe, in the United States it has settled into a firm third place, with an installed base about 29 percent smaller than that of the Xbox.

The last major game console to retail for US$99 in the United States was Sega's Dreamcast - though that price was an inventory-clearing move after Sega discontinued the console and decided to become exclusively a game publisher."

From http://edition.cnn.com/2003/BUSINESS/04/07/nintend o.reut/:

"TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) -- Videogame company Nintendo Co Ltd on Monday slashed its group net profit forecast for the business year that ended on March 31 by 18 percent due to sluggish sales of its GameCube machine.

The Kyoto-based company, known for its hit "Pokemon'' games, now expects a group net profit for 2002/03 of 66 billion yen ($548.5 million) against its November forecast of 80 billion yen.

Citing poor demand for its mainstay GameCube console at home and abroad, the company trimmed its group sales estimates to 500 billion yen from 600 billion yen.

"Demand for the GameCube console was significantly lower than our expectation,'' a company s

A scam that recently was in the news here in Ontario is gangs that put false fronts on ATMs. The faux-fronts contain a camera over the keypad and a magnetic reader on the card reader. These were found on bank machines of the big 5 banks (BMO, TD, RBC, Scotia, and CIBC). So the moral of the story is that even if you stick to the "name-brand" bank machines, you still might get scammed. Personally I'm astounded at the intricacy involved in someone putting fake-fronts on big bank bank machines (don't these things have cameras and some sort of security? How did someone pull up and pull that off?), though I guess that's the extent that organized crime can go.

BTW: Most Canadians I know call them ATMs.

The part about this story that gets to me is that the researcher didn't alert Microsoft before posting to a public mailing list. Sure, a lot of people don't like Microsoft, but that's no reason to make it worse for the millions of people who are forced to use Microsoft products, especially for security holes which have yet to be exploited.

While I agree that all vendors, even Evil(tm) ones, should be notified and given adequate time to fix a bug before exploit code is published, I disagree that there is no reason to "make it worse for the millions of people who are forced to use Microsoft products". There are plenty of reasons.

Making things worse for MS users will lead to more people objecting to being "forced" into using MS products (the word "forced" is used loosely, as in your post). The more people that object to the monopoly, the less likihood that the monopoly will continue to thrive. Whether you admit it or not, the proliferation of MS security exploits in the form of viruses, worms and any other means, is a big part of the recent success of the adoption of open source software around the world. People are getting fed up with viruses and security problems on their PCs, and looking to alternatives. Just by looking at alternatives, the world is coming to realize that there are better ways to get software than paying a vendor for a licence to use binaries, under restrictions.

Another reason is that Microsoft itself is getting fed up with the problem, and so maybe some day they'll change their ways and maybe get a part of a clue about security. This ties in with the first reason I cited, in so far as their present solution to their security problems will only make people dislike them more than they already do. MS constantly blames the users for problems in MS software, so their solution is to remove control from the users and put it in the hands of... whomever. This is more good news for MS alternatives.

There are a multitude of reasons that stem directly from the first reason that I mentioned. Lots of good things will happen if the monopoly crumbles. After only a few crumbs have come off the edges, there are already benefits. For example, poor countries are now much more able to build up their infrastructure, thanks to the existence and advocacy of alternatives to the monopoly. The monopoly itself is bad for security: some of the world's leading computer security experts have argued that the lack of platform diversity is itself a security threat. There are many economic arguments about why monopolies are bad.

So MS users may have some pain coming their way, but in the end the result will be beneficial for society.

"...this is a game in which you play as a foreign soldier and try to kill troops from your own country. I bet that you couldn't even sell a game like this overseas."

I don't think there are any sacred cows left in the west.

Command and Conquer: Generals came out a year ago. Its set 20 years from now and one of the playable sides is the "Global Liberation Army", who use chemical and biological weapons against US and Chinese forces, as well as suicide bombers, car bombs, etc.

So here you have a game which is not about a conflict our grandfathers were involved with, but touches nerves still raw from current events.

I was watching a documentary last night on the 40th anniversary of Kennedy's assasination, which was full of 3D graphics reconstructing the Zapruder film and then replaying it from Oswald's viewpoint. I was struck by the thought that someone, somewhere, must be turning that into a game, too.

-Baz

Others have speculated that mandrake is due to be snapped up, perhaps by HP . Perhaps this is a good time to pick up a little Mandrake stock, no?

Damn straight.

Although, one thing needs to stay clear: Linux is only secure if you know what the hell you're doing. 51% of all known successful root compromises occur under Linux. (Linux has more than 51% of the market share, IIRC, so it's not a very fair comparison. If anybody has market share data, please provide it so we can look at ratios.)

I prefer running Linux, of course. At least I know I can secure it.

Many of the people writing newer viruses (those that relate to spam) are of a different breed entirely. I personally believe the people responsible for modern Internet spamming worms are more malicious than teenage hackers would ever want to be. These menaces to society consider themselves businessmen. You wish we were dealing with teenage hackers. Read up on Internet spam and viruses, and see this less technical article along the same lines.

The guy [Roger Ebert] knows what he's talking about. At least his opinions are largely compatible with mine, and probably the artsy-geek set at large.

Posting their reviews in .mp3 gets them some geek points anyhow.

He should get additional geek points for being one of the most vocal, thoughtful, and relentless critics of the MPAA, especially for their irrational ratings and related restrictions on advertising.

I also enjoy his writing style and usually find his reviews thorough and consistent enough (with a few major exceptions) that you can evaluate whether you'll like a movie, even if you don't always agree with him. Also fairly enlightened on the impact of the Internet, piracy, and worth checking out his views on companies like Blockbuster, Wal-Mart, and their nutty policies.

Some of his thoughts on piracy remind me of the "sadly comical" reports that reviewers are being searched for cellphone cameras at the IMAX releases, contrary to industry boasts that the full-immersion experience makes piracy irrelevant.

The economic damage from the attacks, in lost productivity and recovery costs, fell below average in August, to $707-million (U.S.).

The overall economic damage in August from overt and covert attacks as well as viruses and worms stood at an all-time high of $28.2-billion.

from

"Why are they picking on me?" she asked reporters after learning about the suit Monday night. "My stomach is all in knots." At first, her mother, Sylvia Torres, vowed to fight the industry. "For crying out loud, she's just a child," Ms. Torres said.

to

But late [Tuesday] the RIAA issued a statement announcing that Brianna's mother had settled for $2,000 and quoting the little girl as saying: "I am sorry for what I have done. I love music and don't want to hurt the artists I love." The release also quoted Ms. Torres as saying: "We understand now that file-sharing the music was illegal. You can be sure Brianna won't be doing it any more."

in less than 24 hours!!!

Found it: the Globe and Mail.

So if I hack Mr. Oppenheims computer and "unreasonably" search it (i.e. rifle through his private data) I am immune to rules on unreasonable searches because I am a hacker and not a cop? Nice to know.... Now where did I put that SubSeven kit.....

There was this case, where a hacker posted trojaned applications to kiddie porn newsgroups. He then gathered evidence on those stupid enough to install it, and provided the information to law enforcement agencies. Even after he told them that the information came from hacking, it was not thrown out on the 4th amendment defense. I tried to submit it to slashdot but it was rejected.

So, if you hack Mr. Oppenheims computer (and/or torture him until he provides you with the password for any containers, appearantly), you can submit it to the police, and Mr. Oppenheim can't use the 4th Amendment defense. However, nothing prevents you from being prosecuted under any hacking/torture law though...

Kjella

"At this point, nothing has been contemplated that would change [as a result of] this transaction," Alex Slusky, Vector Capital managing partner, said in an interview yesterday. "Current Corel management continues to run Corel."

[Slusky] believes Corel is going to be "very successful" if it doesn't have to worry about all the costs and complexities of maintaining its public status.

Fuck this article, who fucking cares about a book. This is more important.

Black Box Voting

The source code for the software used in one voting machine was discovered on the Internet, on an unprotected FTP site belonging to Ohio-based Diebold Election Systems Inc. The software, when compiled and run in tests, showed that it appears to be the code used in the company's AccuVote-TS touch-screen terminals.

This software has been analyzed in detail at Truthout.org: How to Rig an Election in the United States. I think your stomach will start turning just a couple paragraphs in. No, let me start it turning for you: the backend database for this state-of-the-art touch-screen votiong machine is Microsoft Access. But that's only part of the story. Wait until you read about the hidden tables. More details here: How We Discovered The Backdoor. The actual code from the FTP site is here: Original Data.

I don't know about you, but I became a little nauseous reading this.... It's quite the yee-opener.

Some more on "problematic" election results:
Florida Ballots Project

Greg Palast's The Best Democracy Money Can Buy

NY TImes: Computer Voting Is Open to Easy Fraud, Experts Say

The most stomach churning thing of all, I think, is the Christian Right connection to Deibold and ES&S.

If you find this stuff credible, spread the word around.

According to this article: "Canada will be added to the Apple system when the CRIA completes its negotiations in the fall"

CRIA = Canadian Recording Industry Association.

FYI, Bell ADSL removed the bandwidth limitations last month...

...most true gamers own consoles now. The PC gaming market is shrinking.

Hell, even Microsoft, the maker of this Windows gaming platform, agrees!

Apple's iTunes Music Store doesn't (to my knowledge) support Canada yet, so I can't yet take advantage of it.

According to Globe and Mail, Canadian users will indeed get iTunes Music Store soon. By mid- to late-September, the CRIA will have completed negotiations to set up a framework for paying music publishers and composers whose music is downloaded on pay-for-play systems. After this, Apple can support iTMS there.

(Granted, this only tells you when Apple can start iTunes, but still, it holds promise...)

WRT to addiction side of it though, here's an interesting study of gaming addiction.

After all, we know Micro$oft servers are a lot easier to crack than Linux or BSD servers, so they'll probably take the brunt of this.

It's asinine thinking like this that causes people to get hacked!

According to this article, 76% of boxes hacked in May were Linux boxes! Only 15% were Windows machines. It's just the simple thought that "oh it's open source, so it's gotta be secure!" that gets people to not update their stuff and get hacked.

Open source security vulnerabilities are just as frequent as Msft's, even moreso. Regardless of what you're running, you need to friggin update and stay on top of the game.

Or, you could just run chroot'ed Apache on OpenBSD.* :D

*The above statement shows the equal tradeoff between security and speed.

You've been listening to bigots too much. 76% of machines rooted in May were Linux boxes, while 15% Windows. I'd be more leary if they were running PHP....

I hate to sound like troll, but can someone please me, WTF is this all about?

I'll tell ya what I think... M$ sponsored FUD.

When has a Linux Box _ever_ been the root cause of crashing the entier internet?

I found it interesting that Telus, a Canadian telco, will use equipment from American companies Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks whereas Sprint, an American telco will use equipment from Canada's Nortel.

I have nothing particularly insightful to say right now. Talk amongst yourselves ;-)

Users of file sharing programs such as Kazaa and iMesh are urged to install a security patch after a serious bug was discovered in their underlying network.

A security researcher recently found a potentially critical vulnerability in the program that drives the FastTrack network. FastTrack is used by peer-to-peer software service including Kazaa and iMesh. Joltid, the maker of FastTrack, initially said the flaw was not serious, but has since done an about-face and plans to plug the loophole.

The makers of Kazaa will release a patch within the next 24 hours and are urging customers to install it as soon as possible.

According to the original security advisory, published on the Full Disclosure security mailing list, attackers can take control of or crash the FastTrack "supernodes" that file swappers connect to.

"It's definitely a serious risk. Just ask anyone if executing arbitrary code is a serious risk or not," the researcher said.

Identifying himself only by his pseudonym, Random Nut, he said he went public with the vulnerability after waiting nearly two weeks for Kazaa and Joltid to get back to him.

"On Tue 13 May I e-mailed a guy at Joltid, and about two days later I filed a bug report at [the Kazaa Web site]. Yesterday, after reading it on Full Disclosure, someone working for Joltid contacted me. He told me that the guy I e-mailed had been on a long honeymoon," he said.

Although he has exploited the vulnerability, he will not make the exploit code public.

"I haven't released the exploit code. I don't want some little script-kiddie to close down all of the network or parts of it," he said.

A representative for Sharman Networks, the company behind Kazaa, said the company had been informed by Joltid that the issue wasn't serious.

"As a licensee, Sharman Networks has been advised that the security of the FastTrack peer-to-peer technology is not under any significant risk," she said. Kazaa will use information provided by Joltid in authoring a patch.

"Sharman Networks has been provided with an update from the FastTrack's licensors which addresses this issue," the company said in a statement. "The latest update will be available for download within 24 hours, and we encourage users to install it as soon as possible."

I find it quite funny that most posters doesn't have any idea about the graphics market.

Here is the lates marketshare data from Q1-2003:
Whole market:
NVIDIA: 31%
Intel: 29%
ATI: 19%

Desktop standalone:
NVIDIA: 64%
ATI: 28%

"I'm hoping this is a driver issue and that subsequent optimized releases of Detinator will speed it up. If not, it is a sad day for NVidia."

What is a driver issue? Article talks about that with an OpenGL wrapper Dawn demo can be run on some ATI cards, nothing more. Slashdot summary is quite misleading since there isn't any benchmarks.

Kind of like Texas? Even New York wants to copy us.

Louisiana, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and New Mexico - well they're all just a bunch of back-woods hicks who don't know nuthin 'bout them 'puters. :)

Sure, I remember. I also remember anyone with any sense was looking to get away from Microsoft as fast as they could. Everyone predicted that M$ would simply use this tool to continue the anti-competitive parctices that were making the platform unstable and unusable. Everyone had already bemoaned the dll hell and knew that throwning more stuff into the same pit would bring less stability not more. Now it's in the EULA that you HAVE to let them do this. I'm sooooooo glad, I moved to free software and put up with a few warts that have been fixed.

The lockdown our shill says is so reasonable will not work. His world is steadily contracting, but so is the world his IT managers work in. Microsoft is going to keep tossing dumb stuff like this that breaks their own software even if you completely sell your soul to the beast. Isn't that the reason people bought into Microsoft stuff to begin with, all the programs that were available? The idea was that competition would provide good quality software. Well, where is that competition now? Want to cure your IE browser vulnerabilities? Right, just trie to remove IE. How about Outlook, the source of our shill's woe? All you are left with on M$ is M$, locked down and out. It's no wonder his IT dudes are so edgy. They know, in the end, that they won't be able to keep Microsoft out. As it is, users can "improve" Outlook with colors ...

The closed source software distribution model has been taken to it's ultimate form by M$ and it's a dismal failure. Their passport and DRM junk are last ditch efforts to lock their existing user base in. It's not going to work and much of IT will be destroyed as users exercise the "I'm not buying it." option. Microsoft's clamp downs are due to the inadequacies of their own tools. It's disgusting how they continue to shift the blame onto their users and administrators.

The free software model gives greater system control, stability and user freedom. There's no reason to lock the user down when you give them a trusted and free source of software to chose from. Even if you do decide not to give root to your users, they can still write and install software in their home directories. The whole Star Office program can be installed in a user's home direcory stand alone. Nasties like Gator don't exist in the free software world and they can easily be removed if they are created. All of this with great uptimes too.

The issue is thornier than that when you consider that Federal spending makes up more than 25% of the US Gross Domestic Product. It should be obvious what kind of tax burden we bear to support that kind of spending. If all Federal spending was directed by the political whims of individual agents, we might feel as if the fruits of our labors were being stripped from us to fund things we dissagree with. That is a state also known as slavery.

That said, it's hard to dissagree with the reasons Theo claims got the project canned. Saying silly things like, "I try to convince myself that our grant means a half of a cruise missile doesn't get built." in a public paper will get you canned from a military project. A statement like that is half a nothing away from advocating sabotage at plants building weapons. You might expect that military projects would require the loyalty or at least prohibit active resistance. You might also imagine the kind of problems this statement would have created for Theo's advocates inside the DARPA administration.

Why should DARPA fund someone who proclaims that his goals are contrary to its Congressionally mandated goals?

Because they care more for the results than brief flashes of fame, and doing otherwise would imply that they are buying the person's or group's silence. Freedom of opinion is no different here. A situation to the contrary sounds awful lot like tyranny.

Also, I re-read the article that stated Theo's opinion and quote. Let me extract the relevant piece here:

Mr. de Raadt is no fan of the U.S. military at the moment. He calls the war in Iraq an oil grab. "It just sickens me."

That is nothing more than a voiced opinion, and not even targeted at any single government-funded instance. As I understand that quote, it was directed towards the entire US Military, which only does what their elected leaders directly or indirectly tell them to. You are allowed to criticize your employer, who pays your wage; you are free to criticize your parents who happen to support you for most of your youth. You are also free to criticize the politicians you YOURSELF have voted for. If we are denied the right to voice criticism the minute we are getting paid or show support, there is no real freedom of opinion.

It would be interesting to see what nations have tried to pull such a stunt off and what we remember of them from history.

Theo's message follows:
- - - -
FYI,

It has come to my attention that DARPA has cancelled the POSSE program with UPENN, (sub OpenBSD & a bit for OpenSSL) for undisclosed reasons, effective today, without any warning.

My suspicion is this happened because I made anti-war statements in a Canadian newspaper article in the Globe & Mail, but I am not an American citizen so I cannot claim to have free speech there (even made "quote of the day").

In a phone call a few days ago it was expressed to me that there were people inside DARPA and UPENN who were very uncomfortable with the article, but I was not told specifically what upset them.

We have 60 developers flying in from around the world (they bought their own tickets, non-refundable) for a Hackathon May 8 - 20, where we do a major part of our development; since DARPA is now forcing UPENN to cancel those Hotel accomodations, I would be very grateful if anyone can find a way to help us. I'm going to need to pay for it myself, since these people are going to come.

Thanks.
- - - -
The anti-war statements that were made can be found here
--
Full steam ahead, stoke the boiler with more kittens! -- Bluey, Dragon Tails

Theo's anti-war comments in The Globe and Mail can be found here. Theo wasn't told why funding was pulled but he suspects his comments there did it.

I don't think it was Theo's comments to ZDNet on "security through beer drinking" which can be found here.

The "oil grab" comment does strike me as a bit uninformed and polemic, but I'll leave that debate for another time. As an OpenBSD user, I'm sad to see the funding pulled and not happy that someone in the U.S. gov't is being petty. (Or perhaps they're just paranoid?)

--LP

Spotted this on the list: U.S. Military helps fund Calgary Hacker

Anger over broadband limits

Why's my cell phone melting?

NCTA Weighs In on IP Telephony

FBI Seeks Hacker of eBay Users' Info

Labels battle to hold onto DMCA win

Western Digital to Launch 10,000rpm Desktop HDD 11th Feb

On the trail of a stolen Tablet PC

Game on for cable

Mail-order drug suppliers under gun

Two panels to monitor Pentagon's spy project

In Europe, Microsoft faces tough sell

Intel to discuss Manitoba and GPS efforts at IDF

More unrest seen among tech workers

While slashdot talks about games on obsolete gamess consoles which no body gives a FLYING DOG SHIT ABOUT! Here are some REAL NEWS! From better news sources like google news and fark(!).

yet another linux migration story
More security holes in open sores software!

Nasa to look at snow flakes!

DRM to be used on water supplies

Jackasses are dumbasses

I am 371673R than j00!

Oddly enough, Linux might have a real shot in the "larger pda/tablet market." There are stories out there about IBM's Meta Pad, as well reports of an AMD/China/Alchemy Semiconductor type thing... both situations where MS need not apply.

Even the Lindows guy is talking about $500 tablets... though he's thinking handwriting recognition isn't needed.

I think tablets look cool, and do have applications in medical/retail/industrial settings, but not for $2,000, not yet. Hoping Midori or whatever, plus other chip options, besides full-fledged Pentiums can get the cost down.

eWeek
Computer Graphics World
Business Week
Globetechnology.com
ZDNet

The wonders of news.google.com.

Last year I had an opportunity to speak with one of the licensed services that are available, who was sued by the RIAA, for being too interactive.
Several points were emphasised
1) This is the price take it or leave it. (there is no negotiating the price, it's set.)
2) You have to write snailmail, and be sure to include the business information (I was told unless you have approx $1,000,000 in liquid assets they won't even talk to you or respond.)
3) Everything, the terms, price, these discussions are confidential or you pay an outragous fine.
4) You play what we tell you to play, not what you want.

There is a really good article on
Globe Technology thats starts "The following are 10 rules of e-business failure, a list inspired by the recording industry's imaginative approach:"

However, they do allow, and even encourage, the use of GnucleusLAN, which allows access on the local network. Since it is all local, we get really high transfer rates (at least 400KB/s), and it doesn't degrade network performance. Yes, the files are at least a week old (many kids get files of Kazaa when they go home for the weekend), but I've been able to get more stuff than I ever could on the outside.

You have to remember that P2P software is very inefficient with bandwidth. As this article shows, P2P programs can generate as much as 150KB/s of downstream traffic even when you aren't downloading stuff.

So, in conclusion, stop whining (and good luck finding any other college which allows unrestricted P2P access). Just be lucky that you have any access to internet P2P -- most college students don't anymore.

Can someone tell me why this is news?

Almost every college and university has blocked or limited P2P software from accessing the internet, simply because the bandwidth is too expensive. Here at WPI, soon after Napster became popular, internet connection speeds dropped to less than 10% of what they previously were. After blocking P2P software, bandwidth use dropped a whopping 87%. However, the do allow, and even encourage, the use of GnucleusLAN, which allows access on the local network. Since it is all local, we get really high transfer rates (at least 400KB/s), and it doesn't degrade network performance. Yes, the files are at least a week old (many kids get files of Kazaa when they go home for the weekend), but I've been able to get more stuff than I ever could on the outside. You have to remember that P2P software is very inefficient with bandwidth. As this article shows, P2P programs can generate as much as 150KB/s of downstream traffic even when you aren't downloading stuff. So, in conclusion, stop whining (and good luck finding any other college which allows unrestricted P2P access). Just be lucky that you have any access to internet P2P -- most college students don't anymore. Can someone tell me why this is news?

The IPic won the 1999 Slashdot World Smallest web Server title. It is based on the world's smallest implementation of a TCP/IP stack(256 bytes) -- which is implemented on the PIC (a small 8-pin low-power microcontroller) .. using a mere 512 words of program ROM. At the time I thought this is great. At a dollar a chip, we will have this in all our toasters and light bulbs in a couple years but it has been three years and I have not heard of it since then. So, as noted in yesterday's Globe and Mail - After two decades of hype about 'smart homes' with computerized brains that control lights, stoves and stereos, The Clapper still rules the living room.

I thought even the revised version had been killed in comittee as reported here - Copyright [CBDTPA] Bill Universally Rejected [slashdot.org]

The CBDTPA is NOT (legally) dead. It is still alive in congress -- we still need to keep our eyes open. The title of the news article that prompted the /. discussion was misleading: "Copyright bill universally rejected"

see lib. of congress bill status

If a book is out of print and no longer being sold, should the gov't have the right to continue to tax the author simply because the gov't feels that IP has value?

Yes. This is called a "copyright renewal." It was a feature of the Copyright Act of 1909, abolished for new works in 1976 and for all post-1964 works in 1992.

If I create a GPL'ed program, retain the copyright to it many folks the world over find it to be an incredibly useful bit of code (one that helps lots of companies save money / generate revenue) should I (as the owner of the IP) be taxed year after year because the gov't determines that bit of code has value?

After ten years, how much value do you still perceive in that code? You could just donate the code to the PD and stop paying the renewal fees.

Lawrence Lessig, a law professor and author of popular books about thought monopolies, has advocated a return to copyright renewal. Here's my slightly modified version of his system: Make copyrights on new works last 10 years. Then every 5 years, you have to file an extension to keep your monopoly, you can only file an extension a small number of times (I'd say 13 times, for a maximum term of 75 years), and after 25 years have expired, compulsory licensing under RAND terms for both verbatim copies and derivative works comes into effect.