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I thought the page looked pretty good, so I hopped on over to Kazaa and downloaded it. Thanks for the recommendation!

So this means we're going to have to buy the DVDs? nope.

And if it isn't, then KaZaA and Bonzi Buddy are not spyware either...

I think we should just agree that the right to privacy should prevail over the ability of the companies to enforce compliance with software licences. Yes, it's important that Adobe is compensated for Photoshop, but it is not so important as to permit the software to spy on its users.

I am baffled as to why i have yet to see this mentioned (maybe I have not looked around enough).

The only way to be able to say in court that a given user actually was making a certain file available to the public is for the RIAA to have downloaded the file themselves. (unless of course they were sniffing the traffic, but that would be illegal as well)

If they used kazaa to download from users to find out that they had an "illegal" file they would violate kazaa licence terms

"2 What You Can't Do Under This Licence" sub sections:
"2.11 Monitor traffic or make search requests in order to accumulate information about individual users;",
"2.12 "Stalk" or otherwise harass another;" and
"2.14 Collect or store personal data about other users."

If they somehow reverse engineered kazaa to make their own client and avoid the above licence stipulations they would have run afoul of:
"3.2 Except as expressly permitted in this Licence, you agree not to reverse engineer, de-compile, disassemble, alter, duplicate, modify, rent, lease, loan, sublicense, make copies, create derivative works from, distribute or provide others with the Software in whole or part, transmit or communicate the application over a network."

It is more likely that frustrated buyers will go back to Morpheus and Kazaa. Do it! Those idiots at the big record labels will never figure this stuff out.

$0 on Kazaa.

Who needs Adobe? I get all my Photoshop versions from KaZaa!

I'm sorry, I just can't agree with the folks who argue that Indian software engineers with doctorate degrees making minimum wage working on outdated equipment in code sweatshops will somehow put me out of a job. I'll do it by fiddling with my 401k, IM-ing, kazooming, and playing Civ-III all day long.

No worries

Ok. Click here to be sued.

You (and I) are the minority. I too am waiting for ogg support, but oggs aren't easily available on popular P2P networks yet, so nobody is in a huge rush to make a product that there's not much demand for.

on the site they state that "Kazaa Media Desktop is not bundled with spyware, and we respect your privacy. See our Privacy Statement for information on our data practices."

i remember something about this not being true. do they lie?

If you read KaZaA's "No Spyware" Policy, you would know that KaZaA contains no spyware. It only contains the following.

• Content - payment for distribution of Rights Managed content (marked with Gold Icons).
• Regular banner and pop advertising - within KMD and Kazaa.com (DoubleClick and Cydoor).
• SaveNow - presents coupons and offers that are related to the websites that you are visiting. SaveNow operates and is managed separately to Kazaa Media Desktop.
• Sales of products and services - eg. BullGuard, MatchNet.

See? No spyware.

Someone else that we know has been getting behind the action of it all. Microsoft has been distributing content with their own DRM through ALTnet on Kazaa.

PressPlay is already on the same path using Microsoft DRM.

Slyck Ciarán: Janus Friis recently told Slyck that "Grokster is an older customized version of KMD/FT" and that older versions "supernode server to fetch seed IP addresses when not available locally". The verdict seemed to clear Gokster Ltd of operating any supernode server. Can you categorically say that Grokster does not need a supernode server and if not how does it fetch the location of supernodes when not availably locally?

Grokster: Grokster does not operate a Supernode server or a server with IP addresses or any type of server that interfaces in any way with the operation of Grokster or FastTrack with the exception of ad serving via the Start page. Grokster does not need a Supernode server to operate.

I wouldn't worry. Microsoft are trying to rain on the parade (read article about WMP9's "anti-piracy" features) so you won't be able to do that for much longer.

Only if these applications are highly interactive.

The most prominent applications deployed as of April 2003 that 1. absolutely require a connection significantly faster than dial-up and 2. are not primarily used for mass piracy are video conferencing and online twitch gaming. Both are highly interactive.

Kazaa has that, they call it an integrity rating. Files are rated Excelent, average or poor.

No, but they advertised it then

OptimumOnline never advertised the ability to upload. Rather, OptimumOnline advertised the ability to download.

Well, lets look at Kazaa.

It's website is in English. It's software is in English, and it does not have a Norwegian version of the software and probably never will. Take a look at their Languages page. It doesn't even have plans to open a Norweigan version of their software, but yet they want to release it in Spanish, French and German? Spanish is basically the second most spoken language in the United States, not Norway. Now, if we take a look at the most common languages in Norway, we can see here and here that hardly anyone speaks English in Norway. Most speak, um, Norwegian (most common dialect is Bokmål).

So, as we can plainly see, Kazaa is targeting the US demographic, not Norway/Denmark/Estonia. Yet their servers and establishments are in Denmark? Why? It's to gain marketshare and profit from the American people, yet not contribute the US. In fact, they're taking money away from the American government. There are no US taxes on the products, so your basically throwing your money away. (Yes, Money, there is now "Kazaa Plus" which costs $$$). Kazaa's advertisments target US customers, it's product is made for US customers and it's only intrest is in the US customer base.

Kazaa is obviously not interested in P2P technology or it's future. It stole Gntuella's technology spec and re-wrote it. Kazaa also has Network Supernodes (dedicated nodes, always on) and other centralized components. So if you took those away, expect drastic changes in performance. The RIAA has pretty much presumed Kazaa was built just like that for a while. Kazaa is all about money. Take away the money, watch the developers flee. The "developers" of Kazaa have already started up similar companies. They know Kazaa will be shut down eventually, and of course they need to keep making their un-deserved millions.

Kazaa will eventually be shut down, even if it means Jennifer Gardner running out of an exploding building in the Netherlands.

Well, lets look at Kazaa.

It's website is in English. It's software is in English, and it does not have a Norwegian version of the software and probably never will. Take a look at their Languages page. It doesn't even have plans to open a Norweigan version of their software, but yet they want to release it in Spanish, French and German? Spanish is basically the second most spoken language in the United States, not Norway. Now, if we take a look at the most common languages in Norway, we can see here and here that hardly anyone speaks English in Norway. Most speak, um, Norwegian (most common dialect is Bokmål).

So, as we can plainly see, Kazaa is targeting the US demographic, not Norway/Denmark/Estonia. Yet their servers and establishments are in Denmark? Why? It's to gain marketshare and profit from the American people, yet not contribute the US. In fact, they're taking money away from the American government. There are no US taxes on the products, so your basically throwing your money away. (Yes, Money, there is now "Kazaa Plus" which costs $$$). Kazaa's advertisments target US customers, it's product is made for US customers and it's only intrest is in the US customer base.

Kazaa is obviously not interested in P2P technology or it's future. It stole Gntuella's technology spec and re-wrote it. Kazaa also has Network Supernodes (dedicated nodes, always on) and other centralized components. So if you took those away, expect drastic changes in performance. The RIAA has pretty much presumed Kazaa was built just like that for a while. Kazaa is all about money. Take away the money, watch the developers flee. The "developers" of Kazaa have already started up similar companies. They know Kazaa will be shut down eventually, and of course they need to keep making their un-deserved millions.

Kazaa will eventually be shut down, even if it means Jennifer Gardner running out of an exploding building in the Netherlands.

I've carefully read the EULA, but I do not find any explicit permission given to KAZAA to "2.4 Forge headers or otherwise manipulate identifiers in order to disguise the origin of any data transmitted to other users". On the contrary, the user is explicitly forbidden from doing so.

~velco

while I don't think that this is on-topic since users don't submit the mp3s that other users pay to dl, let me point out that Kazaa has introduced Altnet files ( more info here) that certify that "Beatles - Can't buy me love" (or whatever) actually IS what you read and not something else.
How reliable is such a system? I don't know but it's definatly a good idea.

I hope you're using the spyware-free KaZaa Lite rather than the infested KaZaa.

I'd take a wild guess that he's running some sort of P2P client (e.g. KaZaA, Direct Connect, Gnutella etc.) They can soak up a lot of upstream bandwidth (so I've heard :-)

I don't think you realized, but other freeware programs come with servers installed. Because they all offer the same functionality (ie: remote administration) there is no real purpose to create a separate XP Server Edition.

; )

So true! When Napster got busted, Morpheus, KaZaA, and Audio Galaxy popped up. But let's face facts: as long as there's been pirates as long as there's been the Audio and Video cassette, as well as the Personal Computer, like the Apple ][, there have been pirates! The Pirating "Industry" will all ways be here. Unless that there is some sort of PHYSICAL prevention, like the difficulty of creating Vynil Discs from LPs, people will always have work-arounds. Even these new "Copy-Protected" CDs and DVDs have workarounds! For DVDs, there's a software solution, for CDs, there's a physical soulution, and for CDs, it a simple method that it totally logical. The pirates won't dissappear unless new laws pop up that would practically squelch our rights, and put our legal system in a light that makes it seem like the old commie Soviet Union. Let's face it, pirates will allways exist, but what can be done is to reduce the numbers of pirates, which reduces the loss of money. The evoloution of DVD-A bringing beter audio, and promising more storage will bring richer media. More things need to be on music discs. Things like full lyrical lists, artist information, music videos, and, for those who like it, Kareoke videos, but these will probably be pirated too. It's a never ending cycle caused by the Digital Revolution and supported by more powerful and better computers and Broad-Band Internet Connections.

It'[s a 55 meg download you can find mirrors
here non-windows
or
here if you running windows

"...download open source and public domain content from multiple peers and mirrors in parallel."

These usefull features have already been implemented in KaZaA [www.kazaa.com].

Which part stuns you? They have found a potential source of income. People don't care. They'll install anything on their machine. In their privacy statement they clearly state that they collect any information they can, and use much of that information any way they want. In their resource usage page they say that they also can steal 10% of your CPU power.

They have said it all loud and clear, and if you install the software, you practically give them the right to use your computer and information gathered for anything they want. No-one has to install this piece of software, it's your own choice.

Sometime someone said, "think before you type"... you should also "think before you download".

Which part stuns you? They have found a potential source of income. People don't care. They'll install anything on their machine. In their privacy statement they clearly state that they collect any information they can, and use much of that information any way they want. In their resource usage page they say that they also can steal 10% of your CPU power.

They have said it all loud and clear, and if you install the software, you practically give them the right to use your computer and information gathered for anything they want. No-one has to install this piece of software, it's your own choice.

Sometime someone said, "think before you type"... you should also "think before you download".

My own music purchasing has declined substantially since napster went away and getting music got "harder" - limewire and the rest are ok, but nowhere near as convenient as napster was.

Have you tried Kazaa? It's got a bad rep because of the security stuff, but I find that there's a WAY bigger selection than there ever was on Napster, and with multi-user downloads and automatic resume, it's way more reliable too. As I speak, 373 million files from 1 million users are indexed and live.

Your privacy is important to us. Read this easy overview of the things we are working on to make what you do on the Net your business.

Your privacy is important to us. Read this easy overview of the things we are working on to make what you do on the Net your business.

As long as the RIAA continues to treat music like product instead of art, and bands as corporate chess pieces instead of artists, nothing will change. Some fans will rebel, some will complain, but most will just keep taking it up the ass.

Thank you.

Given that the supposed quote from the Terms of Service given in the page doesn't actually appear in the Terms of Use listed on the KaZaA site, it's probably safe to assume it's a joke.

What part of responsibility or role do the hosting companies hold in this ? We provide an Acceptable Use Policy and I think if we had a Kazaa user as customer, trading MP3s, and we get a court order to cancel service, we'd have to.

Has anybody had such experiences/similar scenarios they'd share ? What are the implications of such a judgement on current AUPs legal documents in the hosting industry ?

I would like to share with you a story - a story of pain, rejection, denial, loneliness, and perhaps, at the end, triumph and a happy ending. This story begins just three short years ago...

I was in my senior year of highschool, and as was the style at the time, I was very much interested in computers. I loved to take them apart, figure out how they worked, write programs with Microsoft's fine development environment, Visual Studio. As was also the style at the time, I loved to read webpages, in particularly, Slashdot.org. Perhaps you can guess what happened next. I began to slowly change - I developed an unhealthy obsession with computers, began to dislike and openly question America's policies, started shamelessly pirating music and software, and most dangerously, got turned on to that most deviant operating system of all - Linux.

Now I know many of you must be shaking your head in disgust at this point - "This must just be another one of those M$ trolls, hardee har har," but please, hear me out. This is very important.

As time went on, I got deeper and deeper in the Linux underground. I progressed through the various levels of "distros," from Mandrake, to Suse, to RedHat, finally to Debian, like a drug user going from harmless marijuana to cocaine and heroin. I thought I was so smart; I began sneering at other people who didn't use Linux - "Clueless Windo$e luzers," I would say. I was changing outwardly as well. I became a loner, hunched over the keyboard late into the night with the lights off, listening to my illegally downloaded music. All my friends left me after I broke their computers trying to install Linux on them. My hair grew long and unkempt, I stopped bathing and using deodorant, calling them "tools of capitalism and American greed." I got fired from my sysadmin job for installing slackware over the Solaris servers, and installing Debian over the Windows desktops. My bosses told me I cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I would not listen. "How could I be wrong, I'm using Linux?" I thought, "They must be M$ shills." You can see how far gone I was. No girls would look at me, let alone speak to me. I was in a world of pain, anger, and confusion.

But, then one day, I took a long hard look at myself. I saw that something was wrong, but did not know what. I must confess, for a long time I denied what I knew deep down inside my heart - Linux was the cause of all my troubles. I saw what I had allowed myself to become. I was no longer a human being, I was a Linux Zealot. Instead of judging people by their thoughts, feelings, and actions, I judged them by their choice of Operating System. And so began the long road toward recovery...

I am still not fully recovered from my affliction, for you see, I have only one desktop machine, and cannot install Windows without losing much of my data. That's right, I am healthy enough to admit it, Linux is not for desktop use. I am planning my next desktop machine purchase, which will be an Apple iBook. The one good thing that came out of my years of torment is that I learned the power of Unix. Therefore, I will use MacOSX - a true Unix with excellent support and commercial software backing, something Linux will never have. By paying for my software from now on, I will be supporting the American economy. I want to help get America out of this economic tailspin brought on by open source software and the dot com bust. More importantly, I will no longer be an operating system zealot. I will be friendly, kind, and generous to my fellow humans, no matter which operating system they use. I am now slowly regaining my friends, and last weekend I actually got invited to a party - my first party! Perhaps this weekend I will ask a cute girl out on a date. Since I have cleaned myself up and changed my attitude, I have noticed a few girls giving me flirty looks around campus. I'm so excited about my new life!

Please, Fellow Readers of Slashdot, I implore you to look at what you have become. Although it will be long and difficult, you too can change. I have faith in that. You can start by saying this with me - "Microsoft is not evil, Linux is not good for the desktop." Repeat that every time you feel yourself slipping. Together, we can right this horrible wrong.

Thank You.

Check out Kazaa. Flash is free. From their site:

KaZaA does not condone activities and actions that breach the copyright of artists and copyright owners - as a KaZaA user you are bound by the KaZaA Terms of Use and laws governing copyright in each country

You'll have to sign up for a Kazaa ID.

I would like to share with you a story - a story of pain, rejection, denial, loneliness, and perhaps, at the end, triumph and a happy ending. This story begins just three short years ago...

I was in my senior year of highschool, and as was the style at the time, I was very much interested in computers. I loved to take them apart, figure out how they worked, write programs with Microsoft's fine development environment, Visual Studio. As was also the style at the time, I loved to read webpages, in particularly, Slashdot.org. Perhaps you can guess what happened next. I began to slowly change - I developed an unhealthy obsession with computers, began to dislike and openly question America's policies, started shamelessly pirating music and software, and most dangerously, got turned on to that most deviant operating system of all - Linux.

Now I know many of you must be shaking your head in disgust at this point - "This must just be another one of those M$ trolls, hardee har har," but please, hear me out. This is very important.

As time went on, I got deeper and deeper in the Linux underground. I progressed through the various levels of "distros," from Mandrake, to Suse, to RedHat, finally to Debian, like a drug user going from harmless marijuana to cocaine and heroin. I thought I was so smart; I began sneering at other people who didn't use Linux - "Clueless Windo$e luzers," I would say. I was changing outwardly as well. I became a loner, hunched over the keyboard late into the night with the lights off, listening to my illegally downloaded music. All my friends left me after I broke their computers trying to install Linux on them. My hair grew long and unkempt, I stopped bathing and using deodorant, calling them "tools of capitalism and American greed." I got fired from my sysadmin job for installing slackware over the Solaris servers, and installing Debian over the Windows desktops. My bosses told me I cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I would not listen. "How could I be wrong, I'm using Linux?" I thought, "They must be M$ shills." You can see how far gone I was. No girls would look at me, let alone speak to me. I was in a world of pain, anger, and confusion.

But, then one day, I took a long hard look at myself. I saw that something was wrong, but did not know what. I must confess, for a long time I denied what I knew deep down inside my heart - Linux was the cause of all my troubles. I saw what I had allowed myself to become. I was no longer a human being, I was a Linux Zealot. Instead of judging people by their thoughts, feelings, and actions, I judged them by their choice of Operating System. And so began the long road toward recovery...

I am still not fully recovered from my affliction, for you see, I have only one desktop machine, and cannot install Windows without losing much of my data. That's right, I am healthy enough to admit it, Linux is not for desktop use. I am planning my next desktop machine purchase, which will be an Apple iBook. The one good thing that came out of my years of torment is that I learned the power of Unix. Therefore, I will use MacOSX - a true Unix with excellent support and commercial software backing, something Linux will never have. By paying for my software from now on, I will be supporting the American economy. I want to help get America out of this economic tailspin brought on by open source software and the dot com bust. More importantly, I will no longer be an operating system zealot. I will be friendly, kind, and generous to my fellow humans, no matter which operating system they use. I am now slowly regaining my friends, and last weekend I actually got invited to a party - my first party! Perhaps this weekend I will ask a cute girl out on a date. Since I have cleaned myself up and changed my attitude, I have noticed a few girls giving me flirty looks around campus. I'm so excited about my new life!

Please, Fellow Readers of Slashdot, I implore you to look at what you have become. Although it will be long and difficult, you too can change. I have faith in that. You can start by saying this with me - "Microsoft is not evil, Linux is not good for the desktop." Repeat that every time you feel yourself slipping. Together, we can right this horrible wrong.

Thank You.

I would like to share with you a story - a story of pain, rejection, denial, loneliness, and perhaps, at the end, triumph and a happy ending. This story begins just three short years ago...

I was in my senior year of highschool, and as was the style at the time, I was very much interested in computers. I loved to take them apart, figure out how they worked, write programs with Microsoft's fine development environment, Visual Studio. As was also the style at the time, I loved to read webpages, in particularly, Slashdot.org. Perhaps you can guess what happened next. I began to slowly change - I developed an unhealthy obsession with computers, began to dislike and openly question America's policies, started shamelessly pirating music and software, and most dangerously, got turned on to that most deviant operating system of all - Linux.

Now I know many of you must be shaking your head in disgust at this point - "This must just be another one of those M$ trolls, hardee har har," but please, hear me out. This is very important.

As time went on, I got deeper and deeper in the Linux underground. I progressed through the various levels of "distros," from Mandrake, to Suse, to RedHat, finally to Debian, like a drug user going from harmless marijuana to cocaine and heroin. I thought I was so smart; I began sneering at other people who didn't use Linux - "Clueless Windo$e luzers," I would say. I was changing outwardly as well. I became a loner, hunched over the keyboard late into the night with the lights off, listening to my illegally downloaded music. All my friends left me after I broke their computers trying to install Linux on them. My hair grew long and unkempt, I stopped bathing and using deodorant, calling them "tools of capitalism and American greed." I got fired from my sysadmin job for installing slackware over the Solaris servers, and installing Debian over the Windows desktops. My bosses told me I cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I would not listen. "How could I be wrong, I'm using Linux?" I thought, "They must be M$ shills." You can see how far gone I was. No girls would look at me, let alone speak to me. I was in a world of pain, anger, and confusion.

But, then one day, I took a long hard look at myself. I saw that something was wrong, but did not know what. I must confess, for a long time I denied what I knew deep down inside my heart - Linux was the cause of all my troubles. I saw what I had allowed myself to become. I was no longer a human being, I was a Linux Zealot. Instead of judging people by their thoughts, feelings, and actions, I judged them by their choice of Operating System. And so began the long road toward recovery...

I am still not fully recovered from my affliction, for you see, I have only one desktop machine, and cannot install Windows without losing much of my data. That's right, I am healthy enough to admit it, Linux is not for desktop use. I am planning my next desktop machine purchase, which will be an Apple iBook. The one good thing that came out of my years of torment is that I learned the power of Unix. Therefore, I will use MacOSX - a true Unix with excellent support and commercial software backing, something Linux will never have. By paying for my software from now on, I will be supporting the American economy. I want to help get America out of this economic tailspin brought on by open source software and the dot com bust. More importantly, I will no longer be an operating system zealot. I will be friendly, kind, and generous to my fellow humans, no matter which operating system they use. I am now slowly regaining my friends, and last weekend I actually got invited to a party - my first party! Perhaps this weekend I will ask a cute girl out on a date. Since I have cleaned myself up and changed my attitude, I have noticed a few girls giving me flirty looks around campus. I'm so excited about my new life!

Please, Fellow Readers of Slashdot, I implore you to look at what you have become. Although it will be long and difficult, you too can change. I have faith in that. You can start by saying this with me - "Microsoft is not evil, Linux is not good for the desktop." Repeat that every time you feel yourself slipping. Together, we can right this horrible wrong.

Thank You.

I would like to share with you a story - a story of pain, rejection, denial, loneliness, and perhaps, at the end, triumph and a happy ending. This story begins just three short years ago...

I was in my senior year of highschool, and as was the style at the time, I was very much interested in computers. I loved to take them apart, figure out how they worked, write programs with Microsoft's fine development environment, Visual Studio. As was also the style at the time, I loved to read webpages, in particularly, Slashdot.org. Perhaps you can guess what happened next. I began to slowly change - I developed an unhealthy obsession with computers, began to dislike and openly question America's policies, started shamelessly pirating music and software, and most dangerously, got turned on to that most deviant operating system of all - Linux.

Now I know many of you must be shaking your head in disgust at this point - "This must just be another one of those M$ trolls, hardee har har," but please, hear me out. This is very important.

As time went on, I got deeper and deeper in the Linux underground. I progressed through the various levels of "distros," from Mandrake, to Suse, to RedHat, finally to Debian, like a drug user going from harmless marijuana to cocaine and heroin. I thought I was so smart; I began sneering at other people who didn't use Linux - "Clueless Windo$e luzers," I would say. I was changing outwardly as well. I became a loner, hunched over the keyboard late into the night with the lights off, listening to my illegally downloaded music. All my friends left me after I broke their computers trying to install Linux on them. My hair grew long and unkempt, I stopped bathing and using deodorant, calling them "tools of capitalism and American greed." I got fired from my sysadmin job for installing slackware over the Solaris servers, and installing Debian over the Windows desktops. My bosses told me I cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I would not listen. "How could I be wrong, I'm using Linux?" I thought, "They must be M$ shills." You can see how far gone I was. No girls would look at me, let alone speak to me. I was in a world of pain, anger, and confusion.

But, then one day, I took a long hard look at myself. I saw that something was wrong, but did not know what. I must confess, for a long time I denied what I knew deep down inside my heart - Linux was the cause of all my troubles. I saw what I had allowed myself to become. I was no longer a human being, I was a Linux Zealot. Instead of judging people by their thoughts, feelings, and actions, I judged them by their choice of Operating System. And so began the long road toward recovery...

I am still not fully recovered from my affliction, for you see, I have only one desktop machine, and cannot install Windows without losing much of my data. That's right, I am healthy enough to admit it, Linux is not for desktop use. I am planning my next desktop machine purchase, which will be an Apple iBook. The one good thing that came out of my years of torment is that I learned the power of Unix. Therefore, I will use MacOSX - a true Unix with excellent support and commercial software backing, something Linux will never have. By paying for my software from now on, I will be supporting the American economy. I want to help get America out of this economic tailspin brought on by open source software and the dot com bust. More importantly, I will no longer be an operating system zealot. I will be friendly, kind, and generous to my fellow humans, no matter which operating system they use. I am now slowly regaining my friends, and last weekend I actually got invited to a party - my first party! Perhaps this weekend I will ask a cute girl out on a date. Since I have cleaned myself up and changed my attitude, I have noticed a few girls giving me flirty looks around campus. I'm so excited about my new life!

Please, Fellow Readers of Slashdot, I implore you to look at what you have become. Although it will be long and difficult, you too can change. I have faith in that. You can start by saying this with me - "Microsoft is not evil, Linux is not good for the desktop." Repeat that every time you feel yourself slipping. Together, we can right this horrible wrong.

Thank You.

I would like to share with you a story - a story of pain, rejection, denial, loneliness, and perhaps, at the end, triumph and a happy ending. This story begins just three short years ago...

I was in my senior year of highschool, and as was the style at the time, I was very much interested in computers. I loved to take them apart, figure out how they worked, write programs with Microsoft's fine development environment, Visual Studio. As was also the style at the time, I loved to read webpages, in particularly, Slashdot.org. Perhaps you can guess what happened next. I began to slowly change - I developed an unhealthy obsession with computers, began to dislike and openly question America's policies, started shamelessly pirating music and software, and most dangerously, got turned on to that most deviant operating system of all - Linux.

Now I know many of you must be shaking your head in disgust at this point - "This must just be another one of those M$ trolls, hardee har har," but please, hear me out. This is very important.

As time went on, I got deeper and deeper in the Linux underground. I progressed through the various levels of "distros," from Mandrake, to Suse, to RedHat, finally to Debian, like a drug user going from harmless marijuana to cocaine and heroin. I thought I was so smart; I began sneering at other people who didn't use Linux - "Clueless Windo$e luzers," I would say. I was changing outwardly as well. I became a loner, hunched over the keyboard late into the night with the lights off, listening to my illegally downloaded music. All my friends left me after I broke their computers trying to install Linux on them. My hair grew long and unkempt, I stopped bathing and using deodorant, calling them "tools of capitalism and American greed." I got fired from my sysadmin job for installing slackware over the Solaris servers, and installing Debian over the Windows desktops. My bosses told me I cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, but I would not listen. "How could I be wrong, I'm using Linux?" I thought, "They must be M$ shills." You can see how far gone I was. No girls would look at me, let alone speak to me. I was in a world of pain, anger, and confusion.

But, then one day, I took a long hard look at myself. I saw that something was wrong, but did not know what. I must confess, for a long time I denied what I knew deep down inside my heart - Linux was the cause of all my troubles. I saw what I had allowed myself to become. I was no longer a human being, I was a Linux Zealot. Instead of judging people by their thoughts, feelings, and actions, I judged them by their choice of Operating System. And so began the long road toward recovery...

I am still not fully recovered from my affliction, for you see, I have only one desktop machine, and cannot install Windows without losing much of my data. That's right, I am healthy enough to admit it, Linux is not for desktop use. I am planning my next desktop machine purchase, which will be an Apple iBook. The one good thing that came out of my years of torment is that I learned the power of Unix. Therefore, I will use MacOSX - a true Unix with excellent support and commercial software backing, something Linux will never have. By paying for my software from now on, I will be supporting the American economy. I want to help get America out of this economic tailspin brought on by open source software and the dot com bust. More importantly, I will no longer be an operating system zealot. I will be friendly, kind, and generous to my fellow humans, no matter which operating system they use. I am now slowly regaining my friends, and last weekend I actually got invited to a party - my first party! Perhaps this weekend I will ask a cute girl out on a date. Since I have cleaned myself up and changed my attitude, I have noticed a few girls giving me flirty looks around campus. I'm so excited about my new life!

Please, Fellow Readers of Slashdot, I implore you to look at what you have become. Although it will be long and difficult, you too can change. I have faith in that. You can start by saying this with me - "Microsoft is not evil, Linux is not good for the desktop." Repeat that every time you feel yourself slipping. Together, we can right this horrible wrong.

Thank You.

Interestingly, for the others who mention that Kazaa perpetrated this attack to boost their ad revenues, take a look at the Kazaa website.

The way they have a large graphic to welcome over Morpheus users makes it look rather suspicious at least...

- You also don't want sites that do not display well (or even worse, crash) in some browsers. I don't say you have to support every netscape version up to 0.7, but there really *is* a world apart from Internet Explorer 6.

- Make it fast. If you really want to cram your site full of gizmos, be sure to provide an alternative version for people who haven't got an OC30 directly connected to your datacenter.

- Do not annoy your visitors. That means: No pop-whatevers, no "If this banner is flashing, you've won a monkey to punch"-type of stuff. I also don't like pages with sounds, like the "cameron diaz ad" on kazaa, or even the embedded mp3 on mobistar's page. (Mobistar is a Belgian GSM operator).

One thing I think is really cool is the site of URGent, a Belgian student radio, where you can choose between several designs. The content is drawn from a database, and the designs range from a "lynx" theme to heavy graphics. (And I've heard there's a "kde-like" theme under way)...

As far as i can tell Napster boosted sales of a lot of bands and promoted people to buy the albums, obscure bands really got a boost from napster as people often werent willing to go out on a limb to buy music they hadnt heard at any length. I know i bought 2 more albums because of my Peer to Peer experiences.

Anyway Peer to peer is hardly dead, KaZaA has almost 500,000 people using it at any one time or so says my younger bro...

The limits of my language are the limits of my world -- Wittgenstein

If you're seriously comparing KaZaa and BearShare, you have a lot of learning to do.

Start with "SpyWare Tracking for Dummies" and then move on to "Why a File-Sharing Service with 1000 Times More Content is Better."

You should try filenavigator. I just tried it, and it has just as many results as kazaa.

No spyware either (as far as I can tell, with adaware).

This is stright from the front page of he web site:

The original brains behind Kazaa have moved on to develop new innovative software. The team now running Kazaa will continue to deliver the best technology for finding, saving and transfering all the data you want: no limits. Get ready for the next version of KaZaA with even better performance and enhanced usability. Click here to read the new Terms of Use for KaZaA.

To me, this sounds like a mass exodus, not a simple move to avoid some laws...

This is stright from the front page of he web site:

The original brains behind Kazaa have moved on to develop new innovative software. The team now running Kazaa will continue to deliver the best technology for finding, saving and transfering all the data you want: no limits. Get ready for the next version of KaZaA with even better performance and enhanced usability. Click here to read the new Terms of Use for KaZaA.

To me, this sounds like a mass exodus, not a simple move to avoid some laws...