Slashdot Mirror

In my home town what they are calling the Salem Whitch Hunt #2 is going on right now. They have suspended a girl just because she 'looks' like a witch and supposedly put a 'hex' on a teacher that got sick... What a load of crap.

Let's see, we have one candidate who recognized the potential of the net years before most people had even heard of it and who took steps to see that the development of the net was properly funded. The same individual also pressed to fund the federal laboratory which begat Mosaic, which begat Netscape.

Opposing him is a man who probably has difficulties operating a microwave, let alone a computer. The same individual who thinks that the internet is a great threat to our energy supply since it's currently consuming 8% of the nation's power.

Guess which one I'm voting for?

P.S. bo nus Doonesbury cartoon

I wonder how well this article coincides with
this article on MSNBC?

- JoeShmoe

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= -

The weekend did not manage to quell the massive amounts of coverage the Microsoft infiltration continues to garner. Virtually every news organization has its own version of the Microsoft debacle, of which we've provided a sampling below. Meanwhile, we are left wondering why the crown jewels of Microsoft were left at the mercy of passwords. There are all sorts of other authentication technologies that we have no doubt Microsoft will be investigating. Perhaps utilizing the smart card support in Windows 2000 wouldn't be a bad idea. It's a shame it takes negative incidents like this to get people to consider security as a strategic business issue. Shame on you, Microsoft.

• The Wall Street Journal via MSNBC
• CNET
• MSNBC via ZDNet
• Reuters via Yahoo
• The Register

ou've heard it before and you'll hear it again. Threats are evolving. We've seen viruses retrieve and forward passwords before on a large scale, now they are becoming targeted and fast. Threat evolution is something that cannot be dealt with reactively; it must be part of infrastructure planning and design. Today, all attention is focused on Microsoft. The world's favorite target has fallen victim to a password-stealing virus that got a hold of passwords that can access the source code to upcoming versions of Windows and Office. It is unclear whether or not the perpetrators were able to use the passwords to actually access and manipulate the source code, however if the source code was accessed two questions remain. 1. Was the code manipulated in some way that could open the door for later attacks or other problems? Microsoft claims no, the code has maintained it's integrity. Other than to trust Microsoft's word we may never know the answer. 2. Does the ability for a criminal group to view the source code destroy the security by obscurity that is key to so many commercial software products? In the open source community, numerous hackers examine products and contribute solutions to flaws in the products. In the commercial world, many companies rely on their development team to produce secure code and then keep the source code secret to not only protect their intellectual property, but also to minimize potential attacks that could be launched against the product. In this case, the loss of security by obscurity could result in a criminal having intimate knowledge of the product development cycle to be able to develop targeted attacks on future Microsoft products. Regardless of the quality of Microsoft products, the mere fact that the company was able to recognize that this incident occurred is unfortunately unique. Many corporations might never know this had happened to them. In fact the ability to isolate the incident to specific networks or machine is quite difficult in many environments. The other interesting thing going on here is the Trojan horse attack. These attacks have been discussed for several years now and the current solution has been to use content filtering software to detect the attack. If you are one of the world's favorite targets, the Trojan horse writer will write the attack specifically at you. By the time the anti-virus companies know about the Trojan horse and are able to detect and stop it, it's too late. Unfortunately, it has taken a high profile incident like this for awareness to spread. One solution is to seperate general purpose computing such as internet surfing and email from sensitive computing such as accessing source code or controlling IT infrastructure. This is what the military does. They run 2 networks that are physically isolated from each other. A less expensive solution is to keep all executable content from reaching workstations such as executable programs, active HTML content, or documents that contain macros. This is difficult to acheive in reality so physical seperation is the the only way to be sure you are secure. The Wall Street Journal broke this story and pretty much everybody is currently running it. Look for more information and speculation to filter out through the rest of the day.

• Wall Street Journal via MSNBC
• Reuters
• CNNfn
• CNET
• Newsbytes
• AP via ABC News
• Reuters via Excite re: Microsoft Stock Price
• http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.hll w.qaz.a.html
• F-Secure's Qaz description via datafellows.com

The weekend did not manage to quell the massive amounts of coverage the Microsoft infiltration continues to garner. Virtually every news organization has its own version of the Microsoft debacle, of which we've provided a sampling below. Meanwhile, we are left wondering why the crown jewels of Microsoft were left at the mercy of passwords. There are all sorts of other authentication technologies that we have no doubt Microsoft will be investigating. Perhaps utilizing the smart card support in Windows 2000 wouldn't be a bad idea. It's a shame it takes negative incidents like this to get people to consider security as a strategic business issue. Shame on you, Microsoft.

• The Wall Street Journal via MSNBC
• CNET
• MSNBC via ZDNet
• Reuters via Yahoo
• The Register

ou've heard it before and you'll hear it again. Threats are evolving. We've seen viruses retrieve and forward passwords before on a large scale, now they are becoming targeted and fast. Threat evolution is something that cannot be dealt with reactively; it must be part of infrastructure planning and design. Today, all attention is focused on Microsoft. The world's favorite target has fallen victim to a password-stealing virus that got a hold of passwords that can access the source code to upcoming versions of Windows and Office. It is unclear whether or not the perpetrators were able to use the passwords to actually access and manipulate the source code, however if the source code was accessed two questions remain. 1. Was the code manipulated in some way that could open the door for later attacks or other problems? Microsoft claims no, the code has maintained it's integrity. Other than to trust Microsoft's word we may never know the answer. 2. Does the ability for a criminal group to view the source code destroy the security by obscurity that is key to so many commercial software products? In the open source community, numerous hackers examine products and contribute solutions to flaws in the products. In the commercial world, many companies rely on their development team to produce secure code and then keep the source code secret to not only protect their intellectual property, but also to minimize potential attacks that could be launched against the product. In this case, the loss of security by obscurity could result in a criminal having intimate knowledge of the product development cycle to be able to develop targeted attacks on future Microsoft products. Regardless of the quality of Microsoft products, the mere fact that the company was able to recognize that this incident occurred is unfortunately unique. Many corporations might never know this had happened to them. In fact the ability to isolate the incident to specific networks or machine is quite difficult in many environments. The other interesting thing going on here is the Trojan horse attack. These attacks have been discussed for several years now and the current solution has been to use content filtering software to detect the attack. If you are one of the world's favorite targets, the Trojan horse writer will write the attack specifically at you. By the time the anti-virus companies know about the Trojan horse and are able to detect and stop it, it's too late. Unfortunately, it has taken a high profile incident like this for awareness to spread. One solution is to seperate general purpose computing such as internet surfing and email from sensitive computing such as accessing source code or controlling IT infrastructure. This is what the military does. They run 2 networks that are physically isolated from each other. A less expensive solution is to keep all executable content from reaching workstations such as executable programs, active HTML content, or documents that contain macros. This is difficult to acheive in reality so physical seperation is the the only way to be sure you are secure. The Wall Street Journal broke this story and pretty much everybody is currently running it. Look for more information and speculation to filter out through the rest of the day.

• Wall Street Journal via MSNBC
• Reuters
• CNNfn
• CNET
• Newsbytes
• AP via ABC News
• Reuters via Excite re: Microsoft Stock Price
• http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.hll w.qaz.a.html
• F-Secure's Qaz description via datafellows.com

• first, it lasted three months, and there was talk that not only was source downloaded, but it might have been modified
• then, it was for six weeks, and MS was sure that no source was modified
• now, it was only one week, and source was only "viewed", not downloaded, and to a minor "future product" at that.

What's going on? Well, it seems like MS's PR department has been working hard to downplay the attack. Notice how the informant shifts over time from an unnamed "Microsoft engineer" to Balmer to MS's "corporate security officer." I assume that what happened went like this: 1) a mid-level MS engineer leaked the real story to the press, 2) PR (Balmer) steped in for damage control, and finally 3) PR propped up a puppet with a written script to try and kill the issue.

The thing is, the strategy may backfire on MS. Now, they can't claim that open source developers are pirating their code. They've already gone on record saying no MS code exists in the wild. Which means that if you happen upon the source to Office, you are free to look at it, since MS has already declared that that code does not exist.

Heh.

While there is no evidence that any changes have been made to the [MS source] codes .... any unauthorized alterations to Microsoft's products would raise broad questions about the trustworthiness of some of the world's most widely used software applications.

Right. Because they've always been so reliable and trustworthy until now.

This may be a case of social engineering, but please don't gloss over the fact that it is Microsoft themselves who have repeatedly and loudly condemned Linux and who still, at this page on their site claim the Linux security model is weak. They spend a lot of time, money, and effort to put Linux in an extremely bad light. If they can't secure their own network using their own software, then I seriously question how their user base is to be expected to do the same. This points up how incredibly difficult it is to secure their software, yet they claim it is superior to other models out there.

Also, a quote from their spokesdroid, "We are confident that the integrity of Microsoft source code remains secure." (MSNBC article). I'm not so sure I believe them. Can they prove it? Is there any consulting firm in the world not on the Microsoft payroll who will be allowed to study their source to determine that it hasn't been trojaned by Russian subversives (or Steve Jobs or whoever cracked them)? I humbly suggest that from this day forward, there is no guarantee that any newly compiled software or patch hasn't been corrupted. While there's no need for gloating and "moronic childish chants", the fact remains that their source may be compromised and their security through obscurity model does not satisfy even the weakest security policies. This is not a problem we have with Linux or BSD-- which certainly have had holes in them, no denying it. But when you have someone telling you that you should trust them, and please pay mightily for our product, and, yes, you'll just have to trust us that it works the way we say it does (even though we can't seem to keep ourselves secure)-- oh and that Free software that you can obtain for a fraction of the cost and that you are able to review, modify, and share as you will? It sucks.

They do not deserve any leniency whatsoever. Their model is the one that is broken. It is based on trust. They can't buy that with any amount of marketing or legal shenanigans. Trust must be earned. And right now, they get none from me.

We are confident that the integrity of Microsoft source code remains secure.

I was one of those lucky ones that managed to wait only 8 hours and get a PS2 in my area (BIG TEN college town). There were actually people who lined up at Walmart 14 hr prior to the release then found out that Walmart resorted to raffling the consol instead of 'first come, first serve'. Enough people lined up at Best Buy to encircle 1/2 the store 9 hours prior to launch(around 50-100 available at launch). Super K only had 3 available at the launch. Circuit city insist on bundling Fantavision along with the consol at $350. It was unfortunate that these stores were very vague on the # they had and how they were going to distribute them.

After trying 4 different stores we stopped by Target at midnight (8hr before launch) and found them to be the most informative. They specified at the door that only 27 consols are available, and they will hand out 27 tickets to the first 27 people in line. Naturally, the original 27 people in line banded together and discouraged anyone from lining up. Informal numbers were passed around, a list was created to ensure that we would get it. However, near the store opening many people attempted to cut in until the managers intervened. Throughout the experience, I say that Target was the most professional store out of all the ones I visited (super K, Walmart, Best Buy, Meijer).

Note to those who might want to get PS2: Target will have another shipment in the next 2-3 days.

Also, a I heard a rumor regarding the PS2 shortage... Sony had to retool some of their production line due to lack of inventory of PS1 after they slowed production. This caused them to have a 2 month lag in PS2 production. Anyone that can comment on this?

In light of the absurd "Draft Cybercrime Treaty" brought to our attention by this article I'd love to hear Rijmem's take on the whole issue. How does the world expect to pull off other events like the AES challenge if researchers can't "hack/crack" without fear of legal repercussions?

Criminalize the production, sale, distribution or otherwise making available of devices or computer programs who's primary use is to access, intercept or interfere with computer systems or communications;

"Criminalize the production, sale, distribution or otherwise making available of devices or computer programs who's primary use is to access , intercept or interfere with computer systems or communications;" (my emphasis)

Wait a fucking minute here. Illegalize access methods!? Web Browsers, FTP, Telnet.... Any point these gimboids have is located squarely atop their heads.

The Council of Europe has promised to provide a list of exceptions to the treaty...

I'm betting that the list of exceptions is larger than the treaty itself.

Enough is enough... we need another "treaty". The cyber Bill of Rights.

Oh... read this also: http://www.msnbc.com/news/478718.asp/a& gt;.

Well, there's supposedly a brown dwarf out there. It used to be called "Nemesis" since it was supposed to kill us all in a blaze of displaced comets and the terror and the ow ow ow it hurts me, but that seems unlikely now apparently.


-----------

A vote for Nader is a vote for Bush. It's the Supreme Court, stupid. article: Nader is poised to play spoiler

Abstract: Oct. 23 -- Although he was excluded from the national debates, has no money for television advertising and rarely rises above 4 percent in national opinion polls, Ralph Nader enters the last two weeks of Campaign 2000 poised to make an important impact: According to polls and campaign officials, he could tip as many as six states from Vice President Gore to George W. Bush, making a potentially crucial difference in the Electoral College.

read the article for more details

Please get your facts right. A telescope you buy at a department store could be off by 1/2 lambda, which would be on the order of 10^-7 meters. As explained in the article, the distance scales they're talking about for the LIGO mirror are more like 10^-17 m, which is smaller than an atomic nucleus. (Of course it can only be in an average sense that the surface of the mirror is controlled this accurately, since the mirror is made of atoms.)

Really, you should know better than to ask that. Of course they don't have any examples. They never do.

To the conservative mindset, any time a news outlet doesn't print one of their press releases verbatim it's evidence of a "liberal media".

I remember when it was the liberals who were annoying, whiny assholes.

P.S. Here's a couple of stories about Bush that so far have been under reported.

• Bush's sleazy stock manipulations (far worse than anything Hillary ever did)
• Bush the military deserter

I found GW Bush's commentary to be rather hypocritical. (pardon taking these out of context, view the whole commentary here.) First Bush is saying:

"We can have filters on Internets where public money is spent. There ought to be filters in public libraries, and filters in public schools, so that if kids get on the Internet, there's not going to be pornography or violence coming in."

Later on, in the same response, he then says:

"I just, ours is a great land. And one of the reasons why, is because we're free. And so, I don't support censorship. But I do believe that we ought to talk plainly to the Hollywood moguls and people who produce this stuff, and explain the consequences. I think we need to have rating systems that are clear. And I happen to like the idea of having technology for the TV, easy for parents to use, so you can tune out these programs that you don't want in your house.

But I'm going to remind mothers and dads: The best weapon is the off-on button, and paying attention to your children and eating dinner with them."

I can't see how one can support public-funded internet filters and be anti-censorship and promoting the "on-off" switch at the same time. In my opinion, this is just one example of the many responses of George Bush which seem to be double-standardized simply to get votes.

I'd rather have the potential "privacy nightmare" (which by the way, many client-side monitors do exist that do not submit information) than pay for filters at the taxpayers expense, which do a terrible job to begin with; and even worse, let corporations decide what is and isn't appropriate for people's kids.

That is just one reason why I would prefer Gore over Bush (and no, Gore is not perfect either, but I think the best out of the 2).

- Slash

If this is true, then I'm not surprised that companies like Dell are reporting lower than expected earnings.

The First Amendment, which has been on the decline since the 70's, was finally dealt its coupe de gras with the recent Supreme Court decision City of Erie v. PAP's A.M.. Basically, this case affirms a doctrine proposed by the court in a previous case, called "secondary effects." The Secondary Effects doctrine basically states that the First Amendment no longer applies if it can cause the "secondary effect" of a crime. The court, in making this ruling also stated that no proof is necessary, the authorities merely need to assert this. Of course, all speech that anyone has ever wanted to restrict has been said to be leading to "moral decay," crime, and other negative effects. So, it's open season on the First Amendment, and a significant number of the poster's to Slashdot today seem to think that this is a good thing.

(Causing me to come up with my own, "Slashdot sucks on weekends" doctrine.;-)

The practical upshot of this is that only a massive public outcry will prevent anything from being censored in this country. Of course, except for a few really brutal dictatorships this is the rule throughout the world anyway, there's nothing particularly special about America on this. (I'm still going to have to hear, ad nauseum, what an incredibly free country America is of course. American hypocrits love to pretend they live in a free country while restricting everyone according to absurd, intrusive rules. If you dare speak the truth, that there are many places in the world to live that are more pleasant and more free than the US, you get shouted down by these people.) It also provides a massive opening for Organized Crime, which I hope they will take advantage of. "Speakeasy" arcades could be a source of easy money, and they don't have the traditional distastefulness of dealing heroin. I mean there is money to be made here, look at what's happening in Indianapolis:

Some video vendors, like Jayson Kreie, do mind. "We recently took Area 51 and Tekken out." Executive Billiards, which also carries arcade games, replaced two of its biggest sellers thanks to the new ordinance. Kreie says, "We're taking a hell of a hit. That's 60% of our profits right there that we're losing per week on that."--MSNBC: City pulling plug on video games

Of course, it isn't just video games that are being targetted, look at Louisiana, where a skating rink playing that eeevil Rock and Roll was targetted:

In a letter allegedly written by the sheriff to area pastors and entered into evidence yesterday, Hebert warned that music played at the Skate Zone was contributing to juvenile delinquency.

"The music that is being played in this establishment is not what we in this community want our children to be hearing," the sheriff wrote. "This music is demeaning toward women, includes racial slurs, strong vulgar language and lyrics with anti-law messages.

"The lyrics of these songs breed violence in the minds of our children then, unfortunately, they act out what was planted in their minds." -- Owner asks judge to reopen skating rink closed for playing 'vulgar' music

Of course, soon it will be too much of a headache to allow your business to have any appeal for teenagers (you know, 16 - 18 year olds). I suggest that all the arcades in Indianapolis restrict minors altogether, until the law is repealed, including the laundromats. If you aren't 18+, you can't come in. I do that before I'd allow the government to come in and tell me which games I could stock and which I couldn't. It would take a lot of courage to do this though, and I doubt that the arcade owner's will be able to take the hit they'd be required to take if they opposed this disgusting law in this way.

After a while, of course, I'm sure that the good city council of Indianapolis would pass a new law requiring arcades to serve minors. Remember, this is about banning video games (getting votes from the Bible bangers who want them banned), not about protecting minors.

If you are voting age, and you think this sucks as much as this 31 year old does, I suggest you express yourself by voting. (Libertarians won't stand for this garbage, voting Democrat is like playing Russian roulette, and voting Republican is like playing Russian roulette with six bullets.) If you are still a teenager, and can't vote, I suggest you try your local library while the forces of ignorance are trying to turn you into the Junior Fascist Brigade. Ayn Rand, Robert A. Heinlein, George Orwell, and Ray Bradbury are a good place to start. (Though, of course, you may not be able to find any of their books in an Indiana library.)

Fight, don't be sheep like the generation proceeding you turned out to be. There are some really awful people that are trying to return the US to the age of The Scarlet Letter and The Crucible, but they haven't succeeded, yet.

who said a third party won't win? take a look at this poll.

Here is another anecdote about this amusing incident, found at MSNBC.

Phone slamming is highly illegal, but yet ATT seems to get away with it all the time. IMHO you should find the time to report it. It's easy to file a complaint. There is no form to fill out. Write a letter to the FCC and tell them your name, address and phone numbers affected. Also include a phone number where you can be reached. Tell them both the names of the carriers you HAD and that ATT stole your account and any info like a phone number that you can provide or a copy of the bill. Include ALL details of phone conversations and any info you feel they can use. Send info to: Federal Communications Commission, Common Carrier Bureau, Consumer Complaints, Mail Stop Code 1600A2, Washington, DC 20554

"As for AOL, it says it isn't troubled by the software because it doesn't affect outside advertisers. The Instant Messenger box has two advertising spots, and right now they are being used to promote AOL's service. "Since AIM does not have [paid] ads, this is a moot point," says Tricia Primrose, an AOL spokeswoman."

The article is available for free at MSNBC. Also, here's a screenshot from a link at Zeropaid.

==
www.sitesherpa.com

FWIW, Levy writes regularly on technology issues for Newsweek. For instance, here's an article on Stephen King's online publishing experiment. Danno

There's another poll at the article.

Q: Will you buy Windows ME?
A: 8% Yes
92% No

Out of like 13000 responses. Either another script or MS has their work cut out for them.

For those of you that have the bandwidth, you can check out the Dateline piece about the iBot here: Dateline
I also found the "jobs" email address for His company for those of you who read the story and thought, I want to work with him! (Like me) You can send your resume to: DEKA Jobs

and it really sucks. whoever from tom's covered this should be shot, they did a horrid job and are just increasing the incorrect awareness of it.

i had coverage (almost anonymous) from MSNBC for the site i ran that had a DivX ;-) howto (complete with graphics). do a search on MSNBC and notice the picture that has "void.cwru.edu" overlaid on it - thanks M$ news for ripping off my graphics!!

Pirates encourage each other to learn how to copy movies, offering up elaborate instructions and how-to guides on the best methods. This guide author even circled critical instructions before posting screen shots in his step-by-step explanation.

I was one of the poor saps unfortunate enough to have been a one-time customer of CD Universe when their credit card database was stolen and held for ransom. I had purchased one CD (Nina Simone, for the curious) about 10 months before the hacker took the numbers, and I still had to go through all the pain of cancelling my credit card. Worse yet, I had several services (my newspaper, my ISP) auto-billed off the credit card, which I forgot about, and those services were cancelled once they were unable to bill to that old number.

I was very fortunate that there were no purchases made against my number, probably because I had it cancelled very quickly.

In any case, it seems ridiculous that sites should keep your credit-card information forever, thus amplifiying the damage caused by any hacks.

The FBI again defended the use of Carnivore in congressional hearings Thursday, saying the program has only been used about 25 times in two years and always under stringent legal procedures.

Really though, I don't see why, if it's just a packet sniffer that offloads the data to removable storage, there's such a hub-bub about it. But, I'm also thinking that, if they would bother to write software that's already out there in abundance, it must do more than just packet sniffing on a network that the computer is on.

Chris Hagar

"The FBI cannot and does not 'snoop," said Donald Kerr, FBI assistant director. (from the MSNBC article)

Maybe it's just my distrust of government agencies (especially alphabet ones) after the entire information gathering thing up here in Canada, but does anyone else find this just a little hard to believe? (The 'does not' may be true, but I bet you the 'cannot' isn't)

-GreenHell

msNBC.com's article tells a differnet story:

Vint Cerf, an Internet founding father who was selected to serve as an unbiased technical adviser on the Senate panel, was even harsher in his assessment of the suggestion that Carnivore be put in the hands of ISPs. The proposal "strikes me as alarming, quite frankly," he said.

--

A recent article on MSNBC.com shows that the tiny Polynesian country of Tuvalu has recieved $17 million to date because of the Internet domain name it has of ".tv".

Basically, this country (not necessarily the inhabitants thereof, mind you) is getting suddenly wealthy off of the Internet and the potential market value of the .tv domain. If this isn't a "Merchant Nation" in the same vein, then I don't know what is...

Kierthos

A recent article on MSNBC.com shows that the tiny Polynesian country of Tuvalu has recieved $17 million to date because of the Internet domain name it has of ".tv".

Basically, this country (not necessarily the inhabitants thereof, mind you) is getting suddenly wealthy off of the Internet and the potential market value of the .tv domain. If this isn't a "Merchant Nation" in the same vein, then I don't know what is...

Kierthos

MSNBC
Wired
Yahoo!
ABC News

Enjoy~

• MSNBC
• Yahoo Headlines
• Nothing on CNN!

Actually, it's become a Tom Clancy story with his recent essay in Newsweek. And, his analysis is essentially the same as that in the report slashdot linked to.
-----
D. Fischer

You must have missed the part of the story where they mention it being bi-directional:
"Microsoft will also include "two-way" dishes that allow downloads and uploads just as fast as cable modems or DSL".

OK now... I'm convinced that the "default password" is a design flaw... but the media HAS reported on this, I remember reading about it months ago on MSNBC. Check out the article where they say: "Not only were the sites storing the credit cards in plain text in a database connected to the Web -- the databases were using the default user name and in some cases, no password. [CLIP] It included about 20 Web sites which either had no password protection at all on their database servers -- in each case, they were running Microsoft's SQL Server software "

So maybe it's not a technical article... but the media has reported on this vulnerability of SQL Server... and the criticism is from Microsoft-sponsored MSNBC, no less.

-rt-

Click here for a story about the Austrailian 2600 that won't take the code down. They don't just link to it, it looks like they are actually hosting it.

Here's the MSN story that appeared about a day earlier...

Isn't DeCSS a content-scramling system for playback control, not copy control? And isn't the purpose of DeCSS to enable playback, not permit copying? After all, one could do bit-by-bit copying of a scrambled source without DeCSS.

I've contacted AP to see if there is any recourse for such invalid facts. After all, the AP's Code of Ethics clearly states they aim for the truth.

Okkay, so the IOC is banning the net from the olympics. Or are they? As far as I knew, MSNBC's website was the Internet mirror to NBC news, which includes a robust sports section. Will they be banning the broadcast of Olympic related news on this website as well? That seems like a bum deal for a news org that shelled out the bucks to get exclusive coverage.

And as for pirate Olympic broadcasters, give me a break! American audiences are growing less and less interested in the Games as it is. Do they honestly think that some Aussie kid with a geocities website and a digital camera is going to give NBC serious coverage competition with 20-pixel-tall pictures of figure skaters, slightly masked by the back of some guy's head?

Think hard...

I THINK NOT!

Okkay, so the IOC is banning the net from the olympics. Or are they? As far as I knew, MSNBC's website was the Internet mirror to NBC news, which includes a robust sports section. Will they be banning the broadcast of Olympic related news on this website as well? That seems like a bum deal for a news org that shelled out the bucks to get exclusive coverage.

And as for pirate Olympic broadcasters, give me a break! American audiences are growing less and less interested in the Games as it is. Do they honestly think that some Aussie kid with a geocities website and a digital camera is going to give NBC serious coverage competition with 20-pixel-tall pictures of figure skaters, slightly masked by the back of some guy's head?

Think hard...

I THINK NOT!

C-Net Article
MSNBC Article
CNN
NY Times Article

But then again, why believe in DNA when you can have Jerry Falwell tell you it doesn't exist?

Zealotry blinds. And in this case, it makes you into a fucking idiot.

Let's be honest here, Linux will never achieve a giant marketshare on the desktop. You know why? Because most people are content with windows and mac. Linux will always remain an OS of professionals and coders, not your average joe blow who just wants email and espn.com.

Secondly, good things come to those who wait? How long have I been FUCKING waiting for Mozilla? like 3 years? Navigator 4.0 was good for me about 4 years ago, but not NOW. I was extremely patient with Netscape and did my share of bug reporting for the mac version of mozilla. But what the fuck, they've had 3 years, and I need a viable browser now, not one that's been promised to me for years. I've converted to IE/OE, and I've crashed about 5 times. Thats about how many times I'd crash with mozilla in an hour.

Secondly, who gets the spoils? Most users already have the spoils, its called internet explorer. Most of the "new" features that you zealots cry about have already been implemented perfectly in IE.

Thirdly, you seriously think netscape is going to regain any market share with mozilla? Why would a regular desktop user wait 60 minutes to download something they already have on their comps with IE? Contempt for IE is weaning among mac zealots and only seems to be found in the most blind linux/mac whores. And have you read any of the reviews in the prominent magazines? They all trample Mozilla because of it's crash-ridden design, it's poorly written bloat "features", and it's memory hogging and memory clogging. Not only that, but I assume most consumers would be scared to download an app from a dying company that will most likely dismantled after it's mozilla failure.

I know this might seem like flamebait, but it's just how I feel after being a Netscape/Mozilla fan for so long, only to be given shit and expected to love it. I'm angry because Netscape had a chance of beating goliath, but instead they stalled, implemented shit few people want (how many people really need skins for their browser?), and constantly spit on consumers by releasing bug riddled updates to previously decent software (netscape 4.7.4 anyone?). Netscape is building it's own coffin, and you might as well take it to the moretorum, because Netscape is dead.