Slashdot Mirror

The PBS series "Frontline" did a show called "Bigger Than Enron" that has an excellent website to go along with the show. It contains interviews with many of the key players here, including former SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt, current chairman Arthur Pitt, and others.

It's acutally more robust than the B2.0 article, and goes into some detail about how politicians and businesspeople push for the SEC to have less power than it needs. At one point Levitt describes how the heads of different congressioinal committees were threating to pull funding entirely from the SEC if Levitt didn't quit pushing for accounting reforms, the exact reforms that turned out to be so necessary. This was in April of 2000, just before the all the shit started to hit the fan.

Coming on in conjunction with today's announcement by the Bush Administration that they don't want to give the SEC too much money, it's certainly not too much of a stretch to see a pattern develop.

The "Thief-in-chief" today asked congress to cut by 27% the amount of money allocated to fight corporate fraud -- yet more evidence that this administration's main goals are a) ensuring that the rich texas oil barons get richer while the middle class sinks below the poverty line, b) the good old boy system remains firmly entrenched, and c) Saddam Hussein must die for humiliating George H.W. Bush.

Now you know.

Compared by who? A bunch of teenagers on Slashdot? I don't recall the website saying anything about the switch campaign.

Is The New York Times good enough for ya?

clicky.

:)

Triv

he clearly works for fuddles&fudstorm, the giaNT ?pr? ?firm?, & lives in central florida. stevIE billmirror having to disavow him/his shillery, would be a genuine Coupe De Ville for the one who eXPoses him to the "mainstream" media. happy hunting.

Revolt in the Den: DVD Sends the VCR Packing to the Attic This NY Times articles (account needed) highlights the growth of the DVD industry and how its helped the movie industry. Dreamworks isn't complaining about its sales of Shrek DVDs and neither will Disney/Pixar with its Monsters Inc DVDs. Rick McCallum's apocryphal predictions are a shameless attempt by the movie industry to garner public concern and stricter legislation. If Lucasfilms is so concerned about it they shouldn't release the DVD. My 2 cents. -Diganta

"Robert Metcalfe, the co-inventor of the Ethernet office networking standard, who is a friend of Mr. Kamen, told me via e- mail: 'Some months ago when speculation was running high, I said that Kamen's It was more important than the Internet, but not as important as cold fusion, had cold fusion worked out. The It I was talking about, which I did not disclose, was NOT Segway. That's all I can say.'"

You mean: if you get a team of longshoremen with block and tackle and prybars to push it off a table.

Wow! In light of recent events, that really would be impossible!

So why haven't CDs killed concerts?

And CDs have better sound than most concerts (though increasingly concerts are pre-recorded and musicians just pretend to play and sing).

Oh, and concerts for big acts cost five times as much or more these days.

By tomorrow most people will have forgotten about it,

except the thousands of slashdot users that will make references to it anytime a MS article is posted for the next 2 years.

From the NYT article:
Mr. Malda added: "I still think of it as my personal soapbox. If I decide next Thursday that `It's all about Windows!' I don't know if Slashdot would follow that -- but I would keep posting it and posting it until they fire me."

Does Slashdot, in fact, make money? Its owners say, yes, sort of. The site is owned by Open Source Development Network Inc., a subsidiary of the VA Software Corporation. Open Source runs a number of technology-related Web sites and an online store, ThinkGeek.

Richard French, senior vice president and general manager for Open Source, declined to break out the income of any one component of the company, except to say, "Slashdot works from a cost point of view and from a revenue perspective."

In fact, he acknowledged, "If you took any one of them on their own, probably none of them would be profitable," he said of Open Source's various Web sites.

But because many of the sites use the same hardy, low-maintenance software developed by Mr. Malda and his team, and because the Internet resources are pooled, the company says it is able to squeeze out a profit from the cluster, and makes further profits from sites that it sets up for businesses.

Considering /. was featured in the New York Times Today I'm sure the word will get out. /. is more well known and "mainstream" than you think. There are lots of normal people who read /. but don't post and don't read the comments.

Funny you mention that on the same day that the New York Times does an article about Slashdot. Gotta admit, /. is becoming more mainstream everyday.

They're in The New York Times... and in a favorable story!

Completely offtopic, I know... but still interesting!

Yeah, I'm sure lots of Microsoft employees (or any self-respecting computer scientist, for that matter) read this site.

Oddly enough (and the dude in the middle is admittedly odd), the technology section in
today's Times would beg to differ with you.

Well, not whack, but I just wanted to point out that there *is* this article at the NYTimes and I'm imagining /.'ers other than me have submitted the story, but still nothing on the front page.

Maybe the editors are waiting for the story that strikes the perfect balance between slavish sycophancy and neutral observation.

In that case, PICK MY ARTICLE!!!

:)

msq

Slashdot featured in the new york times

• Lameness filters (It blocks a lot of legitmate posts)
  
• Unnessary posting delays. Hasnt taco learned to touch type? A lot of posts are typed in less than 20 seconds and it is a ANNOYING DELAY! 2 minute ban? Come on, so some are faster then others, big deal, some people have more to say than others
  
• Broken moderation system, The whole point is to sort the gems from the crap, yet a lot of posts designed to make a LIVELY DISCUSSION are MODERATED as flamebait! Come on, not everyone likes X, but just because some one bashes it dosent mean its Flamebait. Flame bait is more useful for DIRECT INSULTS and not legitmate discussions.
  

• Crapfloods, a meaningless flood of random letters or text, which the lameness filter does a crappy job at trying to stop, besides trolls have written tools using the opensource slashcode to generate crapfloods which bypass the filter
• Links to offensive websites, the most common one is known a http://www.goatse.cx, a awful site which shows a bleeding anus being stretched on the front page. Trolls sneak these links in by posting messages that look legitimate, but infact are sneaky redirects to the site. Common examples include rd.yahoo.com, www.linux-kernel.tk, goatsex.cjb.net, and googles "Im feeling lucky".
• Trying to break slashdot, this is actually a good thing, as it helps test slashdot for bugs. Famous examples include the goatse.cx javascript pop-up, the pagewidening post and the browser crashing post!
  

• Lameness filters (It blocks a lot of legitmate posts)
• Unnessary posting delays. Hasnt taco learned to touch type? A lot of posts are typed in less than 20 seconds and it is a ANNOYING DELAY! 2 minute ban? Come on, so some are faster then others, big deal, some people have more to say than others
• Broken moderation system, The whole point is to sort the gems from the crap, yet a lot of posts designed to make a LIVELY DISCUSSION are MODERATED as flamebait! Come on, not everyone likes X, but just because some one bashes it dosent mean its Flamebait. Flame bait is more useful for DIRECT INSULTS and not legitmate discussions.

• Crapfloods, a meaningless flood of random letters or text, which the lameness filter does a crappy job at trying to stop, besides trolls have written tools using the opensource slashcode to generate crapfloods which bypass the filter
• Links to offensive websites, the most common one is known a http://www.goatse.cx, a awful site which shows a bleeding anus being stretched on the front page. Trolls sneak these links in by posting messages that look legitimate, but infact are sneaky redirects to the site. Common examples include rd.yahoo.com, www.linux-kernel.tk, goatsex.cjb.net, and googles "Im feeling lucky".
• Trying to break slashdot, this is actually a good thing, as it helps test slashdot for bugs. Famous examples include the goatse.cx javascript pop-up, the pagewidening post and the browser crashing post!

I largely disagree, but you do have some valid points.

Because patents have become so pervasive and will continue to do so, large corporations have huge portfolios. It is a near certainty that a lowly peon with a great idea and a patent will be infringing upon a patent owned by a large corporation.

That is a very distinct possibility, and it is certainly the way that large corporations are attempting to (ab)use the patent system. However, concluding that there are no more original ideas out there is in the ballpark of the late great PTO Director, circa 1899, that argued Pres McKinley for the abolition of the PTO, stating that "Everything that can be invented has been invented." I cry bullshit.

If you can prove that you are the inventor of an idea, you can sue any corporation for infringement. A great way to prove you're the inventor is by having a patent. I say, the larger the corporation, the deeper the pockets, and if I can prove that I made them aware of the existence of my patent or patent-pending application before they went into production, I can sue them for additional damages. Any large corporation should have better sense than to willfully disobey the law, I'm sure over the advice of their Legal dept., and try to steal my idea after I've already got a patent. My legal team doesn't have to be better than theirs. It just has to be good enough to get a jury verdict in my favor. In case you haven't been following the US news, the current environment isn't exactly friendly to big business law-breakers.

Japanese toilet technology will advance to the point that nobody has a reason for ever leaving. Weeks later, people will start asking, "Hey, have you seen the Japanese lately?".

That could make for some pretty good copy protection at the movies! (along with blind viewers) But hey, all technology comes at a cost. right?

Thank you, Google News!

The USAAF dropped cases to the French resistance, who used them to little or no effectiveness- not entirely unexpected French-like bevaior.

Enough already!

Everyone knows the French are cowards, yada yada yada. Did you read that bit in the newspaper a few days ago where the French rescued all the Westerners (including several Americans) from the Ivory Coast? (And, by the way, the article fails to point out that the French had been there for several days before the American forces turned up.) Would it surprise you to learn that the French, prior to WWII, had one of the proudest and most effective resistance records in the world? Drop it, for crying out loud.

And no, I have no affinity to France. For what it's worth, I'm from one of the few countries which has felt the effects of official state-sponsored French terrorism in the past few decades. (The bombing of the ship "Rainbow Warrior" in Auckland, New Zealand, 7 July 1985, ordered by the French Secret Service to dissuade Greenpeace from protesting continued nuclear bomb testing at Mururoa Atoll.)

But enough with the xenophobic hatred. Considering the real wars and battles currently being fought by more than half the nations in the world, don't you think that leaving off these snide and childish insults might be rather a good idea?

Googlefied NYT article for your enjoyment

Google news link is:

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/07/technology/07ZZA P.html?ex=1034654400&en=67f6d3a765aded4c&ei=5062&p artner=GOOGLE

Argh, that text is nearly unreadable (no line spaces and such)... try the Google Partner link to bypass the login.

I thought you were exagerating until I clicked to www.nytimes.com, and found this article on the front page.

but the NYTimes (free reg., etc. etc.) has an article comparing the Sidekick with the competition...

~RdeJ

How is this insightful? The US Patent Office operates at a deficit and is not anywhere near profitability. In fact, they are not even profit-driven (meaning that profitability is not within their charter). They are severely under-funded and under-staffed. If anything, they are concerned with through-put, not profit.

Check out this article from the New York Times. The article has already been discussed here on Slashdot

It -may- be the longest bear market, but it certain is -not- the worst, job wise. We're still under 7% unemployment (or is it still under 6?). That -by itself- tells me that while it's hanging on, it certainly isn't nearly as sever as it could have been.

The unemployement figures dont count people who stop looking for various reasons. The link suggest over three million may have stopped looked already in the current recession. A more accurate way is to look at Bureau of Labor total payroll figures which seems to be falling.

.. i noticed this while trying Google's news search. If you go here:

here

You can find the link here:

here

No registration required.

... here.

...friend

Also seems to work without parter=foo.

partner=cmdrtaco appears to work just as well. You can use that one instead.

Non-Reg Link Thanks to Google News.

...friend!

Thanks to Google...

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/29/technology/circu its/29CHIP.html?ex=1033963200&en=3b60e461ca6b0684& ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE

"The past has seen dramatic climate changes without humans having anything to do with it."

And that makes it ok for us to speed the process along? Short-term self-interest uber alles. "We can do whatever we want, let future generations fix it if there's a problem" sounds remarkably like "Fsck em all and let God sort them out."

Also, these kinds of things make me 'think it':

As Thousands of Salmon Die, Fight for River Erupts Again

Much of the time we have no freaking clue what the real impact of our actions will be on the environment. A little introspection and scientific investigation seems entirely justified.

Courtesy of the NYT Random Login Generator, here is the article:

[Original Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/27/technology/27FRE E.html

New Software Quietly Diverts Sales Commissions
By JOHN SCHWARTZ and BOB TEDESCHI

Some popular online services are using a new kind of software to divert sales commissions that would otherwise be paid to small online merchants by big sites like Amazon and eToys.

Critics call the software parasite-ware and stealware. But the sites that use the software, which is made by nearly 20 companies and used by dozens, say that it is perfectly legal, because their users agree to the diversion.

The amounts involved are estimated by those in the industry to have mounted into the hundreds of thousands of dollars and are likely to continue to grow -- in part because most users are unaware that the software is operating on their computers.

There is no cost to the customer, but those who run small Web sites that funnel sales to the big merchants say that they are being hurt. "It's painful when someone walks in and takes sales right from under me," said Shawn Collins, who runs a number of sites that feed customers to Amazon and other merchants. "I probably saw a drop-off of 30 percent in income for the past six months."

The diversion begins when consumers get software from the Internet that helps them swap music or other files, or find bargains online. As they install the software, they are asked whether they would also like to show support for the software maker by shopping through an online affiliate program. These programs typically give a percentage of each purchase back to the affiliate -- in this case, the software maker -- as a commission.

What the consumers are not told clearly is that if they agree to participate, their computers may be electronically marked: all future purchases will look as if they were made through the software maker's site, even if they were not.

In many versions of the software, a purchase will look as if it was made through the software maker's site even if the shopper came in through another site that has its own affiliate agreement with the online store in question. Those affiliate sites include small businesses and even charities that use affiliate links as fund-raisers.

Some version of the diversion software is used by some of the most popular music trading sites that have tried to fill the void left by the collapse of Napster, including Morpheus, Kazaa and LimeWire. The companies say their software has been downloaded by tens of millions of Web surfers.

Although estimates are hard to come by, those in the business say that the amount of money involved could be large. The affiliate market, in which smaller sites funnel sales to larger ones in return for commissions, accounts for roughly 15 to 20 percent of the estimated $72 billion online market, said Carrie Johnson, an analyst with Forrester Research. A successful affiliate Web site can make $60,000 a month from referrals alone, said Haiko De Poel Jr., chief executive of Abestweb, an online forum devoted to affiliate marketing. He has organized owners of sites to fight Morpheus and others.

A spokeswoman for Amazon, which has 800,000 affiliate sites feeding it customers, said the company worked to protect those sites from hijacking. "We don't allow sites that use a download or a tool to redirect a shopping session to their account if they do not initiate the shopping session," said the spokeswoman, Patty Smith. "We've kicked out a number of sites for doing that."

Last week, Amazon cut off affiliate payments to Morpheus, one site that employs the shopping software, said an online executive. Coldwater Creek, an online clothing store, has also blocked Morpheus.

Some companies that make and use the diversion software said they were rewriting the programs so that they would no longer take money intended for others. But these changes may not affect copies of the software already installed on millions of computers. "We're not interested in stealing any Web site's revenue," said Greg Bildson, chief operating officer for LimeWire. "We know that this is sort of a new and sort of strange area, but we're interested in doing the right thing." He referred calls to TopMoxie, the maker of the software that LimeWire uses to get affiliate money.

Patrick Toland, a vice president for sales and marketing at TopMoxie, said that the company did not intend for its software to displace other affiliates' rights and that his company had altered the software in the last two weeks to stop substituting its affiliate identification code for those of other sites. "The second we realized this is a problem, we turned that boat around and said, `Let's get this out,' " he said. He added that the amount of money involved was minuscule.

Mr. Toland attributed the losses that the Web sites claimed to a tougher marketplace for small players.

Morpheus referred inquiries to Wurld Media, which operates its shopping rebates program. Kirk H. Feathers, the chief technical officer of Wurld Media, said that it had been wrongly accused of stealing and that the company would readily go to court to defend itself.

He acknowledged that an earlier version of the company's software did divert commissions away from other affiliate sites but said that new versions dealt with that situation. Now, the company said, the softwareoffers a choice to the consumer before each purchase: whether to give the commission to the affiliate or to himself in the form of a rebate, with a portion of the rebate going to Morpheus. The software does not misrepresent the user's computer to sellers' sites, Mr. Feathers said.

Arguments that the diversions are somehow the fault of an unintentional flaw do not persuade Erik Petersen, the chief technical officer at an Internet security company, Polar Cove, in Providence, R.I. Mr. Petersen said that he had received complaints about TopMoxie and LimeWire from friends and took a closer look. After conducting a detailed analysis of the software, he concluded that the TopMoxie program was intricately designed to substitute its affiliate identification code for that of other sites as transactions were made. He said that the program remained on the computer even if the user removed the original LimeWire music sharing software. "I don't buy their explanation," he said. "What kind of accident is that?"

Mr. Petersen also pointed to a statement made in an online forum where the technology was discussed, in which a LimeWire developer characterized accusations that the software diverts money as "pretty accurate," but said, "While I agree that this is really a bit of a scam, it is a way for us to pay salaries while not adversely affecting our users."

A chief executive of one software company was similarly unapologetic about the diversion of commissions. "We look at affiliates as competitors," said Avi Naider, the chief executive of WhenU.com, which makes the diversion software used by the music swapping services Kazaa and BearShare. The software, he said, provides services to users and money to each company "so it doesn't have to charge" for the currently free software and services.

The companies also argue that consumers give consent to the terms of the contract when they download the software, whether they read the agreement carefully or not. An expert in online consumer protection said the companies had a point. In the case of the LimeWire agreement, for example, "there does seem to be some indication to the user of what's going on," said David Medine, a Washington lawyer and former Federal Trade Commission official.

Mr. Medine said that he was, however, uncomfortable with the degree of disclosure. "The question is whether the quality of the notice is as good as it could be," he said. "They don't tell you that it's interfering with other business relationships."

Jeff Pullen, the president of Commission Junction, a company that helps link affiliates with Web sites, said that he was not inclined to cut off companies that divert commissions if the customer has agreed to the diversion. "The tactics that they use, maybe they're on the edge," he said. "Maybe, personally, I don't find them particularly attractive. But if they aren't illegal, it's hard for me to point to my public service agreement and say, `I have a reason to kick you off my network.' "

Still, other online merchants are taking action after being confronted by angry affiliates -- and they find that they are dealing with a moving target. TigerDirect, an online computer and electronics store, blocked Morpheus from its program earlier this year after discovering that the company was diverting online commissions. "I obviously thought it wasn't honorable," said Andy Rodriguez, the company's manager of affiliate marketing. "They said, `It's our right.' I said, `It's our right to remove you.' "

Morpheus changed its software, Mr. Rodriguez said, but a few weeks ago TigerDirect noticed that sales through Morpheus were "going through the roof" at the same time that many affiliates were complaining of a drop in commissions. So he blocked them again. "Guys at Morphus wanted a piece of the pie for each of our sales," he said. "I'm sorry. Absolutely not.

The diversion programs have made life difficult for affiliate marketers in the last year, said Steve Messer, chief executive of LinkShare, a company that runs a major affiliate network. But he sees a silver lining. "It's showed affiliate marketing has come of age," Mr. Messer said. "If you look at it, the volume of transactions passing through LinkShare's affiliate marketing got so big that when affiliates get upset, the largest merchants in the world react. If it's just a few dollars, nobody would've noticed."

LinkShare is working with other companies in their market to come up with industry standards to govern ethical practices in online advertising, Mr. Messer said. "For some people, WWW stands for the Wild, Wild West," he said. "Hopefully, that's coming to an end."

A Software Cleanup

Computer users who want to remove shopping software from their machines can do so in a few steps. Instructions for removing three of the most common programs:

BUYERSPORT - The shopping software with Morpheus:

Click the Start button.

Click on Find.

Click on Find Files or Folders.

Type in mbho.dll. Click on find now. When the file appears in the directory window, drag mbho.dll into the trash.

LIMESHOP - The software with LimeWire:

Click the Start button.

Click on Settings.

Click Control Panel.

Double-click Add/Remove Programs.

Click LimeShop.

Click Add/Remove.

SAVENOW - The software used by Kazaa:

Click on Start.

Click Settings.

Click on Control Panel.

Double-click on Add/Remove Programs.

Click SaveNow.

Click on Add/Remove

Doesn't it bug you to tell some stranger about yourself for no reason? When you walk into the shopping mall, is there someone standing at the door telling you you can't come in unless you tell them your salary? Then do they have someone follow you around with a clipboard writing down what stores you look in? Wouldn't that creep you out just a little bit?

Do you rent videos? The video store keeps a record of all the videos you've rented. Is this an invasion of privacy too? Is it ok because you're paying them for the videos?

most web site owners know it would drive users away from the web in droves.

The NYT website has 8.8 million visitors each month. They hardly have a problem with droves of users running away - quite the opposite.

that's why the NYT is so annoying.

Annoying. Ok. This I can accept. But why protest something just because it's annoying? Usually people protest for ethical reasons, but it doesn't seem like there's an ethical issue here - just a bunch of people who want something for nothing.

Sorry, I didn't know slashdot allowed non-user posts. My mistake.

#2 Registering to have an exlusive name to use when posting comments makes sense. To read a NYT article it does not.

This is entirely subjective. You don't want to register, so you don't think it makes sense. NYT wants to gather data, so they ask you to register. Would it make more sense if they charged $80/year to register and read their content, like the Wall Street Journal does?

#3 Having a Slashdot account provides me with desirable services such as being able to review my latest posts for responses. NYT registration does not.

An NYT registration provides me with the highly desirable service of displaying NYT articles, which I find even more valuable that Slashdot's features. Again, it's a subjective judgement of value.

#4 Slashdot doesn't even ask for, much less DEMAND info like my income, (general)address, age, profession, sex, etc. I don't recall if slashdot even asked for an E-mail.

True, but I don't remember using real information when signing up for NYT, and they don't seem to care, even after many years. They've never contacted me in any way.

(I skipped over a few of your points that weren't really criticisms.)

#7 Slashdot is THE ONLY cookie on my system. It is there because I find it useful. Cookies are a serious mis-feature, 99% of the time their use is not for the users benefit.

The NYT cookie is useful to me because it allows me to get to content that otherwise would not be available. I guess you just don't value that content as much.

#8 Any website that completely fails to function without cookies is BROKEN. Let me rephrase that - Any website that completely refuses to function without cookies is BROKEN. "Fails" implies design error - this generally results in a mostly-useable site. "Refuses" implies by-design, this often results in a completely broken site.

Again, this is a subjective judgement. 8.8 million people use the NYT website every month, so in some sense it is not broken - it functions exactly as the developers intended. Cookies have been around for seven years or so. Most people have them turned on. NYT decided it was a fair tradeoff to get the benefit of millions of registered users while losing the handful of people who refuse to accept cookies. A perfectly reasonable business decision.

#9 I trust slashdot's use of my information more than I trust NYT's use of my information.

Why?

#10 I trust NYT a hell of a lot more than I trust most other sites. Any success of the NYT system will only promote its use elsewhere.

And some more web content providers will stay in existence because they could target their content more accurately.

#11 The sole purpose of the NYT login is to snoop on people.

And to use that data to target content more effectively, improve site structure, fund content that readers enjoy, and target advertising more effectively.

#12 What would your reaction be if your local library or supermarket started requiring you to clip a photoID to your shirt in order to walk in the door?

The costs for a local supermarket to allow lots of customers through the door are minimal, because most customers buy stuff. This doesn't happen with a content website. NYT has chosen to make the investment in their online articles worthwhile by aggregating a small amount of data. I see this as a fair trade. You don't think there's enough value received to make giving away your data worthwhile.

#13 Throwing up barricades like that all over the internet is a BadThing. It impedes useful linking and free travel. That's not an internet, that's a balkanized-net. #14 If someone wants to make information freely available, kudos to them. But making people jump through hoops for freely available information is obnoxious. If you're putting it on the web, put it on the damn web.

It sounds like you're just annoyed by the NYT policy, and don't think that you're getting enough value to make giving up your personal information worthwhile. For me (and 8.8 million others each month), it's definitely a good tradeoff.

The fact that you want bread for free doesn't make it unethical for someone to offer bread in exchange for your mailing address. Furthermore, a few hundred people choosing not to register is not going to change things. I was really hoping for someone who could explain the ethical dilema here - why should I be concerned?

Here

that didn't come out right... should have been a link

For all the lamers who don't want to register, Google News is your friend.

In case anyone is too much with war: WE ARE STILL IN A RECESSION. Poverty is greater now than when Bush I was in office. Don't be fooled, or wooed.