Slashdot Mirror

I saw him on the first leg of his US tour in Glenside, PA. He does "Perform This Way" in the peacock suit that shows up about 2/3 of the way through the video.

He averaged a costume change every 1.5 songs or so. And yes, it was an awesome show, though I hear he won't be doing "You're Pitiful" live anymore, which is a shame.

"A moment of silence, please, to honor the brave robot we lost today in Libya: http://is.gd/e1Oyyj "- Original Link

Is this your Twitter account? If so, your name is Louis Aldum. With this real name it should be easy to find a lot more.

APK detected. If you Googled the name "Alexander Peter Kowalski" you would find these:

http://www.thorschrock.com/2008/05/19/how-to-respond-when-people-threaten-to-sue-you-on-the-web/

A nice bit using APK as an example of how to handle yourself when dealing with people "like these." APK is the poster child for this behavior.

http://www.jeremyreimer.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=4128

More of the same from other people... complaints mostly and somewhere in there, his home address. Probably moved by now since many complaints about this nuisance date back before the year 2000... quite a career.

http://www.acronymgeek.com/APK/Alexander_Peter_Kowalski/276459

Here he is so infamous that he is registered with an acronym.

I'll skip the crappy registry cleaner utilities. There are hundreds of those all equally useless. And really... engine? Is that what a utility gets called? An engine?

http://twitter.com/#!/klastalov/statuses/2001247938

Here's a link from an APK fan... worth reading

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=821190&start=40

This is beyond awesome.

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-33596.html

Yet more indicating his stellar reputation as a contributing member of society who gets along well with everyone.

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=1010242&start=40

Another sample... these are dated 2001. I mean really. If a person goes a whole 10 years like this and everyone seems to respond to him in the same way, what sane person can believe that he's not the problem and that the rest of the world just wants to attack him for no good reason. This is just a person who will never look at himself as the source of his own problems.

"erroneus" spelled in this way is a kind of loop. Also, it was taken from an error message reported by old IRC server software after a user attempted to change his nick to something that is not allowed -- "erroneus nick change." Oh yeah, I go way back.

What I find amazing is that he replied to my same comment numerous times and then replied to his own replies numerous times. His replies are hilariously like elementary school tactics rather like calling someone "chicken" or in his case "...ran away!" As people go, APK is quite a piece of work and completely genuine I'm convinced. He's literally stuck in a kind of loop somehow. Tracking just what he does on Slashdot alone is quite impressive. He has to track individual targets all over the place checking and rechecking comments and threads to keep his fire burning. And it's not just here. It's other places too. This is probably the most angry and obsessive person I have ever witnessed. I am completely convinced that he's over-the-top mentally ill.

Clearly the UK police are so desperate to catch us that they've gone and arrested someone who is, at best, mildly associated with us. Lame.

Their Twitter

It gets better.

http://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec/status/83164092998758400

In a tweet: "Seems the glorious leader of LulzSec got arrested, it's all over now... wait... we're all still here! Which poor bastard did they take down?" https://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec/statuses/83164092998758400 http://www.scmagazine.com.au/News/261303,lulzsec-linked-uk-teen-arrested-in-fbi-sting.aspx

"norendition Lara Fist RT @anonesc v @KforKallisti "Ryan has little to do with #LulzSec besides running IRC. All 6 members of @LulzSec are fine & safe." #AntiSec 7 minutes ago" link

"Ryan Cleary, an alleged member of the hacking group behind the claim, LulzSec, was arrested in Essex this morning by specialist cyber crime officers from Scotland Yard." link

Given the ease with which they traced him, I can't help wondering if LulzSec is overrated and the security expertise of the PCeU is over rated. What the security people don't seem to understand is that groups like LulzSec are not formal organizations like PCeU but more a loose collection of individuals drawn together through a shared ideology. As such there is no command-and-control structure to take out. As someone once wrote - you can't fight an idea.

in other news, the usually vocal Lulzsec twitter feed stopped at the same time as the arrest.

The fix is coming: https://twitter.com/#!/nddrylliog/status/81798532717228032

err...that tweet says:

Stuck in my hotel with no SSH access, cannot bring http://jsmad.org/ back up. Going to Starbucks.

Wrong kind of fix.

Microsoft is only attacking WebGL because it competes with their interest.

Does it compete with John Carmack's interests? Doubtful, but he agrees

I agree with Microsoft's assessment that WebGL is a severe security risk. The gfx driver culture is not the culture of security.

.

Carmack seems to agree with MS here: "I agree with Microsoft’s assessment that WebGL is a severe security risk. The gfx driver culture is not the culture of security." http://twitter.com/#!/ID_AA_Carmack/status/81732190949486592

https://twitter.com/#!/ID_AA_Carmack/status/81732190949486592

I nominate YOU Picachu!

What's with the troll mod? How am I trolling? You can even see the guys twitter feed.

“Tango down - http://t.co/2QGXy6f - for the lulz.” http://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec/status/81115804636155906 wtf

I love this article and what the goal of this is! Programming and developing has been an absolute passion of mine for years, and it's been my career for at least half as long. My only qualm with this is that we're still dupping kids into this. Programming can be fun no matter what you're building! The problem, in my view, isn't teaching space invaders vs. a tip calculator; the problem is that the teaching gets monotonous, too many concepts get repeated course to course, and only about half (or less) of what is taught in schools is actually useful to get a job!

I'm not just complaining either. Together with a couple of guys I've put together a site http://wibit.net/ (as of this writing the site is down for maintenance, check http://twitter.com/wibit_usa for when we're back up, or to just check out some of the videos from now and older ones check out http://youtube.com/wibitnet :-) offering free video tutorials on how to get started in computer programming. We've done a few intro courses and C and C++ (23 hours of video my partners and I worked our asses off on) and we're doing this linearly. We're not repeating concepts, we're not monotone, we're telling jokes and making it entertaining! That's what it should be about, having fun with what you're building.

It is awesome that schools are trying to engage kids with this, I just think that can happen by offering them an engaging curriculum and not a gimmick (not to say game programming is a gimmick, but how they're pitching it they're using it as one).

According to their Twitter, they were taking requests for DDoS, and targets included Minecraft, Escapist, EVE, and League of Legends.

Their twitter specifically said they're letting off on Minecraft.

https://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec

This is the end result of the SomethingAwful mindset. Hope you're happy, Internet.

It appears they're just taking requests by Twitter and phone and knocking things down via DDoS, 'for the lulz': http://twitter.com/#!/lulzsec

League of Legends down. Minecraft down. Escapist down. EVE down. finfisher.com down.

That's today, so far...

The interesting thing is, I wouldn't guess this is a voluntary (ie Loic) DDoS. Seems unlikely since they're also specifically targeting gamers and gaming companies to elicit 'gamer rage'. I mean, how many 14 year olds are donating their machines to those causes? So are they operating with botnets of compromised machines? That'd be like a force multiplier of illegal, anti-social behavior. Either way, no pretense whatsoever of calling attention to social wrongs.

If my suspicions are correct (admittedly, they're quite possibly not), it kinda makes you miss the olden-days of Anon trolling Scientology and anti-wikileaks orgs because they think it's right.

If it is voluntary, a few simple switches at Twitter, Facebook, whichever registrar and Freenode should do the trick and break up the C&C. At least for a little while. It's not that they couldn't switch to new places, but getting the message out is a relatively slow process.

Forgot the link for reference: http://twitter.com/LulzSec/status/80675710246723584

This attitude is why software is so bad, lulzsec can go around owning just about any company it wants purely for the lulz.

Good thing we don't treat our bridge builders like we treat our the designers and builders of our software infrastructure. Then people would die instead of just losing millions of dollars.

Ok, his twitter account is here, and it says: "San Francisco" "My own ramblings about being trying to live on part-time retail at a Fortune 500 multi-national company, along with other random shit nobody cares about."... Trying to live on part-time retail?!? WTF.

Most people can't live on part-time ANYTHING. And he wants to live on part-time RETAIL.. In SanFran. A serious WTF.

Reading his posts, he seems like a good guy, and a real apple believer (and not just some agitator). But he needs to get a reality check.

Actually, if you follow his Twitter feed, you'll see he has a lot of general commentary on software design in general. Based on that I'd say he's working a lot on his programming interests too.

In Rio de Janeiro, where checkpoints are now common, people just use Twitter.

Really?

LulzSec has said no one was arrested from their group. See the following: http://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec/status/77785393289887745

DING DONG DING DONG! THE BRITISH ARE COMING TO TAKE YOUR GUNS! SHOOT YOUR GUNS! DING DONG DING DONG!

Here's where I try to get by the lameness filter so I can post the actual tweet in the format it was written.

Everything else they've done could be argued to be altruistic

Altruistic? That's a difficult argument to make. LulzSec are not whitehat. An altruist would not release credit card details onto the internet for shits and giggles.

This really is a case of, First they came for PSN, but I didn't speak out because I was a Sony hater...

Moffat has clarified that he was only talking about the current season: https://twitter.com/#!/steven_moffat/status/75506136593338368

OpenSSH isn't vulnerable to this attack: https://twitter.com/#!/damienmiller/status/72814031941017600

They backpedalled on that pretty quickly: https://twitter.com/#!/VZWSupport/status/74160501885644800

Whoops: Linky: http://twitter.com/#!/VZWSupport/status/74072016147324928

Similarly, unless Twitter has a significant UK office, it is governed by US law and not UK law.

Twitter has a UK office -- it's very new (is it even operating yet? I don't know). You can see many jobs advertised: http://twitter.com/jobs-international.html

Actually, we have 2 verdicts plus a foreign imposition.

Under Scots Law, the alleged behaviours/acts are proven, or not proven on the evidence and is decided by lay jury.

If proven, it is a matter of legal expertise (and therefore rightly reserved to the judge to decide on legal arguments presented) whether this constitutes a crime (and if so, which) that the defender (note: not defendent - that's an unknown foreign term) is guilty of.

'Not Guilty' is an import from the English system and is the anomaly, conflating facts and legal liability.

IANAL but did study law as part of my postgrad.
For an actual learned opinions on Scots Law, talk to @LoveAndGarbage or better yet, Professor Emeritus of Scots Law at Edinburgh University, Robert Black.

Actually, we have 2 verdicts plus a foreign imposition.

Under Scots Law, the alleged behaviours/acts are proven, or not proven on the evidence and is decided by lay jury.

If proven, it is a matter of legal expertise (and therefore rightly reserved to the judge to decide on legal arguments presented) whether this constitutes a crime (and if so, which) that the defender (note: not defendent - that's an unknown foreign term) is guilty of.

'Not Guilty' is an import from the English system and is the anomaly, conflating facts and legal liability.

IANAL but did study law as part of my postgrad.
For an actual learned opinions on Scots Law, talk to @LoveAndGarbage or better yet, Professor Emeritus of Scots Law at Edinburgh University, Robert Black.

https://twitter.com/#!/paulg/status/51528478083923968

"Google's refusal to not release Honeycomb source code is kosher because the code in question is released under the Apache license. But the kernel at the heart of Android is GPL'd, which means that code must be released. Google has actually been a good citizen in this regard

Wait, hold on a minute. It's precisely the fact the Apache licence doesn't compel them to release the source that would make them "good citizens" if they did, rather than just giving it to a select few OEMs.

but many third-party Android vendors, not so much. While Asus has released their code, there are a host of companies that seem to have not done so, and Matthew Garrett is maintaining a list."

We were sold on Android being an open source and free alternative to iOS and the like, but unfortunately the reality is proving anything but. Part of this is Google going back on their stance on what constitutes open, but also that they haven't more rigorously enforced compliance of the GPL by their OEMs.

It's a shame they have to do this for companies other than Asus and Samsung (good GPL folk, IIRC), but companies have proved time and time again their misunderstanding of what their responsibilities are under the GPL at best, and knowingly ignoring them at worst.

Just search on Twitter for Imogen Thomas, the girl he had his affair with. His name will likely pop up in the first few tweets.

Imogen Thomas then decided to try and blackmail him into paying her 100,000 pounds to keep quiet. He has refused to pay and so she is desperate to tell her story to our gutter press instead.

I have little sympathy for him but I have even less for her. He has kids and they will also suffer as a result of this slapper and her greed (and his stupidity for having an affair in the first place)

Here's a handy search link

Just search on Twitter for Imogen Thomas, the girl he had his affair with. His name will likely pop up in the first few tweets.

William Gibson doesn't seem too worried about that sort of thing. https://twitter.com/#!/GreatDismal GreatDismal William Gibson A novelist who is absolutely particular about who read the audio book is a novelist with really a lot of free time. 16 May

The "random twat" even rickrolled: http://twitter.com/RoyOsherove/status/71334987152101376
That was his third tweet on the subject...

We contacted Microsoft for response to this story. A Microsoft spokesperson said the story was not confirmed by Microsoft, but the statement she gave did not deny the story. It reads, "The plan to open source [VB6 on] CodePlex is rumor, and has not been confirmed by Microsoft."

also this tweet refuses such version

Rob Osherove was joking when he tweeted that VB6 is being open sourced. If you look at his tweets, he followed that tweet with another with a link to "video of the official announcement" which is actually a link to Never Gonna Give Up. Looks like he was rickrolling. Anyway, Dough Seven, the Senior Product Manager of the Visual Team, had also tweeted that the rumors are not true. https://twitter.com/#!/dseven/status/71352709785198592 via http://digitizor.com/2011/05/20/microsoft-visual-basic-6-not-open-source/

And the person who broke the "news" wasn't even trying to pretend it was true.

http://twitter.com/#!/RoyOsherove/status/71334987152101376
@RoyOsherove here's a more official video of announcement of VB6 going open source from #msteched http://bit.ly/79qHlZ

http://twitter.com/#!/dseven/status/71352709785198592
@dseven The rumors of VB6 going open source are simply not true. #msteched #vb6rumor #vb6

http://twitter.com/#!/dseven/status/71359684904366081
@dseven @beckynagel I'm the Director of Product Management for Visual Studio Tools & Languages. There's no more solid source than me. Its not true.

http://twitter.com/#!/dseven/status/71352709785198592
@dseven The rumors of VB6 going open source are simply not true. #msteched #vb6rumor #vb6

http://twitter.com/#!/dseven/status/71359684904366081
@dseven @beckynagel I'm the Director of Product Management for Visual Studio Tools & Languages. There's no more solid source than me. Its not true.

But if we moved to this model, how would I give tips on climagic? I'd start having to post links to screen shots. I kid. Sounds like this guy is trying to turn the command line into the multilayer net with protocols between the programs.

funny... there's a jam3s on twitter who appears to be an intern at Intel in the UK. but surely that must just be a coincidence.

That would be myself (found this article via hit refers to my site) and it is just a coincidence. Just an average IT guy