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You can read the Scientologist religious document concerning Jesus here:

http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/fishman/index2.html

Short version: They call him a pedophile with a nasty temper.

If you want a good laugh, these 2 sites offer a run down on their beliefs:

http://www.xenu.net/
http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/fishman/index2.html

Jesus Liked Little Boys?

Very few BeOS applications worth raving about come to mind, but SoundPlay is a most excellent music player. It can play multiple audio files at once at any speed, including backwards. It also has the ability to fade between two files that are playing simultaneously, a feature DJ's will find useful. Moreover, it can be used as a streaming mp3 or ogg server.

Because of the database-like file system you don't need a bloated interface like iTunes to index and search through your music. You can just use the file manager for equally powerful functionality.

Something you have to understand is that Scientologists _know_ they have the answers to everything (because L. Ron Hubbard said so). If a member has any doubts, then they're "out of ethics" and have to report for additional training (at their expense). The CoS does not use the same meaning of the word ethics that you or I would. To them, ethics is doing and believing exactly what you're told. If you don't understand something, or have questions, then you are assumed to simply not understand the material; because if you did understand the material, you wouldn't have any questions.

The organization is set up so that it slowly isolates members from normal society, both physically but also mentally. Everything the CoS teaches becomes the truth and any conflicting information is actively ignored. The group as a whole forms a sort of feedback loop whereby members receive positive affirmation from the group when they do, experience or feel something the CoS wants them to feel regardless of whether or not it's true. This is why some people claim that Scientology has helped them, it's not because of the "tech", it's because they feel acceptance and safety within that group.

The church has several ways of dealing with dissent and criticism. The first is by declaring someone a suppressive person, or SP. SPs are considered to be very, very evil people as they're trying to suppress or prevent the CoS from saving mankind (yes, that's their stated mission). People who leave the church, or people outside of the church that are trying to talk someone into leaving are "declared" SP which means that Scientologists are forbidden from speaking to them about anything meaningful. If you're a Scientologist and someone is an SP it doesn't matter whether or not they're your father, mother, brother or daughter, they're dead to you. The second way is through their "fair game" doctrine which basically states that the CoS will not punish a member for anything they do towards an SP, be it harassment, extortion, assault or murder.

David Touretzky (yes, _that_ Touretzky) has some great information about Scientology available on his homepage. There's a fantastic article available that describes exactly how someone gets sucked into the cult, little by little. Note I say cult and not religion because the CoS _is_ a cult. They simply call themselves a religion in order to attempt to shield themselves from "interference" from government and to take advantage of IRS tax breaks (so they can keep more money). In addition, they have members sign contracts that absolve the church of any responsibility should something like you dying from their Introspection Rundown happen. Check out this contract they have you sign. Pay particular attention to this sentence,

I understand, acknowledge and agree that the Introspection Rundown addresses only the individual's spiritual needs and I freely consent, without reservation, and without condition or limitation, to Church members conducting the Introspection Rundown, and that I accept and assume all known and unknown risks of injury, loss, or damage resulting from my decision to participate in the Introspection Rundown and specifically absolve all persons and entities from all liabilities of any kind, without limitation, associated with my participation or their participation in my Introspection Rundown.

Notice it says "only the individual's spiritual needs", which means that it doesn't meet your physical needs and you can die from their "ritual" like Lisa McPherson did.

I could go on and on about things like church members being locked into compounds with patrolling armed guards, related organizations like Narconon treating drug abuse problems with long saunas and megadoses of niacin or actual proved conspiracies like Operation Snow White and Operation Freakout, but I'd prefer the reader follow some of the links I provided and educate themselves.

The Xenu story is revealed only when the scientologist has paid enough to get to OT III level (OT stands for operating thetan). It's not until you get to OT VIII (which very few ever do) that you learn:

• L. Ron Hubbard was the anti-christ, but in a good way, as well as the reincarnation of the Buddha, who was supposed to return at some point as Metteyya
• Jesus Christ was actually a bisexual pedophile who slept with underage boys and girls

For tons of fun and some incredibly bad science-fiction, you can read all the top-secret Scientology documents here. They were released as part of a court case.

The Xenu story is revealed only when the scientologist has paid enough to get to OT III level (OT stands for operating thetan). It's not until you get to OT VIII (which very few ever do) that you learn:

• L. Ron Hubbard was the anti-christ, but in a good way, as well as the reincarnation of the Buddha, who was supposed to return at some point as Metteyya
• Jesus Christ was actually a bisexual pedophile who slept with underage boys and girls

For tons of fun and some incredibly bad science-fiction, you can read all the top-secret Scientology documents here. They were released as part of a court case.

The Xenu story is revealed only when the scientologist has paid enough to get to OT III level (OT stands for operating thetan). It's not until you get to OT VIII (which very few ever do) that you learn:

• L. Ron Hubbard was the anti-christ, but in a good way, as well as the reincarnation of the Buddha, who was supposed to return at some point as Metteyya
• Jesus Christ was actually a bisexual pedophile who slept with underage boys and girls

For tons of fun and some incredibly bad science-fiction, you can read all the top-secret Scientology documents here. They were released as part of a court case.

Right, because Einstein wasn't just a math-loving, nobody patent clerk when he published some of the most important papers in the history of physics.

Beware of making universal generalizations.

Eyes rolling...

XS4ALL has its roots in a close-knit international internet community which played a large part in the creation of the internet. We therefore cherish and seek to protect the original values of the internet as a worldwide computer network that allows the free and uncensored exchange of data, information and ideas for everyone. XS4ALL therefore believes it has a special responsibility for the development of the internet.

The internet and society
The internet has given rise to a new digital society which calls for a new set of rules. XS4ALL promotes civil rights in this digital society. We are actively opposing the mandatory retention of all our customers' internet traffic data. We seek to initiate debates on freedom of speech and privacy on the internet.

Freedom of speech
XS4ALL believes that freedom of speech is an immense asset. Every voice must be able to be heard. It is a fundamental tenet of our democracy. XS4ALL considers that internet providers should not concern themselves with the views of their customers. For XS4ALL, it is the laws of the Netherlands that determine what customers can and cannot publish. We do not judge the content ourselves. Such a judgment should be made by an independent court and not by private companies. If it turns out that customers' content hosted by XS4ALL contravenes Dutch law, it intervenes rapidly and appropriately.

The original objective of internet for everyone has now been largely achieved, but the ideal of the free exchange of information, unimpeded by censorship, has not been realised 100%. The internet is increasingly being censored by governments.

That is done by blocking websites or, if they are hosted outside their sphere of influence, by forbidding certain search terms. The (current) Dutch government would not venture to conduct such forms of censorship, but in a certain sense censorship does take place even in the Netherlands.

There are known examples of internet service providers that have voluntarily blocked access to websites even though their content is neither prohibited nor unlawful. For some internet service providers, the fact that a website offends good taste is sufficient to shut it down. But whose good taste, and where do you draw the line?

XS4ALL is very concerned about such forms of self-regulation and believes that freedom of speech should have the protection it deserves under the Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights.

XS4ALL has its roots in a close-knit international internet community which played a large part in the creation of the internet. We therefore cherish and seek to protect the original values of the internet as a worldwide computer network that allows the free and uncensored exchange of data, information and ideas for everyone. XS4ALL therefore believes it has a special responsibility for the development of the internet.

The internet and society
The internet has given rise to a new digital society which calls for a new set of rules. XS4ALL promotes civil rights in this digital society. We are actively opposing the mandatory retention of all our customers' internet traffic data. We seek to initiate debates on freedom of speech and privacy on the internet.

Freedom of speech
XS4ALL believes that freedom of speech is an immense asset. Every voice must be able to be heard. It is a fundamental tenet of our democracy. XS4ALL considers that internet providers should not concern themselves with the views of their customers. For XS4ALL, it is the laws of the Netherlands that determine what customers can and cannot publish. We do not judge the content ourselves. Such a judgment should be made by an independent court and not by private companies. If it turns out that customers' content hosted by XS4ALL contravenes Dutch law, it intervenes rapidly and appropriately.

The original objective of internet for everyone has now been largely achieved, but the ideal of the free exchange of information, unimpeded by censorship, has not been realised 100%. The internet is increasingly being censored by governments.

That is done by blocking websites or, if they are hosted outside their sphere of influence, by forbidding certain search terms. The (current) Dutch government would not venture to conduct such forms of censorship, but in a certain sense censorship does take place even in the Netherlands.

There are known examples of internet service providers that have voluntarily blocked access to websites even though their content is neither prohibited nor unlawful. For some internet service providers, the fact that a website offends good taste is sufficient to shut it down. But whose good taste, and where do you draw the line?

XS4ALL is very concerned about such forms of self-regulation and believes that freedom of speech should have the protection it deserves under the Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights.

xs4all.nl is brave enough to face $cientology in a 10-year lasting court case. And winning!

They just paid millions of dollars for something that systems like OpenBSD, Linux, and FreeBSD offer for free. OpenBSD's filesystem encryption is particularly good. And when you combine it with their meticulous code reviews and near-100% insistence on using as many security good practices as possible, there's really no reason to not use OpenBSD if security is one of your main concerns.

Only for vim (vimacs, already mentioned). If you want something as small and fast as a regular vi, but with emacs key bindings, I'ld suggest mg.

Crazy talk. A competent GM and players make their own story. All a game needs to do is present the opportunity for adventure and a good kicker for where to go. Shadowrun presents plenty of opportunity in the form of corporate espionage, bodyguarding, investigation, and good old bug (shaman) hunts. The election of the dragon Dunkelzahn as president, his assassination, and his will are great adventure hooks.

Not everyone needs a module to script out and hold the hands of a play group to enjoy a game. In fact, I've always felt that trying to shove a story down the throat of your customers made for games that had no real replay value. (Look at White Wolf's Orpheus for an example. It's by no means a bad game, but it's not playable twice, really.)

Incidentally, Shadowrun had several publisher created adventures for the creatively challenged, so your whole point is moot.

And while we're at it, let's put a charge on p2p traffic as well. Oh wait, net neutrality and all that.

While you could probably solve a lot of the spam problem by metered billing for e-mail, the same could be said for p2p. Only for p2p it would just solve the ISP's problem (and possibly the content industry), in stead of a user problem.

To fight spam in stead of reacting to it (i.e. using spam filters), you have to attack the problem itself. As soon as an ISP notices a botnetted PC in their network, drop its internet connection. Redirect all their webtraffic to a page displaying a phonenumber they can call, and don't let them back on until they cleaned their machine. A Dutch ISP (http://www.xs4all.nl/) already does this, and I happen to think it's great.

Then there's the problem of economic incentive. If only there was a way to stop people from actually bying any of this crap. I'm not sure if it would be legal, but an ISP that has marked a message as spam, could collect any linked urls from those messages, and tell their DNS to redirect to a single specific page for all them (goatse.cx perhaps). Ofcourse, they'd still need a decent spam filter to actually do this. Chicken and egg kind of thing I suppose.

A Dutch invention, from 1994. And then to think that in The Netherlands the problem has never been that bad! The counter-script it's called, and it's here: http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html

From the website:

The Direct Marketing sector regards the telephone as one of its most successful tools. Consumers experience telemarketing from a completely different point of view: more than 92% perceive commercial telephone calls as a violation of privacy.
Telemarketers make use of a telescript - a guideline for a telephone conversation. This script creates an imbalance in the conversation between the marketer and the consumer. It is this imbalance, most of all, that makes telemarketing successful. The EGBG Counterscript attempts to redress that balance.

I'm not affiliated with the site, I just happen to know about it. I never even tried it, when a telemarketer calls I usually just hang up.

Hes' not. That's part of OT III, the OT's are the official scriptures of the Church (/spit) of Scientology. They became public in the US as part of the Fishman affidavits. The files have been closed in the US, Scientology is a sue-happy bunch, but they're completely legal in the Netherlands, our highest court has allready ruled on the matter.

And they've starred in more than one legal case, here's to it starring in another one :)

Hes' not. That's part of OT III, the OT's are the official scriptures of the Church (/spit) of Scientology. They became public in the US as part of the Fishman affidavits. The files have been closed in the US, Scientology is a sue-happy bunch, but they're completely legal in the Netherlands, our highest court has allready ruled on the matter.

And they've starred in more than one legal case, here's to it starring in another one :)

Guys, numerous synthesizers allow using arbitrary scales, from the program "Scala", for example. Just see the list on the homepage: http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/scala/

I'm surprised that there are so many knowlegable folks on slash here that can discuss music and the physics of music

One thing that I'm lacking is a good reference on the theory. For example, I know that "no sharps of flats" is the key of C-major/A-minor. Why? Is it by definition?

Yeah, it does sound a little like this (scroll down a bit to "Y'ALL KEWL BOMB DOODZ")

Your wish is google's command:

http://dribibu.xs4all.nl/dilbert19950813.html
http://dribibu.xs4all.nl/dilbert19951230.html

Your wish is google's command:

http://dribibu.xs4all.nl/dilbert19950813.html
http://dribibu.xs4all.nl/dilbert19951230.html

You can play some online!

Right here, in fact.

And absolutely, singing the Ballad of the Star-crossed Miner to Floyd as he died, that was emotionally intense. Of course, I was something like 12 at the time so hormones had their say.

I also greatly enjoyed Planescape: Torment. It's a work of art in its own way, in my opinion (less so about the graphics and interface, more so for the experience).

I think Ebert's out to lunch on this topic.

>> while the lowest Intel can produce is 65W.

Ever heard of Socket-478-Mobile (not to be confused with the old P4-socket-478) desktop motherboards?

T5x00 and T7x00 CPUs are almost equivalent to E4x00/6x00 desktop CPUs performancewise and have a TDP of ~30 Watts (they lag a bit on the FSB, but we're not comparing to enthusiast monsters, the CPUs in question have big caches and are otherwise very powerful and can easily power gaming rigs, video compression etc). I'm writing this on one in fact).

Unlike the AMD 30 Watt parts, they're not vaporware - they're present in retail and in most laptops (and some desktops too).

Further, L7x00 CPUs that are already appearing on the market in lappies halve that figure (17W) and still come in PGA socket form factor (ie can be used in desktops easily enough), and U7x00 which halve it again (9W) may also come in PGA. The lower power, the lower you'll find the clock-speed range, but even the lowest-of-the-low CPUs such as the Core-based Celeron 423 (Core 1 Solo 1.06GHz) can easily power standard desktop systems, and consume an entire 5 Watts.

Do some homework - here link, knock yourself out

And if you can put your own system together, you can probably cool an L7x00 and maybe even with a bit of effort a T5x00/T7x00 using passive cooling (Ninja Scythe minus fan or some such). Lose the fan - save another watt or two :-)

So even if your power savings using a lower-power CPU over a high-power one amount to the cost of powering the CPU for 2-3 years rather than 1 year, my point stands. If there's no noticeable benefit, why pay the money?

btw, my next gaming rig will be built around this concept (with some kind of depowering scheme for the GPU I haven't figured out yet)

Use this counter-script! I remember someone posting about this counter-script awhile back and it's been on my bookmarks every since!

It's pretty funny!

http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html

Better yet, fight fire with fire. Just use this handy-dandy Anti-Telemarketer counterscript. Works every time!

This guy says it better than I can:

http://www.xs4all.nl/~sbpoley/webmatters/whatnojs. html

There are plenty of reasons to browse without Javascript. And, if you use Firefox with noscript, you can control which scripts are allowed to run and which ones aren't.

And what if Lincoln had been armed and able to fire back?

Having read this http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/fishman/ot3.html (written by their founder), it seems pretty obvious to me that a lot of LSD was used.. Also, how much did that guy with the dark glasses resemble Tom Cruise? -- SCARY MAN :) Let this me a lesson to you all - DRUGS ARE BAD!! A couple of cheeky ones at the weekend, and who knows; you too could become a cult leader.

Use an MD5 password generator. You can use the same password across sites, but it won't get compromised. Ever. There are a few sites like these that can help you generate these passwords:

http://passwordmaker.org/
http://angel.net/~nic/passwdlet.html
http://www.xs4all.nl/~jlpoutre/BoT/Javascript/Pass wordComposer/

The same cannot be said of scientology. It is verboten for anyone not part of the religion to look at any of their "holy" documents and even then, you can only see so much based on what you have paid to them. Further, if you are part of scientology, you cannot show anyone not part of scientology those documents or allow those documents to be released. If you do, the lawsuits ensue. See The Fishman Affidavit for evidence of this.

Sorry, your example doesn't fly.

*The Book of Mary being one that the Vatican refuses to allow anyone to look at. After all, can't have a woman's opinion be part of the male-only Catholic Church, can we?

Under MCE, I use the MCE Standy Tool. MCE has a bad habit of waking up to record a show and then not returning to standby afterwards. This can result in the computer staying on all day instead of just 1/2 hour to record a small show. The Standby Tool has features to help MCE handle power management in better ways then Windows default methods. It makes me wonder why Microsoft couldn't get things to work as smoothly as this 3rd party software. http://www.xs4all.nl/~hveijk/mst/indexe.htm

For several years, one of the major banks in NL caused all kinds of grief to people using Anything But Internet Explorer (tm) to try and access their on-line banking website. Some months it would work only in konqueror, some months only in firefox, sometimes only when we flushed the cache, and sometimes the only recourse was to change the identification string to act as if we're using Internet Explorer. Then everything works fine :-) despite it's still gecko and not really IE rendering the html...
See this for example: (in dutch, and from 2003) http://www.girotel4all.nl/nieuws.php, and http://www.xs4all.nl/~koospol/nl/gto/index.html.
BTW, at this moment their (new) product works fine in firefox (well, iceweasel) on Debian.
So, maybe the low uptake of firefox means people have once set their identification string to "IE" in 2002-2003 and never changed it back. Well, it's AN explanation at least, I didn't say it was a good explanation :-)

That precedent was Scientology busting anon.penet.fi remailers. The US does not control the internet and hopefully as time goes by legal jurisdictions around the world will rule against heavy handed American tactics.

Is the sumbitter part of the group that worked on this emulator or something? Waxes on about it like it brings something new to the table even though there's a laundry list of x86 emulators that have long done this one's claim to fame is. Lame. It's not even the first java x86 emulator: http://www.xs4all.nl/~rjoris/retro/

A nice example of how to deal with friendly hacker/crackers in an adult way is in the Terms and Conditions of Dutch ISP xs4all:
http://www.xs4all.nl/uk/overxs4all/voorwaarden/ind ex.php?taal=en

4.4 Without prejudice to article 4.3, customers are permitted to hack the XS4ALL system.

The first customer who succeeds in attaining a position equivalent to that of the XS4ALL system administrator will be offered six months' free use of the system, provided that the said customer explains how he or she succeeded in hacking the system, has not damaged the system or other customers and has respected the privacy of other customers. Each customer hereby gives consent for other customers to attempt to hack the system under the aforementioned conditions.

Would more companies have a similar and well published policy guys like Samy might not have to go through all this legal grief.
And the companies would gain a lot of security.

My Acorn Atom actually came with schematics (2) and it was easy enough to disassemble the ROM. The manual even had a complete definition of the syntax in Backus-Naur format. Too bad modern computer makers don't seem to have that sort of respect for their users.

My Acorn Atom actually came with schematics (2) and it was easy enough to disassemble the ROM. The manual even had a complete definition of the syntax in Backus-Naur format. Too bad modern computer makers don't seem to have that sort of respect for their users.

My cat would get her own human retinal samples if she could only figure out how to use a knife.

"There is a BIG difference between being able to design a circuit on paper (or SPICE) and actually being able to put components together and make them work in the real world."

This guy seems to have done well. :)

More on Acorn / BBC and all the rest here : http://www.oldcomputers.freeserve.co.uk/index.htm The BBC ran quite a few programmes on home computing including a radio show called Chip Shop which used to broadcast programmes to save on tape in a feature called the Chip Shop Takeaway. They used a system called Basicode which enabled the same programmes to run on different types of computer and had originally been developed by the Dutch broadcaster NOS. More on that here : http://www.xs4all.nl/~lennartb/basicode.html

procmail to the rescue:

    procmail code by Dr.Ruud
    -> procmailrc.anti-gifspam, or
    -> procmailrc.anti-gifspam.mini

thats why you need to keep the telemarketer counter script handy... http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html

http://www.xs4all.nl/~jcdverha/scijokes/1_7.html#H ardy_2

• Spanish-Mapudungun glossary
• Mapudungun-Spanish Dictionary from the U. Católica de Temuco
• Mapuche-Spanish dictionary
• Freelang Dictionary

There is a neat little piece of javascript at http://www.xs4all.nl/~jlpoutre/BoT/Javascript/Pass wordComposer/ that lets you just think up a master password in your head and then use this applet to automatically generate a site-specific, unique hash and fill in the password field automatically. This way you can remember the passwords easily, you never have to save them or write them down. And if one site gets compromised, that password (the hash) won't work with any other site. The drawback is that if you don't have this piece of javascript then you can't get into your sites.

Here a procmail recipe set to catch the gifspams: anti-gifspam