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The root of the problem is Right Here(tm) by freebsd+guy · 2002-01-10 03:16 · Score: -1, Troll · on Jon Johansen Indicted by Norwegian Authorities

"I have watched kids testifying before Congress. It is clear that they are completely unaware of the seriousness of their acts. There is obviously a cultural gap. The act of breaking into a computer system has to have the same social stigma as breaking into a neighbor's house. It should not matter that the neighbor's door is unlocked. The press must learn that misguided use of a computer is no more amazing than drunk driving of an automobile."

At first glance, one might attribute that statement to a computer-illiterate senator or to an incompetent journalist. You may be surprised, then, to find that this quote was from Ken Thompson in 1995. Yes, one of our own - a creator of the UNIX system and the command line we use every single day - condemned the antisocial activities of malicious computer users. Which leads me to ask: why aren't we listening, and where is our moral compass?

A few years ago, it was all the media's fault: the media gave much attention to antisocial criminals who happened to use computers. Nowadays, computer crime is rarely front-page news, especially in light of the recent terrorist attacks caused by the usual suspects. So what kind of notoriety, then, are these criminally insane geeks seeking? The fact of the matter is that the open source community here on Slashdot is not only tolerating illicit behavior; it is encouraging it. We are partially responsible for every Brian West, Eric Corley, Dmitri Skylarov, Ted Felten, Randal Schwartz,, and DrinkOrDie member. We are harboring criminals because we are glorifying their acts and lauding them for "civil disobedience." We are not unlike the Arabs who cheered as they watched the Twin Towers collapse on their (banned) TV sets. And like those ungrateful Arabs, we owe our prosperity to the American government and the capitalist society that so many users here seem to despise. We have become our own enemy.

We, as a community, need to stop tolerating this behavior. Instead of encouraging people like Jon Johansen by sending money to the EFF to help them keep these ingrates' lilly white asses out of jail, we need to send a strong message that computer crime is not consistent with our ethical standards. We need to lead by example - log off of Gnutella, start paying for software (even Windows), stop cracking your DVDs and eBooks "for fun," and start acting like an upstanding citizen. It is only then that the powers that be will start taking us seriously and repeal the DMCA/SSSCA/PATRIOT legislation, and start giving us our rights back. It is crystal clear that we will not get our rights back a moment before we get out of the business of producing criminals, and the first step is to stop empathizing with them.

freebsd guy

Summary from ZDNET by wiredog · 2002-01-10 01:17 · Score: 5, Informative · on SuSE No Longer Barred From Selling

Zdnet reports that the "Krayon" app isn't even included in the distro. Also, "Crayon apparently was not interested in pursuing the case" and "In Germany, trademark suits can be filed by any attorney, even if that attorney doesn't represent the trademark holder" So it looks like the lawyer saw the opportunity for a quick kill, and missed.

It's all over. But why? by halym · 2002-01-09 17:33 · Score: 1 · on Preliminary Injunction Against SuSE

See
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories

Re:There's a shocker by philthechill · 2002-01-09 11:13 · Score: 1 · on Microsoft Caught Rigging ZD Net Poll

Here are the current results of this previous "rigged" MS poll:

I'll upgrade to Windows Me:

Right away 6009 (13%)

In a few months 4153 (9%)

When I buy a new computer 9693 (22%)

When Hell freezes over 24835 (56%)

To vote yourself, go to http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/stories/story/0,10 738,2627324,00.html?chkpt=zdhpnews02 and show them what you think!

403 Forbidden by ProfKyne · 2002-01-09 09:14 · Score: 1 · on Defamation, Free Speech, Jurisdiction and the Net?

IMHO -- this web page is stored on my server, in my country, with my laws. If you don't want to see it, or if you don't want access to it, then don't request that page. The internet is not a "push" medium. You are perfectly welcome to not request my web pages, or deny all packets from my server.

Conversely, this would be a rare bit of irony, if it does apply to the country that ordered Norwegian hacker Johanssen brought overseas for trial at the behest of their recording industry and mediacorps.

Re:Build it, and they will... by Anonymous Coward · 2002-01-08 14:21 · Score: 0 · on Even Flash Can Get Viruses

FLASH sucks plain and simple. When will you art school Design idiots stop the obsession with shiny metal objects and learn how to create universally usable and standardized design solutions?

Re:Mobile Phones the way to go by donutello · 2002-01-07 06:55 · Score: 2 · on Microsoft to Introduce GBA-competitor?

Unless M$ gets into the movile phone market,

You mean like Stinger?

Re:originally called a trojan by H310iSe · 2002-01-05 11:23 · Score: 5, Interesting · on Spyware in Kazaa, Limewire, Grokster

It was in the register (my other regular read who scoops slashdot at least 1/2 the time BTW) - and people above seem to have been missing the point, yes, this is not gator or some other silly thing, it's spyware classified as a trojan by antivirus vendors because, it appears, no-one knows what exactly it does.
LINKS: - the register article
zdnet on the trojan
symantec listing the file as a trojan

mmmm.... by Cinematique · 2002-01-04 11:25 · Score: 3, Interesting · on Is CD Copy Protection Illegal?

now that we have 2390482398 copies of the same general idea posted... i have a new one to add to the melee.

what is going to happen when the people who use operating systems produced by people outside this company... aren't able to access the music on a copy-protected cd?

"no, i'm sorry mom. you can't use your imac to listen to that cd because the record companies don't want you to."

Re:how do we protect ourselves? by Pinball+Wizard · 2002-01-04 09:41 · Score: 2 · on Judge Upholds FBI Keyboard Sniffing

Zdnet, of all places, actually just put out an article covering how to protect yourself against hardware keystroke loggers.

The author, David Coursey, has been hit and miss with his articles, but when he gets it right, he's pretty good.

Re:Antivirus Ignoring FBI Keyloggers by delta407 · 2002-01-04 08:36 · Score: 0 · on Judge Upholds FBI Keyboard Sniffing

The antivirus companies have changed their stance after someone informed them that ignoring Magic Lantern was a Bad Idea.

Antivirus firms: FBI loophole is out of line:
"Antivirus software vendors said Monday they don't want to create a loophole in their security products to let the FBI or other government agencies use a virus to eavesdrop on the computer communications of suspected criminals."

Re:Silly counter-argument by NutscrapeSucks · 2002-01-03 11:54 · Score: 2, Informative · on Open Source And The Obligation To Recycle

Factual problems -- Microsoft did not "win", in fact they settled for $20M (link), which is a pretty good price if you consider that Mosaic was technologically obsolete by the time MS started using it (didn't support popular Netscapisms like tables and frames), and had less than a 10% marketshare at the time.

On top of that $20M, they spent many millions of dollars and a couple years developing IE into something that was actually competitive with Netscape, and for the most part no longer resembled Mosaic.

I do agree that they probably _tried_ to steal Mosaic, but they didn't get away with it, and nor was the deal essential to IE's eventual market dominiation. It's also sad that a company with $4B/year revenue would try to dick over some doomed-to-failure pipsqueaks like Spyglass.

Re:Microsoft IIS and ASP by cscx · 2002-01-03 05:59 · Score: 2, Interesting · on Linux During The .Com Crash

I also firmly believe that many .com companies that went down had really stupid employees that hardly could code a page without visual BASIC-like ASP. This resulted in thousands of really bad webpages that prevented anyone not using Internet Exploder from entering.

Here's a link for ya. Ooh, here's a quote too:

"But though PHP thrives on hosted servers, it's too immature for a high-traffic business environment. As much as we were rooting for it to succeed in our testing, it failed--especially when we attempted to evaluate on Windows."

I'd like to see proof of that bullshit you posted. See, the truth really is that IIS/ASP is for the more educated, business people, and PHP is for the 133t k1dd13z... If you notice, ASP and IIS are used by many high caliber e-commerce sites, where PHP is not, because it would choke (so would MySQL).

Guess who uses IIS? eBay, Dell, Gateway, Intel, Nasdaq, Compaq, most of the UK Government sites... etc.

Is linux helping this boom? by DeadBugs · 2002-01-02 12:16 · Score: 2, Informative · on CGI About to Boom In Hollywood

There have been many stories about computer animation switching to Linux boxes because of cost savings and availability. I wonder if the adoption of Linux is helping the industry and in turn will this growth help Linux. Either way here are some Computer Animation\Linux articles to read:

Linux Goes Hollywood
Linux Goes To The Movies
Linux takes Hollywood by storm
Maya ported to Red Hat

Where'd the Microsoft Spike Come From? by Crispin+Cowan · 2002-01-01 14:46 · Score: 2, Interesting · on Is Domain Speculation Bust?

IMHO, more significant (to say nothing of distrubing) than the domain name reduction is the huge spike in use of Microsoft web servers starting last June. The spike continues unabated through the summer of Code Red and Nimda.

What is it that caused this surge in Microsoft web servers? And what is it that causes these clueless dweebs to ignore the substantial risks of employing Microsoft web servers?

Crispin
----
Crispin Cowan, Ph.D.
Chief Scientist, WireX Communications, Inc.
Immunix: Security Hardened Linux Distribution
Available for purchase

Who listens to analysts by lseltzer · 2002-01-01 14:02 · Score: 2, Interesting · on Is Domain Speculation Bust?

Interesting that the curve shoots up as Gartner tells people to ditch IIS.

Re:Market woes by Waffle+Iron · 2001-12-29 03:08 · Score: 2 · on SGI Sets Sights On Turnaround

uhhh, 18 dollar CD sellers are doing just fine.

Or maybe not, according to this article: CD prices set to take a plunge

Some related links by KieranElby · 2001-12-28 07:27 · Score: 2, Informative · on EFF Equivalent in the EU?

While there does not appear to be a direct equivalent of the EFF in the UK/EU, one organisation that springs to mind is Statewatch, which is dedicated to monitoring civil liberties (including electronic) in the EU.

Hopefully organisations like these will stop abuses of power such as the EU Telecommunications Directive (news story ZDNET) which calls for ISP and Telecomms to retain communication records for 7 (yes, seven) years.

Some people are also rather annoyed with Echelon, the Menrith Hill based UK-US monitoring centre which listens to some/many/all (depending on who you talk to!) calls and email within the UK. Personally, I have a soft spot for it, since it really annoys the French: ZDNET story

On a semi-related note, the Campaign for FOI is campaiging for more open access to information in the UK.

On an insane note, these people Project Freedom are determined to expose MI5/MI6/CIA use of mind control on socialists and other undesirables...

Re:oh well - maybe lead to ecash by AgTiger · 2001-12-27 07:43 · Score: 2 · on Europe Adding RFID Tags to Euro Currency

At the risk of continuing the offtopicness... :-)

This ZDNet story contains information on creating a H.E.R.F. (High Energy Radio Frequency) gun.

This article was picked up and discussed on Slashdot here.

Big Business abusing Trademarks to bully by Garry+Anderson · 2001-12-26 23:24 · Score: 3, Interesting · on Commercialization Of The Internet

I have been warning about this problem on WIPO.org.uk for some time now.

Virtually every word is trademarked, even the common words you learnt with your A B C's - apple, ball and cat. MOST share the same words or initials with MANY others in a different business and/or country. For example, the World Trade Organization (WTO) shares its initials with six trademarks - in the U.S. alone (please check). Caterpillar tractors claimed 'cat' is 'their' trademark on the Internet - even though hundreds of trademarks use the word 'cat' - again in U.S. alone (see for yourself).

Conflict with trademark and domain name is IMPOSSIBLE to avoid. Yet, the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO.org) and the United States Department of Commerce are hiding the simple solution. It was ratified by honest attorneys - including the honourable G. Gervaise Davis III, UN WIPO panellist judge.

Please visit WIPO.org.uk to see.

HP Did This Too by MathJMendl · 2001-12-26 16:29 · Score: 5, Interesting · on Cringely Wants A Supercomputer in Every Garage

ZDNet has an article of HP building a supercomputer like this as well, called the "I-Cluster." It has 225 networked computers running Linux Mandrake (so changes could be easily made) on 733 MHZ out of the box PCs. The only catch is that is is slightly more expensive- $210,000 (minus network cabling). On the other hand, they plan to release the open source tools they made as well, so that people can repeat this.

pictures by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-21 03:05 · Score: -1, Flamebait · on KT-Tech Challenges Nancy and MPEG-4 for Wireless Video

more pictures can be found here at ZDnet.

in reference to the warez raid by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-20 12:12 · Score: 4, Interesting · on Slashback: Ford, Buccaneers, Hardware

an Australian LUG applauded the raid saying that stamping out pirated software will make open source alternatives more attractive

No Coverage!!! by rev_icon · 2001-12-20 08:12 · Score: 1 · on WinXP Security Flaw

Here's more coverage...

ZDNet

Cnet

-Matt
Digitalmeca.com

Software shouldnt be sold by HanzoSan · 2001-12-19 04:27 · Score: 2 · on Why Free Software is a Hard Sell

Do these people even read the GNU? Do they even know what Open Source means? Its not about selling the software. Its not about selling the information. Its about selling the services. Someone has to write the code, charge for the code to be written instead of for the packaged product and you have a business. Redhat sells services for free software and is making alot of money. They continue to profit without selling software. RedHat Profits surpass expectations again Now enough about redhat, lets talk about the ways to sell services and the purpose of the GNU. The GNU is here so that people will be able to freely share source code / information with each other. The GNU and GPL states information should be shared not sold. So why are some corperations complaining if they cant sell GNU software to people who support the GNU which specifically is against the sale of the software itself? Selling GNU software is basically asking people to donate to your company. Instead of wasting your time pressing a CD, charge for access to the actual ftp site or dont let them download at all forcing them to buy the CD from you. This can work but only in the corperate world. How do you sell to the user? Its simple. You dont. You charge the user for the service of actually writing the code. You have surveys asking the users what software they need. you make a demo version which is VERY VERY stripped down, and tell the user if they want this software to be completed they have to subscribe for $1-5 a month until development is complete. Development is completed. User gets software, Developers got paid. Company then earns profit by selling updates via CD. Its easy to get a person to buy an update to software they already use, but its impossible to get a person to buy software they've never used. So yes its possible to make money on open source software, but you arent going to do it using the closed source business model.

talk about old news... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 10:25 · Score: 0 · on WEP Gets A Bit Stronger

That's cos' both zdnet and yahoo have had it aaaages ago.

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 09:00 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Broadband Alternatives to WebTV?

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 09:00 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Broadband Alternatives to WebTV?

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 08:38 · Score: -1, Troll · on More Final Fantasy Bits

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 08:38 · Score: -1, Troll · on More Final Fantasy Bits

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 02:28 · Score: -1, Troll · on Testing the Audigy

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 02:28 · Score: -1, Troll · on Testing the Audigy

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 00:16 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on 'Q' Plays US GameCube Games

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-17 00:16 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on 'Q' Plays US GameCube Games

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 22:13 · Score: -1, Troll · on Wired on Autism in the Valley

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 22:13 · Score: -1, Troll · on Wired on Autism in the Valley

and while you're waiting, sing... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 17:58 · Score: -1, Troll · on Deep Space One Mission Comes To An End

and while you're waiting, sing... by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 17:58 · Score: -1, Troll · on Deep Space One Mission Comes To An End

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 17:53 · Score: -1, Troll · on Deep Space One Mission Comes To An End

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 17:53 · Score: -1, Troll · on Deep Space One Mission Comes To An End

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 16:37 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Comparing the DVRs?

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 16:37 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Comparing the DVRs?

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 16:21 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Linux Kernel 2.5.1 is Out

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 16:21 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Linux Kernel 2.5.1 is Out

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 04:45 · Score: -1, Troll · on Atari 2600 Lord of the Rings Discovered

Spread that Christmas Cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-16 04:45 · Score: -1, Troll · on Atari 2600 Lord of the Rings Discovered

Sing with me by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-15 23:35 · Score: -1, Troll · on Audio Fingerprinting Via Cell Phones

Sing with me by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-15 23:35 · Score: -1, Troll · on Audio Fingerprinting Via Cell Phones

Spread some Christmas cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-15 23:17 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Audio Fingerprinting Via Cell Phones

Spread some Christmas cheer by Anonymous Coward · 2001-12-15 23:17 · Score: -1, Offtopic · on Audio Fingerprinting Via Cell Phones

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