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Slashback: Drives, Errors, Copyright
Spin control for some IBM drives? If you are one ofthe people who have the same results with IBM 75GXP hard drives that Sean Kelly did when he posed a recent Ask Slashdot, you may be interested in this report from legLess, who writes: "Pair Networks is swapping out every IBM 75GXP hard drive they have "[b]ased on an amazingly high failure rate." Pair is a big host: 114,000 sites all running on FreeBSD 4.1.1, including cdrom.com and Tom's Hardware. "We currently use and recommend Maxtor drives" they say. Big black eye for IBM."
GNU isn't Linux, either. Amid the stream of recent and upcoming software releases (Suse 7.3, Red Hat 7.2, Qt 3.0), it's sometimes easy for projects with smaller followings or more esoteric goals to get lost. BorrisYeltsin writes: "The Debian HURD iso images are now available from your local ftp.gnu.org mirror. There are 3 iso's available, so get downloading now!" (And read through the recent months' on the HURD Kernel Cousin too.)
Update: 10/16 14:20 GMT by T : Please note that the GNU Project maintains a list of ftp mirrors -- look for one local to you for best results all around :)
Placing warning signs along the road to consumerism brigc writes: "Good interview in the Chronicle of Higher Education with Jessica Litman about changes in the copyright arena since the publication of her book.
For those who were asleep, Litman's book 'Digital Copyright' does a good job of discussing why the copyright process got handed over to the industry and Congress has failed to protect the rights of the public."
Litman's book got a rave review from Michael a few months back; I suggest you check it out, and better yet ask you local library to put it up on display. Libraries have a strong vested interest in not ceding all control to copyright holders forever and ever amen.
It might pay to have a big fat mouth and ask for a refund on defective merchandise, too. anonicon writes: "Here's a heads up to the web site I'm running at http://www.fatchucks.com. I've started both a Corrupt CDs list for people who wish to report 'copy-protected' CDs or find out which ones they are, and an Indie Rec for people who want to recommend independent artists to the public. Thank you."
HURD -- a testament to the never-give-up and never-think-things-through spirit of GNU.
"Linux is nothing, work on the HURD" -- Stallman
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
I was planning on upgrading my own small servers with some of these drives, but have also made the switch to Matrox. I grew up the son of an IBM company man, who had great pride in IBM. This pride was passed down to me, and I've always trusted IBM for quality and dependability when it came to hardware for "Business Machines"... this is not just a black eye for IBM, but an end of an era.
From Tim Baker of Sunrise Records during MusicNotes @ 6 on my local radio station CHTZ-FM, best as I can remember the quote:
"You know the Panasonic or Yamaha CD burners you want to get this Christmas? Well, I've got news for you - save your money. After Christmas all new releases will be encoded and you won't be able to burn your own - and it's about time"
This is really paraphrased, but I have the gist of the quotation. I guess our fair use rights are supposedly forfeited because of the evil Napster. I wish these people would realise it's the price of a CD that was driving the Napster thing, not a willingness to steal. I alomst feel sorry for the record stores, though, since they take orders from the RIAA cabal.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
"Copy protected" CDs are going to be a shambles, good on the owner of that site for starting a list! And even better for compiling ways to, ahem, deal with the problem :).
These CDs will do little to stop online piracy. Everyone knows, if it can be heard it can be copied. Working a line-in jack on a stereo or computer isn't hard. Heck, you probably lose more fidelity in the MP3/OGG/Whatever compression than the digital-to-analog conversion with good audio equipment. All it takes is one good copy to be released and online music piracy will be off again.
Basically, if you want to stop the problem of music piracy, you've got to go back to the root issue -- the users themselves versus the bands in question.
I have a friend who was firmly on Metallica's side during the Lars Ulrich vs. Napster debacle. Why? He respected them as artists, and as a result owns every album they have ever put out.
This is what the RIAA doesn't get. The bands themselves are the only ones who can convince users not to copy, not any fancy technical or legal hurdles -- or have they forgotten that the bands exist apart from phony marketing images?
So here's a plan to decrease piracy. Every band has a back catalogue of covers, garage recordings, and so on that will probably never get released and are next to worthless commerically. All they have to do is say "From now on, we're monitoring KaZaA/Morpheus/Gnutella/etc, and every fortnight where there's an average of less than XYZ files shared from us, we release new material for you to legally download free of charge".
Think about it. Dedicated fans, who already respect the band for their abilities, will start to police these file-sharing services for them. Problem halved.
Does this stand a chance, Slashdot? Ideas?
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The Debian HURD iso images are now available from your local ftp.gnu.org mirror.
Shouldn't that be Debian GNU/HURD, just to be fair?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
The RIAA will never change, ever. Remember when tapes first got easy to record on?
Luck favors the prepared, darling.
Yeah, that is a bit of a blow to IBM. However the real question this raises is: Why is pair using consumer level IDE drives in their servers?!
Q.
IBM drives are on the whole very good. Yes the 75GXPs are crap. On the other hand the 40GXPs and 60GXPs are some of the best consumer level drives on the market right now. If you're trying to avoid a faulty drive don't go to a slightly less faulty alternative like Maxtor (I have seen too many Maxtors (of varying generations) fail, I will never trust them again) rather than one of the products that gave IBM their previous reputation for reliability.
P.S. No I don't work for or are in any way affiliated with IBM. I'm just a sysadmin thats run a lot of hardware into the ground over the years, and am a happy owner of a 60GXP.
How the hell is this supposed to stop piracy? So these bands will just play thier little tunes while the pirates are our raping and pilliaging on the high seas? How will this help? The ONLY way to stop pirates is to protect every convoy with armed naval ships!
...um, wait a second... Wha? Since when did pirates copy music anyway?
:)
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
Well then I am going to have to agree w/what Metallica did. OTOH I don't agree w/the rest of the shit that is going on. Most artists do NOT allow this sort of trading and are attempting to stop it.
The DTLA is one of the affected drives, the IC35L040 is one of the new 60GXPs, I've heard mixed reports on them, but so far they don't appear to be as bad as the 75GXPs. Also, you have command tagged queueing turned on, for some reason this seems to reduce the failure rate (at least on our local machines; we used to get these failures every couple of months on the drives, but we havn't seen it since turning on CTQ).
I read the internet for the articles.
I wonder if Pair Networks runs AMD on VIA boards with that quirky chipset problem. Someone pointed out the last time this IBM Deathstar issue came up that a lot of the people affected have VIA boards. I have one of these drives with a VIA board and my machine when screech screech screech .... clickety, clickety, clickety too 8^(
Anyone running AMD on VIA with the GXP?
You'd be right to bring a class-action suit, except that IBM is fulfilling their warranty in a speedy fashion.
The notion of a good being saleable for the purpose it was intended isn't separate from the warranty that's provided on the condition that the item fails before it's life expectancy.
Now, if IBM had failed to honor the warranty, and the alleged large number of drives had failed, then there'd be room for legal action. EXCEPT, IBM has acted honorably.
I'm still not a lawyer.
Personally I believe that the best way to do it is to allow free recording of every show that an artist puts out. A devout fan is more likely to BUY a studio album if they can already get a taste of what the band is capable of on stage.
:) There are many other artists like this, Dave is just one of them.
Dave Matthews does exactly that. He allows recorders at his shows and allows his music to be freely traded/swapped/copied/etc. He's ok with people making CD's out of his shows and selling them (including those shows he makes into albums). He's ok with people making MP3s (and other formats) out of his albums and shows and then placing them on p2p services.
Why does he do this? His philosophy is that of a Jazz musician (his music has an element of Jazz to it, btw) (i shouldnt really be singling out jazz, a lot of other types of musicians are the same way). They like their music to be listened to and enjoyed, not the monetary value they get in return. That philosophy is very similar to programmers who contribute to Open Source projects.
You are correct by saying a devout fan buys music - I have all of Dave's CDs
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
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GNU/HURD should indeed be called just GNU, since it's the GNU OS proper; RMS said recently in a mailing-list that although this is the case one should use GNU/HURD whenever there is need to differenciate (e.g. "Debian GNU" would be awkward and misleading, hence GNU/Linux and GNU/HURD). Apart from that, the HURD is indeed GNU (since the kernel is part of the GNU system there is no need to use GNU/HURD, unlike GNU/Linux where there is such a need).
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Usability: how many people have actually tried installing and running GNU/HURD? From the comments, not a lot... Sure, there are still several things missing, but the concept of the HURD is elegant and interesting enough to make it worthwhile... the fundamental servers are already done, many interesting translators are done and others being developed (think for example of the ftp translator... that give system wide transparent FTP, with no modification on any user program...). All the gnu shell and text utils are there, and so is Emacs and hundrends of other programs, including XFree. I wouldn't call this 'useless'...
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Some limitations and shortcomings are still there, and some of them probably give the appearance of a slowdown in development (threads, the 1GB limit for the partitions that the it can handle and the ppp code); this will be hopefully soon solved (I would say very soon). The truth is that, apart from the hardware support - that will be greatly improved with oskit-mach - and some programs that depend on libs that are hard to port everything is available. I can browse the web on GNU/HURD; I can program in GNU/HURD; I can do huge ammounts of important stuff while using GNU/HURD, and all this without even going for HURD specific features that are very intriging and useful (again, servers and translators come to mind... check the GNU/HURD website for info on all this.
Instalation and packaging is pure Debian, so nobody should have major problems (always keeping in mind that it's still being developed).All in all I'm very pleased with the status of it and the possibilities it gives (and the ones that are to follow).
Try it; get involved; you could just come to like it.
I had a IBM 20gig fail on me just two weeks ago--right after my brother lost two Maxtors. IBM was very good about filling the warranty--much better than Maxtor! The 20gig had been running smoothly for about a year.
In reality, all hard drives are made pretty much the same way. (For some GREAT information on everything harddrive related, check out this site.) For some reason IBM appears to be in a bit of a slump, but I remember a few years ago everyone was saying "don't buy a maxtor--they're cheap trash." Whatever you buy, just remember that your precious data resides on ferroceramic disks spinning at 5200-10000 rpm with the means of destruction--the read head--floating mere microns above. Back up often!
-s
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Don't worry, being eaten by a crocodile is just like going to sleep in a giant blender.
"We currently use and recommend Maxtor drives"
Shit, Maxtor drives? Those are at the very bottom of my list of reliable drives, trying hard for a place next to Western Digital. Seriously, couldn't they have picked a better drive? Fujitsu still makes some good quality drives. They're very quite, too.
OTOH, maybe Maxtor's gotten better since they incorporated Quantum... but I dunno. It doesn't seem terribly likely to me.
Take the example of my best friend. He owns TWO copies of every Metallica CD up to the Napster fiasco. One copy of every cassette tape up to then. 4 or 5 posters, up to then. 5 or 6 T-shirts. A baseball cap. He was The World's Biggest Metallica Fan, all caps, in stereo. He was also the second-biggest Napster user I ever met. Then came the Napster Fiasco, and he got banned for an mp3 of No-Leaf Clover, found on his machine, *ripped off his own legitimate CD and not available for downloads*. Result?
;-) Second, he dropped Metallica cold, and hates their guts today, Lars in particular. He gets a grim satisfaction from anti-metallica sites like killmetallica.com. He is now one of the biggest Metallica HATERS I know. There is no evidence that his Napster use ever cost them a dime, and he must have spent hundreds on them over the years. Would have spent hundreds more if he'd remained a fan. Now, nothing.
Well, first he hacked his way out of the ban like any self-respecting music fan.
Talk about your Operation: Footbullets.
This is not about fan's respect. A fan who likes a band is MORE likely to share its music. Metallica was all in favor of tape trading back in the day, when they were little. We haven't forgotten, Lars, even if fame has made you forget. Face it - this is about money, and about destroying those fair-use rights that cut in on corporate profit. Nothing more, nothing less.
-Kasreyn
P.S. Doubly ironic, they banned him for a reallu sUxx0r song like No Leaf Clover, when there were also mp3's of Master of Puppets, Orion, One, etc...
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
I've been trying to think of something along the lines of a "Boston Tea Party" to protest the dismantling of consumer rights.
Trashing a bunch of CDs would only be to the RIAA's benefit since we'd have to pay for all those CDs. Unless we steal them, but I doubt breaking into record stores would be good PR.
So my idea is to distribute copies of "corrupted" CDs for free. We do it standing outside the stores, too. Now, we could say that we're only providing computer-readable copies for people who have legally bought the CD, but it's such a hassle to have to ask every single person to show a receipt.
Any sufficiently advanced civilization is indistinguishable from Gods.
This Sony page tells us that any CD carrying the "compact disc digital audio" logo is compliant to the IEC 908 standard and/or the Philips-Sony Compact Disc Digital Audio System Description (the RED Book). Any way to get the labels in for wrongfully using that logo (if they do) ?
I hate the idea of copy-protected CDs (and personally I will not buy them) but I have a feeling we won't have a choice. Boycotting them won't work (try boycotting any chain, etc) it is HIGHLY unlikely that numbers of bought CDs will drop in any significant amount. (Just as they haven't dropped due to Napster, Gnutella, whatever).
Actually....
So quickly we forget the details. It's kinda sad in a way.
I remember seeing something on CNN in early 2000 right when the Napster lawsuits were filed and/or aired to the general public as a whole. The news went something like this:
"The RIAA has filed a lawsuit against Napster, the online music-sharing service, due to it's ability to facilitate piracy of music and potential to cripple sales.
"In other news, CD sales this quarter are up almost 20%, a near-record quarter for the music industry."
The teeny little smirk of irony that the guy let slip through spoke volumes for those that saw it.
Very shortly afterwards, hundreds of people started boycotting the RIAA by refusing to purchase CDs released by RIAA member labels. Everyone was outraged by the total ridiculousness of the charges in the lawsuit and by God they were going to DO something about it!
And you know what? It worked. Unfortunately, because it was such a grassroots and spontaneous choice by hundreds and even thousands of individuals, nobody bothered to tell the MEDIA that people were boycotting the RIAA. And so it backfired on us.
Whatsernutz, the RIAA's Head Hatchetwoman... er... spokeswoman, that is, pointed to CD sales in 2001 being down even further than usual to points much lower than in the past two to three years as proof that Napster and other music-sharing services ARE hurting the industry. Never mind the fact that the major player - Napster - has been stopped cold, with no way to trade anything over it. Never mind that online music piracy has been reduced, effectively, to that of pre-Napster levels. CD sales are slipping. They know why, and can even truthfully say that it's because of Napster. They just haven't bothered to tell anyone that, hey, it's because we SUED Napster that they're slipping. The cause is Napster, but not in the way that they want everyone to think.
And nobody's bothered to point this out to the Media, the courts, or the world at large.
So you say that it's highly unlikely that a boycott would do any good. I say that you're right, but not for the same reasons. Boycotts are USELESS if the public isn't made aware of them. The number of CDs purchased in the past year HAS dropped significantly, and as of right now, it's only filling their ammo bins. We need someone to step up and tell people that the reason CD sales are slipping is because the people who buy the majority of music aren't buying anymore in protest. And it needs to be someone famous - or at least vaguely well-known - and respected.
Just some food for thought for all of ya.
You thought that this sig was what you think that I thought you wanted me to think. I think.
This is drifting off topic, but this is not a troll. Just honest thinking about it. Questions to ponder. More questions than answers. But one conclusion at the end.
Shouldn't it really be called: GNU/Linux/XFree/ALSA/Qt/KDE? I mean, that's what I run. Honest. And my system wouldn't be usable (to me at least) without these.
In all honesty and complete candor, my system really wouldn't be usable if I didn't call it...
GNU / Linux / XFree / ALSA / Qt / KDE / StarOffice / XMMS / LAME / Apache / Java / Python / PHP / PostgreSQL / htdig / et. all.
Now in my progression of names, you might argue that some of them are merely "packages" that enable specific functionality. But there are two good counter arguments to that which are seperate and distinct.
1. Isn't GNU just a collection (or package) of software that enables specific functionality? Is it really more necessary in order to have an operational system, than say, Apache?
2. Isn't what constitutes a "usable" system dependent on the user and intended use?
For instance, one might argue that Apache isn't necessary. But if the system's intended use is a webserver, then Apache might be necessary, and GNU tools might be unnecessary. For instance, can't you replace most GNU tools with perl scripts? (In fact, I remember a project once to replace most of the tools with perl scripts.) Imagine a web server appliance. It might have a Linux kernel, an Init program, a web server, a scripting language, and NO GNU tools. No command line. No compilers, etc. It seems clear that this hypothetical system would not properly be called GNU/anything.
And on my system, I have lots of GNU tools installed. I don't think about them any more than I give any special thought to Qt, KDE, XFree, Apache, Python, etc., etc. or other major projects which are the product of major effort. I don't mean to downplay the effort that has been put into GNU. So should my system be called GNU/Linux? Shouldn't the other important major projects which make all the difference to my system being usable get a place in the name? Why should going from my hypothetical embedded webserver appliance to a desktop system where GNU tools are added, mandate a prefix of GNU?
Maybe the people who package my system should choose the name? The box says "SuSE Linux 7.2 Professional". What if they wanted to call it the "Aardvark" operating system which includes and is based on lots of software works including Linux, GNU, KDE, etc., etc.?
I'm not suggesting that GNU should not receive credit. I also don't want to fail to recognize the wonderful work of untold thousands in many other major software projects that I make use of daily and take for granted, with hardly a second thought.
Imagine a system geared for end users. Not stupid people. Just non-geeks who want to do useful work. They never use the command line, compilers, etc. How hard would it be for such a system to be GNU free? Even if GNU parts were installed on the system as part of the distribution, does GNU play a big or even any part of making the system usable to them in any significant way? Doesn't Linux and (let's suppose) KDE, XFree and StarOffice play the bigger roles of making this system operational and usable?
Suppose Apple were to include GNU tools as an optional install in Mac OS X? What part do those tools play in the overall system? Should they call it GNU/Mac OS X? How much does this system resemble the non-Mac system of the previous paragraph?
Like I said, I have a lot more questions than answers. I'm not ooposed to using GNU/Linux in a lot of contexts. But in the end, the real problem I have is that I think RMS is a control freaque. I applaud the many good things he has done. But I don't worship him as much as I do some others. And as I read more and more articles I find myself more and more pissed at RMS as time goes on. (I should use the term alienated, but I'm more in the "pissed" mindset at this moment.) Just as a longtime Apple user (20+ years, predating Macintosh and even IBM PC) I find myself very pissed at Steve Jobs as I've read more accounts of behind the scenes.
This is a rant. Not intended as a troll or flame or to draw flames. An opinion for sure. Questions. No definite answers. Blowing off steam.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.