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Linuxcare Founders Go Wireless
LinuxCare founders Dave Sifry, Art Tyde and Dave LaDuke have started their second company: Sputnik. Basically, they have an ISO you can download that will turn a laptop with an 802.11b card into a wireless gateway. They also wrote a user-authentication scheme that reroutes all traffic to the gateway until the user logs in via a web form. This should sound familiar to people who stay in broadband capable hotels a lot. Using this authentication technique, the software allows you to choose who can and cannot use your gateway, and in you'll be able to charge strangers for access (with Sputnik handling the billing). This will likely get some isps a wee bit upset. NewsForge has an article detailing what they are doing. Update: Turns out the authentication wasn't written by Sputnik, my bad. They use NoCatAuth
Disclaimer: I've known these guys for a long time and am pals with them, so I waited until someone else (in this case Grant at NewsForge and the NYT) put something up independently about them before linking to them.
AC first post - fuck the troll library
its an attempt but it will probably be second
STOP ME BEFORE I POST AGAIN!
Now I know what wireless company to avoid investing in.
These guys have the Midas touch.
Think about it. Those on the wrong side are going to be the #1 beneficiaries of a technology like this. It allows them to create their own secure networks and organize murderous attacks against the civilized world with total impunity.
In the past I might have thought putting all this power in the hands of just anyone was an unmitigated blessing. But now?
I'm only asking: Is it worth the risk? Can't anything be done to make this technology safe?
Sputnik didn't write the 'captive portal' authentication system. It's a GPL'd program called
NoCat. http://www.nocat.net/
OK, while I think this is some cool technology and is Linksys Done Right (tm), I have to ask...
In this post-dot-com era, where's the business model?
How do they expect to make money? LOTS of open-source software companies are making PLENTY of money these days, right?
Kudos to them for putting together what seems to be a really nice product -- I just wouldn't expect to get rich at this one.
Linuxcare -- the Clemens fastball down the middle...
Sputnik -- The breaking ball down and out that the Babe himself couldn't hit.
So where's strike 3 coming from?
--NBVB
Even with Ricochet coming back, this seems like a much better idea if it catches on. Granted, if there are no gateways, nobody can use it, but it'd be a lot faster than Ricochet and (it seems) based off actual usage, not monthly fees. It seems there's a lot of potential for abuse here, but I'd definately like to check this out, it seems like a good way to make a little extra cash (though I'm curious if there's a way to block out abusive users, I don't need any m4d h4x0rz cracking machines through my IP.) This will also probably violate a lot of ISPs ToSes, but who cares, most of us are violating them anyway. :)
I don't know if the ISPs will be pissed off or not. This seems like a fairly straight business deal. Running it from CD makes me wonder how customizable it'll be. They're planning to make money by charging roamers to connect, while letting their partners (w/ fat pipes) connect for free.
If anything, it should make the consumer broadband ISPs happy, since it restricts unauthorized use.
jred
I'm not a mechanic but I play one in my garage...
From the article I get the impression it seems like one could mistake this for one of those affiliate "scams." Let me get this straight, I set up a wireless node, and then I get paid for my bandwidth, or I can connect to other wireless sputnik nodes? Only problem with that is that my (and your) broadband providers aren't going to be to keen on the idea of me being a reseller of bandwidth, when I originally signed up as an end home consumer for DSL. I'm not harping on the hardware and code, that seems all nice and nifty, but the idea of reselling your bandwidth probably will not go over too well.
Do you label everyone who thinks outside your narrow little world a "troll"? Excuse me for asking tough questions. If thinking for myself makes me a "troll" then so be it, I'd rather be a "troll" than live the life of a mere receptacle for media products and blind consumerism.
Was in Albuquerque for the Microsoft VS .Net release (this is a traveling event). Viva le VB!
Proof of the gay-linux conspiracy!
Gee, I was starting to make my own thing like this. I am not unhappy that they beat me to the gate though.
But where's the source? All I see is the ISO download. Unless the source can fit in the 48 or whatever megs.
Now, to burn it onto a mini-CD......
'cuz I know I sure would like to be able to roam at will and stay connected to my IV drip otherwise known as the Internet.
The more you know, the less you understand.
Is it wrong to ask if this technology can be made safe? How do we know if we don't ask the question?
how long will the LinuxCare founders last without a recharge? Not too long, I would guess...
(fuck metrollica)
HOW TO POOP AT WORK
We've all been there but don't like to admit it. We've all kicked back in our cubicles and suddenly felt something brew down below. As much as we try to convince ourselves otherwise, the WORK POOP is inevitable. For those who hate pooping at work, following is the 2001 Survival Guide for taking a dump at work. Memorize these definitions and pooping at work will become a pure pleasure.
ESCAPEE.
Definition: a fart that slips out while taking a leak at the urinal or forcing a poop in a stall. This is usually accompanied by a sudden wave of panic embarrassment. This is similar to the hot flash you receive when passing an unseen police car and speeding. If you release an escapee, do not acknowledge it. Pretend it did not happen. If you are standing next to the farter in the urinal, pretend you did not hear it. No one likes an escapee, it is uncomfortable for all involved. Making a joke or laughing makes both parties feel uneasy.
JAILBREAK (Used in conjunction with ESCAPEE).
Definition: When forcing poop, several farts slip out at a machine gun pace. This is usually a side effect of diarrhea or a hangover. If this should happen, do not panic. Remain in the stall until everyone has left the bathroom so to spare everyone the awkwardness of what just occurred.
COURTESY FLUSH.
Definition: The act of flushing the toilet the instant the nose cone of the poop log hits the water and the poop is whisked away to an undisclosed location. This reduces the amount of air time the poop has to stink up the bathroom. This can help you avoid being caught doing the WALK OF SHAME.
WALK OF SHAME.
Definition: Walking from the stall, to the sink, to the door after you have just stunk up the bathroom. This can be a very uncomfortable moment if someone walks in and busts you. As with all farts, it is best to pretend that the smell does not exist. Can be avoided with the use of the COURTESY FLUSH.
OUT OF THE CLOSET POOPER.
Definition: A colleague who poops at work and damn proud of it. You will often see an Out Of The Closet Pooper enter the bathroom with a newspaper or magazine under their arm. Always look around the office for the Out Of The Closet Pooper before entering the bathroom.
THE POOPING FRIENDS NETWORK (PFN).
Definition: A group of coworkers who band together to ensure emergency pooping goes off without incident. This group can help you to monitor the whereabouts of Out Of The Closet Poopers, and identify SAFE HAVENS.
SAFE HAVENS.
Definition: A seldom used bathroom somewhere in the building where you can least expect visitors. Try floors that are predominantly of the opposite sex. This will reduce the odds of a pooper of your sex entering the bathroom.
TURD BURGLAR:
Definition: A pooper who does not realize that you are in the stall and tries to force the door open. This is one of the most shocking and vulnerable moments that can occur when taking a dump at work. If this occurs, remain in the stall until the Turd Burglar leaves. This way you will avoid all uncomfortable eye contact.
CAMO-COUGH.
Definition: A phony cough that alerts all new entrants into the bathroom that you are in a stall. This can be used to cover-up a WATERMELON, or to alert potential Turd Burglars. Very effective when used in conjunction with an ASTAIRE.
ASTAIRE.
Definition: A subtle toe-tap that is used to alert potential Turd Burglars that you are occupying a stall. This will remove all doubt that the stall is occupied. If you hear an Astaire, leave the bathroom immediately so the pooper can poop in peace.
WATERMELON.
Definition: A turd that creates a loud splash when hitting the toilet water. This is also an embarrassing incident. If you feel a Watermelon coming on, create a diversion. See CAMO-COUGH.
HAVANA OMELET.
Definition: A load of diarrhea that creates a series of loud splashes in the toilet water. Often accompanied by an Escapee. Try using a Camo-Cough with an Astaire.
UNCLE TED.
Definition: A bathroom user who seems to linger around forever. Could spend extended lengths of time in front of the mirror or sitting on the pot. An Uncle Ted makes it difficult to relax while on the crapper, as you should always wait to drop your load when the bathroom is empty. This benefits you as well as the other bathroom attendees.
FLY BY.
Definition: The act of scouting out a bathroom before pooping. Walk in and check for other poopers. If there are others in the bathroom, leave and come back again. Be careful not to become a FREQUENT FLYER. People may become suspicious if they catch you constantly going into the bathroom.
I am into the copy and paste.
ZDNet recently posted this interesting story about LinuxCare.
Dear Troll,
We are plesed to inform you that, after careful consideration , we have accepted your troll into the Troll Library.
You show a masterful skill at trolling.
Thank you for your time and your contribution.
I am into the copy and paste.
Instead of killing $lashdot, I killed all the other trolls.
Therefore the library is going OFFLINE indefinately.
Now get back to doing you JOB, trolling, you lazy bastards.
I hate muslim scum. The whole fucking religion is shit and I spit on Allah daily. It must burn those infidelic pagan shit pipes that there are people out there that mock their Allah. Allah, the man whore of truckstops. When will he ever stop fucking young boys in the ass and sucking cocks all night? When oh when.
I piss on muslim women also. I piss on them in front of their children. Then I have the suck my cock. Those muslim sluts suck good cock.
I guess my point is to rile up muslim shit-persons to show them as the animals they are. Less than animals in fact. The religion is an embarassment to the human race. I pray for the day that all muslims die. And they must die horrible deaths. Then we can use their teeth to pave roads, the hair to stuff mattresses, and their eyeballs to feed our livestock. then for once in their lives they would be useful.
Allah is shit.
Mohamed is a fucking whore.
Islam is homosexuality personified.
All muslims, please die.
have a nice day. I hate you all.
saru mo ki kara ochiru
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - troll writer Robotroll was found dead in his Maine home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.
I am into the copy and paste.
Personally, I'm sick of the fact that I have two choices for getting broadband into my house: the Cable Monopoly and the Telephone Monopoly. What incentive do I have to follow their "User Agreements" when both of them are in violation of numerous antitrust laws? None. Look at Verizon: they beat every last CLEC to death, and now they've introduced legislation to "deregulate" the broadband market, which means "exercise monopoly power over".
So, now we have a tool. A way for one person to subscribe for DSL or Cable Modem service and share their connection with the entire neighborhood, who can provide kickbacks in the form of cash. With a properly configured distribution of this package, it's entirely possible to make your routing/NAT'ing of your neighbors traffic completely undetectable.
How's that for sticking it to the man? Illegal monopolies: This Is Your Wakeup Call!
If guns kill people, then CmdrTaco's keyboard misspells words.
Reselling bandwidth this way is going to get a lot of people bumped off their Internet Provider. It's almost always one of the Terms of Service that customers can't do so. I would estimate that ISPs will just firewall people away from the Sputnik server that 'handles the billing.'
Or automatically close accounts of customers who access said server.
..somone sniffing the network either captures your 'login' session, or simple takes over your 802.11 session?
don't get me wrong, this is a good thing in many ways, but 802.11 is suck a leaky system that ANYTHING based on it has an inherent problem, short of limiting all connections to authenticated ssh or ipsec connections.
802.11a/b/x is simple broken, and NO 'standard' ip connection routed over it can improve this, hwich is unfortunate, it's ONLY safe if you use a suitable encryption/authentication layer on top of it.
of course, the number of people who realise just how public all internet data is seems to be a very small number, let alone the number of people who realise that email is in effect a public forum, and should NOT be used to forward their credit card numbers.
the part about a simple setup for an 802.11 gateway is a good thing, it can be a pain to set up under linux, but hardly a revolutionary step.
Mexican Party Wings
Ingredients:
1 cup purchased ranch salad dressing
1 (4.5-oz.) can Old El Paso® Chopped Green Chiles
1/2 cup Pillsbury BEST® All Purpose or Unbleached Flour
1 (1.25-oz.) pkg. Old El Paso® Taco Seasoning Mix
2 teaspoons oil
24 chicken drummettes (about 2 lb.)
Dried parsley flakes
Prep Time: 20 Minutes (Ready in 55 Minutes)
Preparation Directions:
1. Heat oven to 350F. Spray large cookie sheet with nonstick cooking spray. In blender container, combine salad dressing and chiles; blend until smooth. Spoon into small serving bowl. Refrigerate while preparing drummettes.
2. Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup; level off. In shallow dish, combine flour and taco seasoning mix; mix well. Add oil; stir with fork until well combined. Coat drummettes with flour mixture. Coat drummettes again to use all flour mixture. Place on sprayed cookie sheet.
3. Bake at 350F. for 15 minutes. Turn drummettes; bake an additional 14 to 17 minutes or until chicken is fork- tender and juices run clear. Sprinkle parsley on salad dressing mixture. Serve with warm drummettes.
Recipe makes 24 servings
I am into the copy and paste.
-everybody else on Slashdot
Wake up dude. Your missing the boat. We don't need ISPs anymore.
www.freenetworks.org
Yu Suzuki, the master.
I am into the copy and paste.
'not gonna work!' my university has a similar authentication system. basically, if your MAC address has been verified by our authentication server, DHCPD will issue correct DNS servers. otherwise, all non-authenticated MACs get DNS servers that route all traffic to the "registration" page. BUT you can put in your own DNS servers and voila, you're past this security feature fairly quickly.
I was considering buying a wireless router to share my cable connection with my laptop. From what I have read, it does not seem necessary to buy a wireless router anymore. Anyone disagree?
I said go home, elenchos!
The /. troll HOWTO
:)
/.ers. This section is dedicated to explaining how to use these in the course of your trolls. Remember though, a great troll can break any or all of these and still be successful...
/. typically repeats stories with small variations and runs lots of similar stories.
:)
/.ers are more likely to read your troll if it starts a large thread. You also want to remember that some people have set their comment thresholds to values higher than 0 - to get the attention of these you either want to get your post moderated up (see Style, below) or get a reply which gets moderated up to 4 or 5, in which case your troll becomes visible to all.
:)
/. and watch the karma roll in. And of course once you get the +1 bonus, the world is your oyster in terms of /. Posts made at a default of 2 hit even those people with the threshold of 2, are more likely to get moderated up even further if they are at all coherent, and people tend to lose their critical thinking abilities in the face of the +1 bonus. Milk it for all it's worth.
/. hero, like Linus Torveldes or Richard Strawlman (thanks dmg). Related to this is the use of the wrong word, explaining an acronym as being something it isn't or making a word into an acronym even when it isn't.
/. sense rather than the real-world sense). Start off fairly reasonable, making statements that are /. friendly and not being too controversial. As the troll goes on, make it more and more controversial, building it up for the coup de grace in the final paragraph.
/. crowd. Moderators love it, and they rarely check the links, so be sure to include as many as possible. And make them wrong - a link to the Perl website should instead point to the Python website instead, and vice versa. The other alternative to incorrect links is "useful" links to places like www.linux.org and www.microsoft.com i.e. places /.ers could never have found on their own :)
/.ers for your amusement. But often a troll requires some help and so you should consider feeding it. Feeding is best reserved for people making either completely clueless responses, people making responses with holes in, or those wonderful people who write a 2000-word point-by-point rebuttal of your troll.
/. so that you can play on and against them. This is why anti-Linux, creationist, gun-loving, pro-corporation trolls work well - the vast majority of /.ers hold the opposite viewpoints. And if a few people agree with you, so much the better - it merely validates your viewpoint in the eyes of readers.
/.ers all kinds of things. Make broad generalisations about /. readers - call them "long-haired Linux zealots", "socialist open-source bigots" or whatever. Stereotyping is encouraged - people always want to think that they're an individual, and will point this out to you given half a chance.
/.ers of being elitist. This is an easy thing to do seeing as a lot of them are. Claim that is their grandmother couldn't use it, then they are just into it to feel better than Joe Sixpack rather than "doing it for the average user". This is always great for working into anti-Linux trolls - attack command-line tools and poorly designed desktops.
/.ers who will then make even more stupid replies, leaving them even more wide open for response.
/. responses.
/. has its community of regular trolls (hi guys!), it's only polite to publish your troll on one of the so-called "hidden" forums for all to see and admire. This way, you get to bask in the praise of other trolls, they get to contribute to your's if they want to, and you get an easy way to find the troll later on when you want to check on its progress :)
/.ers always post before thinking, and often it doesn't matter at all.
:)
:(
/. beliefs, but a similar effect can be achieved by taking a typical /. viewpoint and pushing it to ridiculous extremes.
/. posts, although some are more obvious targets than others. Civil liberty articles, especially on things like censorship, DMCA, UCITA that really get /.ers riled up, are usually extremely fruitful grounds for a well-crafted maniac. The other obvious type of article is anything which could possibly involve religion, especially evolution :)
/. posters and you would have to be very offensive to get this to work. Of course with religion trolls, the argument can go on for ever once it's started... The more common approach is the Christian fundamentalist. They are ignorant, intolerant and bigoted in the extreme. For them the Bible is the inerrant word of God revealed to man - it contains no flaws and no contradictions. Thus they are strict Creationists - mentions of evolution or cosmology will set them off on vitriolic rants. Flaming denunciations of anyone daring to contradict the "Word of God" are the way to go, and any kind of proof can always be ignored by appealing to "secular humanist brainwashing". And let's not forget, the USA is the greatest nation on Earth because it has the righteous power of Jesus Christ behind it.
:)
/.ers as a rule despise - the classic example is dumb marketing guy, but try consultants, lawyers, politicians, lobbyists, executives, journalists (just think Jon Katz). With this kind of troll sweeping statements with little content are the norm, along wire dire portents of future catastrophe and dark hints of "insider knowledge".
/.ers would like it - saying "Linux requires the rock-solid guarantee of a trusted company like Microsoft" or "Apache cannot be trusted for mission-critical enterprise platforms" is guaranteed to get you denials explaining exactly why you're wrong, in excruciating detail.
/.ers protest "IANAL", they certainly seem to think they could be, and any mistakes you make will send them rushing to prove themselves by correcting you.
:) This category includes parodies, offtopic weirdness any all kinds of amusing stuff. Not really my area of expertise, this stuff is mainly done by gnarphlager and opensourceman. Thanks to gnarphlager for this section.
;-)
/. So feel free/ obligated to litter your offtopic and random bits with puns. Hurt the bastards. And if they're sick enough to laugh at them, then they'll eventually end up here ;-)
:). html - A List Of Fallacious Arguments - Learn them and use them liberallyq .html - USENET troll HOWTO
i ggins/thi ngs.htm - Things Creationists
e s.html - Bible quotes by category
This is version 0.6 of a troll HOWTO, sort of a companion piece to jsm's excellent troll FAQ. As a draft, comments and criticism are always welcome, if not appreciated
Section 1 - Trolling techniques
There are techniques used by successful trolls to elicit the maximum amount of responses from unthinking
Timing
Because you're posting as an AC, your troll will generally be ignored in favour of posters using their accounts, and so getting in early is essential. A good guideline is to get into the first 20 posts, so that people reading the article will see the troll before it is swamped out. One way of increasing the speed with which you get your troll into play is to prepare them beforehand, and then quickly customise them for the current article. This is easier than it sounds since
Note that this is why Jon Katz stories are pretty worthless as trolling material - by the time you've found the article and prepared a troll there's already 50+ posts on it, most of them flaming Jon Katz anyway
Exposure
Once you've got your troll in, you need people to actually read it. You also want replies -
Accounts
An alternative to the time-honoured tradition of AC trolling is that of creating a "troll" account. This gives you the advantage of posting at 1 rather than 0, and slashbots are more likely to take you seriously, especially if you at least sound reasonable. If you do this, try to avoid posting stuff where it is obvious you're a troll under the account - post it anoymously instead - some slightly more canny readers actually check your user info before they reply. Not many though
The ultimate goal of the troll account is to secure the +1 bonus, which is currently received once you hit 26 points of Karma. To get there, employ the techniques of karma whoring that we see every day on
Layout
To get people reading it a troll needs to be easily readable. Make sure you break it down into easily digestible paragraphs, use HTML tags where appropriate (but always make sure you close them properly) and use whitespace appropriately.
Size
Generally a troll shouldn't be too short, otherwise it'll get lost in the crowd. A workable minimum is a couple of medium paragraphs. Conversely, it shouldn't be too long, or no- one will bother to read it. Keep it to a happy medium.
Spelling
Whilst spelling is important if you want the troll to be taken "seriously", key spelling mistakes can draw out the spelling zealots, especially if you mis-spell the name of a venerated
Subject
The subject line needs to draw attention to your post without making it obvious that it is a troll. A simple statement of the main point of your argument can work here.
Style
Once you realise that most moderators don't bother to read past the first paragraph or two, you can use this fact to craft trolls that can be moderated up as "Insightful" (note that I mean this in the
Linking
As we all know, a post with links is considered "informative" by the
Feeding
The ideal troll requires no feeding - it runs on its own, generating flamewars between clueless
Know your audience
Always keep in mind the kind of things advocated on
Arrogance
Be arrogant. You, as a troll, know that you're right. No other explanation could exist. The wronger the "fact", the more assertively you should state it. Make it clear that you are better than everyone else - you know the truth and they are just too stupid to realise it. Use plenty of sarcasm, and use "quotes" to show it to people too dumb to realise.
Offensiveness
Being offensive in your initial troll can be counter-productive - it causes moderators to mark you down as flamebait in general. But if you're feeding, then you can get away with calling
Indifference
Great for articles with a political or social bent, this kind of troll expresses complete indifference to the topic at hand, wondering who on Earth cares about it. An alternative method is to say that the topic only concerns a certain group of people - criminals, idiots, hackers (always use this instead of crackers) or whatever group you want to offend.
Sympathy
Appear to take the same stance as the people you're trying to troll - claim you're as much a fan of Linux as the next man, but... This way you can make all kinds of claims in the sure knowledge that you actually know what you're talking about. A great phrase to use here is "In my experience". Remember to act like all the things you're pointing out are unfortunate but true.
The common touch
Always accuse
The 31337 touch
The opposite of the above. Claim that technology or whatever is only for the elite of society and that any attempt to open it up for everyone is wrong, an attack on intellectualism and possibly even dangerous. If people were meant to understand these things then they would, and it's their fault if they're too stupid to learn.
Contradiction
Never be afraid to contradict yourself, even in the space of a single sentence. The phrases "I am a top programmer who codes in VB" or "I am a supporter of open source who uses NT at work and 95 at home" will be sure to get a response from some weenie smugly pointing out the contradiction. Confuse the issue more by engaging in contradiction when you are feeding - this will confuse
Clues
If you're feeling brave, give the reader clues that this is an obvious troll. The classic example here is dmg's stock phrase "I am often accused of trolling (whatever that is)", but also feel free to use phrases like "I have not read the article, and I don't know much about XYZ but I feel I must comment". If anyone responds to a troll with these kinds of clues in it, feel free to bask in the glow of knee-jerk
Denial
If you're unlucky someone will accuse you of being a troll (surely not!) and try and ruin it for you. If you don't want it all to end there, then be sure to counter it by accusing them of being small-minded and petty, saying that it's easier for them to say it's a troll than to accept that people have different opinions. Be sure to say this in the subject line, especially if their subject was the infamous "YHBT. YHL. HAND."
Claiming credit
Given that
As for when to post it, that's a matter of opinion really. You can either post it straight away or leave it will after people start biting. Remember that the troll forum is also frequented by non-trolls, and sometimes you may get a self-declared "troll-buster" try and expose you. But remember,
There is no real current forum at the moment thanks to various spammers hitting the sids, but try trolltalk, the original troll sid started by 80md and osm way back in the day. Generally all postings are done there as an AC, with your name at the end of the post. Include a link to the troll somewhere in the text, which ideally will be directly to the post and its replies - click on the #XX link in the thread to get there.
Ending the troll
Sometimes you just get bored with a troll, or people start posting genuinely thoughtful stuff in reply (it does happen). When this happens it might be time to own up to the troll with a helpful "YHBT. YHL. HAND." post. Sometimes people will carry on a discussion of the issue, and if you're really lucky (and it was a great troll) they will completely fail to believe you and carry on arguing. If that happens, pat yourself on the back for writing a great troll
The cheap $3 crack
Finally, when all else fails and your troll gets moderated down to (-1, Troll) within ten seconds of you posting it, the only honourable thing to do is to accuse the moderators of smoking the cheap $3 crack (again) and give up
Section 2 - Types of troll
The Maniac
Probably the most popular kind of troll, the Maniac holds an opinion on something, and won't budge from that opinion no matter what evidence to the contrary is presented. If challenged, the Maniac will simply get more and more agitated and abusive, deriding his opponents as "idiots", "wrong-thinking", "dangerous" and "subversive". Generally the Maniac takes a position that opposes the prevalent
Maniacs can be crafted for practically every article
Here are some fruitful avenues to explore:
The Right-Wing Maniac
Always popular, the right-wing maniac (RWM) is a God-fearing, gun-toting, flag- waving American, and proud of it. They don't care about the rest of the world, unless it's to "prove" that America is better than everything else, and they cannot stand liberal whining over civil rights. They hate the moral decay of America and want it to revert into a nation of heterosexual, Christian whites like it was meant to be. Woe betide anyone that dares to suggest otherwise.
Religion
There are two ways to approach this kind of maniac. The harder to pull off is the militant atheist, but this is quite common amongst
Ideology
Pick a philosophy, any philosophy. This troll is a troll with a cause - they have found some kind of ideological truth, and are out to expose every other philosophy as a sham. Whether it be libertarianism, objectivism, communism or capitalism, this troll will point out the obvious "flaws" in any other philosophies, whilst spouting dogma about their own. And the best thing is - you don't even need to know that much about what you're spouting - making doctrinaire mistakes will get both sides of the argument flaming you, adding to the fun.
Software
This is an old favourite and crops up in many forms, covering the gamut from OS maniacs (Linux zealots, MS-apologists or embittered BSD fanatics), language maniacs (Pascal vs. C, C vs. C++, C++ vs. Java, Perl vs. Python, VB vs. everything), application maniacs(GIMP vs. Photoshop, Netscape vs. IE, vi vs. emacs) and also includes people who complain about how technology should only be for the 31337 hackers.
Guns
Americans love their guns, and will always fight passionately for their Constitutionally guarenteed rights to bear arms and shoot people. Even the slightest hint of criticism of this will bring down the wrath of a thousand and one enraged gun-owners on you, so it's always a great point to work into a troll
The Expert
The Expert is someone who is "savvy" in their particular field, and is perfectly willing to give their opinion on any topic even vauguely related to their field. The Expert is most likely to be from a field which
Some possible angles to exploit:
Industry knowledge
The expert knows the computing industry from the inside - as a long-term pro, they can dispense knowledge knowing that they can "speak for the industry". Their smug self-satisfaction is bound to annoy, as is any suggestion that things aren't the way that
Helpful hints
With their tech-savvy (or law-savvy or whatever) experience, the expert is obviously the best person to point out what's wrong with things or to give out useful "factual" information. In fact this probably works best with lawyer trolls - for all that
Offtopic Trolls
Not really a "troll" in the strict Jargon File sense of the word, but they certainly should be included here
Offtopic trolls, like any other, come in almost as many colours as an iMac, but generally not as cute. But then again, a good offtopic "troll" can affect more people than a repulsive little gumdrop on your desk, because you need to have someone SEE your desk before they can react. Simple? Moreso than even my overblown prose could indicate. Some basic examples:
The serial troll
Write a story. Keep expanding it. It doesn't matter what article you post it under, so long as it's high up. If you want people to recognize you, pick a couple themes or symbols, and carry them on throughout the story. Other alternatives include back linking or including the entire story, but adding more each time. Be funny if you want. Or if you don't feel like being funny, just be really weird. Someone will react.
The random troll
This has nothing to do with anything. Be it a stream of consciousness rant, or a description of the corner of your desk. Another favorite is a monologue, read as if spoken from any one given entity to another. The more outlandish, the better (a pair of socks talking to a mousepad, for example). If you really wanted to be artsy, work in an actual metaphor or legitimate meaning behind it, but it's not necessary.
The vaguely related troll
Start out with a comment about the article. Have a definite opinion of it. Then, after a little while, disintegrate into randomness. All roads eventually can eventually lead to cheese (yum), Natalie Portman, cannibalism, toasters, squirrels, futons, you name it. All it takes is a little bit of creativity. Oh, and feel free to use other trolls' motifs. Open source and all that
General tips:
If it's funny for a fleeting moment, then it's worth posting.
Puns. Puns are only less vile than mimes, but it's hard to mime on
Obscure cultural references and injokes are always good. SOMEONE will get them eventually.
Several drafts of a serial or random post are common, but true elegance is being able to come up with something on the spot that still makes the top 40 posts (on a post-heavy article)
Section 3 - Useful trolling links
The following links contain background information useful for trolls needing quick quotes and "expert" opinions to include.
General purpose links
ddi.digital.net/~gandalf/trollfaq.html - How to deal with USENET trolls - learn
your enemy
www.don-lindsay-archive.org/skeptic/arguments
www.altairiv.demon.co.uk/troll/trollfa
www.baiting.org - Baiting.org
www.fieldingtravel.com/df/index.htm - Fielding's DangerFinder - A guide to what and where's dangerous
Religious links
www.godhatesamerica.com/ - God Hates America
www.chalcedon.edu/creed.html - The Creed of Christian Reconstruction
www.demonbuster.com - How to cast out your demons and do spiritual warfare
riceinfo.rice.edu/armadillo/Sciacademy/r
hate
www.icr.org/ - Institute for Creation Research
www.xenu.net - Operation Clambake - The fight against Scientology on the net
www.hom.net/~angels/ - Citizens for the Ten Commandments
www.bju.edu/rcnbc.html - The difference between Catholics and Christians
www.geocities.com/prazske00/biblequot
Political/economy links
www.aynrand.org - The Ayn Rand Institute
www.reason.com - Libertarian site
www.freerepublic.com - Right-wing stuff
www.jbs.org - Excellent site for all kinds of right-wingery
www.dack.com/web/bullshit.html - Web economy bullshit generator
Crackpot science links
www.fixedearth.com - The Earth Is Not Moving
www.jir.com/index.htm - The Journal of Irreproducible Results
I am into the copy and paste.
Dear Troll,
We are sad to inform you that, after careful consideration , we have rejected your troll submission from the Troll Library.
You show a a poor skill at trolling. Please go read Troll Howto, and try again. Either that, or stick to adequacy.
I am into the copy and paste.
I make my own lists, but I would love to see yours for comparison. (Note that I only chose active trolls, not once great but now inactive ones. If I had, my list would be far too long)
Wake up dude. Your missing the boat. We don't need ISPs anymore.
That's true if your traffic is local to your neighbourhood.
If you want to route traffic through more than your neighbourhood, though, you're going to run into problems. If the area you're routing traffic in is more than a few hops wide, you'll either be spending most of your bandwidth routing other peoples' messages, or you'll have to set up dedicated high-bandwidth links to let long routes bypass most users' nodes. Now if you have a network of these links... you have something that looks a lot like the existing backbone.
If you have a backbone to maintain, you have to charge for use of the backbone to amortize building and maintenance costs. This gives you a multi-level system where the people running the backbone sell bandwidth to people who locally redistribute the bandwidth.
Which looks a lot like the current system of multiple levels of ISPs.
ISPs exist for a reason. If you try to do away with them, you'll just end up having to reinvent them.
Not really a big deal when you consider that there is *no* way for them to know this is occuring... [...] None. Zip. Zilch. ZeRo.
Unless they just sniff packet headers and notice that you're web surfing while you're playing Quake. Kind of difficult to do that with only two hands and one pair of eyes.
Or unless they notice that you're viewing dozens of web pages per second.
Either way, they'd have a hard time *proving* you're up to something, but they can jerk your connection around under any number of pretenses on their end. If this becomes a big problem, believe me, they'll start squashing people who try this.
...but I can get a wireless gateway cheaper than a laptop...
...selling access probably violates my contract with my ISP...
...It sounds great for hotels wanting to buy a prepackaged deal, but most go through commercial ISPs...
I'm not really sure what market they're trying to corner here... They're not planning on profitting from this are they?
No offense guys, cool idea and all, but I wouldn't bet the farm on it.
Here in wisconsin our cable service is road runner. And the commercials for the service basically show two of the characters using the internet at the same time. They advertise multible computers online. Given that they only give you one modem and one IP, how can they then discurage NAT???
This sig is a virus, take it and use it.
LinuxWorx
Spelling errors are intentional as are gramatical error
The easiest way is just to drop trou in the men's room and press your hiney up against the urinal and let go. However, I can think of a few reasons you might not want to take this approach. For instance, there's the whole "getting caught" ordeal, or having a colon prone to stage fright. Not to mention putting your ass into close proximity with thousands of generations of urine.
With that in mind, I have devised the following not-so-clever and oh-so-easy plan: In the comfort of your own home, when you feel the urge, crap into a plastic bag. Ziploc would be a good idea. When the opportunity presents itself, carefully deposit your offering into the Porcelain Alter of Liquid Excrement. Congratulations, you now have poop in a urinal. Take a picture and send it here.
I am into the copy and paste.
You know -- Apple was the first major computer company to spread the use of 802.11b to the consumer market. Some people will argue that point, because people love to flame Apple, but the fact is that AirPort-ready laptops have been produced for years now, starting a good year or more ahead of mainstream 802.11b-ready Intel/AMD-based laptops.
:)
I know Sputnik is a startup, just taking its first steps, so I understand you still have work to do. But I will tell you, this is right down the alley of most of us Mac users. We've always been the rebellious types, that's why we do what we do. I hope we see this gateway for PowerPC machines soon.
As a side note, I do appreciate that you point out Macintosh clients can connect as easily as any other. It's true. And probably easier (one click in the AirPort menu!) But I hope you soon offer us the ability to spread the project, too.
Keep up the good work.
Ryan
"All your base are belong to this file I send in order to have your advice."
I wish they supported more than just the lame Intersil Prism II cards. I have two lucent/orinico, and a cisco aironet :( I was all set to download, but then I read the requirements.
Here's hoping that more coverage will come. Its all there in the kernel and/or pcmcia-cs.
Go over and read my latest troll, you skanky whore! Tell me what you think! PHEAR IT BITCH! SUCK MY BALLS!!
Linuxcare Founders Go Wireless I knew they were smart and all, but it's cool that they found a way to turn completely wireless. They must save a ton on airfare and bus tickets!
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Today's Top Deals
What's all this about world domination and secure networks?
Note that the computer system you pick to host your Sputnik Gateway will boot and operate entirely from CD-ROM, and must be solely dedicated to functioning as a Sputnik Gateway
If I wanted to use my $2000 laptop (or $500 desktop) as a $200 wireless hub, couldn't I just download linux and set up some firewall rules? Where's the interesting new functionality here?
Why don't I just throw a web login on a can of cheez-whiz and make my own start-up! I'll encrypt it all with 4096 bit encryption and call it secur-a-whiz. Sure you'll have to plug it in to your laptop to use it, but it'll make millions, I swear!
So why am I sitting in an appartment in Bellevue (ie: close suburb of Seattle) reading this page over a 56k dialup link?
If the "last mile" ISP's don't get busy and do some inventing soon I, or someone like me, really will put them out of business.
I think the idea of this, if you read the post, is that once you establish a node, eventually you will be paid by GoWireless for everyone that connects to your node.
Well, how do you think they do that? This is just tunneling controlled net access to each of the nodes, you'd still use your ISP, just not sharing your ISP's "internet", you're sharing GoWireless's "internet".
So basically, you just need to calculate a billing rate by taking into account how much extra per month it costs the broadband user to implement (nothing), the cost of GoWireless's shared internet bandwith (which is probably bought and sold in GB chunks),so basically, anything more than their bandwith, and it's pure profit.
Then for their future services, I'm sure their will be a different pricing model altogether.
C'mon people, free wireless web proxies. What makes you think GoWireless won't start selling internet traffic. The one proven profitable business on the web, a la overture.com, formerly goto.com.
That's my little rant.
ChopSueyar
Lots of folks have been talking about ISPs get'n rectally aroused about this one, but what is to stop them (ISPs) from becoming gateways themselves and selling bandwidth?
For quite some time a trend has been worrying me.That trend is the internet turning into tv .I have always believed that How this phenomenon would occur is through a massive centralisation of isps.How I believed this centralisation would happen was through people like aol/time warner and sony who would start selling large chunks of there content ,(movies games tv/whatever),bundeled .I also believed that to compete the small isps would have to buy the rights to the content of big content companies and accept all of the strings that these content companies should choose to attach and hence that the internet would be controlled by about 5 ,(probably less),big isps.
.Also the whole concept of selling off ones bandwith to to help pay for the connection appeals to me ,as it stands over here in ireland monthly net connections for dsl are way way to much for me to afford and the prospect of selling on some of the bandwith which I would not be using is very appealing to me, If something like this existed over here i would support it.
.All in all thow I am very interested to see how this goes.It reminds me in some ways of a co-op only for bandwith.
with net access and offered exclusively to there customers and that this would lead over time to people thinking about the internet along the same lines as tv and not as something new
This story makes me a little more optimistic that the whole internet wiil = tv phenomenon does not have to happen.I also think that this would if adapted by alot of people make the internet alot harder to control and more competitive in terms of pricing
The only doughts I have about all of this is that
a),it will not make money and b) eventualy some big company will take over and subvert the whole thing to its own ends
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won't work with wireless for security. someone who wants on the network can just take over someone elses MAC address that they sniffed. they can even be polite and wait until the original user goes offline before using it to be less likely that the original user would detect anything.
OK, so, *when* it gets hacked, *when* it breaks, *when* it's down, *when* your laptop craps out, *when* Murphy comes to town...
Who's stuck with the tech support?
For that matter, who's stuck with the 'level 1' support issues?
I owned/ran an ISP for 4 years (sold out, blah blah)... the myriad of non-related tech calls are amazing... UFie Greg's life isn't that too far off the the real thing...
So, who gets that call? I've got a family and a day job, and a night job already... seems to me someone is missing a large factor here.
Ever Onward, Forward Bound
LANRoamer is a GPL'ed system that has been doing this for a while. We gave presentations on it at Bay Area Wireless User Group and Sbay.org back in June, I believe, before even the NoCat project started.
If you're into "bazaar" style software development, one thing you should note is that LANRoamer does network booting and upgrade reboots. So, if you contribute a useful feature to LANRoamer, it can be widely deployed quickly (based on our stability labels and the stability level each gateway owner has selected). Also, in addition to free accounts and revenue sharing to our access point providers, we also offer free courtesy accounts for people who run open access points (not just during a free beta), partly in an effort to thank the developers and "evangelists", but also to get them involved.
Anyhow, here is the software, including the latest LANRoamer network boot floppy or CD-ROM.
The network boot floppy currently requires that the first ethernet card be compatible with 3COM 3c59x, 8139too, Ether Express Pro 100, NE2000 PCI cards, Via Rhine, Tulip cards and PC-Net PCMCIA ethernet (the 802.11 card or the ethernet connection to your access point can be just about any card that Linux supports). Unlike NoKat (the last time I checked), LANRoamer can work behind firewalls, including NAT routers, even ones that distribute IP addresses that LANRoamer would otherwise use. Once your gateway is up, client machines can obtain addresses from your wireless gateway by DHCP and are taken to an SSL-based login page when they try to go anywhere on the web until they log in.
As a former Linuxcare employee, I like this new venture because it's not likely to employ a lot of community people, promise them the planet and then go scrabbling for loose change under Sun's seatcovers. Good work boys, stay out of trouble.
However, I can't help but suspect that this is more likely to have a negative impact on community wireless networks than a positive impact. Charging for wireless, sort of the "anti-community" approach. On the other hand, if they're only targetting business users, maybe it won't have such a negative impact after all. They do say they've talked to ISP's about AUP. On the other, other hand, isn't this likely to encourage local ISP's to be aggressive about competing with community wireless to make a little money in a new market? Don't they have the option of altering their AUP's to leave community wireless out in the cold?
It's the usual slippery slope, boys. But at least you're not a major community road hazard this time around....
just because todays wireless technology only supports a handful of users at a time (say 20 to 30 comfortably) it doesn't mean that tomorrow, we won't have standards that can route wirelessly and support gigabits of traffic at a time, enough for global internet wirelessly.
I'm afraid there are hard limits on how much you'll ever be able to route with a (broadcast) wireless scheme.
The window of frequencies you can use is limited. Above a certain frequency range, your signal will be blocked by things like rain or fog (and of course, walls and windows). This limit is probably in the 10-20 GHz range. No amount of technological development will change this - it's a physical limit.
This places an upper limit on the bandwidth that any given "cell" (broadcast region) can support (no matter how many base stations you put in that cell).
Divide the bandwidth available per cell by the bandwidth a user wants, and you have the maximum number of users per cell. This means your cell must be small enough to have *only* that number of users in it.
This ends up being about 100 people/cell, if they each want 100 kbytes/second access and your broadcasting can handle 100 Gbit (20 GHz of spectrum at 10 bits/Hz with half the bandwidth upstream and half the bandwidth downstream).
This gives a maximum cell size of maybe a hundred metres or so.
When you start to route traffic, things get _much_ worse. If the area you're trying to cover is only a kilometre wide (part of a city's core), the average path length will be on the order of 5-8 hops. If you're distributing *only* through broadcast wireless, your bandwidth use goes up by a factor of 5-8 on average, because you have that many more repeated messages flying through the mesh.
So either everyone gets 10 kbytes/sec, or you shrink your cells, which makes the number of hops needed larger, which means that even *more* of the traffic you're routing is other peoples' messages in flight...
Summary: You need high-capacity point-to-point links. You're not getting around this.
And fiber's a whole lot more reliable than microwave for this (no rain), and can carry a whole lot more (gain-bandwidth product for erbium-doped fiber is in the 100-gigahertz range if I remember correctly, and maximum theoretical limit for optical communication is around 1 petahertz).
Microwave is especially bad for between-city communication, as your range is limited by atmospheric quality and curvature of the earth (and you still need a big expensive tower, which means you still have the ISP problem).
Having read the part about using a laptop as an 802.11b gateway, I immediate thought about the technical possibility of reselling the overpriced broadband they sell at hotels. The target market for resold broadband is not the hotel you stay in, it's the hotel on the other side of the street whose windows are a direct shot from your window. Even better if the hotel across the street lacks broadband. Now, all they need is a freeware client that people can download to search for "renegade ISPs".
What would stop someone from setting up a bunch of these things concealed in suspended ceilings and remotely controllable, offering service all over a metropolitan area just by staying in various hotel rooms and leaving behind some cleverly concealed hardware?
I don't see it as a good news/bad news thing at all!
The people who are motivated to freely give away some of their bandwidth for the good of the community won't suddenly say "Oh darn, now I have to charge for it because this new wireless gateway is designed around a fee structure! There goes my idea for a freenet!" They'll just use other tools to get the job done. It's much easier to offer free access than to find ways of limiting access to paying customers.
This venture simply makes controlled wireless access more feasible (at a reasonable price), and gives more people a new option to share part of their bandwidth while charging for it.
This can't be a bad thing at all. Worst case: It ends up being a rather unpopular thing.
Much more realistic case: It doesn't have massive impact on the industry, but coffee houses and hotels start to catch on, and some of them make good use of it. So do a few enterprising individuals.
Things like sharing connections and the ability to run servers without having to worry about being cut off are a good reason to spend the extra money for a business-grade DSL connection. Sure it costs more, but for a lot of Slashdot readers the extra cost wouldn't be that much of an issue.
fencepost
just a little off
Is there anyway to add a wireless card to a regular PC? I've heard of PCMCIA to PCI cards. Does anyone knw if they actually work? Are they any good? I want to set up my entire house using a wireless network, but I can't justify it w/ having only one laptop! Does any one know of a good brand of PCMCIA/PCI cards?
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Apple's AirPort already has all of these capabilities. Tell me, does Sputnik's product support both 40-bit and 128-bit encryption like the AirPort does? By the way, if you're using an 802.11b card as a wireless gateway, the range isn't very good. The spec is 5m although people have reported being able to use it over 15m in line-of-sight situations. Apple uses a standard Lucent chipset in their cards, although the software supports 3rd party cards, usually without additional drivers, however non-lucent chipsets are limited to 2Mbps with Apple's software, rather than the 11Mbps that AirPort-spec cards can get.
Karma: Ran over your dogma.
"With a properly configured distribution of this package, it's entirely possible to make your routing/NAT'ing of your neighbors traffic completely undetectable."
Any references to how to do this?
Thanx.
^z
People just haven't started hijacking the fibre off the lines for their own inet.
:)
I'd do it if I knew how. Any good FAQs on it?
Jake
Dating: while( 1 ){ call_girl(); get_rejected(); drink_40(); } return 0;
Well, it's true that unencrypted layer 2 traffic sucks over wireless. However, NoCatAuth combats this by requiring credentials to be resubmitted every so often. These credentials are sent only via SSL and are in theory secure. Therefore, if a MAC address is hijacked, the hijacker will only have at best a couple minutes before the session expires on them. This was considered "good enough", given what we have to work with. Any further questions, don't hesitate to visit the website & join the mailing list.
Two minor factual corrections:
(1) LANRoamer and NoCatAuth appear to have started around the same time.
(2) NoCatAuth does indeed authenticate from behind NAT'ed firewalls.
LANRoamer and NoCatAuth appear to have started around the same time.
The two people who started NoCat gave a talk at the Bay Area Wireless User Group about a week after they started development, and I talked to them there. They (or at least one of them) said that they knew about LANRoamer when they started but thought that the LANRoamer back end was proprietary (we had publicly released it as free software by that time, but there was a period of about two weeks from when we announced LANRoamer to when we decided to free the back end, so I understand how they got that impression).