Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Activism, VOIP, Ivies
Until we know how to get to Stallman's Gulch ... sbrown writes: "Public Knowledge responds to Declan McCullagh's call for less activism, more code. Don't fool yourself geeks, political participation is absolutely necessary to maintain the freedom to write code. Public Knowledge has a plan to make geek political participation easy and effective."
Speaking of activism, Roblimo reported yesterday that Bruce Perens might be leaving HP. Today, IDG reporter Matt Berger confirms the break, writing that "Perens says he is leaving HP to pursue political activism. His protests against the DMCA and other legislation that Perens says threatens the open source community, apparently, were too much for HP to handle. So he is becoming an independent consultant and will work with HP as a consultant. He also plans to follow through with a presentation of a DVD player cracking software that he says is in violation of the DMCA. HP stopped him from doing the demonstration at the O'Reilly Open Source Convention last month."
Might these be the basis of a long-distance relationship? AndersBrownworth writes "After Creative nixed their VoIP Blaster, ($20 USB to "plain old telephone line" converter with free software available) ebay prices eclipsed the $200 mark. Now, it seems Creative has found some VoIP Blasters still hanging around and is selling them as refurbished units for $29.99. Ebay prices have reflected the move in Internet time."
Much more fun than a PBS pledge drive. Kodi writes "In case you haven't been watching, Blender's campaign to become open source by raising 100,000 is almost complete, with about 85,000 raised. If you were holding back, perhaps a little doubtful that they would make it, now's the time to chip in and push it over the top."
If your donation happens to be The Last Straw (and the Blender folks can verify it), I will provide you with your choice of ThinkGeek T-shirt ;)
And such pretty campuses, too. guttentag writes "Several weeks ago, Slashdot ran a story about the Princeton admissions dean who used applicant information to hack into a Yale Web site. Today Princeton announced it will remove the official from his position; however, it will offer him another, undisclosed job. It also revealed that Princeton and other Ivy League schools were aware of the break-ins as early as May 15.
MIT's The Tech adds Princeton officials previously said they were unaware of the incident prior to July 24 when Yale's president informed Princeton's, and that Yale notified the FBI the next day (President Bush's niece was among those students whose privacy was violated). It was not until that point that Princeton placed the official on administrative leave.
Apparently, misusing applicant information to commit identity fraud is not a serious offense at Princeton unless the public learns of it (or a member of the president's family is among the victims), and even then it's not serious enough to warrant dismissal. Princeton's president also said other school officials will be disciplined, but declined to provide details, presumably to protect the privacy of those officials or the university."
Princeton admissions dean who used applicant information to hack into a Yale Web site.
If hacking is now considered terrorism, why isn't the government all over this one?
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Because only the poor can be criminals.
There are not a lot of hippie hackers hanging out, and hardly anyone is wearing funny costumes. The combination Trekkie convention and Renaissance Faire feel a lot of early Linux get-togethers had is gone. This is a business gathering.
The author apparantly meets this with dismay. I would like to argue instead that it's about time.
I hate doing things in stuffy, overly-businesslike ways. I much prefer the more freewheeling, hacker style, and I am sure that many /. readers do also. But these are also the same people that want Linux and OSS in general taken seriously. Well, as unfortunate as it may be, to be taken seriously by business-type people, you have to act like business-type people, or at least hire people to do it.
Like it or not, movements that have gatherings of people in "funny costumes" or that have a "trekkie convention" atmosphere are going to be trivialized. Columnists will report these events in the "for your amusement" part of the newspaper, sandwhiched between Dear Abby and the horoscopes. By adopting a more serious attitude at events like this, now you start to get recognition where it counts, like in the Wall Street Journal.
As much as it galls most hacker types (myself included), appearance is everything. But the OSS community needs to remember that it has something more than just appearance, something that many proprietary vendors are missing: substance. OSS code actually works and delivers on what it claims in most cases.
So OSS hackers should keep coding and wearing funny costumes, or whatever floats your boat. But also let the business people and marketers loose. Let them promote what you're doing (think of it this way: it gives you even more time to code).
Karma: Frotzed (mostly due to the Frobozz Magic Karma Company)
(Tough break about the cut. Perhaps you can post the scene script when the movie it out...)
/.'ed into the stone age. I'm trying to order a couple of VOIP Blasters, and while I can do the non-secure part of the system great, all I get when I try to proceed to checkout is "Server timed out".
But enough about CleverNickName... It seems that Creative's HTTPS order transaction server is also
Hmmmm. Just like a brick and mortar - Plenty of stuff in the store, but not enough damn cashiers....
www.eFax.com are spammers
First Napster rules ... as developers get a little pissed!
Then RIAA/MPAA/Politician cartel throws down
Now the pendulum is swinging back...
We need to assault the politicians on all fronts:
- with code
- with law
- with awareness-campaigns
- with boycotts of companies who support politicians
Remember when people ask us to have faith in the law system and that everything will work out we should not trust them. As bleak as it sounds we cannot have faith in many things and should trust only ourselves and that is why WE need to be actively doing all the above bulleted items.
Do you fight against the DMCA and people's right to exchange information with each other?
Do you fight for clean air? I live in VERMONT and today we have worse smog than fucking LA, which I learned courtesy of online EPA ground level ozone reporting information. I would not have believed that possible. Today southern Vermont is at smog danger levels for children, elderly or those with asthma. I have asthma...
Do you fight against water privatization? The global fresh-water situation is getting desperate at a horrifying rate. Part of the problem is overuse, and part of the problem is- get this- corporations forcing entire countries into privatization because the World Bank demands it as a condition of doing business with the country. Once privatized, in the spirit of 'free trade' the corporation (such as Vivendi out of France) can export the country's water elsewhere- like America, if it wants- and refuse water to those in the original country who can't pay for it.
Or you could fight against corporations polluting, like in Anniston, Alabama. When Monsanto dumps so much poison into the creek that fish fucking explode and fall apart within minutes after being put in the water, you HAVE to buy water that Vivendi exported from some African nation where people die of thirst unable to afford water, because if you dig a well for water and drink it, you die!
Or you could google for 'Operation Northwoods', learn that in the 60s, McNamara repeatedly vetoed proposals from our own military to attack US citizens in order to basically create martyrs, blame it on Cuba and stir up enthusiasm for a war they felt desperately necessary... and ask whether any of that seems familiar, try to see if you can do better than 40 years of silence on what's going on today.
These are either great or horrible times to be an activist. The situation is so bad it forces any sane person to question. But there's too much to be done!
You have to pick a thing and work on that, or you just get ulcers and die early... mind you who can tell with the amount of poison and pollution in our air, our water, our food...
(President Bush's niece was among those students whose privacy was violated).
Maybe she can get C's at Yale too...
...misusing applicant information to commit identity fraud is not a serious offense at Princeton unless the public learns of it
How about being completely clueless about security? I guess it's a good thing society doesn't incarcerate people for committing stupidity (I'd be the first to take a drink). But seriously, this is like violating the DMCA by uncoding someone's ROT13 email signature.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
In another note, here's an interesting rebuttal to the Declan article.
Also, know the Digital Speech Project. Best not reinventing any wheels.
Additional data - not only is there HTTPS server bogging bigtime right now, but it will reject any packets with the Explicit Congestion Notify bit set - so if you are running a real OS that actually implements the TCP standard, you may need to
echo 0 >/proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_ecn
before you place your order.
www.eFax.com are spammers
I'm still curious as to three things:
-
Why did the editors post this blurb without indicating that
independent investigators concluded that admissions director
LeMenager intended only to check the security of Yale's
website? The implication that he intended to spy on innocent
applicants who entrusted him with their personal information is irresponsible.
- Given the sheer quantity of Slashdot wailing and chest-beating
about the tragic propensity for computer-security whistleblowers to
get reprimanded, sacked, or prosecuted, the sarcasm of the last
paragraph of the blurb is unexpected, if not downright hypocritical.
- I can understand why the mainstream news calls this a 'hack'. But
Slashdot should know better. I'm not referring to the ESR/RMS
"Editor, when you say hacker, you really mean cracker" lexicographic crusade
-- I'm referring to the fact that using a name/SSN pair obtained legitimately (i.e., from an applicant who mailed it
to you) to access a website is not "hacking" by even the most tortured definition of
the term. It is social engineering, maybe. It is illegitimate, if done with
malice, sure. But it is not "hacking."
I can understand why the mainstream press screws up. Six years ago, how often could you find an article about the Internet that didn't contain enough glaring errors to qualify it for a good MST3King? How much better are they today? Not much.Quoth the press release.
If LeMenager was actually committing "identity fraud" for fun and profit, why on earth would he tell Yale exactly what he did at an admissions conference in May? Read the source. LeMenager made the mistake of repeating the entry to demonstrate how it was done. That hardly qualifies him for dismissal. Quoth the press release.
Lest we forget, Yale sat on this story for two months before releasing it. I've no idea why.
I expected better from Slashdot.
Joe
(in addition to preview being your friend... Drat!)
They don't seem to handle ZIP+4 correctly, so you need to give them just the standard ZIP code.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Damn, since when has entering a name, dob and SSN been elevated to "hacking". How about firing the moron who approved such a system, instead of the slightly more secure "mail them a PIN" or some such.
I'm sorry, that isn't a hack.
Unfortunately, I didn't see the web site, so maybe someone who did can say. Where was the "do not enter name other than yourself" disclaimer? In big letters on the login, or buried on the "privacy policy" page?
What a joke.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I'm really glad to see you're one of the few people who have principles and will follow them.
Doesn't this encourage people to wait longer to make a contribution?
--
Socrates was asked where he was from. He replied not "Athens," but "The world."
I have a VoIP blaster and after testing the quality (on PC2PC conversations) I decided to pay for the PC2Phone service. However, InnoMedia decided that they don't want my money. The reason? They didn't like my email address, saying that they don't accept an email address in your own domain.
Well, screw that. I wonder how they managed to keep the product alive so long with such crappy service.
Petru
Over the next few months, we are going to launch technology to organize and consolidate grassroots activity on policy issues affecting copyright and technology.
They are doing this by writing more code; this is what they mean by "launching new technology".
Code is the key to solving many problems. Like the problem of the RIAA and its inordinately and disproportionately strong political influence.
For example, by writing code, and creating an alternative copyright adminsitration system and organization to gather together the some 80% of copyrights that are not RIAA controlled, the writing of code will have a direct political impact on the issues surrounding compulsory DRM and RIAA / MPAA paid for legislation.
We need to have code written that organizes the scattered power in the world and focuses it to do our collective bidding. Either way, in the end, more code has to be written; Declan is right, and Public Knowledge are acknowledging this by writing code to solve a problem of political imbalance.
ATH0 Bitcoin: 1DnwFLXczVZV8kLJbMYoheUrpqHesjxrSi
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Furthermore, there was a very interesting take on the fiasco published on Slate yesterday; go ahead and read the full story there. The independent author makes a strong case saying that the only reason Yale bothered to accuse Princeton of wrongdoing was that the Yale Daily Herald had discovered what was happened, and was about to make the report public; Yale wanted to distract attention away from their inadequate security, and did so by blaming Princeton.
-- Imagine how much more advanced our technology would be if we had eight fingers per hand.
Only reason I can think of, better digital trail for surveillance.
The obsession with the word "hacking" -- which you're further propagating with your post -- is exactly why the sensationalist media labeled this a hacking incident. Nothing could be further from the truth.
-- Imagine how much more advanced our technology would be if we had eight fingers per hand.
- publishing the full Blender sources, including old and new development, under the GNU GPL license ('Free Software'). The NaN mobile technology will not be included in this.
Sounds like the GPL to me...
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
I think the "or" means "in other words", not the logical operator or.
Read the very next lines:
"What the NaN Holding shareholders and the Foundation agree on:
- publishing the full Blender sources, including old and new development, under the GNU GPL license ('Free Software'). The NaN mobile technology will not be included in this."
Contrary to what you state, the phrase "Free Software" is right there.
They later mention BSD-style licenses for use in commercial projects.
I hold Mr. Perens in high regard and take pleasure in reading his perspectives. However, I am out of my depth in a parking lot puddle of parsing people's prerogatives. That's enough alliteration for one night. Anyway, I realize Mr. Perens' relationship with HP and how it evolves is one that is mature beyond a few paragraphs of my positing.
As HP may take, deservedly or not, a black eye over such antics, I would want to relate that there are many types of people who work for a company, and to put one face on a moniker may be an oversight of the people that make up that stock quote.
I purchased a used HP-branded laptop with no supporting documentation or installation disks. I had no luck in finding out much information about the unit on HP's web site, as the model does not apparently exist, according to all of their mechanisms available. I think the unit may have been a very short production run or a contract build for a government agency or private corporation.
My thorough efforts resulted only a few tentative results for BIOS and driver information. I called HP support expecting to pay a per-incident fee. To my suprise, I spoke with an incredibly helpful and interested tech support rep who realized that with what detective work I had done that I do have a rather rare laptop with no online support documentation. Together we found the appropriate most current bios and identified the major system components. With that information and a little more effort I now find myself writing this post on said same laptop just a few hours later, repartitioned for booting my favorite linux distro and all the hardware questions satisfactorily resolved.
This is just a perspective a satisfied person who in this case was not even a customer of HP's yet got what information I needed to accomplish my task with enthusiastic official support. I hope that his attitude holds sway.
Bravo to Bruce Perens for not being HP's bitch on this one, and standing up for himself.
How does money work? I give you some money, you put it in the bank, it earns you interest. If you don't need to spend it you keep it, because it'll be worth more in the long run.
Who decided it should be that way? There are hundreds of examples from the last few hundred years of communities and regions implementing an alternative currency - one with a state imposed depreciation rate. I give you $10 in August, its worth $9 in September, and $5 by new year. I'll bet you spend it in August!
Why does that help? Because it keeps the markets liquid. It no longer pays for the rich to save their money - they have to spend it. And on the whole that creates wealth in the economy - it is not the amount of money in a country that matters - its the amount of money MOVING in the market that matters.
Do this and political bribes will still exist - but wealth accruel will be a lesser driver. Bill Gates will still be a rich fucker for the rest of his life - but the rest of us will see more of his money more quickly.
If eBay started a similar currency who's to stop them?
Paid: 68985
Pending: 15200
Intent: 3470
Total: 87655
So the real value is, in fact, 68985. My employer had "intent" to pay me "pending" money too. Nothing's yours unless it's in the bank. Isn't there a time limit this 100,000 has to be raised by?
If this is true, and you're really leaving HP on your principles, I greatly admire your conviction. If you run for something, I'll vote for you. Best of luck.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
This runs against my prime directive - never to connect to the internet under the influence of Redmond binaries.
I didn't know you hated Nintendo that much. Nintendo's USA headquarters is located in Redmond, WA, not too far from One Microsoft Way. For a while, back in the Windows 3.1 days, they were working together on a legit emulator called (get this) "Wintendo".
Will I retire or break 10K?
It's amazing how many people don't realize that stocks go up, stocks go down, especially small companies.
And stocks tank after a company announces that it has lost a huge sum of money. Bush, an insider in the company, sold right before such an announcement and the stock tanked. That it later recovered is irrelevent.
The same group of right-wing nut-cases that get so morally indignant because Clinton lied about a blowjob think it's fine for Bush to violate securities laws and engage in insider trading. You probably thought the Whitewater investigation into a 20 year old land deal in which the Clintons lost money was $50million well spent, but you all want us to look the other way when Bush violates securities laws. As you said, "it's amazing."
Yeah, yeah. I realized it as soon as I hit submit. I should preview and all that first...
Big deal. W's company had been bleeding money steadily before, during, and afterwards. Nobody ever claimed he was a good businessman. It's only the people that continue to whine about the 2000 election (get a clue, it's now 2002) whine about Bush's financial past.
I don't give a fsck whether Clinton got a blowjob or not. But he did lie about it under oath, and last time I read the law, lying about anything under oath, even if it was what you had for breakfast yesterday morning, is a felony. That's right, a felony. Something that W hasn't committed and your hero, x42, has.
At least mafia-owned pizzarias make excellent pizza. Compare to Bill Gates.