Slashdot Mirror
Failing Grades For Most Anti-Spyware Tools
serbach writes "Steve Gibson posted this link to a superb test of about two dozen top Anti-Spyware programs: Eric L. Howes conducted the test over a two-week period in October. The results surprised me: only 3 ASW programs had a 'batting average' of better than .500 when it came to eradicating the broad range of spyware in the test. Freeware star Spybot Search & Destroy came in a distant 7th with an average of only .376. The top three? Giant Anti-Spyware, Spy Sweeper, and Ad-Aware. These test results are well worth your time."
I dont use any, and have no problems. Never. And i fix other people's computers without them. When are people going to learn to be careful? I put firefox on a friends PC, along with adaware, and he still was screwed withtin 2 weeks. what is wrong with the general public???
You call it excessive, I call it ambitious.
link me
...actively combats uninstalling...
Why is it so hard to remove *any* program from a Windows computer? On old OS9 and new OSX Macs all one needs to do is drag the program into the trash and empty the trash. One can also delete stuff from the startup and extension folders and that is the end of the unwanted software. Simple free utilities make "invisible" files visible so they too can be trashed.
All theory is gray
http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/economics/nbank1.html
Principles Of Islamic Banking
[This article was published in the 10th issue of Nida'ul Islam magazine, November-December 1995]
For millions of Muslims, banks are institutions to be avoided. Islam is a religion which keeps Believers from the teller's window. Their Islamic beliefs prevent them from dealings that involve usury or interest (Riba). Yet Muslims need banking services as much as anyone and for many purposes: to finance new business ventures, to buy a house, to buy a car, to facilitate capital investment, to undertake trading activities, and to offer a safe place for savings. For Muslims are not averse to legitimate profit as Islam encourages people to use money in Islamically legitimate ventures, not just to keep their funds idle.
However, in this fast moving world, more than 1400 years after the Prophet (s.a.w.), can Muslims find room for the principles of their religion? The answer comes with the fact that a global network of Islamic banks, investment houses and other financial institutions has started to take shape based on the principles of Islamic finance laid down in the Qur'an and the Prophet's traditions 14 centuries ago. Islamic banking, based on the Qur'anic prohibition of charging interest, has moved from a theoretical concept to embrace more than 100 banks operating in 40 countries with multi-billion dollar deposits world-wide. Islamic banking is widely regarded as the fastest growing sector in the Middle Eastern financial services market. Exploding onto the financial scene barely thirty years ago, an estimated $US 70 billion worth of funds are now managed according to Shari'ah. Deposit assets held by Islamic banks were approximately $US5 billion in 1985 but grew over $60 billion in 1994.
The best known feature of Islamic banking is the prohibition on interest. The Qur'an forbids the charging of Riba on money lent. It is important to understand certain principles of Islam that underpin Islamic finance. The Shari'ah consists of the Qur'anic commands as laid down in the Holy Qur'an and the words and deeds of the Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w.). The Shari'ah disallows Riba and there is now a general consensus among Muslim economists that Riba is not restricted to usury but encompasses interest as well. The Qur'an is clear about the prohibition of Riba, which is sometimes defined as excessive interest. "O You who believe! Fear Allah and give up that remains of your demand for usury, if you are indeed believers." Muslim scholars have accepted the word Riba to mean any fixed or guaranteed interest payment on cash advances or on deposits. Several Qur'anic passages expressly admonish the faithful to shun interest.
The rules regarding Islamic finance are quite simple and can be summed up as follows:
a) Any predetermined payment over and above the actual amount of principal is prohibited.
Islam allows only one kind of loan and that is qard-el-hassan (literally good loan) whereby the lender does not charge any interest or additional amount over the money lent. Traditional Muslim jurists have construed this principle so strictly that, according to one commentator "this prohibition applies to any advantage or benefits that the lender might secure out of the qard (loan) such as riding the borrower's mule, eating at his table, or even taking advantage of the shade of his wall." The principle derived from the quotation emphasises that associated or indirect benefits are prohibited.
b) The lender must share in the profits or losses arising out of the enterprise for which the money was lent.
Islam encourages Muslims to invest their money and to become partners in order to share profits and risks in the business instead of becoming creditors. As defined in the Shari'ah, or Islamic law, Islamic finance is based on the belief that the provider of capital and the user of capital should equally share the risk of business ventures, whether those are industries, farms, service companies or simple
http://www.islamonline.net/fatwa/english/FatwaDisp lay.asp?hFatwaID=99645
Title of Fatwa Refuting Claims on the Permissibility of Bank Interest
Date of Fatwa
5/ June/ 2003
Date of Reply
5/ June/ 2003
Topic Of Fatwa
Bank Interest
Question of Fatwa
As-Salamu `alaykum. Many people nowadays are tackling the fatwa of the Islamic Research Academy in which respectful scholars legalize interest on money deposited in banks. They say that determining the percentage of interest is subject to special economic studies. That is to say, it is not fixed but fluctuates according to prices and so on. The percentage of interest, they claim, is also subject to the principle of public interests. But really, I'm not fully satisfied with this fatwa. So what is your opinion on this issue?
Name of Mufti Dr. Hussain Hamed
Content of Reply
Wa `alaykum As-Salamu wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh.
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.
Dear questioner, we would like to thank you for the great confidence you place in us, and we implore Allah Almighty to help us serve His cause and render our work for His Sake.
Actually, banks consider people's money as loans and not as money for investment in shared profitable projects. But loans which incur interest are definitely riba. It has nothing to do with any economic studies or fluctuation of prices. Moreover, riba is made unlawful by textual evidence and it is not subject to public interests.
In his response to the question, Dr. Hussain Hamed, Professor of Shari`ah at the Faculty of Law, Cairo University, states the following:
"The fatwa issued by the Islamic Research Academy is supported by some arguments that prove that predetermining the percentage of interest on money deposited in banks is lawful and there is nothing wrong with it at all. Hence, I will mention these arguments and the reply to them.
The first argument: Predetermining the percentage of interest is based on a thorough study of the conditions of the market.
In this concern the fatwa reads: "It is well known that banks' pre-estimation of a certain percentage of interest on dealers' deposits is based on well established study of the stock market and its conditions, and of the economic conditions of the society. Fixing interest thus differs according to the circumstances, the nature of each deal, and the average of gains."
This justification is not a point of controversy in itself, because what matters is not the way of fixing the interest. Rather, controversy is on the ruling of interest given to depositors, disregarding its amount and the way of fixing.
Bank deposits are considered loans by law and by the consensus of jurists, and "any increment in a loan is riba," as the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) states in his hadith. In reality, banks deal freely in people's deposits; they unilaterally dispose of them by using them in lending to other people for interest. At the same time, banks are committed to pay that money back with interest. These are the characteristics of loans as stated in law, with no regard to how such interest is estimated, what its percentage is, or what the name given to it is. It is no matter whether such extra money given on the capital is called benefit, gain, earning, interest, reward, gift or whatsoever. What matters is the actual results effected by the contract between the bank and the dealers, because contacts are governed by the results they entail. Rulings are generally given to real matters not to hypotheses. Moreover, the claim that banks are just investors by proxy that invest money deposited therein in legal projects has already been refuted by law, Shari`ah, and by experience.
The second argument: The percentage of interest fluctuates.
The fatwa of the Islamic Research Academy states: "It is well known that the percentage of interest
If Linux folks spared half of their time purchasing native Linux games from Loki soft and supporting SDL that way instead of bitching about directx eula...
http://www.islamfortoday.com/attack.htm
On the Hijacking of Islam
If the terrorists that struck the USA last week were indeed Muslims, they have not only committed murder, which carries the death penalty, but have also committed a physical attack upon Islam by the damage they have done to its image.
By English convert to Islam, Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood.
The Islamic Rules of Warfare
Michael Young details how the attackers of the World Trade Center, if indeed they were Muslim, flagrantly violated the most basic Muslim conventions of war.
Recapturing Islam from the Terrorists
"Muslims cannot deny forever that doctrinal extremism can lead to political extremism. They must realise that it is traditional Islam, the only possible alternative to their position, which owns rich resources for the respectful acknowledgement of difference within itself, and with unbelievers."
by English convert to Islam, Abdal-Hakim Murad.
It's Time to Look in the Mirror
"The anger being vented at Muslims in the west is the anger that Muslims should have toward the murderers that crashed into those buildings. We should be the ones so incensed and sad. We should be the ones putting together military forces to hunt them down and find them, then dispense justice - Islamic justice - toward them. They attacked our religion - Allah's religion!"
by American Convert to Islam, Abdul-Lateef Abdullah.
Yusuf Islam on September 11
Britain's first government-funded Islamic school closed temporarily last week amid a wave of anti-Muslim feeling. Its chairman of governors, Yusuf Islam - formerly the pop star Cat Stevens - explains why his adopted religion is the home of tolerance and not of fanaticism.
September 18, 2001
American Muslim Leaders Condemn Terrorism, Defend Muslims' Civil Rights
By Susan Domowitz, Washington File Staff Writer 19 September 2001
Taliban have "hurt Islam and distorted the reputation of Muslims throughout the world".
Full text of the Saudi Arabian Government's statement on the breaking off of diplomatic relations with the Taleban
IslamForToday.com Tuesday, 25 September, 2001
External Links
Islam Hijacked
Rabbi Reuven Firestone, author of "Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam" and Professor of Medieval Judaism and Islam at Hebrew Union College in Los Angeles, offers his insights into the events of September 11.
Mainstream Muslims Condemn the Attacks
Islamic Scholars Call September 11 Attacks a Distortion of Islam
By Laurie Goodstein, The News York Times, 30 September 2001
Muslim clerics say attacks in US are un-Islamic
Sheikh Mohammed Sayyed al-Tantawi of Al-Azhar, the highest institution in Sunni Islam, warned that those who attack innocent people will be punished by Allah.
Irish Times, September 14, 2001
We Need Spiritual Doctoring
Muslim American ER doctor Faiz Khan, M.D., on duty in New York on September 11, reflects on the incomprehensible suffering of that terrible day.
Islamic world deplores US losses
BBC News, 14 September, 2001
Mohammed Ali defends Islam on tour of New York devastation
Ananova, September 21, 2001
American Islamic scholar, Hamza Yusuf: Terrorists are mass murderers, not martyrs "It's politics, tragic politics. There's no Islamic justification for any of it."
The Mercury News (San Jose), September 15, 2001
Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi Condemns Attacks Against Civilians: Forbidden in Islam
Islam Online, September 13, 2001
UK Muslims disown 'lunatic fringe'
Members of Britain's Muslim mainstream majority yesterday rounded on the "tiny lunatic fringe" supporting the terrorist attacks on America.
By Richard Alleyne, Daily Telegraph (London) September 20, 2001
Ali's sorrow at terror attacks
Boxing legend Muhammad Ali has made a morale-boosting visit to rescue workers in the rubble of the World Trade Center.
BBC News, 21 September, 2001
Australian Islamic Council Condemns Attacks in US