I agree, for the most part, and this is what happens in today's closed source world. Vendors want bugs regarding their software to be silent until they patch it. Even after it's patched, their security advisories, changelog, and patch notes don't go in to great detail regarding the issue. In today's open source world, bugs are mentioned and fixed in a timely fashion.
How do you figure this is the result of the "debian way"? This is the result of a user error, and it just so happens that he's making this mistake on a package that will be redistributed to thousands of users amongst various redistributions of Debian, and Debian itself. The "Debian way" you're referring to is a set of guidelines on how they operate, which by no means does it force him to make modifications to source code -- the option is simply there for him to do so, and that's based on FOSS and the GPL.
Have you ever heard of anyone getting "support" from Debian? Yes. When you submit a bug report, the package maintainer is supporting you, whether it's a bug or a user error. It's not the same type of "hand-holding" support that most people think of, but it's a form of support. When you have a problem with a Debian binary package, the first place you hit up is bugs.debian.org, since the source could be modified and the bug in question may be related to that modified code.
I'm not sure of the credibility of this site but the picture there sure looks like him at a younger age, and the bio information says he lives in San Diego and is a member of the republican party. Additionally, if you use the Google cache page, it says that his real name is "Tony".
Regardless of whether it's him or not, people change. We've all done stupid things when we were young. I just hope that, if he's confronted about it, he doesn't try to lie. Hell, he can put it the same way Clinton did when people asked if he smoked marijuana. "I cracked software but didn't distribute it". That last part is a joke.:-)
Great find. To expand on this, it's important to note that the lawyer is trying to defend its company by saying ARIN has no authority over IPs that were allocated before its inception (ARIN was formed in December of 1997). Rather than writing a whole novel, here, I'll simply provide links and quotes from the link.
IANA is responsible for global coordination the Internet Protocol addressing systems, as well as the Autonomous System Numbers used for routing Internet traffic.
RFC1466, section 4.2.1, states: Organizations applying for a Class B network number must submit an engineering plan that documents its need for a Class B network number. This document must demonstrate that it is unreasonable to engineer its network with a block of class C network numbers. The engineering plan must include how many hosts the network will have within the next 24 months and how many hosts per subnet within the next 24 months. I really doubt a marketing company could honestly come up with such a plan. In addition to this, RFC1466 has many other guidelines regarding allocation of IP addresses -- too many to mention here.
This Wired article says that Mr. Medin served at NASA until 1995. As such, policies enforced by the above mentioned RFCs were already in place, regardless of whether ARIN was conceived in 1993 or 1997. There's a good chance that the 134.17/16 network block was most likely still allocated to his research team up until 1995.
RFC1166, in its Introduction section, states: This Network Working Group Request for Comments documents the currently assigned network numbers and gateway autonomous systems. This RFC will be updated periodically, and in any case current information can be obtained from Hostmaster at the DDN Network Information Center (NIC). It looks like someone has forgotten about this RFC or it's been superseded by another RFC that I'm not aware of, as it has not been updated, as they still think that the IP block is still allocated to BAY-PR-NET. While it may still be allocated to "BAY-PR-NET", it's not the same BAY-PR-NET. There may also be a communication gap between IANA and ARIN, as ARIN is responsible for tracking network block transfers.
Respect your deceased friends' privacy?... or help his living family members have peace of mind in terms of how he died? Tough questions, indeed. Being that he didn't leave a reason, it either was an accident (or a murder) or he doesn't want people to know -- not even his family. Also, since he's computer savvy, if it was suicide and he didn't want people to know, he would have covered those tracks. On the flip side, maybe he did leave a reason for someone to find, and that reason is buried deep in one of his various accounts, but he didn't want to make it easy for someone to find. So, since he's smart enough to cover his tracks (if he chose to do so), I don't think it would be much of an issue to gain access to those accounts.
Gaining access to the laptop account should be fairly easy and straight forward. While most of us do have e-mail accounts from major public providers (Gmail, MSN, Yahoo!, Hotmail, etc.), they're all normally registered using an e-mail account from our ISP. With the permission and aid from his parents, you could contact said ISP and have his password changed. This can be done with you portraying to be him (The Wrong Way), or being honest with the ISP and informing them of the situation (The Right Way). The Wrong Way would probably yield better results with less hassle. Once you have access to his personal e-mail account supplied by his ISP, you can most likely gain access to the public accounts by going through the automated password reset feature (The Wrong Way), or you could contact the respective providers, inform them of the situation, and hope for the best (The Right Way). In this case, again, The Wrong Way will most likely yield better results. Gaining access to his university account will probably have to be done The Right Way only.
I don't recommend trying to crack your way in to any of the public accounts. If you're caught, you'd have a hard time explaining it all to the authorities and his family will not be able to help much once the law is involved.
The viewpoint from TFA on this is rather one-sided and doesn't cover other aspects. He mentions that if I were to go to said web site and blocking their ads, I'm far closer to theft of bandwidth, the same bandwidth the web site operator has to pay for. What about those who have to pay for their own bandwidth and/or time that they're online? Is shoving ads down their pipe a kind thing to do? Being that the web site operator is causing them to be online longer and use more bandwidth, thus incurring additional cost to the visitor.
Lets look at another aspect. By blocking their ads, the visitor isn't using more of the web site operators bandwidth. He's actually saving him some bandwidth. If we look at most ads on the Internet, they contain graphics, and those graphical images consume more bandwidth than text.
Now, lets take a look at yet another aspect. Why do people block ads? They block them because they're intrusive and annoying. Not all of them are. Some are static images or text ads, and there are quite a few people who are fine with that. However, some marketers decided to not play nice and screwed it up for those who do wish to play nice.
It's fairly obvious that the business model is flawed. Web site operators who depend on this type of business model is destined to fail and they should seek other ways to gain revenue. If they don't want people blocking ads to visit their web site, that's their choice. At the same time, it's the visitors choice to block the ads. The approach Danny Carlton took not only limits the visitors he'll get, but it can potentially bring him even less revenue. If he doesn't want that precious bandwidth he pays for to be used freely, as it should be, he should change his site to be subscription-based, thus requiring registration and an agreement that registered visitors are to disable ad blocking software.
He's targeting Firefox because he feels they're endorsing ad blocking because AdBlock Plus is a featured add-on to the browser. He wants a method to disable the add-on when people visit his site. The people that make AdBlock Plus didn't comply, so he took it a step further by blocking all Firefox users. What he fails to realize is almost all browsers today offer this type of functionality, including IE7 with IEPro, another featured add-on to the Microsoft web browser.
Yes, bandwidth does cost money. The server costs money. The electricity to run the server costs money. The air conditioning unit to keep the server cool costs money. However, all of this was his choice when he started the web site, and he also chose the flawed business model to support it.
... for this stupidity. He's the man behind this fruitless front. He did a good job at not identifying himself on the page slamming Firefox & AdBlock, but he can't hide.
Here's a quote from his "About Jack Lewis" page (which I viewed in FIREFOX through Google's cache):
"Jack Lewis" is a pseudonym. When I first began using the internet I found out that there were a lot of crazy people out there and wanted some anonymity. The name served it's purpose, but eventually people began to know me by that name alone. When I started setting up my own sites, I got JackLewis.net.
...
While I abandoned any real effort at anonymity several years ago, I kept the pseudonym, because so many people knew me by that name.
So, if he's abandoned his effort at anonymity, why didn't he leave any contact info on whyfirefoxisblocked.com? Is it, by chance, because he doesn't want to get slammed back by Firefox users? Thanks, Danny. You're living proof that idiots *can* use the Internet.
Do the laptops ever make it back to the home office and connect to the network? If so, how often?
Do the laptop users have the option of creating a VPN tunnel back to the home network?
If they're coming in via VPN, how fast is the uplink speed of that connection? Does it vary?
How much data are we talking about?
Is there an in-house server available at the home office to replicate this data to?
Are you working within a specific budget?
One thing he OP did point out is that they're backing up data to an MSDE database and that there are also files that should be backed up. That said, it would be safe to assume that a database is live and running and, as such, would require backup software that can handle open files and/or SQL databases. SQL servers, themselves, have the ability to replicate data from one server to another. This should probably be the first thing you check and try.
Assuming that the laptop users know how to stop the database services so that the database files are not locked, you can use just about any backup software you want. iFolder works really well. It makes copies like rsync so only the deltas are uploaded, not the whole file that has changed. It can also encrypt the data once it's on the server, but I don't think it encrypts the data before it's sent over the wire.
The amount of data can be an issue as well. Making a copy of a customers' database while on their network can be quite fast. However, taking that copied data and replicating it over a WAN link, depending on how much data there is, can take a long time. Perhaps having them keep an external hard disk and making another backup to it would be beneficial until the data can be backed up at the HQ.
An external drive isn't always a viable solution, either. The road warrior will, most likely, keep the external drive in the same bag as his laptop. If one is lost/stolen, chances are the other will be lost/stolen at the same time, thus making that type of data protection useless. It will only be useful for the road warrior in the event that his laptop hard disk crashes or the OS will not boot.
I would highly suggest staying away from the built-in Windows "Make available offline" feature. I had a handful of users using this feature at a past company I worked for. The original file server crashed. We were in the process of bringing up a new file server. Rather than reviving the old server, we restored data from tape to the new server. The new server had a new hostname and the built-in Windows "Make available offline" didn't know how to handle it. Data that users modified offline could not sync up. Another thing to note is Microsoft doesn't support making network data (data on a file server) available offline, especially if more than one person makes the same folder available offline. It also flat-files all data making it next to impossible to know where the original file resided. This was back in Windows 2000. I'm not sure if Windows XP is any different.
There are plenty of options out there. You just need to consider what is best given what you have to work with. Lay out what you have, what you can get, and what your limitations are... then build upon that.
There's no way in hell they will be successful. They're terribly under geared in greens and blues, no epics... hell, they don't even have an epic mount. They paid for power leveling services for all of their toons, and now they're trying to train, so they really don't know how to do a damn thing. The last time they tried to take down Undercity, they wiped on the fatty guards at the bottom of the lift. And why the HELL are they playing as Alliance when they hate us? If they would have went Horde and leveled their own toons, they might stand a chance. Besides, where is the Terrorist Trainer in the game? I've yet to find one.
I use IE from time to time when some stupid web page isn't compatible with Firefox or when some stupid web page fails to render or process forms correctly even after disabling NoScript.
Eh... slightly misleading, but TFA states that this only affects Firefox for Windows based on the installation registering the firefoxurl:// handler.
Meanwhile, Kristensen of Secunia said: "A new URI handler was registered on Windows systems to allow Web sites to force launching Firefox if the 'firefoxurl://' URI was called, like ftp://http:/// or similar would call other applications."
... is us humans. As others have already stated, any type of anti-cheat system implemented via software and/or hardware can be circumvented. While Intel's attempt may make it harder to cheat, it will not be impossible to bypass. It's up to the server admins or the game players to 1) know the game they're playing really well and 2) be able to identify someone, without a doubt, who is cheating. I used to run a Soldier of Fortune 2 server. As the server admin, I felt it was necessary to know the enemy. I watched videos of people who used hacks such as aimbots, wallhacks, shader texture replacements, etc.. After a while, I was able to identify a cheater from, say, a really good player. I did this on my server as well as other clan/public servers.
On a server running PunkBuster, you're able to get a screenshot from an in-game client to see if they're running any wallhacks or replacing shader textures. This works very well but isn't 100%. If a hack program is designed well, it could temporarily disable the hacks so that the screenshot shows the person behind the client is *not* cheating.
PunkBuster also has unique client IDs assigned to each client. If someone is caught cheating, the person is banned from the server using this unique ID. I knew someone who had a multi-hack (aimbot, wallhack, etc.) that could not be detected by PunkBuster. In addition to that, his hack was able to generate new IDs. If he was banned, he could come right back with a new ID.
PunkBuster is only able to detect what they know about. Until a hack is submitted to them, they know nothing about it and are unable to detect it. Nothing can stop cheaters but us humans.
she's been taking the money and gave it to her boy friend who loanded it back to hans. the interview never says how the friend came into that much money. did no one else notice this?
FTFA:
Sturgeon drove a recycling truck for years and owns a condo in Oakland's Lake Merritt district. He isn't rich, but the condo has appreciated. After surgery in 2002 for a torn rotator cuff, he was forced into early retirement. He gets by on disability payments, Social Security, some retirement benefits, and the proceeds from a lawsuit he filed after being in a car accident. His friendship with Reiser is a bright spot. They grew up together in Oakland, and Sturgeon wants to help his friend. He's happy to lend the money, which he obtains by taking a loan on the equity in his condo. He writes Reiser a check for $84,000 at the beginning of 2004.
Most people who play a lot of games are not really addicted to the game. It's an alternate way to escape reality because, in real life, life isn't good. Some examples would be depression, bad relationship, death in the family, unpleasant job, etc.. I'm all of the above. I get home from work and the first thing I do is play a game. I play games until I'm nodding off at the keyboard and ready to fall asleep. However, when I try to sleep (tired or not), the hamster wheel is still spinning and I just can't fall asleep easily. It's sad but true.
Make them believe you have Tourette syndrome. Talk to them as if you're interested and, as the conversation carries on, randomly blurt out bad words. If they ask to talk to someone else, transfer them to your buddy who has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and speaks very fast, commonly interrupting the caller before he/she finishes a sentence. If the caller asks to speak to someone else, transfer him/her to the next buddy who is a manic depressive, speaking in a low tone, sounding very sad. The list goes on... the next person the caller is transferred to can be bipolar, the next can have whatever, but in the end, you all will have fun.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
It would probably be easier to list the applications that do work, fully, without administrative rights... or power user rights.
I wish I had mod points because you've hit the nail on the head with this one.
I agree, for the most part, and this is what happens in today's closed source world. Vendors want bugs regarding their software to be silent until they patch it. Even after it's patched, their security advisories, changelog, and patch notes don't go in to great detail regarding the issue. In today's open source world, bugs are mentioned and fixed in a timely fashion.
I don't know why people are tagging this "Informative" when it's obviously a joke. Stupid /.'ers
How do you figure this is the result of the "debian way"? This is the result of a user error, and it just so happens that he's making this mistake on a package that will be redistributed to thousands of users amongst various redistributions of Debian, and Debian itself. The "Debian way" you're referring to is a set of guidelines on how they operate, which by no means does it force him to make modifications to source code -- the option is simply there for him to do so, and that's based on FOSS and the GPL.
Regardless of whether it's him or not, people change. We've all done stupid things when we were young. I just hope that, if he's confronted about it, he doesn't try to lie. Hell, he can put it the same way Clinton did when people asked if he smoked marijuana. "I cracked software but didn't distribute it". That last part is a joke. :-)
While ARINs web site indicates they were formed in December of 1997, IANA indicates that ARIN was delegated the 134/8 subnet in May of 1993.
IANA is responsible for global coordination the Internet Protocol addressing systems, as well as the Autonomous System Numbers used for routing Internet traffic.
RFC1466, section 4.2.1, states: Organizations applying for a Class B network number must submit an engineering plan that documents its need for a Class B network number. This document must demonstrate that it is unreasonable to engineer its network with a block of class C network numbers. The engineering plan must include how many hosts the network will have within the next 24 months and how many hosts per subnet within the next 24 months. I really doubt a marketing company could honestly come up with such a plan. In addition to this, RFC1466 has many other guidelines regarding allocation of IP addresses -- too many to mention here.
This Wired article says that Mr. Medin served at NASA until 1995. As such, policies enforced by the above mentioned RFCs were already in place, regardless of whether ARIN was conceived in 1993 or 1997. There's a good chance that the 134.17/16 network block was most likely still allocated to his research team up until 1995.
RFC1166, in its Introduction section, states: This Network Working Group Request for Comments documents the currently assigned network numbers and gateway autonomous systems. This RFC will be updated periodically, and in any case current information can be obtained from Hostmaster at the DDN Network Information Center (NIC). It looks like someone has forgotten about this RFC or it's been superseded by another RFC that I'm not aware of, as it has not been updated, as they still think that the IP block is still allocated to BAY-PR-NET. While it may still be allocated to "BAY-PR-NET", it's not the same BAY-PR-NET. There may also be a communication gap between IANA and ARIN, as ARIN is responsible for tracking network block transfers.
In summary, Trudy's shit is looking pretty weak.
The infidels are weakened!... and thank you for the new shoes.
Gaining access to the laptop account should be fairly easy and straight forward. While most of us do have e-mail accounts from major public providers (Gmail, MSN, Yahoo!, Hotmail, etc.), they're all normally registered using an e-mail account from our ISP. With the permission and aid from his parents, you could contact said ISP and have his password changed. This can be done with you portraying to be him (The Wrong Way), or being honest with the ISP and informing them of the situation (The Right Way). The Wrong Way would probably yield better results with less hassle. Once you have access to his personal e-mail account supplied by his ISP, you can most likely gain access to the public accounts by going through the automated password reset feature (The Wrong Way), or you could contact the respective providers, inform them of the situation, and hope for the best (The Right Way). In this case, again, The Wrong Way will most likely yield better results. Gaining access to his university account will probably have to be done The Right Way only.
I don't recommend trying to crack your way in to any of the public accounts. If you're caught, you'd have a hard time explaining it all to the authorities and his family will not be able to help much once the law is involved.
Lets look at another aspect. By blocking their ads, the visitor isn't using more of the web site operators bandwidth. He's actually saving him some bandwidth. If we look at most ads on the Internet, they contain graphics, and those graphical images consume more bandwidth than text.
Now, lets take a look at yet another aspect. Why do people block ads? They block them because they're intrusive and annoying. Not all of them are. Some are static images or text ads, and there are quite a few people who are fine with that. However, some marketers decided to not play nice and screwed it up for those who do wish to play nice.
It's fairly obvious that the business model is flawed. Web site operators who depend on this type of business model is destined to fail and they should seek other ways to gain revenue. If they don't want people blocking ads to visit their web site, that's their choice. At the same time, it's the visitors choice to block the ads. The approach Danny Carlton took not only limits the visitors he'll get, but it can potentially bring him even less revenue. If he doesn't want that precious bandwidth he pays for to be used freely, as it should be, he should change his site to be subscription-based, thus requiring registration and an agreement that registered visitors are to disable ad blocking software.
He's targeting Firefox because he feels they're endorsing ad blocking because AdBlock Plus is a featured add-on to the browser. He wants a method to disable the add-on when people visit his site. The people that make AdBlock Plus didn't comply, so he took it a step further by blocking all Firefox users. What he fails to realize is almost all browsers today offer this type of functionality, including IE7 with IEPro, another featured add-on to the Microsoft web browser.
Yes, bandwidth does cost money. The server costs money. The electricity to run the server costs money. The air conditioning unit to keep the server cool costs money. However, all of this was his choice when he started the web site, and he also chose the flawed business model to support it.
http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/results.jsp? domain=whyfirefoxisblocked.com
http://www.google.com/search?q=Danny+Carlton&ie=ut f-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&c lient=firefox-a
http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/results.jsp? domain=jacklewis.net
http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/results.jsp? domain=dannycarlton.com
Here's a quote from his "About Jack Lewis" page (which I viewed in FIREFOX through Google's cache):
"Jack Lewis" is a pseudonym. When I first began using the internet I found out that there were a lot of crazy people out there and wanted some anonymity. The name served it's purpose, but eventually people began to know me by that name alone. When I started setting up my own sites, I got JackLewis.net.While I abandoned any real effort at anonymity several years ago, I kept the pseudonym, because so many people knew me by that name.
So, if he's abandoned his effort at anonymity, why didn't he leave any contact info on whyfirefoxisblocked.com? Is it, by chance, because he doesn't want to get slammed back by Firefox users? Thanks, Danny. You're living proof that idiots *can* use the Internet.
Do the laptops ever make it back to the home office and connect to the network? If so, how often?
Do the laptop users have the option of creating a VPN tunnel back to the home network?
If they're coming in via VPN, how fast is the uplink speed of that connection? Does it vary?
How much data are we talking about?
Is there an in-house server available at the home office to replicate this data to?
Are you working within a specific budget?
One thing he OP did point out is that they're backing up data to an MSDE database and that there are also files that should be backed up. That said, it would be safe to assume that a database is live and running and, as such, would require backup software that can handle open files and/or SQL databases. SQL servers, themselves, have the ability to replicate data from one server to another. This should probably be the first thing you check and try.
Assuming that the laptop users know how to stop the database services so that the database files are not locked, you can use just about any backup software you want. iFolder works really well. It makes copies like rsync so only the deltas are uploaded, not the whole file that has changed. It can also encrypt the data once it's on the server, but I don't think it encrypts the data before it's sent over the wire.
The amount of data can be an issue as well. Making a copy of a customers' database while on their network can be quite fast. However, taking that copied data and replicating it over a WAN link, depending on how much data there is, can take a long time. Perhaps having them keep an external hard disk and making another backup to it would be beneficial until the data can be backed up at the HQ.
An external drive isn't always a viable solution, either. The road warrior will, most likely, keep the external drive in the same bag as his laptop. If one is lost/stolen, chances are the other will be lost/stolen at the same time, thus making that type of data protection useless. It will only be useful for the road warrior in the event that his laptop hard disk crashes or the OS will not boot. I would highly suggest staying away from the built-in Windows "Make available offline" feature. I had a handful of users using this feature at a past company I worked for. The original file server crashed. We were in the process of bringing up a new file server. Rather than reviving the old server, we restored data from tape to the new server. The new server had a new hostname and the built-in Windows "Make available offline" didn't know how to handle it. Data that users modified offline could not sync up. Another thing to note is Microsoft doesn't support making network data (data on a file server) available offline, especially if more than one person makes the same folder available offline. It also flat-files all data making it next to impossible to know where the original file resided. This was back in Windows 2000. I'm not sure if Windows XP is any different. There are plenty of options out there. You just need to consider what is best given what you have to work with. Lay out what you have, what you can get, and what your limitations are... then build upon that.
Oh my... that digg article almost made me /wrists.
SS or it didn't happen...
There's no way in hell they will be successful. They're terribly under geared in greens and blues, no epics... hell, they don't even have an epic mount. They paid for power leveling services for all of their toons, and now they're trying to train, so they really don't know how to do a damn thing. The last time they tried to take down Undercity, they wiped on the fatty guards at the bottom of the lift. And why the HELL are they playing as Alliance when they hate us? If they would have went Horde and leveled their own toons, they might stand a chance. Besides, where is the Terrorist Trainer in the game? I've yet to find one.
I use IE from time to time when some stupid web page isn't compatible with Firefox or when some stupid web page fails to render or process forms correctly even after disabling NoScript.
At this rate, it won't be long until we have self-sustaining vibrators that don't require batteries.
... forgot... never get caught cheating at LAN parties. http://www.gamespot.com/users/xd3usx/video_player? id=KiZhkTWv5bsPuDM
... is us humans. As others have already stated, any type of anti-cheat system implemented via software and/or hardware can be circumvented. While Intel's attempt may make it harder to cheat, it will not be impossible to bypass. It's up to the server admins or the game players to 1) know the game they're playing really well and 2) be able to identify someone, without a doubt, who is cheating. I used to run a Soldier of Fortune 2 server. As the server admin, I felt it was necessary to know the enemy. I watched videos of people who used hacks such as aimbots, wallhacks, shader texture replacements, etc.. After a while, I was able to identify a cheater from, say, a really good player. I did this on my server as well as other clan/public servers. On a server running PunkBuster, you're able to get a screenshot from an in-game client to see if they're running any wallhacks or replacing shader textures. This works very well but isn't 100%. If a hack program is designed well, it could temporarily disable the hacks so that the screenshot shows the person behind the client is *not* cheating. PunkBuster also has unique client IDs assigned to each client. If someone is caught cheating, the person is banned from the server using this unique ID. I knew someone who had a multi-hack (aimbot, wallhack, etc.) that could not be detected by PunkBuster. In addition to that, his hack was able to generate new IDs. If he was banned, he could come right back with a new ID. PunkBuster is only able to detect what they know about. Until a hack is submitted to them, they know nothing about it and are unable to detect it. Nothing can stop cheaters but us humans.
FTFA:
Sturgeon drove a recycling truck for years and owns a condo in Oakland's Lake Merritt district. He isn't rich, but the condo has appreciated. After surgery in 2002 for a torn rotator cuff, he was forced into early retirement. He gets by on disability payments, Social Security, some retirement benefits, and the proceeds from a lawsuit he filed after being in a car accident. His friendship with Reiser is a bright spot. They grew up together in Oakland, and Sturgeon wants to help his friend. He's happy to lend the money, which he obtains by taking a loan on the equity in his condo. He writes Reiser a check for $84,000 at the beginning of 2004.
I only had 9 fingers? Would I be able to come to the US??
Most people who play a lot of games are not really addicted to the game. It's an alternate way to escape reality because, in real life, life isn't good. Some examples would be depression, bad relationship, death in the family, unpleasant job, etc.. I'm all of the above. I get home from work and the first thing I do is play a game. I play games until I'm nodding off at the keyboard and ready to fall asleep. However, when I try to sleep (tired or not), the hamster wheel is still spinning and I just can't fall asleep easily. It's sad but true.
Make them believe you have Tourette syndrome. Talk to them as if you're interested and, as the conversation carries on, randomly blurt out bad words. If they ask to talk to someone else, transfer them to your buddy who has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and speaks very fast, commonly interrupting the caller before he/she finishes a sentence. If the caller asks to speak to someone else, transfer him/her to the next buddy who is a manic depressive, speaking in a low tone, sounding very sad. The list goes on... the next person the caller is transferred to can be bipolar, the next can have whatever, but in the end, you all will have fun. :-)