Stephen Satchell's theory behind the DC letters. Basically, DC is only going after barcode to web translations, not simply cuecat decoders.
Even though DC has refused to answer what their "intellectual property" is, their letters have gone exclusively to sites that have software that can let you use your cat with the web.
Satchell further points out that NeoMedia Technologies, not DC, actually have a patent on barcode to web lookups. NeoMedia is sitting on the patent until, I guess, there is enough money being made to jump in and begin extorting licensing fees...
I've got four. Three are actually plugged into computers (office, home, in-laws). I've got more computers at home and at the office, but I use X to connect to them so one keyboard does it all.
However, I really wish I could find something to do with them. A CD catalog isn't helpful since CDDB already did all that work for me. As far as books, I find that the majority of my books don't actually have Bar Codes. Even if I was able to create such a catalog, it wouldn't tell me anything really useful like where I *put* that book or CD.
The vast majority of my videos are things that I recorded myself. I don't have a computer in the kitchen and running upstairs before I throw out the peanut butter just doesn't seem like a good idea.
I really wish I could think of something to do with them. I keep reading these/. stories thinking someone's got an original idea, but just shopping lists and catalogs. Yawn.
I think Taco is saying that since DC changed their EULA, they must recognize that the original EULA did *not* prohibit reverse engineering and that those that got in early like flyingbuttmonkeys are free to do as they please.
With a cuecat and a simple decoding program, you can read any bar code (UPC, ISBN, etc). You don't need to use their servers at all. You can search for books on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or the Library of Congress. http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/decode.html has a decoder that can look up product info for all sorts of stuff.
You can scan the books you own and automagically build a card catalog. If you lend a book to a friend, you can swipe the code and keep track of who's got it.
You can also print your own barcodes and make up your own inventory system.
The scanner itself simply converts the barcode into a a keyboard sequence including the serial #, bar code type & bar code # (all wrapped up in pseudo-encrypted base64).
> groups which are dedicated to freedom at the cost of security
Just how much freedom are you willing to give up? And just how much security are we buying with it? Was the country really more secure when Hoover was trying to stop the Civil Rights movement?
> After all if a law was passed requiring people with red hair to register on a national database, of course it would be people with red hair who would complain.
Are you saying that you wouldn't protest if they rounded up the red heads?
First they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the communists
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me -
And there was no-one left
To speak out for me.
Anyways, the first store didn't even ask my name. He still had to ring it up ($0.00), but didn't bother with the name. I guess he didn't wanna type it in. Others asked, but generally conceded when I refused. One guy was a bit insistent, but said that I could give a business address or anything, but that they just needed *something*. I said Bill Clinton, 1600 Pennslyvania Ave. He sighed, but acquiesced.
Yeah, I thought that was the single most useful application of the cuecat: to be able to get information about a book in a consistent format. I wanna be able to write a script that goes to a single source and gives me info for a card catalog.
I'd certainly rather go to Amazon where I can read reviews that are NOT controlled by the publisher than to a fluff site about the book.
When I want to know about a movie, I go to the IMDB. If I want hype, I guess I'd go to the studios site. Same difference.
> I'm wondering why people have stopped hacking the::CueCat::
You believe what DC said? Go to freshmeat and search for cuecat. As far as I can see, the *only* one who doesn't still have their code up is flyingbuttmonkeys. Online decoders like http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/decode.html are still up (never went down, as far as I know).
I wonder if DC really believes the hacking has stopped or if they see this as the only face-saving stance that they could take.
The only other reason I can think that there is any "less" hacking is that the decoding is 100% solved in 7 lines of perl:
There was a story last year about hundreds of convinctions in LA that
need to be reviewed because defendants were never told that evidence
came from illegal wiretaps. The latimes.com article has expired, but
here's an
archive from the IP list.
Not to mention the historic abuses of the FBI against people like Martin
Luther King, Jr. King didn't do anything illegal, but the wiretaps did
catch him having an affair. An anonymous FBI agent
urged King to
commit suicide to avoid exposure.
You can't say "it can't happen here". It *did* happen here. Just don't let it happen again.
And just how, exactly, are you any different? I just went and read your last 5 comments. Every one of them is an attack. I don't ever recall reading a supportive word from you. And *you* acuse/. of "feeling superior"?
I've been without any telephone at home since August 28 because Verizon is still playing catch up after the strike.
If they treat their employees like they treat their customers, I'm not surprised they went on strike. According to ads run during the strike, managers used to follow employees to the bathroom. Still, I'd let them watch me piss if I could get a phone in less than 3 weeks.
According to the IMDB, it was not really a last minute decision to change the name:
The title "Revenge of the Jedi" was leaked early in production, so that pirated merchandise could be easily spotted when the film was released. The official reason for the change was that "...a Jedi would not take revenge". Some authentic pre-release movie posters actually had "Revenge", and are worth a lot of money today.
Sell Absentee / Vote in Person
on
Voteauction.com
·
· Score: 2
Voting in person overrides your absentee ballot, so you can sell your "absentee" vote and still vote at the polls for the candidate you hate least.
All charges were dropped. As an AC points out, the "abuse" was in the form of making his adopted son go on a run, although I thought it was to make the kid lose weight and don't know if was any sort of "punishment".
I've just recently discovered Stella (an Atari 2600 emulator) and have been busy rediscovering the games of my youth.
I never remembered just how low-tech these games looked and sounded. I remember that Asteroids for the 2600 was a disappointment at the time, and I still feel that way compared to MAME's Asteroids (and Asteroids Delux).
Still, to finally play Adventure again is a great joy. If I could only remember how to find the secret key...
> And Rosa Parks was arrested fo breaking the law.
Which is still remembered today and is used as the canonical example of an American fighting for her rights.
> The only actions which worked... were the legal ones (bus boycotts, sit-ins, etc).
The bus boycott would not have happened if Rosa had not been arrested. She brought attention and focus to the struggle.
Incidentally, sit-ins are illegal. Something about trespassing.
Also remember that there are two ways to change a law: get the legislature to change it or have a judge overturn it. In the case of DeCSS, the legislature was already bought and paid for and isn't about to change its mind.
The only alternative is for judicial review, but courts don't hear theoritical cases. The only way to get a law like the DMCA heard by a court is to break it.
Back when I was in high school, they had "Olympics of the Mind". The IOC sent a cease&desist and they became "OM" and, eventually, "Odyssey of the Mind".
Slashdot Mirror
Stephen Satchell's theory behind the DC letters. Basically, DC is only going after barcode to web translations, not simply cuecat decoders. Even though DC has refused to answer what their "intellectual property" is, their letters have gone exclusively to sites that have software that can let you use your cat with the web. Satchell further points out that NeoMedia Technologies, not DC, actually have a patent on barcode to web lookups. NeoMedia is sitting on the patent until, I guess, there is enough money being made to jump in and begin extorting licensing fees...
This has been there since the first /. article:
http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/decode.html
I've got four. Three are actually plugged into computers (office, home, in-laws). I've got more computers at home and at the office, but I use X to connect to them so one keyboard does it all.
/. stories thinking someone's got an original idea, but just shopping lists and catalogs. Yawn.
However, I really wish I could find something to do with them. A CD catalog isn't helpful since CDDB already did all that work for me. As far as books, I find that the majority of my books don't actually have Bar Codes. Even if I was able to create such a catalog, it wouldn't tell me anything really useful like where I *put* that book or CD.
The vast majority of my videos are things that I recorded myself. I don't have a computer in the kitchen and running upstairs before I throw out the peanut butter just doesn't seem like a good idea.
I really wish I could think of something to do with them. I keep reading these
They can be used as small red flashlights.
I think Taco is saying that since DC changed their EULA, they must recognize that the original EULA did *not* prohibit reverse engineering and that those that got in early like flyingbuttmonkeys are free to do as they please.
With a cuecat and a simple decoding program, you can read any bar code (UPC, ISBN, etc). You don't need to use their servers at all. You can search for books on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or the Library of Congress. http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/decode.html has a decoder that can look up product info for all sorts of stuff.
You can scan the books you own and automagically build a card catalog. If you lend a book to a friend, you can swipe the code and keep track of who's got it.
You can also print your own barcodes and make up your own inventory system.
The scanner itself simply converts the barcode into a a keyboard sequence including the serial #, bar code type & bar code # (all wrapped up in pseudo-encrypted base64).
> Sorry for posting what is obviously old news
/. has editors.
/.ers) a weekday reader
Not your fault. That's why
> I am (like many
So are the editors, it seems...
IOC To Olympic Athletes: Online Diaries Verboten
MS did in fact attempt to convert hotmail to NT:
http://www.unix-vs-nt.org/kirch/hotmail.html
> groups which are dedicated to freedom at the cost of security
Just how much freedom are you willing to give up? And just how much security are we buying with it? Was the country really more secure when Hoover was trying to stop the Civil Rights movement?
> After all if a law was passed requiring people with red hair to register on a national database, of course it would be people with red hair who would complain.
Are you saying that you wouldn't protest if they rounded up the red heads?
First they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the communists
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out -
Because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me -
And there was no-one left
To speak out for me.
Pastor Niemöller, 1938
> Gave 4 aliases and paid cash.
Paid cash for what?
Anyways, the first store didn't even ask my name. He still had to ring it up ($0.00), but didn't bother with the name. I guess he didn't wanna type it in. Others asked, but generally conceded when I refused. One guy was a bit insistent, but said that I could give a business address or anything, but that they just needed *something*. I said Bill Clinton, 1600 Pennslyvania Ave. He sighed, but acquiesced.
I wonder how many catalogs Bill gets...
Yeah, I thought that was the single most useful application of the cuecat: to be able to get information about a book in a consistent format. I wanna be able to write a script that goes to a single source and gives me info for a card catalog.
I'd certainly rather go to Amazon where I can read reviews that are NOT controlled by the publisher than to a fluff site about the book.
When I want to know about a movie, I go to the IMDB. If I want hype, I guess I'd go to the studios site. Same difference.
> I'm wondering why people have stopped hacking the ::CueCat::
/usr/bin/perl -n
/\.([^.]+)/g;
You believe what DC said? Go to freshmeat and search for cuecat. As far as I can see, the *only* one who doesn't still have their code up is flyingbuttmonkeys. Online decoders like http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/decode.html are still up (never went down, as far as I know).
I wonder if DC really believes the hacking has stopped or if they see this as the only face-saving stance that they could take.
The only other reason I can think that there is any "less" hacking is that the decoding is 100% solved in 7 lines of perl:
#!
printf "%s %s %s\n",
map {
tr/a-zA-Z0-9+-/ -_/;
$_ = unpack 'u', chr(32 + length()*3/4) . $_;
s/\0+$//;
$_ ^= "C" x length;
}
FCC Makes Wiretapping Easier for Cops
FBI wants to wiretap phones without court order
ACLU & EPIC Challenge Wiretapping
There was a story last year about hundreds of convinctions in LA that need to be reviewed because defendants were never told that evidence came from illegal wiretaps. The latimes.com article has expired, but here's an archive from the IP list.
Not to mention the historic abuses of the FBI against people like Martin Luther King, Jr. King didn't do anything illegal, but the wiretaps did catch him having an affair. An anonymous FBI agent urged King to commit suicide to avoid exposure.
You can't say "it can't happen here". It *did* happen here. Just don't let it happen again.
> geeks are too busy backstabbing each other
/. of "feeling superior"?
And just how, exactly, are you any different? I just went and read your last 5 comments. Every one of them is an attack. I don't ever recall reading a supportive word from you. And *you* acuse
Don't know why this was marked as a troll, but anyways... For confirmation:
N =669719818&CONTEXT=969293000.49807373&hitn um=59
.txt file globally readable via http:.
http://x64.deja.com/=dnc/[ST_rn=ps]/getdoc.xp?A
The site was not "cracked". They simply left the registration file as a plain
I've been without any telephone at home since August 28 because Verizon is still playing catch up after the strike.
If they treat their employees like they treat their customers, I'm not surprised they went on strike. According to ads run during the strike, managers used to follow employees to the bathroom. Still, I'd let them watch me piss if I could get a phone in less than 3 weeks.
The title "Revenge of the Jedi" was leaked early in production, so that pirated merchandise could be easily spotted when the film was released. The official reason for the change was that "...a Jedi would not take revenge". Some authentic pre-release movie posters actually had "Revenge", and are worth a lot of money today.
Voting in person overrides your absentee ballot, so you can sell your "absentee" vote and still vote at the polls for the candidate you hate least.
All charges were dropped. As an AC points out, the "abuse" was in the form of making his adopted son go on a run, although I thought it was to make the kid lose weight and don't know if was any sort of "punishment".
http://www.unix-vs-nt.org/kirch/hotmail.html
I've just recently discovered Stella (an Atari 2600 emulator) and have been busy rediscovering the games of my youth.
I never remembered just how low-tech these games looked and sounded. I remember that Asteroids for the 2600 was a disappointment at the time, and I still feel that way compared to MAME's Asteroids (and Asteroids Delux).
Still, to finally play Adventure again is a great joy. If I could only remember how to find the secret key...
> their most successful net service has been running on Unix since day one.
That's not quite true. They did attempt to convert to NT once before, but it failed under the load.
That's the justification for the headline.
> And Rosa Parks was arrested fo breaking the law.
... were the legal ones (bus boycotts, sit-ins, etc).
Which is still remembered today and is used as the canonical example of an American fighting for her rights.
> The only actions which worked
The bus boycott would not have happened if Rosa had not been arrested. She brought attention and focus to the struggle.
Incidentally, sit-ins are illegal. Something about trespassing.
Also remember that there are two ways to change a law: get the legislature to change it or have a judge overturn it. In the case of DeCSS, the legislature was already bought and paid for and isn't about to change its mind.
The only alternative is for judicial review, but courts don't hear theoritical cases. The only way to get a law like the DMCA heard by a court is to break it.
> refusing to comply with the law is still a crime whether it is keeping DeCSS on your website or murdering small children...
..or sitting at the front of the bus.
Back when I was in high school, they had "Olympics of the Mind". The IOC sent a cease&desist and they became "OM" and, eventually, "Odyssey of the Mind".