I second this, even though you appear to want an "exotic" pet. Cats are low maintenance: provide food, water, and a litter box, and there ya go. Sure, cleaning the litter box is a hassle, but there are some self-cleaning boxes out there. Surely, those would appeal to a geek (presumably cats don't mind them).
More exotic pets, partucularly rodents, can get expensive: My daughter begged and begged for a "pet of her own" and we thought it would help teach her some responsibility. We ended up getting her a guinea pig. BIG mistake: the cage requires daily cleaning; the litter and food and expensive. The damn little rodent costs WAY more in food and litter than our cat. And a guinea pig isn't exactly exotic.
I mentioned a cat earlier. Now, I grew up with a dog -- a rather likable English Setter that lived to the ripe old age of around 18. I like dogs. But dogs need to be walked (some small species can be trained to do their business on newspaper in the garage, but the smell remains long after the excrement has been removed), and I've always thought it cruel to have a dog and not live somewhere where they can run and play in big open places. Cats are quite happy to live indoors, and some species can be trained to not roam. Persians are good for this, but you will have to deal with their long hair, shedding, and trips to the groomer 2-4 times a year to have them shaved (yeah, the hair gets that long, and perioding shaving is necessary). I've had a long-haired Persian cat for almost 10 years now. No regrets. It even adapted well to three moves in that time (apartment to house, to house, to house)
I'm sure we've all "hacked" a cable together under less than ideal circumstances. Any bozo can crimp down plugs and punch down jacks (well, maybe not, but you have to be pretty clumsy or in a real hurry to botch the job).
I remember having to wire something up when the power went out (no, not network cabling, more mundane stuff). Well, when the soldering iron got too cold to work anymore (no, I didn't have a battery powered one -- they weren't decent in those days), you start stripping the cables as usual, twist them, wrap them in solder, and use a match to secure the connection. A temporary hack, to be sure, but it worked for as long as it had to.
I will say, that if you plan to do a lot of this, (and "a lot" can be "as little" as retrofitting structured wiring in a house"), get the proper tools: a Greenlee punch down tool for jacks and headend (usually comes with either a 66 or 110 blade -- you want the 110 but it's worth paying the US$15 or so for the other) at about US$45, a hand crimper for RJ45/RJ11/RJ14 (usually comes with a bunch of plugs) at about US$20, a coax wire stripper with RG6 and R59 settings at under US$10, and a decent RG6/RG59 coax crimper: around US$20. Surprisingly. Home Depot has all this stuff, including plugs, structured wallplates and jacks, Cat5e cable, etc. (Having the coax stuff is, less surprising). BTW, crimping cables, particularly RG6 coax connectors is hard on the hands -- do get a good tool.
I retrofitted structured wiring to a house I bought a year ago. (You don't want to do this: putzing around in the attic, drilling through non-load bearing top-plates is double plus not fun -- I hired a guy who had network experience and did residential "cable" and "phone" cabling, but only had him help tie-wrap and pull cable -- it was stilla lot of work and definately a two-person job.)
I pulled two Cat5e ant two RG6 cables to six drops, plus an attic "subdistribution area" (existing cable and telco drops terminated up there) from a headend which received the DSL line, POTS, dual LNBs pointed at two satellites, and a terrestrial SD/HD/analog TV antenna in the attic. There are breakout panels in the headend. So, that's 14 Cat5e jack terminations (headend side is punched down to 110 blocks), and 28 coax terminations, just for primary cabling. Then there's end-cables to crimp, terminating satellite lead-in (8 more coax connectors: one each end of four cables), satellite cross-connect cables (8 more!), and break-out panel to multiswitch cables (yet another 8). 7 cables (14 more coax connectors!) go from the multiswitch to the coax breakout panels. 7 Cat5E jumpers (14 RJ45 crimps) run from the firewall/router to the Cat5e breakout panel, and 7 punched down jacks on that panel to the 110 blocks. There are some odds and ends (line power inserters for the attic-located terrestrial antenna amp) as well. Oh, and if you do this, you will be making jack extention cables (two coax, two Cat5e, around 100 feet long), with four coax and four Cat5e crimps, for testing back to the headend when you suspect the cabling to a jack.
The bottom line is that if you wire, retrofit structured wiring in a home, you will crimp and punch down so much, by the time you're done, you will be an expert. One upside is that you will almost never buy pre-made cables again: you'll just make your own, to length, as required. Oh, and if you run two cables, do get two spools, or you will go crazy running a cable, going back, running another, and so on. Yes, this means you will have two spools of leftover. Save it to make patch cables.
In my case, I bought 2000 feet of Cat5e and 2000 feet of RG6 (the guys at Home Depot thought I was nuts, and BTW, RG6 on the spool gets heavy fast), and ended up using around 1500 feet of each in a 3200 square foot house. I got headend enclosures, patch panels, a multiswitch, diplexers, and misc. stuff from Home Tech and satellite gear from American Satellite.
Re:ntpdate [server] in crontab...
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Do You Have The Time?
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I think I just found the reason why people want bluetooth in everything!
I came to this same conclusion.
Though, appliance-rich areas, like kitchens, and laundry rooms could do with a pre-wired network: either ethernet or HomePNA. HomePNA is probably easier for low bandwidth applications, like time sync, status checks, etc., and, if I'm not mistaken, can be piggybacked on POTS. Most people have POTS lines already pulled to the kitchen, the location of most dumb clocks. Heck, use a powerline based network, just get time to where it's displayed!
I second this. I have a 24x7 DSL connection on a firewalled and NATted static IP address, and connect to a not-too-far NTP server (the owner of which is nice enough to let anyone connect for only the asking of permission).
That takes care of one PC, and therefore all PCs.
My VCR gets time from a broadcast stream, and my satellite receiver from the satellite. (I always thought satellite receivers should have built-in NTP servers and ethernet ports for, among other things, program guides, but I digress).
Now, the microwave and oven clocks, as well as my alarm clock, are dumb in this regard.
Sorry, I was lazy when I first posted on this topic. O.K., I went to the trouble to find their URL.
I haven't had any trouble with them, primarily because I haven't signed up with them. However, like cable, it's a contention-based system that can't be alleviated by throwing more hardware at it, unless you have the channel capacity in advance, or can buy it. With DSL, you just get fatter pipes, and change your aggregation as you scale, so the contention need not get bad (this does not mean that ISPs will go to those lengths, of course, just that it's easier than with a wireless system).
I currently use Internet America for my DSL needs and am generally satisfied -- about once a month I have to power cycle the DSL modem they provide for some reason (but, then again, I run a dedicated connection on a firewalled and NATted static IP 24x7). Of course, because I'm 15.6 kft from the DSLAM, I have to use a pair dedicated for the DSL line, and pay for that "dry" pair: that makes up $15 of my approx. $80/month fee. It's steep, but it beats SBC's PPPoE offering. And, so far, Internet America has been nice about my running servers (they really only care about bandwidth hogs, and the only "servers" I run is sendmail to sink email for my domain, and sshd for remote access). I've seen some brain dead TOS from other access providers where simply pinging remote hosts is forbidden as "hacking".
Don't go thinking for a split second that I advocate attacks against civilians of any kind: I don't.
You know, since 9/11/2001, I've been thinking about this tactic, and the distinction between "terrorist" and "freedom fighter" (depends on who gets to write the history books), and I've come to the unsettling conclusion, that, as a retaliatory move, so-called terrorist attacks against civilians, particulary voting-citizens in a democracy, are perfectly reasonable and acceptable, as far as war goes.
Consider, that in a democracy, the electorate choses the government. Are they not responsible for what that government does? I suppose one could argue that "I didn't vote for them!" but unless you oppose the democratic electoral system, you accept it's results regardless of how you cast your ballot. I can't see how someone can enjoy the freedoms supposedly associated with a democratically elected government, without accepting responsibility for what that government does. In fact, the very mechanics of democracy smack of power without responsibility. Somehow, attacks against the civilian electorate seams to be the only way to ultimately keep their governments in check.
Now, before you get all hot and seething, recall that I said retaliatory attacks -- there is no justification for the initiation of force. And yes, this just shifts the argument from oppressed vs. oppressor to initiation of force and retaliation to same. But I think that is a useful transformation, nevertheless.
I'm sure that most Americans see OBL's alleged attacks as an initiation of force, but the counterargument is that they are retalliation against a U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia. To decide which is closer to the truth requires an examination of the nature of that presence, and whether it is consistent with principles of liberty espoused by Americans on their own soil: it would be hipocracy to condemn something domestically, while accepting or encouraging it remotely.
If one comes to the conclusion that OBL was legitimately retaliating against an unwelcome occupation of a non-democratic nation, and not initiating an attack for no other reason than to frighten, and one accepts that the electorate of a democracy be held responsible for their government, it stands to reason that they suffer whatever retaliation is meeted out in response to the actions of the government they elect.
Now, how does this relate to Falun Gong?
In order to label them terrorists, they would have to (a) attack so-called civilians, (b) that do not democratically elect their government, and so can't be held responsible for it's actions.
About the only citizens that can't be held responsible for the actions of a democratically elected government would be those that can't vote: children, the incompetent, and the incarcerated that have been stripped of their voting rights. Specifically targetting such groups would probably deserve the "terrorist" moniker, regardless of the provocation.
There's a company starting to rollout wireless access in the Allen, TX area, and being a geek (and not particularly liking my $80/month DSL bill for 768k/384k (with $15/month for a dedicated pair, 'cause I'm 15.6 kft from the DSLAM)), I looked into it.
I can get 2 Mbit up/down, synchronous, for something like $40-$50 a month, so it looks interesting. However, I share that bandwidth with all the people in my quadrant, so, like cable modems, if I'm an early adopter, I get great bandwidth, but if it gets popular, there will be times when it gets clogged up.
Is it worth the $30 extra a month that I'm paying now? Well, I've had few problems, bandwidth is great, and I don't need to worry anout rain fade (ask me about my terrestrial HDTV and DirectTV signals).
Systems like this probably need bandwidth caps on users, and the ability to support multiple channels in a single quadrant. Remember the days of asking what the user/modem ratio for a dial-up ISP was before chosing one? Same kind of thing.
...and are presumably going to bring charges. If not, the items will presumably be returned with damages paid. If this is not what happens, then you can start talking about abuses.
There have been enough cases of seizures, warrentless or otherwise, with no charges laid, and items seized either not returned, or returned damaged beyond repair, that when excessive force is used (the FBI? Come on!), it is reasonable to suspect foul play -- the government has a poor record in these matters, and a "guilty until proven innocent" stance, given the historical record, is not at all unreasonable to take.
Trying to convince people that if something is undesirable then it is `just like the holocaust, man' is absurd.
Like I said, I would not argue the case that way, but I can see why someone might: jack-booted thugs that use excessive force in what appears to be a simple civil dispute look a great deal like brown shirts to me too.
Better to be on guard, and later find out that suspicious events that transpire are legitimate, than the alternative of being caught unawares when the thugs break down your door, for, perhaps, using a deCSS varient to watch DVDs under GNU/Linux (and, yes, I do this, and openly).
But, that's not the issue... the issue is siezing equipment with questionable warrants, and doing so in a discriminatory fashion (i.e. if the accused weren't home, their equipment wasn't siezed).
"Unlawful search and siezure" comes immediately to mind. We've seen enough of this in the past ("Operation Sun Devil" and Steve Jackson Games), to be suspicious.
If anything, this should be a civil case. The overwhelming use of state police force alone is cause for concern.
As for matters of degree, try telling the next rape victim to shut up because her experience, was not "as horrible" as some attrocity. Degree is not a valid means for dismissing abuse, regardless of the form it takes.
To my assertion: "What's troubling is that this line of reasoning suggests that we should wait until things get "bad enough" before being angered enough to fight back. Then, of course, it is to late," you wrote:
"I don't think I've suggested anything of the sort."
Oh, but you have!
In arguing that the comparison either blows the present issue out of proportion, or trivializes the genocide of Jews, you suggest that it isn't as horrible. The poster making the comparison implies that, at some level, it is as horrible, though of course, not at all levels.
Coming to the poster's defense, while I can see the difficulty of making the comparison (precisely because the events differ in scale and atrocity so that there are many levels where the comparison does inflate the gravity of one or trivialize that of the other), I can also see a viewpoint from which the comparison is fair: both occurances stem from evil, or as I called it "abuse of power". The comparison at that level is fair because we should be no more accepting of "little" manifestations of evil than we are of "big" ones.
Just to make sure we are on the same wavelength, as it were, I offer a formal definition of "abuse of power": the violation of laws, principles, or edicts, that one has sworn to uphold, in the service of others. This clearly applies to an elected official.
So, breaking the law by a lawmaker fits the bill. I suppose that the present case is, in some ways, worse than the Nazi concentration of Jews, because the latter was legal, in Germany, at the time. The U.S. interred citizens of Japanese descent as well during WWII, depriving many of them of their possitions in the process. Of course, the ensuing torture and genocide in Germany, wipes any semblence of legitimacy that the Nazi actions may have had, even under their own laws.
I empathize with the emotive "call to arms" the poster makes in his comparision is when I consider the following: "Is any abuse of power acceptable?"
I have to answer no: it is the greatest betrayal of the electorate. There is a reason that we have a specific word for it: treason. My reasoning is as follows, (ignoring Godwin's law, and working backward from Holocaust genocide to lessser attorities):
Would the death of less Jews have been more acceptable? I say no.
Would the death of people other than Jews have been more acceptable? I say no.
Would any betrayal of the electorate by those empowered to serve them be more acceptable? I say no.
Less horrific, yes. Less repugnant, certainly. More acceptable because of this? That's where I say no.
If we accept that some abuses of power are "acceptable" simply because they are of a lesser magnitude, have less irreversible consequences, are on a smaller scale, or evoke less horror, we may as well codify them as non-abuses!
Evil is like a weed. I prefer to tackle it at the root, before it spreads. What assurances do we have that small abuses do not lead to larger ones? Do we not have sufficient evidence of greater encroachments on civil liberties by governments over time? If the Holocaust was a fluke, there would be no other instances of genocide. History, however, is littered with them: The slaughter of Turkish Armenians and Native Americans come to mind, and I know that there are people who insist on comparing the "trivial" deaths of six million Jews to those of twenty million Russians in WWI. Somehow, in that perspective, the Holocaust is less unique as an ultimate horror, and not all that impressive in it's scope. Does that mean we should dismiss it?
Of course not: it probably serves as the best documented example of the excesses to which evil can rise. By some standard, there will be greater and lesser evils, and anyone who suggests that the perpetuation of one horror somehow "outranks" some other one will soon find their pet horror outranked by somethig else. Such arguments divide those who have a vested interest in fighting the common thread in all of them: evil, an example of which is my definition of "abuse of power".
The same force that begets torture and genocide also manifests itself in less dramatic ways, but until we recognize the force for what it is, and nip it in the bud, like a fire threatening to spread, we will watch it spread.
Abuse of power is one of the things for which we should have zero tolerance.
That's why, I, for one, am willing to overlook the fact that the poster's comparison might, at some level, appear to trivialize a particular horror -- I don't believe the intent was to offend in that manner.
What's troubling is that this line of reasoning suggests that we should wait until things get "bad enough" before being angered enough to fight back. Then, of course, it is to late.
Certainly, the poster here appears to by trying to generate an emotional response by drawing a far-fetched analogy, falling back on the knowledge that the same principles, are at play, just to differing degrees.
I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing to try and do: far too often people are not roused to fight abuse of power until it is too late. The danger is that it will be dismissed because of the degree of difference, or that it will rally a disproportionately violent response.
In fact, what is necessary is fostering resistance to these minor (by comparison) abuses, but with the resolve to fight any escalation as strongly as if people were being slaughtered -- the only rational response of an abuser to resistance is to increase the level of abuse and so the resolve to dig in one's heals must be there, lest the battle is lost before it begins.
Peaceful protest that ends as soon as abuse increases does no good, and ending resistance to avoid greater abuse ("see, you made the FBI come and kill you becayse you resisted") does not have the desired effect.
The "principle" that power justifies abuse is as disgusting whether that abuse takes the form of curtailment of innocent pleasures, cruel and unusal punishment for minor transgressions, or outright genocide. The will to fight this must be as strong as if genocide were taking place. Of course, the particular form of resistance undertaken at any one time must be commensurate with the threat -- you don't declare war against the state over the actions of a few overzealous cops.
Still, I can understand the desire for an emotive "call to arms" as it were.
The atrocities of which you write can be traced to abuse of power, yes? The current situation appears, on it's face, to be a different, milder, example of abuse of power. Given what abuse of power can lead to, and the historical record of the various U.S. government agencies and departments in abusing power (eugenics, McCarthyism, etc.), it strikes me that "no holds barred" "extremism" in opposition to abuse of power at its root is not, in fact, excessive.
It isn't the argument I'd use to start with (Godwin's law, and all that), but I don't think the protagonist should necessarily be condemned for chosing to cut to the core of the problem here. All too often, it's precisely because we tolerate the "little" injustices, that the big ones come to pass.
Just because the harmful actions of some are not as horrible as the actions of others does not mean they shouldn't be condemned, espescially since history teaches that little transgressions tend to lead to bigger ones.
What was that judgement about Shylock getting his pound of flesh, but "...nary a drop of blood shall ye spill..." or some such? Nice judicial hack, if you ask me.
I tend to think that this appears to be a civil and not a criminal case.
As for wire fraud, wouldn't communications have to cross state lines for the FBI to get involved?
Of course, there's probably some federal law regarding computer crime (interfering with a computer system strikes me as covering unauthorized use of bandwidth), but I'd still like to see the specifics that justify this kind of federal criminal action, espescially when they were so selective about it (i.e. those who weren't home weren't served..? Huh? What happened to neutral application of the law?)
This has been an interest of mine for some time. I eventually want to phase out much of my A/V system in favour of a single, networked, content source, capable of local media playback (CD/DVD), driving a minimum of non-intelligent exteral equipment (i.e. video monitors, DACs and amps are fine, but there should be no need for a "receiver" or "preamp").
I'd appreciate a greater discussion of your setup. Despam my email address to contact me.
2) MPEG2 decoding. The REALmagic Netstream2000TV fits the bill. No fan on the card either.
3) DVD drive. A DVD read/writer would be nice, but pricy, and a combo DVCROM/CDRW drive convenient.
4) Progressive Scan Component Video output. This is standard with the Netstream2000TV. It also handles TV output (probably via svideo and composite outputs). The earlier Netstream2000 only had SVGA (i.e. component) outputs.
5) Dolby Digital and DTS decoding. The Netstream2000TV has an SPDIF output for this.
6) SPDIF and analog two chanel audio to feed the TV would be nice when you don't want to fire up the whole theater system. Motherboard audio should be fine. This causes a bit of a wrinkle since you probably have to select which digital audio input to use on the reciever. Analog audio could go to the TV when you don't want to fire up the whole theatre system.
7) OSD. The Netstream2000TV allows for SVGA overlay, so you could use the motherboard's video. Not the best for games, but adequate for an OSD or browser.
8) 100BaseT Ethernet. Duh!
9) Wireless keyboard and mouse. Duh!
10) TV tuner/video input for PVR functionality. This is actually tough, because now you're adding another PCI card: two is about the max in an STB and you might want a high-fidelity card. Furthermore, with cable, antenna, SD, and satellite inputs, you probably won't find a tuner for all of them. However, the REAMmagic DVR might be the ticket instead of the Netstream2000TV. This encodes and decodes MPEG2 video. You only have SVGA output with this card, though, so you need a TV with component inputs. So, you could couple this with any receiver (VCR as a tuner, satellite receiver) with video output. The issue would be encoding quality (and you'd lose direct MPEG2 recording that you'd have with a DirecTIVO, for example). Dunno if you could capture component video or only composite. So, I wouldn't expect PVR quality to be all that great.
11) IR output. You want to control those outboard components, like VCR, Cable STB, and satellite receiver, right? There should be plenty of hacks to add circuits off of serial and/or parallel ports for this.
Now, I've pushed the Netstream2000TV rather heavily here (I own a Netstream2000, but no REALmagig stock, nor am I employed by them), but damn, it looks like a nice card. The Netstream2000 even came with some Linux software, but the good bits were binary only.
I think the combination of a VIA C3 processor, Netstream2000TV, and combo DVDROM/CDRW drive, would make a kick-ass STB. Add a hard disk if you can stand the noise. About the only thing remaining to worry about would be power supply fan noise.
IIRC, Panasonic makes unitized pan-tilt-zoom video cameras that allow for blocking out selected parts of an image, like windows of other buildings (and given the degree of zoom available, this is a good thing).
While such cameras are expensive (approx. US$1500), and provide aanalog RS-170 video which would have to be digitized, and not exactly "web" cams, if you point your cam at a fixed point, perhaps you could use software to blur out any of your neighbors' windows or other "sensitive" areas.
I'd talk to a lawyer, find out what you can do (probably a lot, unless you're shooting into their windows, or fenced-in yard), and then suggest reasonable blurring of possibly sensitive portions. IOW, offer to go above and beyond what you have to do, as a gesture of goodwill, and it this isn't good enough, send them a lawyers' letter to stop the harassment.
Yeah, I thought of this, but don't you have to show damages from the libel?
Furthermore, by targeting TV watchers as a group, they haven't singled out an individual.
If I spout, "All <insert ethnic catagory> are assholes!" I may be guilty of ethnic-based hatred and perhaps discrimination (if I use that view in a hiring, rent, sale, or service decision), but I have not libeled any specific member of that group.
Perhaps the key is not libel and slander law, but rather "hate crime" law: with Bush's urging consumers to spend the U.S. out of recession, maybe consumers should be a "protected group", and saying bad things about them a "hate crime" and "economic terrorism".
Aw heck, that's too much trouble. Why not just bulldoze Hollywood into the Pacific, fake tits and all?
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More exotic pets, partucularly rodents, can get expensive: My daughter begged and begged for a "pet of her own" and we thought it would help teach her some responsibility. We ended up getting her a guinea pig. BIG mistake: the cage requires daily cleaning; the litter and food and expensive. The damn little rodent costs WAY more in food and litter than our cat. And a guinea pig isn't exactly exotic.
I mentioned a cat earlier. Now, I grew up with a dog -- a rather likable English Setter that lived to the ripe old age of around 18. I like dogs. But dogs need to be walked (some small species can be trained to do their business on newspaper in the garage, but the smell remains long after the excrement has been removed), and I've always thought it cruel to have a dog and not live somewhere where they can run and play in big open places. Cats are quite happy to live indoors, and some species can be trained to not roam. Persians are good for this, but you will have to deal with their long hair, shedding, and trips to the groomer 2-4 times a year to have them shaved (yeah, the hair gets that long, and perioding shaving is necessary). I've had a long-haired Persian cat for almost 10 years now. No regrets. It even adapted well to three moves in that time (apartment to house, to house, to house)
I remember having to wire something up when the power went out (no, not network cabling, more mundane stuff). Well, when the soldering iron got too cold to work anymore (no, I didn't have a battery powered one -- they weren't decent in those days), you start stripping the cables as usual, twist them, wrap them in solder, and use a match to secure the connection. A temporary hack, to be sure, but it worked for as long as it had to.
I will say, that if you plan to do a lot of this, (and "a lot" can be "as little" as retrofitting structured wiring in a house"), get the proper tools: a Greenlee punch down tool for jacks and headend (usually comes with either a 66 or 110 blade -- you want the 110 but it's worth paying the US$15 or so for the other) at about US$45, a hand crimper for RJ45/RJ11/RJ14 (usually comes with a bunch of plugs) at about US$20, a coax wire stripper with RG6 and R59 settings at under US$10, and a decent RG6/RG59 coax crimper: around US$20. Surprisingly. Home Depot has all this stuff, including plugs, structured wallplates and jacks, Cat5e cable, etc. (Having the coax stuff is, less surprising). BTW, crimping cables, particularly RG6 coax connectors is hard on the hands -- do get a good tool.
I retrofitted structured wiring to a house I bought a year ago. (You don't want to do this: putzing around in the attic, drilling through non-load bearing top-plates is double plus not fun -- I hired a guy who had network experience and did residential "cable" and "phone" cabling, but only had him help tie-wrap and pull cable -- it was stilla lot of work and definately a two-person job.)
I pulled two Cat5e ant two RG6 cables to six drops, plus an attic "subdistribution area" (existing cable and telco drops terminated up there) from a headend which received the DSL line, POTS, dual LNBs pointed at two satellites, and a terrestrial SD/HD/analog TV antenna in the attic. There are breakout panels in the headend. So, that's 14 Cat5e jack terminations (headend side is punched down to 110 blocks), and 28 coax terminations, just for primary cabling. Then there's end-cables to crimp, terminating satellite lead-in (8 more coax connectors: one each end of four cables), satellite cross-connect cables (8 more!), and break-out panel to multiswitch cables (yet another 8). 7 cables (14 more coax connectors!) go from the multiswitch to the coax breakout panels. 7 Cat5E jumpers (14 RJ45 crimps) run from the firewall/router to the Cat5e breakout panel, and 7 punched down jacks on that panel to the 110 blocks. There are some odds and ends (line power inserters for the attic-located terrestrial antenna amp) as well. Oh, and if you do this, you will be making jack extention cables (two coax, two Cat5e, around 100 feet long), with four coax and four Cat5e crimps, for testing back to the headend when you suspect the cabling to a jack.
The bottom line is that if you wire, retrofit structured wiring in a home, you will crimp and punch down so much, by the time you're done, you will be an expert. One upside is that you will almost never buy pre-made cables again: you'll just make your own, to length, as required. Oh, and if you run two cables, do get two spools, or you will go crazy running a cable, going back, running another, and so on. Yes, this means you will have two spools of leftover. Save it to make patch cables.
In my case, I bought 2000 feet of Cat5e and 2000 feet of RG6 (the guys at Home Depot thought I was nuts, and BTW, RG6 on the spool gets heavy fast), and ended up using around 1500 feet of each in a 3200 square foot house. I got headend enclosures, patch panels, a multiswitch, diplexers, and misc. stuff from Home Tech and satellite gear from American Satellite.
I came to this same conclusion.
Though, appliance-rich areas, like kitchens, and laundry rooms could do with a pre-wired network: either ethernet or HomePNA. HomePNA is probably easier for low bandwidth applications, like time sync, status checks, etc., and, if I'm not mistaken, can be piggybacked on POTS. Most people have POTS lines already pulled to the kitchen, the location of most dumb clocks. Heck, use a powerline based network, just get time to where it's displayed!
That takes care of one PC, and therefore all PCs.
My VCR gets time from a broadcast stream, and my satellite receiver from the satellite. (I always thought satellite receivers should have built-in NTP servers and ethernet ports for, among other things, program guides, but I digress).
Now, the microwave and oven clocks, as well as my alarm clock, are dumb in this regard.
I haven't had any trouble with them, primarily because I haven't signed up with them. However, like cable, it's a contention-based system that can't be alleviated by throwing more hardware at it, unless you have the channel capacity in advance, or can buy it. With DSL, you just get fatter pipes, and change your aggregation as you scale, so the contention need not get bad (this does not mean that ISPs will go to those lengths, of course, just that it's easier than with a wireless system).
I currently use Internet America for my DSL needs and am generally satisfied -- about once a month I have to power cycle the DSL modem they provide for some reason (but, then again, I run a dedicated connection on a firewalled and NATted static IP 24x7). Of course, because I'm 15.6 kft from the DSLAM, I have to use a pair dedicated for the DSL line, and pay for that "dry" pair: that makes up $15 of my approx. $80/month fee. It's steep, but it beats SBC's PPPoE offering. And, so far, Internet America has been nice about my running servers (they really only care about bandwidth hogs, and the only "servers" I run is sendmail to sink email for my domain, and sshd for remote access). I've seen some brain dead TOS from other access providers where simply pinging remote hosts is forbidden as "hacking".
You know, since 9/11/2001, I've been thinking about this tactic, and the distinction between "terrorist" and "freedom fighter" (depends on who gets to write the history books), and I've come to the unsettling conclusion, that, as a retaliatory move, so-called terrorist attacks against civilians, particulary voting-citizens in a democracy, are perfectly reasonable and acceptable, as far as war goes.
Consider, that in a democracy, the electorate choses the government. Are they not responsible for what that government does? I suppose one could argue that "I didn't vote for them!" but unless you oppose the democratic electoral system, you accept it's results regardless of how you cast your ballot. I can't see how someone can enjoy the freedoms supposedly associated with a democratically elected government, without accepting responsibility for what that government does. In fact, the very mechanics of democracy smack of power without responsibility. Somehow, attacks against the civilian electorate seams to be the only way to ultimately keep their governments in check.
Now, before you get all hot and seething, recall that I said retaliatory attacks -- there is no justification for the initiation of force. And yes, this just shifts the argument from oppressed vs. oppressor to initiation of force and retaliation to same. But I think that is a useful transformation, nevertheless.
I'm sure that most Americans see OBL's alleged attacks as an initiation of force, but the counterargument is that they are retalliation against a U.S. presence in Saudi Arabia. To decide which is closer to the truth requires an examination of the nature of that presence, and whether it is consistent with principles of liberty espoused by Americans on their own soil: it would be hipocracy to condemn something domestically, while accepting or encouraging it remotely.
If one comes to the conclusion that OBL was legitimately retaliating against an unwelcome occupation of a non-democratic nation, and not initiating an attack for no other reason than to frighten, and one accepts that the electorate of a democracy be held responsible for their government, it stands to reason that they suffer whatever retaliation is meeted out in response to the actions of the government they elect.
Now, how does this relate to Falun Gong?
In order to label them terrorists, they would have to (a) attack so-called civilians, (b) that do not democratically elect their government, and so can't be held responsible for it's actions.
About the only citizens that can't be held responsible for the actions of a democratically elected government would be those that can't vote: children, the incompetent, and the incarcerated that have been stripped of their voting rights. Specifically targetting such groups would probably deserve the "terrorist" moniker, regardless of the provocation.
I can get 2 Mbit up/down, synchronous, for something like $40-$50 a month, so it looks interesting. However, I share that bandwidth with all the people in my quadrant, so, like cable modems, if I'm an early adopter, I get great bandwidth, but if it gets popular, there will be times when it gets clogged up.
Is it worth the $30 extra a month that I'm paying now? Well, I've had few problems, bandwidth is great, and I don't need to worry anout rain fade (ask me about my terrestrial HDTV and DirectTV signals).
Systems like this probably need bandwidth caps on users, and the ability to support multiple channels in a single quadrant. Remember the days of asking what the user/modem ratio for a dial-up ISP was before chosing one? Same kind of thing.
There have been enough cases of seizures, warrentless or otherwise, with no charges laid, and items seized either not returned, or returned damaged beyond repair, that when excessive force is used (the FBI? Come on!), it is reasonable to suspect foul play -- the government has a poor record in these matters, and a "guilty until proven innocent" stance, given the historical record, is not at all unreasonable to take.
Trying to convince people that if something is undesirable then it is `just like the holocaust, man' is absurd.
Like I said, I would not argue the case that way, but I can see why someone might: jack-booted thugs that use excessive force in what appears to be a simple civil dispute look a great deal like brown shirts to me too.
Better to be on guard, and later find out that suspicious events that transpire are legitimate, than the alternative of being caught unawares when the thugs break down your door, for, perhaps, using a deCSS varient to watch DVDs under GNU/Linux (and, yes, I do this, and openly).
But, that's not the issue... the issue is siezing equipment with questionable warrants, and doing so in a discriminatory fashion (i.e. if the accused weren't home, their equipment wasn't siezed).
"Unlawful search and siezure" comes immediately to mind. We've seen enough of this in the past ("Operation Sun Devil" and Steve Jackson Games), to be suspicious.
If anything, this should be a civil case. The overwhelming use of state police force alone is cause for concern.
As for matters of degree, try telling the next rape victim to shut up because her experience, was not "as horrible" as some attrocity. Degree is not a valid means for dismissing abuse, regardless of the form it takes.
...Shea and Wilson, if I'm not mistaken.
"I don't think I've suggested anything of the sort."
Oh, but you have!
In arguing that the comparison either blows the present issue out of proportion, or trivializes the genocide of Jews, you suggest that it isn't as horrible. The poster making the comparison implies that, at some level, it is as horrible, though of course, not at all levels.
Coming to the poster's defense, while I can see the difficulty of making the comparison (precisely because the events differ in scale and atrocity so that there are many levels where the comparison does inflate the gravity of one or trivialize that of the other), I can also see a viewpoint from which the comparison is fair: both occurances stem from evil, or as I called it "abuse of power". The comparison at that level is fair because we should be no more accepting of "little" manifestations of evil than we are of "big" ones.
Just to make sure we are on the same wavelength, as it were, I offer a formal definition of "abuse of power": the violation of laws, principles, or edicts, that one has sworn to uphold, in the service of others. This clearly applies to an elected official.
So, breaking the law by a lawmaker fits the bill. I suppose that the present case is, in some ways, worse than the Nazi concentration of Jews, because the latter was legal, in Germany, at the time. The U.S. interred citizens of Japanese descent as well during WWII, depriving many of them of their possitions in the process. Of course, the ensuing torture and genocide in Germany, wipes any semblence of legitimacy that the Nazi actions may have had, even under their own laws.
I empathize with the emotive "call to arms" the poster makes in his comparision is when I consider the following: "Is any abuse of power acceptable?"
I have to answer no: it is the greatest betrayal of the electorate. There is a reason that we have a specific word for it: treason. My reasoning is as follows, (ignoring Godwin's law, and working backward from Holocaust genocide to lessser attorities):
Would the death of less Jews have been more acceptable? I say no.
Would the death of people other than Jews have been more acceptable? I say no.
Would any betrayal of the electorate by those empowered to serve them be more acceptable? I say no.
Less horrific, yes. Less repugnant, certainly. More acceptable because of this? That's where I say no.
If we accept that some abuses of power are "acceptable" simply because they are of a lesser magnitude, have less irreversible consequences, are on a smaller scale, or evoke less horror, we may as well codify them as non-abuses!
Evil is like a weed. I prefer to tackle it at the root, before it spreads. What assurances do we have that small abuses do not lead to larger ones? Do we not have sufficient evidence of greater encroachments on civil liberties by governments over time? If the Holocaust was a fluke, there would be no other instances of genocide. History, however, is littered with them: The slaughter of Turkish Armenians and Native Americans come to mind, and I know that there are people who insist on comparing the "trivial" deaths of six million Jews to those of twenty million Russians in WWI. Somehow, in that perspective, the Holocaust is less unique as an ultimate horror, and not all that impressive in it's scope. Does that mean we should dismiss it?
Of course not: it probably serves as the best documented example of the excesses to which evil can rise. By some standard, there will be greater and lesser evils, and anyone who suggests that the perpetuation of one horror somehow "outranks" some other one will soon find their pet horror outranked by somethig else. Such arguments divide those who have a vested interest in fighting the common thread in all of them: evil, an example of which is my definition of "abuse of power".
The same force that begets torture and genocide also manifests itself in less dramatic ways, but until we recognize the force for what it is, and nip it in the bud, like a fire threatening to spread, we will watch it spread.
Abuse of power is one of the things for which we should have zero tolerance.
That's why, I, for one, am willing to overlook the fact that the poster's comparison might, at some level, appear to trivialize a particular horror -- I don't believe the intent was to offend in that manner.
Certainly, the poster here appears to by trying to generate an emotional response by drawing a far-fetched analogy, falling back on the knowledge that the same principles, are at play, just to differing degrees.
I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing to try and do: far too often people are not roused to fight abuse of power until it is too late. The danger is that it will be dismissed because of the degree of difference, or that it will rally a disproportionately violent response.
In fact, what is necessary is fostering resistance to these minor (by comparison) abuses, but with the resolve to fight any escalation as strongly as if people were being slaughtered -- the only rational response of an abuser to resistance is to increase the level of abuse and so the resolve to dig in one's heals must be there, lest the battle is lost before it begins.
Peaceful protest that ends as soon as abuse increases does no good, and ending resistance to avoid greater abuse ("see, you made the FBI come and kill you becayse you resisted") does not have the desired effect.
The "principle" that power justifies abuse is as disgusting whether that abuse takes the form of curtailment of innocent pleasures, cruel and unusal punishment for minor transgressions, or outright genocide. The will to fight this must be as strong as if genocide were taking place. Of course, the particular form of resistance undertaken at any one time must be commensurate with the threat -- you don't declare war against the state over the actions of a few overzealous cops.
Still, I can understand the desire for an emotive "call to arms" as it were.
It isn't the argument I'd use to start with (Godwin's law, and all that), but I don't think the protagonist should necessarily be condemned for chosing to cut to the core of the problem here. All too often, it's precisely because we tolerate the "little" injustices, that the big ones come to pass.
Just because the harmful actions of some are not as horrible as the actions of others does not mean they shouldn't be condemned, espescially since history teaches that little transgressions tend to lead to bigger ones.
What was that judgement about Shylock getting his pound of flesh, but "...nary a drop of blood shall ye spill..." or some such? Nice judicial hack, if you ask me.
As for wire fraud, wouldn't communications have to cross state lines for the FBI to get involved?
Of course, there's probably some federal law regarding computer crime (interfering with a computer system strikes me as covering unauthorized use of bandwidth), but I'd still like to see the specifics that justify this kind of federal criminal action, espescially when they were so selective about it (i.e. those who weren't home weren't served..? Huh? What happened to neutral application of the law?)
He bought the whole 4 flavour setup (refurbished) for about CA$600.
Where I live, the thing to do is to pull out your gun and defend yourself against the atempted kidnapping.
I'd appreciate a greater discussion of your setup. Despam my email address to contact me.
Dunno about Linux support, tho.
2) MPEG2 decoding. The REALmagic Netstream2000TV fits the bill. No fan on the card either.
3) DVD drive. A DVD read/writer would be nice, but pricy, and a combo DVCROM/CDRW drive convenient.
4) Progressive Scan Component Video output. This is standard with the Netstream2000TV. It also handles TV output (probably via svideo and composite outputs). The earlier Netstream2000 only had SVGA (i.e. component) outputs.
5) Dolby Digital and DTS decoding. The Netstream2000TV has an SPDIF output for this.
6) SPDIF and analog two chanel audio to feed the TV would be nice when you don't want to fire up the whole theater system. Motherboard audio should be fine. This causes a bit of a wrinkle since you probably have to select which digital audio input to use on the reciever. Analog audio could go to the TV when you don't want to fire up the whole theatre system.
7) OSD. The Netstream2000TV allows for SVGA overlay, so you could use the motherboard's video. Not the best for games, but adequate for an OSD or browser.
8) 100BaseT Ethernet. Duh!
9) Wireless keyboard and mouse. Duh!
10) TV tuner/video input for PVR functionality. This is actually tough, because now you're adding another PCI card: two is about the max in an STB and you might want a high-fidelity card. Furthermore, with cable, antenna, SD, and satellite inputs, you probably won't find a tuner for all of them. However, the REAMmagic DVR might be the ticket instead of the Netstream2000TV. This encodes and decodes MPEG2 video. You only have SVGA output with this card, though, so you need a TV with component inputs. So, you could couple this with any receiver (VCR as a tuner, satellite receiver) with video output. The issue would be encoding quality (and you'd lose direct MPEG2 recording that you'd have with a DirecTIVO, for example). Dunno if you could capture component video or only composite. So, I wouldn't expect PVR quality to be all that great.
11) IR output. You want to control those outboard components, like VCR, Cable STB, and satellite receiver, right? There should be plenty of hacks to add circuits off of serial and/or parallel ports for this.
Now, I've pushed the Netstream2000TV rather heavily here (I own a Netstream2000, but no REALmagig stock, nor am I employed by them), but damn, it looks like a nice card. The Netstream2000 even came with some Linux software, but the good bits were binary only.
I think the combination of a VIA C3 processor, Netstream2000TV, and combo DVDROM/CDRW drive, would make a kick-ass STB. Add a hard disk if you can stand the noise. About the only thing remaining to worry about would be power supply fan noise.
Rouse not the wrath of the Elder, RMS.
While such cameras are expensive (approx. US$1500), and provide aanalog RS-170 video which would have to be digitized, and not exactly "web" cams, if you point your cam at a fixed point, perhaps you could use software to blur out any of your neighbors' windows or other "sensitive" areas.
I'd talk to a lawyer, find out what you can do (probably a lot, unless you're shooting into their windows, or fenced-in yard), and then suggest reasonable blurring of possibly sensitive portions. IOW, offer to go above and beyond what you have to do, as a gesture of goodwill, and it this isn't good enough, send them a lawyers' letter to stop the harassment.
Furthermore, by targeting TV watchers as a group, they haven't singled out an individual.
If I spout, "All <insert ethnic catagory> are assholes!" I may be guilty of ethnic-based hatred and perhaps discrimination (if I use that view in a hiring, rent, sale, or service decision), but I have not libeled any specific member of that group.
Perhaps the key is not libel and slander law, but rather "hate crime" law: with Bush's urging consumers to spend the U.S. out of recession, maybe consumers should be a "protected group", and saying bad things about them a "hate crime" and "economic terrorism".
Aw heck, that's too much trouble. Why not just bulldoze Hollywood into the Pacific, fake tits and all?
And, don't get me started on Clearcase Multisite.