Overwriting tools have been available for years and the ammount of time required to use them is very small.
Overwriting tools are useless when forensics experts arrive on the scene. Even hard drives that have been wiped with the standard I can never remember (wipe with all ones, then with all zeroes, then with alternating ones and zeroes) are still recoverable.
It all boils down to how much is willing to be spent on recovering the data. "Shredding" computer files is not sufficient, especially when prosecutors are motivated by potential millions in settlement (ala Microsoft). Anything short of encrypted swap/file space is asking for it in the long run.
The point of the judge is that if someone has made a reasonable effort to delete something, then it should be considered to be deleted.
Otherwise, anything that you have ever said or typed which has ever been saved on a computer can and will come back to bite you. Ever posted a flame to usenet? Ever sent a naughty picture via email? Ever accidentally clicked on a goatse.cx link? It's been recorded, somewhere.
>>some people work to increase the total wealth for everybody, while other people work to grab as much of it for themselves as they can.
>Of course it's a familiar pattern. You just described the essential difference between Democrats and Republicans.
Uhm, which is which? It seems to me that both groups claim to do the former as a cover for doing the latter.
There were two guys on alt.2600 that new the most. Will something (the FAQ maintainer) and
Will! He went by the nick of "Voyager". He was so fun to troll. He wrote, hands-down, some of the funniest flames I've ever read (back when flaming on usenet was an artform). My friend Chris (Y-Windoze, now at nsa.org) trolled Will about Phrack (there was a running joke that Will had stopped being the FAQ maintainer so he could edit Phrack). Will replied with something along the lines of "Y-Windoze, like so many of this year's freshman, is finally allowed to release his inner child. Unfortunately for us, his inner child is a butthole."
Just to show that there weren't any hard feelings, Will and Chris Grogan (aka Eric Bloodaxe, then editor of Phrack) gave money ($1.35!) to help get Chris (Y-Win) out of jail when he got arrested at summercon.
what would Americans do if they found out that Europeans have more vacation time than they do?
What?!? Europeans get more than than eight days off a year? Unbelievable. Next, you'll want me to believe that they're also not expected to be on-call for unix support while taking vacation.
BellSouth uses Alcatel modems in my area. If you're using the wintel client, when you bring up the connection status, if you hit 'Ctrl-Alt-A' you'll get a window that has additional information.
Included is maximum possible speed (actual, not theoretical) to/from the CO and actual speed to the CO. Bellsouth's max uplink was around 800Kb/s, but was throttled to 256Kb. That was a definite hard throttle. The maximum possible downstream was very close to 1.5Mb/s, but the actual rate seemed to hover around 1Mb/s, but never went above that. I literally lived across the street from the CO (both as the crow flies and the coppier lies), so I don't see how I could *not* get better connection speeds. Anybody else try this?
What's the legality in purchasing a version of software for one platform and then getting a warez version of it for another version? For example, I legally own copies of the Zork series for the C-64. Can I legally run these games on my BSD box?
I can legally copy a tape of music onto a CD (or visa versa). Is there any relation between the music and software worlds as far as copyright is concerned?
3. Here's the real sticking point (which I'm also the most out-of-my-league about): if it can be proved that a copyright holder knowingly allowed someone to infringe on that copyright and did not take action to prevent it, then the rights to that material can be permanently lost.
IANAL, but... ...the kind folks from the SPA had a nice talk with me, which prompted me to do some research into the subject. Under the Berne convention, copyright does not need to be policed by the copyright owner. Trademark and patents, yes, copyright, no.
And there's the rub. Duke or Doom are copyrighted titles... but they're also trademarks. Not defending the copyright is the same as not defending the trademark. That's why publishers are so quick to take action when copyright infringement is brought to their attention.
A webbug is a 1x1 image whose SRC attribute is on a server other than the site you're currently on. I could be going way out a limb here, but... the "pagecount.gif" could be used to count page hits (or page hits that are viewing images).
Furthermore, images*(adlog.pl|banner).* should be a giveaway that it's probably an ad.
The javascript junk looks like another attempt at *gasp* a page counter. Maybe they're counting the number of hits from browsers that have javascript and images turned on?
It's not a webbug unless the 1x1 image is going to another server./. already has a list of all of the/. pages your ip is going to (which is why they don't need webbugs). Could a more likely explanation be that they're trying to get a guestimate of how many people are viewing images (for ad reasons) and how many people are viewing javascript (for more ad reasons)?
Obviously if a person hits a page and is getting these 1x1 images, but is *not* getting the ads, then that person is running an ad filter. I think that a person is entirely within their rights to run filters, but I also think that slashdot is entirely within their rights to try to figure out how many ad views they're "losing".
Noooo, that's about right. Think about it. When was Diablo II announced? When was it released? Games tend to be announced about three years, +/- six months, before they're actually released (that's in real years, not marketing years).
Let's be fair here. Back in the day, Netscape released its own fair share of non-standard tags. is easier to ask permission than it is to ask forgiveness. -- hymie
What's the difference between me providing a link to data, and me providing a bit-for-bit copy of the data?
For example, there's some web sites that mirror resposts from the a.b.warez newsgroups. Not just a link to the data, but the actual data itself. However, the web page (in some of the cases, at least) gets the data via a script. It could just as easily mirror a post of the Bible as it could part 14/59 of Deus Ex.
If linking to "illegal" sites (assuming that the linker did not know the site had illegal content) is deemed to be legal, can automatic mirroring of illegal data (again, assuming the host does not necessarily know that the content is illegal) be considered to be legal?
Up until now, most places that have been asked to stop linking have done so. I think it's more of a fear of being sued thing. For example, waaay back when Dilbert first showed up on the net (when *all* of the comics were available online for free) there were a couple of people who provided links from their own home pages to that day's dilbert -- avoiding the unitedmedia page and its banners (or whatever form of ads they had at the time).
Unitedmedia, like the RIAA, was pissed because they were missing out on the ability to serve the content with ads 'n' stuff. It's more than just "links to illegal sites", as the RIAA claims, it's links to the content that they don't get anything from.
I'll bet dimes to dollars that if I were to link straight to an mp3 on sonymusic.com, I'd be contacted by the nice people from their legal department.
Sure, they say that they're against links to illegal sites, but they're really against not being able to add their flavor of piss (whether it be banner ads or pop-ups) to the "illegal" content.
Not quite. Consider it from a legal standpoint. If DA hasn't read any of Pratchett's work, DA can't be accused of being derivative. I don't think he dodged the question, he just seemed to be answering honestly: he hasn't read Pratchett's work, so he can't give an informed opinion.
As far as Adams being a putz as a person, I'd also have to disagree. I managed to stumble into him at E3 a couple of years ago (he was there for Starship Titanic). He was very nice and took time to answer a couple of questions about the game. Keep in mind that this was not at the official signing thingy. He easily could have said "terribly sorry, I'm late for an appointment," but did not.
Call it an attempt at increasing good word-of-mouth PR for the game, if you like, but he managed to convince me that's he's basically a likeable person.
This thing will eat batteries for lunch. The eGo mp3 player can use the IBM 340MB Microdrive (and with a firmware flash, presumably this newer drive). A standard set of 1200mAh rechargeables will only last just over an hour. What's the use in having ten hours of music if I have to carry around ten sets of batteries?
Slashdot Mirror
Overwriting tools are useless when forensics experts arrive on the scene. Even hard drives that have been wiped with the standard I can never remember (wipe with all ones, then with all zeroes, then with alternating ones and zeroes) are still recoverable.
It all boils down to how much is willing to be spent on recovering the data. "Shredding" computer files is not sufficient, especially when prosecutors are motivated by potential millions in settlement (ala Microsoft). Anything short of encrypted swap/file space is asking for it in the long run.
The point of the judge is that if someone has made a reasonable effort to delete something, then it should be considered to be deleted.
Otherwise, anything that you have ever said or typed which has ever been saved on a computer can and will come back to bite you. Ever posted a flame to usenet? Ever sent a naughty picture via email? Ever accidentally clicked on a goatse.cx link? It's been recorded, somewhere.
hymie
>Of course it's a familiar pattern. You just described the essential difference between Democrats and Republicans. Uhm, which is which? It seems to me that both groups claim to do the former as a cover for doing the latter.
hymie
Will! He went by the nick of "Voyager". He was so fun to troll. He wrote, hands-down, some of the funniest flames I've ever read (back when flaming on usenet was an artform). My friend Chris (Y-Windoze, now at nsa.org) trolled Will about Phrack (there was a running joke that Will had stopped being the FAQ maintainer so he could edit Phrack). Will replied with something along the lines of "Y-Windoze, like so many of this year's freshman, is finally allowed to release his inner child. Unfortunately for us, his inner child is a butthole."
Just to show that there weren't any hard feelings, Will and Chris Grogan (aka Eric Bloodaxe, then editor of Phrack) gave money ($1.35!) to help get Chris (Y-Win) out of jail when he got arrested at summercon.
hymie
Okay, I'll admit it. I had to read that last bit twice before I realized that "OFF" wasn't some computer acronym that I didn't realize.
"Oh-eff-eff? What the heck is an oh-eff-eff?"
hymie3
What?!? Europeans get more than than eight days off a year? Unbelievable. Next, you'll want me to believe that they're also not expected to be on-call for unix support while taking vacation.
hymie
Included is maximum possible speed (actual, not theoretical) to/from the CO and actual speed to the CO. Bellsouth's max uplink was around 800Kb/s, but was throttled to 256Kb. That was a definite hard throttle. The maximum possible downstream was very close to 1.5Mb/s, but the actual rate seemed to hover around 1Mb/s, but never went above that. I literally lived across the street from the CO (both as the crow flies and the coppier lies), so I don't see how I could *not* get better connection speeds. Anybody else try this?
hymie
I can legally copy a tape of music onto a CD (or visa versa). Is there any relation between the music and software worlds as far as copyright is concerned?
hymie
IANAL, but...
...the kind folks from the SPA had a nice talk with me, which prompted me to do some research into the subject. Under the Berne convention, copyright does not need to be policed by the copyright owner. Trademark and patents, yes, copyright, no.
And there's the rub. Duke or Doom are copyrighted titles... but they're also trademarks. Not defending the copyright is the same as not defending the trademark. That's why publishers are so quick to take action when copyright infringement is brought to their attention.
hymie
Furthermore, images*(adlog.pl|banner).* should be a giveaway that it's probably an ad.
The javascript junk looks like another attempt at *gasp* a page counter. Maybe they're counting the number of hits from browsers that have javascript and images turned on?
It's not a webbug unless the 1x1 image is going to another server. /. already has a list of all of the /. pages your ip is going to (which is why they don't need webbugs). Could a more likely explanation be that they're trying to get a guestimate of how many people are viewing images (for ad reasons) and how many people are viewing javascript (for more ad reasons)?
Obviously if a person hits a page and is getting these 1x1 images, but is *not* getting the ads, then that person is running an ad filter. I think that a person is entirely within their rights to run filters, but I also think that slashdot is entirely within their rights to try to figure out how many ad views they're "losing".
hymie
hymie
Let's be fair here. Back in the day, Netscape released its own fair share of non-standard tags. is easier to ask permission than it is to ask forgiveness.
--
hymie
For example, there's some web sites that mirror resposts from the a.b.warez newsgroups. Not just a link to the data, but the actual data itself. However, the web page (in some of the cases, at least) gets the data via a script. It could just as easily mirror a post of the Bible as it could part 14/59 of Deus Ex.
If linking to "illegal" sites (assuming that the linker did not know the site had illegal content) is deemed to be legal, can automatic mirroring of illegal data (again, assuming the host does not necessarily know that the content is illegal) be considered to be legal?
--
hymie
Unitedmedia, like the RIAA, was pissed because they were missing out on the ability to serve the content with ads 'n' stuff. It's more than just "links to illegal sites", as the RIAA claims, it's links to the content that they don't get anything from.
I'll bet dimes to dollars that if I were to link straight to an mp3 on sonymusic.com, I'd be contacted by the nice people from their legal department.
Sure, they say that they're against links to illegal sites, but they're really against not being able to add their flavor of piss (whether it be banner ads or pop-ups) to the "illegal" content.
--
hymie
As far as Adams being a putz as a person, I'd also have to disagree. I managed to stumble into him at E3 a couple of years ago (he was there for Starship Titanic). He was very nice and took time to answer a couple of questions about the game. Keep in mind that this was not at the official signing thingy. He easily could have said "terribly sorry, I'm late for an appointment," but did not.
Call it an attempt at increasing good word-of-mouth PR for the game, if you like, but he managed to convince me that's he's basically a likeable person.
--
hymie
hymie