Will be targeted by the appropriate party functionaries in the next election, since FB will be selling their PI to the various parties and campaigns. This is a *huge* money making opportunity for FB.
Consider how FB makes money. Consider what political affiliation information can be gleaned from someone's FB history. Consider how difficult it is for political parties and campaigns to track down those who might support them, either with votes or money.
This year (an off year), over USD$4 Billion has been spent on political campaigns. This will likely be much, much more in 2016 (in 2012, USD$7 Billion was spent on political campaigns). FB wants their piece of the pie.
Lets assume we gave all the people in public housing 100 percent of everything they want/need free.
Have we encouraged them or given them the opportunities to better their lives?
Nope.
Public housing should be seen as a temporary solution to temporary problems in a person's life. That or permanent if someone is very disabled which most of the people in PHing are not.
People are raising SECOND generations of children in public housing. That is madness. Get these people out of public housing if they've been in it for more then a couple years.
That might mean encouraging them to leave big cities they can't afford to live in. Tough. If you're poor, why would you think you can afford to live in places with high costs of living?
PHing the way it is implemented is bad on so many levels. I almost don't know where to start with it.
Absolutely correct. There has to be another way. And of course there is. I'd like to propose a solution. A proposal for preventing the poor people in the United States from being a burden to their parents or country. It would also make them beneficial to the public at-large. I've posted my thoughts online for public comment. I think we should push ahead with due haste, don't you?
There are some services like education, medical care and child care that are cheaper and more efficient for the government to deliver
Is this why there are relatively few areas in the US where people with money send their kids to public schools? Is it likely that these people prefer an inferior education for their kids and are willing to shell out a lot of money for that while still paying taxes for superior educational services they have chosen not to use? Hmm... Sounds unlikely to me. My, admittedly limited, sample set of people I know who do choose to pay to send their kids to private school certainly don't do it because they are seeking an inferior education for their spawn.
The upshot of this "deal" is that a bunch of pampered welfare recipients in NYC receive subsidies from other Comcast customers because NYC's wealthy political elite thinks it's a good idea: they can create and maintain a dependent class of voters and they don't even have to raise taxes for it.
And morons like you support this kind of corruption.
Pampered? Please explain how those on public assistance are, as you say, "pampered." I think not.
The devil's in the details, isn't it? If you go through my posts, I'm for ensuring everyone has access to internet, but against doing a lot of these things as long as the US doesn't have its undocumented (fuck PC... ILLEGAL) immigrant problem under control. Makes for a complicated problem, and that's why I'm not a politician, or even an activist. I'd just fuck it up.
I'm not sure how illegal immigrants fit into this discussion, since they aren't eligible for most Federalwelfare programs. Eligibility for state benefits varies from state to state. I suggest you educate yourself, friend.
That said, I pay more in property tax than a minimum salary worker makes pre-tax, and my wife and I together pay more income tax than the average household income in the US. The only "tax shelters" we have is our 401ks, and only real deductions are the property tax and mortgage interests (I guess I deduct my transit cards too...how greedy of me).
So that probably pays for my share?
Good for you. But that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand either. Are you complaining that you pay too much in taxes? Are you unhappy with how your tax dollars are spent? If so, these folks may be able to help.
Will you be writing a check Payable to NYC Housing dept ?
Will you be writing a check Payable for DemCare Obamacare ?
Will you be writing a check Payable for ObamaPhone BidenPhones ?
Not exactly.But close. If you don't want to do the same, revoke your American citizenship and GTFO, friend.
Basically, their votes are for sale to the highest bidder. Convince them that "the man" is keeping them down and tell them who the man is and they'll vote against him/her/it. Convince them that so-and-so is like them and will stand up for their rights and they'll vote so-and-so every time. Left unchecked, the combination of uninformed voters and unlimited political contributions will be the downfall of free societies.
An excellent point. It is the duty of citizens to vote their consciences. Since those who are elected are making decisions for us, we, as an electorate, need to educate ourselves in order to identify the right criminal^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H candidate for a given elective office. Unlimited political contributions fly in the face of this. It's rather depressing.
On a side note, what the hell kind of country allows people to vote without verifying they're eligible to do so and are who they claim to be? I don't know what kind of warped logic that comes from, but it's so stupid that other countries are (literally, I've seen in firsthand) laughing at us. If the problem is that somehow minorities and poor people "can't afford" to get and carry a picture ID, fix THAT problem, not some almost entirely unrelated symptom. Or better yet, work on fixing the even more fundamental problem of poverty rather than whining about how this and that specific thing are somehow "not fair" to poor people...
I don't know about where you live, but where I live there is most certainly a verification process. I must sign the election district register where there is *already* a sample of my signature. If they don't match, then it's not me. I won't be allowed to vote again either, since my signature is already recorded. That's plenty of verification for me.
Similar conclusions can be reached concerning the Allied (primarily British) carve-up of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, with respect to the fractious nature of nation-states in the Middle-East as well, if one deigns to read a little history.
log2(1,000,000) is only 19.9 bits.
log2(100,000,000,000,000) is 46.5 bits.
An 8-character random password with upper/lower+numbers only has log2(62^8) = 47.6 bits.
If you're serious about security, use something longer. A 16-character password has 95.3 bits.
tl;dr: Memorize a random 16-character password, and use it to to access your password vault of other 16-character random passwords.
Even better, pick some song lyrics as your password -- especially lyrics you have wrong inside your head. That way the password can be really long and extremely difficult to guess. Add in spaces and punctuation and it's even better:
There must be some kind of way out of here, said the joker to his feet
would make an excellent password. And It's really easy to remember. Much easier than something akin to correcthorsebatterystaple
...You gotta squeeze every penny! You see this tux? I got it cheap, 'cause Roy Cohn died in it! That fancy yacht? A bargain, because it smells like cat pee! And those beautiful women? They used to be men. The point is, you gotta squeeze every penny!
At the same time, just modifying the PID is far from "destroying" the device. If FTDI's driver did something that actually did damage to the hardware, I might be more sympathetic.
Let's say you take your car into a dealership and they flash the ECU so that the car won't start. No physical damage was done, so it's all good.
There's the rub. For your analogy to work, it would need to read something like this:
Let's say you take your car (a Honda, for example) into a dealership and they see that it's not actually a car manufactured by them, but a car that copied their designs and sells cheap knockoffs with 'Honda' written in all the right places, and change proprietary settings in the car electronics so that the car won't start. No physical damage was done, so it's all good.
No, it's not right and it shouldn't have happened. But caveat emptor.
Regardless of whether they were permanently 'bricked' or not, your initial comment was about 'technologically ignorant users' somehow 'requiring' them to support the fake product - the driver can simply refuse to work with the device.
Now, however, you take that 'technically ignorant user' who went out and bought say 3 x 4GB USB dongles that happened to have fake FTDI chips in them, unaware of that fact of course, who then copies his business critical data, say 3 years worth of work, onto all 3 of them (for safe keeping)... then his machine auto-updates his driver (because, again, he's a technically ignorant user) and suddenly he can't get to his data... in fact, again, technically ignorant, he tries all 3 dongles (if the first one fails, try the backup(s) right?).
Now, he can't even take them to another machine that maybe didn't get the driver update, or a Linux machine without the proprietary FTDI driver... sure, it's 'fixable' by him say paying an IT geek (a non-technically-ignorant person) to reprogram the USB ID, but that's a cost he is incurring because of what FTDI did to his devices. And that isn't to mention that perhaps he needed that data to bid on a potential $million contract with someone, on a deadline that he's now missed because of what FTDI did to 'damage' his devices.
He most certainly, if it can be proven that FTDI is *deliberately* breaking (even temporarily) the devices in question, has a good case for damages from FTDI.
Actually, what I said was:
I'll say it again. FTDI went about this the wrong way, but just as ignorance of the law isn't a defense, a consumer's ignorance of technology shouldn't require a manufacturer to support those who steal their designs and profit from them.
Since (based on what you wrote) you misunderstood my statement, I'll explain. I make two points:
1. FTDI blundered badly (whether that bites them with legal action, we'll have to see) by having their driver reset the PIDs of counterfeited FTD232 chips to '0'.
2. Many folks posting on this thread (not you, BTW) seem to be making the argument that FTDI should somehow suck it up and support counterfeited chips with their drivers. That isn't the case, IMHO. Caveat emptor.
You pointed out that:
Now, however, you take that 'technically ignorant user' who went out and bought say 3 x 4GB USB dongles that happened to have fake FTDI chips in them, unaware of that fact of course, who then copies his business critical data, say 3 years worth of work, onto all 3 of them (for safe keeping)... then his machine auto-updates his driver (because, again, he's a technically ignorant user) and suddenly he can't get to his data... in fact, again, technically ignorant, he tries all 3 dongles (if the first one fails, try the backup(s) right?)
[emphasis added]
As TFA (and much of the discussion here) points out, the chip in question (FTD232) is a USB/Serial converter (UART) and isn't used for flash drives -- nor is the driver, so your example isn't realistic. Sure, modifying the PID will inconvenience users, but it doesn't put anyone's data at risk.
The updated driver modified the PID setting (to a value of '0') on hardware not manufactured by FTDI that was using FTDI's assigned VID/PID.
One more time: I do not think that FTDI did the right thing and I suspect it will come back to bite them in the ass. But FTDI did not damage anyone's hardware.
So you would have no problem at all if I secretly modified the EPROM data of your car's computer so that it no longer starts up? I haven't permanently broken your car you see, you should be perfectly capable of fixing the damage yourself if you can figure out what I did.
Is reading comprehension an issue for you? I said, and I quote:
this will likely produce a nasty backlash against FTDI, as they went about this the wrong way.
Or is it just that you want to argue with someone?
Its like you taking you car into a dealer them finding you got a oil change at a non-dealer mechanic so they brick engine control chips on your cars on board computer and saying its you problem you can fix it you just need to overhaul then engine to get at it and re flash the firmware and it will work fine. So its not broken even though it won't start and requires special equipment and non trivial time money and knowledge to fix.
for all intents and purposes it is broken and they are responsible for breaking it
You know, I was thinking of using a similar analogy myself. However, the analogy just doesn't fit, so I bagged the idea.
A better analogy would be that you bought a car from a dealer who claimed it was a Ford, but when you took it in to the actual Ford dealership, they checked and found that it was a Yugo (yes, I'm old) masquerading as a Ford.
Under those circumstances, it makes no sense to get all butthurt that Ford won't service the car -- they didn't produce it.
Whether or not the Ford dealer has the right to remove any logos or other identifiers (like the USB PID) that make the Yugo look like a Ford is another question. And the answer is probably not, IMHO. But that doesn't mean Ford needs to service such a vehicle, does it?
Nobody could complain if they simply went and made their driver incompatible with the forged chips. If there is no working driver, then the customer would have to complain with the original maker of the hardware and demand a working driver. That's quite within FTDI's rights.
The point is that they attack the firmware of the device involved, which is by no accounts ok anymore. This isn't locking out a competitor, it's destruction of a competitor's hardware. Yes, that competitor didn't act correctly by trying to get a free ride. No doubt about that. By that logic, though, it's just a-ok for any printer maker to trash the printer (e.g. by hosing it with printer ink) should they detect that you use anything but their overpriced original stuff.
We are clearly in agreement here except on a single point: changing the PID is neither attacking the firmware nor damaging the hardware. After a PID change, the hardware (and firmware) is still functional -- as long as either some driver can recognize it or the PID is reset to a valid ID.
It may be that FTDI was unable (or unwilling) to find a way for their driver to stop supporting the counterfeited chips, so they just removed the mask (the PID) on the chip that claimed the counterfeits were genuine. That's not damaging the hardware or the firmware, merely modifying an embedded setting.
All that said, FTDI's actions were not appropriate -- and they will likely end up paying for it in the court of public opinion. However, FTDI's driver did not damage or harm the chips themselves -- and they certainly weren't (as some here have claimed) "bricked."
I didn't say it was fair. In fact, I said it was rather underhanded. That said, the manufacturer should provide a driver for their hardware. But that would require more work than just copying someone else's design, wouldn't it?
Given that FTDI invested in the R&D to design the chip and write the driver, I would expect that they should be able to decide if they want their driver to work with chips made by other manufacturers.
I'll say it again. FTDI went about this the wrong way, but just as ignorance of the law isn't a defense, a consumer's ignorance of technology shouldn't require a manufacturer to support those who steal their designs and profit from them.
I tell you what, go ahead and develop a new device and start selling it. I'll copy your design and sell it for 25% of your price, and instruct users to install your software for the device. If you make any attempt to stop me with your software, I'll blame you and suggest you be sued. Sound good?
I'll say it one more time -- FTDI went about this the wrong way.
Their driver should just ignore any device that it can detect as counterfeit and produce an error suggesting that the user contact the actual manufacturer for a driver. Assuming there is no such driver, then the consumer is hosed.
Since the common customer will have no idea that it can be done (or how), it is for all purposes *bricked*. Guess who the customer will blame? the manufacturer, not the counterfeiter. So basically FTDI is harming legitimate manufacturers. Hope they get sued into oblivion for that...
If these manufacturers are legitimate, why are they forcing their customers to use a third-party driver from FTDI?
Cut the crap, FTDI modifies the chips in such a way as to not work with any drivers, not just theirs. They are breaking them. Willfully and maliciously.
As I said, it was rather underhanded. However, they are not breaking anything. The device is still fully functional, but won't work with drivers that were made for the real chips.
If you have a problem, contact the actual chip manufacturer or someone along the supply chain to where you purchased the counterfeit and ask for their driver.
What? The manufacturer didn't expend any resources in creating drivers for the chips they manufactured? Sounds like a pretty crappy manufacturer. Perhaps you should use hardware that has drivers instead, no?
So FTDI is pissed that counterfeiters are using FTDI PIDs in their counterfeit chips so that the counterfeit chips get the benefit of FTDI drivers. I certainly sympathize with their gripe there. So FTDI is saying, "Don't use our PID" and setting the PIDs to 0 in counterfeit chips.
My guess is that FTDI didn't really think through the implications of that, that setting a PDI of 0 would brick the chip. What they should have done is just set the PID to some generic USB CDC serial port so that the counterfeit chips would no longer use the FTDI driver and would no longer show ups as FTDI chips to the OS.
This very could have been more of an "oops, sorry about that dude" than an "I KILL YOUR CHIP NOW! MOOHAHAHHA!"
Except the chip wasn't, as you put it, "killed." The chip is still fully functional with a driver that will support it. That FTDI doesn't want to support counterfeited chips with the driver it developed for the real article is reasonable.
Um, no. They're intentionally modifying the device ID on the counterfeit chip so it will no longer work. The average consumer will have no idea this is what's wrong or how to recover. While this isn't necessarily destruction of property, it IS (in the US) a federal hacking crime because it is causing the victim to lose access to their device and/or data.
As I previously mentioned, no real damage is done to the hardware. Various tools are available to resolve the issue and the device itself is not damaged.
That said, this will likely produce a nasty backlash against FTDI, as they went about this the wrong way.
At the same time, resetting the PID points up the counterfeit chip without any ambiguity. I guess that was the point.
Intentional and willful destruction of another person's property for the base reason that he didn't buy with you but with your competitor? I don't know about your country, but over here in socialist Europe we have consumer protection laws that deserve that name.
I would say that modifying the PID on the chip is pretty far from "intentional and willful destruction." From one of the comments in the support board posting masquerading as TFA:
The driver reprograms the product ID so it won't work.
Price of buying fake chips.
If that is the case you can easily bind the new VID/PID to the correct driver in Linux and it should still work:
Code: [Select]
A vid/pid pair can be added dynamically using sysfs, for example:
While it is rather underhanded, had FTDI done this the *correct* way and just interrogated the chip and refused to work with a fake, this would be a non-story. At the same time, just modifying the PID is far from "destroying" the device. If FTDI's driver did something that actually did damage to the hardware, I might be more sympathetic. That's not to say that I think FTDI did the right thing, just that the did not actually damage or "brick" anything. The device isn't broken, it just needs to have its PID reset. Once that happens (and I guess that's what FTDI was trying to do), the end user will be painfully aware that they have a counterfeit chip.
As I said, poorly executed and likely to cause some backlash, but no hardware is damaged or destroyed. Unless you're an idiot.
Because throwing your kids' lives into turmoil is the better course? For some people quietly cheating is a better option, believe it or not, many marriages survive affairs and are still rated as average to above.
Children are not oblivious. They can tell when there are problems in their parents' relationship. What sort of relationship role models are parents who have really dysfunctional relationships? They give a really horrible idea about what romantic relationships *should* be to the children exposed to them.
That's not to say (for all the not-so-deep thinkers out there) that a couple should split up at the first signs of problems, but when it becomes clear that the issues in the relationship are intractable, staying together "for the children" is not only dumb, it may well be harmful to the children later in life.
Slashdot Mirror
Will be targeted by the appropriate party functionaries in the next election, since FB will be selling their PI to the various parties and campaigns. This is a *huge* money making opportunity for FB.
Consider how FB makes money. Consider what political affiliation information can be gleaned from someone's FB history. Consider how difficult it is for political parties and campaigns to track down those who might support them, either with votes or money.
This year (an off year), over USD$4 Billion has been spent on political campaigns. This will likely be much, much more in 2016 (in 2012, USD$7 Billion was spent on political campaigns). FB wants their piece of the pie.
... More free stuff.
Lets assume we gave all the people in public housing 100 percent of everything they want/need free.
Have we encouraged them or given them the opportunities to better their lives?
Nope.
Public housing should be seen as a temporary solution to temporary problems in a person's life. That or permanent if someone is very disabled which most of the people in PHing are not.
People are raising SECOND generations of children in public housing. That is madness. Get these people out of public housing if they've been in it for more then a couple years.
That might mean encouraging them to leave big cities they can't afford to live in. Tough. If you're poor, why would you think you can afford to live in places with high costs of living?
PHing the way it is implemented is bad on so many levels. I almost don't know where to start with it.
Absolutely correct. There has to be another way. And of course there is. I'd like to propose a solution. A proposal for preventing the poor people in the United States from being a burden to their parents or country. It would also make them beneficial to the public at-large. I've posted my thoughts online for public comment. I think we should push ahead with due haste, don't you?
Is this why there are relatively few areas in the US where people with money send their kids to public schools? Is it likely that these people prefer an inferior education for their kids and are willing to shell out a lot of money for that while still paying taxes for superior educational services they have chosen not to use? Hmm... Sounds unlikely to me. My, admittedly limited, sample set of people I know who do choose to pay to send their kids to private school certainly don't do it because they are seeking an inferior education for their spawn.
That's strange, since 90% of elementary and secondary school students in the US are enrolled in public schools.
I know, dealing with facts is just so damned inconvenient when those facts contradict your biases. It's a shame, you were on a roll.
The upshot of this "deal" is that a bunch of pampered welfare recipients in NYC receive subsidies from other Comcast customers because NYC's wealthy political elite thinks it's a good idea: they can create and maintain a dependent class of voters and they don't even have to raise taxes for it.
And morons like you support this kind of corruption.
Pampered? Please explain how those on public assistance are, as you say, "pampered." I think not.
The devil's in the details, isn't it? If you go through my posts, I'm for ensuring everyone has access to internet, but against doing a lot of these things as long as the US doesn't have its undocumented (fuck PC... ILLEGAL) immigrant problem under control. Makes for a complicated problem, and that's why I'm not a politician, or even an activist. I'd just fuck it up.
I'm not sure how illegal immigrants fit into this discussion, since they aren't eligible for most Federalwelfare programs. Eligibility for state benefits varies from state to state. I suggest you educate yourself, friend.
That said, I pay more in property tax than a minimum salary worker makes pre-tax, and my wife and I together pay more income tax than the average household income in the US. The only "tax shelters" we have is our 401ks, and only real deductions are the property tax and mortgage interests (I guess I deduct my transit cards too...how greedy of me).
So that probably pays for my share?
Good for you. But that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand either. Are you complaining that you pay too much in taxes? Are you unhappy with how your tax dollars are spent? If so, these folks may be able to help.
Will you be writing a check Payable to NYC Housing dept ? Will you be writing a check Payable for DemCare Obamacare ? Will you be writing a check Payable for ObamaPhone BidenPhones ?
Not exactly. But close. If you don't want to do the same, revoke your American citizenship and GTFO, friend.
Basically, their votes are for sale to the highest bidder. Convince them that "the man" is keeping them down and tell them who the man is and they'll vote against him/her/it. Convince them that so-and-so is like them and will stand up for their rights and they'll vote so-and-so every time. Left unchecked, the combination of uninformed voters and unlimited political contributions will be the downfall of free societies.
An excellent point. It is the duty of citizens to vote their consciences. Since those who are elected are making decisions for us, we, as an electorate, need to educate ourselves in order to identify the right criminal^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H candidate for a given elective office. Unlimited political contributions fly in the face of this. It's rather depressing.
On a side note, what the hell kind of country allows people to vote without verifying they're eligible to do so and are who they claim to be? I don't know what kind of warped logic that comes from, but it's so stupid that other countries are (literally, I've seen in firsthand) laughing at us. If the problem is that somehow minorities and poor people "can't afford" to get and carry a picture ID, fix THAT problem, not some almost entirely unrelated symptom. Or better yet, work on fixing the even more fundamental problem of poverty rather than whining about how this and that specific thing are somehow "not fair" to poor people...
I don't know about where you live, but where I live there is most certainly a verification process. I must sign the election district register where there is *already* a sample of my signature. If they don't match, then it's not me. I won't be allowed to vote again either, since my signature is already recorded. That's plenty of verification for me.
The US government never owned the entire world in the first place.
That attitude is the single biggest reason there are terrorists.
The reason why Islamic terrorists have been attacking India for decades is "because USA"?
Actually, the British partition of India that is largely responsible for much of the strife in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Similar conclusions can be reached concerning the Allied (primarily British) carve-up of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, with respect to the fractious nature of nation-states in the Middle-East as well, if one deigns to read a little history.
It is called commandeering, and it does happen but not nearly as much as in the movies. And it is really more akin to car jacking.
Civil Forfeiture, anyone?
"There must be some kind of way out of here, said the joker to his feet"
Too many characters, contains an illegal character, doesn't contain a number.
Oh, absolutely. Because all password applications and databases have the same limitations and configuration, which can never be modified. Sigh.
log2(1,000,000) is only 19.9 bits. log2(100,000,000,000,000) is 46.5 bits.
An 8-character random password with upper/lower+numbers only has log2(62^8) = 47.6 bits. If you're serious about security, use something longer. A 16-character password has 95.3 bits.
tl;dr: Memorize a random 16-character password, and use it to to access your password vault of other 16-character random passwords.
Even better, pick some song lyrics as your password -- especially lyrics you have wrong inside your head. That way the password can be really long and extremely difficult to guess. Add in spaces and punctuation and it's even better:
would make an excellent password. And It's really easy to remember. Much easier than something akin to correcthorsebatterystaple
hunting for the cheapest price online is not how you fly for cheap :)
Of course not. Chuck Garabedian showed us the way:
At the same time, just modifying the PID is far from "destroying" the device. If FTDI's driver did something that actually did damage to the hardware, I might be more sympathetic. Let's say you take your car into a dealership and they flash the ECU so that the car won't start. No physical damage was done, so it's all good.
There's the rub. For your analogy to work, it would need to read something like this:
Let's say you take your car (a Honda, for example) into a dealership and they see that it's not actually a car manufactured by them, but a car that copied their designs and sells cheap knockoffs with 'Honda' written in all the right places, and change proprietary settings in the car electronics so that the car won't start. No physical damage was done, so it's all good.
No, it's not right and it shouldn't have happened. But caveat emptor.
Regardless of whether they were permanently 'bricked' or not, your initial comment was about 'technologically ignorant users' somehow 'requiring' them to support the fake product - the driver can simply refuse to work with the device.
Now, however, you take that 'technically ignorant user' who went out and bought say 3 x 4GB USB dongles that happened to have fake FTDI chips in them, unaware of that fact of course, who then copies his business critical data, say 3 years worth of work, onto all 3 of them (for safe keeping)... then his machine auto-updates his driver (because, again, he's a technically ignorant user) and suddenly he can't get to his data... in fact, again, technically ignorant, he tries all 3 dongles (if the first one fails, try the backup(s) right?).
Now, he can't even take them to another machine that maybe didn't get the driver update, or a Linux machine without the proprietary FTDI driver... sure, it's 'fixable' by him say paying an IT geek (a non-technically-ignorant person) to reprogram the USB ID, but that's a cost he is incurring because of what FTDI did to his devices. And that isn't to mention that perhaps he needed that data to bid on a potential $million contract with someone, on a deadline that he's now missed because of what FTDI did to 'damage' his devices.
He most certainly, if it can be proven that FTDI is *deliberately* breaking (even temporarily) the devices in question, has a good case for damages from FTDI.
Actually, what I said was:
Since (based on what you wrote) you misunderstood my statement, I'll explain. I make two points:
1. FTDI blundered badly (whether that bites them with legal action, we'll have to see) by having their driver reset the PIDs of counterfeited FTD232 chips to '0'.
2. Many folks posting on this thread (not you, BTW) seem to be making the argument that FTDI should somehow suck it up and support counterfeited chips with their drivers. That isn't the case, IMHO. Caveat emptor.
You pointed out that:
[emphasis added]
As TFA (and much of the discussion here) points out, the chip in question (FTD232) is a USB/Serial converter (UART) and isn't used for flash drives -- nor is the driver, so your example isn't realistic. Sure, modifying the PID will inconvenience users, but it doesn't put anyone's data at risk.
The updated driver modified the PID setting (to a value of '0') on hardware not manufactured by FTDI that was using FTDI's assigned VID/PID.
One more time: I do not think that FTDI did the right thing and I suspect it will come back to bite them in the ass. But FTDI did not damage anyone's hardware.
So you would have no problem at all if I secretly modified the EPROM data of your car's computer so that it no longer starts up? I haven't permanently broken your car you see, you should be perfectly capable of fixing the damage yourself if you can figure out what I did.
Is reading comprehension an issue for you? I said, and I quote:
Or is it just that you want to argue with someone?
car anlology time.
Its like you taking you car into a dealer them finding you got a oil change at a non-dealer mechanic so they brick engine control chips on your cars on board computer and saying its you problem you can fix it you just need to overhaul then engine to get at it and re flash the firmware and it will work fine. So its not broken even though it won't start and requires special equipment and non trivial time money and knowledge to fix.
for all intents and purposes it is broken and they are responsible for breaking it
You know, I was thinking of using a similar analogy myself. However, the analogy just doesn't fit, so I bagged the idea.
A better analogy would be that you bought a car from a dealer who claimed it was a Ford, but when you took it in to the actual Ford dealership, they checked and found that it was a Yugo (yes, I'm old) masquerading as a Ford.
Under those circumstances, it makes no sense to get all butthurt that Ford won't service the car -- they didn't produce it.
Whether or not the Ford dealer has the right to remove any logos or other identifiers (like the USB PID) that make the Yugo look like a Ford is another question. And the answer is probably not, IMHO. But that doesn't mean Ford needs to service such a vehicle, does it?
Nobody could complain if they simply went and made their driver incompatible with the forged chips. If there is no working driver, then the customer would have to complain with the original maker of the hardware and demand a working driver. That's quite within FTDI's rights.
The point is that they attack the firmware of the device involved, which is by no accounts ok anymore. This isn't locking out a competitor, it's destruction of a competitor's hardware. Yes, that competitor didn't act correctly by trying to get a free ride. No doubt about that. By that logic, though, it's just a-ok for any printer maker to trash the printer (e.g. by hosing it with printer ink) should they detect that you use anything but their overpriced original stuff.
We are clearly in agreement here except on a single point: changing the PID is neither attacking the firmware nor damaging the hardware. After a PID change, the hardware (and firmware) is still functional -- as long as either some driver can recognize it or the PID is reset to a valid ID.
It may be that FTDI was unable (or unwilling) to find a way for their driver to stop supporting the counterfeited chips, so they just removed the mask (the PID) on the chip that claimed the counterfeits were genuine. That's not damaging the hardware or the firmware, merely modifying an embedded setting.
All that said, FTDI's actions were not appropriate -- and they will likely end up paying for it in the court of public opinion. However, FTDI's driver did not damage or harm the chips themselves -- and they certainly weren't (as some here have claimed) "bricked."
I didn't say it was fair. In fact, I said it was rather underhanded. That said, the manufacturer should provide a driver for their hardware. But that would require more work than just copying someone else's design, wouldn't it?
Given that FTDI invested in the R&D to design the chip and write the driver, I would expect that they should be able to decide if they want their driver to work with chips made by other manufacturers.
I'll say it again. FTDI went about this the wrong way, but just as ignorance of the law isn't a defense, a consumer's ignorance of technology shouldn't require a manufacturer to support those who steal their designs and profit from them.
I tell you what, go ahead and develop a new device and start selling it. I'll copy your design and sell it for 25% of your price, and instruct users to install your software for the device. If you make any attempt to stop me with your software, I'll blame you and suggest you be sued. Sound good?
I'll say it one more time -- FTDI went about this the wrong way.
Their driver should just ignore any device that it can detect as counterfeit and produce an error suggesting that the user contact the actual manufacturer for a driver. Assuming there is no such driver, then the consumer is hosed.
Since the common customer will have no idea that it can be done (or how), it is for all purposes *bricked*. Guess who the customer will blame? the manufacturer, not the counterfeiter. So basically FTDI is harming legitimate manufacturers. Hope they get sued into oblivion for that...
If these manufacturers are legitimate, why are they forcing their customers to use a third-party driver from FTDI?
Cut the crap, FTDI modifies the chips in such a way as to not work with any drivers, not just theirs. They are breaking them. Willfully and maliciously.
As I said, it was rather underhanded. However, they are not breaking anything. The device is still fully functional, but won't work with drivers that were made for the real chips.
If you have a problem, contact the actual chip manufacturer or someone along the supply chain to where you purchased the counterfeit and ask for their driver.
What? The manufacturer didn't expend any resources in creating drivers for the chips they manufactured? Sounds like a pretty crappy manufacturer. Perhaps you should use hardware that has drivers instead, no?
So FTDI is pissed that counterfeiters are using FTDI PIDs in their counterfeit chips so that the counterfeit chips get the benefit of FTDI drivers. I certainly sympathize with their gripe there. So FTDI is saying, "Don't use our PID" and setting the PIDs to 0 in counterfeit chips.
My guess is that FTDI didn't really think through the implications of that, that setting a PDI of 0 would brick the chip. What they should have done is just set the PID to some generic USB CDC serial port so that the counterfeit chips would no longer use the FTDI driver and would no longer show ups as FTDI chips to the OS.
This very could have been more of an "oops, sorry about that dude" than an "I KILL YOUR CHIP NOW! MOOHAHAHHA!"
Except the chip wasn't, as you put it, "killed." The chip is still fully functional with a driver that will support it. That FTDI doesn't want to support counterfeited chips with the driver it developed for the real article is reasonable.
Why should FTDI support chips it didn't make?
Um, no. They're intentionally modifying the device ID on the counterfeit chip so it will no longer work. The average consumer will have no idea this is what's wrong or how to recover. While this isn't necessarily destruction of property, it IS (in the US) a federal hacking crime because it is causing the victim to lose access to their device and/or data.
As I previously mentioned, no real damage is done to the hardware. Various tools are available to resolve the issue and the device itself is not damaged.
That said, this will likely produce a nasty backlash against FTDI, as they went about this the wrong way.
At the same time, resetting the PID points up the counterfeit chip without any ambiguity. I guess that was the point.
Intentional and willful destruction of another person's property for the base reason that he didn't buy with you but with your competitor? I don't know about your country, but over here in socialist Europe we have consumer protection laws that deserve that name.
I would say that modifying the PID on the chip is pretty far from "intentional and willful destruction." From one of the comments in the support board posting masquerading as TFA:
And
While it is rather underhanded, had FTDI done this the *correct* way and just interrogated the chip and refused to work with a fake, this would be a non-story. At the same time, just modifying the PID is far from "destroying" the device. If FTDI's driver did something that actually did damage to the hardware, I might be more sympathetic. That's not to say that I think FTDI did the right thing, just that the did not actually damage or "brick" anything. The device isn't broken, it just needs to have its PID reset. Once that happens (and I guess that's what FTDI was trying to do), the end user will be painfully aware that they have a counterfeit chip.
As I said, poorly executed and likely to cause some backlash, but no hardware is damaged or destroyed. Unless you're an idiot.
Because throwing your kids' lives into turmoil is the better course? For some people quietly cheating is a better option, believe it or not, many marriages survive affairs and are still rated as average to above.
Children are not oblivious. They can tell when there are problems in their parents' relationship. What sort of relationship role models are parents who have really dysfunctional relationships? They give a really horrible idea about what romantic relationships *should* be to the children exposed to them.
That's not to say (for all the not-so-deep thinkers out there) that a couple should split up at the first signs of problems, but when it becomes clear that the issues in the relationship are intractable, staying together "for the children" is not only dumb, it may well be harmful to the children later in life.
After all, marriage implies consent to sexual relations.
Eh? Not so much. Consent is the only thing that implies consent to sexual relations, nothing else does. Marriage does *not*.
Marriage is a contract which *may* acknowledge a sexual relationship, but that contract is not consent to sexual relations.
Consent is not optional, friend. Non-consensual sex is rape, regardless of those involved.