OK, so what is your guess what happened? Apart from some rather good cartoons there is little *real* data available.
I'm uncomfortable with accepting that experienced pilots do not pick up on comms. What if there was an emergency? If they WERE in the cockpit, what are the changes they really, really didn't hear calls?
Most of the comments appear to assume that "it must have been in the EULA somewhere".
Well, I may be different to most - I READ THOSE. That's why I will never uise Google services - check out their Terms of Service, point 11.
So, bottomline, every comment that states "you have probably agreed to this" - sorry, I explicitly haven't. The Java plugin I knew about, and so for all the others. *Not* so for the MS breach of my computer.
If you find a EULA that states differently I'd like to read it - I have not find a single reference to this plug-in, so the MS apology is not "mea culpa", it's more like Sony: "sh*t, someone caught us".
What happened since? The consultants moved in. Just in case you missed it, an Open solution doesn't bring in half as much money and customer lock in as proprietary solutions, so the door was thrown wide open to Microsoft based IT. "Come in, all is forgiven, we've relegated those nasty sandal wearing people to some unimportant jobs. Now, what were you saying about a nice position after I retire again? What? Naah, we don't need to to save money, it's TAXpayer's money. As long as we can sell a halfway plausible reason which it's not Open we'll be OK. Something like "not ready for industrial use" or something will do, I'm sure you can cook up some feasibility studies that "prove" that. We'll be nice to each other, won't we? Got any retiring people we can stick in the audit commission?
I'm glad the administration is showing signs of intelligence here, but it's a mighty strong lobby..
No, just put a bridge rectifier over the bus load contacts (a fat one, it's going to handle a serious amount of current). It means you wouldn't even need to worry about which way round the connections are wired up, but you'll have a voltage drop over the diodes (you could also use one diode, but that would mean it would simply not load when connections are wrong).
Having said that, I would like to see an ultracapacitor go "bang" - that's a lot of energy to release in one go..
Alternatively, you may just end up with a bus driving backwards:-)
Umm, you never had the chance to reject the.Net plugin - it was installed surreptitiously.
What's more, it was installed in such a way that uninstalling it was a lot of hard work. As the specs are very clearly available on how to write a *decent* plugin with proper uninstall capabilities I cannot assume this to be an accident.
Ergo, it's malicious to me.
As for other installs, yes, there too I have some issues but they alow at least a degree of control. Still not good enough, but better than the MS approach.
At least the thing now has an uninstall button, but I think Mozilla fist did the right thing, and now the questionable thing. Oh well, at least it brought this rubbish on the radar again.
Yup, saw it happen too on a machine I don't use often in Windows (the ones with Windows only had this thing removed the moment it appeared).
Now, the plugin was installed without consent, nor was there a way to remove it, and it exposed the end user to risk. Ergo, this plugin thus violates computing laws in most countries - if it's illegal for Sony to rootkit your system it should be illegal for MS to add something to software that it didn't make.
I am thus quite surprised that I haven't heard any class action suits for this - I guess it's patch fatigue setting in..
Anyone else an explanation why that plugin avoided legal consequences?
Yeah, I heard that too. It's time I start playing with some high brightness IR LEDs. Hell, you could even spell "idiots" and they wouldn't be able to do anything - it's not illegal to carry a battery and a bunch of LEDs. I don't care if there's piracy or not, I don't have some bork staring at me with nightvision kit, especially since those people are not subject to any vetting.
Could be quite fun to complain about possible child harassment - let's see them explain themselves to the police. "I'm not a pedo, I watch pirates". "Certainly sir, we would expect that when playing Pirates of the Caribian. If you would be so kind to step this way"..
I'm not convinced it's "just" corporations abusing the system. The rot starts at the top. When politicians dial back reasonable rights, accountability, transparency, privacy and the separation between state and justice, companies generally follow in that wake and abuse as much as they can. Companies are there to make money, and ethics won't come into this unless they become a route to revenue.
Granted, the RIAA has been very creative (and is IMHO *preventing* revenue - different debate) but the likes of Enron and the Wall Street crash are also a consequence.
Fixing the issue thus requires starting at the top or you'll fight symptoms, not causes. Having said that, sometimes that's all you can do until the upper problem is corrected. There's no point weaning someone off smoking if you don't take care of the cancers already present..
If they code up some wedgeware between an Open Source project and the client, that's the end of project revenue for them. If, instead, they code the whole show from scratch, guess who makes money on the maintenance?
The name of the game is *always* about what makes most money for the consulting company, and how they can hang on to the available budget. Only if the CLIENT specifies what has to be supplied you can get Open Source involved, but if you're capable to spec in such a way that they can't rip you off with change control you might as well use contractors at half the price.
Peter Sellers was actually the Godfather of my later stepfather-in-law, who also had a brilliant sense of humour. What I remember best about my stepfather was his full control of the English language, not only in his word-perfect BBC accent but also in the humour he could stack into a sentence without changing the "top level" meaning - I don't think any other language but English can carry so much extra meaning in depth (which makes it a nightmare for contracts:-)). I really miss him:-(.
A slight side effect was that I ended up studying this period a bit, so here's the part of the post you didn't get (slightly amended):
It started all with work of the Goons (Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Harry Secombe) and there was somewhat of an explosion of comedy in the years of the Cambridge Footlights when people like Stephen Fry And Tony Slattery created pieces that shall forever stand tall in history (I leave you to ponder that one, grin) -- do a YouTube search for "The letter, Stephen Fry" for a taste. For those that like the series "House", you may be surprised to discover that Hugh Laurie was actually a rather accomplished, multi-talented comedian as well, look for "A bit of Fry and Laurie", especially "Your name". A bit of a warning, here, some of it is NSFW (especially "the pre-coital agreement" discussion is only suitable for those that actually have a sense of humour) - comedians were relentlessly taking the mickey out of the then prevalent puritanism (something I think we need to do again for political correctness).
And then the Monty Python gang got together (I think this is right chronologically, but I'm happy to be corrected). The first airing of Monty Python was on October 5th, 1969, which means today it's 40 years old. Almost everything they did is now in some form or another on YouTube, so go and enjoy it. Look for the dead parrot sketch, the argument clinic, the ministry of silly walks etc etc. The list is almost as endless as the period before.
It was irreverent, sometimes utterly bizarre but always entertaining and - most importantly - intelligent (check out the colleges these people came from). It was IMHO one of the crowning achievements of the BBC that they supported comedy almost from the first instance (AFAIK this is also how the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy got its first public presence).
AFAIK this is part of one of the SSH blocker efforts, DenyHosts. I found you need to change the window failed attacks are detected in as the people trying to break in appear aware of the current default (at least, that's what my logfiles appeared to suggest).
However, there are more things you can do, and I agree that just changing port numbers makes an enormous difference.
That the shop appears to be dishonest in its representation is one thing, but we're also hearing of a product that was "terrible".
So the questions I would have is:
1) what was the product (make & type)? 2) what made it "terrible" for you? 3) is there anything the manufacturer can do to make it more acceptable (thus get at least some progress out of this saga)?
The moment the product & type is known one can do some searching for other reviews, and with an indication of what didn't work for you someone can judge if this matters to them or not (even if they don't buy from Overclockers).
Anyway, well done for kickstarting the Streisand effect:-)
As simple LEDs use next to nothing in the way of power, why isn't it possible to make something that picks up WiFi energy and powers an LED with it? It's been a while since I played with radio (decades, actually), but it can't be that hard. If we're walking around in 1200 Watt of broadcast power of which 90% I personally didn't ask fr I think it may be fun to use it for other purposes.
A WiFi powered torch strikes as an interesting idea. As you can now get 1F capacitors you don't even need to be in the field all the time..
On the plus side, the least sensible place to carry a phone happens to also filter out that habit in the future in a sort of Darwinistic fashion (if we indeed have a radiation problem): trouser pocket..
On that topic, my problem is that pagers do not work internationally, otherwise I would not expect an iPhone to be delivered tomorrow..:-)
MS, the company that makes code that is so deficient it's a wide open door to virus infections, stops people that use an illegal copy (or simply refuse to allow WGA on their system for reasons that really don't need repeating) to download the software that is alleged (not proven yet) to make the system more secure. Thus, of course, exposing those that play by MS' rules exclusively.
Hello WGdA (Windows Genuine disAdvantage), your makers found a new way to ram it down people's throat. Not sure it will work, because at least the anti.virus market will still have somewhat longer to live. Expect MS to buy one of them soon.
You know, I also use Linux. Seems a safer bet day by day. Hell, I may even buy a Mac..
Yes, I'm in the "let them have it" camp. Botnets are made out of unsecured systems.
Correct. And you can decide if you want to share free of get a kickback. If you share for free you are also entitled to access all other FON nodes in the world, if you share for a revenue share you have to pay. Pretty fair model IMHO.
However, I'm unhappy with a node on my personal network where someone can change code on the fly, which is why I took it offline a while back.
That's a new definition of "best", I think. Anyone worth its salt would have avoided participation in this nauseating crap.
To me, it smacks of a marketing exec who's seen some powerpoint slide that states that viral marketing works. Not understanding the concept, that ad was the result.
Look at the bright side: this is bound to win an award. Just not a positive one.
Slashdot Mirror
OK, so what is your guess what happened? Apart from some rather good cartoons there is little *real* data available.
I'm uncomfortable with accepting that experienced pilots do not pick up on comms. What if there was an emergency? If they WERE in the cockpit, what are the changes they really, really didn't hear calls?
Whatever happened, it wasn't good.
Let me amend this question.
Most of the comments appear to assume that "it must have been in the EULA somewhere".
Well, I may be different to most - I READ THOSE. That's why I will never uise Google services - check out their Terms of Service, point 11.
So, bottomline, every comment that states "you have probably agreed to this" - sorry, I explicitly haven't. The Java plugin I knew about, and so for all the others. *Not* so for the MS breach of my computer.
If you find a EULA that states differently I'd like to read it - I have not find a single reference to this plug-in, so the MS apology is not "mea culpa", it's more like Sony: "sh*t, someone caught us".
AFAIK you have to apply the laws and processes of the Swiss canton your business is registered in (IANAL).
What MS appears to do is be registered in Zug, yet use the cantonal laws of, say, Basel Stadt for any court cases.
November 1999, Slashdot interview with "the Queen's webmaster".
What happened since? The consultants moved in. Just in case you missed it, an Open solution doesn't bring in half as much money and customer lock in as proprietary solutions, so the door was thrown wide open to Microsoft based IT. "Come in, all is forgiven, we've relegated those nasty sandal wearing people to some unimportant jobs. Now, what were you saying about a nice position after I retire again? What? Naah, we don't need to to save money, it's TAXpayer's money. As long as we can sell a halfway plausible reason which it's not Open we'll be OK. Something like "not ready for industrial use" or something will do, I'm sure you can cook up some feasibility studies that "prove" that. We'll be nice to each other, won't we? Got any retiring people we can stick in the audit commission?
I'm glad the administration is showing signs of intelligence here, but it's a mighty strong lobby..
No, just put a bridge rectifier over the bus load contacts (a fat one, it's going to handle a serious amount of current). It means you wouldn't even need to worry about which way round the connections are wired up, but you'll have a voltage drop over the diodes (you could also use one diode, but that would mean it would simply not load when connections are wrong).
Having said that, I would like to see an ultracapacitor go "bang" - that's a lot of energy to release in one go..
Alternatively, you may just end up with a bus driving backwards :-)
Umm, you never had the chance to reject the .Net plugin - it was installed surreptitiously.
What's more, it was installed in such a way that uninstalling it was a lot of hard work. As the specs are very clearly available on how to write a *decent* plugin with proper uninstall capabilities I cannot assume this to be an accident.
Ergo, it's malicious to me.
As for other installs, yes, there too I have some issues but they alow at least a degree of control. Still not good enough, but better than the MS approach.
At least the thing now has an uninstall button, but I think Mozilla fist did the right thing, and now the questionable thing. Oh well, at least it brought this rubbish on the radar again.
Yup, saw it happen too on a machine I don't use often in Windows (the ones with Windows only had this thing removed the moment it appeared).
Now, the plugin was installed without consent, nor was there a way to remove it, and it exposed the end user to risk. Ergo, this plugin thus violates computing laws in most countries - if it's illegal for Sony to rootkit your system it should be illegal for MS to add something to software that it didn't make.
I am thus quite surprised that I haven't heard any class action suits for this - I guess it's patch fatigue setting in..
Anyone else an explanation why that plugin avoided legal consequences?
"But Microsoft, which bears at least part of the responsibility for the mistake, is paying the price with its reputation"
Just out of curiosity, what reputation might that be? :-)
No. "Blub" doesn't work as a ping signal :-)
Yeah, I heard that too. It's time I start playing with some high brightness IR LEDs. Hell, you could even spell "idiots" and they wouldn't be able to do anything - it's not illegal to carry a battery and a bunch of LEDs. I don't care if there's piracy or not, I don't have some bork staring at me with nightvision kit, especially since those people are not subject to any vetting.
Could be quite fun to complain about possible child harassment - let's see them explain themselves to the police. "I'm not a pedo, I watch pirates". "Certainly sir, we would expect that when playing Pirates of the Caribian. If you would be so kind to step this way"..
Morons, the lot of them.
I'm not convinced it's "just" corporations abusing the system. The rot starts at the top. When politicians dial back reasonable rights, accountability, transparency, privacy and the separation between state and justice, companies generally follow in that wake and abuse as much as they can. Companies are there to make money, and ethics won't come into this unless they become a route to revenue.
Granted, the RIAA has been very creative (and is IMHO *preventing* revenue - different debate) but the likes of Enron and the Wall Street crash are also a consequence.
Fixing the issue thus requires starting at the top or you'll fight symptoms, not causes. Having said that, sometimes that's all you can do until the upper problem is corrected. There's no point weaning someone off smoking if you don't take care of the cancers already present..
Apologies for rambling - I'll go to bed now :-)
.. you'd get confusion: is this person already dead or it is still the BSOD glow?
Open Source is not interesting for a consultancy.
If they code up some wedgeware between an Open Source project and the client, that's the end of project revenue for them. If, instead, they code the whole show from scratch, guess who makes money on the maintenance?
The name of the game is *always* about what makes most money for the consulting company, and how they can hang on to the available budget. Only if the CLIENT specifies what has to be supplied you can get Open Source involved, but if you're capable to spec in such a way that they can't rip you off with change control you might as well use contractors at half the price.
Follow the money.
Peter Sellers was actually the Godfather of my later stepfather-in-law, who also had a brilliant sense of humour. What I remember best about my stepfather was his full control of the English language, not only in his word-perfect BBC accent but also in the humour he could stack into a sentence without changing the "top level" meaning - I don't think any other language but English can carry so much extra meaning in depth (which makes it a nightmare for contracts :-)). I really miss him :-(.
A slight side effect was that I ended up studying this period a bit, so here's the part of the post you didn't get (slightly amended):
It started all with work of the Goons (Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Harry Secombe) and there was somewhat of an explosion of comedy in the years of the Cambridge Footlights when people like Stephen Fry And Tony Slattery created pieces that shall forever stand tall in history (I leave you to ponder that one, grin) -- do a YouTube search for "The letter, Stephen Fry" for a taste. For those that like the series "House", you may be surprised to discover that Hugh Laurie was actually a rather accomplished, multi-talented comedian as well, look for "A bit of Fry and Laurie", especially "Your name". A bit of a warning, here, some of it is NSFW (especially "the pre-coital agreement" discussion is only suitable for those that actually have a sense of humour) - comedians were relentlessly taking the mickey out of the then prevalent puritanism (something I think we need to do again for political correctness).
And then the Monty Python gang got together (I think this is right chronologically, but I'm happy to be corrected). The first airing of Monty Python was on October 5th, 1969, which means today it's 40 years old. Almost everything they did is now in some form or another on YouTube, so go and enjoy it. Look for the dead parrot sketch, the argument clinic, the ministry of silly walks etc etc. The list is almost as endless as the period before.
It was irreverent, sometimes utterly bizarre but always entertaining and - most importantly - intelligent (check out the colleges these people came from). It was IMHO one of the crowning achievements of the BBC that they supported comedy almost from the first instance (AFAIK this is also how the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy got its first public presence).
Let's hope we can preserve this ..
AFAIK this is part of one of the SSH blocker efforts, DenyHosts. I found you need to change the window failed attacks are detected in as the people trying to break in appear aware of the current default (at least, that's what my logfiles appeared to suggest).
However, there are more things you can do, and I agree that just changing port numbers makes an enormous difference.
That the shop appears to be dishonest in its representation is one thing, but we're also hearing of a product that was "terrible".
So the questions I would have is:
1) what was the product (make & type)?
2) what made it "terrible" for you?
3) is there anything the manufacturer can do to make it more acceptable (thus get at least some progress out of this saga)?
The moment the product & type is known one can do some searching for other reviews, and with an indication of what didn't work for you someone can judge if this matters to them or not (even if they don't buy from Overclockers).
Anyway, well done for kickstarting the Streisand effect :-)
As simple LEDs use next to nothing in the way of power, why isn't it possible to make something that picks up WiFi energy and powers an LED with it? It's been a while since I played with radio (decades, actually), but it can't be that hard. If we're walking around in 1200 Watt of broadcast power of which 90% I personally didn't ask fr I think it may be fun to use it for other purposes.
A WiFi powered torch strikes as an interesting idea. As you can now get 1F capacitors you don't even need to be in the field all the time..
Congrats, you're one of the more sensible people.
On the plus side, the least sensible place to carry a phone happens to also filter out that habit in the future in a sort of Darwinistic fashion (if we indeed have a radiation problem): trouser pocket..
On that topic, my problem is that pagers do not work internationally, otherwise I would not expect an iPhone to be delivered tomorrow.. :-)
So, where exactly do you wear your mobile phone? Does that location change?
MS, the company that makes code that is so deficient it's a wide open door to virus infections, stops people that use an illegal copy (or simply refuse to allow WGA on their system for reasons that really don't need repeating) to download the software that is alleged (not proven yet) to make the system more secure. Thus, of course, exposing those that play by MS' rules exclusively.
Hello WGdA (Windows Genuine disAdvantage), your makers found a new way to ram it down people's throat. Not sure it will work, because at least the anti.virus market will still have somewhat longer to live. Expect MS to buy one of them soon.
You know, I also use Linux. Seems a safer bet day by day. Hell, I may even buy a Mac..
Yes, I'm in the "let them have it" camp. Botnets are made out of unsecured systems.
I think you could also include DWI: Driving While an Idiot.
Would help preventing a lot of accidents as the roads would be considerably emptier :-)
Correct. And you can decide if you want to share free of get a kickback. If you share for free you are also entitled to access all other FON nodes in the world, if you share for a revenue share you have to pay. Pretty fair model IMHO.
However, I'm unhappy with a node on my personal network where someone can change code on the fly, which is why I took it offline a while back.
They hire one of the best comedians
That's a new definition of "best", I think. Anyone worth its salt would have avoided participation in this nauseating crap.
To me, it smacks of a marketing exec who's seen some powerpoint slide that states that viral marketing works. Not understanding the concept, that ad was the result.
Look at the bright side: this is bound to win an award. Just not a positive one.
Fact checking and due diligence. Spreadsheets in XLS format. Fail.
Next. :-)