"Will there come a point where I have to write a notice on the front page of my site that it contains no third-party advertising and/or banner ads... and that anything that might appear of that nature on the page was not put there by me?"
I intend to put this notice into my sites:
"This site contains no advertising. If you see any advertising, that is because your browser client is placing them there. This site does not endorse any of these advertisers, and questions the integrity of products/services that would steal space without compensation on a noncommercial wensite.
If you wish to experience this site with no ads, as the author intended, use Mozilla http://www.mozilla.org, as your browser client. "
I'm thinking that we can use this invasive marketing (which will piss off even Joe 6pack) as an opportunity to sell the average user on Mozilla, the first, and ONLY cross-platform browser designed to give the USER control of his internet.
IE and Netscape lack Mozilla's controls because MS and AOL have no desire to lock THEMSELVES out of doing the same things if they wish to.
The more over the line the marketers go, the more likely it is that people will go out of their way to avoid them. Installing Mozilla isn't that hard of a way to avoid them.
" This kind of stuff has got to stop. I own my computer. I'm not leasing it from anybody, it's a physical product and I own it. And I'll be damned if I want people smuggling their parasite-ware onto my pc, to make money from bandwidth I am paying for. When's this going to stop?"
It's getting all the more common. For example, you can't even install some hardware anymore without getting adware... Creative Labs pretty much has a monopoly in sound cards (ever since they sued Aureal into extinction with a frivilous lawsuit that Creative lost). Installing the drivers (which aren't packaged as drivers, you have to run their installer, NOT just install the drivers) you get a trojan called "newsupd" which tracks your browser AND sends you ads.
My guess is that this sort of thing will only get more common, particularly as two companies (NVidia and Creative) have a virtual lock on the medium/high-end sound and video segments of the PC.
What is most offensive is how these massive corporations don't even give us the dignity of dealing with us as CUSTOMERS. No, they see us as sheep to be mined again by marketers, just for USING the product that we bought!
If adware hardware was cheaper to buy BECAUSE of the spyware/adware it has in it, then I might have less of a problem with it. But, in the case of sound cards, it's clearly not, as the SB Live! (which has not advanced any in 3 years other than adding some minor bells and whistles) hasn't really gone down any in price in the same period.
When you consider that harware always gets cheaper to make as it gets older in design, Creative obviously is using it's monopoly to fatten profit margins at their customer's expense. The Newsupd trojan only being another part of it.
I'd guess that NVidia will soon do the same thing with the GeForce, now that 3DFx is dead. In fact, I'd imagine that their marketing departments will be looking into this new web-defacing adware.
After all, corporations have no morals other than profit, and marketers have even fewer morals.
I think you make some points... This is a clear violation of copyright. There might have been some gray area for MS's smartlinks, which didn't alter the content in any way other than to put links on "keywords" to MS pages or to paid customers of MS.
That was bad enough, particularly for those who have anti-MS pages, it amounts to rape.
But this is even worse... This "technology" completely alters your page, and even uses it like part of their site. It strips out your own links replacing it with the marketers. This is something that likely can't be protected by "fair use", as it's likely something that the marketdroids can't get permission to do from the end user.
Certainly the big sites will sue, as will the OTHER marketing companies.
As far as I'm concerned, marketers who are as offensive as these clowns DESERVE to have the sharks unleased on them. Which will happen. That is, until a MS or AOL buys them...
"A split might not hurt (3-way, preferably), nor would opening Windows."
The only kind of split that would both leave MS free to do what they want with their products, AND would eliminate the monopoly would be to split them off vertically (ie, create a minimum of 3 "baby bill's").
Each "baby bill" would have full rights to all current MS IP and trademarks, as well as an equal share of all money, facilities and employees.
They'd not be permitted to cooperate in any way (they'd all have to pay user fees to an oversight board that would monitor this). They'd only be able to cooperate thru industry standards groups (which set open standards any company can use).
I see this as the ONLY way to actually punish MS, and to prevent them from continuing their "innovative" embrace, extend, extinguish business model, as no one of the "baby bills" can stray too much from current API, file formats, etc, or risk becoming incompatible...
Not to mention that no one "baby bill" could have the control over OEM licensing, and price as MS currently does.
" You might be surprised at how many beta testers worked on it, and how stable it is. Of course, you may never use it, but if you ever have to touch a windows machine again, pray that it's XP..."
I have beta tested the server version of it (at work). And, it's so far been stable, though completely unexciting (rather than the retard GUI). XP server is not any different than 2000 server. In fact, the installer even looks identical except the change in name.
The activation problem though, will likely hurt it's chances of success on server platforms. What network admin in his right MIND wants to put an OS on the server that requires activation, and will quit working altogether if there is ever a problem with the date/time on the motherboard's RTC (I saw this happen), and that will be the "final" arbiter of what hardware change to your server is "too much" and quit?
In other words, there isn't anything on the server side AT ALL to recommend it over 2000, and quite alot against it. Compared to 2000 Server, XP Server is a loss, not a gain.
This will do little to persuade users and recent users of NT Server (who have finally begun moving to 2000) to upgrade again, or to chose XP over 2000 Server. Which is why I expect MS to make availability of 2000 Server scarce quickly after the XP server products are released. Which could end up biting them in the ass.
In their lust to lock everyone into.NET and their rental scheme, MS may have just destroyed their chance to actually get into the enterprise server market.
"You don't think Microsoft's going to keep throwing away money at innovative new products once they've destroyed all competitors and locked customers into a subscription contract, do you?"
There are already examples of this. For instance, IE hasn't seen ONE major "innovation" since IE 4.0. IE 5.x and 6 HARDLY qualify as "major" upgrades from 4.x, certainly nothing on the order of the quantum leap jumps from the pathetic 1.x to the less pathetic 2.x to the useable 3.x, to the groundbreaking 4.x... Mozilla, in that it's the first browser designed for USERS (instead of marketers), in that it has ad blocking and a useful system for refusing cookies, is ahead of IE in the "innovation" department. So is Konqueror.
Likewise for Office. The last "major" new Office was `97. Y2K and now XP have only had superficial (bloat) added to them. XP's only "innovation" is the rental scheme and activation. Not to mention that Office XP won't run on Windows `95, for the simple reason that MS wants to force the remaining businesses that use `95 desktops to upgrade.
Windows XP is a similar product... In terms of "innovation" it's no more advanced (except in bloat) than Windows 2000. It's main purpose is to get ".net" and activation into the PC.
In many, MANY ways, except in rudeness, MS is right now a VERY stagnant company. They've not released a single groundbreaking product in years (the last, IMO, being Windows 2000), and since then have had nothing new to add except bloat, superficial GUI "enhancements", and the fascism of forced product activation (the worst being that Windows XP will itself decide whether to "allow" you to upgrade certain parts of your PC).
Even left to itself, MS has failed to keep up with the marketplace, which in itself gives you some hope, even if the government fails to punish them (the fact that this judge is a Clinton appointee is not encouraging, Clinton's judges (ahem) Lewis Kaplan (ahem) haven't had a very good track record in ruling against corporations. MS has failed to capture the enterprise (outside the desktop), and has seen the Unix market largely migrate to Linux and Sun.
"i have a quick question. would something like pgp work to stop this snooping garbage? just have the data encrypted when you send it to people, and then no one can snoop, right?"
Yes, it would. But are there any FTP sites, etc, who transmit/receive in PGP? I doubt it. On the bright side, this sort of crap is JUST the thing to incentivise the OSS/FS community to come up with such a thing.
The harder the IP cartel swings the hammer, the thicker people will armor themselves.
Though I agree with WHAT they are doing, I'm not in agreement with HOW they are doing it.
Simply put, a government should not be in the business of breaking the law. That is inherantly DANGERIOUS. What is to stop them from breaking other laws to supress someone, "in the public good"?
What Brazil should do is pass and impliment a new law that limits the scope and duration of ALL patents, and provide for mandatory non-exclusive licensing of all patents. But it should apply to ALL patents, foreign and domestic, equally and without discrimination.
The patent holder SHOULD be compensated. But it should be reasonable. To not compensate them at all IS theft, this time on a grand government scale. That is reprehensible.
To do it the way they are doing it is to set a dangerous legal precedent for their own citizens, and to discourage any further development of drugs and technology for their benefit.
If a farmer grew food, only to have the government come and steal what it wants when it wants to (against the law), the farmer would be less likely to care about how much he grows, or worse, to give up the business (because he couldn't even feed his own family). This ultimately hurts both the government and the people. This is one reason why communist/collectivism has failed every time and everywhere it's been tried.
"As far as how I feel -- I'm happy to be back in my car without having to break a window, and GM does not care that a locksmith opened my car.
"
Using the "logic" of the DMCA, your parents are guilty of creating a "circumvention device" because you have fists which can break that window and thus, by-pass the lock.
A ridiculous example, but we need to hypothesize extreme uses of such types of law so as to illustrate the absurdity. The DMCA, if let stand will NOT be the last such law.
"At least Canada has a history of socialism, which makes it a bit more likely to look out for Joe Public. Not that it makes a *lot* of difference, what with the crooks in government."
This will be Canada's undoing as well. A socialistic government is already stealing from others to give away goodies to you. Where is the moral difference between using force of a gun to steal from someone, and using the force of government (also a gun) to steal from someone?
A government powerful enough to give things to you also has the power to take away from you. I prefer a government, such as that under the US Constitution, that DENIES such power to the government. Unfortunately, the US Constitution has been given but bare lip service for many years now, and the DMCA is one result.
Ergo, the MORE socialistic (ie, like Canada in your view) the US has become, the MORE authoritarian and powerful the government has become. Which, in turn, corrupts it and allows corps to buy what they want. Face it, the welfare state takes a lot of cash to run, corps have the cash to keep it running, and in turn, gets a disporportionate amount of leverage as a result.
Shrink the government, make it live within the law (Constitution), and you will have less corruption.
" Before Stallman got involved with the KDE issue, it was closed sourced. Do you want all of your apps to include closed source code that can'y be fixed or improved. Now Gt is GPLed. I think the Linux world is a better place for it."
Wrong. KDE was never closed source, neither was QT. In fact, KDE was always GPL even. The only issue was a technicality in the licensing.
It's true that his stubborness might have led to them releasing QT under the GPL, but it was done at the cost of setting Linux on the desktop back years. X-Windows isn't GPL either, but I don't hear Stallman declaring war on them.
" Fascism is the only way to enforce IP laws. They must have control over what you see and what you download. In other words, the government is going to be spying on you big time, not a little bit like before. The FTAA is also a way for the have nations to economically dominate (i.e., enslave) the have-nots since most IP in the western world is owned by Europe and North America."
You make an excellent point. Fascism is on the rise worldwide, though most of the world has ALWAYS been non-free, elective republics being only a recent phenomenon largely condfined to the Western world. And even there, most of the West didn't become democratic until after World War II, only 50 years ago or so.
History shows that most republics don't last more than 30 generations, the United States being in fact, the LONGEST lasting one. However, given the increasing despotic and authoritarian nature of the US government, I believe an argument can be made that we've already crossed the line into fascism. If we haven't crossed, we're percariously balanced on the edge.
As I've stated before, I believe the US has been becoming less free since 1933, when our first "king" came in to power (FDR) and single handedly removed all Constitutional restraint on the federal government. All in the name of "empowering government to do more FOR you".
Well, as you know, everything works both ways, a government that can do things FOR you, has equal power to do things TO you. Such as confiscate on average, about 50% of your income in various direct, indirect, and hidden taxes, so as to fund "bread and circuses" which both buys votes and keeps the majority cowed.
Giving our government this awesome power is what corrupted it. Who else, but the wealthy and powerful would be able to "buy" the use of this power?
The DMCA is many ways is the ultimate expression of such abuse, as it's complete narrow-special interest legislation, completely at odds with precedent, the Constitution, and morality. The kangaroo court nature of the 2600 trial exposed just how far the rot has gotten into other instutions. The corps have owned Congress and the White House for many years, but now they own the courts (judges come from lawfirms, who represent corps, who in turn pay obscene "speaking fees" to judges).
Which is why the DMCA must be fought. Believe me, it's only the BEGINNING of where things are headed, not the end. But nothing will happen so long as the majority of Americans keep looking on the government as some kind of nanny, thus empowering the government to do more for them, which in turn empowers it to do more TO them.
I'm not optimistic. The "bread and circuses" genie was let out of the bottle almost 70 years ago, and there is no sign of it being even checked, much less reversed. I find it ironic that the MOST evil of all states (Nazi Germany, the USSR, Communist China) are the ones who "take care of" their (obiedient) citizens with handouts stolen from the pockets of others. Somehow though, this gets distorted as "compassion".
"In fact, I might be stuck in another country that has no free speech, and no human rights, and a stricter DMCA. "
You might be more right than you know. The US Constitution will eventually cause the demise of the worst of the DMCA, that is, if an honest judge ever hears a case (not a MPAA shill like Kaplan). It hasn't happened yet, but it eventually will, as the fair use rights circumvention in the DMCA are contrary to years of Supreme Court precedent (such as the Betamax case).
All it should take is a smart lawyer arguing that digital is no different than analog, the only difference is that the IP cartels are LYING about it being different so as to flout the Constitution in ways they were smacked down on in cases relating to analog technology. Judges may be clueless with regard to technology, but they are DEFINATELY not clueless if informed that a "fast one" is being pulled on them.
However, those who live elsewhere may not have the advantage of having a Constitution written by men who loathed overreaching government more than any other founders.
And, even here, I'm not completely confident that the Constitution will prevail, as we've suffered under regieme after regieme, both in the white house and in congress since 1933, who have ALL subverted the Constitution for their own personal and political gain.
I really admire RMS, but I have to say, he does go off the deep end to the point that he may be doing more to HURT the FSF than help it.
I understand that free software is as much a political movement as it is an idea for better software. However, RMS seems to be HOSTILE to those who don't make the same choices he does. Freedom to me, means, that, freedom. It's about having the freedom to make good or bad choices.
The KDE controversy, and this takeover attempt on GLIBC etc, makes him look more like a raving lunatic, and by extension, makes ALL of us who support the principle of the GPL and open source look the same. Why? Because Stallman proclaims himself the leader of the whole movement whenever asked, or not asked.
While I have tremendous respect for the man, and his philospohy, his despotic style runs contrary to the whole anarchistic nature of free software. RMS needs to realize that not EVERYTHING needs to be called "GNU/".
" I fully believe that the people behind gator are wide open for a lawsuit from the web sites that depend on ad revenue to survive... you can't just "replace" another site's ads whenever you want, even an idiot can understand that."
Actually, you can, from the client side. Most of these spyware/adware programs HAVE an EULA that gives the program permission to do it's thing. Most people never read EULA's.
So, legally, it's the USER, not the company behind this program that is "replacing" ad content with Gator's. Which, I suppose, they have just as much right to do as they do to use Mozilla and other tools to block ads in the first place.
What worries me is that the large media sites (owned by large media companies that depend on ad revenue) will go to Congress and get a "Digital Millenium Marketing Act" passed that makes it illegal to manufacture or use any "anti marketing circumvention" devices that allows you to bypass advertising...
I know that sounds crazy, but it's BEEN DONE before...
In my job as a QA tester, we run many different NOS's for compatibility. OpenUnix 8.0 is virtually no different from Unixware 7.1.1, other than the fact that Caldera logos have replaced SCO ones. Big freaking deal.
The OS is still cumbersome to install, and far less user friendly than any Linux distro. Of course, SCO is a true enterprise server Unix, which is it's sole (vanishing) advantage over Linux.
I was extremely disappointed that 8.0 lacked ANY improvement in user friendliness, which is the major thing I expected Caldera to bring to SCO. Caldera's Linux distros (which I also test) probably have the best installer of any Linux (though I really like TurboLinux's text mode installer). Also, the SCO shell lacks all of the user-friendliness the GNU BASH shell has, which makes it one of the hardest command lines to master (particularly when you first Unix exposure was the friendly BASH command line).
OpenUnix 8.0 is nothing more than a "slap our new name on it and get it out" to generate new revenue release. I'd advise anyone running 7.1.1 to wait until 8.1. Unfortunately, licensing isn't the ONLY one of MS's business practices that Caldera is imitating.
Will the game companies be Lemmings?
on
$1200 Cheap!
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· Score: 3, Insightful
"Microsoft's games carry higher profit margins for the Redmond, Wash., company than those published by third-party companies such as Activision Inc. and Electronic Arts Inc."
Which is why it's SUICIDE for established game companies to program for the X-Box. Microsoft, in effect, will be using them to kill themselves. We all know that whenever MS enters any market, be it word processors or web browsers, they do it for the sole purpose of leveraging all their other might to "embrace, extend, extinguish" any and all competition. To me, it makes no sense for a game company to waste effort on programming for a rival software company when there are already viable alternatives, like Sony and Nintendo. If they wouldn't do games for X-Box, it will fail.
Fortunately, in the case of game software, MS's own history is against it. Though MS has produced a decent game here and there, they are FAR from the dominant player on the PC platform. This is because to have a megahit game title REQUIRES innovation. The real thing, not that word that MS, in Princess Bride fashion, continues to misuse. MS has always been an imitative, not innovative company.
Even the games that they have had success with (Age of Empires, etc) were imitations of products already on the market. They won't be able to get away with always being months behind whatever is "new and hip" in the console market, ergo, why they need the third party game companies on their side.
Also, it remains to be seen as to whether the X-Box will be a success. Will game console users, who so far are largely BSOD free, tolerate MS bugs? Since the X-Box is running Windows, it's not likely to be any more stable than any other PC running Windows, though the advantage of supporting only ONE hardware configuration will add stability that the average `Doze box won't have.
Which is perhaps what the X-Box has most against it... It's basically a non-upgradable `Doze PC in a game console box. Which means that it will quickly fall behind the conventional PC in power and capability.
I completely agree with you. Back in the barbaric regions of Eastern Kentucky, where I lived all my life until recently (relocated to Raleigh, NC), prosecutors and courts do a similar thing...
Anyone who knows East Ky, knows that most of the state's "real" cash crop (pot) is grown there. Which means the courts are a revolving door of minor drug offenders. To keep up the facade that they are "winning" the "drug war", a corrupt system exists, a collusion between judge, prosecutor, and public defender. They basically arrest someone, throw them in jail, hold them there for 15, 30, 60, 90, whatever days, give them a hearing and let them go on "time served" if they plead guilty to whatever manufactured charge that is presented... 90%+ of people get this treatment, and accept the offer (who wouldn't, after all, you are being offered freedom).
Few cases actually GET prosecuted (ie, a trial), but all those "plea bargains" count as "sucessful prosecutions" and makes the corrupt judge and prosecutors look good. No one ever challenges this system because you can't get a local lawyer to represent you against the judge/prosecutors, and they are always careful to only pick on those who can't AFFORD to get an "outside" lawyer who will provide an adequate defense.
This situation reminds me of the corruption back home, that I've personally witnessed, though this is at a mugh higher level (FBI and federal court) than at the county level. Basically, given that they've already offered to let him off with a slap on the wrist, is PROOF that they can't hope to possibly win the case in a trial, that they want him to sign off as "guilty" to something so that they can declare yet another "victory" against EEVIL hackers.
I hope that West has a good attorney. I'm an EFF member, and would be happy to help contribute whatever I can (not much, unfortunately) to his defense. Cases like this are all the more proof that we techies NEED to form some sort of association. Collectively, we CAN make a difference and defend ourselves as a class by pulling together.
"What? Huh? First off he the prosecutor goes for Title 18 Sect 1030 and doesn't get a conviction, he can't just go after him again for wire fraud instead. Double Jeapordy."
Morally, yes, legally, no, because it'd be a different charge.
Remember, the "justice" system is about nothing of the sort. It's about the SYSTEM. Justice is, at best, an INTENDED side effect. Which can be done away with when you have corrupt judges, law enforcement, and prosecutors. And there plainly are some or all of the above in this instance, even though it may not be DELIBERATE, but instead incompetence.
However, of those with the power to use force to take away freedom, and the power to imprison, I believe incompetence=corruption. There IS no excuse, be it deliberate, or a case of ignorance, for the abuse of government force against the individual. Just as ignorance of the law is no defence for the citizen, cluelessness shouldn't be for the government.
"You, a computer knowledgable person, represent a good tasty meal for the FBI's new computer crime group. They must somehow prove their worth to congress. You provide them with opportunity by providing a community service. Dont provide it."
Yep, that's exactly what you are doing by helping them out. If we, as a profession, quit making victims of ourselves, the problem will take care of it'self. For one thing, the government is as likely as incompetent with computer security as it is with almost everything else it does (such as deliver mail). What it's VERY efficient at, unfortunately, is using force, and at manufacturing crime for profit (drug war).
Remember, FBI and other law enforcement types are trained and propogandized to believe the WORST about us. Don't play into their hands. I know I'm sounding off the deep end on this, but with our government UNANIMOUSLY rubber stamping laws like the DMCA, why should anyone be surprised at ALL that they will do such things even to those of us who try to, GOD FORBID, do someone a favor?
The only mistake this guy made was in not demanding $thousands up front as a "CONsultant" from the site in question.
It's sad indeed that in 2001 America, we've seen truth in the old adage "no good deed goes unpunished".
I suppose in today's legal climate, the only way to treat your neighbor is callousness, at least, and stay out of jail. Help your neighbor, get 1-5 years.
My suggestion to all those who are admins/coders/hackers/engineers, keep it to yourselves. I suppose we'll secure our systems, and let the government and the rest fall prey to script kiddies and our silence until they learn the Darwinian lesson of the consequences of their stupid 21st Century "digital age" laws.
The more the corporations, and their lackeys in government restrict freedom, the more determined those to preserve it will become, and the less effective their efforts will be.
For one thing, it's a challenge, and nothing inspires great accomplishments from hackers than waving the red flag.
"If someone's lawyers attacked, would slashdot's database record the actual poster's ID, or does the act of checking the button completely sever the poster's real id? For that matter, is the data truly anonymous (whether the box is checked, or it is posted from a non-logged in person) or does it track your IP address and other data (browser info, whatever.) "
A lawyer friend of mine told me that the BEST way to protect my users, and my site (which is a radio message board, which draws a lot of ire from supporters of Clear Channel Communications) is to NOT keep such information.
I delete IP logs. I do not KEEP such information on record. The best defense is to not keep information around to be subpoened or discovered.
It's unfortunate that more sites don't take the same stance. But, Yahoo!, et all, RELY on tracking their users for marketing purposes, which removes protection from users.
BTW, since Slashcode is GPL software, all it would take is an examination of the source code to find out if any such "secret tracking" of anonymous cowards exists in the code. I'm not a programmer, unfortunately, so I can't do this.
"It's the mess left by lazy admins who can't be bothered with security patches a month before a worm comes out to exploit them. Shame on the NT admins."
Does this really surprise anyone? MCSE's are trained (and tested) to solve everything by "reboot, reload, reinstall", because Microsoft's way is to "take the easy way out" instead of actually FIXING the problem.
And, so many MS service packs BREAK servers and software when installed, can you also not blame people for NOT rushing ot install them? Even where I work, where we do OS compatibility testing on servers we don't start using new MS service packs until they've been tested and found safe by our internal test group...
I for one expect use of IIS to drop as a consequence of the Code Red virus... Were IIS open source, these holes and backdoors would have been seen LONG ago and fixed. Apache runs MUCH more of the web than does IIS, yet you don't see anywhere near the number of bugs, exploits and DOS worms as does IIS.
Slashdot Mirror
"Will there come a point where I have to write a notice on the front page of my site that it contains no third-party advertising and/or banner ads... and that anything that might appear of that nature on the page was not put there by me?"
I intend to put this notice into my sites:
"This site contains no advertising. If you see any advertising, that is because your browser client is placing them there. This site does not endorse any of these advertisers, and questions the integrity of products/services that would steal space without compensation on a noncommercial wensite.
If you wish to experience this site with no ads, as the author intended, use Mozilla http://www.mozilla.org, as your browser client. "
I'm thinking that we can use this invasive marketing (which will piss off even Joe 6pack) as an opportunity to sell the average user on Mozilla, the first, and ONLY cross-platform browser designed to give the USER control of his internet.
IE and Netscape lack Mozilla's controls because MS and AOL have no desire to lock THEMSELVES out of doing the same things if they wish to.
The more over the line the marketers go, the more likely it is that people will go out of their way to avoid them. Installing Mozilla isn't that hard of a way to avoid them.
" This kind of stuff has got to stop. I own my computer. I'm not leasing it from anybody, it's a physical product and I own it. And I'll be damned if I want people smuggling their parasite-ware onto my pc, to make money from bandwidth I am paying for. When's this going to stop?"
It's getting all the more common. For example, you can't even install some hardware anymore without getting adware... Creative Labs pretty much has a monopoly in sound cards (ever since they sued Aureal into extinction with a frivilous lawsuit that Creative lost). Installing the drivers (which aren't packaged as drivers, you have to run their installer, NOT just install the drivers) you get a trojan called "newsupd" which tracks your browser AND sends you ads.
My guess is that this sort of thing will only get more common, particularly as two companies (NVidia and Creative) have a virtual lock on the medium/high-end sound and video segments of the PC.
What is most offensive is how these massive corporations don't even give us the dignity of dealing with us as CUSTOMERS. No, they see us as sheep to be mined again by marketers, just for USING the product that we bought!
If adware hardware was cheaper to buy BECAUSE of the spyware/adware it has in it, then I might have less of a problem with it. But, in the case of sound cards, it's clearly not, as the SB Live! (which has not advanced any in 3 years other than adding some minor bells and whistles) hasn't really gone down any in price in the same period.
When you consider that harware always gets cheaper to make as it gets older in design, Creative obviously is using it's monopoly to fatten profit margins at their customer's expense. The Newsupd trojan only being another part of it.
I'd guess that NVidia will soon do the same thing with the GeForce, now that 3DFx is dead. In fact, I'd imagine that their marketing departments will be looking into this new web-defacing adware.
After all, corporations have no morals other than profit, and marketers have even fewer morals.
I think you make some points... This is a clear violation of copyright. There might have been some gray area for MS's smartlinks, which didn't alter the content in any way other than to put links on "keywords" to MS pages or to paid customers of MS.
That was bad enough, particularly for those who have anti-MS pages, it amounts to rape.
But this is even worse... This "technology" completely alters your page, and even uses it like part of their site. It strips out your own links replacing it with the marketers. This is something that likely can't be protected by "fair use", as it's likely something that the marketdroids can't get permission to do from the end user.
Certainly the big sites will sue, as will the OTHER marketing companies.
As far as I'm concerned, marketers who are as offensive as these clowns DESERVE to have the sharks unleased on them. Which will happen. That is, until a MS or AOL buys them...
"A split might not hurt (3-way, preferably), nor would opening Windows."
The only kind of split that would both leave MS free to do what they want with their products, AND would eliminate the monopoly would be to split them off vertically (ie, create a minimum of 3 "baby bill's").
Each "baby bill" would have full rights to all current MS IP and trademarks, as well as an equal share of all money, facilities and employees.
They'd not be permitted to cooperate in any way (they'd all have to pay user fees to an oversight board that would monitor this). They'd only be able to cooperate thru industry standards groups (which set open standards any company can use).
I see this as the ONLY way to actually punish MS, and to prevent them from continuing their "innovative" embrace, extend, extinguish business model, as no one of the "baby bills" can stray too much from current API, file formats, etc, or risk becoming incompatible...
Not to mention that no one "baby bill" could have the control over OEM licensing, and price as MS currently does.
" You might be surprised at how many beta testers worked on it, and how stable it is. Of course, you may never use it, but if you ever have to touch a windows machine again, pray that it's XP..."
.NET and their rental scheme, MS may have just destroyed their chance to actually get into the enterprise server market.
I have beta tested the server version of it (at work). And, it's so far been stable, though completely unexciting (rather than the retard GUI). XP server is not any different than 2000 server. In fact, the installer even looks identical except the change in name.
The activation problem though, will likely hurt it's chances of success on server platforms. What network admin in his right MIND wants to put an OS on the server that requires activation, and will quit working altogether if there is ever a problem with the date/time on the motherboard's RTC (I saw this happen), and that will be the "final" arbiter of what hardware change to your server is "too much" and quit?
In other words, there isn't anything on the server side AT ALL to recommend it over 2000, and quite alot against it. Compared to 2000 Server, XP Server is a loss, not a gain.
This will do little to persuade users and recent users of NT Server (who have finally begun moving to 2000) to upgrade again, or to chose XP over 2000 Server. Which is why I expect MS to make availability of 2000 Server scarce quickly after the XP server products are released. Which could end up biting them in the ass.
In their lust to lock everyone into
"You don't think Microsoft's going to keep throwing away money at innovative new products once they've destroyed all competitors and locked customers into a subscription contract, do you?"
There are already examples of this. For instance, IE hasn't seen ONE major "innovation" since IE 4.0. IE 5.x and 6 HARDLY qualify as "major" upgrades from 4.x, certainly nothing on the order of the quantum leap jumps from the pathetic 1.x to the less pathetic 2.x to the useable 3.x, to the groundbreaking 4.x... Mozilla, in that it's the first browser designed for USERS (instead of marketers), in that it has ad blocking and a useful system for refusing cookies, is ahead of IE in the "innovation" department. So is Konqueror.
Likewise for Office. The last "major" new Office was `97. Y2K and now XP have only had superficial (bloat) added to them. XP's only "innovation" is the rental scheme and activation. Not to mention that Office XP won't run on Windows `95, for the simple reason that MS wants to force the remaining businesses that use `95 desktops to upgrade.
Windows XP is a similar product... In terms of "innovation" it's no more advanced (except in bloat) than Windows 2000. It's main purpose is to get ".net" and activation into the PC.
In many, MANY ways, except in rudeness, MS is right now a VERY stagnant company. They've not released a single groundbreaking product in years (the last, IMO, being Windows 2000), and since then have had nothing new to add except bloat, superficial GUI "enhancements", and the fascism of forced product activation (the worst being that Windows XP will itself decide whether to "allow" you to upgrade certain parts of your PC).
Even left to itself, MS has failed to keep up with the marketplace, which in itself gives you some hope, even if the government fails to punish them (the fact that this judge is a Clinton appointee is not encouraging, Clinton's judges (ahem) Lewis Kaplan (ahem) haven't had a very good track record in ruling against corporations. MS has failed to capture the enterprise (outside the desktop), and has seen the Unix market largely migrate to Linux and Sun.
"i have a quick question. would something like pgp work to stop this snooping garbage? just have the data encrypted when you send it to people, and then no one can snoop, right?"
Yes, it would. But are there any FTP sites, etc, who transmit/receive in PGP? I doubt it. On the bright side, this sort of crap is JUST the thing to incentivise the OSS/FS community to come up with such a thing.
The harder the IP cartel swings the hammer, the thicker people will armor themselves.
WHY are they wasting money doing this? Also, this kind of activity SCREAMS security hole, ripe for abuse.
Not good. And this getting out among the enthusiast, who are the EXACT people to buy broadband, can't help their chances of avoiding File 13.
Though I agree with WHAT they are doing, I'm not in agreement with HOW they are doing it.
Simply put, a government should not be in the business of breaking the law. That is inherantly DANGERIOUS. What is to stop them from breaking other laws to supress someone, "in the public good"?
What Brazil should do is pass and impliment a new law that limits the scope and duration of ALL patents, and provide for mandatory non-exclusive licensing of all patents. But it should apply to ALL patents, foreign and domestic, equally and without discrimination.
The patent holder SHOULD be compensated. But it should be reasonable. To not compensate them at all IS theft, this time on a grand government scale. That is reprehensible.
To do it the way they are doing it is to set a dangerous legal precedent for their own citizens, and to discourage any further development of drugs and technology for their benefit.
If a farmer grew food, only to have the government come and steal what it wants when it wants to (against the law), the farmer would be less likely to care about how much he grows, or worse, to give up the business (because he couldn't even feed his own family). This ultimately hurts both the government and the people. This is one reason why communist/collectivism has failed every time and everywhere it's been tried.
"As far as how I feel -- I'm happy to be back in my car without having to break a window, and GM does not care that a locksmith opened my car.
"
Using the "logic" of the DMCA, your parents are guilty of creating a "circumvention device" because you have fists which can break that window and thus, by-pass the lock.
A ridiculous example, but we need to hypothesize extreme uses of such types of law so as to illustrate the absurdity. The DMCA, if let stand will NOT be the last such law.
"At least Canada has a history of socialism, which makes it a bit more likely to look out for Joe Public. Not that it makes a *lot* of difference, what with the crooks in government."
This will be Canada's undoing as well. A socialistic government is already stealing from others to give away goodies to you. Where is the moral difference between using force of a gun to steal from someone, and using the force of government (also a gun) to steal from someone?
A government powerful enough to give things to you also has the power to take away from you. I prefer a government, such as that under the US Constitution, that DENIES such power to the government. Unfortunately, the US Constitution has been given but bare lip service for many years now, and the DMCA is one result.
Ergo, the MORE socialistic (ie, like Canada in your view) the US has become, the MORE authoritarian and powerful the government has become. Which, in turn, corrupts it and allows corps to buy what they want. Face it, the welfare state takes a lot of cash to run, corps have the cash to keep it running, and in turn, gets a disporportionate amount of leverage as a result.
Shrink the government, make it live within the law (Constitution), and you will have less corruption.
" Before Stallman got involved with the KDE issue, it was closed sourced. Do you want all of your apps to include closed source code that can'y be fixed or improved. Now Gt is GPLed. I think the Linux world is a better place for it."
Wrong. KDE was never closed source, neither was QT. In fact, KDE was always GPL even. The only issue was a technicality in the licensing.
It's true that his stubborness might have led to them releasing QT under the GPL, but it was done at the cost of setting Linux on the desktop back years. X-Windows isn't GPL either, but I don't hear Stallman declaring war on them.
" Fascism is the only way to enforce IP laws. They must have control over what you see and what you download. In other words, the government is going to be spying on you big time, not a little bit like before. The FTAA is also a way for the have nations to economically dominate (i.e., enslave) the have-nots since most IP in the western world is owned by Europe and North America."
You make an excellent point. Fascism is on the rise worldwide, though most of the world has ALWAYS been non-free, elective republics being only a recent phenomenon largely condfined to the Western world. And even there, most of the West didn't become democratic until after World War II, only 50 years ago or so.
History shows that most republics don't last more than 30 generations, the United States being in fact, the LONGEST lasting one. However, given the increasing despotic and authoritarian nature of the US government, I believe an argument can be made that we've already crossed the line into fascism. If we haven't crossed, we're percariously balanced on the edge.
As I've stated before, I believe the US has been becoming less free since 1933, when our first "king" came in to power (FDR) and single handedly removed all Constitutional restraint on the federal government. All in the name of "empowering government to do more FOR you".
Well, as you know, everything works both ways, a government that can do things FOR you, has equal power to do things TO you. Such as confiscate on average, about 50% of your income in various direct, indirect, and hidden taxes, so as to fund "bread and circuses" which both buys votes and keeps the majority cowed.
Giving our government this awesome power is what corrupted it. Who else, but the wealthy and powerful would be able to "buy" the use of this power?
The DMCA is many ways is the ultimate expression of such abuse, as it's complete narrow-special interest legislation, completely at odds with precedent, the Constitution, and morality. The kangaroo court nature of the 2600 trial exposed just how far the rot has gotten into other instutions. The corps have owned Congress and the White House for many years, but now they own the courts (judges come from lawfirms, who represent corps, who in turn pay obscene "speaking fees" to judges).
Which is why the DMCA must be fought. Believe me, it's only the BEGINNING of where things are headed, not the end. But nothing will happen so long as the majority of Americans keep looking on the government as some kind of nanny, thus empowering the government to do more for them, which in turn empowers it to do more TO them.
I'm not optimistic. The "bread and circuses" genie was let out of the bottle almost 70 years ago, and there is no sign of it being even checked, much less reversed. I find it ironic that the MOST evil of all states (Nazi Germany, the USSR, Communist China) are the ones who "take care of" their (obiedient) citizens with handouts stolen from the pockets of others. Somehow though, this gets distorted as "compassion".
"In fact, I might be stuck in another country that has no free speech, and no human rights, and a stricter DMCA. "
You might be more right than you know. The US Constitution will eventually cause the demise of the worst of the DMCA, that is, if an honest judge ever hears a case (not a MPAA shill like Kaplan). It hasn't happened yet, but it eventually will, as the fair use rights circumvention in the DMCA are contrary to years of Supreme Court precedent (such as the Betamax case).
All it should take is a smart lawyer arguing that digital is no different than analog, the only difference is that the IP cartels are LYING about it being different so as to flout the Constitution in ways they were smacked down on in cases relating to analog technology. Judges may be clueless with regard to technology, but they are DEFINATELY not clueless if informed that a "fast one" is being pulled on them.
However, those who live elsewhere may not have the advantage of having a Constitution written by men who loathed overreaching government more than any other founders.
And, even here, I'm not completely confident that the Constitution will prevail, as we've suffered under regieme after regieme, both in the white house and in congress since 1933, who have ALL subverted the Constitution for their own personal and political gain.
I really admire RMS, but I have to say, he does go off the deep end to the point that he may be doing more to HURT the FSF than help it.
I understand that free software is as much a political movement as it is an idea for better software. However, RMS seems to be HOSTILE to those who don't make the same choices he does. Freedom to me, means, that, freedom. It's about having the freedom to make good or bad choices.
The KDE controversy, and this takeover attempt on GLIBC etc, makes him look more like a raving lunatic, and by extension, makes ALL of us who support the principle of the GPL and open source look the same. Why? Because Stallman proclaims himself the leader of the whole movement whenever asked, or not asked.
While I have tremendous respect for the man, and his philospohy, his despotic style runs contrary to the whole anarchistic nature of free software. RMS needs to realize that not EVERYTHING needs to be called "GNU/".
" I fully believe that the people behind gator are wide open for a lawsuit from the web sites that depend on ad revenue to survive... you can't just "replace" another site's ads whenever you want, even an idiot can understand that."
Actually, you can, from the client side. Most of these spyware/adware programs HAVE an EULA that gives the program permission to do it's thing. Most people never read EULA's.
So, legally, it's the USER, not the company behind this program that is "replacing" ad content with Gator's. Which, I suppose, they have just as much right to do as they do to use Mozilla and other tools to block ads in the first place.
What worries me is that the large media sites (owned by large media companies that depend on ad revenue) will go to Congress and get a "Digital Millenium Marketing Act" passed that makes it illegal to manufacture or use any "anti marketing circumvention" devices that allows you to bypass advertising...
I know that sounds crazy, but it's BEEN DONE before...
In my job as a QA tester, we run many different NOS's for compatibility. OpenUnix 8.0 is virtually no different from Unixware 7.1.1, other than the fact that Caldera logos have replaced SCO ones. Big freaking deal.
The OS is still cumbersome to install, and far less user friendly than any Linux distro. Of course, SCO is a true enterprise server Unix, which is it's sole (vanishing) advantage over Linux.
I was extremely disappointed that 8.0 lacked ANY improvement in user friendliness, which is the major thing I expected Caldera to bring to SCO. Caldera's Linux distros (which I also test) probably have the best installer of any Linux (though I really like TurboLinux's text mode installer). Also, the SCO shell lacks all of the user-friendliness the GNU BASH shell has, which makes it one of the hardest command lines to master (particularly when you first Unix exposure was the friendly BASH command line).
OpenUnix 8.0 is nothing more than a "slap our new name on it and get it out" to generate new revenue release. I'd advise anyone running 7.1.1 to wait until 8.1. Unfortunately, licensing isn't the ONLY one of MS's business practices that Caldera is imitating.
"Microsoft's games carry higher profit margins for the Redmond, Wash., company than those published by third-party companies such as Activision Inc. and Electronic Arts Inc."
Which is why it's SUICIDE for established game companies to program for the X-Box. Microsoft, in effect, will be using them to kill themselves. We all know that whenever MS enters any market, be it word processors or web browsers, they do it for the sole purpose of leveraging all their other might to "embrace, extend, extinguish" any and all competition. To me, it makes no sense for a game company to waste effort on programming for a rival software company when there are already viable alternatives, like Sony and Nintendo. If they wouldn't do games for X-Box, it will fail.
Fortunately, in the case of game software, MS's own history is against it. Though MS has produced a decent game here and there, they are FAR from the dominant player on the PC platform. This is because to have a megahit game title REQUIRES innovation. The real thing, not that word that MS, in Princess Bride fashion, continues to misuse. MS has always been an imitative, not innovative company.
Even the games that they have had success with (Age of Empires, etc) were imitations of products already on the market. They won't be able to get away with always being months behind whatever is "new and hip" in the console market, ergo, why they need the third party game companies on their side.
Also, it remains to be seen as to whether the X-Box will be a success. Will game console users, who so far are largely BSOD free, tolerate MS bugs? Since the X-Box is running Windows, it's not likely to be any more stable than any other PC running Windows, though the advantage of supporting only ONE hardware configuration will add stability that the average `Doze box won't have.
Which is perhaps what the X-Box has most against it... It's basically a non-upgradable `Doze PC in a game console box. Which means that it will quickly fall behind the conventional PC in power and capability.
I completely agree with you. Back in the barbaric regions of Eastern Kentucky, where I lived all my life until recently (relocated to Raleigh, NC), prosecutors and courts do a similar thing...
Anyone who knows East Ky, knows that most of the state's "real" cash crop (pot) is grown there. Which means the courts are a revolving door of minor drug offenders. To keep up the facade that they are "winning" the "drug war", a corrupt system exists, a collusion between judge, prosecutor, and public defender. They basically arrest someone, throw them in jail, hold them there for 15, 30, 60, 90, whatever days, give them a hearing and let them go on "time served" if they plead guilty to whatever manufactured charge that is presented... 90%+ of people get this treatment, and accept the offer (who wouldn't, after all, you are being offered freedom).
Few cases actually GET prosecuted (ie, a trial), but all those "plea bargains" count as "sucessful prosecutions" and makes the corrupt judge and prosecutors look good. No one ever challenges this system because you can't get a local lawyer to represent you against the judge/prosecutors, and they are always careful to only pick on those who can't AFFORD to get an "outside" lawyer who will provide an adequate defense.
This situation reminds me of the corruption back home, that I've personally witnessed, though this is at a mugh higher level (FBI and federal court) than at the county level. Basically, given that they've already offered to let him off with a slap on the wrist, is PROOF that they can't hope to possibly win the case in a trial, that they want him to sign off as "guilty" to something so that they can declare yet another "victory" against EEVIL hackers.
I hope that West has a good attorney. I'm an EFF member, and would be happy to help contribute whatever I can (not much, unfortunately) to his defense. Cases like this are all the more proof that we techies NEED to form some sort of association. Collectively, we CAN make a difference and defend ourselves as a class by pulling together.
"What? Huh? First off he the prosecutor goes for Title 18 Sect 1030 and doesn't get a conviction, he can't just go after him again for wire fraud instead. Double Jeapordy."
Morally, yes, legally, no, because it'd be a different charge.
Remember, the "justice" system is about nothing of the sort. It's about the SYSTEM. Justice is, at best, an INTENDED side effect. Which can be done away with when you have corrupt judges, law enforcement, and prosecutors. And there plainly are some or all of the above in this instance, even though it may not be DELIBERATE, but instead incompetence.
However, of those with the power to use force to take away freedom, and the power to imprison, I believe incompetence=corruption. There IS no excuse, be it deliberate, or a case of ignorance, for the abuse of government force against the individual. Just as ignorance of the law is no defence for the citizen, cluelessness shouldn't be for the government.
"You, a computer knowledgable person, represent a good tasty meal for the FBI's new computer crime group. They must somehow prove their worth to congress. You provide them with opportunity by providing a community service. Dont provide it."
Yep, that's exactly what you are doing by helping them out. If we, as a profession, quit making victims of ourselves, the problem will take care of it'self. For one thing, the government is as likely as incompetent with computer security as it is with almost everything else it does (such as deliver mail). What it's VERY efficient at, unfortunately, is using force, and at manufacturing crime for profit (drug war).
Remember, FBI and other law enforcement types are trained and propogandized to believe the WORST about us. Don't play into their hands. I know I'm sounding off the deep end on this, but with our government UNANIMOUSLY rubber stamping laws like the DMCA, why should anyone be surprised at ALL that they will do such things even to those of us who try to, GOD FORBID, do someone a favor?
The only mistake this guy made was in not demanding $thousands up front as a "CONsultant" from the site in question.
It's sad indeed that in 2001 America, we've seen truth in the old adage "no good deed goes unpunished".
I suppose in today's legal climate, the only way to treat your neighbor is callousness, at least, and stay out of jail. Help your neighbor, get 1-5 years.
My suggestion to all those who are admins/coders/hackers/engineers, keep it to yourselves. I suppose we'll secure our systems, and let the government and the rest fall prey to script kiddies and our silence until they learn the Darwinian lesson of the consequences of their stupid 21st Century "digital age" laws.
What it boils down to is this:
The more the corporations, and their lackeys in government restrict freedom, the more determined those to preserve it will become, and the less effective their efforts will be.
For one thing, it's a challenge, and nothing inspires great accomplishments from hackers than waving the red flag.
"If someone's lawyers attacked, would slashdot's database record the actual poster's ID, or does the act of checking the button completely sever the poster's real id? For that matter, is the data truly anonymous (whether the box is checked, or it is posted from a non-logged in person) or does it track your IP address and other data (browser info, whatever.) "
A lawyer friend of mine told me that the BEST way to protect my users, and my site (which is a radio message board, which draws a lot of ire from supporters of Clear Channel Communications) is to NOT keep such information.
I delete IP logs. I do not KEEP such information on record. The best defense is to not keep information around to be subpoened or discovered.
It's unfortunate that more sites don't take the same stance. But, Yahoo!, et all, RELY on tracking their users for marketing purposes, which removes protection from users.
BTW, since Slashcode is GPL software, all it would take is an examination of the source code to find out if any such "secret tracking" of anonymous cowards exists in the code. I'm not a programmer, unfortunately, so I can't do this.
"It's the mess left by lazy admins who can't be bothered with security patches a month before a worm comes out to exploit them. Shame on the NT admins."
Does this really surprise anyone? MCSE's are trained (and tested) to solve everything by "reboot, reload, reinstall", because Microsoft's way is to "take the easy way out" instead of actually FIXING the problem.
And, so many MS service packs BREAK servers and software when installed, can you also not blame people for NOT rushing ot install them? Even where I work, where we do OS compatibility testing on servers we don't start using new MS service packs until they've been tested and found safe by our internal test group...
I for one expect use of IIS to drop as a consequence of the Code Red virus... Were IIS open source, these holes and backdoors would have been seen LONG ago and fixed. Apache runs MUCH more of the web than does IIS, yet you don't see anywhere near the number of bugs, exploits and DOS worms as does IIS.