With all the free time this guy has, it looks like he just got fired from CompUSA or something. I'm surprised that someone could actually do that without the paint making everything (keys, fans, buttons, etc.) stick. The sad thing is, I can actually look at the thing and think to myself, "hmm, I want one."
With all of the bare-breasted statues out there in America, maybe Ashcroft decided that he was going to have to take his show on the road if he was to get them all.
Come on, how ignorant must the USPTO be to allow something like this to get through? Subdomains, hyperlinks, and frames have been used long before the patents for them were ever drafted. Some companies, like ideaflood, probably didn't even exist when domains (and therefore subdomains) were created; RFC 882 was created in 1983 and obsoleted in 1987. I know that the USPTO can't have an expert investigation into every patent that is filed, but the situation is still unacceptable. The government needs to crack down on companies whose sole purpose is to file patents on commonly-used proceses and who make the majority of their profits off of lawsuits, as these companies only destroy the progression of our society and don't contribute in producing goods or services. I also notice that nowhere in the article is there a www. in front of the websites. Does this mean that someone could interpret www as a subdomain and they're afraid of being sued?
Chances are, adult-oriented websites will have little to no incentive to move their domains over to a different TLD.
"When faced with the slippery nature of what depictions of sexual activity should be illegal or not, one U.S. Supreme Court justice blithely defined obscenity as: 'I know it when I see it.'"
Using legislation as a means to force such sites to the new TLD is impossible to implement, since the courts are simply unwilling to touch (no pun intended) on the technicalities of the issue. Trying to ask any judge what they consider sexually explicit will get you a different answer every time, and will change as you go to different parts of the world. The United States is in no position to impose it's ethical views on other contries.
Getting back to my oringinal point, what is the incentive to migrate to the new TLD? Webmasters are generally more interested in getting more visitors to their site rather than placing restrictions. Placing a price cut, which I can see as the only viable incentive, on registration to the.xxx domain could cause non-adult sites to move there, which would cause them to be restricted to children who may otherwise have legal and unrestricted access.
See, this just shows you that the open source ideal works. Sharing the code from Mozilla, BSD, and Linux creates a more effective networking platform. Sharing the code to SoBig creates a more effective way of showing everyone why they should use the aforementioned software.
But businesses have been advised to be vigilant and beef up their security teams.
<sarcasm> I am responsible for a number of systems that employ technologies including the Apache webserver, OpenSSH, and the Linux kernel. I am deeply concerned to find out that the source code of these very programs have been released into public, for free! Anyone from anywhere in the world can download the source, compile it on their own machines, change it, and even submit their changes back to the developers to be included in the next release. I can not even start to believe the security implications that this must cause. I mean, how can a system like Apache be secure if everyone in the world with decent programming knowledge can look at all of its source and find its weaknesses? And Apache runs two-thirds of the Web!! I hear that people all over the world have contributed to the Linux kernel. How do I know that I can trust something that was written in a country not ruled by Capitalist lobbying and corporate power, where the dollar is the bottom line and one expects to pay a high price for quality? How can something developed for free be better than a system which costs thousands of dollars and forces restrictive licensing upon its users?
The only solution is to switch to something that is carefully guarded and kept closed. </sarcasm>
Currently, broadband service is still lacking in many parts of the US and the world. I live only 7 miles away from the nearest downtown area, but DSL is not available in my home town. Until a decent solution to dial-up exists in the majority of the country at a reasonable price, download-as-you-go games will never catch on. Considering how much data goes into each level in Half-Life, it could take hours to download everything needed for that level (especially in single-player) on a 56k connection.
Something written by Microsoft that was supposed to protect against attacks was found vulnerable. This won't be the last time it happens. Cisco, on the other hand, has no excuse given their record.
The DMCA is the equivalent of trying to stop break-and-entry of homes by making screwdrivers illegal.
The DMCA wouldn't make screwdrivers illegal. It would just make it illegal for you to publish instructions on how to fabricate a screwdriver, locate the door, and insert the screwdriver.
I've never felt that addresses ending with.COM /.ORG and the like should be global. Country codes to be used, eg:
slashdot.org - From within the US
slashdot.org.us - Globally
microsoft.com - From within the US
microsoft.com.us - Globally
Ok, so here's what happens:
<a href="http://www.ignorantdevelopers.com/page2.htm" >Page 2</a>
suddenly results in Host Not Found for every user residing outside of the host's country.
I've seen pop-up blockers in just about every shape and form, whether it comes from ISP software or a third party (like the kinds you see advertised in banners). My favorite pop-up blocker is Mozilla, but I know it will be a very long time until everyone else I know catches on. What's even more sad is how many self-proclaimed *nix "fans" I see using Internet Explorer.
I just looked at the google cache of this page and it looked like Microsoft had a ways to go before receiving a "good faith reprieve" from this site. This sounds like the voice of someone with the corporate pistol pointed at his head.
Five years ago, Microsoft defended their IE/Win32 Shell integration as an "innovation." Like SiteFinder, it caused more problems than it solved, and angered a lot of people, especially those working for the competition. I would be furious if I were an exec. for Google, but this will just come from the standpoint of a university network administrator.
My concerns about the SiteFinder:
Who decides what pages are shown? Is it a completely objective search or are we under the cover of corporate sponsorship?
What kind of user control do you have? So far I see three options available to me, and I could really care less about content filtering so where is everything else?
Where are the other languages? Google supports just about every language known to mankind, living, dead, and ficticious. Why does America think it runs the world?
How does this make the Internet stronger? So far, this move has defeated spam filters and caused other network problems.
As far as I'm concerned, this is an abuse of their administrative powers and ICANN has done the right thing for a change by putting a stop to this operation. They should revoke Verisign's power if abuse continues.
good thing it's only artists I don't like that are doing this, so far...
They should be sued for discriminating against the "minority," e.g. Linux, BSD, and portable MP3 users. Since when is it law that a PC is required to use Windows?
You don't need kernel 2.6.x for RPM to break. I have this happening in my university department every time an RPM command is run and I can't find out why.
+1 cracker bit (use when attempting buffer overflow, backdoor, exploit, etc.)
+2 terrorist bit (need I say what countries to put here?)
+4 deceptive business bit (apply to 192.189.271.221 and others
+8 p0rn bit (apply to 90% of gnutella searches)
+16 spam bit (apply to SMTP transfers from domains including, but not limited to, yahoo.com, hotmail.com, and aol.com.. might as well use it if you're reading mail from any of these too)
+32 annoying bit (IRC scripts should use this)
+64 utterly-insecure bit (IIS, IE, Outlook, and practically all other Microsoft programs should apply this bit)
+128 Pinky and the Brain bit (network traffic used to try to take over the world; apply to sites including, but not limited to, 207.46.249.27, 65.244.101.222, Bill Gates' personal T1)
Just another example how MS forces you to continue shelling-out more cash as time goes by. The timing for this is just a little too perfect it seems (like 2 days?) to say that MS did not discontinue support for NT4 in preparation for the release of Server 2003. Now, companies using NT4 are almost forced to buy the upgrade even when I'm sure NT4 works according to Microsoft's high standards of quality in other areas. This is another example of Microsoft's profit-motivated engineering working for them and against everyone else. Just wait 10 more years...
Illequipped??? A word processor is a word processor no matter what platform you're running it on. While there are differences between Word and StarOffice, it's the same underlying principle. You type a document, format it, press the U button whenever you want it to underline, save it, and print it. What's the big difference? Including Internet Explorer in your comment is completely bullshit, the internet works exactly the same (from the user's perspective) in IE as it does in Mozilla/Netscape/Opera. In my opinion, it would be better to learn Mozilla because IE is buggy and full of holes, and there are few sites out there that only work in IE.
Also keep in mind that this is a programming class. Environments like Visual C++ let you get away with so many lazy programming shortcuts that when these students get into any REAL development scenario, their skills will still be undeveloped and they'll have no choice but to go work for Microsoft and generate more poorly-coded software. Also if they're learning to write programs, then they should also know how computers work well enough to be able to adapt to different platforms.
Operating systems perform basic tasks, such as recognizing input from the keyboard, sending output to the display screen, keeping track of files and directories on the disk, and controlling peripheral devices such as disk drives and printers.[webopedia.com]
Nowhere in does this mention anything about deciding what programs/documents the user can and cannot open. An OS is desined to give functionality to a computer, not a tool to implement bureaucratic policies and legal restrictions (e.g. the Palladium and other DRM nightmares).
Now, getting back to WRMS (for Stallman's sake I'll call it WRMS from now on). The difference between this and paper shredding is that you now get to keep the documents you're trying to hide. Think of how many Enrons and Arther Andersens still out there now have digital protection! Once again, Microsoft caters to big corporations that invest lots of money into the computer industry and want to see things their way. This does not help the rest of us, and if the Enron scam happens again because of this (and it will), then it will hurt our economy again.
Enter Palladium, just another part of Microsoft's new restrictive practices. I think we should petition Intel against killing its own platform. We've gone very far from the 80's now, and I think if this does not stop it will only get worse. I'm no legal expert, but I see Palladium as a violation of the 4th amendment in the US constitution. Your PC is as much private to you as your house is. Criminals can break into computer just as well as a burglar can crawl through that open window in your back yard when you're not home. However, the police still can't get in without your permission or a warrant. DRM is, by design, used to find illegal material and warezed software then delete it or report it. How is this any different from search and seizure?
Now for those of you who are worried are going to lose your freedoms, just remember who's really at fault here. It is the people who swap thousands of MP3's every day, download warez and illegal keys.. basically those too cheap to actually pay for your software and music. Granted, I don't think it's right for Microsoft to charge 200 bucks for an OS, but that's one of the reasons I'm using Linux. I still don't believe it's right what they're doing, but the blame should really be placed on most of the/. h4x0r w4nn4b3's who are adding fuel to the fire. If you're a corporation and you're really paranoid about your sensitive documents getting into the wrong hands, then maybe you should be more concerned about keeping your networks secure (one way would be by not using Microsoft products) and choosing your employees wisely.
answer: Well of course not. Microsoft would like to keep their business model of "recruiting" all those misguided [insert OS here] users back to their world. In a company network where it's Windows servers running everything, they would rather require users to use Windows for their job rather than have the freedom to choose alternate operating systems. Not only this, but it's also easy for them to make things instantly obsolete (since the computer world is always "changing" so much), label things as "legacy," and therefore companies would have to upgrade and eventually so would the home user.
It's not like everybody who becomes first interested in Linux is a hacker anyway. Today, distrobutions are creating cleaner install programs, interfaces, software, and hardware support. Just recently I upgraded my RH 7.0 system to 7.2 and found there were many improvements that would appeal to Windows users. If improvements continue, an OEM could follow by building Linux systems for a lot cheaper, which would catch the eye of the consumer. Even those consumers that don't know what it is to "compile" something or what OS stands for, something like "Free Software Upgrades Available" or would definately get their attention along with the lower price. The average user boots-up to check e-mail, browse websites, use office software, print, etc. and don't need the advanced features of hardware components that Linux doesn't support (even though the list is growing rapidly smaller). It is only companies that continue to build proprietary systems that would continue to hurt themselves if an OEM put together a Linux PC. And those that need the advanced hardware (gamers, for example) would have the know-how of what to get (a Linux HCL provided) and how to upgrade on their own.
Slashdot Mirror
I zoomed in on the advertisement. That looks like a 1 to me, not a 3.
With all the free time this guy has, it looks like he just got fired from CompUSA or something. I'm surprised that someone could actually do that without the paint making everything (keys, fans, buttons, etc.) stick. The sad thing is, I can actually look at the thing and think to myself, "hmm, I want one."
I mean did you ever see the early releases of Linux? or any other open source project at release point .1 or .4?
:)
Yeah I tried to build the original test (<= 0.99) kernels, but GCC 2.95 just wouldn't compile them
With all of the bare-breasted statues out there in America, maybe Ashcroft decided that he was going to have to take his show on the road if he was to get them all.
What an asshole
Actually with 256 bits you could only address about 10^77 of them, but who needs the rest anyway?
Come on, how ignorant must the USPTO be to allow something like this to get through? Subdomains, hyperlinks, and frames have been used long before the patents for them were ever drafted. Some companies, like ideaflood, probably didn't even exist when domains (and therefore subdomains) were created; RFC 882 was created in 1983 and obsoleted in 1987. I know that the USPTO can't have an expert investigation into every patent that is filed, but the situation is still unacceptable. The government needs to crack down on companies whose sole purpose is to file patents on commonly-used proceses and who make the majority of their profits off of lawsuits, as these companies only destroy the progression of our society and don't contribute in producing goods or services.
I also notice that nowhere in the article is there a www. in front of the websites. Does this mean that someone could interpret www as a subdomain and they're afraid of being sued?
Chances are, adult-oriented websites will have little to no incentive to move their domains over to a different TLD.
.xxx domain could cause non-adult sites to move there, which would cause them to be restricted to children who may otherwise have legal and unrestricted access.
"When faced with the slippery nature of what depictions of sexual activity should be illegal or not, one U.S. Supreme Court justice blithely defined obscenity as: 'I know it when I see it.'"
Using legislation as a means to force such sites to the new TLD is impossible to implement, since the courts are simply unwilling to touch (no pun intended) on the technicalities of the issue. Trying to ask any judge what they consider sexually explicit will get you a different answer every time, and will change as you go to different parts of the world. The United States is in no position to impose it's ethical views on other contries.
Getting back to my oringinal point, what is the incentive to migrate to the new TLD? Webmasters are generally more interested in getting more visitors to their site rather than placing restrictions. Placing a price cut, which I can see as the only viable incentive, on registration to the
See, this just shows you that the open source ideal works. Sharing the code from Mozilla, BSD, and Linux creates a more effective networking platform. Sharing the code to SoBig creates a more effective way of showing everyone why they should use the aforementioned software.
It's ok, you're paying for their bandwidth anyway.
But businesses have been advised to be vigilant and beef up their security teams.
<sarcasm>
I am responsible for a number of systems that employ technologies including the Apache webserver, OpenSSH, and the Linux kernel. I am deeply concerned to find out that the source code of these very programs have been released into public, for free! Anyone from anywhere in the world can download the source, compile it on their own machines, change it, and even submit their changes back to the developers to be included in the next release. I can not even start to believe the security implications that this must cause. I mean, how can a system like Apache be secure if everyone in the world with decent programming knowledge can look at all of its source and find its weaknesses? And Apache runs two-thirds of the Web!! I hear that people all over the world have contributed to the Linux kernel. How do I know that I can trust something that was written in a country not ruled by Capitalist lobbying and corporate power, where the dollar is the bottom line and one expects to pay a high price for quality? How can something developed for free be better than a system which costs thousands of dollars and forces restrictive licensing upon its users?
The only solution is to switch to something that is carefully guarded and kept closed.
</sarcasm>
Currently, broadband service is still lacking in many parts of the US and the world. I live only 7 miles away from the nearest downtown area, but DSL is not available in my home town. Until a decent solution to dial-up exists in the majority of the country at a reasonable price, download-as-you-go games will never catch on. Considering how much data goes into each level in Half-Life, it could take hours to download everything needed for that level (especially in single-player) on a 56k connection.
Something written by Microsoft that was supposed to protect against attacks was found vulnerable. This won't be the last time it happens. Cisco, on the other hand, has no excuse given their record.
The DMCA is the equivalent of trying to stop break-and-entry of homes by making screwdrivers illegal.
The DMCA wouldn't make screwdrivers illegal. It would just make it illegal for you to publish instructions on how to fabricate a screwdriver, locate the door, and insert the screwdriver.
I've never felt that addresses ending with .COM / .ORG and the like should be global. Country codes to be used, eg:
" >Page 2</a>
slashdot.org - From within the US
slashdot.org.us - Globally
microsoft.com - From within the US
microsoft.com.us - Globally
Ok, so here's what happens:
<a href="http://www.ignorantdevelopers.com/page2.htm
suddenly results in Host Not Found for every user residing outside of the host's country.
I've seen pop-up blockers in just about every shape and form, whether it comes from ISP software or a third party (like the kinds you see advertised in banners). My favorite pop-up blocker is Mozilla, but I know it will be a very long time until everyone else I know catches on. What's even more sad is how many self-proclaimed *nix "fans" I see using Internet Explorer.
I just looked at the google cache of this page and it looked like Microsoft had a ways to go before receiving a "good faith reprieve" from this site. This sounds like the voice of someone with the corporate pistol pointed at his head.
My concerns about the SiteFinder:
- Who decides what pages are shown? Is it a completely objective search or are we under the cover of corporate sponsorship?
- What kind of user control do you have? So far I see three options available to me, and I could really care less about content filtering so where is everything else?
- Where are the other languages? Google supports just about every language known to mankind, living, dead, and ficticious. Why does America think it runs the world?
- How does this make the Internet stronger? So far, this move has defeated spam filters and caused other network problems.
As far as I'm concerned, this is an abuse of their administrative powers and ICANN has done the right thing for a change by putting a stop to this operation. They should revoke Verisign's power if abuse continues.good thing it's only artists I don't like that are doing this, so far... They should be sued for discriminating against the "minority," e.g. Linux, BSD, and portable MP3 users. Since when is it law that a PC is required to use Windows?
You don't need kernel 2.6.x for RPM to break. I have this happening in my university department every time an RPM command is run and I can't find out why.
one bit isn't good enough
here is my proposal:
+1 cracker bit (use when attempting buffer overflow, backdoor, exploit, etc.)
+2 terrorist bit (need I say what countries to put here?)
+4 deceptive business bit (apply to 192.189.271.221 and others
+8 p0rn bit (apply to 90% of gnutella searches)
+16 spam bit (apply to SMTP transfers from domains including, but not limited to, yahoo.com, hotmail.com, and aol.com.. might as well use it if you're reading mail from any of these too)
+32 annoying bit (IRC scripts should use this)
+64 utterly-insecure bit (IIS, IE, Outlook, and practically all other Microsoft programs should apply this bit)
+128 Pinky and the Brain bit (network traffic used to try to take over the world; apply to sites including, but not limited to, 207.46.249.27, 65.244.101.222, Bill Gates' personal T1)
Just another example how MS forces you to continue shelling-out more cash as time goes by. The timing for this is just a little too perfect it seems (like 2 days?) to say that MS did not discontinue support for NT4 in preparation for the release of Server 2003. Now, companies using NT4 are almost forced to buy the upgrade even when I'm sure NT4 works according to Microsoft's high standards of quality in other areas. This is another example of Microsoft's profit-motivated engineering working for them and against everyone else. Just wait 10 more years...
Illequipped??? A word processor is a word processor no matter what platform you're running it on. While there are differences between Word and StarOffice, it's the same underlying principle. You type a document, format it, press the U button whenever you want it to underline, save it, and print it. What's the big difference? Including Internet Explorer in your comment is completely bullshit, the internet works exactly the same (from the user's perspective) in IE as it does in Mozilla/Netscape/Opera. In my opinion, it would be better to learn Mozilla because IE is buggy and full of holes, and there are few sites out there that only work in IE.
Also keep in mind that this is a programming class. Environments like Visual C++ let you get away with so many lazy programming shortcuts that when these students get into any REAL development scenario, their skills will still be undeveloped and they'll have no choice but to go work for Microsoft and generate more poorly-coded software. Also if they're learning to write programs, then they should also know how computers work well enough to be able to adapt to different platforms.
Operating systems perform basic tasks, such as recognizing input from the keyboard, sending output to the display screen, keeping track of files and directories on the disk, and controlling peripheral devices such as disk drives and printers.[webopedia.com]
/. h4x0r w4nn4b3's who are adding fuel to the fire. If you're a corporation and you're really paranoid about your sensitive documents getting into the wrong hands, then maybe you should be more concerned about keeping your networks secure (one way would be by not using Microsoft products) and choosing your employees wisely.
Nowhere in does this mention anything about deciding what programs/documents the user can and cannot open. An OS is desined to give functionality to a computer, not a tool to implement bureaucratic policies and legal restrictions (e.g. the Palladium and other DRM nightmares).
Now, getting back to WRMS (for Stallman's sake I'll call it WRMS from now on). The difference between this and paper shredding is that you now get to keep the documents you're trying to hide. Think of how many Enrons and Arther Andersens still out there now have digital protection! Once again, Microsoft caters to big corporations that invest lots of money into the computer industry and want to see things their way. This does not help the rest of us, and if the Enron scam happens again because of this (and it will), then it will hurt our economy again.
Enter Palladium, just another part of Microsoft's new restrictive practices. I think we should petition Intel against killing its own platform. We've gone very far from the 80's now, and I think if this does not stop it will only get worse. I'm no legal expert, but I see Palladium as a violation of the 4th amendment in the US constitution. Your PC is as much private to you as your house is. Criminals can break into computer just as well as a burglar can crawl through that open window in your back yard when you're not home. However, the police still can't get in without your permission or a warrant. DRM is, by design, used to find illegal material and warezed software then delete it or report it. How is this any different from search and seizure?
Now for those of you who are worried are going to lose your freedoms, just remember who's really at fault here. It is the people who swap thousands of MP3's every day, download warez and illegal keys.. basically those too cheap to actually pay for your software and music. Granted, I don't think it's right for Microsoft to charge 200 bucks for an OS, but that's one of the reasons I'm using Linux. I still don't believe it's right what they're doing, but the blame should really be placed on most of the
answer: Well of course not. Microsoft would like to keep their business model of "recruiting" all those misguided [insert OS here] users back to their world. In a company network where it's Windows servers running everything, they would rather require users to use Windows for their job rather than have the freedom to choose alternate operating systems. Not only this, but it's also easy for them to make things instantly obsolete (since the computer world is always "changing" so much), label things as "legacy," and therefore companies would have to upgrade and eventually so would the home user.
It's not like everybody who becomes first interested in Linux is a hacker anyway. Today, distrobutions are creating cleaner install programs, interfaces, software, and hardware support. Just recently I upgraded my RH 7.0 system to 7.2 and found there were many improvements that would appeal to Windows users. If improvements continue, an OEM could follow by building Linux systems for a lot cheaper, which would catch the eye of the consumer. Even those consumers that don't know what it is to "compile" something or what OS stands for, something like "Free Software Upgrades Available" or would definately get their attention along with the lower price. The average user boots-up to check e-mail, browse websites, use office software, print, etc. and don't need the advanced features of hardware components that Linux doesn't support (even though the list is growing rapidly smaller). It is only companies that continue to build proprietary systems that would continue to hurt themselves if an OEM put together a Linux PC. And those that need the advanced hardware (gamers, for example) would have the know-how of what to get (a Linux HCL provided) and how to upgrade on their own.