By the time the change-over is enforced (does anyone really believe that will be 2007?) the prices will be a lot more reasonable.
You're overlooking one thing - it's in the best interests of the businesses selling the digital broadcasting equipment to keep the prices high, regardless of drops in the cost of manufacture, until *after* the mandated changeover.
Why? So they can bilk as much money out of the *rich* stations as possible. Why bother selling $5000 of equipment to each of four stations, when you could sell $25,000 of equipment to each of two bigger ones? The companies selling the equipment have a vested interest in keeping the prices high until the changeover is "complete" -- then they *might* drop prices, at which point it could become possible for smaller stations to afford the equipment - but I wouldn't hold my breath.
Were I a conspiracy theorist, I *might* surmise that the broadcasting industry giants might be "silently" endorsing the higher prices as a way to force their competition out of the market...but I'm not, so I won't;P
Have to agree here -- the one from FF9 made very little sense. The extra rules took a game that was mildly amusing (the card game from FF8) and made it confusing as all hell. I can't count the number of times I said "Huh? How the hell can he take *that* card with *that* one?". The one from FF8 made sense, and was rather consistant once you figured out how it worked.
Of course, I think a rulebook would have made both games more enjoyable - especially the one from FF9.
What "Rights" exactly. You buy the game if you agree with their conditions. If you disagree, you don't buy it. Simple.
With most software, you don't get to *read* the EULA until you've already bought it, opened the box, broken the shrink-wrap on the CD case, and started to install it.
Then you get to read the EULA in a little tiny scrolling textbox.
If you agree to their conditions, fine, you click on "Accept" and you continue the installation.
If you disagree, you stop the install, and immediately run into a problem. Most stores won't take opened software back - unless the media is defective (IE: the cds are scratched and won't run). Depending on the store, you *might* be able to convince the manager to allow the return - but most of the time they'll point at their "store policy" which says you can't return it.
So...what to do? You can't generally go to the manufacturer, as they don't take returns of software purchased elsewhere. You can't return it to the store you purchased it from, for the reasons above. You're basically stuck with software that you won't install, and can't get a refund for.
In most other industries, if you have to agree to a contract before using a product, that contract is offered up front, before purchase, and your point is valid -- "Don't like it, don't buy it". But with software, in most cases, it's quite tough to do that.
Kudos to Bioware for actually publishing the EULA for review *before* purchase, at least for those who can find it. People who don't know it's published, or who pick NWN up as an "impulse buy" are still in the same sticky situation.
As a web browser, Mozilla should be able to withstand maliciously formatted content. It really is a bug.
Hmm...the flaw itself is in XFree, and it's handling of huge fonts. Presumably the only reason a web browser is such a problem is because of the potential to attempt display of a *lot* of text at once (I would assume opening a long document in Star/Openoffice with gigantic fonts would produce the same effect, although I haven't tested it myself...). Therefore, while it's a "nice" thing that Mozilla throws a limit in there to prevent one vector of attack, it's merely throwing a band-aid over the real problem, which should be fixed in XFree.
With this in hand, it is difficult to say 'but my kid installed it' as LEGALLY the kid cannot use or install it without your permission. Notwithstanding this a good company lawyer could say that a reasonable parent would monitor the programs that a child installs on your computers.
Interesting...but if the kid can't be legally bound by the EULA to begin with, isn't it reasonable to assume that he/she/it can't be bound by the clause of the EULA that says they need a parent/guardian's permission?
All the MPAA's crusade against "piracy" is doing is crippling legitimate users of their "product". They're not stopping piracy at all (search on any popular filesharing service for "dvdrip"). But they do prevent there being a legitimate player for linux (LinDVD hasn't been released, has it?) such that someone who has *already* paid for an "approved" DVD drive (and thus paid the DVD-CCA tax on that) as well as (most probably) a bundled "approved" player app (without which the drive is basically useless for playing DVDs) has no choice in what OS they run, unless they want to become a "criminal".
Think of Joe. Joe is a linux user, and a movie fan. He sees a movie about every two weeks, and enjoys himself. He buys DVDs of the movies he likes. He's the model customer of the MPAA. Until he wants to play his DVDs, that is. See, Joe doesn't have a dedicated DVD player - he instead has a DVD drive for his computer, as it will also allow him to use DVD-ROM discs that hold a lot more data than normal CDs. He has a nice big monitor, and a surround sound system. Joe paid a bundle for this hardware. The MPAA says that since Joe doesn't run Windows, he shouldn't be able to play a DVD, regardless of the fact that he's already paid the DVD-CCA for an approved player. For Joe to use DVD player software capable of playing his legitimately purchased DVDs on his legitimately purchased hardware, on a legitimate free OS, he must use an illegal piece of software. Why? Because the MPAA says that Joe is a pirate. And pirates are bad, evil people that loot and pillage. THe MPAA says that Joe (who really only wants to watch his copy of "The Matrix") will willfully copy and distribute his legitimately purchased DVDs, simply because he isn't using a "blessed" OS.
The real "pirates", however, don't care whether they use "illegal" software to get their dvd-rips -- they already know that what they are doing is illegal, so who cares what they use?
Joe, however, is trying to be a "good" person -- he buys his stuff legitimately. He doesn't make copies (except for personal backup purposes as dictated by "fair use") - he encourages his friends to see movies he liked, and to buy DVDs of the movies they enjoyed.
What has Joe done wrong? Nothing - unless he wants to watch his DVDs. Then the MPAA would brand him a criminal - even though he's pretty much their ideal customer.
This definitely would get a +1 Interesting were I a mod this week.
The good thing (tm) would be that eradicating the MSHTML-replacement-malware would be fairly straightforward - just go grab Gecko and plug THAT in instead. For the paranoid, construct a script to load on startup that verifies the integrity of the Gecko files and their status as the MSHTML-replacement - and fixes things, if necessary.
Of course, other "piggy-back" components couldn't be eradicated this way - but that's what Ad-Aware is there for.
As long as there's a way to get new software onto the system, the creeps making this malware will continue to do it. The question is - how long until someone in the gov't gets smacked by one of these, leaks sensitive information as a result, and brings the law crashing down on malware in the name of "National Security"?
Of course, there's the other way it could swing too...with malware-authors using some kind of legal argument against anti-malware programs like Ad-Aware...I wouldn't put it past them to call it a "Circumvention Device" or somesuch under the DMCA, and attempt to have it banned, although I can't see anything short of a huge bribe convincing any reasonable judge of the validity of such an argument.
Well, even if MS does this (disable a boot manager), I am sure there will be some crackers over the internet to code some illigal software that disables windows from disabling the boot managers. What's more, this software might be included in standard Linux or FreeBSD (or whatever) releases.
Hmm...I kinda doubt that. If it was illegal (and I'm not sure in this case that it would be - I don't think running a boot manager is a DMCA violation...), I think most linux distributions would stay away from it, because they want to remain legal.
Now, if MS has it's way, and gets Free Software outlawed - THEN that open up a whole other ball of wax.
I agree - MS's hardware division actually does seem to produce quality products.
We have an old Natural keyboard - that thing is a tank - admittedly, not so much so as my old metal IBM monster, but it has taken it's share of punishment, and still performs flawlessly.
Up until a couple months ago, I had one of the original, first-run IM Explorer mice - and never ran into the cord problems other people had - It did start acting a bit odd, off and on (almost like the LED was taking a few seconds to change brightness), so I replaced it with one of the new Logitech dual-optical mice, but I still have the Explorer tucked away as a spare.
If I have an unmetered connection, and I find something online that I want to read, and I don't have to pay for it, then it is free. If I did have to pay for it, it wouldn't be free. Do you see?
There are costs to everything, regardless of whether you see them at the time.
It's "free", only in the sense that there's no added cost above and beyond that which you're paying for that "unmetered connection".
For you, there may be no added cost for the bandwidth required to transfer "foo" from wherever it is to you, but I guarantee you that your provider is being charged by their upstream for the bandwidth used -- they simply pass that on to you through your ISP bill, which may or may not be "estimating" now much bandwidth a "normal user" would use (IE: not the full rated capacity of the line that you think you are paying for, but rather a low percentage burst usage estimate - this is how broadband providers get in trouble bandwidth-wise, selling more bandwidth than they have for less than it costs, on the hopes that people won't use it)
More than likely, it's also costing "foo"'s provider for the transfer as well. This is the cost that kills many good websites, or causes them to have to bow to the intrusive-advertizing-demons will. The more people that like a site, and visit it, the more bandwidth it costs for that site to operate and keep those users happy. The more users are happy, the more new users they will tell about the site, and the site's audience (and hence bandwidth charges) grows. Eventually, their donated or low-cost bandwidth will run out, and they will be asked to start paying for their (now very high) usage. If they're doing it for free, where does the money come from? This is where sites that survive either turn to advertizing (and possibly lose some of their userbase due to ultra-intrusive ad tactics), subscriptions, or some combination of both.
In HS, I was one of the "privileged few" that got to share a 1200 baud connection to the local university's Gopher system. Ahh...those were the days.
Later, I found out that simply exitting the gopher client would have dropped me to a true unix shell - but I didn't know that at the time. I could have started my Unix education 2 years earlier!
Many people who are "hackers" wear clothing. Therefore we should outlaw the sale of such items.
Many people who are "hackers" consume food products. All businesses which sell food products, therefore, need to be closed down.
Many "hackers" rent apartments or own homes under a mortgage. Allowing this is unforgivable, and we need to outlaw the practice of renting or mortgaging immediately, as it is contributing to the problem.
yes, recognize urls and other items, and allow a link to launch the appropriate application, but I don't need HTML in my email.
Even better - give an option to strip the html entirely - leaving only plaintext - and then, optionally, recognize urls/email addys and linking them appropriately.
That way you get the best of both worlds - the security of plaintext, and the convenience of being able to read email from people who (for whatever reason) use html email, without having to jump through hoops to do so.
Well technically, manipulating all reality through the power of will alone is a pretty good functional definition of what it means to BE God. Only important thing missing is knowing everything, but that probably comes along with all events playing out according to one's will.
Sure - if you can manipulate reality by power of will alone, it should be dead simple to will yourself all the knowledge of the universe =)
if you accuse God of existing you better be able to prove it, or he might sue.
The same with accusing him of not existing;P
So, the only reasonable, legal course of action then, is to say "I can neither confirm or deny the existance of your Supreme Being, at least until he/she/it comes down and has a cup of coffee with me". =)
Popups that abused javascript to run "full-screen", changing the size of my browser window without my permission caused me to disable javascript altogether.
Then, I stopped visiting certain websites when the "browser takeover" intensified with the use of "shoshkles"(sp?) - which obscured the very content I visited the web page to read, in order to hock their annoying, unwanted product. The analogy here is opening a newspaper, and starting to read an article on a local election, when suddenly an ad from the other page crawls and sets itself over that article.
Now, the same company that brought *that* annoyance now decides that the very interface of my browser isn't mine to control. Who needs that "Home" button? Not you! No - you go ahead and have this "BUY!" button instead. "Back" button? Nonono...you need another "BUY!" button!. What? You're not pressing them? Well, maybe you need some more incentive...let's replace the Reload button with a button that looks *just like* your old one, but actually goes to the same place our "BUY!" button takes you!
Hopefully Opera will stay clear of this, otherwise I may have to stop browsing altogether when I'm forced to use the Windows partition of my comp.
How long until a new worm uses this to quietly replace all the buttons and fields in a users browser with identical-looking ones that don't work as advertized?
Re:Have they fixed the fonts?
on
KDE 3.0 is Out
·
· Score: 2
Well - I couldn't get it to work for everything, but in/etc/XftConfig, adding a line similar to:
match any family == "helvetica" edit += "verdana";
...seemed to alleviate at least some of the problem. Replace "verdana" with whichever font you want the offending "default" replaced with.
Slashdot Mirror
...and he would have gotten away with it too...if it hadn't been for you meddling /.ers...
Much thanks!
Seeing as it's not in sid yet, mind tossing us a bone with your apt source for Gnome2 experimental packages?
By the time the change-over is enforced (does anyone really believe that will be 2007?) the prices will be a lot more reasonable.
;P
You're overlooking one thing - it's in the best interests of the businesses selling the digital broadcasting equipment to keep the prices high, regardless of drops in the cost of manufacture, until *after* the mandated changeover.
Why? So they can bilk as much money out of the *rich* stations as possible. Why bother selling $5000 of equipment to each of four stations, when you could sell $25,000 of equipment to each of two bigger ones? The companies selling the equipment have a vested interest in keeping the prices high until the changeover is "complete" -- then they *might* drop prices, at which point it could become possible for smaller stations to afford the equipment - but I wouldn't hold my breath.
Were I a conspiracy theorist, I *might* surmise that the broadcasting industry giants might be "silently" endorsing the higher prices as a way to force their competition out of the market...but I'm not, so I won't
Have to agree here -- the one from FF9 made very little sense. The extra rules took a game that was mildly amusing (the card game from FF8) and made it confusing as all hell. I can't count the number of times I said "Huh? How the hell can he take *that* card with *that* one?". The one from FF8 made sense, and was rather consistant once you figured out how it worked.
Of course, I think a rulebook would have made both games more enjoyable - especially the one from FF9.
What "Rights" exactly. You buy the game if you agree with their conditions. If you disagree, you don't buy it. Simple.
With most software, you don't get to *read* the EULA until you've already bought it, opened the box, broken the shrink-wrap on the CD case, and started to install it.
Then you get to read the EULA in a little tiny scrolling textbox.
If you agree to their conditions, fine, you click on "Accept" and you continue the installation.
If you disagree, you stop the install, and immediately run into a problem. Most stores won't take opened software back - unless the media is defective (IE: the cds are scratched and won't run). Depending on the store, you *might* be able to convince the manager to allow the return - but most of the time they'll point at their "store policy" which says you can't return it.
So...what to do? You can't generally go to the manufacturer, as they don't take returns of software purchased elsewhere. You can't return it to the store you purchased it from, for the reasons above. You're basically stuck with software that you won't install, and can't get a refund for.
In most other industries, if you have to agree to a contract before using a product, that contract is offered up front, before purchase, and your point is valid -- "Don't like it, don't buy it". But with software, in most cases, it's quite tough to do that.
Kudos to Bioware for actually publishing the EULA for review *before* purchase, at least for those who can find it. People who don't know it's published, or who pick NWN up as an "impulse buy" are still in the same sticky situation.
As a web browser, Mozilla should be able to withstand maliciously formatted content. It really is a bug.
Hmm...the flaw itself is in XFree, and it's handling of huge fonts. Presumably the only reason a web browser is such a problem is because of the potential to attempt display of a *lot* of text at once (I would assume opening a long document in Star/Openoffice with gigantic fonts would produce the same effect, although I haven't tested it myself...). Therefore, while it's a "nice" thing that Mozilla throws a limit in there to prevent one vector of attack, it's merely throwing a band-aid over the real problem, which should be fixed in XFree.
With this in hand, it is difficult to say 'but my kid installed it' as LEGALLY the kid cannot use or install it without your permission. Notwithstanding this a good company lawyer could say that a reasonable parent would monitor the programs that a child installs on your computers.
Interesting...but if the kid can't be legally bound by the EULA to begin with, isn't it reasonable to assume that he/she/it can't be bound by the clause of the EULA that says they need a parent/guardian's permission?
All the MPAA's crusade against "piracy" is doing is crippling legitimate users of their "product". They're not stopping piracy at all (search on any popular filesharing service for "dvdrip"). But they do prevent there being a legitimate player for linux (LinDVD hasn't been released, has it?) such that someone who has *already* paid for an "approved" DVD drive (and thus paid the DVD-CCA tax on that) as well as (most probably) a bundled "approved" player app (without which the drive is basically useless for playing DVDs) has no choice in what OS they run, unless they want to become a "criminal".
Think of Joe. Joe is a linux user, and a movie fan. He sees a movie about every two weeks, and enjoys himself. He buys DVDs of the movies he likes. He's the model customer of the MPAA. Until he wants to play his DVDs, that is. See, Joe doesn't have a dedicated DVD player - he instead has a DVD drive for his computer, as it will also allow him to use DVD-ROM discs that hold a lot more data than normal CDs. He has a nice big monitor, and a surround sound system. Joe paid a bundle for this hardware. The MPAA says that since Joe doesn't run Windows, he shouldn't be able to play a DVD, regardless of the fact that he's already paid the DVD-CCA for an approved player. For Joe to use DVD player software capable of playing his legitimately purchased DVDs on his legitimately purchased hardware, on a legitimate free OS, he must use an illegal piece of software. Why? Because the MPAA says that Joe is a pirate. And pirates are bad, evil people that loot and pillage. THe MPAA says that Joe (who really only wants to watch his copy of "The Matrix") will willfully copy and distribute his legitimately purchased DVDs, simply because he isn't using a "blessed" OS.
The real "pirates", however, don't care whether they use "illegal" software to get their dvd-rips -- they already know that what they are doing is illegal, so who cares what they use?
Joe, however, is trying to be a "good" person -- he buys his stuff legitimately. He doesn't make copies (except for personal backup purposes as dictated by "fair use") - he encourages his friends to see movies he liked, and to buy DVDs of the movies they enjoyed.
What has Joe done wrong? Nothing - unless he wants to watch his DVDs. Then the MPAA would brand him a criminal - even though he's pretty much their ideal customer.
This definitely would get a +1 Interesting were I a mod this week.
The good thing (tm) would be that eradicating the MSHTML-replacement-malware would be fairly straightforward - just go grab Gecko and plug THAT in instead. For the paranoid, construct a script to load on startup that verifies the integrity of the Gecko files and their status as the MSHTML-replacement - and fixes things, if necessary.
Of course, other "piggy-back" components couldn't be eradicated this way - but that's what Ad-Aware is there for.
As long as there's a way to get new software onto the system, the creeps making this malware will continue to do it. The question is - how long until someone in the gov't gets smacked by one of these, leaks sensitive information as a result, and brings the law crashing down on malware in the name of "National Security"?
Of course, there's the other way it could swing too...with malware-authors using some kind of legal argument against anti-malware programs like Ad-Aware...I wouldn't put it past them to call it a "Circumvention Device" or somesuch under the DMCA, and attempt to have it banned, although I can't see anything short of a huge bribe convincing any reasonable judge of the validity of such an argument.
It could also use a lot more shows and movies starring Matt Frewer
Unfortunately, not even he could save the second Lawnmower Man movie...
Well, even if MS does this (disable a boot manager), I am sure there will be some crackers over the internet to code some illigal software that disables windows from disabling the boot managers. What's more, this software might be included in standard Linux or FreeBSD (or whatever) releases.
Hmm...I kinda doubt that. If it was illegal (and I'm not sure in this case that it would be - I don't think running a boot manager is a DMCA violation...), I think most linux distributions would stay away from it, because they want to remain legal.
Now, if MS has it's way, and gets Free Software outlawed - THEN that open up a whole other ball of wax.
I agree - MS's hardware division actually does seem to produce quality products.
We have an old Natural keyboard - that thing is a tank - admittedly, not so much so as my old metal IBM monster, but it has taken it's share of punishment, and still performs flawlessly.
Up until a couple months ago, I had one of the original, first-run IM Explorer mice - and never ran into the cord problems other people had - It did start acting a bit odd, off and on (almost like the LED was taking a few seconds to change brightness), so I replaced it with one of the new Logitech dual-optical mice, but I still have the Explorer tucked away as a spare.
There are costs to everything, regardless of whether you see them at the time.
If they do, they'll just expand the channel's name to "G4M35" ;P
Once again, Geocities is useless. "Bandwidth Allocation Exceeded" ::sigh::
In HS, I was one of the "privileged few" that got to share a 1200 baud connection to the local university's Gopher system. Ahh...those were the days.
Later, I found out that simply exitting the gopher client would have dropped me to a true unix shell - but I didn't know that at the time. I could have started my Unix education 2 years earlier!
In protest, they should change their website to:
http://www.we-are-not-hasbro.com
=)
Many people who are "hackers" wear clothing. Therefore we should outlaw the sale of such items.
Many people who are "hackers" consume food products. All businesses which sell food products, therefore, need to be closed down.
Many "hackers" rent apartments or own homes under a mortgage. Allowing this is unforgivable, and we need to outlaw the practice of renting or mortgaging immediately, as it is contributing to the problem.
=)
yes, recognize urls and other items, and allow a link to launch the appropriate application, but I don't need HTML in my email.
Even better - give an option to strip the html entirely - leaving only plaintext - and then, optionally, recognize urls/email addys and linking them appropriately.
That way you get the best of both worlds - the security of plaintext, and the convenience of being able to read email from people who (for whatever reason) use html email, without having to jump through hoops to do so.
Wow, great! Forever war was a really good book. I also liked the sort of seqel, Forever Peace.
;P
I'm a fan of the spinoff show, Forever Knight
Well technically, manipulating all reality through the power of will alone is a pretty good functional definition of what it means to BE God. Only important thing missing is knowing everything, but that probably comes along with all events playing out according to one's will.
Sure - if you can manipulate reality by power of will alone, it should be dead simple to will yourself all the knowledge of the universe =)
if you accuse God of existing you better be able to prove it, or he might sue.
;P
The same with accusing him of not existing
So, the only reasonable, legal course of action then, is to say "I can neither confirm or deny the existance of your Supreme Being, at least until he/she/it comes down and has a cup of coffee with me". =)
Popups that abused javascript to run "full-screen", changing the size of my browser window without my permission caused me to disable javascript altogether.
Then, I stopped visiting certain websites when the "browser takeover" intensified with the use of "shoshkles"(sp?) - which obscured the very content I visited the web page to read, in order to hock their annoying, unwanted product. The analogy here is opening a newspaper, and starting to read an article on a local election, when suddenly an ad from the other page crawls and sets itself over that article.
Now, the same company that brought *that* annoyance now decides that the very interface of my browser isn't mine to control. Who needs that "Home" button? Not you! No - you go ahead and have this "BUY!" button instead. "Back" button? Nonono...you need another "BUY!" button!. What? You're not pressing them? Well, maybe you need some more incentive...let's replace the Reload button with a button that looks *just like* your old one, but actually goes to the same place our "BUY!" button takes you!
Hopefully Opera will stay clear of this, otherwise I may have to stop browsing altogether when I'm forced to use the Windows partition of my comp.
How long until a new worm uses this to quietly replace all the buttons and fields in a users browser with identical-looking ones that don't work as advertized?
Well - I couldn't get it to work for everything, but in /etc/XftConfig, adding a line similar to:
match any family == "helvetica" edit += "verdana";
...seemed to alleviate at least some of the problem. Replace "verdana" with whichever font you want the offending "default" replaced with.