>Judge ordered spam is no better than any other >kind of spam.
Um, yes it is. I would be very happy if all the SPAM I got every day said: "Hi. We're a crappy company. We engage in deceptive business practices. We apologize if we tricked you into buying our stuff, and we'd like to remind you that you don't ever have to buy stuff from us, regardless of the apparent importance of the bill or invoice that you send you."
>Lets see... if I buy a CD, it might screw-up my >computer... but if I download the same mp3s, I >don't have to worry about it messing up my >computer...
Very true. So more people are going to download MP3s. Then, 6 or 9 or 12 months later the RIAA comes back and says: "Look at this! CD sales have dropped even more, and pirated MP3 downloads have increased. We told you that we needed better copy protection. Maybe _now_ you'll believe was when we say that we need hardware copy protection." Congress will say, "We're terribly sorry - we'll never doubt you again. We'll force the CBDTPA/SSSCA/whatever it will be called through right now. Take that, pirates!".
To combat this, people should go find these CDs, and (assuming they don't have labels stating they can't be used in a computer); buy them; attempt to play them; and then return them. Then the RIAA can't say sales have decreased, and hopefully, someone, somewhere (other than geeks) will realize that copy protection on CDs simply isn't going to work.
What about these allegations of crappy sound? Has anyone tried returning a CD because it sounded like shit (because of the audio data itself, not the content) Did they accept the return?
That's the nicest way of saying "fuck you" I've ever seen:-)
Re:From the article...
on
Time Travel
·
· Score: 1
Oh, just an engineering problem...
Uh, the "just an engineering" problem applies to sending a person. He has said he believes it is possible to send a particle through time with current knowledge and resources.
Many things in science have ben proved as a concept, yet using them in real life was an "engineering" problem. Even after Marconi's wireless was proved useful and functional for sending messages across large portions of Europe, he still considered it an "engineering" problem to send messages across the Atlantic. The engineering problem was overcome with enormous amounts of power and the correct antenna configuration. Engineering problems need to be overcome, it doesn't mean it's impossible.
Kerbeos for authentication. http://web.mit.edu/kerberos/www/
Hesiod is used to obtain the equivalent of what would be stored in/etc/passwd (but because Kerberos is used, there's no crypted password in the password field, only a Asterisk (*) which indicates Kerberos authorization should be used.) Hesiod is based on bind, so clients exist for most platforms, and if they don't, you can simply use nslookup as the client.
Microsoft on Sunday filed to strike large portions of the submitted testimony from the
proceeding before U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. She did not grant the request.
"Uh, your honor? We'd like to delete this testimony since it makes us look guilty. We're really not guilty, so you shouldn't allow anyone to intimate otherwise."
They're pretty dumb if they thought they were going to get away with that. Once has to wonder what will happen to Gateway now... I think MS will take the cow boxes to the slaughterhouse while they still can.
Assuming that Virtumundo really did get screwed when they were given a bogus database, then kudos to them for showing that they are a somewhat responsible company.
It would appear that they are different from Joe Spammer who uses Korean mail servers and provides a bogus reply-to address. The fact that they even read the complaints they got proves that they aren't out to (purposely) screw people.
I've gotten some things that I thought were complete spam, but when researching where they originated from, I realized there were times when signing up on a website, I forgot to uncheck all of the "I want to receive e-mail from our partner sites" buttons. While they really should be opt-in, instead of opt-out, it's my own damn fault for not double-checking my work.
I have no problem receiving advertising mail if it's because I forgot to uncheck a box, or accidentally checked a box. The problem is when there's no way to get off the list. It sounds like these folks actually read replies and care about whether they're spamming or not, and if so, good for them. Personally, I think e-mail marketing is a waste of bandwidth, but if I can prevent myself from receiving junk mails in the future, I don't have a problem with it.
(On the other hand, they could just be some schmoes who spammed knowingly or on purpose, and are now just trying to pass the buck.)
Seriously though, the article says it can only affect IE. This makes sense, given that it's easier to do sneaky things in the registy and elsewhere which, while invisible to the user, will cause drastically different behavior in parts of the operating system, like IE.
Aren't you glad you use Netscape? Don't you wish everyone else did? (apologies to the old Dial ads)
Quoth the article:
The mouse Engelbart used in that important demonstration differed somewhat
from today's designs. Most notably, it had three, equal-sized buttons on top.
I dunno what kind of mice they have in Canada today, but all of my mice have three buttons, with the exception of the Microsoft mouse which I use as a backup for my laptop. My first serial mouse had 3 buttons, as did other old mice I've come across.
..but all the Apple ads I saw had at the bottom, in fairly large print as far as disclaimers go, "Don't steal msuic."
Think about that for a second. They didn't put some legalese disclaimer about proper use, etc, etc - they came right out and said that downloading music that isn't yours is stealing. It seems like Apple is pretty clear that they want people to use their software/hardware only for legal activities.
I'm a little confused as to why companies like Diamond, Iomega, and others that make "personal digital music devices" (read: MP3 players) aren't kicking and screaming about the SSCA. Do they not realize that sales of these devices will go down to 0 if people can't rip CDs? Or have they already sold their souls to the RIAA, who in turn has promised to provide (Windows) software to decode "unrippable" CDs?
The obvious thing being omitted here is that there's this company called Netscape (AOL/TW, I know...), and they open-sourced their browser (Mozilla), and last I checked they were still making new versions.
The fact that there is a Netscape 6.2 and a Mozilla project, should render the Microsoft IE argument useless.
When I bought my Compudyne 486 from CompUSA, it came with Windows. When I asked "Where are the diskettes?", CompUSA replied "Oh, they're on the hard drive. You don't need floppies." When I insisted that I really did, they told me where they were located on the hard drive, and pointed me to a program they had written which would automatically create the windows floppies from the data on the HD.
I see a lot of posts here claiming new students only know about AOL, MSN, Office XP, etc. Can you blame them? When Mom and Dad by them their new Dell Optiplex GX150 with a TFT display, does it come with Linux on it? Of course not.
When I first came to MIT, I knew about Windows and MS Office. That was it. Was I criticized for running Windows? Was I sneered at by zekr1t n1Nj@ Haxxor dudez who were running Linux or NetBSD? No. Instead, someone suggested (nicely; not by saying "Try running a _real_ OS") that I give Linux a try - If I didn't like it, I didn't have to boot into it, and I would only have lost 300MB of hard drive space (those were the days). I was given a RedHat 4.0 network boot disk and the IP address of an NFS server, and I installed Linux. My friends were willing to help me learn things, and give me pointers. There is a community mailing list that people who use Linux can subscribe to and get their questions answered by other members of the community who've been using Linux for much longer. The people on this list didn't get annoyed or flame if you asked dumb questions, nor did they gve you snide "MS sux" remarks if you inquired how to mount a Windows partition in Linux. Because of that environment, I am now a competent Linux user, administrator, and halfway decent developer. You can't expect students to rise to that level if you only offer criticism.
And can you blame students for using MS Office formats to exchange files? The media rarely mentions Linux without saying "hackers" and "computer crime" in the same sentence. Ignorant website developers and system adminsitrators think Microsoft Office is the only answer. I've even encountered people here at MIT who refuse to accept PDF documents, saying that they don't want to deal with the extra effort required to open them. (Who hasn't heard of Acrobat Reader?) In order for this bias to change, colleges need to foster an environment in which Microsoft Office is not the only format for exhanging documents. The campus computing environment here runs on a variety of platforms, including Solaris, IRIX, and Linux, so by default all course-related documents have to be in a format accessible from all platforms. This is accepted for the most part, and materials appear in HTML, PDF, and PostScript (though StarOffice has given some people an excuse to distribute.doc files). If other colleges start creating policies like this, that might just cut down on the Microsoft-centric atmosphere.
Education is a key point in this topic, and colleges are a good place to start. I would venture to say that the majority of college students who only use Windows do so not because of choice, but because they are unaware of the alternatives, or because the alternatives seem daunting and unnecessary. These perceptions have to change before more college students will start using Linux.
I didn't say programmers didn't deserve credit. I said Stallman's viewpoint supports a stereotype. As we all know, stereotypes are not fact by any means. Yes, the majority of programmers are willing to help individual users if they have the time. And yes, people who think they are "entitled" to support for free software are wrong. The point is, there are those (I could find sources, but we've all seen their words) who would respond to a bug/feature request in software with: "It's open-source. You figure it out and fix it, or stop bitching."
After reading Stallman's responses to the poll, my impression of him has not changed.
First of all, he should be commended for having the guts to go out and make the statements he does. Look at his responses - he's basically telling the GNOME Board "Look, you can get as enthusiastic as you want about GNOME, but it's an integral part of GNU software, and don't you forget it." Whether right or wrong, you have to believe strongly in something to say that to their [virtual] faces.
The problem is, Stallman's viewpoint only serves to support the stereotype of the free software movement: "A bunch of opinionated geeks, who have all these high and mighty principles, but won't actually help Joe User learn how to use this stuff, because they don't consider him worthy."
If you wish to obey both the letter and spirit of the "laws" of the free software community, then yes, Stallman's view that free is free, and proprietary is proprietary, and never the twain shall meet, is right on target. However, it's impossible to do that in the real world. In today's society of capitalism and instant gratificaton, you need to offer people an incentive to use your software. Simply appealing to their ideals isn't going to be that successful.
Here's an example: Imagine Joe User is given a Windows PC. Let's pretend that Windows PC runs the GNOME desktop, but still runs Windows as the OS. Once Joe User figures it out, he's pretty happy with it. In a year or so, Microsoft wants to charge him some more money for his license. His friend says "Hey, you don't need to do that. Try installing Linux." Joe User sets it up, and when it boots up, he sees the familiar GNOME desktop. Joe User is a happy user, and sticks with Linux, and another ones bites the dust as far as MS is concerned. This is a good thing, right?
Now imagine another scenario: GNOME can't be used with any proprietary software. It doesn't exist for for Windows. Joe User's friend comes along, and installs Linux for him to alleviate Microsoft's licensing. Joe User is very confused. "WTF is this bear claw doing where the Start menu should be?" he says. "Well, I see Netscape, but damned if I know how to manage my windows. I'm a busy man - I don't have time to read this documentation when I'm supposed to be working. I can't get anything done.", he laments. "Screw it," he says. "I'll just pay Microsoft the extra money."
The difference between the two scenarios is that in the first case, the user can take his time to learn GNOME. It's not essential to get his work done. Joe User views the idea of having to learn about Windows as a done deal. To him, you can't use computers unless you can figure out Windows. Because of this, he can fall back onto Windows if GNOME is confusing. But he'll eventually master it, at his own pace. If you throw it at him, and say "You can't do squat until you figure out how to use this, he's going to be unhappy."
There's lots of free (speech, not beer) software available for commerical OS's. I love Apache, but because of some applications I use, I can't boot into Linux 24-7. Thank goodness Apache is available for Windows, and not just because it's more secure than IIS - it's also a better product.
Imagine if it wasn't available for anything but GNU/Linux.
The point is, if you irreparably sever the connections between free and proprietary software, it can only serve to be detrimental to the movement. It's like opening "Joe's Fast-Food Burgers" right between a McDonald's and a Burger King, and wondering why no one is showing up to buy your food. You need to offer the average person an incentive to come to YOU instead of competitors.
As much as we may hate it, "It runs under Windows" is a good incentive for some people. Then we can say: "Hey - why don't you try out CygWin? It looks a lot like a UN*X console, but it runs under Windows. If you get fed up with it, just click that "X" in the corner, and you can go back to what you were doing."
Now it's up to the free software community to take it to the next step. As in, "Hey, buddy. I noticed you've got cygwin, Apache, and StarOffice on that Windows box. Want to try installing Linux? You get the exact same thing, but without paying money to Microsoft. Give it a try."
The "free as in speech" idea will appeal to users once they're involved in the movement. The "free as in beer" is what is necessary to draw them into the movement. Stallman would do well to understand this.
New York had pneumatic tubes for travel over 100 years ago. Not quite the kind featured in Futurama but close. In 1870, a demonstration of a new kind of transit system took place in lower Manhattan. I think it was near City Hall Park - I might be wrong. Anyway, this guy (I forget his name) built a 1-track transit system with two stations. It was called the pneumatic transit system and people entered a large capsule that moved on a track through a tube. (Incidentally, that's where the River of Slime in Ghostbusters II is supposed to be). It was a novelty, but used ridiculous amounts of energy, and the placement of the large fans to create the air pressure was difficult. Anyway, it faded into history two years later, and is rarely mentioned since. I believe most of it is now gone, since some of the tunnel was used during construction of one of the later subway lines in Manhattan.
First of all, every host on the internet is potentially a server, and potentially contains useful, intended-for-the-public information.
This is true, however there are some hosts that obviously do not fall into this category. For example, foo-bar-baz.dial-access.att.net or quux.b8348b4892.blk3.coxathome.com are pretty obviously not servers that would contain useful public information. Domain names are cheap. If someone _really_ wanted to provide never-before-seen useful info to the public, he'd get a CNAME like usefulinfo.com to point to his machine. If I saw someone methodically checking every port on a machine like one of the two above, I'd assume he was running mscan or something, not some guy looking for info.
If it becomes illegal to connect to port 80 of someone's machine to see if they're running a web
server, that's a huge loss for us all. You might think http is different somehow, but do you really want the goverment maintaining a list of what ports are legal to use for services?
It shouldn't become illegal to connect to port 80, port 23, 21, 79, etc. However, when you connect to port 23, and don't get a login prompt, it's pretty obvious that a telnet server isn't running. That does NOT mean that you go ahead and try every other port to see if they might have a hidden telnet server running elsewhere.
Moving back to a higher-level thread, the problem is (as has been said before) differentiating between hackers and crackers; between people who are intelligent and interested in learning and those who are script kiddies.
If people like this 2600 group want the public to see them as people who "hack" their computers to make them do interesting things, then they should make every effort possible to dissociate from these zekRit n1Nj@ H@xx0r DooD3z who serve no useful purpose whatever.
Finally, it is very easy to learn about securing your system without breaking into one that doesn't belong to you.
Slashdot Mirror
>Judge ordered spam is no better than any other
>kind of spam.
Um, yes it is. I would be very happy if all the SPAM I got every day said: "Hi. We're a crappy company. We engage in deceptive business practices. We apologize if we tricked you into buying our stuff, and we'd like to remind you that you don't ever have to buy stuff from us, regardless of the apparent importance of the bill or invoice that you send you."
If only that would happen...
>Lets see... if I buy a CD, it might screw-up my
>computer... but if I download the same mp3s, I
>don't have to worry about it messing up my
>computer...
Very true. So more people are going to download MP3s. Then, 6 or 9 or 12 months later the RIAA comes back and says: "Look at this! CD sales have dropped even more, and pirated MP3 downloads have increased. We told you that we needed better copy protection. Maybe _now_ you'll believe was when we say that we need hardware copy protection." Congress will say, "We're terribly sorry - we'll never doubt you again. We'll force the CBDTPA/SSSCA/whatever it will be called through right now. Take that, pirates!".
To combat this, people should go find these CDs, and (assuming they don't have labels stating they can't be used in a computer); buy them; attempt to play them; and then return them. Then the RIAA can't say sales have decreased, and hopefully, someone, somewhere (other than geeks) will realize that copy protection on CDs simply isn't going to work.
What about these allegations of crappy sound? Has anyone tried returning a CD because it sounded like shit (because of the audio data itself, not the content) Did they accept the return?
That's the nicest way of saying "fuck you" I've ever seen :-)
Uh, the "just an engineering" problem applies to sending a person. He has said he believes it is possible to send a particle through time with current knowledge and resources.
Many things in science have ben proved as a concept, yet using them in real life was an "engineering" problem. Even after Marconi's wireless was proved useful and functional for sending messages across large portions of Europe, he still considered it an "engineering" problem to send messages across the Atlantic. The engineering problem was overcome with enormous amounts of power and the correct antenna configuration. Engineering problems need to be overcome, it doesn't mean it's impossible.
Kerbeos for authentication.
/etc/passwd (but because Kerberos is used, there's no crypted password in the password field, only a Asterisk (*) which indicates Kerberos authorization should be used.) Hesiod is based on bind, so clients exist for most platforms, and if they don't, you can simply use nslookup as the client.
http://web.mit.edu/kerberos/www/
Hesiod is used to obtain the equivalent of what
would be stored in
"Uh, your honor? We'd like to delete this testimony since it makes us look guilty. We're really not guilty, so you shouldn't allow anyone to intimate otherwise."
They're pretty dumb if they thought they were going to get away with that. Once has to wonder what will happen to Gateway now... I think MS will take the cow boxes to the slaughterhouse while they still can.
Assuming that Virtumundo really did get screwed when they were given a bogus database, then kudos to them for showing that they are a somewhat responsible company.
It would appear that they are different from Joe Spammer who uses Korean mail servers and provides a bogus reply-to address. The fact that they even read the complaints they got proves that they aren't out to (purposely) screw people.
I've gotten some things that I thought were complete spam, but when researching where they originated from, I realized there were times when signing up on a website, I forgot to uncheck all of the "I want to receive e-mail from our partner sites" buttons. While they really should be opt-in, instead of opt-out, it's my own damn fault for not double-checking my work.
I have no problem receiving advertising mail if it's because I forgot to uncheck a box, or accidentally checked a box. The problem is when there's no way to get off the list. It sounds like these folks actually read replies and care about whether they're spamming or not, and if so, good for them. Personally, I think e-mail marketing is a waste of bandwidth, but if I can prevent myself from receiving junk mails in the future, I don't have a problem with it.
(On the other hand, they could just be some schmoes who spammed knowingly or on purpose, and are now just trying to pass the buck.)
I should get some mod points for that subject :-)
Seriously though, the article says it can only affect IE. This makes sense, given that it's easier to do sneaky things in the registy and elsewhere which, while invisible to the user, will cause drastically different behavior in parts of the operating system, like IE.
Aren't you glad you use Netscape? Don't you wish everyone else did?
(apologies to the old Dial ads)
I dunno what kind of mice they have in Canada today, but all of my mice have three buttons, with the exception of the Microsoft mouse which I use as a backup for my laptop. My first serial mouse had 3 buttons, as did other old mice I've come across.
Well, I'm glad that I kept my Mac Portable, which weighs in at 21 pounds. Let's see some schmoe try to steal that...
Think about that for a second. They didn't put some legalese disclaimer about proper use, etc, etc - they came right out and said that downloading music that isn't yours is stealing. It seems like Apple is pretty clear that they want people to use their software/hardware only for legal activities.
I'm a little confused as to why companies like Diamond, Iomega, and others that make "personal digital music devices" (read: MP3 players) aren't kicking and screaming about the SSCA. Do they not realize that sales of these devices will go down to 0 if people can't rip CDs? Or have they already sold their souls to the RIAA, who in turn has promised to provide (Windows) software to decode "unrippable" CDs?
The fact that there is a Netscape 6.2 and a Mozilla project, should render the Microsoft IE argument useless.
When I bought my Compudyne 486 from CompUSA, it came with Windows. When I asked "Where are the diskettes?", CompUSA replied "Oh, they're on the hard drive. You don't need floppies." When I insisted that I really did, they told me where they were located on the hard drive, and pointed me to a program they had written which would automatically create the windows floppies from the data on the HD.
Oh, and this was in 1993.
I see a lot of posts here claiming new students only know about AOL, MSN, Office XP, etc. Can you blame them? When Mom and Dad by them their new Dell Optiplex GX150 with a TFT display, does it come with Linux on it? Of course not.
.doc files). If other colleges start creating policies like this, that might just cut down on the Microsoft-centric atmosphere.
When I first came to MIT, I knew about Windows and MS Office. That was it. Was I criticized for running Windows? Was I sneered at by zekr1t n1Nj@ Haxxor dudez who were running Linux or NetBSD? No. Instead, someone suggested (nicely; not by saying "Try running a _real_ OS") that I give Linux a try - If I didn't like it, I didn't have to boot into it, and I would only have lost 300MB of hard drive space (those were the days). I was given a RedHat 4.0 network boot disk and the IP address of an NFS server, and I installed Linux. My friends were willing to help me learn things, and give me pointers. There is a community mailing list that people who use Linux can subscribe to and get their questions answered by other members of the community who've been using Linux for much longer. The people on this list didn't get annoyed or flame if you asked dumb questions, nor did they gve you snide "MS sux" remarks if you inquired how to mount a Windows partition in Linux. Because of that environment, I am now a competent Linux user, administrator, and halfway decent developer. You can't expect students to rise to that level if you only offer criticism.
And can you blame students for using MS Office formats to exchange files? The media rarely mentions Linux without saying "hackers" and "computer crime" in the same sentence. Ignorant website developers and system adminsitrators think Microsoft Office is the only answer. I've even encountered people here at MIT who refuse to accept PDF documents, saying that they don't want to deal with the extra effort required to open them. (Who hasn't heard of Acrobat Reader?) In order for this bias to change, colleges need to foster an environment in which Microsoft Office is not the only format for exhanging documents. The campus computing environment here runs on a variety of platforms, including Solaris, IRIX, and Linux, so by default all course-related documents have to be in a format accessible from all platforms. This is accepted for the most part, and materials appear in HTML, PDF, and PostScript (though StarOffice has given some people an excuse to distribute
Education is a key point in this topic, and colleges are a good place to start. I would venture to say that the majority of college students who only use Windows do so not because of choice, but because they are unaware of the alternatives, or because the alternatives seem daunting and unnecessary. These perceptions have to change before more college students will start using Linux.
I didn't say programmers didn't deserve credit. I said Stallman's viewpoint supports a stereotype. As we all know, stereotypes are not fact by any means. Yes, the majority of programmers are willing to help individual users if they have the time. And yes, people who think they are "entitled" to support for free software are wrong. The point is, there are those (I could find sources, but we've all seen their words) who would respond to a bug/feature request in software with: "It's open-source. You figure it out and fix it, or stop bitching."
First of all, he should be commended for having the guts to go out and make the statements he does. Look at his responses - he's basically telling the GNOME Board "Look, you can get as enthusiastic as you want about GNOME, but it's an integral part of GNU software, and don't you forget it." Whether right or wrong, you have to believe strongly in something to say that to their [virtual] faces.
The problem is, Stallman's viewpoint only serves to support the stereotype of the free software movement: "A bunch of opinionated geeks, who have all these high and mighty principles, but won't actually help Joe User learn how to use this stuff, because they don't consider him worthy."
If you wish to obey both the letter and spirit of the "laws" of the free software community, then yes, Stallman's view that free is free, and proprietary is proprietary, and never the twain shall meet, is right on target. However, it's impossible to do that in the real world. In today's society of capitalism and instant gratificaton, you need to offer people an incentive to use your software. Simply appealing to their ideals isn't going to be that successful.
Here's an example: Imagine Joe User is given a Windows PC. Let's pretend that Windows PC runs the GNOME desktop, but still runs Windows as the OS. Once Joe User figures it out, he's pretty happy with it. In a year or so, Microsoft wants to charge him some more money for his license. His friend says "Hey, you don't need to do that. Try installing Linux." Joe User sets it up, and when it boots up, he sees the familiar GNOME desktop. Joe User is a happy user, and sticks with Linux, and another ones bites the dust as far as MS is concerned. This is a good thing, right?
Now imagine another scenario: GNOME can't be used with any proprietary software. It doesn't exist for for Windows. Joe User's friend comes along, and installs Linux for him to alleviate Microsoft's licensing. Joe User is very confused. "WTF is this bear claw doing where the Start menu should be?" he says. "Well, I see Netscape, but damned if I know how to manage my windows. I'm a busy man - I don't have time to read this documentation when I'm supposed to be working. I can't get anything done.", he laments. "Screw it," he says. "I'll just pay Microsoft the extra money."
The difference between the two scenarios is that in the first case, the user can take his time to learn GNOME. It's not essential to get his work done. Joe User views the idea of having to learn about Windows as a done deal. To him, you can't use computers unless you can figure out Windows. Because of this, he can fall back onto Windows if GNOME is confusing. But he'll eventually master it, at his own pace. If you throw it at him, and say "You can't do squat until you figure out how to use this, he's going to be unhappy."
There's lots of free (speech, not beer) software available for commerical OS's. I love Apache, but because of some applications I use, I can't boot into Linux 24-7. Thank goodness Apache is available for Windows, and not just because it's more secure than IIS - it's also a better product.
Imagine if it wasn't available for anything but GNU/Linux.
The point is, if you irreparably sever the connections between free and proprietary software, it can only serve to be detrimental to the movement. It's like opening "Joe's Fast-Food Burgers" right between a McDonald's and a Burger King, and wondering why no one is showing up to buy your food. You need to offer the average person an incentive to come to YOU instead of competitors.
As much as we may hate it, "It runs under Windows" is a good incentive for some people. Then we can say: "Hey - why don't you try out CygWin? It looks a lot like a UN*X console, but it runs under Windows. If you get fed up with it, just click that "X" in the corner, and you can go back to what you were doing."
Now it's up to the free software community to take it to the next step. As in, "Hey, buddy. I noticed you've got cygwin, Apache, and StarOffice on that Windows box. Want to try installing Linux? You get the exact same thing, but without paying money to Microsoft. Give it a try."
The "free as in speech" idea will appeal to users once they're involved in the movement. The "free as in beer" is what is necessary to draw them into the movement. Stallman would do well to understand this.
Nope. RIAA, means Record Industry Association of America. They don't give a crap about the artists.
New York had pneumatic tubes for travel over 100 years ago. Not quite the kind featured in Futurama but close. In 1870, a demonstration of a new kind of transit system took place in lower Manhattan. I think it was near City Hall Park - I might be wrong. Anyway, this guy (I forget his name) built a 1-track transit system with two stations. It was called the pneumatic transit system and people entered a large capsule that moved on a track through a tube. (Incidentally, that's where the River of Slime in Ghostbusters II is supposed to be). It was a novelty, but used ridiculous amounts of energy, and the placement of the large fans to create the air pressure was difficult. Anyway, it faded into history two years later, and is rarely mentioned since. I believe most of it is now gone, since some of the tunnel was used during construction of one of the later subway lines in Manhattan.
This is true, however there are some hosts that obviously do not fall into this category. For example, foo-bar-baz.dial-access.att.net or quux.b8348b4892.blk3.coxathome.com are pretty obviously not servers that would contain useful public information. Domain names are cheap. If someone _really_ wanted to provide never-before-seen useful info to the public, he'd get a CNAME like usefulinfo.com to point to his machine. If I saw someone methodically checking every port on a machine like one of the two above, I'd assume he was running mscan or something, not some guy looking for info.
If it becomes illegal to connect to port 80 of someone's machine to see if they're running a web server, that's a huge loss for us all. You might think http is different somehow, but do you really want the goverment maintaining a list of what ports are legal to use for services?
It shouldn't become illegal to connect to port 80, port 23, 21, 79, etc. However, when you connect to port 23, and don't get a login prompt, it's pretty obvious that a telnet server isn't running. That does NOT mean that you go ahead and try every other port to see if they might have a hidden telnet server running elsewhere.
Moving back to a higher-level thread, the problem is (as has been said before) differentiating between hackers and crackers; between people who are intelligent and interested in learning and those who are script kiddies.
If people like this 2600 group want the public to see them as people who "hack" their computers to make them do interesting things, then they should make every effort possible to dissociate from these zekRit n1Nj@ H@xx0r DooD3z who serve no useful purpose whatever.
Finally, it is very easy to learn about securing your system without breaking into one that doesn't belong to you.