Let them lock up digital rights all they want - if they're going to waste millions/billions building hardware/software that will flop, maybe it will teach them a lesson:
It's farking TAX software, it's not CAD, it's not 3D animation or video editing. It's for doing TAXES.
It's like installing a sophisticated electronic ignition interlock system in a Yugo or something. Why bother?
It's this sort of thing that permanently alienates me on a product. I will NEVER buy a product that uses low-level writes on my system for copy protection purposes, especially if they try and keep it secret.
I enjoy the work that I do, I enjoy my nice office, working with my co-workers, relatively flexible work-schedule, etc.
I have no pirated software, Pr0n, or P2P applications on my machine at work. I have no desire to lose the sweet deal that I have by screwing around with stuff like that.
I imagine that people who hate their jobs, coworkers, boss, etc. may view things differently and not care if they land the company they work for in legal trouble - there's always another job to be found. And of course, if they get fired, they'll promptly rat-out their office to the BSA (no matter if they have pirated software or not, an audit is nasty, costly, and uncomfortable for teh company).
The moral is, keep your employees happy and content, and they won't feel the need to put your business in jeaopardy. Treat your employees badly at your own peril.
Spirited Away deserves to be best animated feature. While some of the other nominees are enjoyable, they're just not in the same league.
I sincerely hope the Academy doesn't get this one wrong. I really believe that while the studios producing the other movies would be elated if they win, every one of their artists knows who deserves the award.
Mr. Miyazaki's recently visited Pixar during Spirited Away's US release - practically the entire staff turned out to meet him and express how his work has influenced them.
N.
Re:You keep all your money in cash?
on
Cashless Society
·
· Score: 1
Same with this Canuck.
The downside is the "hidden" debit charges of an additional $1 or more per debit transaction, plus a service charge of another $0.60 at the bank.
So you're really getting dinged almost $2 extra per-purchase using debit...
It adds up fast.
I'll pay at stores with debit when the charge is over $50 or so. Other than that, I'll just get some cash and stick with that for small purchases.
I've never discovered the reason why Esperanto is supposed to be so good. I have a suspicion it's based soley on Mexico's proximity to the US. For countries with few spanish speakers, it doesn't make much sense at all...
Residing in Canada, it doesn't make much sense to me - I know Harry Harrison is fond of it, but otherwise...
As boring as it is, English will probably win-out by way of mass-media exposure.
Hopefully Japanese will come in 2nd, because it sounds nicer than the alternative (Chinese dialects);)
Since the channels are different and Bravo Canada won't be showing it (I don't even think there is any relation to the US Bravo network), with any luck someone will (hint hint hint) bag it , encode it, then throw it on sharereactor;P
The "military grade" security phrase is always one of those "key points" which always seems to mean that the product being advertised is smoke and mirrors...
It costs next to nothing to implement GOOD encryption these days, and it would've been extremely simple to implement something extremely fast and secure like blowfish with a 256/448 bit password.
Implementing DES (slow in software, probably slow in their hardware) with a 40 bit password (VASTLY INSECURE) is basically saying upfront that they're more interested in preserving an easy attack on the system than ensuring that users' data is secure.
As other posters have mentioned, products like DriveCrypt (for the PC), can encrypt your partitions (or removable drives) with encryption that is for all intents and purposes absolutely unbreakable with a good passkey. Move up to something like DriveCrypt Pluspack and it will even encrypt the boot partition so the drive doesn't even get to the OS until a proper password has been entered (no software keyloggers possible).
There's simply no excuse for the kind of sloppy security that this company is trying to sell. Either they are trying to preserve access to their product for law enforcement purposes (hunt down them terrorists!), or trying to preserve access incase dumb users lock themselves out so their tech support can save the day.
All too true. Our campus standardized on IBM laptops as well. They're adequate I suppose, but I certainly wouldn't put them anywhere near the league of my current favorite models (Toshiba).
As insult to injury, they also decided to standardize on:
- Lotus Notes (Anyone read the now-defunct interface hall of shame? Lotus Notes breaks every established interface rule that would normally result in "ease of use" for a user.)
and
- Lexmark Laser Printers (with the good ol' DMCA anti-refill chip in them).
I think it has to record in standard DV format for it to be of any use to me.
MPEG files (unless they're I-frame only) are not easily editable, plus the fact that none of the best software in the editing world (Avid, Final Cut, etc) will work with raw MPEG files without decoding/recoding them to something more useful.
As others have said, if they made a version of this that had a interchangeable 2.5" HD port so you could plug in whatever capacity you wanted to use, and recorded standard DV video that you could transfer out with a firewire cable, (or, in addition have direct access to the filesystem on the HD in the camera), I'd snap one up in a second.
I live in Canada and their support form seems to be for the US audience only.
I know that it's the US regulators who they will be talking to, however it goes without saying that anything passed in the US migrates north almost effortlessly.
Sure would be nice if they'd take comments from other countries... Especially those right next door...
Sure is generous (and fairly eliteist) of you to characterize anyone without a fixed IP as a "luser".
I suggest that 90% or more of people who read slashdot from home are on cable/DSL modems with non-fixed IPs.
The solution here isn't to just block ports and pretend there's no problem, but to enhance or re-create the mail protocol so forged message headers addresses are impossible so spam filtering can be more effective.
In the meantime, having ISPs introduce statistical filters on email to block spam would also be a great benefit.
I've recently installed POPFile on my system, and with a couple weeks of training, it's in the 97% accuracy range blocking spam. Another couple weeks and it should be nearly perfect.
Just wait, the next thing they'll want to do is charge $0.50 per CDR you buy (and even more for other types of storage), even if you are using it for non-musical purposes (or your OWN music!).
Oh wait, in SOVIET Canada, they already do that...
N.
Re:how about a cell phone jammer?
on
GPS Jamming for $50
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
A much preferable solution at least for cell phones, would be a system whereby a theatre, school, courtroom, etc. could install a device that would broadcast a low-power signal to the phones telling them to switch to a non-audible mode.
Rather than disabling them by jamming, it would mandate that the phone must only use vibrate or "flashing" signalling methods until it's removed from the range of the transmitter.
That's another good point that this article doesn't mention:
If you have a HD that has sectors that go bad, many HDs (or operating systems) will mark the block as bad and off-limits so it doesn't get used any more.
This of course poses a problem with most "erase" type programs, as there may not be a way that the eraser can override either the operating system "bad block" mark, or the drive's "bad block" internal mapping.
If something critical happens to be in a block marked bad on the HD, there may not be any way to securely erase it 100% via software and you'd need to destroy it physically.
The last time I posted a Mac vs. PC comparison (backing up my clain with a web link to the comparison), I got modded down my the Mac cultists;P
[The site quoted in this post has much the same result as my findings, BTW].
When I was doing more film work, I had to run approx 8,000 x 8mb.TIF files through Photoshop to adjust the resolution. I was amazed when it finished the complete run in just over an hour on my AMD Athlon 1200. Regardless of your choice of platform, today's machines have pretty amazing processing power.
Slashdot Mirror
"You've made your point Hans, let them pull back!"
"I'll take it under advisement, Mr. Cowboy, now HIT REFRESH AGAIN"
(followed by an explosion, either of a police RV, or of a webserver).
Oh, I totally agree!
As long as I'm paying the Canadian Levy on media, then as far as I'm concerned, I've paid for any music I download.
They can't have it both ways.
N.
I won't buy a palladium system.
Let them lock up digital rights all they want - if they're going to waste millions/billions building hardware/software that will flop, maybe it will teach them a lesson:
Give the customer what they want.
N.
One other plus for this one:
You only have to pay if you are owed a refund. You owe the Govt and it's free.
Erm, ya.
It's farking TAX software, it's not CAD, it's not 3D animation or video editing. It's for doing TAXES.
It's like installing a sophisticated electronic ignition interlock system in a Yugo or something. Why bother?
It's this sort of thing that permanently alienates me on a product. I will NEVER buy a product that uses low-level writes on my system for copy protection purposes, especially if they try and keep it secret.
N.
I enjoy the work that I do, I enjoy my nice office, working with my co-workers, relatively flexible work-schedule, etc.
I have no pirated software, Pr0n, or P2P applications on my machine at work. I have no desire to lose the sweet deal that I have by screwing around with stuff like that.
I imagine that people who hate their jobs, coworkers, boss, etc. may view things differently and not care if they land the company they work for in legal trouble - there's always another job to be found. And of course, if they get fired, they'll promptly rat-out their office to the BSA (no matter if they have pirated software or not, an audit is nasty, costly, and uncomfortable for teh company).
The moral is, keep your employees happy and content, and they won't feel the need to put your business in jeaopardy. Treat your employees badly at your own peril.
Spirited Away deserves to be best animated feature. While some of the other nominees are enjoyable, they're just not in the same league.
I sincerely hope the Academy doesn't get this one wrong. I really believe that while the studios producing the other movies would be elated if they win, every one of their artists knows who deserves the award.
Mr. Miyazaki's recently visited Pixar during Spirited Away's US release - practically the entire staff turned out to meet him and express how his work has influenced them.
N.
Same with this Canuck.
The downside is the "hidden" debit charges of an additional $1 or more per debit transaction, plus a service charge of another $0.60 at the bank.
So you're really getting dinged almost $2 extra per-purchase using debit...
It adds up fast.
I'll pay at stores with debit when the charge is over $50 or so. Other than that, I'll just get some cash and stick with that for small purchases.
I've never discovered the reason why Esperanto is supposed to be so good. I have a suspicion it's based soley on Mexico's proximity to the US. For countries with few spanish speakers, it doesn't make much sense at all...
;)
Residing in Canada, it doesn't make much sense to me - I know Harry Harrison is fond of it, but otherwise...
As boring as it is, English will probably win-out by way of mass-media exposure.
Hopefully Japanese will come in 2nd, because it sounds nicer than the alternative (Chinese dialects)
Since the channels are different and Bravo Canada won't be showing it (I don't even think there is any relation to the US Bravo network), with any luck someone will (hint hint hint) bag it , encode it, then throw it on sharereactor ;P
The "military grade" security phrase is always one of those "key points" which always seems to mean that the product being advertised is smoke and mirrors...
I agree.
It costs next to nothing to implement GOOD encryption these days, and it would've been extremely simple to implement something extremely fast and secure like blowfish with a 256/448 bit password.
Implementing DES (slow in software, probably slow in their hardware) with a 40 bit password (VASTLY INSECURE) is basically saying upfront that they're more interested in preserving an easy attack on the system than ensuring that users' data is secure.
As other posters have mentioned, products like DriveCrypt (for the PC), can encrypt your partitions (or removable drives) with encryption that is for all intents and purposes absolutely unbreakable with a good passkey. Move up to something like DriveCrypt Pluspack and it will even encrypt the boot partition so the drive doesn't even get to the OS until a proper password has been entered (no software keyloggers possible).
There's simply no excuse for the kind of sloppy security that this company is trying to sell. Either they are trying to preserve access to their product for law enforcement purposes (hunt down them terrorists!), or trying to preserve access incase dumb users lock themselves out so their tech support can save the day.
Regardless, it's a waste of money.
Sigh...
All too true. Our campus standardized on IBM laptops as well. They're adequate I suppose, but I certainly wouldn't put them anywhere near the league of my current favorite models (Toshiba).
As insult to injury, they also decided to standardize on:
- Lotus Notes (Anyone read the now-defunct interface hall of shame? Lotus Notes breaks every established interface rule that would normally result in "ease of use" for a user.)
and
- Lexmark Laser Printers (with the good ol' DMCA anti-refill chip in them).
Sigh...
I think it has to record in standard DV format for it to be of any use to me.
MPEG files (unless they're I-frame only) are not easily editable, plus the fact that none of the best software in the editing world (Avid, Final Cut, etc) will work with raw MPEG files without decoding/recoding them to something more useful.
As others have said, if they made a version of this that had a interchangeable 2.5" HD port so you could plug in whatever capacity you wanted to use, and recorded standard DV video that you could transfer out with a firewire cable, (or, in addition have direct access to the filesystem on the HD in the camera), I'd snap one up in a second.
N.
They're certainly doing a great job of preventing it right now aren't they :)
N.
I live in Canada and their support form seems to be for the US audience only.
I know that it's the US regulators who they will be talking to, however it goes without saying that anything passed in the US migrates north almost effortlessly.
Sure would be nice if they'd take comments from other countries... Especially those right next door...
N.
And I always pronounce it "sequel" :P
N.
Not to mention every starcraft and diablo player :P
N.
There's one fairly close to my house... I'm not going anywhere near it! I can play games a heck of a lot safer in my place.
The place was robbed at gunpoint by an asian gang in the summer, and some guy was just beat up and shot inside the place this week.
I should move...
N.
Would this mean the formation of the real "Men In Black", that wear nothing but euro-black outfits?
:)
How about going into government offices and seeing decorative iMacs with flowers and pastel colors as you are encouraged to "Think Different?".
Microsoft wouldn't be happy - I could just about guarantee they'd lose antitrust cases left and right
Sure is generous (and fairly eliteist) of you to characterize anyone without a fixed IP as a "luser".
I suggest that 90% or more of people who read slashdot from home are on cable/DSL modems with non-fixed IPs.
The solution here isn't to just block ports and pretend there's no problem, but to enhance or re-create the mail protocol so forged message headers addresses are impossible so spam filtering can be more effective.
In the meantime, having ISPs introduce statistical filters on email to block spam would also be a great benefit.
I've recently installed POPFile on my system, and with a couple weeks of training, it's in the 97% accuracy range blocking spam. Another couple weeks and it should be nearly perfect.
Just wait, the next thing they'll want to do is charge $0.50 per CDR you buy (and even more for other types of storage), even if you are using it for non-musical purposes (or your OWN music!).
Oh wait, in SOVIET Canada, they already do that...
N.
A much preferable solution at least for cell phones, would be a system whereby a theatre, school, courtroom, etc. could install a device that would broadcast a low-power signal to the phones telling them to switch to a non-audible mode.
Rather than disabling them by jamming, it would mandate that the phone must only use vibrate or "flashing" signalling methods until it's removed from the range of the transmitter.
Thoughts?
That's another good point that this article doesn't mention:
If you have a HD that has sectors that go bad, many HDs (or operating systems) will mark the block as bad and off-limits so it doesn't get used any more.
This of course poses a problem with most "erase" type programs, as there may not be a way that the eraser can override either the operating system "bad block" mark, or the drive's "bad block" internal mapping.
If something critical happens to be in a block marked bad on the HD, there may not be any way to securely erase it 100% via software and you'd need to destroy it physically.
Danger, danger!
;P
.TIF files through Photoshop to adjust the resolution. I was amazed when it finished the complete run in just over an hour on my AMD Athlon 1200. Regardless of your choice of platform, today's machines have pretty amazing processing power.
The last time I posted a Mac vs. PC comparison (backing up my clain with a web link to the comparison), I got modded down my the Mac cultists
[The site quoted in this post has much the same result as my findings, BTW].
When I was doing more film work, I had to run approx 8,000 x 8mb
N.