Slashdot Mirror


User: Jeos

Jeos's activity in the archive.

Stories
0
Comments
18
First seen
Last seen
Profile
(view on slashdot.org)

Comments · 18

  1. This is insane on MPAA Head Valenti on DVD "Hackers" · · Score: 0

    This article is wrong on so many levels. First of all he asserts that CSS was broken only to pirate movies. Breaking CSS happened for 2 reasons: 1, to allow DVD's to be played under linux. 2, to prove how weak CSS was. He also mentions that DeCSS allows distribution of copyrighted DVD's by way DVD-r's. I dunno about you but copying a $20 movie to a $30 5.2 GB DVD-R dosent make sense to me. Sure in 5 years it might cost $5 for a 5.2 GB DVD-R, but the MPAA HAD to know CSS would be broken by then. 40-bit encryption is not hard to break, especially with the computing power that will be available 5 years from now, when copyng a DVD is economically feasable.
    I see his point that a digital copy of a dig copy is a good as the original, that goes with the territory. But there is no way to have a digital format without being able to (eventually) copy it.
    The idea is to think of pirates(ARRRRRRR!) as competitors, and just offer the product at a price that is reasonable compared to the hassle of d/l'ing or copying a movie.
    Their best bet is to take cues from what the RIAA is doing right now, and do the opposite. Regardless of the legality of DeCSS, the cat is out of the bag now, just like mp3.



    PS: Call me crazy but I think the object of a movie (as a form of art) is to reach as many people as possible, not to make money.

  2. Re:Before freaking out on Napster Attacks Open Source Clone · · Score: 1

    Actully there was a linux client for Napster already out. It just wasn't open source. Also it didn't have a GUI and didn't work that well.

    They have some weak security measures you have to pass to connect to a Napster client, and didn't want an open source client for security reasons. However they were trying to use security through obscurity, which dosen't work. Any idiot can run a packet sniffer and try to figure out what's going on on there own.

  3. How good are the Lego smindstorms? on The Unofficial Guide to Lego Mindstorms Robots · · Score: 1

    I was wondering if anyone could tell me if these are worth getting or not. I've been thinking about asking for these for Christmas, but I was wondering if they would just end up in my closet collecting dust.

    They sound fun but I don't know if I'd ever get the time to play around with them(I work and go to school).

    Thanks

  4. Re:DVD writers on DVD for Linux: an Interview With the Developers · · Score: 1

    Right now a DVD-RAM can be bought for 400-500$, however these only write 2.6GB a side whereas a DVD can be about 8.5GB a side. Not too bad though 5.2GB is still a lot of space, but the bad part is that it costs $10 for a blank 1-sided disk and $20 for a 2-sided disk, so there is NO point in copying a DVD, for now anyway.
    I don't know if they have writers that can do 17GB yet, maybe those are the $18,000 ones.

  5. Dont listen to him on The Big Bang Generator That Wasn't · · Score: 0

    >>Fred Moody is the author of I Sing the
    >> Body Electronic: A Year with Microsoft on
    >> the Multimedia Frontier and of The
    >> Visionary Position: The Inside Story of the
    >> Digital Dreamers Who Made Virtual
    >> Reality a Reality. His column appears on
    >> alternate Wednesdays.


    A ha! so he spent a year with Microsoft, it goes without saying that we can't trust/listen to him

  6. Dumb idea but... on CBS to Pay One Million to Desert Island "Survivor" · · Score: 1

    I've read a lot of the messages on this and I have to say 2 things.


    1) Yes this is kind of a a dumb idea, mostly beacuse this has absoultly nothing to do with surviving and therefore the name of the show makes no sense.


    2) It would however be very difficult to win this thing. It is not just about being popular. I think to win this you would have to accomplish two things. First you would have to have the others like you, and come off as a nice/fair person. Second you would have to make people think (for whatever reason) that you have little chance of winning.
    I think the best way to do this would be nice to everyone and have them like you, but don't be the dominant person in the group. Then near the end become more dominant, and at the same time attempt to bring down the person you see as #1. However you would have to do this in a certain way so the other person looks bad, but you still come off looking like the good guy (so you can win the final vote).
    Throughout the whole contest a good idea would be to become friends with everyone, and make them think that you like them best.


    Something that came up in a few threads that I agree with, is that you would have to be very good at manipulating people. But while 'popular' people are generally good at manipulating people, I don't think they would win because people would see them as having a good chance to win, and therefore target them early on.

    So while this contest has nothing to do with survival and in some ways is stupid, I think it would be interesting to see who won and more importantly how they did it. Although I think if I was there I'd go with the split the money approach.

  7. Impulse control probs on CBS to Pay One Million to Desert Island "Survivor" · · Score: 1

    Maybe he developed the impulse control problems when he was already an ex-SEAL?

  8. Good point on Microsoft Plays Linux Games at Work · · Score: 1
    I see your point about how if MS came out with software for linux, people wouldn't hate them as much. It'd be a BIG step for microsoft to do this , and it might sweeten peoples attitudes twords MS. It would show that they aren't as immature and abusive of a company as everyone thinks they are. In many ways it would be a good business step for them too, opening up a new market for them. The problem with this is, this step would mean that they accept Linux as a viable OS, and it would go against all their previous dealing with competion. For MS though any chance to change the negitive public opinion against them would be something they should think about.


    Almost every one I know hates MS, to different degrees, and most people I know aren't into Linux at all. This just goes to show what a bad reputation they have, no one wants to buy MS software, they only do it if they feel they need to, kinda like going to Wal-Mart. While coming out with Linux software probably would matter to this people, it could still have some effect on their opinions.

  9. Linux box probably a mostly default config on PCWeek "Hack This Page" Cracked · · Score: 3
    Someone in the forum on the hackpcweek page was arguing that Mircosoft had configured the NT server, but the linux one was mostly default. I think this probably was the case, when poking around the linux server i noticed that the Apache default dirs manual and icons were still on the server with all the default files in them. While this doesn't really cause and security problems, it lends toword the idea that the Linux/Apache install was mostly default and not configured very well. Since they used a mostly default install they probably also just grabbed an off the shelf cgi script, which is more important because it lead to the crack. Also when the contest first started the Linux guestbook script wasn't even filtering out HTML and javascript, but the NT script was. Which once again points to carelessness with setting up the Linux box.

    But regardless of if they were careless or not, thats really a non-issue, the issue is that cgi script was at fault. I'm sure that if this script was running on the NT server, it could also have been cracked.

  10. Re:ASG Movies on WinLinux 2000 · · Score: 1

    LOL, Yeah but truly would be nice if there was an ASF player for Linux.

  11. Netscape stable? on WinLinux 2000 · · Score: 1

    Download now! You will be amazed by its power and reliability and with Netscape Communicator included you will have a fast and stable Internet browsing machine.


    Hmmm.. I wonder what version of netscape they use, can't be the same one I use, Hell I wonder if it's even the same product. They must be talking about some other browser

  12. Netscape stable? on WinLinux 2000 · · Score: 0
    >Download now! You will be amazed by its power and reliability and with Netscape Communicator >included you will have a fast and stable Internet browsing machine.


    Hmmm.. I wonder what version of netscape they use, can't be the same one I use, Hell I wonder if it's even the same product. They must be talking about some other browser

  13. PC Week servers crawling on Yet Another Crack-This-Box Challenge · · Score: 1
    Seems like all the servers are going really slow, both the NT and Linux ones.

    Wonder if it's because /. effect, DoS attacks or both.

  14. Not a big deal on Killing Off Linux: It's All Academic · · Score: 1
    My school has been doing this for a year or 2 now and I don't think it'll have that much of an effect on students using linux/UNIX. Sure I can go and buy Windows NT for $5, but I can also go and d/l linux for free.

    I think that another reason for MS doing this is they really don't lose much money. How many college students do you know who will pay $500 for MS Visual Studio? Many college students just get pirated versions of software like this anyway, so MS dosen't lose any money here. As a bonus they probably cut down on some distribution of their software being pirated, because it less hassle to fork over $5 then to try and get a warez copy. Although it is also possible this adds to piracy, because since it is easier to obtain a product almost for free, more potential software pirates have copies that they can distribute.

    Back to why this won't have a big effect on linux though, listen to this, the first OS I ever actully paid for was Red Hat linux. I have never paid for any MS operating system, before or after my university was giving MS products away. So it being free had no effect on my choice of OS. Also I know for a fact that many people in my school use linux. The people who know a lot about computers, choose between MS and linux and I don't think MS being free has much of an effect on their choice. These people who know a lot about computers usually have a way of getting software for free, either from a friend or the internet, and most people I know have absoultly NO qualms about pirating MS products. The people who don't know much about computers will likely not use linux anyway, for now at least.

    Finally I think for something as basic as an operating system , most people have well rooted preferences before they get into college, and so their OS preference is not affected much by this. Where i do think this will have an effect, is in the choice of an IDE(Interative Development Environment). Many students in CS who haven't ever programmed before, will not have used an IDE before and so will be more open to a free choice. I have to admit that the one MS product that I like to use, is MS Visual Studio. I think this was at least in some way tied to the fact that I was able to get it for $5. However I imagine that I will stop using this once I find an IDE that I like for linux (which sadly will probably have to be a lot like Visual Studio).

    So I think that while this may have some effect on college students using MS applications (now and in the future), I really don't see it having much of an effect on operating system preference.

  15. A Little more info on Telnet into Dreamcast? · · Score: 4

    Ok heres a little more info on the Dreamcast, I was the one who posted.

    I was running the web browser CD on the Dreamcast and I was dialed to my ISP, my university. I ran the port scan from my computer. I obtained the IP of the Dreamcast from a website which gives you your IP. It's possible this is wrong, but this is the only way I can think of to get my IP. As far as I know there is no direct way to get the IP, the Dreamcast doesn't tell you your IP.

    I would like to try and find a l/p for it, although it'll be kinda hard since I don't even have a username. If anyone knows of a good brute force program for telnet let me know. My email is aminidab@mailcity.com.

  16. Why bother... on Sony Investing in TiVo · · Score: 1

    I don't really see the point to this. It would be fairly easy to do this type of thing yourself. All you really need is a computer with a decent sized hard drive, a tv-out card and a video capture card. All of which would come out to be much cheaper than this product and you could also do things like surf the web from your tv. Although surfing the web on your tv is kind of annoying (it's hard to read all the text).

  17. Silly French on French revolt against Prime Meridian-Sort Of · · Score: 1

    When will the French realize that they aren't the center of the universe (America is of course). While saying America is obviously an arrogant (and only half serious) statement, at least it can be backed up.
    But the arrogance is only part of it, the worst part is the ungratefullness, remember WWII? Now the French did help out America in the American Revoultion, but that was mainly to piss off the British I think. Anyway we kept strong to France afterwords and were friendly etc... But not long after WW II the French turned out to be irritating and ungrateful to America. Ah whata ya gonna do.

  18. December A little late on AOL Considers Ending Mozilla? · · Score: 1

    Communicator 5.0 not suppossed to ship until December! By then it may be too late, and thats if they can actully manage to ship by the deadline. Don't get me wrong, I like netscape and mozilla both and I think 5.0 will be an excellent browser, but by then IE 5 will have been out for over 8 months. Even if this browser turns out as fast and stable as it looks like it will be, it's still gonna be difficult to go against IE, which by then will probably have a large majority of the market.
    Oh well at least it looks like netscape will hold the linux market for a long time