I'm sure there are many ISP's throughout the world that don't really care if you've got a little Linksys router with a few PC's behind it. I found one today that encourages it.
Black Hills Fibercom (in little Rapid City, SD). They offer phone, digital cable, and broadband. Called today on behalf of my Dad who is considering their broadband package. I asked about firewalls - they strongly recommend using one and will even help set up any of the major software firewalls during install. He then proceeded to recommend purchasing a NAT router for additional protection. I damn near fell out of my chair.
We talked a bit about bandwidth and I brought up access for multiple PC's. He then said definately get a router or they would have to charge an additional (though nominal) fee for each additional IP. At that point, I did fall out of my chair.
They won't support your home network nor will they help set up your router. They will, however, walk a user through disconnecting it during a support call if it's necessary for them to see their computer over the network to resolve an issue.
And I'm sure that works well in those small shops. Don't try it in a corporate environment, though. Standard Software Configurations and Authorized Software lists are held as dear as the writings of Christ himself. "Rogue" techs installing unauthorized software generally have a short lifespan.
My including IBM wasn't by accident. Guess which office suite they run internally (at least on the hardware side of the house). Nope, not SmartSuite. Ever had occasion to work with an IBM corporate-account rep on enterprise desktops? SmartSuite isn't even offered as an option on a great majority of their standard configs. Go figure.
BOA changing it's tune? Perhaps, though I haven't heard anything about it yet. They're big enough that I'm sure a mass OSS rollout or even them asking questions would have hit the news. So now you pull your $$ out of BOA - where are you going to put it? Find me a big name bank that isn't running MS Office. Maybe under your mattress...
I don't know for sure what Ford is running either, but again I'm fairly sure we would know about it (and flaunt it mercilessly) if it was anything other than Redmond's finest (no offence, Lycoris).
Though the AC is obviously trolling, I think he has a really valid point.
Major corps aren't switching. In fact, they keep buying deeper and deeper into the Beast through Software Assurance, Upgrade Advantage, etc. Every single one of your points is valid, but it doesn't matter. And the end result proves it. MS is still pushing around it's "customers" with ridiculous licensing schemes. The BSA is still in business and actively auditing and fining everyone they can get their hands on.
I'm sure you could find whole offices running OpenOffice or StarOffice or even still using WordPerfect and 123 just so they can stay away from MS products. But they aren't the IBM's or Fords or Bank of America's of the world.
In general I agree - inkjets suck. I bought a LaserJet 1200 a bit over a year ago and am much happier with it than I was with my old Cannon inkjet. I'm almost 1000 pages over the estimated life of the toner cartridge and still printing strong. Well worth the $399. That Cannon would print fairly well if the ink cartridges were only a week or so old but after that got really gummy and print quality went down hill fast. Couple that with $15 for a really small black cart. and $29 for a really really small color cart. and I decided to shell it.
However, last summer my son was very disappointed to find out he couldn't print color cards from his Pokemon Studio program. Being a softie (and also having wished for the ability to print color myself)(and being gainfully employeed at the time) , I broke down and bought the new HP DeskJet 5550. I have to admit I've never been more impressed with an inkjet. It has *great* print resolution, is truely fast for both color and b&w, and cartridges don't require amputation of limbs. In fact, I've only had to replace the black cart once ($19 for standard capacity HP branded) and that was because I accidentally printed a book (literally) to it rather than the laser. We don't print regularly to it (sometimes several weeks between use), but each time we do the print quality is just as good as the first page.
Anybody else have similar luck with the 5550? I think I only spent $149 for it. Sure - that's a lot more that the el-cheapo $39 flavor-of-the-week from Best Buy, but well worth it for the quality.
Just my $.02US.
In other news, Michael Dell - CEO of Dell Computers - was found dead in his home tonight, an apparent victim of gang violence. FBI and local law enforcement are closely studying spray painted graffiti left at the scene for clues to the perpetrators. A source close to the investigation reports the grafiti contained cryptic messages such as "UCB Rulez", "rm -f Michael" and "mv MichaelDell/dev/null".
Oh my God! What are we all going to DO if those poor, mistreated Bells stop developing broadband! This is horrible! This is a catastrophe! This is...EXACTLY THE WAY IT IS NOW!
I've lived in the same house (in a larger town) since DSL first started to catch on for residential use. Couldn't get it then and guess what? Right - can't get it now either. How many years has that been? Two blocks over, however, is no problem. Cry me a fscking river.
I agree. This may be a perfectly fine way to back up your terrabyte ogg/mp3/pr0n archive, but no way will any major corps take it seriously. Has nothing to do with how secure it really is, but more on executive perception.
" SMS messages can be set to "expire" if the are not delivered in a certain amount of time. All the phones I've owned had this set to "now or never", so if the message couldn't be delivered at the moment it got trashed. Mos users, of course, have no idea this setting exists."
YES!! (Damn mod points - never there when you need them)
A year+ ago I was trying to set up system-automated cell text messaging from Peregrine ServiceCenter to the Verizon phones carried by our sysadmins. Would only work about 50% of the time, so we scrapped the idea and reverted back to the Hell^Hp Desk calling admins.
Long story short, I went through 3 levels of support at Verizon to figure out that this was the problem only to subsequently find out there was no way for us the change the expiration through their service. Wonder if that's been fixed yet?
+4 Funny? Go ahead and laugh. Ever heard of UCITA? Shrinkwrap licenses are already enforceable in Virginia and Maryland. More info from the EFF and Avert.
True, UCITA is most commonly thought of in terms of software licensing, but it can apply to other digital works.
To an extent, I agree with you. The directive from the judge (per the article):
"...the judge told jurors that in order to find the company guilty, they must agree that company representatives knew their actions were illegal and intended to violate the law. Merely offering a product that could violate copyrights was not enough to warrant a conviction, the jury instructions said."
Will this help by setting precedent for future cases? Absolutely. Does it help to overturn the DMCA? Absolutely not. And that's what I would consider a huge victory.
At best this case is a limited victory for "us", but I can't see it that way. As it stands right now, the DMCA can still be invoked to immediately stifle potentially legitimate projects and products.
We need a case that better tests the law as a whole rather than just clarify it to death with precedents.
Exactly. From reading the article, this sounds more like a win for the DMCA. Elcomsoft was found not guilty only because the tests in the law were not passed. Had nothing to do with whether or not those tests were appropriate.
I'm glad to see Elcomsoft come out on top of this, but don't see where it helps overturn the DMCA.
What's the point of the suit? Is it to make sure the secrets of CSS stay locked away? May be part of it, but I doubt that's all.
More likely, they're trying to send a message to serve as an example and ward off future crack attempts. That, and $$. DeCSS was distributed freely ergo they're not collecting any licensing fees. From their point of view, someone has to pay.
The advantage of Halon is that you can breathe quite comfortably in an atmosphere that will not sustain fire. CO2 works just about as effectively but will not sustain life.
You've obviously never been in a Halon dump. Either that or you consider burning in your lungs to be "quite comfortable". Not to mention that if you're standing under one of the discharge nozzles at a dump you can get a nasty case of frostbite.
I've personally been through two 1211 dumps and had to enter a computer room and drag staff out after an FM200 dump. It takes about two days to completely stop coughing.
Why? Or perhaps more appropriately...Why, man? (sorry)
Should someone really be forced to limit the use of their name because it's already taken by a spotlight star? What's next - the need to copyright and enforce IP rights on your name so that no-one else can use it? Give me a break.
If anyone hears reports of the '41 being subject to ME or XP attacks, please post. For now...well... I've never been afraid of a couple of backslashes or a c:\.
Why doesn't G2 survey the MPAA, RIAA, and their legislative lackeys to see how many of them care about what their customers/constituents want or believe?
Counter your counter-proof: They're different sensors.
Each of your eyes can transmit 3D back to a "program" running on (author ducks for cover) a much more elegant platform than BrickOS. If you can figure out how to wire up a couple of eyeballs and a brain to the LegWay, you're right - probably only need two.
NOTE: That is not, I repeat *NOT*, a challenge for all you MindStormers.
Fa(c)e it, we live in a throw away society. We want it cheap, and now.
Exactly...for now. Quality vs. quantity demand is cyclical along with the economy. When times are good, we'll pay whatever the cost for a quality product. Conversly, we want bargains when the economy is uncertain. Like now.
Wait a year or so after things pick up and you'll see these same manufactures offering "premium" models with longer warranties and a much smaller offering of low-end product.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm sure there are many ISP's throughout the world that don't really care if you've got a little Linksys router with a few PC's behind it. I found one today that encourages it.
Black Hills Fibercom (in little Rapid City, SD). They offer phone, digital cable, and broadband. Called today on behalf of my Dad who is considering their broadband package. I asked about firewalls - they strongly recommend using one and will even help set up any of the major software firewalls during install. He then proceeded to recommend purchasing a NAT router for additional protection. I damn near fell out of my chair.
We talked a bit about bandwidth and I brought up access for multiple PC's. He then said definately get a router or they would have to charge an additional (though nominal) fee for each additional IP. At that point, I did fall out of my chair.
They won't support your home network nor will they help set up your router. They will, however, walk a user through disconnecting it during a support call if it's necessary for them to see their computer over the network to resolve an issue.
Almost makes me wish I still lived there.
And I'm sure that works well in those small shops. Don't try it in a corporate environment, though. Standard Software Configurations and Authorized Software lists are held as dear as the writings of Christ himself. "Rogue" techs installing unauthorized software generally have a short lifespan.
My including IBM wasn't by accident. Guess which office suite they run internally (at least on the hardware side of the house). Nope, not SmartSuite. Ever had occasion to work with an IBM corporate-account rep on enterprise desktops? SmartSuite isn't even offered as an option on a great majority of their standard configs. Go figure.
:)
BOA changing it's tune? Perhaps, though I haven't heard anything about it yet. They're big enough that I'm sure a mass OSS rollout or even them asking questions would have hit the news. So now you pull your $$ out of BOA - where are you going to put it? Find me a big name bank that isn't running MS Office. Maybe under your mattress...
I don't know for sure what Ford is running either, but again I'm fairly sure we would know about it (and flaunt it mercilessly) if it was anything other than Redmond's finest (no offence, Lycoris).
Though the AC is obviously trolling, I think he has a really valid point.
Major corps aren't switching. In fact, they keep buying deeper and deeper into the Beast through Software Assurance, Upgrade Advantage, etc. Every single one of your points is valid, but it doesn't matter. And the end result proves it. MS is still pushing around it's "customers" with ridiculous licensing schemes. The BSA is still in business and actively auditing and fining everyone they can get their hands on.
I'm sure you could find whole offices running OpenOffice or StarOffice or even still using WordPerfect and 123 just so they can stay away from MS products. But they aren't the IBM's or Fords or Bank of America's of the world.
In general I agree - inkjets suck. I bought a LaserJet 1200 a bit over a year ago and am much happier with it than I was with my old Cannon inkjet. I'm almost 1000 pages over the estimated life of the toner cartridge and still printing strong. Well worth the $399. That Cannon would print fairly well if the ink cartridges were only a week or so old but after that got really gummy and print quality went down hill fast. Couple that with $15 for a really small black cart. and $29 for a really really small color cart. and I decided to shell it.
However, last summer my son was very disappointed to find out he couldn't print color cards from his Pokemon Studio program. Being a softie (and also having wished for the ability to print color myself)(and being gainfully employeed at the time) , I broke down and bought the new HP DeskJet 5550. I have to admit I've never been more impressed with an inkjet. It has *great* print resolution, is truely fast for both color and b&w, and cartridges don't require amputation of limbs. In fact, I've only had to replace the black cart once ($19 for standard capacity HP branded) and that was because I accidentally printed a book (literally) to it rather than the laser. We don't print regularly to it (sometimes several weeks between use), but each time we do the print quality is just as good as the first page.
Anybody else have similar luck with the 5550? I think I only spent $149 for it. Sure - that's a lot more that the el-cheapo $39 flavor-of-the-week from Best Buy, but well worth it for the quality. Just my $.02US.
In other news, Michael Dell - CEO of Dell Computers - was found dead in his home tonight, an apparent victim of gang violence. FBI and local law enforcement are closely studying spray painted graffiti left at the scene for clues to the perpetrators. A source close to the investigation reports the grafiti contained cryptic messages such as "UCB Rulez", "rm -f Michael" and "mv MichaelDell /dev/null".
Oh my God! What are we all going to DO if those poor, mistreated Bells stop developing broadband! This is horrible! This is a catastrophe! This is...EXACTLY THE WAY IT IS NOW!
I've lived in the same house (in a larger town) since DSL first started to catch on for residential use. Couldn't get it then and guess what? Right - can't get it now either. How many years has that been? Two blocks over, however, is no problem. Cry me a fscking river.
"...MS, however, hasn't fixed it in 14 days. Go figure."
Hey, cut them a little slack. Remember, they're focused on security now. I'm sure that's where all the developer time goes...;)
What's with all the posts referring to Stephen King? Didn't I see something recently on /. that he died?
*ducks* Sorry, couldn't resist.
I agree. This may be a perfectly fine way to back up your terrabyte ogg/mp3/pr0n archive, but no way will any major corps take it seriously. Has nothing to do with how secure it really is, but more on executive perception.
"...but as far as we know, the whole reason for her leaving is that she got a really irressistable offer from a headhunter."
Yeah, I overheard that call. Something about the Napster name being available and "can't beat 'em, join 'em".
...and they can title it Shelat & Garfinkles Greatest (eBay) Hits.
Sorry.
" SMS messages can be set to "expire" if the are not delivered in a certain amount of time. All the phones I've owned had this set to "now or never", so if the message couldn't be delivered at the moment it got trashed. Mos users, of course, have no idea this setting exists."
YES!! (Damn mod points - never there when you need them)
A year+ ago I was trying to set up system-automated cell text messaging from Peregrine ServiceCenter to the Verizon phones carried by our sysadmins. Would only work about 50% of the time, so we scrapped the idea and reverted back to the Hell^Hp Desk calling admins.
Long story short, I went through 3 levels of support at Verizon to figure out that this was the problem only to subsequently find out there was no way for us the change the expiration through their service. Wonder if that's been fixed yet?
"Ten countries or agencies including Russia and NATO have already signed agreements..." (emphasis mine)
Signed agreements? Is this really open? I don't remember signing anything before being able to look at RedHat source...
+4 Funny? Go ahead and laugh. Ever heard of UCITA? Shrinkwrap licenses are already enforceable in Virginia and Maryland. More info from the EFF and Avert.
True, UCITA is most commonly thought of in terms of software licensing, but it can apply to other digital works.
To an extent, I agree with you. The directive from the judge (per the article):
"...the judge told jurors that in order to find the company guilty, they must agree that company representatives knew their actions were illegal and intended to violate the law. Merely offering a product that could violate copyrights was not enough to warrant a conviction, the jury instructions said."
Will this help by setting precedent for future cases? Absolutely. Does it help to overturn the DMCA? Absolutely not. And that's what I would consider a huge victory.
At best this case is a limited victory for "us", but I can't see it that way. As it stands right now, the DMCA can still be invoked to immediately stifle potentially legitimate projects and products.
We need a case that better tests the law as a whole rather than just clarify it to death with precedents.
Exactly. From reading the article, this sounds more like a win for the DMCA. Elcomsoft was found not guilty only because the tests in the law were not passed. Had nothing to do with whether or not those tests were appropriate.
I'm glad to see Elcomsoft come out on top of this, but don't see where it helps overturn the DMCA.
What's the point of the suit? Is it to make sure the secrets of CSS stay locked away? May be part of it, but I doubt that's all.
More likely, they're trying to send a message to serve as an example and ward off future crack attempts. That, and $$. DeCSS was distributed freely ergo they're not collecting any licensing fees. From their point of view, someone has to pay.
The advantage of Halon is that you can breathe quite comfortably in an atmosphere that will not sustain fire. CO2 works just about as effectively but will not sustain life.
You've obviously never been in a Halon dump. Either that or you consider burning in your lungs to be "quite comfortable". Not to mention that if you're standing under one of the discharge nozzles at a dump you can get a nasty case of frostbite.
I've personally been through two 1211 dumps and had to enter a computer room and drag staff out after an FM200 dump. It takes about two days to completely stop coughing.
Why? Or perhaps more appropriately...Why, man? (sorry)
Should someone really be forced to limit the use of their name because it's already taken by a spotlight star? What's next - the need to copyright and enforce IP rights on your name so that no-one else can use it? Give me a break.
If anyone hears reports of the '41 being subject to ME or XP attacks, please post. For now...well... I've never been afraid of a couple of backslashes or a c:\.
Why doesn't G2 survey the MPAA, RIAA, and their legislative lackeys to see how many of them care about what their customers/constituents want or believe?
What they don't realize is that as soon as metered bandwidth becomes a reality, ad-blocking software will become a big market.
Except that in most instances you still download the ad. The software just keeps it from being displayed in your browser.
Counter-proof: You only have 2 eyes, yet you can.
Counter your counter-proof: They're different sensors.
Each of your eyes can transmit 3D back to a "program" running on (author ducks for cover) a much more elegant platform than BrickOS. If you can figure out how to wire up a couple of eyeballs and a brain to the LegWay, you're right - probably only need two.
NOTE: That is not, I repeat *NOT*, a challenge for all you MindStormers.
Fa(c)e it, we live in a throw away society. We want it cheap, and now.
Exactly...for now. Quality vs. quantity demand is cyclical along with the economy. When times are good, we'll pay whatever the cost for a quality product. Conversly, we want bargains when the economy is uncertain. Like now.
Wait a year or so after things pick up and you'll see these same manufactures offering "premium" models with longer warranties and a much smaller offering of low-end product.