It's called blackballing or blacklisting, and it's one of the most important powers we have as a community. Yes, we should be careful when we wield it, but we should be be afraid to strike when the violation is clear. From the evidence presented, it's very clear.
Find one post here that is actually making an articulate argument presenting evidence in defense of Castle. I sure don't see one. It's a pretty flagrent violation.
But I think what the parent of your post wanted was a giant parachute scheme on the cabin
Some small planes have this now. Weirdo that I am, I often read the NTSB air accident reports. My impression of the system is that it is often not helpful in small planes, or is counterproductive.
One example if I recall correctly, a hot shot asshole was flying very low in a canyon, hit a wire, and then attempted to deploy the parachute system. I believe he died. Deploying a chute at 30 feet over the ground isn't a very hot idea.
You could probably chalk that up to lack of training, or maybe a false sense of security caused by the system, both things that would have to be overcome.
Re:Electrostatic discharge down damage plasma trai
on
Latest Columbia News
·
· Score: 1
Wouldn't it be the ultimate irony if the shuttle itself was the unwilling participant in atmospheric electrical phenomena research?
I'm not sure what you are proposing, after all, inside the plane is generally the safest place they could be, assuming you meant some sort of bail-out scheme.
Almost air crashes are survivable, a large majority are very minor. Even in the major ones, the forces involved are generally a lot lower than a car crash. Most of the people die from the smoke and fire, or drown in water if the plane ditches in it.
All jarge jets have multiple engines, with an ability to usually still be controllable on a single engine. RAID1 basically. Isn't that enough of a backup plan?
Back when brainbench was doing the free cert thing, I noticed they had a cert for AOL User. I couldn't resist taking it, even though I hadn't used AOL for nearly 6 years.
I passed it, and got the cert in the mail. It's a great conversation piece. "Certified AOL User":)
I think the anonymous reply is better than I could sum it up.
Just a note as an addendum though, the AC doesn't seem to differentiate between open source forks and closed source forks, his comments mostly apply to closed source forks, which are of course much more common with BSD than GPL.
I think BSD is great for some things, such as reference implementations of standards and other similar things, where getting it right is more important than preventing people from extending the code in closed ways.
It's also good for small programs that do one simple thing, and do it well, such as most of the basic UNIX utilities.
Just as people need to be educated about the GPL before using it, they should be similarly educated about BSD, and make a thoughtful choice.
BSD should equal the assumption that MS will use your code, possibly in a way that could damage you or other free software. It's the price paid for allowing total freedom of redistribution.
Likewise, the GPL should come with the implicit assumption that you will be making it very difficult for closed source vendors to use your code in their apps.
Of course, you already knew all that most likely, so we are just treading water here. In the end, neither license affects any end user's freedom negatively, at least never directly, and that is what is most important. Software isn't written for the software industry, it's written for end users. I think this fact alone has been the real drive of the Open Source movement.
You really aren't stupid, what you posted is the main part of it. The rest is just authentication it seems. My german isn't so good though, so I can't read the comments or the variable names. When will people get it through their head that all proper computer programs should be in english?
This is the great socialist nation of Canada we are talking about here, you probably have to get a license from the government before you can buy a computer.
After all, electric scooters are considered motor vehicles in Canada, and require a VIN and all the paperwork of a real car, I wouldn't be surprised if they had other Nazi-esqe measures in place for computers.
Credit cards aside, try to go into any store and get them to give you items with a promise to pay later.
I usually implicitely promise that I'm not going to cart the goods off without checking out at the register and paying for them first, even though they are in my possession and I would have a good chance of just walking off with them.
Now I will type random shit because I typed the above line in 4 seconds, and I have to sit here and wait for 20 seconds to pass before I can hit reply. EDITORS, HINT, LAMENESS FILTERS ARE LAME.
If you hooked Linux to a starband box, you were getting maybe 80 kilobits/sec MAX. It is about 10 times faster with a windows box connected to it.
I tried and tried to make Linux work with Starband. I eventually had to give up and put a Windows 2000 box directly on the starband running Winroute, and all the other computers behind that.
You are wrong, Media Player is sending a globally unique ID to a MS server, along with a fingerprint of the DVD you are watching. This GUID is associated with an email address if you signed up for their newsletter, and also the newsletter encourages you to register for a Passport account.
Here was the original BugTraq post that started this all. Read carefully.
Serious privacy problems in Windows Media Player for Windows XP by Richard M. Smith
http://www.ComputerBytesMan.com
February 20, 2002
Introduction ============ I found a number of serious privacy problems with Microsoft's Windows Media Player (WMP) for Windows XP. A number of design choices were made in WMP which allow Microsoft to individually track what DVD movies consumers are watching on their Windows PC. Thesep problems which introduced in version 8 of WMP which ships preinstalled on all Windows XP systems.
In particular, the privacy problems with WMP version 8 are: - Each time a new DVD movie is played on a computer, the WMP software contacts a Microsoft Web server to get title and chapter information for the DVD. When this contact is made, the Microsoft Web server is giving an electronic fingerprint which identifies the DVD movie being watched and a cookie which uniquely identifies a particular WMP player. With this two pieces of information Microsoft can track what DVD movies are being watched on a particular computer. - The WMP software also builds a small database on the computer hard drive of all DVD movies that have been watched on the computer. - As of Feb. 14, 2002, the Microsoft privacy policy for WMP version 8 does not disclose that the fact that WMP "phones home" to get DVD title information, what kind of tracking Microsoft does of which movies consumers are watching, and how cookies are used by the WMP software and the Microsoft servers. - There does not appear to be any option in WMP to stop it from phoning home when a DVD movie is viewed. In addition, there does not appear any easy method of clearing out the DVD movie database on the local hard drive.
Technical Details =================
When a DVD movie is played by the WMP, one of the first thing that WMP does is to query via the Internet a Microsoft server for information about the DVD. The query is made using the standard HTTP protocol that is also used by Web browsers like Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator. Using a packet sniffer I was able to observe WMP making these queries to a Microsoft server each time a new DVD movie was played. The packet sniffer also showed the movie information which was returned to WMP by the Microsoft servers. The first HTTP GET request sent by WMP identified the movie being played.
For example, an HTTP GET request is made for this URL for the "Dr. Strangelove" DVD: http://windowsmedia.com/redir/QueryTOC.asp?WMPFrie ndly=true&locale=409& version=8.0.0.4477& cd=1E+ 96+1B1E+30D9+42D8+5D61+783E+9083+C49C+F0C8+1 151E+13CF9+ 15812+16C5D+1A04F+1BF2D+1ECB7+212E1+2 2E48+25724+27 E9D+2A91A+ 2D0E6+2F451+38367+3CF64+4A4D6+4C001+4D 517+4E51B+4F DBC+51F74 The hex numbers at the end of the URL are an electronic fingerprint for the DVD table of contents which uniquely identify the "Dr. Strangelove" DVD. This URL is sent to WindowsMedia.com, Microsoft's Web site dedicated to the WMP software. The HTTP GET request also included a ID number in cookie which uniquely identifies my WMP player. Here's what this cookie looks like: MC1=V=2&GUID=CA695830BB504D399B9958473C0FF086 By default, this cookie is anonymous. That is, no personal information is associated with the cookie value. However, if a person signs up for the Windows Media newsletter, their email address will be associated with their WindowsMedia.com cookie.
For example, when I signed for the Windows Media newsletter, the following URL was sent to Microsoft servers: http://windowsmedia.com/mg/Newsletter.asp?eNws=rms @computerbytesman.com& format=HTM
The same windowsmedia.com cookie value will be sent back to Microsoft servers when signing up for the newsletter and when a DVD moive is played. In addition, using various well-known "cookie synch" tricks, an email address can be associated with a cookie value at any time. Also when subscribing to the Windows Media newsletter, I was encouraged by an email message from the Microsoft newsletter department to create a Passport account based on my email address. In theory, yet more personal information from Passport could be matched with what DVD movies I have watched. There is no evidence however that Microsoft is making this connection. The WindowsMedia.com cookie was assigned to my computer the first time I ran WMP. The lifetime of the cookie was set to about 18 months. This cookie gives Microsoft the ability to track the DVD movies that I watch on my computer.
After a series of redirects from the WindowsMedia.Com server, information about the "Dr. Strangelove" movie was returned in this XML file: http://services.windowsmedia.com/amgvideo_a/templa te/QueryDVDTOC_v3.xml? TOC=90a1b0d1571524ea
WMP extracted movie information from this file and then added this information to a database file, named wmplibrary_v_0_12.db, which is located on my hard disk in the directory " C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Media Index". I didn't see any method of removing movie information from this file, so it appears to me that the file keeps a complete record of all movies watched that have ever been watched on my computer. Because as of Feb. 14, 2002 the Windows Media privacy policy is silent about what is done with DVD information sent to Microsoft servers by the WMP software, we can only speculate what Microsoft is doing with the information. Here are some possibilities: - Microsoft can be used DVD title information for direct marketing purposes. For example, the WMP start-up screen or email offers can be customized to offer new movies to a WMP user based on previous movies they have watched. - Microsoft can be keeping aggregrate statistics about what DVD movies are the most popular. This information can be published as weekly or monthly "top ten" lists. - Microsoft might be doing nothing with the DVD information. (In my discussions with Microsoft, I was told this option is their current practice.) Note: The Video Privacy Protection Act of the United States prevents video rental stores from using movie titles for direct marketing purposes. The letter of this law does not apply to Microsoft because they are not a video rental store. However, clearly the spirit of the law is that companies should not be using movie title information for marketing purposes. Recommendations ===============
I believe that the Microsoft should remove the DVD movie information feature from WMP version 8 altogether. The value of feature seems very small given that almost all DVD movies include a built-in chapter guide. In addition, the Microsoft movie information feature is not available when DVD movies are shown in full-screen which is how DVD are typically watched. If Microsoft feels that this feature is important to leave in WMP, then I think it should be turned off by default. The feature can be made privacy-friendly very easily, by having WMP never send in cookie information with movie title requests. This change will prevent Microsoft from tracking individual movie viewing choices.
Vendor Response ===============
Response from the Windows Digital Media Division of Microsoft Corporation is available here: http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/wmp8respon se.htm Acknowledgements ================ Thanks to Ian Hopper of the Associated Press for bringing this issue to the attention of the author.
Links ===== Digital Media in Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/wind owsxp.asp
Media Player for Windows XP Privacy Statement
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/soft ware/v8/privacy.asp
The RealJukeBox monitoring system
http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/realjb.htm
TiVo's Data Collection and Privacy Practices http://www.privacyfoundation.org/privac ywatch/repo rt.asp?id=62&action=0
Internet Explorer SuperCookies bypass P3P and cookie controls
http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/supercooki e.htm Video Privacy Protection Act
http://www.accessreports.com/statutes/VIDEO1.htm
Bill Gate's memo on Trustworthy computing:
Voting Libertarian doesn't mean you want a "Libertarian government". Does voting for a Democrat mean you want a "Liberal Government"? I vote for people, not platforms. The Libertarians that are in office are the only ones that have stood up and opposed many Big Brother measures. We refuse corporate and government sponsership in our campaigns. We believe in encouraging competition, not eliminating it. I think you have many misconceptions about Libertarianism. I hope you see the light before it is too late.
I think there should be some rule, you shouldn't be able to mod down a message that has not been replied to as "Flamebait". If it was such flamebait, it would have drawn a response.
Maybe the moderator just hates being wrong. Maybe he voted for a Republicrat. This is what you reap people. If you vote for big government, you get big government. Suck it up next time and vote for freedom, vote Libertarian.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, and people who give lectures with printed transcripts should just bring a 4 color sheetfed litho press with them!
It's called blackballing or blacklisting, and it's one of the most important powers we have as a community. Yes, we should be careful when we wield it, but we should be be afraid to strike when the violation is clear. From the evidence presented, it's very clear.
Find one post here that is actually making an articulate argument presenting evidence in defense of Castle. I sure don't see one. It's a pretty flagrent violation.
But I think what the parent of your post wanted was a giant parachute scheme on the cabin
Some small planes have this now. Weirdo that I am, I often read the NTSB air accident reports. My impression of the system is that it is often not helpful in small planes, or is counterproductive.
One example if I recall correctly, a hot shot asshole was flying very low in a canyon, hit a wire, and then attempted to deploy the parachute system. I believe he died. Deploying a chute at 30 feet over the ground isn't a very hot idea.
You could probably chalk that up to lack of training, or maybe a false sense of security caused by the system, both things that would have to be overcome.
Wouldn't it be the ultimate irony if the shuttle itself was the unwilling participant in atmospheric electrical phenomena research?
I'm not sure what you are proposing, after all, inside the plane is generally the safest place they could be, assuming you meant some sort of bail-out scheme.
Almost air crashes are survivable, a large majority are very minor. Even in the major ones, the forces involved are generally a lot lower than a car crash. Most of the people die from the smoke and fire, or drown in water if the plane ditches in it.
All jarge jets have multiple engines, with an ability to usually still be controllable on a single engine. RAID1 basically. Isn't that enough of a backup plan?
Back when brainbench was doing the free cert thing, I noticed they had a cert for AOL User. I couldn't resist taking it, even though I hadn't used AOL for nearly 6 years.
:)
I passed it, and got the cert in the mail. It's a great conversation piece. "Certified AOL User"
Comptia certs
I know A+ at least is for keeps. My 1998 A+ is still just as valid as it ever was (value is debatable though).
I believe most CompTIA tests are forever, unless they changed their policy in the last year or two.
I could understand Pink Floyd, but GnR has what, 4 songs they can play on the radio?
November Rain
Welcome to the Jungle
Patience
Sweet Child Of Mine
I really can't think of any others.
I think the anonymous reply is better than I could sum it up.
Just a note as an addendum though, the AC doesn't seem to differentiate between open source forks and closed source forks, his comments mostly apply to closed source forks, which are of course much more common with BSD than GPL.
I mostly agree.
I think BSD is great for some things, such as reference implementations of standards and other similar things, where getting it right is more important than preventing people from extending the code in closed ways.
It's also good for small programs that do one simple thing, and do it well, such as most of the basic UNIX utilities.
Just as people need to be educated about the GPL before using it, they should be similarly educated about BSD, and make a thoughtful choice.
BSD should equal the assumption that MS will use your code, possibly in a way that could damage you or other free software. It's the price paid for allowing total freedom of redistribution.
Likewise, the GPL should come with the implicit assumption that you will be making it very difficult for closed source vendors to use your code in their apps.
Of course, you already knew all that most likely, so we are just treading water here. In the end, neither license affects any end user's freedom negatively, at least never directly, and that is what is most important. Software isn't written for the software industry, it's written for end users. I think this fact alone has been the real drive of the Open Source movement.
You really aren't stupid, what you posted is the main part of it. The rest is just authentication it seems. My german isn't so good though, so I can't read the comments or the variable names. When will people get it through their head that all proper computer programs should be in english?
BSD programmers already code for MS, haven't you read the license?
This is the great socialist nation of Canada we are talking about here, you probably have to get a license from the government before you can buy a computer.
After all, electric scooters are considered motor vehicles in Canada, and require a VIN and all the paperwork of a real car, I wouldn't be surprised if they had other Nazi-esqe measures in place for computers.
Welcome to Canada Comrade!
Credit cards aside, try to go into any store and get them to give you items with a promise to pay later.
I usually implicitely promise that I'm not going to cart the goods off without checking out at the register and paying for them first, even though they are in my possession and I would have a good chance of just walking off with them.
I don't think there is anything else on this Earth that would turn a normally law abiding citizen into a criminal any faster
Oral or anal sex in about 13 states in the US.
Possession of certain herbs and/or naturally occuring chemicals in more concentrated forms.
Etc
All the old feedback reverted to neutral.
Now I will type random shit because I typed the above line in 4 seconds, and I have to sit here and wait for 20 seconds to pass before I can hit reply. EDITORS, HINT, LAMENESS FILTERS ARE LAME.
All your Mac Mice are belong to me?
If you hooked Linux to a starband box, you were getting maybe 80 kilobits/sec MAX. It is about 10 times faster with a windows box connected to it.
I tried and tried to make Linux work with Starband. I eventually had to give up and put a Windows 2000 box directly on the starband running Winroute, and all the other computers behind that.
Well every time I drop normal Hydrogen, it falls up.
:)
I guess you mean in a vacuum.
gravitational attraction between objects that weigh a couple ounces? You have to be kidding.
You are wrong, Media Player is sending a globally unique ID to a MS server, along with a fingerprint of the DVD you are watching. This GUID is associated with an email address if you signed up for their newsletter, and also the newsletter encourages you to register for a Passport account.
e ndly=true&locale=409&+ 96+1B1E+30D9+42D8+5D61+783E+9083+C49C+F0C8+1 151E+13CF9+2 2E48+25724+27 E9D+2A91A+D 517+4E51B+4F DBC+51F74
s @computerbytesman.com&
a te/QueryDVDTOC_v3.xml?
n se.htm
d owsxp.asp t ware/v8/privacy.asp m c ywatch/repo rt.asp?id=62&action=0 i e.htm Video Privacy Protection Act
e mo .htm
Here was the original BugTraq post that started this all. Read carefully.
Serious privacy problems in Windows Media Player for Windows XP by Richard M. Smith
http://www.ComputerBytesMan.com
February 20, 2002
Introduction
============
I found a number of serious privacy problems with Microsoft's Windows Media Player (WMP) for Windows XP. A number of design choices were made in WMP which allow Microsoft to individually track what DVD movies consumers are watching on their Windows PC. Thesep problems which introduced in version 8 of WMP which ships preinstalled on all Windows XP systems.
In particular, the privacy problems with WMP version 8 are: - Each time a new DVD movie is played on a computer, the WMP software contacts a Microsoft Web server to get title and chapter information for the DVD. When this contact is made, the Microsoft Web server is giving an electronic fingerprint which identifies the DVD movie being watched
and a cookie which uniquely identifies a particular WMP player. With this two pieces of information Microsoft can track what DVD movies are being watched on a particular computer. - The WMP software also builds a small database on the computer hard
drive of all DVD movies that have been watched on the computer. - As of Feb. 14, 2002, the Microsoft privacy policy for WMP version 8 does not disclose that the fact that WMP "phones home" to get DVD title
information, what kind of tracking Microsoft does of which movies consumers are watching, and how cookies are used by the WMP software and the Microsoft servers. - There does not appear to be any option in WMP to stop it from phoning home when a DVD movie is viewed. In addition, there does not appear any
easy method of clearing out the DVD movie database on the local hard drive.
Technical Details
=================
When a DVD movie is played by the WMP, one of the first thing that WMP does is to query via the Internet a Microsoft server for information about the DVD. The query is made using the standard HTTP protocol that is also used by Web browsers like Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator. Using a packet sniffer I was able to observe WMP making these queries to a Microsoft server each time a new DVD movie was played. The packet sniffer also showed the movie information which was returned to WMP by the Microsoft servers.
The first HTTP GET request sent by WMP identified the movie being played.
For example, an HTTP GET request is made for this URL for the "Dr. Strangelove" DVD: http://windowsmedia.com/redir/QueryTOC.asp?WMPFri
version=8.0.0.4477&
cd=1E
15812+16C5D+1A04F+1BF2D+1ECB7+212E1+
2D0E6+2F451+38367+3CF64+4A4D6+4C001+4
The hex numbers at the end of the URL are an electronic fingerprint for the DVD table of contents which uniquely identify the "Dr. Strangelove" DVD. This URL is sent to WindowsMedia.com, Microsoft's Web site dedicated to the WMP software. The HTTP GET request also included a ID number in cookie which uniquely identifies my WMP player.
Here's what this cookie looks like: MC1=V=2&GUID=CA695830BB504D399B9958473C0FF086
By default, this cookie is anonymous. That is, no personal information is associated with the cookie value. However, if a person signs up for the Windows Media newsletter, their email address will be associated
with their WindowsMedia.com cookie.
For example, when I signed for the Windows Media newsletter, the following URL was sent to Microsoft servers: http://windowsmedia.com/mg/Newsletter.asp?eNws=rm
format=HTM
The same windowsmedia.com cookie value will be sent back to Microsoft servers when signing up for the newsletter and when a DVD moive is played. In addition, using various well-known "cookie synch" tricks, an email address can be associated with a cookie value at any time. Also when subscribing to the Windows Media newsletter, I was encouraged
by an email message from the Microsoft newsletter department to create a Passport account based on my email address. In theory, yet more personal information from Passport could be matched with what DVD movies I have
watched. There is no evidence however that Microsoft is making this connection. The WindowsMedia.com cookie was assigned to my computer the first time I ran WMP. The lifetime of the cookie was set to about 18 months. This cookie gives Microsoft the ability to track the DVD movies that I watch
on my computer.
After a series of redirects from the WindowsMedia.Com server, information about the "Dr. Strangelove" movie was returned in this XML file: http://services.windowsmedia.com/amgvideo_a/templ
TOC=90a1b0d1571524ea
WMP extracted movie information from this file and then added this information to a database file, named wmplibrary_v_0_12.db, which is located on my hard disk in the directory " C:\Documents and Settings\All
Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Media Index". I didn't see any method
of removing movie information from this file, so it appears to me that the file keeps a complete record of all movies watched that have ever been watched on my computer. Because as of Feb. 14, 2002 the Windows Media privacy policy is silent about what is done with DVD information sent to Microsoft servers by the WMP software, we can only speculate what Microsoft is doing with the
information. Here are some possibilities: - Microsoft can be used DVD title information for direct marketing purposes. For example, the WMP start-up screen or email offers can be
customized to offer new movies to a WMP user based on previous movies they have watched. - Microsoft can be keeping aggregrate statistics about what DVD movies are the most popular. This information can be published as weekly or monthly "top ten" lists. - Microsoft might be doing nothing with the DVD information. (In my discussions with Microsoft, I was told this option is their current practice.) Note: The Video Privacy Protection Act of the United States prevents
video rental stores from using movie titles for direct marketing purposes. The letter of this law does not apply to Microsoft because
they are not a video rental store. However, clearly the spirit of the law is that companies should not be using movie title information for marketing purposes.
Recommendations
===============
I believe that the Microsoft should remove the DVD movie information feature from WMP version 8 altogether. The value of feature seems very small given that almost all DVD movies include a built-in chapter guide.
In addition, the Microsoft movie information feature is not available when DVD movies are shown in full-screen which is how DVD are typically watched. If Microsoft feels that this feature is important to leave in WMP, then I think it should be turned off by default. The feature can be made privacy-friendly very easily, by having WMP never send in cookie information with movie title requests. This change will prevent
Microsoft from tracking individual movie viewing choices.
Vendor Response
===============
Response from the Windows Digital Media Division of Microsoft Corporation is available here: http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/wmp8respo
Acknowledgements
================
Thanks to Ian Hopper of the Associated Press for bringing this issue to the attention of the author.
Links
=====
Digital Media in Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/win
Media Player for Windows XP Privacy Statement
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/sof
The RealJukeBox monitoring system
http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/realjb.ht
TiVo's Data Collection and Privacy Practices
http://www.privacyfoundation.org/priva
Internet Explorer SuperCookies bypass P3P and cookie controls
http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/supercook
http://www.accessreports.com/statutes/VIDEO1.htm
Bill Gate's memo on Trustworthy computing:
http://www.computerbytesman.com/security/billsm
Voting Libertarian doesn't mean you want a "Libertarian government". Does voting for a Democrat mean you want a "Liberal Government"? I vote for people, not platforms. The Libertarians that are in office are the only ones that have stood up and opposed many Big Brother measures. We refuse corporate and government sponsership in our campaigns. We believe in encouraging competition, not eliminating it. I think you have many misconceptions about Libertarianism. I hope you see the light before it is too late.
I think there should be some rule, you shouldn't be able to mod down a message that has not been replied to as "Flamebait". If it was such flamebait, it would have drawn a response.
Maybe the moderator just hates being wrong. Maybe he voted for a Republicrat. This is what you reap people. If you vote for big government, you get big government. Suck it up next time and vote for freedom, vote Libertarian.
I'm fully confused now.
Dr. Albert Hofmann, Abbie Hoffman, and bears oh my!
Nah, He killed himself in 1989.