Others have already pointed out the wiretapping statutes you can run afoul of, but there are other concerns as well.
For example: you deploy a honeynet for forensic analysis. A blackhat enters your network and, as you watch it happen, sets up a child porn server.
What is your liability in this case? Aiding and abetting? Accessory? Heck, it doesn't even need to be as heinous as child porn -- it could simply be a w4r3z repository, in which case you could face contributory infringement charges.
Don't get me wrong; I think Shatner has entered his period of self-parody very gracefully (the latest Priceline commercials are really cute). But to re-enter the role of Kirk means playing it straight, and I just don't think he can pull that off anymore.
But more importantly, I think it shows just how creatively bankrupt Star Trek has gotten under Berman's watch. I lost interest in DS9 at about season two, watched perhaps half a dozen episodes of Voyager, and saw Enterprise's pilot, but that's about it. Maybe I'm getting old and crochety, but there's just no sense of wonder there anymore.
Future may not be available as shown; individual fates may vary. Future not available in India, Africa, or Central/South America.
-- Tom Servo, Mystery Science Theater 3000, "Design for Dreaming"
Beg, borrow, or make a copy of MST3K episode 524, "12 to the Moon," which leads with the short subject, "Design for Dreaming," a corporate promotion film by General Motors. Produced in the 1960's, it depicts THE FUTURE! as General Motors will bring it to you. Astounding labor-saving kitchen devices! Amazing new cars! ("For the electronic highway of the future, the new Firebird-II!")
Corn-ball as it is these days, part of me still wishes the future were like this.
I hate that the same business model killed Commodore, yet Apple survives.
Sorry to wander off-topic, but I watched Commodore's demise from rather closer that would be considered prudent, and I see very little similarity between Apple's business practices and Commodore's.
Commodore died due to non-existent marketing and aggressively incompetent management. They were used to "fire-and-forget" products that required no end-user support or continuing R&D. The Commodore-128 (and arguably the C-64) was the last such platform meeting that description. It was designed, manufactured, and sold -- end of discussion. You could return it under warranty if it was DOA, but that was about the extent of their "support."
Then they bought Amiga, and suddenly found themselves not only with the finest personal computer system the world would see for the next 15 years, but an honest-to-$(GOD) computer system that demanded end-user support and continuing R&D to keep it up to date and moving forward. Commodore could never figure this out. They couldn't understand why people didn't just buy the thing and then leave them alone. They had an amazing computer, but what they really wanted to sell was consumer electronic equipment. Commodore's technical staff was first-rate, but was continually sabotaged by an executive management team (Irving Gould, Medhi Ali) that simply didn't want to be bothered.
Apple's management understood and understands computer system design and enhancement. Commodore's didn't. And so, Commodore died, and (effectively) took the Amiga with it.
Simply put, the pictures are organized and displayed in a manner according to data embedded in the image file itself... which is halfway innovative.
No, it's not. They're simply scanning the EXIF headers (that is, after all, one of the things EXIF headers are for), and sorting on one of the fields in the header. There are about forty fields in an EXIF header; I suppose they're applying for forty more patents, one each for sorting on each field.
Apple makes the OS. It makes the hardware. It makes the music store. It makes the music player.
These facts are true. They are also not relevant.
If you get to choose who plays in the sandbox, it's your sandbox, and for the Macintosh, it's Apple's sandbox.
But that's my point: Apple doesn't have that privilege. They absolutely do not have the right to say who can and can't play in the sandbox.
Your attempt to draw a parallel with the Macintosh merely underscores my point. Anyone who forks over the dough for a Mac and (optionally) a development kit can write and distribute any program they want for the Mac. Apple may get to complain about it, but they don't get to enjoin it. Indeed, even for hostile software such as worms and viruses, Apple has no right of action against the writers and distributors of such malware.
Some may attempt to draw a distinction between the Mac, which is an "open" platform, and the iPod, which is "closed." This distinction is merely nominal -- if I can write code and get it to run on a system I lawfully own, it hardly makes a difference if the vendor chooses to describe thata system as "open" or "closed." Your stereo is a "closed" system, but if you mess around inside to improve the sound quality or output power, Sony does not have the right to stop you. Nor do they have the right to forbid you from telling anyone else. They can recommend you avoid it, and void your warranty if you do it anyway, but that's it. There is no reason the situation should be different for computers and computer-based systems.
Let me be clear: I'm not objecting to Apple's unhappiness with Real's reverse-engineering per se. What I'm objecting to is Apple's attempt to portray such reverse-engineering as unethical and immoral. It's not; it never has been. Apple owes its existence to such activity. For them to now claim it's somehow "unethical" obliges them, ethically, to self-immolate.
Much more civil, but making a HUGE assumption. That Apple actually is OK with other people playing in their sandbox.
Actually, it may be you that's making assumptions:
That Apple has the right to dictate activity within the sandbox,
That the sandbox belongs to Apple at all.
Neither assumption is correct.
Apple may be unhappy with how people conduct themselves within the sandbox, but vociferous complaining is about the extent of their options. They don't get to haul in the playground monitor and Make Them Stop. They could, of course, change the sandbox to make it more difficult for other people to play in it, but that sort of behavior would be -- dare I say it? -- childish.
...if Real starts advertising as "iPod compatible" you run into the problem of this being an unsupported hack, which most of the consumers won't understand.
If this is truly the case, then it was entirely unnecessary for Apple to couch their objections under the rubric of unethical "hacking" of their product. Compare Apple's press release with this, which I just made up on the spot:
Apple wishes to extend its congratulations to Real for their work in making their RealMedia(R) products iPod(R)-compatible. The spirit of dilligence, curiosity, exploration, and imagination lie at the heart of both our companies, and have built the vibrant industry we all enjoy today.
While we applaud Real's innovation, we would nevertheless like to caution Apple iPod owners that Real's work was done without Apple's consultation, and does not integrate well into the iPod's design. Apple also continues to work to enhance the iPod's design, both for existing and future products. Real's products may not be compatible with these planned enhancements. Therefore, iPod owners should beware that RealMedia products they obtain for their current iPod may not work with future iPod software updates, or with future iPod products.
Apple will continue to work with Real and other third parties to make a wider selection of media products available to our customers, and to make the iPod the defining standard for portable media players around the world.
I just can't escape the feeling that if the name of the company involved was anything besides Apple, 99% of the community here would be decrying their anticompetitive behavior.
Then let me be the first to say: Apple is wrong on this one.
I don't know where these companies got the idea that they somehow maintain "rights" over their products after they have been sold to customers (yes, sold; "licenses" are a distubingly popular myth, but a myth nontheless).
Apple has a very peculiar history in the PC industry. Their first product, the Apple ][, was created by a guy who took whatever parts came readily to hand and hacked them together to create one of the world's first personal computers. I own a copy of the Apple ][ Reference Manual, which contains a complete source listing of the ROM, as well as a schematic of the machine -- indeed, the very embodiment of the "Hacker Ethic." Such open disclosures would give today's industry executives and lawyers fits of apoplexy. Yet, despite this open disclosure of "proprietary technology", the Apple ][ sold millions of units, and put Apple Computer on the map as the pre-eminent personal computer maker.
Then the Macintosh came out in 1984, and Apple started down the path of becoming a closed-architecture "proprietary" information hoarder. ROM listings were not available. Schematics were not available. This didn't stop people from "prying open" the Mac and learning what they could about it.
Now we have the iPod, and Apple is making the unconscionable claim that no one has the right to pry open "their" product and learn how to make it do things. That they are shocked, simply shockced, that anyone would adopt the "tactics and ethics of a hacker" to manipulate an iPod to their own ends. This from a company that was founded on the tactics and ethics of a hacker.
So, let me be the first to say: Apple, you're absolutely dead wrong about this. Real may be a bunch of assholes for other reasons, but in this case, they have done nothing wrong. Look to your own history to understand why. By making such a claim, you are repudiating your own origins and your founders -- you are, in effect, claiming your own company has no right to exist.
You owe Real an apology. You owe your founders an apology. And you owe us an apology.
The real test for me is, "Is the link back to the official site? Or does it look like a link and take you to some mysterious 3rd party server?"
That's no longer sufficient.
I've recently received some phish spam claiming to be from US Bank (I've never had an account with them) demanding I "verify my account information." Naturally, it came in an HTML-only email. I read my email with Mutt, configured to filter through Lynx. Lynx took it apart and revealed it for what it was.
However, this one engaged my interest a bit more, and I looked at the HTML directly. Those of you who revere Netscape might want to sharpen your axes for inflicting JavaScript on the world. Basically, the link that took you to the scammer's site looked something like this (my syntax is probably wrong):
To update account info, click <A HREF="http://identity-thieves.com/USBank/" onMouseOver="javascript:setStatusBar ('http://usbank.com/');">here</A>
In other words, mousing over the link activates JavaScript, which re-writes the status bar with 'http://usbank.com', thereby hiding the actual URL you'll be taken to.
So being observant is now no longer enough -- you now have to be dilligently paranoid. Oh, and shut off f&#%ing JavaScript!
Barely less than a week ago, I bought a Sony Vaio VGN-S150 laptop, to replace an old HP Omnibook subnotebook running Linux. I wanted something that was small-ish but had more than 1024*768 pixels on the panel. The VGN-S150 is a "mid-size" laptop, with a panel resolution of 1280*800 and absolutely amazing brightness and clarity.
I was aware that Sony had a poor reputation for reliability and suport when I bought it. However, since I don't tend to abuse my machines, I don't anticipate needing to deal with Sony. If the machine craps out, it will be because the machine is legitimately a lemon, and that fact should be revealed within the one-year warranty period.
I'm finding, much to my delight, that the VGN-S150 is turning out to be a rather fine Linux laptop. The ATI graphics drivers, both XFree86 and radeonfb, can drive the odd panel resolution directly without complaint, so I get to use all the pixels. The internal 802.11g card, with the Intel 2200BG driver, appears to work fine (although Kismet isn't talking to it). I have yet to get sound working, and I'm still trying to get ACPI standby/suspend to work. Elsewise, it's just lovely. Once I get Linux fully working, I'll do a write-up for the TuxMobil pages.
So... let me get this straight... they are going to connect to my laptop's wireless NIC, and then piggyback onto the wired connection? Riiiiight... This would be tough to accomplish... even in Windows.
Well, actually, no.
If we assume a Windoze laptop that doesn't have the absolute latest patches (and there will be many of them), then the following will be very simple to accomplish:
Set up WAP with high-gain antenna, ESSID broadcast enabled, no authentication, WEP disabled. Have it offer DHCP leases. Windoze will happily connect without so much as a by-your-leave. (If you're lucky, you'll get a little balloon saying it connected.)
Inject Virus Of The Week into system, carrying remote rootkit.
Connect to rootkit. Enable Windoze built-in routing software (connection sharing).
You now have a machine routing packets for you from/to the private network. Not hard. Very difficult to trace. (Hmmm. Any HAMs out there who want to do signal triangulation?)
It would be rather harder to accomplish the same thing through a Linux or *BSD laptop, since Linux typically doesn't connect to a network without an explicit order to do so. Then you'd have to compromise root to alter the routing table. Not impossible, but considerably less straightforward.
Company X patents some idea and it is so good that every other company wants to use it. Ok, say patents did not exist then all other companies start to use it and no one want to invate [sic] anymore. [emphasis mine]
This does not follow. Just because a bunch of people copy your idea does not mean that the incentive to innovate is lost.
Your point proceeds from the assumption that all creative people are motivated by the "carrot" of commercial exploitability. The Open Source and Free Software communities illustrate very clearly this is not necessarily true. Different people are motivated by different things -- there are more currencies than just the one in your wallet.
I believe I had the privilege of playing that same game on that same setup at a conference some years ago. (Was there a McDonald's on the moon once you landed?) The UI was rather poor; the lightpen has essentially the same advantages and drawbacks as PDA styli do today.
Doom. Quake. Unreal Tournament. All games where you play the role of a hero against insurmountable odds. All deliciously showy and fun as hell. But... Could you step into the shoes of an actual hero and land Apollo 11?
Download Eagle Lander 3D and find out. From their home page:
Eagle Lander 3D (EL3D) is an authentic simulation of the Apollo lunar landings. EL3D includes accurate renditions of scenery, flight dynamics and the lunar module. EL3D has developed from a freeware first generation Apollo 11 simulator to one that will recreate every Apollo landing mission. Currently EL3D includes Apollo 11,12, 15, a LM racing course and an orbital module. [... ]
I don't know about anyone else, but this simple simulation has somewhat skewed my view of FPS games. I have passable 5k1llz in QuakeWorld and UT, but they are absolutely useless trying to land a LEM. Patience and attention to detail are the key here, not twitch-and-fire. (You couldn't "twitch" a LEM, anyway.) I've played Eagle Lander a bit, and I'm no damn good at it.
Think about that for a second. I've wrecked a LEM several times in this game/simulator. Hey, no big deal, right? Just restart the game. Now, think about Neil Armstrong, sitting there in the middle of what's essentially the ultimate desert, a half million miles from home, being watched by a billion people, flying this tiny little metal can, trying to kiss the surface of the moon. Granted, he had years of training in simulators and mockups, but this is the real deal, and he absolutely cannot fuck this up! No retries, no $0.25 for three more lives. One shot. Success or absolute failure.
Now, keep that frame of reference in mind when you grab the controls of Eagle Lander 3D, and see if it doesn't even slightly mess with your sense of gravity about what you're doing (pun not intended).
It seems Microsoft is performing an end-run around the free market again.
Not so very long ago, during the dawn of the x86 PC, machines were sold without operating systems. You had to buy your own copy. You were likely to ask friends or consult magazine reviews as to which OS was the best buy. As such, there was a possibility that you would buy, for example, CP/M-86 or Concurrent CP/M and not MS-DOS. In fact, there was a very good chance you wouldn't buy MS-DOS, because it was junk, and everyone knew it.
Bill Gates knew it, too. He knew he couldn't win a fair fight on the retail shelf. So he did the same thing he'd done with BASIC: He took the choice out of the consumers' hands and made deals with PC manufacturers to bundle MS-DOS with the machine. Today, as a direct result of such deals, Microsoft is an oppressive illegal monopoly, and industry innovation has been provably stunted.
It seems Microsoft intends to repeat the process, this time with in-TV software, in a country not yet familiar with their felonious behavior.
Watch this carefully. Microsoft has proved repeatedly that they don't give a damn about the end-user, because that's not their customer -- the OEM is, and Microsoft has shown that they can bend OEMs over at will without repercussions. Personally, I don't think this bodes well at all for the future of TV receivers.
...chances are these were requirements this guy was given, and he implemented them because that was what his employer wanted. And that doesn't make him a tool, it makes him "employed".
No. It makes him a tool. At best, it makes him painfully naive.
Let me tell you a little story, nigh upon 20 years old at this point. My employer at the time developed a piece of software that was leased, not sold -- elaborate support contracts and all that. To ensure that a client didn't just stop payments and continue using their copy, I was ordered to create a copy protection system that would kill the application in 90 days. The idea was that clients would receive an updated copy every 60 days, provided they kept up with the payments.
Technical problem: Most of the users would not quit the program when they were done for the day, they would shut the machine off, preventing usage metrics from being written to the disk. I would detect such a case and subtract a day's worth of usage time. Some time later, Management decided that they wanted to encourage orderly shutdown of the app, and ordered me to change it such that ten days worth of usage would be lost if the machine was simply shut off. So I did. After all, they were Management, and it was My Job.
Do the math: 90 days total usage divided by 10 days per power-off equals... An important client's installation self-destructed, per Management's specifications, after two weeks.
Guess whose ass got fired for it.
I have since sworn an oath that I will never, ever design or facilitate copy protection measures again, for one simple reason: There is no honor among thieves. Copy protection is a deliberately introduced flaw, a capacity for failure that would not otherwise exist. They are stealing reliability from you. They are stealing your rights from you. I like to think of myself as a man of good character, and I will not burden my conscience or soil my reputation by participating in such reprehensible practices. I suggest you seriously consider doing the same. It's your future, after all...
Hmm... each of the claims in the patent as it was actually granted refers (explicitly or implicitly) specifically to "limited resource computing devices".
The Amiga computer, whose UI also supported double-clicking, originally shipped with 256K of ROM, 256K of RAM, and a 7.1MHz MC68000 processor. Does this qualify as a limited-resource computing device? Does my 19-year-old Amiga now infringe on this just-granted patent?
The canonical multiplier to go from bytes/sec to bits/sec is ten (10): One start bit, eight data bits, one stop bit. This is how things were over serial/modem connections not so very long ago.
I find it still remains a reasonable rule of thumb. DSL and Ethernet frame data packets differently, of course. There are no start or stop bits surrounding each byte, but there is a multi-byte packet header and trailer. IP framing, of course, adds more overhead, but I find the 10:1 rule is close enough for most purposes. Besides, it's really easy to calculate in your head.
Color me ignorant, but I was under the impression that telemarketing calls to cell phones was already illegal, primarily because the called party pays for all airtime. Was this ever true? Has this suddenly changed?
Slashdot Mirror
Others have already pointed out the wiretapping statutes you can run afoul of, but there are other concerns as well.
For example: you deploy a honeynet for forensic analysis. A blackhat enters your network and, as you watch it happen, sets up a child porn server.
What is your liability in this case? Aiding and abetting? Accessory? Heck, it doesn't even need to be as heinous as child porn -- it could simply be a w4r3z repository, in which case you could face contributory infringement charges.
Schwab
Don't get me wrong; I think Shatner has entered his period of self-parody very gracefully (the latest Priceline commercials are really cute). But to re-enter the role of Kirk means playing it straight, and I just don't think he can pull that off anymore.
But more importantly, I think it shows just how creatively bankrupt Star Trek has gotten under Berman's watch. I lost interest in DS9 at about season two, watched perhaps half a dozen episodes of Voyager, and saw Enterprise's pilot, but that's about it. Maybe I'm getting old and crochety, but there's just no sense of wonder there anymore.
Schwab
Beg, borrow, or make a copy of MST3K episode 524, "12 to the Moon," which leads with the short subject, "Design for Dreaming," a corporate promotion film by General Motors. Produced in the 1960's, it depicts THE FUTURE! as General Motors will bring it to you. Astounding labor-saving kitchen devices! Amazing new cars! ("For the electronic highway of the future, the new Firebird-II!")
Corn-ball as it is these days, part of me still wishes the future were like this.
Schwab
Sorry to wander off-topic, but I watched Commodore's demise from rather closer that would be considered prudent, and I see very little similarity between Apple's business practices and Commodore's.
Commodore died due to non-existent marketing and aggressively incompetent management. They were used to "fire-and-forget" products that required no end-user support or continuing R&D. The Commodore-128 (and arguably the C-64) was the last such platform meeting that description. It was designed, manufactured, and sold -- end of discussion. You could return it under warranty if it was DOA, but that was about the extent of their "support."
Then they bought Amiga, and suddenly found themselves not only with the finest personal computer system the world would see for the next 15 years, but an honest-to-$(GOD) computer system that demanded end-user support and continuing R&D to keep it up to date and moving forward. Commodore could never figure this out. They couldn't understand why people didn't just buy the thing and then leave them alone. They had an amazing computer, but what they really wanted to sell was consumer electronic equipment. Commodore's technical staff was first-rate, but was continually sabotaged by an executive management team (Irving Gould, Medhi Ali) that simply didn't want to be bothered.
Apple's management understood and understands computer system design and enhancement. Commodore's didn't. And so, Commodore died, and (effectively) took the Amiga with it.
Sorry about the off-topic rant.
Schwab
No, it's not. They're simply scanning the EXIF headers (that is, after all, one of the things EXIF headers are for), and sorting on one of the fields in the header. There are about forty fields in an EXIF header; I suppose they're applying for forty more patents, one each for sorting on each field.
That's Microsoft "innovation" for you.
Schwab
These facts are true. They are also not relevant.
But that's my point: Apple doesn't have that privilege. They absolutely do not have the right to say who can and can't play in the sandbox.
Your attempt to draw a parallel with the Macintosh merely underscores my point. Anyone who forks over the dough for a Mac and (optionally) a development kit can write and distribute any program they want for the Mac. Apple may get to complain about it, but they don't get to enjoin it. Indeed, even for hostile software such as worms and viruses, Apple has no right of action against the writers and distributors of such malware.
Some may attempt to draw a distinction between the Mac, which is an "open" platform, and the iPod, which is "closed." This distinction is merely nominal -- if I can write code and get it to run on a system I lawfully own, it hardly makes a difference if the vendor chooses to describe thata system as "open" or "closed." Your stereo is a "closed" system, but if you mess around inside to improve the sound quality or output power, Sony does not have the right to stop you. Nor do they have the right to forbid you from telling anyone else. They can recommend you avoid it, and void your warranty if you do it anyway, but that's it. There is no reason the situation should be different for computers and computer-based systems.
Let me be clear: I'm not objecting to Apple's unhappiness with Real's reverse-engineering per se. What I'm objecting to is Apple's attempt to portray such reverse-engineering as unethical and immoral. It's not; it never has been. Apple owes its existence to such activity. For them to now claim it's somehow "unethical" obliges them, ethically, to self-immolate.
Schwab
Actually, it may be you that's making assumptions:
Neither assumption is correct.
Apple may be unhappy with how people conduct themselves within the sandbox, but vociferous complaining is about the extent of their options. They don't get to haul in the playground monitor and Make Them Stop. They could, of course, change the sandbox to make it more difficult for other people to play in it, but that sort of behavior would be -- dare I say it? -- childish.
Schwab
If this is truly the case, then it was entirely unnecessary for Apple to couch their objections under the rubric of unethical "hacking" of their product. Compare Apple's press release with this, which I just made up on the spot:
There. Much more civil, isn't it?
Schwab
Then let me be the first to say: Apple is wrong on this one.
I don't know where these companies got the idea that they somehow maintain "rights" over their products after they have been sold to customers (yes, sold; "licenses" are a distubingly popular myth, but a myth nontheless).
Apple has a very peculiar history in the PC industry. Their first product, the Apple ][, was created by a guy who took whatever parts came readily to hand and hacked them together to create one of the world's first personal computers. I own a copy of the Apple ][ Reference Manual, which contains a complete source listing of the ROM, as well as a schematic of the machine -- indeed, the very embodiment of the "Hacker Ethic." Such open disclosures would give today's industry executives and lawyers fits of apoplexy. Yet, despite this open disclosure of "proprietary technology", the Apple ][ sold millions of units, and put Apple Computer on the map as the pre-eminent personal computer maker.
Then the Macintosh came out in 1984, and Apple started down the path of becoming a closed-architecture "proprietary" information hoarder. ROM listings were not available. Schematics were not available. This didn't stop people from "prying open" the Mac and learning what they could about it.
Now we have the iPod, and Apple is making the unconscionable claim that no one has the right to pry open "their" product and learn how to make it do things. That they are shocked, simply shockced, that anyone would adopt the "tactics and ethics of a hacker" to manipulate an iPod to their own ends. This from a company that was founded on the tactics and ethics of a hacker.
So, let me be the first to say: Apple, you're absolutely dead wrong about this. Real may be a bunch of assholes for other reasons, but in this case, they have done nothing wrong. Look to your own history to understand why. By making such a claim, you are repudiating your own origins and your founders -- you are, in effect, claiming your own company has no right to exist.
You owe Real an apology. You owe your founders an apology. And you owe us an apology.
Schwab
That's no longer sufficient.
I've recently received some phish spam claiming to be from US Bank (I've never had an account with them) demanding I "verify my account information." Naturally, it came in an HTML-only email. I read my email with Mutt, configured to filter through Lynx. Lynx took it apart and revealed it for what it was.
However, this one engaged my interest a bit more, and I looked at the HTML directly. Those of you who revere Netscape might want to sharpen your axes for inflicting JavaScript on the world. Basically, the link that took you to the scammer's site looked something like this (my syntax is probably wrong):
To update account info, click <A HREF="http://identity-thieves.com/USBank/" onMouseOver="javascript:setStatusBar ('http://usbank.com/');">here</A>
In other words, mousing over the link activates JavaScript, which re-writes the status bar with 'http://usbank.com', thereby hiding the actual URL you'll be taken to.
So being observant is now no longer enough -- you now have to be dilligently paranoid. Oh, and shut off f&#%ing JavaScript!
Schwab
Barely less than a week ago, I bought a Sony Vaio VGN-S150 laptop, to replace an old HP Omnibook subnotebook running Linux. I wanted something that was small-ish but had more than 1024*768 pixels on the panel. The VGN-S150 is a "mid-size" laptop, with a panel resolution of 1280*800 and absolutely amazing brightness and clarity.
I was aware that Sony had a poor reputation for reliability and suport when I bought it. However, since I don't tend to abuse my machines, I don't anticipate needing to deal with Sony. If the machine craps out, it will be because the machine is legitimately a lemon, and that fact should be revealed within the one-year warranty period.
I'm finding, much to my delight, that the VGN-S150 is turning out to be a rather fine Linux laptop. The ATI graphics drivers, both XFree86 and radeonfb, can drive the odd panel resolution directly without complaint, so I get to use all the pixels. The internal 802.11g card, with the Intel 2200BG driver, appears to work fine (although Kismet isn't talking to it). I have yet to get sound working, and I'm still trying to get ACPI standby/suspend to work. Elsewise, it's just lovely. Once I get Linux fully working, I'll do a write-up for the TuxMobil pages.
Schwab
In the parent poster's signature:
You knew that's patented, too, right? Hayes got a patent for the trick of using [pause]+++[pause] of getting a modem's attention.
Schwab
Monty Python did it first.
Schwab
Well, actually, no.
If we assume a Windoze laptop that doesn't have the absolute latest patches (and there will be many of them), then the following will be very simple to accomplish:
You now have a machine routing packets for you from/to the private network. Not hard. Very difficult to trace. (Hmmm. Any HAMs out there who want to do signal triangulation?)
It would be rather harder to accomplish the same thing through a Linux or *BSD laptop, since Linux typically doesn't connect to a network without an explicit order to do so. Then you'd have to compromise root to alter the routing table. Not impossible, but considerably less straightforward.
Schwab
This does not follow. Just because a bunch of people copy your idea does not mean that the incentive to innovate is lost.
Your point proceeds from the assumption that all creative people are motivated by the "carrot" of commercial exploitability. The Open Source and Free Software communities illustrate very clearly this is not necessarily true. Different people are motivated by different things -- there are more currencies than just the one in your wallet.
Schwab
I believe I had the privilege of playing that same game on that same setup at a conference some years ago. (Was there a McDonald's on the moon once you landed?) The UI was rather poor; the lightpen has essentially the same advantages and drawbacks as PDA styli do today.
And yes, it was very, very cool.
Schwab
Doom. Quake. Unreal Tournament. All games where you play the role of a hero against insurmountable odds. All deliciously showy and fun as hell. But... Could you step into the shoes of an actual hero and land Apollo 11?
Download Eagle Lander 3D and find out. From their home page:
I don't know about anyone else, but this simple simulation has somewhat skewed my view of FPS games. I have passable 5k1llz in QuakeWorld and UT, but they are absolutely useless trying to land a LEM. Patience and attention to detail are the key here, not twitch-and-fire. (You couldn't "twitch" a LEM, anyway.) I've played Eagle Lander a bit, and I'm no damn good at it.
Think about that for a second. I've wrecked a LEM several times in this game/simulator. Hey, no big deal, right? Just restart the game. Now, think about Neil Armstrong, sitting there in the middle of what's essentially the ultimate desert, a half million miles from home, being watched by a billion people, flying this tiny little metal can, trying to kiss the surface of the moon. Granted, he had years of training in simulators and mockups, but this is the real deal, and he absolutely cannot fuck this up! No retries, no $0.25 for three more lives. One shot. Success or absolute failure.
Now, keep that frame of reference in mind when you grab the controls of Eagle Lander 3D, and see if it doesn't even slightly mess with your sense of gravity about what you're doing (pun not intended).
Schwab
You obviously don't spend much time around the laptops...
Schwab
BeOS. Since 1998, and probably much earlier.
Schwab
It seems Microsoft is performing an end-run around the free market again.
Not so very long ago, during the dawn of the x86 PC, machines were sold without operating systems. You had to buy your own copy. You were likely to ask friends or consult magazine reviews as to which OS was the best buy. As such, there was a possibility that you would buy, for example, CP/M-86 or Concurrent CP/M and not MS-DOS. In fact, there was a very good chance you wouldn't buy MS-DOS, because it was junk, and everyone knew it.
Bill Gates knew it, too. He knew he couldn't win a fair fight on the retail shelf. So he did the same thing he'd done with BASIC: He took the choice out of the consumers' hands and made deals with PC manufacturers to bundle MS-DOS with the machine. Today, as a direct result of such deals, Microsoft is an oppressive illegal monopoly, and industry innovation has been provably stunted.
It seems Microsoft intends to repeat the process, this time with in-TV software, in a country not yet familiar with their felonious behavior.
Watch this carefully. Microsoft has proved repeatedly that they don't give a damn about the end-user, because that's not their customer -- the OEM is, and Microsoft has shown that they can bend OEMs over at will without repercussions. Personally, I don't think this bodes well at all for the future of TV receivers.
Schwab
No. It makes him a tool. At best, it makes him painfully naive.
Let me tell you a little story, nigh upon 20 years old at this point. My employer at the time developed a piece of software that was leased, not sold -- elaborate support contracts and all that. To ensure that a client didn't just stop payments and continue using their copy, I was ordered to create a copy protection system that would kill the application in 90 days. The idea was that clients would receive an updated copy every 60 days, provided they kept up with the payments.
Technical problem: Most of the users would not quit the program when they were done for the day, they would shut the machine off, preventing usage metrics from being written to the disk. I would detect such a case and subtract a day's worth of usage time. Some time later, Management decided that they wanted to encourage orderly shutdown of the app, and ordered me to change it such that ten days worth of usage would be lost if the machine was simply shut off. So I did. After all, they were Management, and it was My Job.
Do the math: 90 days total usage divided by 10 days per power-off equals... An important client's installation self-destructed, per Management's specifications, after two weeks.
Guess whose ass got fired for it.
I have since sworn an oath that I will never, ever design or facilitate copy protection measures again, for one simple reason: There is no honor among thieves. Copy protection is a deliberately introduced flaw, a capacity for failure that would not otherwise exist. They are stealing reliability from you. They are stealing your rights from you. I like to think of myself as a man of good character, and I will not burden my conscience or soil my reputation by participating in such reprehensible practices. I suggest you seriously consider doing the same. It's your future, after all...
Schwab
...Not to mention no sales tax and very liberal concealed-carry weapons laws?
Schwab
The Amiga computer, whose UI also supported double-clicking, originally shipped with 256K of ROM, 256K of RAM, and a 7.1MHz MC68000 processor. Does this qualify as a limited-resource computing device? Does my 19-year-old Amiga now infringe on this just-granted patent?
Schwab
The canonical multiplier to go from bytes/sec to bits/sec is ten (10): One start bit, eight data bits, one stop bit. This is how things were over serial/modem connections not so very long ago.
I find it still remains a reasonable rule of thumb. DSL and Ethernet frame data packets differently, of course. There are no start or stop bits surrounding each byte, but there is a multi-byte packet header and trailer. IP framing, of course, adds more overhead, but I find the 10:1 rule is close enough for most purposes. Besides, it's really easy to calculate in your head.
Schwab
Color me ignorant, but I was under the impression that telemarketing calls to cell phones was already illegal, primarily because the called party pays for all airtime. Was this ever true? Has this suddenly changed?
Schwab