Not exactly what you want. But interesting: Here is the list of all the largest known
primes (at their time): http://www.utm.edu/research/primes/ftp/all.txt
This article [http://www.eetimes.com/at/news/OEG20020319S0029] talks about using a cell matrix which configure their neighbours at run-time, something like the game-of-life or a more generic turing machine sort of thing. This has lot of applications, including a highly programmable FPGA which is very simple to fabricate or even complicate circuiry.
What really attracted my attention was the passage at the end: >Cell Matrix has been working with nanotechnology groups, hoping to forge a >new computing substrate from some type of atomic-level fabrication technique. >Macias was impressed with work at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in which a >matrix defined by erbium disilicide wires that address rotaxane molecules >has been proposed as an atomic-level route to massively dense FPGAs.
Could this new research be an answer to these people ? Probably combining the two technologies, not only do we have a massive memory-device, but a massive computing device : Imagine an FPGA (or an ASIC) with a million times more density!
Now lets see how the situation would look when they have to make a decision for or against DRM. At this point, the choice of using DRM or not is not a legislative one, but a business decision by the RIAA and others. And since they completely control the market, they could just make an announcement "RIAA has decided that by 2008 all the CDs released will be digitally signed."
There is nothing that can be done to stop them, since there is nothing illegal about them choosing to do so. The only thing that can stop them is if they are not able to enforce the law and this is precisely the loose end that they are trying to tie up.
Let me introduce another equation:
!This_legislature => !DRM
Basically if this legislation does not pass, then there is no reason for RIAA to move over to DRM-enabled media and media players since some hacker would surely break it. Looking at all the other related laws, its quite clear that there is a pattern. And here is the ominous pattern:
1. Increase penalties for hacking. Make it federal criminal offence. 2. Allow RIAA to hack into computers they cannot enforce the law on. 3. Enact very strict laws concerning piracy, and make it such that hackers
could stand to lose so much that the very fear of even a random enforcement
would shut down most hackers from venturing there. 4. Yet to happen: Force how people can listen to content, and thus obtain complete
business control of this industry.
I feel that once this law passes, there is very little that can be done to avoid DRM-enabled media enforcement, no matter how well people realise that its bad. Its just too late.
One of the things that people frequently ask about sites like ibiblio.org is "They are great. But how long will they be around?"
Do you see this as a concern (esp. after the LWN announcement) and do you have any comments regardning this. Are there any good approaches you suggest (like augmenting free usership with voluntary subscriptions, etc) for such free sites in general ?
Under section.3. Prohibition against.... `(2) an illicit authentication feature affixed to or embedded in, or designed to be affixed to or embedded in--
Talks about authentication feature.
Scroll down for the definition: (4) the term `authentication feature' means any hologram, watermark, certification, symbol, code, image, sequence of numbers or letters, or other physical feature that either individually or in combination with another feature is used by the respective copyright owner to that a phonorecord, a copy of a computer program, a copy of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, or documentation or packaging is not counterfeit or otherwise infringing of any copyright;
This is what basically encompasses the digital signatures and authentication. Of course they dont use the words DRM openly. Its neatly conceals in tons of language.
How many of you would be willing to ban buying CDs if such bills are enacted ?
How many of you are willing to forgo the "premium" music and listen to only those
groups which put up their music on the Net ?
This again has the same reasons as many other outrageous copy-right laws that are being danced around. People simply dont understand the technological details, and blind anologies are made for the common public.
Take for instance: > Gray believes that forging a digital watermark or signature > should be just as unlawful as forging a physical watermark > or signature. "It's like taking a T-shirt that you've put a > design on and then attaching a Disney hologram or the NBA > championship hologram, distributing it, and giving people > the impression that it's an authorized apparel item from the > NBA or Disney," Gray says. "That's a deceptive practice that > we have a long history of banning."
But this is such a misleading statement. Consider the case where you buy an expensive MP3 player from microsoft which plays only digitally water-marked mp3 files. On the offset it may look like this law is prohibiting me from playing a pirated song. But look deeply. What its prohibiting is me playing _any_ songs which are not water-marked by the some governing body. Which means that if I make my own music (however cacofonic it might be) I will not be able to play it unless I get it certified from this governing body.
In light of this, it becomes clear that not only they are stopping piracy,with this law, they are also giving themself absolute control over what content can be played by people (even privately) and what should not. How easy would it be for me to certify my own "music" (or noise) by these governing bodies? Obviously I have to stand in line along with the other members of RIAA and pay the prices that they set. This is extremely dangerous situation, since the misleading phrasing of the bill makes it impossible for ordinary senetors to understand the ramifications and hence we could expect a wide spread floor-banging approval. The very fact that this bill is set for fast track, scares me more becasuse they precisely didnt want the time for people to let the real meaning sink in.
I guess I was lucky. When I did this exact thing (and maybe a little more fun stuff;) ) in our harmless local campus network while at school, I got into so much trouble, you just cannot imagine!
The thing that I learnt very hard and sadly was that people in charge of making decisions related to the networks hardly know any technical details. And they always come down hard exactly because of their ignorance.
Anyway, at that point it put a dampener to my enthusiasm to find holes in systems. And I am sure I will never find myself in the position this man found himself, thanks to this enlightening experience!
Of course, it would be very nice if someone educated the lawmakers and buerocrats a little bit more about the systems, security and technology in general. (sigh)
Hmm.. probably we have a product idea here. I agree that XTest is basically generating fake key presses and mouse events. What we really need is an X-Extension which can generate more intelligent events: Events specific to each widget. There could be a way of specifying which widgets take what events, (or better still, parse source code and find that out?)
Not sure what really the market for such a thing is. But seems to be, implementation should not be too hard, what say?
Looking at the bill, it seems that they cannot delete files. If they do rename the files, we could write a simple script which stores the names and check sums of all the files in a directory, and when needed, can re-evaluate the checksums and rename the files back !
Okay, so the DoS is the big problem. Put a lot of open source files in the same file share, and the bill says it cannot affect file-sharing of non-copyright violating files.
It also says that the maximum limit of damage to the offender is limited to 50$ Can we put a price on downloads of legitimate open source files which got affected by the DoS and prove that its above $50 ?
Anyway, all these comments are just technical points. (Dont we all itch to beat them at their own games?) C'mon, its not a big deal. Just another card on the table. Setup nice secure linux servers, put automatic IP filtering for offending IP addresses, and what can they really do?
And if they do try bashing some poorman's server I am sure the hackers will be more imaginative in their vengeance:)
Slashdot Mirror
who can use emacs and worries about case! ;)
Not exactly what you want. But interesting: Here is the list of all the largest known primes (at their time): http://www.utm.edu/research/primes/ftp/all.txt
This article [http://www.eetimes.com/at/news/OEG20020319S0029]
talks about using a cell matrix which configure their neighbours at run-time,
something like the game-of-life or a more generic turing machine sort of thing.
This has lot of applications, including a highly programmable FPGA which
is very simple to fabricate or even complicate circuiry.
What really attracted my attention was the passage at the end:
>Cell Matrix has been working with nanotechnology groups, hoping to forge a
>new computing substrate from some type of atomic-level fabrication technique.
>Macias was impressed with work at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in which a
>matrix defined by erbium disilicide wires that address rotaxane molecules
>has been proposed as an atomic-level route to massively dense FPGAs.
Could this new research be an answer to these people ? Probably combining
the two technologies, not only do we have a massive memory-device, but
a massive computing device : Imagine an FPGA (or an ASIC) with a million
times more density!
Mathematically put: Now lets see how the situation would look when they have to make a decision
for or against DRM.
At this point, the choice of using DRM or not is not a legislative one, but
a business decision by the RIAA and others. And since they completely
control the market, they could just make an announcement "RIAA has decided that
by 2008 all the CDs released will be digitally signed."
There is nothing that can be done to stop them, since there is nothing illegal
about them choosing to do so. The only thing that can stop them is if they
are not able to enforce the law and this is precisely the loose end that they
are trying to tie up.
Let me introduce another equation: Basically if this legislation does not pass, then there is no reason for RIAA
to move over to DRM-enabled media and media players since some hacker would
surely break it. Looking at all the other related laws, its quite clear that
there is a pattern. And here is the ominous pattern:
1. Increase penalties for hacking. Make it federal criminal offence.
2. Allow RIAA to hack into computers they cannot enforce the law on.
3. Enact very strict laws concerning piracy, and make it such that hackers
could stand to lose so much that the very fear of even a random enforcement
would shut down most hackers from venturing there.
4. Yet to happen: Force how people can listen to content, and thus obtain complete
business control of this industry.
I feel that once this law passes, there is very little that can be done to avoid
DRM-enabled media enforcement, no matter how well people realise that its bad.
Its just too late.
One of the things that people frequently ask about sites like ibiblio.org
is "They are great. But how long will they be around?"
Do you see this as a concern (esp. after the LWN announcement) and do you have any
comments regardning this. Are there any good approaches you suggest (like augmenting
free usership with voluntary subscriptions, etc) for such free sites in general ?
Thanks.
Under section .3. Prohibition against ....
`(2) an illicit authentication feature affixed to or embedded in,
or designed to be affixed to or embedded in--
Talks about authentication feature.
Scroll down for the definition:
(4) the term `authentication feature' means any hologram, watermark,
certification, symbol, code, image, sequence of numbers or letters,
or other physical feature that either individually or in combination
with another feature is used by the respective copyright owner to
that a phonorecord, a copy of a computer program, a copy of a motion
picture or other audiovisual work, or documentation or packaging is
not counterfeit or otherwise infringing of any copyright;
This is what basically encompasses the digital signatures and
authentication. Of course they dont use the words DRM openly. Its neatly conceals
in tons of language.
Thats not a bad idea! Maybe thats one of the biggest leverages we as a community have.
How many of you would be willing to ban buying CDs if such bills are enacted ? How many of you are willing to forgo the "premium" music and listen to only those groups which put up their music on the Net ?
This again has the same reasons as many other outrageous
copy-right laws that are being danced around. People simply
dont understand the technological details, and blind anologies
are made for the common public.
Take for instance:
> Gray believes that forging a digital watermark or signature
> should be just as unlawful as forging a physical watermark
> or signature. "It's like taking a T-shirt that you've put a
> design on and then attaching a Disney hologram or the NBA
> championship hologram, distributing it, and giving people
> the impression that it's an authorized apparel item from the
> NBA or Disney," Gray says. "That's a deceptive practice that
> we have a long history of banning."
But this is such a misleading statement. Consider the case where
you buy an expensive MP3 player from microsoft which plays only
digitally water-marked mp3 files. On the offset it may look like
this law is prohibiting me from playing a pirated song. But look
deeply. What its prohibiting is me playing _any_ songs which are
not water-marked by the some governing body. Which means that if
I make my own music (however cacofonic it might be) I will not
be able to play it unless I get it certified from this governing
body.
In light of this, it becomes clear that not only they are stopping
piracy,with this law, they are also giving themself absolute control
over what content can be played by people (even privately) and what
should not. How easy would it be for me to certify my own "music"
(or noise) by these governing bodies? Obviously I have to stand in
line along with the other members of RIAA and pay the prices that they
set. This is extremely dangerous situation, since the misleading phrasing
of the bill makes it impossible for ordinary senetors to understand the
ramifications and hence we could expect a wide spread floor-banging approval.
The very fact that this bill is set for fast track, scares me more
becasuse they precisely didnt want the time for people to let the real
meaning sink in.
I guess I was lucky. When I did this exact thing (and maybe a little more fun stuff ;) )
in our harmless local campus network while at school, I got into so much trouble,
you just cannot imagine!
The thing that I learnt very hard and sadly was that people in charge of making
decisions related to the networks hardly know any technical details. And they
always come down hard exactly because of their ignorance.
Anyway, at that point it put a dampener to my enthusiasm to find holes in systems.
And I am sure I will never find myself in the position this man found himself, thanks
to this enlightening experience!
Of course, it would be very nice if someone educated the lawmakers and buerocrats
a little bit more about the systems, security and technology in general.
(sigh)
is basically generating fake key presses and mouse events.
What we really need is an X-Extension which can generate more intelligent
events: Events specific to each widget. There could be a way of specifying
which widgets take what events, (or better still, parse source code
and find that out?)
Not sure what really the market for such a thing is. But seems to be,
implementation should not be too hard, what say?
Expect allows us to do on Linux
(and a vareity of other operating systems) ?
Can this law apply to out of country servers ? Definitely not! ;)
Looking at the bill, it seems that they cannot delete files. If they do rename the
:)
files, we could write a simple script which stores the names and check sums of all the
files in a directory, and when needed, can re-evaluate the checksums and rename the
files back !
Okay, so the DoS is the big problem. Put a lot of open source files in the same file
share, and the bill says it cannot affect file-sharing of non-copyright violating
files.
It also says that the maximum limit of damage to the offender is limited to 50$
Can we put a price on downloads of legitimate open source files which got affected
by the DoS and prove that its above $50 ?
Anyway, all these comments are just technical points. (Dont we all itch to beat them
at their own games?) C'mon, its not a big deal. Just another card on the table.
Setup nice secure linux servers, put automatic IP filtering for offending IP addresses,
and what can they really do?
And if they do try bashing some poorman's server I am sure the hackers will be more
imaginative in their vengeance