Im Australian... its not my problem when the US takes away your basic rights under the guise of 'protecting freedom'
HOWEVER.. it is my problem when your arrogant government and big business industries (read RIAA/MPAA) try to force your legislation on my country. if the US wants to try and get its copyright and DMCA law mirrored over here in aus, then at least let me vote in your elections ffs!
Im sick of 'America - Land of the Free'... its a misnomer... its BS. I turned down a well paid job in the US a month back... because as an IT admin, it would be frankly dangerous to work over there.
Im sure the US will try to stop dealing with countries without a DMCA equivalent. Eventually the US will be economically affected by these restrictions, and its citizens will start to ask questions. Unfortunately... as of course 'American Values' are good enough for all... we are likely to see 'peaceful non-agression military' solution to their problems.
Recently in our city there was a rather highly publicised case of a man who owned a house using miniture cameras to spy on housemates. They sued... he won. (IANAL) i think the decisions went along the lines of 'he had a right to be there... so he coulnt invade the privacy'. Lots of outrage obviouly, as this goes against common sense.
Phone lines are a different kettle of fish, and almost certainly come under seperate acts. The legal system has difficulty understanding what a computer is... so the law is rather behind when it comes to digital things. Phones have been around for ages.
Anyway it all comes down to the terms and conditions of the agreement, and what is considered 'reasonable'. I mentioned in a previous post that i had my uni over a barrel, when i clocked up a huge bandwidth bill and refused to pay (they never said i would pay by the meg). A lot of unis word their internet access as 'Access to the university services and the internet for study purposes'. I dont see how the latest crap from eemememein comes under that umbrella;)
Well, my flatmate ran out and got a digital/hd box the other day. Only using a normal TV, so no HD stuff... but i have one major beef:
Picture quality and sound is great with good reception... if the signal fades... instead of a bit of light fuzz you get major visual artifacts, and horrible clicks, pops (and if the subwoofers plugged in - eardrum assailing bangs) in the soundtrack.
In fact that sums it up really... never a mediocre signal. So really if your reception isnt great allready all digital TV will do is annoy you.
Nothing interrupts the show more than frequent pops (which must be damaging my speakers) followed by a second of silence.
Information about the tv guide is good too, but only when its working.
Perhaps I am unlucky with reception... but usually i switch back to analog, at least for the soundtrack.
Not quite so evidently. This ENUM (e.164.in-arpa) system, would give your internet connection a 'phone number'.. which would be most useful for voip.
Im sure your government will find some way to lock it down to 'protect your freedom'. After all if it works kinda like a dynamic DNS, it will make it easier to track p2p sharers. people that do illegal shit online... 'Unpatriotic' postings.... 'dissidents' 'people that say bad things about gwb'... oh i mean 'TERRORISTS!'
1) Grab IP address. 2) do an e.164.in-arpa to get 'phone number' 3) look up in reverse directory
Cool... no need to subpoena ISP's. Heh, this is actually kinda scary...
Sure am glad I dont have 'US Freedom' no matter how hard bush tries to force it on the rest of the world...
I can also take out the boxes hard disk and mount it in another one. I can *shock horror* read the NTFS partition and take ownership of all the files!
Of course if the 'encryption' checkbox is selected then its a little more difficult.
[i]When I've spoken with Microsoft security pros about similar problems in the past, they've referred me to a company policy that says, "If a bad guy has unrestricted physical access to your computer, it's not your computer anymore." [/i]
Any system with an entry point is vunerable; even if i have to put a gun to the head of your sysadmin;)
Yup I can see it now... ignorant justice in action:....and as you can the heuristic dectection of the compiled machine code results in clear similarities....
Could you please be more clear on what these 'computers' do?
Our computer has a blue case and a GNU is hairy.
Seems pretty clear to me! Case dismissed!
*groan*
* RMS yells at the judge about free as in freedom until he is locked up for contempt of court.
I would just like to make the comment... please do not judge Aussie beer by Fosters.
None of my mates drink Fosters beer... and noone down here with any taste drinks Fosters, 'Victoria Bitter' or 'West End'.
If any of you forigners;) would like a decent drop, try to import some Coopers...
Otherwise just drink Guinness:)
Re:Ironically, it's Windows-only!
on
Paper Mounted CPUs
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I dont see that as particularily ironic. They are using Linux to host their site because Linux is particularily better at doing this.
If I was using spreadsheets, processing data and making reports I would most likely be doing it in Windows.
A COM object is excellent. You can have a macro embedded in your spreadsheet / database / word document that grabs all the data out of this.
As far as i can see they are picking the best tools for the job.
Re:I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing...
on
Advergames
·
· Score: 1
Agreed.... to my knowlege video games are approximately $80 over in the US... in Australia they are about $80 AUD... about $40 US, its just supply and demand.
Cracking a nut with a sledgehammer....
on
Kazaa Fights Back
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
The nuts going to get smashed, and nothing useful will come of it.
Seriously though: "Sharman is asking the judge to declare the copyright holders guilty of antitrust and related violations, and to bar them from enforcing any of their copyrights."
You dont think the *AAs are going to go absolutely all out to get this thrown out of court? I mean forcing all their works into the public domain might do wonders for the 'information wants to be free crowd'... but realistically the *AAs will fight tooth and nail!
The *AAs would be prepared to blow all their money in lawyers and bribes to avoid a verdict like that... which would really obliterate their business.
I think theyre asking for too much... and because of this they may end up with nothing. Kazzza was an example of semi-legitimate peer to peer, and was a good example to show off legal p2p working. (As like its *cough* only a small minority sharing illegal stuff *cough*)...
But with claims like "bar them from enforcing any of their copyrights"... i mean for fucks sake, they only make profit out of holding copyrights.. im finding this difficult to explain.. but like i say, the *aas will pay anything to stop that verdict.
Maybe a slightly less inflamatory suit wouldve done more good for p2p imho.
And then how much does a nice college boy get raped and murdered when doing his 5 years. Oh im sure youll only ever be around "Model" prisoners.
Im sure the Bubbas of the US prison system is loving these stupidly harsh new laws. Go in a college boy, come out a cynical addict with a very sore arse.
Chalk up another victory for the "Land of the Free"... heh heh heh
GTA3 was banned after it was released before it had gone though the ratings bumf. Basically someone forgot to get it checked out, so it was pulled off the shelves.
Once the publishers got off their butt (or the government found the paperwork) and it got its rating... (MA15 from memory) it was of course un-banned, back on the shelf and installed on my box:)
Criminals? Actually Australians are most likely to be a blend of many different cultures... and generally we are a racially tolarant country. Most of them are people that have chosen to come and live in our great country... and when I look at your DMCA etc, i truly believe that Australia is the real Land of the Free.
I'm fortunate to live in a country whose leaders dont see it as their business to poke into the affairs of other nations. I think its great that in every crisis we can get away with sending a few rowboats and a handful of troops to keep dictator Bush happy.
Our nation is of peace and tolerance. The US seems to be about profit and imposing its 'freedoms' on others by force.
Im proud to be Australian.
Please dont take enclosed joke too seriously;)
There was an Aussie, an American and an African father in the maternity ward... and the nurse announces that all the births were successful, however the staff had got the babies mixed up. The fathers would have to go in and identify their child. So the Aussie grabs the African baby and says 'This black one must be mine!'. 'Surely sir this is the African mans baby?'. 'Well, maybe... but one of the others is American, and i cant take that risk'
Karma: Rock Bottom, mostly due to insulting all the american mods:D
George Bush has released his own network security suite "Homeland Security" with many advanced features.
"Homeland Security" allows you to scan another system for 'Toolz of Mass Hax0ring' and to kill any processes that try to stop you. It even allows you to take a remote host down if you belive it to have such Toolz in its possession.
Furthermore, "Homeland Security" allows the admin to arbitarily flag a process as 'Bin Very Nasty' and gain root on any host that you belive may be running it. After root is gained on the remote host, "Homeland Security" sets up its own daemons to police secuirty on the remote host. As an extra bonus, hosts that do not help police your process control can be added to/etc/hosts.deny.trade.
Of course no modern security package would be complete without a broad range of settings to really lock down your users and remove from them as many privildges as you think you can get away with under the guise of Security.
GWB Homeland Security, proudly sponsored by the 'Land of the Free' Software Foundation *sarcastic cough*
Quicktime is just horrible. Theres a key that starts up its tray icon in my hkeyallusers/.../Run registry key... and part of its plugin for IE restores that key everytime I use my browser. This really annoys me.
In fact just having a brainwave, im going to use Norton to put the little tray icon thingo into quarantine. Take that! HAH!
Ive never really liked Real*... it has that visual bloat that comes with ICQ, Gamespy and other advert laden programs.
As far as DRM goes, there is still nothing stopping me from using VAC (Virtual Audio Cables)... a driver that gives me a few virtual soundcards that act as cables. I can play any content through 'VAC #1 In' and record 'VAC #1 Out' with say CoolEdit Pro streaming plain non-DRM content to disk. Perfect digital copy too.
Unfortunately DRM will always be broken by people that try hard enough... just like the warez scene works. Hardware dongles have bit the dust with dongle emulators, nothing seems to protect data. All DRM does is annoy users with a legitimate reason to access data. Its a big annoying pain in the arse. I habitually crack all my legit games so I dont have to go through the motions of putting in the CD when I want to play them. Its annoying... and doesnt seem to stop illicit use.
Anyway I can allways hear your DRM-Super-Mega-Zero-Alpha-Mp3 music... and sing it back to you (badly, im afraid)... would you like to come and attempt to put a DRM chip in my head? *brandishes axe*;)
At work last week I was installing some desktop boxen with another tech. CD ejects, and is still spinning in the tray at 48 odd speed. Just seeing this thing spinning and skittering and starting to bounce caused the tech and I to hit the deck fast.
I remember looking up at the confused faces of a couple of users who thought we were nuts until the CD hopped out the tray and shot accross the room at warp speed, severing the plastic christmas tree near the top and embedding itself in the plasterboard wall.
Cue shocked expression on users faces:D
Pity we didnt have these nice 52 speed drives! The wall it got stuck in was a thin gyprock internal wall to the boss's office. Wouldve gone straight through! The boss, who had just said that the 'funny noises' coming from the drive were no cause for concern and that we couldnt RTM the drive because it would take too long;)
Yes i can say that without ranting like a hippie. The wonder of Linux and the benefit of Linux is that there is so much more to choose from. The less standardised, the more freedom. Sure this makes applications difficult, but now we have a natural evolution... a survival of the fittest and most versatile librarys and APIs.
* Standardised Linux would attract more windows user and bill gates is satan and must die...
Ranting lunatics. Linux has a purpose, and as Free software (as in beer this time)... its performance is NOT MEASURED IN MARKETSHARE. Do not forget this. Linux should allways be for the power user, the tweaker, the guy/girl that cannot stop fiddling with their computer.
New users should be encouraged to fiddle, they should be given VMWare or VirtualPC and a nice easy distro, or they should have a dual boot system set up. Standardisation is only going to piss off the 75% of people that prefer a different standard.
Who really cares what percentage of boxen runs linux? Sure it might attract a better quality of drivers or closed source apps, but to do this by sacrificing the core Freedom values by standardising bits is ridiculous.
And all those that take marketshare as an ego thing, you are a bunch of morons. If popular equated useful we would all be running Windows.
God, reading thru my post im starting to rant like stallman:(
NWN is very RPGish, and is true DND with a 3D GUI wrapped around this. 'doze people that actually can play this will notice wierd stuff happening when the ruleset actually 'catches up' with what is happening in the GUI. Picture playing true DND with a Diablo client and the server continually correcting what you see, it can be frustrating.
Yes CS is a client and is referred to as such.
But NWN is definitely not a 3D shooter. Think updated Baulders Gate (sp?). Quite a bit of fun really, and nice multiplayer. Bit of a bitch if you play a mage class... you will be forever resting (to be able to cast spells you need to rest for the uninitiated), while the rest of your party rushes off and either kills everything or gets themselves killed:D
Slashdot Mirror
Im Australian... its not my problem when the US takes away your basic rights under the guise of 'protecting freedom'
HOWEVER.. it is my problem when your arrogant government and big business industries (read RIAA/MPAA) try to force your legislation on my country. if the US wants to try and get its copyright and DMCA law mirrored over here in aus, then at least let me vote in your elections ffs!
Im sick of 'America - Land of the Free'... its a misnomer... its BS. I turned down a well paid job in the US a month back... because as an IT admin, it would be frankly dangerous to work over there.
Im sure the US will try to stop dealing with countries without a DMCA equivalent. Eventually the US will be economically affected by these restrictions, and its citizens will start to ask questions. Unfortunately... as of course 'American Values' are good enough for all... we are likely to see 'peaceful non-agression military' solution to their problems.
Recently in our city there was a rather highly publicised case of a man who owned a house using miniture cameras to spy on housemates. They sued... he won. (IANAL) i think the decisions went along the lines of 'he had a right to be there... so he coulnt invade the privacy'. Lots of outrage obviouly, as this goes against common sense.
;)
Phone lines are a different kettle of fish, and almost certainly come under seperate acts. The legal system has difficulty understanding what a computer is... so the law is rather behind when it comes to digital things. Phones have been around for ages.
Anyway it all comes down to the terms and conditions of the agreement, and what is considered 'reasonable'. I mentioned in a previous post that i had my uni over a barrel, when i clocked up a huge bandwidth bill and refused to pay (they never said i would pay by the meg). A lot of unis word their internet access as 'Access to the university services and the internet for study purposes'. I dont see how the latest crap from eemememein comes under that umbrella
Well, my flatmate ran out and got a digital/hd box the other day. Only using a normal TV, so no HD stuff... but i have one major beef:
Picture quality and sound is great with good reception... if the signal fades... instead of a bit of light fuzz you get major visual artifacts, and horrible clicks, pops (and if the subwoofers plugged in - eardrum assailing bangs) in the soundtrack.
In fact that sums it up really... never a mediocre signal. So really if your reception isnt great allready all digital TV will do is annoy you.
Nothing interrupts the show more than frequent pops (which must be damaging my speakers) followed by a second of silence.
Information about the tv guide is good too, but only when its working.
Perhaps I am unlucky with reception... but usually i switch back to analog, at least for the soundtrack.
Obviously THG survived the slashdot effect the first time.... ... and we cant let this happen now can we?
The www must live in fear! FEAR I TELL YOU!
BWAHAHAHAHHA!
600mhz will be fine? are you serious? i thought linux (i havent used it for years) could do better than that?
*pulls up terminal services to kalashikov*
very little lag here in word... on a celeron 366 running win2k advanced server (and theres 2 users on it and god knows how many services...)
Oh no my village is on fire!
... formatting hard drive, please wait.
Click... Mouse Swirl...Point...
[user]: NO! THAT WAS FOR THE GAME YOU STUPID SYSTEM...
Not quite so evidently. This ENUM (e.164.in-arpa) system, would give your internet connection a 'phone number'.. which would be most useful for voip.
Im sure your government will find some way to lock it down to 'protect your freedom'. After all if it works kinda like a dynamic DNS, it will make it easier to track p2p sharers. people that do illegal shit online... 'Unpatriotic' postings.... 'dissidents' 'people that say bad things about gwb'... oh i mean 'TERRORISTS!'
1) Grab IP address.
2) do an e.164.in-arpa to get 'phone number'
3) look up in reverse directory
Cool... no need to subpoena ISP's. Heh, this is actually kinda scary...
Sure am glad I dont have 'US Freedom' no matter how hard bush tries to force it on the rest of the world...
For Fuck's Sake...
;)
I can also take out the boxes hard disk and mount it in another one. I can *shock horror* read the NTFS partition and take ownership of all the files!
Of course if the 'encryption' checkbox is selected then its a little more difficult.
[i]When I've spoken with Microsoft security pros about similar problems in the past, they've referred me to a company policy that says, "If a bad guy has unrestricted physical access to your computer, it's not your computer anymore." [/i]
Any system with an entry point is vunerable; even if i have to put a gun to the head of your sysadmin
IE resumes broken downloads... just re-click the link.
Its often nice to get apparantly 10mbit speeds over dialup when your resuming one of those downloads that craps out at 97%.
And im allergic....
... who do i sue?
*takes a look at all the universes net worth*
Yup I can see it now... ignorant justice in action: ....and as you can the heuristic dectection of the compiled machine code results in clear similarities....
Could you please be more clear on what these 'computers' do?
Our computer has a blue case and a GNU is hairy.
Seems pretty clear to me! Case dismissed!
*groan*
* RMS yells at the judge about free as in freedom until he is locked up for contempt of court.
I would just like to make the comment... please do not judge Aussie beer by Fosters.
;) would like a decent drop, try to import some Coopers...
:)
None of my mates drink Fosters beer... and noone down here with any taste drinks Fosters, 'Victoria Bitter' or 'West End'.
If any of you forigners
Otherwise just drink Guinness
I dont see that as particularily ironic. They are using Linux to host their site because Linux is particularily better at doing this.
If I was using spreadsheets, processing data and making reports I would most likely be doing it in Windows.
A COM object is excellent. You can have a macro embedded in your spreadsheet / database / word document that grabs all the data out of this.
As far as i can see they are picking the best tools for the job.
Agreed.... to my knowlege video games are approximately $80 over in the US... in Australia they are about $80 AUD... about $40 US, its just supply and demand.
Doing some work on a object management system for games... and i think this is heading towards the worlds worst c macro
The nuts going to get smashed, and nothing useful will come of it.
Seriously though:
"Sharman is asking the judge to declare the copyright holders guilty of antitrust and related violations, and to bar them from enforcing any of their copyrights."
You dont think the *AAs are going to go absolutely all out to get this thrown out of court? I mean forcing all their works into the public domain might do wonders for the 'information wants to be free crowd'... but realistically the *AAs will fight tooth and nail!
The *AAs would be prepared to blow all their money in lawyers and bribes to avoid a verdict like that... which would really obliterate their business.
I think theyre asking for too much... and because of this they may end up with nothing. Kazzza was an example of semi-legitimate peer to peer, and was a good example to show off legal p2p working. (As like its *cough* only a small minority sharing illegal stuff *cough*)...
But with claims like "bar them from enforcing any of their copyrights"... i mean for fucks sake, they only make profit out of holding copyrights.. im finding this difficult to explain.. but like i say, the *aas will pay anything to stop that verdict.
Maybe a slightly less inflamatory suit wouldve done more good for p2p imho.
And then how much does a nice college boy get raped and murdered when doing his 5 years. Oh im sure youll only ever be around "Model" prisoners.
Im sure the Bubbas of the US prison system is loving these stupidly harsh new laws. Go in a college boy, come out a cynical addict with a very sore arse.
Chalk up another victory for the "Land of the Free"... heh heh heh
well... sharks sink if they dont keep moving, so i would suggest it is possible to make lift somehow ;)
:/
im guessing you would be using reduced water pressure on the bottom of the wing though, to suck it down (as its bouyant*)
* hooray for dyslexic spelling skills
GTA3 was banned after it was released before it had gone though the ratings bumf. Basically someone forgot to get it checked out, so it was pulled off the shelves.
:)
Once the publishers got off their butt (or the government found the paperwork) and it got its rating... (MA15 from memory) it was of course un-banned, back on the shelf and installed on my box
Criminals? Actually Australians are most likely to be a blend of many different cultures... and generally we are a racially tolarant country. Most of them are people that have chosen to come and live in our great country... and when I look at your DMCA etc, i truly believe that Australia is the real Land of the Free.
;)
:D
I'm fortunate to live in a country whose leaders dont see it as their business to poke into the affairs of other nations. I think its great that in every crisis we can get away with sending a few rowboats and a handful of troops to keep dictator Bush happy.
Our nation is of peace and tolerance. The US seems to be about profit and imposing its 'freedoms' on others by force.
Im proud to be Australian.
Please dont take enclosed joke too seriously
There was an Aussie, an American and an African father in the maternity ward... and the nurse announces that all the births were successful, however the staff had got the babies mixed up. The fathers would have to go in and identify their child. So the Aussie grabs the African baby and says 'This black one must be mine!'. 'Surely sir this is the African mans baby?'. 'Well, maybe... but one of the others is American, and i cant take that risk'
Karma: Rock Bottom, mostly due to insulting all the american mods
George Bush has released his own network security suite "Homeland Security" with many advanced features.
/etc/hosts.deny.trade.
"Homeland Security" allows you to scan another system for 'Toolz of Mass Hax0ring' and to kill any processes that try to stop you. It even allows you to take a remote host down if you belive it to have such Toolz in its possession.
Furthermore, "Homeland Security" allows the admin to arbitarily flag a process as 'Bin Very Nasty' and gain root on any host that you belive may be running it. After root is gained on the remote host, "Homeland Security" sets up its own daemons to police secuirty on the remote host. As an extra bonus, hosts that do not help police your process control can be added to
Of course no modern security package would be complete without a broad range of settings to really lock down your users and remove from them as many privildges as you think you can get away with under the guise of Security.
GWB Homeland Security, proudly sponsored by the 'Land of the Free' Software Foundation *sarcastic cough*
Quicktime is just horrible. Theres a key that starts up its tray icon in my hkeyallusers/.../Run registry key... and part of its plugin for IE restores that key everytime I use my browser. This really annoys me.
;)
In fact just having a brainwave, im going to use Norton to put the little tray icon thingo into quarantine. Take that! HAH!
Ive never really liked Real*... it has that visual bloat that comes with ICQ, Gamespy and other advert laden programs.
As far as DRM goes, there is still nothing stopping me from using VAC (Virtual Audio Cables)... a driver that gives me a few virtual soundcards that act as cables. I can play any content through 'VAC #1 In' and record 'VAC #1 Out' with say CoolEdit Pro streaming plain non-DRM content to disk. Perfect digital copy too.
Unfortunately DRM will always be broken by people that try hard enough... just like the warez scene works. Hardware dongles have bit the dust with dongle emulators, nothing seems to protect data. All DRM does is annoy users with a legitimate reason to access data. Its a big annoying pain in the arse. I habitually crack all my legit games so I dont have to go through the motions of putting in the CD when I want to play them. Its annoying... and doesnt seem to stop illicit use.
Anyway I can allways hear your DRM-Super-Mega-Zero-Alpha-Mp3 music... and sing it back to you (badly, im afraid)... would you like to come and attempt to put a DRM chip in my head? *brandishes axe*
At work last week I was installing some desktop boxen with another tech. CD ejects, and is still spinning in the tray at 48 odd speed. Just seeing this thing spinning and skittering and starting to bounce caused the tech and I to hit the deck fast.
:D
;)
I remember looking up at the confused faces of a couple of users who thought we were nuts until the CD hopped out the tray and shot accross the room at warp speed, severing the plastic christmas tree near the top and embedding itself in the plasterboard wall.
Cue shocked expression on users faces
Pity we didnt have these nice 52 speed drives! The wall it got stuck in was a thin gyprock internal wall to the boss's office. Wouldve gone straight through! The boss, who had just said that the 'funny noises' coming from the drive were no cause for concern and that we couldnt RTM the drive because it would take too long
* Free as in Freedom.
:(
Yes i can say that without ranting like a hippie. The wonder of Linux and the benefit of Linux is that there is so much more to choose from. The less standardised, the more freedom. Sure this makes applications difficult, but now we have a natural evolution... a survival of the fittest and most versatile librarys and APIs.
* Standardised Linux would attract more windows user and bill gates is satan and must die...
Ranting lunatics. Linux has a purpose, and as Free software (as in beer this time)... its performance is NOT MEASURED IN MARKETSHARE. Do not forget this. Linux should allways be for the power user, the tweaker, the guy/girl that cannot stop fiddling with their computer.
New users should be encouraged to fiddle, they should be given VMWare or VirtualPC and a nice easy distro, or they should have a dual boot system set up. Standardisation is only going to piss off the 75% of people that prefer a different standard.
Who really cares what percentage of boxen runs linux? Sure it might attract a better quality of drivers or closed source apps, but to do this by sacrificing the core Freedom values by standardising bits is ridiculous.
And all those that take marketshare as an ego thing, you are a bunch of morons. If popular equated useful we would all be running Windows.
God, reading thru my post im starting to rant like stallman
NWN is very RPGish, and is true DND with a 3D GUI wrapped around this. 'doze people that actually can play this will notice wierd stuff happening when the ruleset actually 'catches up' with what is happening in the GUI. Picture playing true DND with a Diablo client and the server continually correcting what you see, it can be frustrating.
:D
Yes CS is a client and is referred to as such.
But NWN is definitely not a 3D shooter. Think updated Baulders Gate (sp?). Quite a bit of fun really, and nice multiplayer. Bit of a bitch if you play a mage class... you will be forever resting (to be able to cast spells you need to rest for the uninitiated), while the rest of your party rushes off and either kills everything or gets themselves killed