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User: solostring

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Comments · 37

  1. This is a joke right? on Amazon Scores Another Patent · · Score: 2, Redundant

    How can something as trivial as this become a patent?

  2. You don't need the RIAA in todays world on A Music Industry Case Study · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I've heard so many real-life stories like this, where record company execs get rich off of someone else's talents, and the artists themselves get very little. Most signed artists that I know end up owing money to the record companies (unbelievable but true)

    I'm not a signed musician, yet last year, I made about $12,000 from my music. Whilst this was by no means a good salary, it is certainly more than any non-gigging musician that I know. The vast majority of that money was from selling homemade CD's directly to the public.

    You don't need the RIAA in this day and age. With the power of the internet/mp3's & (god forbid) paypal, who needs a coccaine addicted suit to take the food from your mouth?

  3. I've never heard of this system!!! on Cashless Society · · Score: 1

    I live in France (Paris), and I have never heard of this system before, I have not noticed any advertising about this, and I don't know anyone who actually uses it...

    Considering most places accept Carte Bleu (credit cards) for purchases 8Euros and above and most people carry a few euros in their pockets, I can't really see this taking off.

  4. If it were not for mp3's and the internet..... on Don't Sever A High-Tech Lifeline for Musicians · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If it were not for mp3's and the internet I would have really starved last year, and certainly would not have gotten as far with my musical project as I have.

    In 2002, I received about $4000 in paypal donations from complete strangers who happened to stumble across my site. Whilst this was in no means a real salary, it kept the wolves from my door and the taxman fed.

    It sickens me that the RIAA and the greedy fat record executives are trying to prevent anyone who does not produce 'commercial music' a chance to live off of their talents....

  5. GNN - New axis of evil? on S-11 Redux: (Channel) Surfing the Apocalypse · · Score: 2

    That was an incredibly biting and funny piece of political satire! I've been a fan of GNN for a while, ever since they re-released their 'Real War' video.

    I wonder how long it will take for GNN to be classed amongst the 'Axis of Evil' :)

  6. This is nothing new (flash banners) on Next-Gen Pop-up Ads · · Score: 2

    I remember about a year or so ago, there was a banner on one site which when the mouse rolled over it, it popped up another window as though I had clicked it. This confused me, as like I said, JS was definitely off. It turned out to be a flash banner.

  7. What the hell? on AOL Awarded Millions in Spam Case · · Score: 3, Insightful

    No offence, but this is becoming a joke. How many dupes a week/day/hour are we up to nowadays? If the 'powers that be' don't even bother reading their own site, then why the hell don't they pass their mod status to someone who cares.

  8. This is not a unique happening.... on eBay Customers Targetted by Credit Card Scam · · Score: 4, Informative

    If you check out the safeharbour forums on Ebay, this is not a rare occurance. There are many scam sites and spam emails which try to socially engineer credit card info and passwords from Ebay users.

    I really don't know why this particular instance was picked up by the big news corporations....

  9. Also available on DivX on Psst! Eight Bits Gets You "The Two Towers" In China · · Score: 2

    I did a scan just out of curiosity on a couple of underground P2P networks, and low and behold, Two towers was available. (No I'm not going to tell you where I found it, but I suspect that most P2P apps will be sharing it soon, if not already)

    I resisted the temptation to hit 'download', as I to would love to see this first on a large screen, with state of the art dolby digital sound. I agree - It's all about the experience, suspense, hype... Watching the movie first on a 15" laptop screen with poorly coded audio and video would destroy the whole buzz for me...

  10. Re:glad he spent 5 minutes on William Shatner Replies · · Score: 2

    You mean he's that slow at typing?

  11. Spyware? on Economic Predictions Using Web Usage Data · · Score: 2

    The company gains access to people's Internet travelogues by giving them free security software...

    This makes me laugh so much. They give you 'free security software' to prevent your computer and privacy from being compromised in exchange for compromising your privacy.... The paradox is incredible :)

  12. And I bet I know where the money is *NOT* going to on Danish Anti-Piracy Organization Bills P2P Users · · Score: 2

    ......the artists of the pirated material. Its amazing - another greedy bastard has found a way to make ridiculous money off of someone elses work.

  13. This is great news :) on Bringing Back the PDP8 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I fondly remember the PDP8. My father had one installed in the garage when I was a kid, and had my first experience of programming on it when I was 8 or so.

    On the subject of PDP8's, I was surprised to hear that they were used in communications in Hong Kong up until at least 1999 for a number of financial institutions. I worked with an old computer technician who earned a fortune maintaining these beasts. I wonder if they are still being used in HK after the Chinese reclaimation?.....

  14. Hhhmmm on University of Twente NOC Fire Arson · · Score: 4, Funny

    They obviously didn't have enough firewalls.

    (Sorry... couldnt resist)

  15. What about theft from me? on Only Thieves Block Pop-Ups · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I've never worked out how much bandwidth popup ads have sucked out of me over the years, but until recently, I had to pay for 'x' amount of MB's over my monthly limit (crap monopolistic ISP).

    The people that block popup ads are the same people who would *NEVER* click on a popup ad and purchase something, so I'm sorry, but I can't really see what their problem is. Surely we are saving THEM bandwidth?

  16. A script kiddies dream! on The Internet: Your Next Remote Control · · Score: 1

    Just imagine the damage that a hacker could do your house :)

  17. I don't care how silly it looks.... on Segway HT Starts Selling · · Score: 3, Interesting

    .... I WANT ONE! :)

    It will be interesting to see how popular this will become over the next few years (and subsequent price drops). Remember when push-scooters first started to become fashionable? People looked on at the owners, and thought "What a ridiculous concept".... Switch to today, and there are many businessmen using this mode of transport to get around the city (at least in Paris).

    Do you think that the same will happen to the Segway?.... Time will tell....

  18. Re:So let me get this straight... on Fewer Employees + Same Work = Higher Productivity · · Score: 1

    Yes :)

    Sanity has its own rewards, far beyond fiscal benefits :)

  19. Is this really frontpage news? on Microsoft Loses $177m on Xbox in Three Months · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Is this really frontpage news?

    After all, M$ has repeatedly said that it is expecting to lose $2billion over the next few years, and has had to drop the prices od the unit a couple of times since its launch to shift the units. Plus, with the extra costs of constantly remodifiying the boxes to stop the Xbox-linux crowd etc. etc.

    Microsoft has taken a big gamble by putting the amount of money that it has into the Xbox, and hopes that its unit will the THE home entertainment system of the future. It is common knowledge that they are banking on losing money selling the units to recoup their losses with the sales of games, but with the recent winning battles by the Xbox-Linux crowd, and M$ losing every 'closed box DRM encryption' battle so far, maybe its a gamble that will seriously cripple the company in the future....

    Its going to be interesting to see how this turns out :)

  20. In my last job.... on Fewer Employees + Same Work = Higher Productivity · · Score: 1

    I was initially employed at my previous job to handle static html pages and look after customer support for a 100k userbase.

    However, after a series of layoffs when the dotcom goldrush era ended, I had to take on the added responsibilities of server administration, database administration, development of java/jsp administrative and back-office apps, software development and internal network maintenance.

    Needless to say, the workload was incredible, and I cracked under the strain. Being threatened with 'The company will collapse if you don't do the tasks, and you will be out of a job' can only produce so much workflow, and there are only so many hours in a day.

    I'm glad that I left that company, and the world of IT for good. I know so many people who work continuously under the same pressure as I did.

    One thing that seems to be always the case, is that when there are layoffs, it is the techies who are the hardest hit percentage wise. They seem to be laid off in preference to the bloated managers/directors who in retrospect, do/did fuck all.

  21. mars.raketti.net on Trojan Found in libpcap and tcpdump · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The program connects to 212.146.0.34 (mars.raketti.net) on port 1963

    With that information, I suppose that it is easy to find out which Finnish 'author' included the trojan, and would be simple to track him down. But my question is how something like this could have been included in an open source code and released to the general public?

  22. But.... on Go Stand By the Stairs, So I Can Protect You · · Score: 1

    ...is Grandma protected?

  23. And what about Minitel (France) on Chocolatier Fights PanIP Uber-Commerce Patent · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Minitel has been around in France since 1980 (or was it before?), and had online booking/ordering facilities.... If anything is prior art, then this surely is....

  24. Shared download class on Examples of Programming Gone Wrong? · · Score: 5, Funny

    I used to work for a 1999/2000 'golden child' dot-bomb which dealt in file trading... a proposed legal form of napster. It was a fucked company from the start, but it still had a lot of traffic in the early days.

    We always had problems with downloading files from the site.... the files kept getting corrupted, and occasionaly, a member would complain that they tried to download a powerpoint presentation and ended up getting 4 way anal porn.

    This perplexed the developers, and it was not until 9 months after going online with the site, did they realise that the java class that dealt with the downloads was a single process shared by all users! :)

    So, your download would go ok IF nobody else tried to download at the same time. If two people clicked download at about the same time, you would download the file that the second person wished to download.

    No wonder they went bankrupt :)

  25. Using this as a hacking tool on Pushback against DDOS Attacks · · Score: 1

    How would this deal against spoofed ip's?

    The script kiddy would just have to send spoofed ip packets to the server with Pushback installed with an ip address of a server they want to hack. Spread this out over a number of large number compromised zombie machines, against a large number of high-bandwidthed Pushback servers, and know that their actual target is being DDOS'd by Amazon, Yahoo, Microsoft etc. etc. etc.