If any of you have some spare dollars or Euros lying around, maybe this article and the fact that you're in a relaxed Friday night mood might convince you to make a tax-deductible donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and help save civil liberties in cyberspace.
Andrew Bunner, the man featured on this Slashdot page, was being prosecuted under California's trade secret laws for redistributing DeCSS. If the EFF hadn't stepped in and stood up for his rights (at no cost to him), he very well might be in jail right now.
So please, consider joining or donating right now. It really does make a big difference.
One thing I promised myself back in college was that if I made any money off my computer knowledge gleaned from the Open-Source and computer-loving communities like Slashdot, Freshmeat, SourceForge, etc., I would donate 1% of my salary to various groups such as the EFF. I have kept my word, and I must tell you that it feels great.
I urge you all to think strongly consider it. Who's watching out for us if we don't all chip in?
Thanks for reading this, friends. It means a lot to me.
/* efdtt.c Author: Charles M. Hannum <root@ihack.net> */ /* */ /* Thanks to Phil Carmody <fatphil@asdf.org> for additional tweaks. */ /* */ /* DVD-logo shaped version by Alex Bowley <alex@hyperspeed.org> */ /* */ /* Usage is: cat title-key scrambled.vob | efdtt >clear.vob */
As neat as some of these inventions are, the logical section of my brain is forced to conclude that this is yet another step in the wrong direction for desktop Linux.
A few years ago, I found an Open-Source project online and just jumped right in. Using the Web interface, IRC, etc., I was able to teach myself proper C++ coding and Linux system software design, which allowed me to realize my dream -- starting my own (Linux) company. Fast forward 12-16 months, and I find myself hounded daily by CFOs, CTOs, and other executives waiting for our bubble to finally bulge into a profitable, hugely influential corporate entity. Unfortunately, it's lack of corporate tie-ins that Microsoft utilizes (abuses?) so frequently which keeps companies like my own down in the basement, while the Microsofts, Nortons, Computer Associates, etc. all help one another and co-sponsor many new projects.
The desktop Linux companies like mine do not network very well. I've had discussions about this with subordinates, but it seems that there are a few issues: 1) Lack of social tact among Linux startups 2) Lack of tie-ins between true GNU/Open-Source/Free Software and the corporate Linux companies such as my own, and 3) Lack of raw capital. While a company like Microsoft has billions at its disposal to pay other companies to develop Windows-only gadgets, startup Linux entities such as my own have little or no pull among hardware vendors. This is readily apparent by reading SourceForge -- roughly 25% of the projects hosted there seem to involve reverse-engineering non-Linux devices. The worst part is that such tactics are usually illegal and can place young hackers in jail just because they wanted to use the Web camera they got for Christmas on their Gentoo/Mandrake machine.
What we need is better alliances, more open communication, and more money (this is capitalism, and unfortunately one thing I've found is that money really does influence people and get things "done" so to speak). Sites like this one (Slashdot) and the OSDNs, Red Hats, and other big players in the Linux market need to support the fledgling companies and give hardware hackers incentive to create new, LINUX-ONLY hardware gadgets that will finally make Linux a viable piece of desktop operating system software for everyday Ma' & Pa' users. The all-to-often heard phrase of "lusers" or "lamers" when referring to people who aren't computer experts is disappointing because with a negative attitude, nothing significant can be accomplished.
So let's keep our heads held high, support one another, and spread the word to both hardware and software vendors about what Linux has to offer -- not only on the server side, which is the only area it's highly popular, but for desktop PC users as well. It may sound silly, but at pep meetings I like to say "Hey guys, remember that we are a TEAM, and Together Everyone Accomplishes More."
Thanks for hearing me out, friends. There are some novel and intriguing ideas proposed above. Let them sink in and don't ever forget it!
69 percent of US adults use the Internet. Sounds good, right? Here's the problem...
Most of these people probably do not use the Internet for something truly worthwhile. By that I claim that instead of doing research or reading various news sources to gain an unbiased perspective on the world around us, people mostly are just forwarding silly emails, chatting mindlessly with their peers, searching for pornography, and downloading crappy quality pirated music files.
The Internet has changed my life. I have a news source for each aspect of life that I must keep up on. I can read the NY Times, Slashdot, live Associated Press feeds, and much more. I don't have to rely on biased news sources (FOX, anyone?) to brainwash me into a Republican prosumer.
I also used the Internet to first teach myself about programming. A few years ago, I found an Open-Source project and just jumped right in. Using the Web interface, IRC, etc., I was able to teach myself proper C++ coding and Linux system software design. I started my own Linux company last year.
What I'm saying is just that I wish people truly knew what they were doing more with respect to computers and the Internet. I fear that 30% of this 69% sample group probably doesn't even know how to use Google to find Web sites, USENET postings, pictures, news articles, etc. That's truly sad.
I don't mean to champion intellectual pursuits too much. I do agree that the Web and Internet as a whole has a lot to offer in the way of social progress, but as I see test scores continue to drop and standards get lowered for our next generation of children, I can't help but wonder if little things like these could be changed to make all of our futures better and brighter.
That being said however, I've read some great reviews of this keyboard, and it stacks up well against the Triton and Yamaha (potential competitors) in terms of features, quality, and price.
Here's my goal for next year: 1) Buy this thing 2) Become a rockstar 3) Get tons of ass 4) ??? 5) Profit!
Let's give a warm welcome to the iPod killer, Slashdotters. SoniqCast was just selected as a finalist in the TechTV "Best of CES" award. This thing is cool as shit -- it's the world's first-ever portable wireless WiFi MP3 player. It won the "Best of CES Portable Audio" award at the 2004 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.
I got to play with one of these, and I can assure you that this thing is totally badass. It automatically and wirelessly moves music from your PC to the player. With iPods, which some feel are overpriced and suffer from poor battery quality, getting music onto your MP3 player involves the following steps:
Get iPod from the car or wherever it's at
Start up iTunes software
Pick your playlists
Dock the iPod
Stand around by your PC for a while
Undock the iPod
Put the iPod back in the car or wherever you want it
With this Aireo gadget, you don't have to do any long process like that. It automatically does content refreshes via wireless. You don't need wires, you can use the built-in FM transmitter in your car to listen to music on your car stereo, and it's all at a very reasonable price for such a cutting-edge piece of technology. My friends at Best Buy say that it will retail for $299.99 and include some great discounts inside the package (free iTunes/Napster downloads, perhaps).
You Linux hackers will be happy, too. Aireo includes an internal hard disk drive. I'm sure it'll only be a couple months before this thing's completely hacked and works flawlessly with Linux, BSD, OS X, and perhaps even Solaris machines.
The model I tried out came with a carrying case, headphones, an AC power cord/charger, USB cable, installation guide, SoniqSync personal preferences play list manager, and owners manual.
I don't work for this company or Best Buy, but I love music and computers, and as such I think this thing is really neat. Imagine the sexual possibilities of playing some Marvin Gaye off my Aireo on my car stereo while I tongue down some chic in the backseat!
Statistics are dangerous in the hands of people who may have a certain agenda to push. For example, saying that filesharing goes up 14% could simply imply that more new computer and/or Internet users have signed online to find previews of their favorite music artists' songs. Also, it's very possible that the way these companies conduct these studies of the popularity of file sharing could simply have changed a bit. If one month they're monitoring seven different filesharing networks for their statistics, and they suddenly add an eighth to the mix, the numbers are obviously going to increase.
We need to stop worrying about these silly RIAA lawsuits and about the ethics of filesharing and simply realize that the current music distribution model is horrible. The CD/album is not popular anymore; artists are fueled by hit singles much more so than hit albums. Things like Apple's iPod/iTunes service, while expensive, are a good first step to delivering media content the way people wish to receive it.
Stop letting the media tell you what to do. If you want to use peer to peer software, use it. There's nothing wrong with sharing songs with friends/associates in my opinion, and it only helps to spread the word about music artists and make them and their merchandise more popular. Sharing file is as natural an act as sexual intercourse between a man and woman/man and a man/woman and a woman, so the days of prosecuting it are definitely numbered, and it'll be as laughable in 20 years time as the article 2 nodes down on the Slashdot front page about VCR taping regulations.
Have fun with life and be responsible, but at the same time don't worry about the evil bit devil at the other end of your cable connection reading your data that flows to and fro your machine. There will soon be better options, and hopefully moves like HP licensing Apple iTunes technology, as well as other things, will make the online movies/music environment better than ever.
I know we'll probably have our share of gay jokes, trolls, and comments about Linux being gay and what have you, but I ask that you avoid making fun of people who had the guts to sit nearly naked in front of hundreds of other guys just so they could do their part to put their fame to a good cause and donate a lot of money to the very worthy Cystic Fibrosis foundations.
I probably wouldn't have had the guts to be able to do something like that, but Linus and those other guys did, and I think we should praise them instead of poking fun at them like Slashdotters do all too often.
I realize this sneak peak represents a nice way to vicariously "visit" another country and examine their tecnology, but I personally encourage my fellow breasthren (Slashdotters) to visit the Middle Eastern regions at least once or twice to see things and experience them in an environment that's richer than any text that Robin can pen in her Linux/Saudi articles. I know that books are a nice tool, but sometimes seeing things in the 1st person can really educated you. As red-blooded Americans, we sometimes get fucked in the ass because our media companies are so intertwined with businesses that it makes it very difficult to get the truth sometimes (remember Election 2000, anyone?). Some Saudis are great, intelligent, kind people who are good friends to me. I'm not saying they're all like that. Many of them are dirty SNs who only want to cause hate and death to other people.
Just remember that what doesn't kill us can only make us stronger. Linux, terrorism, culture, social tiffs, etc. will make us a better, truer, purer race of people. Once we colonize Mars, I sense big things for Americans and even the rest of the world as well. We're all in this together. Thank you, Robin, for a nice set of informative and interesting articles, and for piquing our interests in the Middle East and Linux (the greatest OS in the world, bar none) once again now that things have shifted from Iraq battlefields to the crusties of Mars.
My business faces near ruin. CD sales have dropped through the floor. People aren't buying half as many CDs as they did just a year ago. Revenue is down and costs are up. My store has survived for years, but I now face the prospect of bankruptcy. Every day I ask myself why this is happening.
I bought the store about 12 years ago. It was one of those boutique record stores that sell obscure, independent releases that no-one listens to, not even the people that buy them. I decided that to grow the business I'd need to aim for a different demographic, the family market. My store specialised in family music - stuff that the whole family could listen to. I don't sell sick stuff like Marilyn Manson or cop-killer rap, and I'm proud to have one of the most extensive Christian rock sections that I know of.
The business strategy worked. People flocked to my store, knowing that they (and their children) could safely purchase records without profanity or violent lyrics. Over the years I expanded the business and took on more clean-cut and friendly employees. It took hard work and long hours but I had achieved my dream - owning a profitable business that I had built with my own hands, from the ground up. But now, this dream is turning into a nightmare.
Every day, fewer and fewer customers enter my store to buy fewer and fewer CDs. Why is no one buying CDs? Are people not interested in music? Do people prefer to watch TV, see films, read books? I don't know. But there is one, inescapable truth - Internet piracy is mostly to blame. The statistics speak for themselves - one in three discs world wide is a pirate. On The Internet, you can find and download hundreds of dollars worth of music in just minutes. It has the potential to destroy the music industry, from artists, to record companies to stores like my own. Before you point to the supposed "economic downturn", I'll note that the book store just across from my store is doing great business. Unlike CDs, it's harder to copy books over The Internet.
A week ago, an unpleasant experience with pirates gave me an idea. In my store, I overheard a teenage patron talking to his friend.
"Dude, I'm going to put this CD on the Internet right away."
"Yeah, dude, that's really lete [sic], you'll get lots of respect."
I was fuming. So they were out to destroy the record industry from right under my nose? Fat chance. When they came to the counter to make their purchase, I grabbed the little shit by his shirt. "So...you're going to copy this to your friends over The Internet, punk?" I asked him in my best Clint Eastwood/Dirty Harry voice.
"Uh y-yeh." He mumbled, shocked.
"That's it. What's your name? You're blacklisted. Now take yourself and your little bitch friend out of my store - and don't come back." I barked. Cravenly, they complied and scampered off.
So that's my idea - a national blacklist of pirates. If somebody cannot obey the basic rules of society, then they should be excluded from society. If pirates want to steal from the music industry, then the music industry should exclude them. It's that simple. One strike, and you're out - no reputable record store will allow you to buy another CD. If the pirates can't buy the CDS to begin with, then they won't be able to copy them over The Internet, will they? It's no different to doctors blacklisting drug dealers from buying prescription medicine.
I have just written a letter to the RIAA outlining my proposal. Suing pirates one by one isn't going far enough. Not to mention pirates use the fact that they're being sued to unfairly portray themselves as victims. A national register of pirates would make the problem far easier to deal with. People would be encouraged to give the names of suspected pirates to a hotline, similar to TIPS. Once we know the size of the problem, the police and other law enforcement agencies will be forced to take piracy seriously. They have fought the War on Drugs with skill, so why not the War on Piracy?
I have no qualms whatsoever with censorship. In my opinion, most of the Internet is great and I'm fine with probably 98% of the content.
However, sites like Tubgirl and GoatSex serve no purpose and only have negative connotations on the world.
Sites like the two above should be censored from the Internet, as well as hardcore porn sites and sites that promote child endangerment, software piracy, and violence.
If you are in favor of sites that expose children in erotic sex acts or that promote killing people, you are the one with the problem, not me.
Entertainment these days consists of either: A) Making fun of another person, ethnic group, or sexual group, or B) Humiliating one's self thru reality television shows
The music industry is slowly dying, so I suspect we'll only have TV and movies 5 yrs from now. Radio/records will be long gone.
Intuit _does_ in fact work on Macs if you buy the right version (it's the white box with steel gray graphics, not the blue/green Windows retail package). Anyway, you can also play the.mov files you're familiar with on your DVD drive (little known fact, but I tried it out)!
I discovered when I dug beneath the hood that the Sorensen codec used in most conventional Quicktime encodings is actually MPEG2 frames in little-endian rather than big-endian format. Each frame is stamped with a SRSN watermark in an unused (and irrelevant for our purposes) portion of the field and run through Diffie-Hellman encoding which is lossless and while a good deal slower than MPEG4 on playback offers better quality and is the reason the movie studios tend to choose Quicktime over other video formats for their trailers.
Not entirely coincidentally, MPEG2 is what is used on DVDs, and I have discovered that it is possible to jerry-rig a decent VCD out of a.mov file with tools that are available for free provided you know what you're doing. I don't guarantee the following, but it worked for me after a period of trial and error.
As usual, don't forget PGP to encode/sign and decode/verify your media files. If you need help on getting started, check the links below at the end of this comment.
Hopefully you'll think it was worth the effort. Naturally, your DVD player will have to be able to handle VCDs for this to have any point, but irregardless it's almost a guarantee that the second or third Matrix DVD is going to have all of Animatrix as extras anyway if you don't mind the wait. But I thought I'd share this technique with you anyway because of the coolness factor.:)
Here are some more links to help you out on your endeavor:
This is one of the many reasons I've always stuck with Windows when it comes to choosing an operating system for my machines.
I try not to get all "religious" when it comes to software. Sure, I code for a living, but I realize that these days most programs are good, if not great, quality pieces of software. There are so few programming jobs left that practically everyone still getting paid to code is really, really, _really_ good at it.
Therefore, I just have stuck with Windows rather than BSD, OS X, or Linux. I have Windows Two Thousand, which I must say is 2000 times better than 98 SE was;-)
Anyway, it's time like these that I come to realize it's good that Windows has such a broad, class-spawning user base. We can have class action lawsuits with millions of people because there are so many Windows out there. We have a louder voice, if you will, against any large grievous software companies out there who write backdoor holes and product activation viruses.
I'm not saying it's best for you. In fact, it probably isn't as you all seem to be better coders than me. But deep down I feel Windows is fine for me and I'll keep using it until they go bankrupt or a really, really better product comes along that I have to switch to.
But until then, I'm sorry to say to you that I won't be switching to Linux. Maybe back in 2000 when the markets were hot on Linux, but these days, talking about Linux is like talking about the grandfather who commmitted suicide at the thanksgiving table -- it's just not something you should do.
I thought it was something that _I_ personally did wrong until I started searching Google trying to find out what I did wrong before installing the software. Did I mess up permissions some where? Did I forget to "su root" before running the scripts? Where was the error?
Well, then I found a blog that said "Likely the biggest problem users have expressed, is the level at which the TurboTax licensing agreement is managed and protected with the SafeCast/C-Dilla technology. People believe C-Dilla infiltrates their system in a very insidious manner, and uses memory and resources even when TurboTax is not loaded. And some believe it has caused them serious compatibility problems with non-related CD writing operations. (PC Magazine and ExtremeTech will be conducting some tests next week to see if we can duplicate some of these problems). Intuit and Macrovision have provided only cursory information regarding C-Dilla operations. Understandably, Intuit does not want to expose significant details. But if the scheme is mathematically and technically sound, there really is no reason why ALL the details should not be known, as it would likely not be computationally feasible to crack in a reasonable timeframe, even if one is armed with full knowledge of how it works. Unless Intuit and Macrovision provide this level of information, many people will still not trust you."
It's not that product activation is bad all of the time, it's just that the implementation really sucks on occasion.
I have no problem with paying for good, reliable, quality software for my home machine, but if you use tricks or traps to sucker people into paying more than they should, that's just not right.
SOFTWARE MAKERS: Don't cry foul about piracy and then turn around and be just as dishonest with consumers.
Well, I guess this is a reason to go back to pirating my games;-)
I mean, Christ, you're worse than those people at the peace rallies. I showed up to discuss politics and world events with rational intelligent people. Instead, there were like 2 or 3 socialist scumbags who didn't know the different between the White House and White Castle, and they were spewing forth such idiocy thru their megaphones that I just left. I was disgraced.
You wanna know why there's no peace? Because the stupidest of the stupid always seem to get the microphone.
Anyone else think these kinds of games are partly the reason why we're going to invade Iraq, North Korea, and various African countries once we're done there?
Violence breed violence and encourages hate. Why do we love to hate?
But I just don't see why every bloody patent is seen as evil on Slashdot. I agree wholeheartedly that the patent system has gotten out of control. I just don't think every single cotton-pickin' patent is evil.
In a lot of cases, businesses need patents to exist. Hey people, they need to profit ya know. For example, what would happen if Microsoft figured out how to implement Google's page rank system (which could be done via academic papers!) and implemented it on MSN? Google would have no recourse and Microsoft has approximately 80 quntillion times the resources of Google and could easily out market them.
And by the way, you trolls... the difference between patents and RFCs is that with RFCs, there's no expectations of profit. They're made in cases where the greater societal benefit outweighs potential profits as in capitalism and other successful societal systems. Many RFCs and IEEE standards are based on corporate IP anyway, especially ones dealing with network protocols. Token Ring, FDDI, and Ethernet were all proprietary standards back in the day...
Put that in your hat. Think 2x before you dis people.
Slashdot Mirror
We should get rid of them immediately and stop championing these hacks/mods.
They care about profits, not people.
They care about profits, not privacy.
Wal*Mart is evil, and you should avoid their stores like the plague. Use local grocery stores and department stores whenever possible.
If any of you have some spare dollars or Euros lying around, maybe this article and the fact that you're in a relaxed Friday night mood might convince you to make a tax-deductible donation to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and help save civil liberties in cyberspace.
Andrew Bunner, the man featured on this Slashdot page, was being prosecuted under California's trade secret laws for redistributing DeCSS. If the EFF hadn't stepped in and stood up for his rights (at no cost to him), he very well might be in jail right now.
So please, consider joining or donating right now. It really does make a big difference.
One thing I promised myself back in college was that if I made any money off my computer knowledge gleaned from the Open-Source and computer-loving communities like Slashdot, Freshmeat, SourceForge, etc., I would donate 1% of my salary to various groups such as the EFF. I have kept my word, and I must tell you that it feels great.
I urge you all to think strongly consider it. Who's watching out for us if we don't all chip in?
Thanks for reading this, friends. It means a lot to me.
/* efdtt.c Author: Charles M. Hannum <root@ihack.net> */
,y,s[2048];main( ,n=2048 ,s,n) )if(s /16%4 ==1 ){int /2^j&1
;}}
/* */
/* Thanks to Phil Carmody <fatphil@asdf.org> for additional tweaks. */
/* */
/* DVD-logo shaped version by Alex Bowley <alex@hyperspeed.org> */
/* */
/* Usage is: cat title-key scrambled.vob | efdtt >clear.vob */
#define m(i)(x[i]^s[i+84])<<
unsigned char x[5]
n){for( read(0,x,5 );read(0,s
); write(1
[y=s [13]%8+20]
i=m( 1)17 ^256 +m(0) 8,k =m(2)
0,j= m(4) 17^ m(3) 9^k* 2-k%8
^8,a =0,c =26;for (s[y] -=16;
--c;j *=2)a= a*2^i& 1,i=i
<<24;for(j= 127; ++j<n;c=c>
y)
c
+=y=i^i/8^i>>4^i>>12,
i=i>>8^y<<17,a^=a>>14,y=a^a*8^a<<6,a=a
&nbs p; >>8^y<<9,k=s[j],k ="7Wo~'G_\216"[k
&7]+2^"cr3sfw6v;*k+>/n."[k>>4]*2^k*257/
  ; 8,s[j]=k^(k&k*2&34)*6^c+~y
... for engineering/law majors, you insensitive clod!!!
(Seriously, I hardly got more than 4 hours a night, which I doubt is enough time to let your brain sort out, store, and "solve" these problems!)
As neat as some of these inventions are, the logical section of my brain is forced to conclude that this is yet another step in the wrong direction for desktop Linux.
A few years ago, I found an Open-Source project online and just jumped right in. Using the Web interface, IRC, etc., I was able to teach myself proper C++ coding and Linux system software design, which allowed me to realize my dream -- starting my own (Linux) company. Fast forward 12-16 months, and I find myself hounded daily by CFOs, CTOs, and other executives waiting for our bubble to finally bulge into a profitable, hugely influential corporate entity. Unfortunately, it's lack of corporate tie-ins that Microsoft utilizes (abuses?) so frequently which keeps companies like my own down in the basement, while the Microsofts, Nortons, Computer Associates, etc. all help one another and co-sponsor many new projects.
The desktop Linux companies like mine do not network very well. I've had discussions about this with subordinates, but it seems that there are a few issues: 1) Lack of social tact among Linux startups 2) Lack of tie-ins between true GNU/Open-Source/Free Software and the corporate Linux companies such as my own, and 3) Lack of raw capital. While a company like Microsoft has billions at its disposal to pay other companies to develop Windows-only gadgets, startup Linux entities such as my own have little or no pull among hardware vendors. This is readily apparent by reading SourceForge -- roughly 25% of the projects hosted there seem to involve reverse-engineering non-Linux devices. The worst part is that such tactics are usually illegal and can place young hackers in jail just because they wanted to use the Web camera they got for Christmas on their Gentoo/Mandrake machine.
What we need is better alliances, more open communication, and more money (this is capitalism, and unfortunately one thing I've found is that money really does influence people and get things "done" so to speak). Sites like this one (Slashdot) and the OSDNs, Red Hats, and other big players in the Linux market need to support the fledgling companies and give hardware hackers incentive to create new, LINUX-ONLY hardware gadgets that will finally make Linux a viable piece of desktop operating system software for everyday Ma' & Pa' users. The all-to-often heard phrase of "lusers" or "lamers" when referring to people who aren't computer experts is disappointing because with a negative attitude, nothing significant can be accomplished.
So let's keep our heads held high, support one another, and spread the word to both hardware and software vendors about what Linux has to offer -- not only on the server side, which is the only area it's highly popular, but for desktop PC users as well. It may sound silly, but at pep meetings I like to say "Hey guys, remember that we are a TEAM, and Together Everyone Accomplishes More."
Thanks for hearing me out, friends. There are some novel and intriguing ideas proposed above. Let them sink in and don't ever forget it!
69 percent of US adults use the Internet. Sounds good, right? Here's the problem...
Most of these people probably do not use the Internet for something truly worthwhile. By that I claim that instead of doing research or reading various news sources to gain an unbiased perspective on the world around us, people mostly are just forwarding silly emails, chatting mindlessly with their peers, searching for pornography, and downloading crappy quality pirated music files.
The Internet has changed my life. I have a news source for each aspect of life that I must keep up on. I can read the NY Times, Slashdot, live Associated Press feeds, and much more. I don't have to rely on biased news sources (FOX, anyone?) to brainwash me into a Republican prosumer.
I also used the Internet to first teach myself about programming. A few years ago, I found an Open-Source project and just jumped right in. Using the Web interface, IRC, etc., I was able to teach myself proper C++ coding and Linux system software design. I started my own Linux company last year.
What I'm saying is just that I wish people truly knew what they were doing more with respect to computers and the Internet. I fear that 30% of this 69% sample group probably doesn't even know how to use Google to find Web sites, USENET postings, pictures, news articles, etc. That's truly sad.
I don't mean to champion intellectual pursuits too much. I do agree that the Web and Internet as a whole has a lot to offer in the way of social progress, but as I see test scores continue to drop and standards get lowered for our next generation of children, I can't help but wonder if little things like these could be changed to make all of our futures better and brighter.
Thanks for reading, friend.
The only problem with this kind of high-end equipment is that traditional capitalistic methods cannot bring prices down through competition.
The only North American dealer is http://www.coastrecording.com/. In Europe, your only choice is probably http://www.electricsound.com/.
That being said however, I've read some great reviews of this keyboard, and it stacks up well against the Triton and Yamaha (potential competitors) in terms of features, quality, and price.
Here's my goal for next year:
1) Buy this thing
2) Become a rockstar
3) Get tons of ass
4) ???
5) Profit!
Let's give a warm welcome to the iPod killer, Slashdotters. SoniqCast was just selected as a finalist in the TechTV "Best of CES" award. This thing is cool as shit -- it's the world's first-ever portable wireless WiFi MP3 player. It won the "Best of CES Portable Audio" award at the 2004 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.
I got to play with one of these, and I can assure you that this thing is totally badass. It automatically and wirelessly moves music from your PC to the player. With iPods, which some feel are overpriced and suffer from poor battery quality, getting music onto your MP3 player involves the following steps:
Get iPod from the car or wherever it's at
Start up iTunes software
Pick your playlists
Dock the iPod
Stand around by your PC for a while
Undock the iPod
Put the iPod back in the car or wherever you want it
With this Aireo gadget, you don't have to do any long process like that. It automatically does content refreshes via wireless. You don't need wires, you can use the built-in FM transmitter in your car to listen to music on your car stereo, and it's all at a very reasonable price for such a cutting-edge piece of technology. My friends at Best Buy say that it will retail for $299.99 and include some great discounts inside the package (free iTunes/Napster downloads, perhaps).
You Linux hackers will be happy, too. Aireo includes an internal hard disk drive. I'm sure it'll only be a couple months before this thing's completely hacked and works flawlessly with Linux, BSD, OS X, and perhaps even Solaris machines.
The model I tried out came with a carrying case, headphones, an AC power cord/charger, USB cable, installation guide, SoniqSync personal preferences play list manager, and owners manual.
I don't work for this company or Best Buy, but I love music and computers, and as such I think this thing is really neat. Imagine the sexual possibilities of playing some Marvin Gaye off my Aireo on my car stereo while I tongue down some chic in the backseat!
Statistics are dangerous in the hands of people who may have a certain agenda to push. For example, saying that filesharing goes up 14% could simply imply that more new computer and/or Internet users have signed online to find previews of their favorite music artists' songs. Also, it's very possible that the way these companies conduct these studies of the popularity of file sharing could simply have changed a bit. If one month they're monitoring seven different filesharing networks for their statistics, and they suddenly add an eighth to the mix, the numbers are obviously going to increase.
We need to stop worrying about these silly RIAA lawsuits and about the ethics of filesharing and simply realize that the current music distribution model is horrible. The CD/album is not popular anymore; artists are fueled by hit singles much more so than hit albums. Things like Apple's iPod/iTunes service, while expensive, are a good first step to delivering media content the way people wish to receive it.
Stop letting the media tell you what to do. If you want to use peer to peer software, use it. There's nothing wrong with sharing songs with friends/associates in my opinion, and it only helps to spread the word about music artists and make them and their merchandise more popular. Sharing file is as natural an act as sexual intercourse between a man and woman/man and a man/woman and a woman, so the days of prosecuting it are definitely numbered, and it'll be as laughable in 20 years time as the article 2 nodes down on the Slashdot front page about VCR taping regulations.
Have fun with life and be responsible, but at the same time don't worry about the evil bit devil at the other end of your cable connection reading your data that flows to and fro your machine. There will soon be better options, and hopefully moves like HP licensing Apple iTunes technology, as well as other things, will make the online movies/music environment better than ever.
I know we'll probably have our share of gay jokes, trolls, and comments about Linux being gay and what have you, but I ask that you avoid making fun of people who had the guts to sit nearly naked in front of hundreds of other guys just so they could do their part to put their fame to a good cause and donate a lot of money to the very worthy Cystic Fibrosis foundations.
I probably wouldn't have had the guts to be able to do something like that, but Linus and those other guys did, and I think we should praise them instead of poking fun at them like Slashdotters do all too often.
Thanks, Linus, for continuing to be a leader.
I realize this sneak peak represents a nice way to vicariously "visit" another country and examine their tecnology, but I personally encourage my fellow breasthren (Slashdotters) to visit the Middle Eastern regions at least once or twice to see things and experience them in an environment that's richer than any text that Robin can pen in her Linux/Saudi articles. I know that books are a nice tool, but sometimes seeing things in the 1st person can really educated you. As red-blooded Americans, we sometimes get fucked in the ass because our media companies are so intertwined with businesses that it makes it very difficult to get the truth sometimes (remember Election 2000, anyone?). Some Saudis are great, intelligent, kind people who are good friends to me. I'm not saying they're all like that. Many of them are dirty SNs who only want to cause hate and death to other people.
Just remember that what doesn't kill us can only make us stronger. Linux, terrorism, culture, social tiffs, etc. will make us a better, truer, purer race of people. Once we colonize Mars, I sense big things for Americans and even the rest of the world as well. We're all in this together. Thank you, Robin, for a nice set of informative and interesting articles, and for piquing our interests in the Middle East and Linux (the greatest OS in the world, bar none) once again now that things have shifted from Iraq battlefields to the crusties of Mars.
"Europe collectively has just extended their arms and given SCO the middle finger! It's a beautiful sight, Charley."
My business faces near ruin. CD sales have dropped through the floor. People aren't buying half as many CDs as they did just a year ago. Revenue is down and costs are up. My store has survived for years, but I now face the prospect of bankruptcy. Every day I ask myself why this is happening.
I bought the store about 12 years ago. It was one of those boutique record stores that sell obscure, independent releases that no-one listens to, not even the people that buy them. I decided that to grow the business I'd need to aim for a different demographic, the family market. My store specialised in family music - stuff that the whole family could listen to. I don't sell sick stuff like Marilyn Manson or cop-killer rap, and I'm proud to have one of the most extensive Christian rock sections that I know of.
The business strategy worked. People flocked to my store, knowing that they (and their children) could safely purchase records without profanity or violent lyrics. Over the years I expanded the business and took on more clean-cut and friendly employees. It took hard work and long hours but I had achieved my dream - owning a profitable business that I had built with my own hands, from the ground up. But now, this dream is turning into a nightmare.
Every day, fewer and fewer customers enter my store to buy fewer and fewer CDs. Why is no one buying CDs? Are people not interested in music? Do people prefer to watch TV, see films, read books? I don't know. But there is one, inescapable truth - Internet piracy is mostly to blame. The statistics speak for themselves - one in three discs world wide is a pirate. On The Internet, you can find and download hundreds of dollars worth of music in just minutes. It has the potential to destroy the music industry, from artists, to record companies to stores like my own. Before you point to the supposed "economic downturn", I'll note that the book store just across from my store is doing great business. Unlike CDs, it's harder to copy books over The Internet.
A week ago, an unpleasant experience with pirates gave me an idea. In my store, I overheard a teenage patron talking to his friend.
"Dude, I'm going to put this CD on the Internet right away."
"Yeah, dude, that's really lete [sic], you'll get lots of respect."
I was fuming. So they were out to destroy the record industry from right under my nose? Fat chance. When they came to the counter to make their purchase, I grabbed the little shit by his shirt. "So...you're going to copy this to your friends over The Internet, punk?" I asked him in my best Clint Eastwood/Dirty Harry voice.
"Uh y-yeh." He mumbled, shocked.
"That's it. What's your name? You're blacklisted. Now take yourself and your little bitch friend out of my store - and don't come back." I barked. Cravenly, they complied and scampered off.
So that's my idea - a national blacklist of pirates. If somebody cannot obey the basic rules of society, then they should be excluded from society. If pirates want to steal from the music industry, then the music industry should exclude them. It's that simple. One strike, and you're out - no reputable record store will allow you to buy another CD. If the pirates can't buy the CDS to begin with, then they won't be able to copy them over The Internet, will they? It's no different to doctors blacklisting drug dealers from buying prescription medicine.
I have just written a letter to the RIAA outlining my proposal. Suing pirates one by one isn't going far enough. Not to mention pirates use the fact that they're being sued to unfairly portray themselves as victims. A national register of pirates would make the problem far easier to deal with. People would be encouraged to give the names of suspected pirates to a hotline, similar to TIPS. Once we know the size of the problem, the police and other law enforcement agencies will be forced to take piracy seriously. They have fought the War on Drugs with skill, so why not the War on Piracy?
This evening, my daught
I have no qualms whatsoever with censorship. In my opinion, most of the Internet is great and I'm fine with probably 98% of the content.
However, sites like Tubgirl and GoatSex serve no purpose and only have negative connotations on the world.
Sites like the two above should be censored from the Internet, as well as hardcore porn sites and sites that promote child endangerment, software piracy, and violence.
If you are in favor of sites that expose children in erotic sex acts or that promote killing people, you are the one with the problem, not me.
Entertainment these days consists of either:
A) Making fun of another person, ethnic group, or sexual group, or
B) Humiliating one's self thru reality television shows
The music industry is slowly dying, so I suspect we'll only have TV and movies 5 yrs from now. Radio/records will be long gone.
I discovered when I dug beneath the hood that the Sorensen codec used in most conventional Quicktime encodings is actually MPEG2 frames in little-endian rather than big-endian format. Each frame is stamped with a SRSN watermark in an unused (and irrelevant for our purposes) portion of the field and run through Diffie-Hellman encoding which is lossless and while a good deal slower than MPEG4 on playback offers better quality and is the reason the movie studios tend to choose Quicktime over other video formats for their trailers.
Not entirely coincidentally, MPEG2 is what is used on DVDs, and I have discovered that it is possible to jerry-rig a decent VCD out of a
As usual, don't forget PGP to encode/sign and decode/verify your media files. If you need help on getting started, check the links below at the end of this comment.
Hopefully you'll think it was worth the effort. Naturally, your DVD player will have to be able to handle VCDs for this to have any point, but irregardless it's almost a guarantee that the second or third Matrix DVD is going to have all of Animatrix as extras anyway if you don't mind the wait. But I thought I'd share this technique with you anyway because of the coolness factor.
Here are some more links to help you out on your endeavor:
mpeg2-movie
Ogg Vorbis Quicktime component (for high quality sound ;)
OpenQuicktime
GNU VCDImager
PGP extensions
A little geek duct tape ;)
This is one of the many reasons I've always stuck with Windows when it comes to choosing an operating system for my machines.
;-)
I try not to get all "religious" when it comes to software. Sure, I code for a living, but I realize that these days most programs are good, if not great, quality pieces of software. There are so few programming jobs left that practically everyone still getting paid to code is really, really, _really_ good at it.
Therefore, I just have stuck with Windows rather than BSD, OS X, or Linux. I have Windows Two Thousand, which I must say is 2000 times better than 98 SE was
Anyway, it's time like these that I come to realize it's good that Windows has such a broad, class-spawning user base. We can have class action lawsuits with millions of people because there are so many Windows out there. We have a louder voice, if you will, against any large grievous software companies out there who write backdoor holes and product activation viruses.
I'm not saying it's best for you. In fact, it probably isn't as you all seem to be better coders than me. But deep down I feel Windows is fine for me and I'll keep using it until they go bankrupt or a really, really better product comes along that I have to switch to.
But until then, I'm sorry to say to you that I won't be switching to Linux. Maybe back in 2000 when the markets were hot on Linux, but these days, talking about Linux is like talking about the grandfather who commmitted suicide at the thanksgiving table -- it's just not something you should do.
It's true. I should know, it happened to me.
I thought it was something that _I_ personally did wrong until I started searching Google trying to find out what I did wrong before installing the software. Did I mess up permissions some where? Did I forget to "su root" before running the scripts? Where was the error?
Well, then I found a blog that said "Likely the biggest problem users have expressed, is the level at which the TurboTax licensing agreement is managed and protected with the SafeCast/C-Dilla technology. People believe C-Dilla infiltrates their system in a very insidious manner, and uses memory and resources even when TurboTax is not loaded. And some believe it has caused them serious compatibility problems with non-related CD writing operations. (PC Magazine and ExtremeTech will be conducting some tests next week to see if we can duplicate some of these problems).
Intuit and Macrovision have provided only cursory information regarding C-Dilla operations. Understandably, Intuit does not want to expose significant details. But if the scheme is mathematically and technically sound, there really is no reason why ALL the details should not be known, as it would likely not be computationally feasible to crack in a reasonable timeframe, even if one is armed with full knowledge of how it works. Unless Intuit and Macrovision provide this level of information, many people will still not trust you."
It's not that product activation is bad all of the time, it's just that the implementation really sucks on occasion.
;-)
I have no problem with paying for good, reliable, quality software for my home machine, but if you use tricks or traps to sucker people into paying more than they should, that's just not right.
SOFTWARE MAKERS: Don't cry foul about piracy and then turn around and be just as dishonest with consumers.
Well, I guess this is a reason to go back to pirating my games
Do you really believe the stuff you write?
I mean, Christ, you're worse than those people at the peace rallies. I showed up to discuss politics and world events with rational intelligent people. Instead, there were like 2 or 3 socialist scumbags who didn't know the different between the White House and White Castle, and they were spewing forth such idiocy thru their megaphones that I just left. I was disgraced.
You wanna know why there's no peace? Because the stupidest of the stupid always seem to get the microphone.
Anyone else think these kinds of games are partly the reason why we're going to invade Iraq, North Korea, and various African countries once we're done there?
Violence breed violence and encourages hate. Why do we love to hate?
Why patents suck: http://lpf.ai.mit.edu/Images/chess-flyer-crop-thum bnail.jpg
You can get sued for writing a program like the one above. It's 3 lines of code. No, really guys. It's 3 friggin' lines of code.
Look at it! It's a patent on the fucking EXCLUSIVE OR operation that's standard in every microchip ever made since the 1950s.
THAT, my friends, is why I don't trust patents. You never know how they can be extended.
PLUS they're a large gov't organization that's slow and stagnant. Let the people innovate!
I'd write more but I want to go look at the pig floating outside my window...
;-)
Wait, a Slashbot making some lame end-of-world joke involving flying pigs or frozen devils?
Surely you jest!
But I just don't see why every bloody patent is seen as evil on Slashdot. I agree wholeheartedly that the patent system has gotten out of control. I just don't think every single cotton-pickin' patent is evil.
In a lot of cases, businesses need patents to exist. Hey people, they need to profit ya know. For example, what would happen if Microsoft figured out how to implement Google's page rank system (which could be done via academic papers!) and implemented it on MSN? Google would have no recourse and Microsoft has approximately 80 quntillion times the resources of Google and could easily out market them.
And by the way, you trolls... the difference between patents and RFCs is that with RFCs, there's no expectations of profit. They're made in cases where the greater societal benefit outweighs potential profits as in capitalism and other successful societal systems. Many RFCs and IEEE standards are based on corporate IP anyway, especially ones dealing with network protocols. Token Ring, FDDI, and Ethernet were all proprietary standards back in the day...
Put that in your hat. Think 2x before you dis people.