First Report from Grokker Inside Hearing: IBM Wins Both Motions to Compel
Friday, December 05 2003 @ 02:30 PM EST
Our first report from a Groklaw volunteer, sam, who attended the court hearing is that IBM won both of its motions to compel and SCO's motion was set for a later date. Here is what sam is telling us, and it's subject to further information and confirmation as more news arrives. We have several attending and I'll do a followup, but this is the first word. Here is what sam is telling us:
"Just returned from the hearing.
"Needless to say there was blood all over the floor on the SCO side of the aisle none on the 'left' side.
"Judge granted both IBM motions to compel, gave SCO thirty days to comply 'with specificity' and suspended further discovery. Did not rule on the SCO motion until next hearing scheduled for Friday, Jan 23 and 10:00 am.
"SCO did say that they will be filing a complaint within days on copyright violations.
"More to come"
So it looks like they have 30 days to finally tell us what code they are talking about "with specificity". Finally.
When I put an incomplete term into the address bar of Windows Explorer on my Winxp workstation, I am often redirected to the MSN search page.
Apparently, IE isn't the only MS program that defaults to using MSN search. Just tested it on win2k, not only did I get MSN Search, I even get a popup!
Original Belkin reply here Steve originally posted a link to this here FWIW, I saw this originally posted through google groups. I can't verify it word for word, but it does look the same to me. (I did try to clean up the format a little to make it a little easier to read, but I tried to stay close to the original formatting)
> Mr. Uh Clem wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> What does Belkin say when you complain?
>
> I'd make their life miserable until they removed the offending software from
> my machine.
>
> You did not conset to this aspect of your machine's modification - this is
> nothing less than malicious.
>
> Raise hell.
I was made aware of this posting by an e-mail that was sent to
Belkin's tech support e-mail box. Since I am a product manager for
Belkin's LAN products and was very involved with the development of
the Parental Control feature, I feel that I can shed some light on
this subject. Firstly, without trying to sound too stand-offish, we
are not talking about SPAM here. For me to clarify, an understanding
of the Parental Control service will really be needed.
Since Parental Control is a subscription service, Belkin wanted to
make registering for the service very easy. Since the router actually
will work in tandem with an outside server (Cerberian,
www.cerberian.com) registration information needs to be collected and
sent to Belkin and Cerberian to activate an account. Traditional
methods of registration, such as asking the user to go to a website or
navigate to the Router's internal Web page to enter information didn't
meet the ease-of-use goal. We elected to re-direct one http request to
the "Register Now" reminder page. (There is a link in a previous
posting if you want to see it) This page asks the user to register for
the service for a free 6 month trial. Now, granted this looks like an
ad. It should, it is intended to be informative and easy enough to
understand. At this point, the user can register or click "No Thanks".
Clicking "No Thanks" sets a flag in the Router to stop the Router from
re-directing every 8 hours to the reminder page. (Again remember, only
one http request every 8 hours). Admittedly, there is no controlling
which computer on the LAN this message will pop up on. If the user
just closes the window without clicking "No Thanks", then the flag is
never set, and the reminders will continue. Now, if you are the type
that doesn't want to click the "No Thanks" button, then no problem.
Navigate to the Router's internal web interface (default IP =
192.168.2.1), click on the Parental Control menu. In the Menu, select
"Don't Remind every 8 hours" (This phrase actually varies a b
Unless you do not give the appropriate 'not interested' answer, at which point Onstar continues to give you the sales pitch every time you connect, until you give the answer they are expecting. I might add that Belkin needs access to the router to turn off the flag that causes this behavior.(Hope your device isn't behind a firewall).
Ok, the 'you'd sue' was a little over the top, but I am quite angry about it.
I still feel the comparison is fair though. The device does malfunction every 8 hours until you give the appropriate response. Even Belkin admitted that it wasn't covered in the manual as it should have been. That doesn't even mention the routers that didn't originally come with this feature, but had it turned on with a firmware update.
Mozilla and Mozilla Firebird block pop-ups and are highly recomended. The drive by installs are more likely to occur if you are using IE, although if you let them in there's nothing a browser can do for you.
Also, using alternative browsers gives an added side benefit. If pop-ups are turned off, and you continue to get pop-ups (or pop unders, which happened to me) you can be reasonably sure that it is the result of malware on your computer.
The pop under I was recieving resulted from installing something labelled freeware (Heh Heh, my bad!)
I picked my ISP, Speakeasy, specifically because they allow servers and the sharing of bandwidth.
The cost is based on my bandwidth allocation and I could get up to a T1 if I wanted
Mostly I picked them to vote with my wallet! Every other broadband ISP in my area has port filtering and restrictions (pay extra to hook an additional computer up, WTF?). I know that I could technically get around most of the restrictions, but I wanted to avoid even the appearance that I support such draconian rules (If I could!)
Wanna share a WIFI access point with your neighbors? Build your own personal Data Center?
I know I tend to sound like a marketroid, but in all honesty I am impressed with them.
There must be others that are non-restrictive, search them out, and when you switch be sure to tell your ISP exactly why.
"We won't give tickets for it unless there's an accident", now they pull people over for it. While I won't necessarily argue with the law, the TRICK used to pass it was a flat out lie.
Maybe laws and some rules should have a time limit associated with it. If it hasn't been enforced in $many years, it becomes null and void.
When I first read the article, it said port 80, I kinda chuckled and thought "Port 25 would help too." It has been changed since I read it early Friday. If you look quick, you'll find that he references msblaster as an email virus (which comes in over the SMTP port 135, I guess;-)
It wouldn't surprise me to find out that this guy has a free MSDN subscription or 12.
I also got quite a laugh about the PC blades suggestion. Why does this sound like another round of hardware upgrades, kinda like what accompanied 2000 and to a lesser extent XP? How exactly would patch management be ANY easier with blade PC's? Replacing hardware, sure. Is he actually suggesting that Microsoft go back to the Mainframe - Terminal model?
"YOUR data" is irrelevent.
Its the data of the 100,000 machines your infected machine will cripple that is important, not to mention the bandwidth eaten.
Forcing a step or 2 between opening an email and executing would be a blessing for those of us tired of dealing with IE/Outlook vulnerabilty combinations that make permission based policies irrelevent.
One last thing, can someone Puhlease stick a fork in the "but a Linux virus DOES EXIST" argument!!
Make sure you connect the digital out on your cd player (most have it) to the digital input on your sound card, route that to a wav file and you're done. This way it will be "CD Quality" This bypasses the problem of substandard quality.
The best copy protection in existence is to create an atmosphere of mutual respect. It's not perfect and many will still copy, but at least the rest of us will begin to give a shit.
I agree with most of what you say, but I have to take issue with the cost of a "Decent" studio.
I have a computer based home studio set up. It wasn't cheap. It was obsolete in months (actually, it was probably obsolete before I put it together!) But most importantly, it doesn't compare to the Pro quality stuff I've heard! Much of the equipment is expensive BECAUSE it's not standardized and in fact could not be standardized.
Much of the equipment can and has been built "on a chip" very cheaply, yet still does not retain the quality that the PRO gear has.
The difference is barely noticable until you stack all of these things on top of each other. Track after track after track of minutely lower quality gear shows up in the final mix. I've looked into Open source software for studio gear, and would LOVE it if it would happen. Unfortunately it's nowhere near even the lower end home studio gear that I have. Why is the quality of even the low end gear lower? Manufacturers of the lower cost gear tend to cut corners on vital components (the AD/DA converters not being made of gold, for instance)that are not noticeable to the human ear on (lets say)16 tracks, but become very noticeable on (lets say)32-64 tracks, not to mention the master. The prices of alot of this equipment has come down significantly in the last 10-15 years, and I wouldn't doubt that producers are taking a cut, But I assure you that it's far from open source on commodity hardware. If I'm wrong, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE tell me, it would make my year. Hell for that matter, I'll experiment with anything you find and try it out just on the hope!
Build tools that sidestep the RIAA
on
RIAA Bits
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
And fullfill the authors desires.
I found an interesting one at Sourceforge called iRate. It downloads independent songs and you rate them. There's more to it, and I recomend anyone who's tired of the RIAA to at least take a look. Some of the downloads are a little slow, and it's an early version but I've already found some indie stuff I like.
This may be the direction we need to go. Artists could get feedback and people are exposed to new music (minus the $20 per DECENT song tax;-)
Allow me to gleefully parrot my take.
Ten years ago, I would bet that there weren't a third as many pickup trucks on the road (Lets face it, SUV's are pretty much glorified pickup trucks) Everyone that I knew with a truck used it to cart things around that simply would not fit in a car, or to carry tools and various other things that would shred a car seat. And yes, trucks are definitely a bands best friend. Flash forward ten years They seem to be EVERYWHERE. Their gas mileage has barely improved. Many people drive them like cars, even though they could take out 2 or 3 cars in an accident.
Many people are frustrated with this trend due to the fact that: They suck gas there are more of them on the road causing an increased demand for gas You can figure out the rest.
The fact of the matter is that for the price, most people would save money renting a van the 2-3 times a year that they actually need the space.
We recieved an automated bouce that included a copy of virus. (It sent the original email as an attachment.)
Makes me wonder how much of an echo effect there is.
Slashdot Mirror
TheOpenCd
LOLOLOLOOLOLOLOLO,
I'm sorry,
I hate to waste space here,
but that is HILARIOUS!
Here here!
Groklaw is an invaluable rescource.
Be kind!
Groklaw being slashdotted for the equivalent of a paragraph of information.
Help out PJ, waiting for a dropped server is time she could be sleeping!
First Report from Grokker Inside Hearing: IBM Wins Both Motions to Compel
Friday, December 05 2003 @ 02:30 PM EST
Our first report from a Groklaw volunteer, sam, who attended the court hearing is that IBM won both of its motions to compel and SCO's motion was set for a later date. Here is what sam is telling us, and it's subject to further information and confirmation as more news arrives. We have several attending and I'll do a followup, but this is the first word. Here is what sam is telling us:
"Just returned from the hearing.
"Needless to say there was blood all over the floor on the SCO side of the aisle none on the 'left' side.
"Judge granted both IBM motions to compel, gave SCO thirty days to comply 'with specificity' and suspended further discovery. Did not rule on the SCO motion until next hearing scheduled for Friday, Jan 23 and 10:00 am.
"SCO did say that they will be filing a complaint within days on copyright violations.
"More to come"
So it looks like they have 30 days to finally tell us what code they are talking about "with specificity". Finally.
One last thing - PJ Rocks!
Thanks for the info.
I generally use Windows Explorer to access network shares, and you won't get MSN if you have the \\ in front of your mangled spelling;)
When I put an incomplete term into the address bar of Windows Explorer on my Winxp workstation, I am often redirected to the MSN search page.
Apparently, IE isn't the only MS program that defaults to using MSN search.
Just tested it on win2k, not only did I get MSN Search, I even get a popup!
Where's my tinfoil hat?!?
Original Belkin reply here
Steve originally posted a link to this here
FWIW, I saw this originally posted through google groups. I can't verify it word for word, but it does look the same to me. (I did try to clean up the format a little to make it a little easier to read, but I tried to stay close to the original formatting)
Full text for the sake of duplication
From ericd@belkin.com Fri Nov 7 20:19:08 2003 Path: internal1.nntp.ash.giganews.com!border2.nntp.ash.g iganews.com!border1.nntp.ash.giganews.com!firehose 2!nntp4!intern1.nntp.aus1.giganews.com!border1.nnt p.aus1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!opentransit. net!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.ed u!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: ericd@belkin.com (Eric Deming) Newsgroups: news.admin.net-abuse.email Subject: Re: [OT-evil marketing] Belkin does Verislime one better - router spam! Date: 5 Nov 2003 15:25:28 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com Lines: 70 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: 67.98.73.254 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1068074728 22743 127.0.0.1 (5 Nov 2003 23:25:28 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 23:25:28 +0000 (UTC) Xref: intern1.nntp.aus1.giganews.com news.admin.net-abuse.email:1466982
"JerryMouse" wrote in message news:...
> Mr. Uh Clem wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> What does Belkin say when you complain?
>
> I'd make their life miserable until they removed the offending software from
> my machine.
>
> You did not conset to this aspect of your machine's modification - this is
> nothing less than malicious.
>
> Raise hell.
I was made aware of this posting by an e-mail that was sent to Belkin's tech support e-mail box.
Since I am a product manager for Belkin's LAN products and was very involved with the development of the Parental Control feature, I feel that I can shed some light on this subject.
Firstly, without trying to sound too stand-offish, we are not talking about SPAM here. For me to clarify, an understanding of the Parental Control service will really be needed.
Since Parental Control is a subscription service, Belkin wanted to make registering for the service very easy. Since the router actually will work in tandem with an outside server (Cerberian, www.cerberian.com) registration information needs to be collected and sent to Belkin and Cerberian to activate an account.
Traditional methods of registration, such as asking the user to go to a website or navigate to the Router's internal Web page to enter information didn't meet the ease-of-use goal.
We elected to re-direct one http request to the "Register Now" reminder page. (There is a link in a previous posting if you want to see it) This page asks the user to register for the service for a free 6 month trial.
Now, granted this looks like an ad. It should, it is intended to be informative and easy enough to understand.
At this point, the user can register or click "No Thanks". Clicking "No Thanks" sets a flag in the Router to stop the Router from re-directing every 8 hours to the reminder page. (Again remember, only one http request every 8 hours).
Admittedly, there is no controlling which computer on the LAN this message will pop up on. If the user just closes the window without clicking "No Thanks", then the flag is never set, and the reminders will continue.
Now, if you are the type that doesn't want to click the "No Thanks" button, then no problem. Navigate to the Router's internal web interface (default IP = 192.168.2.1), click on the Parental Control menu. In the Menu, select "Don't Remind every 8 hours" (This phrase actually varies a b
Unless you do not give the appropriate 'not interested' answer, at which point Onstar continues to give you the sales pitch every time you connect, until you give the answer they are expecting.
I might add that Belkin needs access to the router to turn off the flag that causes this behavior.(Hope your device isn't behind a firewall).
Ok, the 'you'd sue' was a little over the top, but I am quite angry about it.
I still feel the comparison is fair though.
The device does malfunction every 8 hours until you give the appropriate response.
Even Belkin admitted that it wasn't covered in the manual as it should have been.
That doesn't even mention the routers that didn't originally come with this feature, but had it turned on with a firmware update.
This is a device to route traffic.
If it is not routing traffic to its appropriate destination, then it is faulty!
If a car were to stop running every 8 miles and ask you if you'd like Onstar, you'd sue!
And you should.
I will NEVER buy a Belkin product again.
This is a sign that the marketing department has control over the tech side.
The ONLY way that this would be REMOTELY acceptable is if it were clearly stated on the outside packaging.
One last thing. You give money to a manufacturer for a product, NOT advertising.
And no, my clothing doesn't have labels.
I wouldn't be surprised if the MS software necessary to put MP3s on the device is all about DRM.
offtopic - but...
I just had an experience with Dell tech support that I can only sum up as discouraging!
The BIOS couldn't find the HD or the CDROM, after one hour of humoring them, I was told to reinstall the OS!!!
I still can't figure out how I should do that without access to the HD.
Dell was known for support and computers that didn't need extra crap to run (like Compaqs paq shit,) what's happening to them??
Mozilla and Mozilla Firebird block pop-ups and are highly recomended.
The drive by installs are more likely to occur if you are using IE, although if you let them in there's nothing a browser can do for you.
Also, using alternative browsers gives an added side benefit. If pop-ups are turned off, and you continue to get pop-ups (or pop unders, which happened to me) you can be reasonably sure that it is the result of malware on your computer.
The pop under I was recieving resulted from installing something labelled freeware (Heh Heh, my bad!)
Mail server here too.
I picked my ISP, Speakeasy, specifically because they allow servers and the sharing of bandwidth.
The cost is based on my bandwidth allocation and I could get up to a T1 if I wanted
Mostly I picked them to vote with my wallet!
Every other broadband ISP in my area has port filtering and restrictions (pay extra to hook an additional computer up, WTF?). I know that I could technically get around most of the restrictions, but I wanted to avoid even the appearance that I support such draconian rules (If I could!)
Wanna share a WIFI access point with your neighbors? Build your own personal Data Center?
I know I tend to sound like a marketroid, but in all honesty I am impressed with them.
There must be others that are non-restrictive, search them out, and when you switch be sure to tell your ISP exactly why.
Did I mention 2 static IPs standard?
Illinois had a seatbelt law passed this way...
"We won't give tickets for it unless there's an accident", now they pull people over for it.
While I won't necessarily argue with the law, the TRICK used to pass it was a flat out lie.
Maybe laws and some rules should have a time limit associated with it. If it hasn't been enforced in $many years, it becomes null and void.
Some laws at least.
For what it's worth...
;-)
When I first read the article, it said port 80, I kinda chuckled and thought "Port 25 would help too."
It has been changed since I read it early Friday.
If you look quick, you'll find that he references msblaster as an email virus (which comes in over the SMTP port 135, I guess
It wouldn't surprise me to find out that this guy has a free MSDN subscription or 12.
I also got quite a laugh about the PC blades suggestion.
Why does this sound like another round of hardware upgrades, kinda like what accompanied 2000 and to a lesser extent XP?
How exactly would patch management be ANY easier with blade PC's?
Replacing hardware, sure.
Is he actually suggesting that Microsoft go back to the Mainframe - Terminal model?
Ironically, a 'security researcher' is reporting today through NTBugtraq that MS03-039 still leaves holes behind.
MS03-039 refers to the RPC disaster that you lucky *NIX admins haven't had to deal with.
On the bright side, broken patches...
Crap, another late night coming up!
No, really, I'll trust a Microsoft firewall;-)
ROFLMAOROFLMAO I usually don't write such things, but my gawd, that was hilarious!! Are you guys hiring??
"YOUR data" is irrelevent.
Its the data of the 100,000 machines your infected machine will cripple that is important, not to mention the bandwidth eaten.
Forcing a step or 2 between opening an email and executing would be a blessing for those of us tired of dealing with IE/Outlook vulnerabilty combinations that make permission based policies irrelevent.
One last thing, can someone Puhlease stick a fork in the "but a Linux virus DOES EXIST" argument!!
Make sure you connect the digital out on your cd player (most have it) to the digital input on your sound card, route that to a wav file and you're done.
This way it will be "CD Quality"
This bypasses the problem of substandard quality.
The best copy protection in existence is to create an atmosphere of mutual respect.
It's not perfect and many will still copy, but at least the rest of us will begin to give a shit.
You've obviously never seen these
And you can tell me that they don't apply to you, I'll just reply "no, not these particular ones..."
Look around, this isn't the only list!
NOTHING should be compulsory, but no AV on a windows box, have you never heard of a worm?
I agree with most of what you say, but I have to take issue with the cost of a "Decent" studio.
I have a computer based home studio set up. It wasn't cheap. It was obsolete in months (actually, it was probably obsolete before I put it together!)
But most importantly, it doesn't compare to the Pro quality stuff I've heard!
Much of the equipment is expensive BECAUSE it's not standardized and in fact could not be standardized.
Much of the equipment can and has been built "on a chip" very cheaply, yet still does not retain the quality that the PRO gear has.
The difference is barely noticable until you stack all of these things on top of each other.
Track after track after track of minutely lower quality gear shows up in the final mix.
I've looked into Open source software for studio gear, and would LOVE it if it would happen. Unfortunately it's nowhere near even the lower end home studio gear that I have.
Why is the quality of even the low end gear lower?
Manufacturers of the lower cost gear tend to cut corners on vital components (the AD/DA converters not being made of gold, for instance)that are not noticeable to the human ear on (lets say)16 tracks, but become very noticeable on (lets say)32-64 tracks, not to mention the master.
The prices of alot of this equipment has come down significantly in the last 10-15 years, and I wouldn't doubt that producers are taking a cut,
But I assure you that it's far from open source on commodity hardware.
If I'm wrong, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE tell me, it would make my year.
Hell for that matter, I'll experiment with anything you find and try it out just on the hope!
And fullfill the authors desires. I found an interesting one at Sourceforge called iRate.
It downloads independent songs and you rate them.
There's more to it, and I recomend anyone who's tired of the RIAA to at least take a look.
Some of the downloads are a little slow, and it's an early version but I've already found some indie stuff I like.
This may be the direction we need to go.
Artists could get feedback and people are exposed to new music (minus the $20 per DECENT song tax;-)
Allow me to gleefully parrot my take.
Ten years ago, I would bet that there weren't a third as many pickup trucks on the road (Lets face it, SUV's are pretty much glorified pickup trucks)
Everyone that I knew with a truck used it to cart things around that simply would not fit in a car, or to carry tools and various other things that would shred a car seat. And yes, trucks are definitely a bands best friend.
Flash forward ten years
They seem to be EVERYWHERE.
Their gas mileage has barely improved.
Many people drive them like cars, even though they could take out 2 or 3 cars in an accident.
Many people are frustrated with this trend due to the fact that:
They suck gas
there are more of them on the road
causing an increased demand for gas
You can figure out the rest.
The fact of the matter is that for the price, most people would save money renting a van the 2-3 times a year that they actually need the space.
We recieved an automated bouce that included a copy of virus.
(It sent the original email as an attachment.)
Makes me wonder how much of an echo effect there is.
Maybe they should be offering jobs to existing, qualified SCO employees. Such a brain drain could have a devastating effect on SCO as a whole.