Liability: It'll be interesting to see how automated driving technology performs in the hands of the common folk. While under development, you've got technically skilled individuals with the best training available checking prototype vehicles out on a regular basis. What happens when they're out in the wild? There are quite a few people out there that can't be bothered to change their headlight bulbs or get an oil change on time, let alone maintain a complex computer system that requires a variety of sensors and other equipment be working for the technology to function correctly. How many people drive around with a check engine light? I'm sure the dealership will be able to simply summon the car back overnight and send out a loaner if it's not ready in time, but is it wise to have a malfunctioning vehicle driving itself in for service while it is malfunctioning? Will the dealer's mechanics have the appropriate skills to maintain such systems? Self-driving vehicles still have the same properties as other vehicles, including causing serious property damage and bodily injury if they hit you.
Capacity/Energy: Automated vehicles driving around on the road will take up space and use energy, with or without an occupant. Here's a scenario: Dad's at work for a few more hours, Mom needs to visit a client. Jane wants to go to a friend's house on the other side of town. Rather than drive across town twice, Mom decides to summon Dad's car so that Jane can use it while Mom is out taking care of business. Once Jane is at her friend's house, the car drives itself back to work to pick up Dad. Meanwhile, Mom's done and Dad isn't home yet, so she sends her car back out to pick up Jane. In this scenario, instead of Mom running around town in a single car, both cars are on the road for an extended duration. Multiply this times millions of large families that are drooling over such a possibility. Yes, there will be an increase in cars on the road, either from vehicles deadheading (see below), or families that will be encouraged to take trips separately to save time.
I'm not saying that driverless technology isn't going to work out. EV/hybrid and automated tech will likely become the standard in taxi and rental car service, where vehicles can be dispatched and returned to a garage for maintenance/fueling as needed, with fleets maintained by dedicated mechanics with access to appropriate resources and detailed maintenance histories. Given enough time, automation will probably replace some forms of rubber wheeled transit services as well. After all, an automated vehicle that is summoned by the touch of a button, that can go anywhere on a door-to-door basis is the main premise of personal rapid transit. How will the average person use this technology? Will they use it responsibly?
There are three broad topics that I feel need to be addressed before allowing minors to ride around unaccompanied in automated vehicles:
Liability: Who is responsible for the safety of an unaccompanied minor in the event of an accident or vehicle malfunction, especially if the vehicle is a long distance from home? More importantly, who will be willing to accept that kind of liability and at what cost?
Capacity: Is there enough room on our roads and in our parking lots to accommodate children riding around in their own personal vehicles? Will the efficiencies of automated vehicle traffic be enough to overcome an overall increase in vehicle traffic? How much will associated expansion projects cost? Can we afford to pay for them?
Energy: Can we afford the increase in energy consumption associated with increasing vehicle traffic at a time when the capacity of available energy reserves is questionable and energy policy is all over the place?
As far as in-house developed games go, Square Enix has always had a bad track record when it comes to MMO PC performance. They have made improvements in recent years, but only when using someone else's game engine: The Last Remnant (Unreal Engine 3 and Steamworks) and Gyromancer (Bejeweled Twist) both run quite well on PC.
Does your system hard drive have write caching enabled? If you don't want to splurge for an uninterruptable power supply, you might want to try turning write caching off and see if that helps with your problem.
I've seen many problems in the past with write caching-enabled hard drives that become heavily corrupted when an unexpected power outage occurs, which we usually attributed to cached data being lost before it could be written to the hard drive. Granted newer hard drives and operating systems are more dependable when it comes to write caching, I still don't trust it enough in ye ole generic workstation to enable it (especially when the performance boost is virtually unnoticable to Joe User on newer machines when running generic desktop applications).
I live in Tampa, and our transit is abysmal. It's not good when your local university has a better transit system than your city does. Granted, people have been actively trying to get some kind of rail system in place for a while now (like HARTrail in Tampa, the St. Petersburg/Clearwater monorail project, the now-dead Florida High Speed Rail system), but most politicians (and a good chunk of the middle and upper class) only see it as either a toy for the poor or something to get them re-elected. That, and there is absolutely no coherence in planning; everyone has their own type of system they want and when all is said and done, if we ever get that far, we're going to end up with 100% incompatable poorly-planned transit systems across the bay area.
I grew up in the Toronto downtown core. I never needed to use a car, ever. Buses, streetcars and subways got me anywhere I needed to be in a timely manner, even to the outskirts of Toronto. All of the regional transit networks (except Missisauga Transit) are working together to integrate their systems even more, so you can go between ANY two points in the GTA region without a car and still get there at roughly the same time. It makes me want to move back up there after I graduate from college.
A group of IRC client programmers announced today they are working on a new direct connection protocol named DCC2 of which the draft can be found here.
"The DCC2 community, a group of leading IRC client developers, today announced an initiative to create standards that will make establishing direct connections between IRC clients easier. The group will also work to standardize the protocols used to transfer files and text messages between clients once a connection has been established, allowing for a simpler and more feature-rich user experience" developer Dan Smith wrote in a press release to IRCJunkie. Smith is also the lead developer of the windows IRC client dIRC.
Besides dIRC, the developers of the next IRC clients are involved with the new DCC2 protocol; Visual IRC, Ircle, KVirc, Bersirc, Chatzilla and OrnateIrc. We asked Smith why key clients like mIRC and BitchX are yet not present in this list. "I have not talked with the authors of the clients you listed personally. Our group is following a standards process and would appreciate input from anyone who expresses interest! I am personally impressed with the large number of major client authors (Windows, Unix, Mac) who have already expressed interest and are helping to write our drafts."
The current DCC protocol is known to be lacking in clarity where it comes down to finding out why something fails to work. "The main goal of our negotiation draft is to identify connections that are more likely to be established. The second goal is to allow the clients to know exactly why a connection failed, instead of a silent failure" Smith explained their goal to improve in this area as well. For users behind a NAT who are not really known with networking issues this is a well known source of problems. Smith explains how the DCC2 protocol would handle in case of problems in this situation: "... direct connections between two ipv4 users behind NAT/firewalls will still fail if they do not have ports forwarded for connections. However both clients will know why the connection failed and can take appropriate action, such as opening ports using UPNP or notifying the user that their network setup prevents connections. With the addition of IPv6 to direct irc connections, users can map ipv6 addresses inside of their NAT, and use ipv6 in the connection negotiation process as well. I highly recommend sixxs.net for anyone interested in ipv6 technology."
"File name and size information never needs to pass over IRC", the website of the DCC2 protocol reads. Some networks have taken action against channels where music files are being shared over DCC. We asked Smith if this will prevent the network to see what is being transmitted between the clients. "The main goal of the file transfer draft is to allow multiple files/directories to be transferred concurrently, along with additional metadata such as file checksums, descriptions, etc. The fact that this file metadata is listed out of band, and possibly encrypted, keeps file transfers private between two irc clients. The direct connection negotiation still takes place over irc."
The DCC2 protocol will be compatible with the currently used DCC protocol. "While DCC2 is a completely new way to publicize connection data, we have added a compatibility layer to work with historic dcc. In short, we found that many clients ignore unused tokens after historic dcc messages. The DCC2 tokens can be appended to the historic dcc commands, and if both clients support dcc2 then a connection negotiation takes place", Smith explains.
It is expected that during the coming summer the first clients will come with DCC2 at a experimental stage.
I went down to my local GameStop today and tried out one of their demo units, out of curiosity. The only complaints I had to voice about the gaming experience are that 1) the screen is too small and 2) the frame rates are too low (making the games choppy). If I were a casual gamer who just wanted something to pass time that was somwehere inbetween other mobile phone offerings and a dedicated gaming device like a GBA, I would probably get one. But as a gamer, I'm going to stick with my original stance and avoid it like the plague...
PS: For those of you who are wondering, I tried out Sonic N and Pandemonium.
I'm going to have to disagree with your opinion of IRC...
Regarding shells: there are many legitimate reasons to use a shell for IRC, from vanity hosts to bypassing firewall restrictions. While the use of vanity hosts (vhosts) is debatable, there's nothing wrong with wanting to show off something like the domain name of a website you maintain or a project you're involved with...
You can't just assume thaty everyone uses a shell to hide or do something illegal. Besides, most people who really want to hide properly use a variety of non-legitimate proxies or route through trojan-infected individuals - it's too easy to get caught by using a dedicated IRC proxy on a shell maintained for such a purpose.
Regarding accountability: If said server gets banned from a network because of something like 20 users using the same account, then it's their own fault for failing to prevent such things from happening.
Regarding bots: There's nothing wrong with running a bot to keep others off a nickname. I do it on many networks and I usually don't have a problem with DDoS. Then again, I usually avoid networks like EFnet where there's no real way to protect hostname information from someone who really wants to pound my bot into the ground.
Regarding illegal activity: Those who are committing illegal activity don't just use IRC. they use all forms of chat, including this "Jabber" you speak of.
Regarding DDoS: There have been several improvements on a majority of IRCds that protect people from the attacks you describe, the biggest example of which is hostmasking (usermode +x or +z, depending on the daemon). Additional steps are also in the process of being taken to improve said safety on IRC.
Besides that, "Kiddies" can sniff out IP adddresses just as easily via other chat mediums as they can with uncloaked users on IRC if they have the right tools. I've been DDoSed by morons on ICQ and AIM many a time...
Regarding MPAA/RIAA: Most shell providers prohibit said illegal activity, passing the blame onto the end user since they violated the shell server's ToS. Those that don't are asking for it. Remember - the RIAA/MPAA doesn't give a crap about what's sitting on someone's server - they're out to fry whoever put it there. And do you think whoever operated the shell is going to help them? Damn right they are...
Yes, IRC has it's faults, but keep in mind that only a portion of networks (See: EFnet, IRCnet) are lagging behind in terms of evolution. The others are working hard to bring IRC up to par with other chat mediums. All of the things you've mentioned haven't gone unnoticed within the community...
Re:Hosting IRC is asking for a BSA 'investigation'
on
IRC in the Dog House?
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
DCC is NOT supported by IRC servers. It was never defined in RFC, and there is not a single feature in any major IRCd that was designed specifically to help users file-share.
DCC was introduced on the Client-side as a method of sending pictures. It has remained client-side. Too bad it evolved into what it is considered today...
Think of it this way: Let's say that ICQ doesn't support file-sharing. Eventually someone figures out a way to file-share over the ICQ network by using just messages and codes it into a popular alternative client. Said protocol spreads and ten years later is generaly considered a basic feature of an ICQ client. That's basically what DCC is to IRC.
Just to debunk a few things here before people get started...
1) Some trojans already use non-IRC protocol. Some trojans already use more than one protocol.
2) Almost all of the larger networks run some type of anti-drone and anti-proxy system to prevent the problem from getting out of control. Said programs are widely available in a variety of forms for most IRC daemons.
Newer worms target smaller networks because of this, since smaller networks generally don't run said software (besides the usual nickname/channel services). Many worms also use private IRC networks, since the botnets can't be tracked and/or shut down as easily on them.
3) Most IRC servers are not hosted by people who lease servers at small hosting companies. A majority of servers linked to larger networks are either hosted by ISPs or by large entities with large amounts of bandwidth to burn.
Smaller hosting providers purposely shun IRC servers because they know that they can be a bandwidth burden (not to mention a DDoS target). Larger hosts, which monitor their bandwidth 24/7, usually don't object to hosting servers - all they have to do is blackhole the server's IP when a DDoS attack comes their way and the disruption is minimalized.
EFnet may have lost some high-profile servers lately, but the majority of IRC networks are doing well server-wise. QuakeNet (the world's largest IRC network) is in the process of starting a campaign to link more North American servers... and not because the network needs more servers (they could easily handle 300000 users in their current state), but because they want to draw in more North American users.
You can deactivate your "Content ID" if you don't feel like playing/paying for a period of time, then reactivate it when you feel like playing again and still have all of your character data.
Square Enix saves all character data regardless if the account is paid for or not - but only active Content ID data is stored on the main database server. All of your old stuff (unless you deleted your character instead of deactivating your ID) is kept around elsewhere so that if you want to play again, you can pick up right where you left off.
NYC subway cars rarely fall victim to graffiti nowadays. And even if they do, the vandalism is removed within 48 hours.
Over the past decade, subway vandalism has shifted from graffiti (spraying your crappy initials onto a subway car) to scratchitti (scratching your crappy initials into a window or piece of plastic on the subway car - more costly and time consuming to get rid of than graffiti).
The only way people are going to get a wakeup call is if a group of people got a database of eligible voters from local precincts complete with whatever data is necessary to fake a ballot, go into said precincts, and make it look like some unknown Non-Democrat/Non-Republican party candidates (who wouldn't have won anyways) won the election.
Alternately, it would humor me if some "terrorist" organization used this hole to severely screw up the vote by mass-wiping voting terminals/databases.
BTW: How would someone catch this before it's too late? Most precinct staff are volunteers, and they definitely can't see who voted what...
I'm going to have to agree with you here, although I'm going to go a bit further.
While it can be argued that video games *may* incite violence in kids, you have to look at the big picture first. Those in the United States and abroad, over the last decade or so, have been embracing violence (and sex) as a major part of their culture. Combine that with a growing lack of responsibility among people (especially in the USA) and you've got a problem.
Don't believe me? Look at movies. Look at television. Look at the most popular sport in the United States. Look at how successful wrestling (even through it's fake) has been. Look at our print media. Look at those considered to be "role models" and how frequently they get in trouble with the law. Do I need to go on further?
You *cannot* blame the video game manufacturers for violent kids. Most of the games considered extremely violent were created to satisfy the wants of older gamers (a very big part of the video game market), not to keep little kiddies occupied. The warning labels placed on games clearly state that some games are NOT intended for younger audiences. Smaller video game retailers won't even sell those types of games to children (or parents before asking for consent). Surely responsible parents would make sure their kids aren't playing inappropriate games, right?
I grew up with video games. I didn't become a violent member of society (I'm only 19). I've played all of the games that supposedly make kids violent at a decently young age (10-16). However, when I was younger my parents actually stressed the fact that video games aren't real and that I shouldn't go around emulating what I see on television, video games, etc.. Maybe that had something to do with it?
I'm not saying video games aren't responsible. I'm not saying they are responsible. I'm saying that there are other factors that need to be addressed before people can come out and point their fingers at video games.
In other words, every lazy user that downloads lame with a frontend or some other encoder without modifying default settings and that leaves the ID3 tag alone (most use CDDB/Gracenote or freeDB to generate an ID3 tag, resulting in identical tags) will end up with the same MD5 hash when compared to someone else who did the same thing with the same CD.
The only ways you're going to get a different MD5 checksum from an MP3 file is by:
A) using a different encoder
B) using a different version of an encoder
C) modifying the ID3 tag
D) deleting the ID3 tag
E) changing the file name
F) modifying the file in an audio editing program
Don't forget that the RIAA is probably also using CRC checksums to identify specific albums, as many encoders also support inserting CRCs into MP3s by default (and these will be identical for rips coming from the same album regardless of bitrate)
So that's where Bandai got the idea for the nasty sideeffects of "The World"...
Kinda makes you wonder what would happen in real life is something like that actually happened.
I tried soldat out about two weeks with a bunch of friends that have cable or DSL. The game lagged quite a bit even with three people playing simultaneously. More than six people was annoyingly lagged and nearly unplayable (like Ragnarok Online in open beta). And yes, we did rotate game hosting duties, so no it didn't lag because the person hosting the game was slow.
Yeah, you might be able to play Soldat on a slower computer, but you can't do medium to large multiplay on a 56k with it...
Slashdot Mirror
Liability: It'll be interesting to see how automated driving technology performs in the hands of the common folk. While under development, you've got technically skilled individuals with the best training available checking prototype vehicles out on a regular basis. What happens when they're out in the wild? There are quite a few people out there that can't be bothered to change their headlight bulbs or get an oil change on time, let alone maintain a complex computer system that requires a variety of sensors and other equipment be working for the technology to function correctly. How many people drive around with a check engine light? I'm sure the dealership will be able to simply summon the car back overnight and send out a loaner if it's not ready in time, but is it wise to have a malfunctioning vehicle driving itself in for service while it is malfunctioning? Will the dealer's mechanics have the appropriate skills to maintain such systems? Self-driving vehicles still have the same properties as other vehicles, including causing serious property damage and bodily injury if they hit you.
Capacity/Energy: Automated vehicles driving around on the road will take up space and use energy, with or without an occupant. Here's a scenario: Dad's at work for a few more hours, Mom needs to visit a client. Jane wants to go to a friend's house on the other side of town. Rather than drive across town twice, Mom decides to summon Dad's car so that Jane can use it while Mom is out taking care of business. Once Jane is at her friend's house, the car drives itself back to work to pick up Dad. Meanwhile, Mom's done and Dad isn't home yet, so she sends her car back out to pick up Jane. In this scenario, instead of Mom running around town in a single car, both cars are on the road for an extended duration. Multiply this times millions of large families that are drooling over such a possibility. Yes, there will be an increase in cars on the road, either from vehicles deadheading (see below), or families that will be encouraged to take trips separately to save time.
I'm not saying that driverless technology isn't going to work out. EV/hybrid and automated tech will likely become the standard in taxi and rental car service, where vehicles can be dispatched and returned to a garage for maintenance/fueling as needed, with fleets maintained by dedicated mechanics with access to appropriate resources and detailed maintenance histories. Given enough time, automation will probably replace some forms of rubber wheeled transit services as well. After all, an automated vehicle that is summoned by the touch of a button, that can go anywhere on a door-to-door basis is the main premise of personal rapid transit. How will the average person use this technology? Will they use it responsibly?
There are three broad topics that I feel need to be addressed before allowing minors to ride around unaccompanied in automated vehicles:
Liability: Who is responsible for the safety of an unaccompanied minor in the event of an accident or vehicle malfunction, especially if the vehicle is a long distance from home? More importantly, who will be willing to accept that kind of liability and at what cost?
Capacity: Is there enough room on our roads and in our parking lots to accommodate children riding around in their own personal vehicles? Will the efficiencies of automated vehicle traffic be enough to overcome an overall increase in vehicle traffic? How much will associated expansion projects cost? Can we afford to pay for them?
Energy: Can we afford the increase in energy consumption associated with increasing vehicle traffic at a time when the capacity of available energy reserves is questionable and energy policy is all over the place?
As far as in-house developed games go, Square Enix has always had a bad track record when it comes to MMO PC performance. They have made improvements in recent years, but only when using someone else's game engine: The Last Remnant (Unreal Engine 3 and Steamworks) and Gyromancer (Bejeweled Twist) both run quite well on PC.
Does your system hard drive have write caching enabled? If you don't want to splurge for an uninterruptable power supply, you might want to try turning write caching off and see if that helps with your problem.
I've seen many problems in the past with write caching-enabled hard drives that become heavily corrupted when an unexpected power outage occurs, which we usually attributed to cached data being lost before it could be written to the hard drive. Granted newer hard drives and operating systems are more dependable when it comes to write caching, I still don't trust it enough in ye ole generic workstation to enable it (especially when the performance boost is virtually unnoticable to Joe User on newer machines when running generic desktop applications).
I live in Tampa, and our transit is abysmal. It's not good when your local university has a better transit system than your city does. Granted, people have been actively trying to get some kind of rail system in place for a while now (like HARTrail in Tampa, the St. Petersburg/Clearwater monorail project, the now-dead Florida High Speed Rail system), but most politicians (and a good chunk of the middle and upper class) only see it as either a toy for the poor or something to get them re-elected. That, and there is absolutely no coherence in planning; everyone has their own type of system they want and when all is said and done, if we ever get that far, we're going to end up with 100% incompatable poorly-planned transit systems across the bay area.
I grew up in the Toronto downtown core. I never needed to use a car, ever. Buses, streetcars and subways got me anywhere I needed to be in a timely manner, even to the outskirts of Toronto. All of the regional transit networks (except Missisauga Transit) are working together to integrate their systems even more, so you can go between ANY two points in the GTA region without a car and still get there at roughly the same time. It makes me want to move back up there after I graduate from college.
Sony stores do carry third-party software... for PS2
A group of IRC client programmers announced today they are working on a new direct connection protocol named DCC2 of which the draft can be found here.
"The DCC2 community, a group of leading IRC client developers, today announced an initiative to create standards that will make establishing direct connections between IRC clients easier. The group will also work to standardize the protocols used to transfer files and text messages between clients once a connection has been established, allowing for a simpler and more feature-rich user experience" developer Dan Smith wrote in a press release to IRCJunkie. Smith is also the lead developer of the windows IRC client dIRC.
Besides dIRC, the developers of the next IRC clients are involved with the new DCC2 protocol; Visual IRC, Ircle, KVirc, Bersirc, Chatzilla and OrnateIrc. We asked Smith why key clients like mIRC and BitchX are yet not present in this list.
"I have not talked with the authors of the clients you listed personally. Our group is following a standards process and would appreciate input from anyone who expresses interest! I am personally impressed with the large number of major client authors (Windows, Unix, Mac) who have already expressed interest and are helping to write our drafts."
The current DCC protocol is known to be lacking in clarity where it comes down to finding out why something fails to work.
"The main goal of our negotiation draft is to identify connections that are more likely to be established. The second goal is to allow the clients to know exactly why a connection failed, instead of a silent failure" Smith explained their goal to improve in this area as well.
For users behind a NAT who are not really known with networking issues this is a well known source of problems. Smith explains how the DCC2 protocol would handle in case of problems in this situation: "... direct connections between two ipv4 users behind NAT/firewalls will still fail if they do not have ports forwarded for connections. However both clients will know why the connection failed and can take appropriate action, such as opening ports using UPNP or notifying the user that their network setup prevents connections. With the addition of IPv6 to direct irc connections, users can map ipv6 addresses inside of their NAT, and use ipv6 in the connection negotiation process as well. I highly recommend sixxs.net for anyone interested in ipv6 technology."
"File name and size information never needs to pass over IRC", the website of the DCC2 protocol reads. Some networks have taken action against channels where music files are being shared over DCC. We asked Smith if this will prevent the network to see what is being transmitted between the clients.
"The main goal of the file transfer draft is to allow multiple files/directories to be transferred concurrently, along with additional metadata such as file checksums, descriptions, etc. The fact that this file metadata is listed out of band, and possibly encrypted, keeps file transfers private between two irc clients. The direct connection negotiation still takes place over irc."
The DCC2 protocol will be compatible with the currently used DCC protocol. "While DCC2 is a completely new way to publicize connection data, we have added a compatibility layer to work with historic dcc. In short, we found that many clients ignore unused tokens after historic dcc messages. The DCC2 tokens can be appended to the historic dcc commands, and if both clients support dcc2 then a connection negotiation takes place", Smith explains.
It is expected that during the coming summer the first clients will come with DCC2 at a experimental stage.
Don't worry... you're not missing too much...
I went down to my local GameStop today and tried out one of their demo units, out of curiosity. The only complaints I had to voice about the gaming experience are that 1) the screen is too small and 2) the frame rates are too low (making the games choppy). If I were a casual gamer who just wanted something to pass time that was somwehere inbetween other mobile phone offerings and a dedicated gaming device like a GBA, I would probably get one. But as a gamer, I'm going to stick with my original stance and avoid it like the plague...
PS: For those of you who are wondering, I tried out Sonic N and Pandemonium.
I'm going to have to disagree with your opinion of IRC...
Regarding shells: there are many legitimate reasons to use a shell for IRC, from vanity hosts to bypassing firewall restrictions. While the use of vanity hosts (vhosts) is debatable, there's nothing wrong with wanting to show off something like the domain name of a website you maintain or a project you're involved with...
You can't just assume thaty everyone uses a shell to hide or do something illegal. Besides, most people who really want to hide properly use a variety of non-legitimate proxies or route through trojan-infected individuals - it's too easy to get caught by using a dedicated IRC proxy on a shell maintained for such a purpose.
Regarding accountability: If said server gets banned from a network because of something like 20 users using the same account, then it's their own fault for failing to prevent such things from happening.
Regarding bots: There's nothing wrong with running a bot to keep others off a nickname. I do it on many networks and I usually don't have a problem with DDoS. Then again, I usually avoid networks like EFnet where there's no real way to protect hostname information from someone who really wants to pound my bot into the ground.
Regarding illegal activity: Those who are committing illegal activity don't just use IRC. they use all forms of chat, including this "Jabber" you speak of.
Regarding DDoS: There have been several improvements on a majority of IRCds that protect people from the attacks you describe, the biggest example of which is hostmasking (usermode +x or +z, depending on the daemon). Additional steps are also in the process of being taken to improve said safety on IRC.
Besides that, "Kiddies" can sniff out IP adddresses just as easily via other chat mediums as they can with uncloaked users on IRC if they have the right tools. I've been DDoSed by morons on ICQ and AIM many a time...
Regarding MPAA/RIAA: Most shell providers prohibit said illegal activity, passing the blame onto the end user since they violated the shell server's ToS. Those that don't are asking for it. Remember - the RIAA/MPAA doesn't give a crap about what's sitting on someone's server - they're out to fry whoever put it there. And do you think whoever operated the shell is going to help them? Damn right they are...
Yes, IRC has it's faults, but keep in mind that only a portion of networks (See: EFnet, IRCnet) are lagging behind in terms of evolution. The others are working hard to bring IRC up to par with other chat mediums. All of the things you've mentioned haven't gone unnoticed within the community...
DCC is NOT supported by IRC servers. It was never defined in RFC, and there is not a single feature in any major IRCd that was designed specifically to help users file-share.
DCC was introduced on the Client-side as a method of sending pictures. It has remained client-side. Too bad it evolved into what it is considered today...
Think of it this way: Let's say that ICQ doesn't support file-sharing. Eventually someone figures out a way to file-share over the ICQ network by using just messages and codes it into a popular alternative client. Said protocol spreads and ten years later is generaly considered a basic feature of an ICQ client. That's basically what DCC is to IRC.
For those that don't believe, check out this article.
Just to debunk a few things here before people get started...
1) Some trojans already use non-IRC protocol. Some trojans already use more than one protocol.
2) Almost all of the larger networks run some type of anti-drone and anti-proxy system to prevent the problem from getting out of control. Said programs are widely available in a variety of forms for most IRC daemons.
Newer worms target smaller networks because of this, since smaller networks generally don't run said software (besides the usual nickname/channel services). Many worms also use private IRC networks, since the botnets can't be tracked and/or shut down as easily on them.
3) Most IRC servers are not hosted by people who lease servers at small hosting companies. A majority of servers linked to larger networks are either hosted by ISPs or by large entities with large amounts of bandwidth to burn.
Smaller hosting providers purposely shun IRC servers because they know that they can be a bandwidth burden (not to mention a DDoS target). Larger hosts, which monitor their bandwidth 24/7, usually don't object to hosting servers - all they have to do is blackhole the server's IP when a DDoS attack comes their way and the disruption is minimalized.
EFnet may have lost some high-profile servers lately, but the majority of IRC networks are doing well server-wise. QuakeNet (the world's largest IRC network) is in the process of starting a campaign to link more North American servers... and not because the network needs more servers (they could easily handle 300000 users in their current state), but because they want to draw in more North American users.
"Stop it! Don't open that door!" - Wesker, Resident Evil
"You spoony bard!" - Tellah, Final Fantasy IV
(yeah it's not a soundbyte but it deserves to be on the list)
You can deactivate your "Content ID" if you don't feel like playing/paying for a period of time, then reactivate it when you feel like playing again and still have all of your character data.
Square Enix saves all character data regardless if the account is paid for or not - but only active Content ID data is stored on the main database server. All of your old stuff (unless you deleted your character instead of deactivating your ID) is kept around elsewhere so that if you want to play again, you can pick up right where you left off.
NYC subway cars rarely fall victim to graffiti nowadays. And even if they do, the vandalism is removed within 48 hours.
Over the past decade, subway vandalism has shifted from graffiti (spraying your crappy initials onto a subway car) to scratchitti (scratching your crappy initials into a window or piece of plastic on the subway car - more costly and time consuming to get rid of than graffiti).
This does not surprise me.
The only way people are going to get a wakeup call is if a group of people got a database of eligible voters from local precincts complete with whatever data is necessary to fake a ballot, go into said precincts, and make it look like some unknown Non-Democrat/Non-Republican party candidates (who wouldn't have won anyways) won the election.
Alternately, it would humor me if some "terrorist" organization used this hole to severely screw up the vote by mass-wiping voting terminals/databases.
BTW: How would someone catch this before it's too late? Most precinct staff are volunteers, and they definitely can't see who voted what...
I'm going to have to agree with you here, although I'm going to go a bit further.
While it can be argued that video games *may* incite violence in kids, you have to look at the big picture first. Those in the United States and abroad, over the last decade or so, have been embracing violence (and sex) as a major part of their culture. Combine that with a growing lack of responsibility among people (especially in the USA) and you've got a problem.
Don't believe me? Look at movies. Look at television. Look at the most popular sport in the United States. Look at how successful wrestling (even through it's fake) has been. Look at our print media. Look at those considered to be "role models" and how frequently they get in trouble with the law. Do I need to go on further?
You *cannot* blame the video game manufacturers for violent kids. Most of the games considered extremely violent were created to satisfy the wants of older gamers (a very big part of the video game market), not to keep little kiddies occupied. The warning labels placed on games clearly state that some games are NOT intended for younger audiences. Smaller video game retailers won't even sell those types of games to children (or parents before asking for consent). Surely responsible parents would make sure their kids aren't playing inappropriate games, right?
I grew up with video games. I didn't become a violent member of society (I'm only 19). I've played all of the games that supposedly make kids violent at a decently young age (10-16). However, when I was younger my parents actually stressed the fact that video games aren't real and that I shouldn't go around emulating what I see on television, video games, etc.. Maybe that had something to do with it?
I'm not saying video games aren't responsible. I'm not saying they are responsible. I'm saying that there are other factors that need to be addressed before people can come out and point their fingers at video games.
In other words, every lazy user that downloads lame with a frontend or some other encoder without modifying default settings and that leaves the ID3 tag alone (most use CDDB/Gracenote or freeDB to generate an ID3 tag, resulting in identical tags) will end up with the same MD5 hash when compared to someone else who did the same thing with the same CD. The only ways you're going to get a different MD5 checksum from an MP3 file is by: A) using a different encoder B) using a different version of an encoder C) modifying the ID3 tag D) deleting the ID3 tag E) changing the file name F) modifying the file in an audio editing program Don't forget that the RIAA is probably also using CRC checksums to identify specific albums, as many encoders also support inserting CRCs into MP3s by default (and these will be identical for rips coming from the same album regardless of bitrate)
So that's where Bandai got the idea for the nasty sideeffects of "The World"... Kinda makes you wonder what would happen in real life is something like that actually happened.
why can I never remember to login before posting?
I tried soldat out about two weeks with a bunch of friends that have cable or DSL. The game lagged quite a bit even with three people playing simultaneously. More than six people was annoyingly lagged and nearly unplayable (like Ragnarok Online in open beta). And yes, we did rotate game hosting duties, so no it didn't lag because the person hosting the game was slow.
Yeah, you might be able to play Soldat on a slower computer, but you can't do medium to large multiplay on a 56k with it...
Snake? What are you eating? Snake?! SNAAAAAAAKE?!