Not knowing that ms "innovated"/"invented" terraserver, I tried to "google" for "microsoft buys terraserver" and "microsoft acquire terraserver" but stumbled upon this:
"BARC was chartered to develop scalable server technology, and its most visible product was the Microsoft TerraServer. Launched in 1998, TerraServer, which currently runs on a Windows 2000 SQL Server cluster, is existing proof that Windows can reliably serve terabyte datasets to a worldwide audience."
Now, this second bit (excerpts from Dan Gillmor of SJ Mercury News:) is slightly off-topic or dated, but it talks about ms competing with Google and settling (cumulatively $3 billion) with companies it "trampled over"..:
"Linux and other open-source software remain the best hope for actual competition, at least in more traditional computing markets. More and more corporate customers are finding open-source at least a plausible alternative.
Microsoft has been forced to lower its prices and offer cheaper versions of its products in several countries where Windows and Office are prohibitively expensive in local terms. If this spreads, it's a good sign. China's Linux push, meanwhile, is adding some pressure."
wherein ms buys "certain technology" from China...
"Microsoft already offers its MSN Messenger instant messaging service and the MSN Hotmail e-mail service in Chinese, but said the new venture will deliver more comprehensive communications and information for the 94 million Chinese who were online in 2004."
I wonder how much of this deal includes a demand to embed citizen tracking technologies into cellphones beyond what is normally possible for cell carriers. PRC might be "PeepHole Remote Control" (pun...intended...)
"yea, i don't have a clue what that is:/ im curious tho"
Data-onian/Tuvokian response...
As far as I am able to ascertain, Captain, it appears to be a 20th-century aphorism or threat tactic for "Colon Slash". I surmise it was a technique used to bombard the bullseye of the target's organic disposal chute.
We recommend you download one of the browsers above, or you can try to load Google Maps in your current browser.
Hmm, is this a plug-in feature deficiency or a KDE.org issue not addressed?
Second Comment:
I imagine that regardless of the OS in use, this kind of service will only become more useful to evildoers that want to pinpoint buildings to level, power transformers to breach, and roads to clog up. Geez, thanks! Most people don't need this kind of service, except events planners, infrastructure managers and maybe tour guides, emergency services and real estate manages. But, the average joe/jane probably only will get a "gee, this is nifty stuff..." feeling then move on to the next mesmerising item of the day/web.
I wonder if mshaft (lower-casing/name deprecation intentional/perpetual with me) will trumpet this:
"We innovate! We make it EASIER for Al Quaida to pinpoint their next targets. Since google (lower-casing/name deprecation on the part of my about google intentional/perpetual)" refuses to go global with buildings in more than overhead angles and refuses to expose the world, WE, microbomber, will innovate terrorism by providing 45-degree angles of not only the US, but of the WERLD. We are equo-oppotunity inhancers of tehro-rizm."
Ajax and Jason combine forces to rid the world of evil SCUM... (like certain (among but not all of) politicians, world figures, rogue secular/organized religious zealots, baby snatchers, paedophiles, embezzlers, larsonists, arsonists, FUDmasters, ms, and others...
Wow, "To confirm you're not a script,..."
Now, that's reminiscent of the cleanser Ajax, hehe...
Not to be persnickety or overly didactic, but I realize that a ship's hull is moored far more often than it is docked, but I served aboard two ships which were drydocked for several months at a time.
The US will eventually try to tie non-disclosures, non-compete, and punitive measures clauses to entry/exit visas.
Via tested biometrics, security logging, and other apparati, the US will persecute, prosecute, and punish legally any reentering student who managed to exit but who was determined to have broken knowledge clauses prior to or after departing the US with a degree or after having gained access to said sensitive/jealously-guarded knowledge.
Really, though, this is yet another hare-brained US attempt at stabbing the EU and Chile and Brazil and China and others in the eye for taking anti-US stances on patent laws the US has been exporting like cigarettes and ambassadors...
They'll just call the cops like the OfficeDepot (IIRC, or was it WalMart?) employee who called the cops on the man paying his purchase or his balance in $2 bills. But, in this case the cops will arrest you for presenting, carrying or using false/non-personal ID. If you have no conflicting but authentic ID, they'll detain you for 24-48 hours to ascertain your identity. At that time, having confirmed you attempted (or were going to attempt) fraud, they'll arrest you with evidence and charge you accordingly.
If you work in the tech or "trust-demanding" industries, you'll likely lose your job, some creditworthiness, and maybe more. Maybe even do community service, embarrass your family, and set a bad example for kids...
I have a friend who has a SHLOAD of PS/2 and similar games (legit, in cases/sleeves). He has them neatly, lovingly stacked/organized, with a sign above:
"Enjoy Here; No Borrowing"
I wonder how long it will be before people go to full-service Internet Cafes which set up policies to pre-alert users that the machines COULD be bugged/wiretapped.
NO federal warrant will EVER prevent ME from posting warnings on my i/cafe machines, should I ever set up one. ALL the machines will be hand-built, from componentes shopped randomly. Each machine will have a cert that ttbook (to the best of our knowledge) no machine was bugged/wiretapped when built. Each is inspected every other day. Under our supervision, you will be allowed to disassemble, RF-scan, and bug check our machines and tell US if they are bugged surreptitiously.
You will have the right to see our sign stating that "As of today, and the previously-named dates, we have not received a federal warrant to wiretap nor any orders not to disclose... in the absense of a date, or should we stop updating, you should assume we've been federally screwed to comply with screwing or attempting to screw you..."
Really, the most sophisticated of the bad guys won't be dumb enough to get caught THIS easily. They'll have ruses and drop sites and even piggyback on legit users, or hijack them outright, and maybe even tunnel right through federal facilities that claim to be secure when they are as weak as anything else out there...
It's GOT to be a trial balloon. IIRC, the patriot act has a number of points or provisions which are to expire soon unless congress (the opposite of PROGress) extends or rewrites them.
Maybe this is a trial, subterfuge vendetta against the librarians who stiffly resisted the initial patriot and other acts that were after library patron information. See, if Illinois approves of it, other states--particularly some of the bible-belt states-- might cause this to be mass-deployed around the US. I do realize that some foreign countries, maybe Taiwan and Singapore, have some rather (western-perspective) invasive mechanisms for tax collection (tho Taiwan just allowed Linux and Mac/Apple users to pay taxes via a recently-deployed piece of software access) and other lawful expeditions/law enforcement, but maybe now the US is seeking out ways of keeping abreast of individual behavior, movements, intents, and such...
"You are under arrest for crimes you WILL commit..." With that, who needs a temporal stability police agency?
BTW, the news jumper-report footage was not of the actual jump-- it was post-leap/splat analysis.
As for the rat and the Deep Rising hero music loop, I can't remember if those of us watching it shoulder-to-shoulder started doing the wave and snapping our necks.
wally censors their Japan-based WalMarts (which happen to be operating under a locally-pronouncable name, vs "wa-dadu-mata-du"...
I was in Japan Dec-Feb, and during what we 'merkuns would call afternoon programming, I saw in the local TV some wester b-movie full of church-cringing profanity, along the lines of...
"Give us the money and we'll let you live."
"FUCK YOU. How 'bout you give ME the money and I'll let YOU live?"
It was worse than that.
What was funny and macabre at once was one morning I watched a comedian/variety show which covered restaurants coping with and eradicating rats. One hired a pest eliminator who (after the cameras were mounted strategically) placed super-sticky tape ALL OVER the floor, the counters and against wall/floor edges. Eventually, one hapless mouse/rat got stuck and began gnawing itself to free the majority of its body from the tape, only to become more stuck. All the while, the soundtrack from "Deep Rising" (all dramatic, and gung-ho and such, from where the movie opens and the speedboat Treat Williams is helming cuts through the rough, rained-on waives: 'Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh,.....) I mean, the music was KEWL, cuz I'd liked it. It set my mind to figuring the track, and lo and behold I had it in my luggage, JUSt for occasions like this and showing friends in the hostel.
But, what was trippin' about the rat's fate was the way Japanese comedy/variety/news shows incessantly, didactically replay scenes... over, and over, and over, as if short-term memory effect reigns over Sake or Fundoshis... The poor rat/mouse, its red eyes (photo effect) flared and panned and zoomed...
But, such didactic replays are not limited to darkly comedic pest eliminations. Once, a man or a couple jumped in a suicide pact from a building and the camera footage that showed the jump point to the splat point was repled over and over as if to find out where JFK's bullet came from. Various angles, math, and trajectory-like analysis prevailed, lasting about 4 or 6 minutes, maybe even 8. After a while it made us in the lounge nearly numbed or cold to the sadness that led to the jumpers' fate.
So, maybe Walmart does censor... After all, loopers in the studios add lines to scenes that are otherwise dull when the principal characters have their backs to the screen and nothing is going on. With the sequence timing on-screen, it's easy to have voice talent come in and fix or adjust things during post production, particularly after a test screening has met with lower-than-expected reaction.
To abominate a teletype typing test line of the USN... ("Now is the time for all good men to serve their country."...)
Now is the time for all good men and women AND foreign governments (and the domestic ones with SPINES and world thoughts, not just domestic thoughts) to join together and buy Red Hat.
Just like the Manchester (or whatever) team's fans might buy them out to hamper some hungry billionaire interested in the team, so should many governments. They could and SHOULD just outright buy up Red Hat. Nevermind that the products are must polished or rushed/commercialized versions of Open Sources/Free/Libre stuff. Just do it as a pre-emptive strike on ms. "Take the war to them", so to speak. Considering the current regime's sentiments about "preemptive strikes", then, fair is fair. Allowing ms to rule all things computerese is tantamount to bolstering "preeminence" of a single nation.
We'll have NONE of that shit. The world belongs to ALL, good and evil, but more to the good, unborn, and those who are tired of the "old-boy network" that pervades in many countries. Now, if only the young would become astute and less greedy and just "retire" the current heads of their respective nations. Maybe we need to retire any politician over the age of 35 or 45 so as to make sure that the country reflects the interests of the eventual caretakers of it, instead of allowing the old stoges to "impress" upon the young THEIR ideas vs those the youth want.
Open Source is an example of what the world COULD be, if proprietary and selfish ideas were to be deprecated.
IBM, Apple, CA and other "large" or potentially more suitable/deserving suitor companies better band together to stop even another HINT of stories like this in which mshaft *might* be thinking of acquiring Red Hat. Red Hat, if bought by ms really WOULD "dead rat".
Not to mention: probably the entire community would scream and fight like hell and fragment like crazy. So, this could be one of mshaft's attempts, and if not an attempt, an eventuality if they fund and fuel the notion they will buy Red Hat...
Moreover, it would be utterly putrid, reprehensible, contemptable, and "votiminus" that mshaft would EVEN get it's bloodied, dirty hands on that much Open Source material and try to "own" or "innovate" it. But, then if others feel the way I do, ms probably would hope for a "mass suicide" or spiritual implosion of the Open Source community. Why? Because many of the licensing schemes designed to PROTECT Linux very well could be used in ms' favor of they buy Red Had lock, stock and barrel. Should that happen, then many devs would either struggle to come up with a new licensed designed to go totally proprietary, thereby undermining the FSF, Lessig, Raymond, and others, OR, mshaft would cause such fear in Open Source developers that they just quit the team out of disgust, thereby, mshaft "puts vinegar in the milk" or sugar in the gas tank.
Disgusting. SHould this happen, I dare say that IF there were to be another target struck in the US and votes were being taken, you KNOW where my ballot would go...
Too bad erudition doesn't always lead to employment. Hence, I am in the process of building a screenplay/manuscript tracking application which I hope to release under dual-licensing conditions.
I'd **prefer** it release to F/LOSS users, but since I'm building it (either as a deployable app or as a prototype by which SO/OO.o developers can try to mimic to help give Linux/Open Source users an addition "flagship product") in Lotus Approach (IANAD (I am NOT a developer)), I have to get my timing right. I also have to copyright it officially, initiate an expensive patent pending process (not to obstruct others from what I am doing, but to prevent the microsofts of the screenplay software industry from trying to pinch off pieces and ideas and then patent them themselves... this way, my ideas are open to all, or to none, but not to just a few greedsters or opportunists...) and STILL try to get the attention of the F/LOSS/Open Source database and GUI tools creators.
Far too many Linux-based apps out there have a "geek edge" (I am not necessarily any better, just frustrated...). It's not apparent to me that there is a mogul or philanthropist or IBM of sorts out there acting as a "best runner-up clearinghouse" for deserving OpenSource/FLOSS apps that are whiled away out of passion but sequestered to privacy out of fear of being exploited by others and to the economic exclusion of the inventor.
I hope to release this thing in the next 3 months and then get feedback on it. I tend to think of myself as an "end-user-oriented" database too developer, but being not a programmer, my focus is on "cool", "neat" and "functional". Hence I stick with Lotus Approach, Lotus WordPro, and other parts of Lotus SmartSuite. I am sorely upset that IBM and Lotus aren't allowing the OpenSource community to have pieces of SmartSuite as a challenge to improve the languishing suite. It ought to be criminal that a suite as nice as SmartSuite is sequestered only to windoze land.
For IBM to port or allow external adaptation of SmartSuite for Open Source users would be, simply/simplistically, along these lines:
1. Target skilled, available, passionate developers who know windoze land and its strengths and weaknesses from a non-zealot perspective compared to Linux/F/LOSS and who are passionate about getting more robust and polished apps to Linux users and corporations
2. Set up and deliver some 25 to 50 laptops preloaded with Wine/Linux and Lotus SmartSuite (alternatively, windoze 98 in Mandrake or Fedora or Debian set up with Win4Lin...)-- these laptops would have to be stripped of data-passing ports or interfaces, electromagnetically sealed, data/key-stroked, and running the minimum of apps, excluding ANY development tools.
3. Insist the developers who opt into the program are to use the laptops for up to 5 hours per day or about 20 hours per week, randomly, but log in to the Internet accounts they have, surf, and correspond via documents created in Lotus WordPro, calculate things in Lotus 1-2-3, and develop ad-hoc database apps based on pre-canned activities by IBM and Lotus to ensure the user/dev/tester is forced to develop and think like a hybrid user/developer within the limitations of SmartSuite (eschewing SO/OO.o... Corel and ms orifice...). The MAIN goal here is that the developers get a feel for the capabilities and limitations of Lotus SmartSuite as compared to OO.o/SO, Corel's suite, and ms orifice.
4. As the users wrap up their 2-3 week testing period, the laptops are returned to IBM, inspected for tampering (you KNOW geeks WILL try to crack or nose around the box...), and the level of individual ingenuity and collaborative work integration is evaluated, IBM then selects some 25 engineer candidates to be whittled down to 15 developers who agree to be flown out to an IBM-sanitized/cleanroom site, with minimal to non-existent facilities for outside visitors. (This is to reduce or eliminate the risk of "external contamination".)
Okay, mshaft (lower-casing/deprecation of mshaft's name intentional/perpetual with me...), here we go...
I've got something for you to do: Put one thumb in your mouth, and put the other up your ass. Now, when I say, 'SWITCH!'...
That probably will work for mscarf, too.
Now, we need a new Linux mantra, too.
"Ours works as well, if not better. Ours works because it's open; you have access. We dont' SCREW you with encrypted code; obfuscated code, security dependent upon obscurity. Our's works because you're not locked in.
If you're un-American, or just non-'Merkun, a foreign government, an enemy of the US-state, well, Linux, F/LOSS, and GPL just werk! You're not at the mercy of code going to the NSA, unless you voluntarily build and optimize code on secure Linux ports.
Ours works because it's based on the LIBRE principles and ideas. You can modify it as you need and have few onerous restrictions in the rebranding and commercial exchange department, but overall, when apps become more windoze-like, well, ms you'd BETTER just "get to work" rather than proclaim a la stolen Apple Mantra "It Just Works"...
What burns me up about SO/OO.o is that I cannot VISUALLY see a sensible metaphor or user interface for dealing with master/detail documents. That is, When I create or use an existing document and want to include newly-created or other existing, disparate documents within that first document, I NEED to see the flow from page one through to the end.
Currently, as I've seen from SO/OO.o since day one is some kludge where you open the main document, then when you insert another doc, it "goes" into some "rule" or in between two horizontal lines, the text of which is mysteriously "somewhere", but not flowing, not even in print preview.
I've asked Sun and OpenOffice.org over the the years to look at other suites, particularly at Lotus' SmartSuite's WordPro, the outgrowth from Ami Pro. LWP has a BRILLIANT, flawless, intuitive, and working interface, and just like spreadsheets that became ubiquitous and nearly unpatentable, so should the WordPro interface.
As for Base... ughh, don't get me started. I feel a sense of "DEBASE" the users. It boggles my mind that Lotus Approach, Borland/Corel Paradox. and mshaft abscess have for YEARS, no, make that almost 2 decades, had stable, mature USER INTERFACES.
I am SICK of the "for-dev-kludge-interface/ me geek, for --me" syndrome that is fostered by the "we are a different app maker, we don't have to do what they do..." political shortsightedness. Yes, in this forum I rant like hell, but usually for things, reasons beyond myself and far beyond bean counters and piss-ant politicians. Lotus, Borland/Corel, and mshaft have collectively spent BILLIONS on user interface R&D, yet OO.o STILLLLLLL has one hell of a primitive, geek-oriented interface that relies too much on calc.
Base should NOT be dependent upon the spreadsheet app, nor the spreadsheet interface metaphor, except for TWO (maybe more) things:
Beyond that, the END (not GEEK) user needs and interface that as much as possible (legally, practically and programmatically) mimics Lotus Approach.
I really wish--since the IBM/Sun rancor won't go away anytime soon-- that IBM, now that it is going into the "services sector", opens up Lotus SmartSuite so that people such as myself, who are developing apps and interfaces sequestered to Lotus Approach and Lotus 1-2-3, could ONCE AND FOR ALL join in on the dev action. I am not a programmer. I am an end user. But, I end up making many of my own interfaces because no one else out there makes quite what I want, or refuses to add features I need, compelling me to do it on my own. For example, I am an aspiring fiction author. I have created a base of characters, their environment, and their basic personality or personal information. I cannot possibly do this work in SO/OO.o with the ease that I have had with Lotus SmartSuite. I would never dream of doing it in ms abscess, as abscess demands TOO much programming once beyond a certain point. I also tried Paradox, but when I found, or was given, a copy of Approach (well, Lotus SmartSuite for windoze 3.1 and for OS/2) by a former manager and his manager who saw my plight and ignorance in using a word processor and spreadsheet to manage, I was in heaven. Even the venerable FileMaker (which took too damned LONG to get to windoze, and Alpha 3/4/5, which were close but not quite as neat and streamlined as Approach) couldn't do for me what I needed.
Now, I've tried various Open Source alternatives, and for the stage at which I've gone, they cannot compete. They lack various features, have very little developer commitment, or just have geeky interfaces that I won't DARE pass on to end users for profit or for free. I need a simple approach like Approach, which is a non-geek, non-programmer front end to relational databases who DON'T want to program.
Over the years, every single time at which I thought I was at crossroads in having to learn to program, Approach or Approach users in forums gave me tips or insight that yet a
As for the Click Inflators, Google should DEflate them...
Google should hurry up and automate their scripts to track the multi-click abusers and then deny them the ads information.
If the contract (lega/business, not SOCIAL contract) between Google and the ad spot placers is written to account for this, then Google could exercise its option to exORcise the offending ad/content owner, just by not passing and not telling them they have information.
Then, when an inquirer picks up the phone to place an order for a product, an order not directly attributable to the ad on Google, the CSR will log the caller and the claim that that an ad on Google led them to make a purchase (and the number of however many times the con/Prosumer saw and considered the ad prior to making the call for infomation or the consummate a purchase), which then won't jibe with that company's own "placements" they paid for.
THen, Google can say, well, you're playing games with our system, which tries to be fair, but your games are exploitative, deceptive, abusive, and unctuous. You're being uncouth, greedy, manipulative thieves, stealing from US the price you are supposed to pay, or agreed to pay. We could take you to court, but then you'll cost US money and time and personnel resources. So, we'll just delay or deprive you of your ads/banners hits information.
This will either enlighten or starve the abusive companies.
Now, being a Libra and trying to consider the implications of "SOCIAL CONTRACT" of accepting ads for access to free content...
I don't currently believe I SHOULD be bombarded with junk, nor should cookies be foisted onto my system. Cleaning that SHIT up is time-consuming, enraging, and makes me conjure up "get-even" schemes. It's tantamount, no, it's EQUAL to TRESPASS. So, were I a programmer or someone skilled in cookie decryption, I'd break those cookies open, implant bullshit into them, and then send them on their way.
Is there a product to do that? I'd pay $100 for it, JUST to be able to poison, not just delete, cookies and that cookie monster reconstruction stuff that's floating around. When a person says, "DON'T TRACK me", WTF does that mean to ad sponsors? Anything? Nothing? A big "SCREW YOU, browser/person"?
I guess soon, though, the people like me will see their downloads increasingly throttled down as punishment or spite.
I realize that a number of sites DEPEND upon receving ads so they generate revenue to offset operating costs, and I am considering setting up a website, a blog, or other interface that may also dependd upon having advertisers. But, my advertisers of choice will be SCREENED, whittled, and chosen tailored to my site visitors, and now allowed to just willy-nilly/surreptitiously/sneakily obtain any and all kinds of information from my visitors.
Any visitors who DON'T want to be tracked are likely so small a number as to be negligible. Advertisers OUGHT to respect that, and fear it, but they so much fear it or bullishly abuse their position that they force it down most people's throats. Either they are, or the site pushing or receving the cookies from routing sources are spending an INORDINATE (30 seconds, and longer) trying in VAIN to get a response from my and other people's browsers when a damn cookie is being blocked or not allowed onto the machine (yep, I locked down my Konqueror temp cache (gave it to root, but I browse as my own user) for my username so I no longer store cookies. I tell Konqueror and Firestarter to deny such and such IP and host name, and when the cookies from those particular sites I deny still show up, I become enraged, but I don't break any laws. Were I a lesser person, I'd start an "Anti-Cookie Exec Bounty Hunter" organization...
David Syes
Re:The question every firefox user is asking INT..
on
Opera 8 Released
·
· Score: 1
WTF?
"Does FIREFOX allow me to 'archive' a web page like Konqueror can?" (Notice in Konqueror on the menu bar that little globe icon with 2 dog-eared corners (SW & NE) and one white dog ear, (SE))
Unless I'm missing it (not sighting it in FIREFOX), THAT is one reason I don't use FIREFOX, and stopped using Opera, for that matter, tho I LIKE Opera. I imagine tho that, if FIREFOX adds the feature, downloads in the windoze land version of FIREFOX may triple. (I don't surf with windoze, only using win98 in Win4Lin 4.0, in Mandrake 10.0 (there was no Mandriva, hehhe, at rel. 10.0), due to my addiction to Lotus SmartSuite, particularly Lotus Approach and Lotus WordPro, for the things they give me won't be available in SO/OO.o for another decade at the rate SO/OO.oo are going... not flamebait, but FACT, as I've asked them to look at and "borrow" to the extent legal, some WP/Appr features, which they can't seem to appreciate from a user's perspective... (slams skull against wall, again...) )
So, FIREFOX/mirrors, get ready for serious bandwidth consumption in the next release. Add site page archiving... Before ms tries to patent it for windoze/iexploder... =======
As for ad blocking, well, with a combination of Konqueror and Firestarter, I block out unctuous cookie and ad-spammers and usually see:
"An error occurred while loading http://ads.somesite.com/?ad_id=3432234324&alloc_id =1342234319&site_id=1&request_id=8dfasdfsdf8:
Timeout on server Connection was to ads.somesite.com at port 80"
Or:
"An error occurred while loading http://n3285ad.doubleclick.net/adi/N3285.yahoocom/ B1231090.170;dcadv=852807;sz=728x90;dcopt=rcl;clic k=http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=1246ko9oh/M=320917.6 328163.7310618.313120/D=mail/S=150500004:N/EXP=111 3953061/A=2619669/R=0/*;ord=1113945861811890?:
Timeout on server Connection was to n3285ad.doubleclick.net at port 80"
But, it is at the price of very slowwwww page downloads. It''s the price I pay (umm, am WILLING to pay) to let them know I have NO SOCIAL CONTRACT with double-dick. I don't want THEM or their kind cataloging me. I can't win, but at least I can slow down their efforts, a little, tiny bit.
I am sure that I won't be buying any Nikon (or any other mfr's (manufacturers')) cameras that use encyrption to stymie users who want to edit or process photos with other than that camera maker's provided tools.
I can see this as a stage or the first stage of kiosks and stores being set up to "help" users whose film/data/property are locked up in the medium or the camera or such.
When will these manufacturers EVER learn? THEY don't own the toll rights or property rights to PICTURES the camera user/owner shoots? The same goes for cell and PDA makers/sellers who wrap audio/visual content in obscure or obfuscated formats that deny the user the right to access their data on non-Mac/non-windoze machines.
Nikon, you better WAKE UP and knock this crap off. Remember the rule about how much work it takes to recover customers after losing them. If you have been applying or plan on applying this encrypted white-balance information to lower end products... shame on YOU.
Slashdot Mirror
Not knowing that ms "innovated"/"invented" terraserver, I tried to "google" for "microsoft buys terraserver" and "microsoft acquire terraserver" but stumbled upon this:
t erraserver&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&start=10&sa=N
r aserver&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
l sID=90
s iness/columnists/dan_gillmor/10179377.htm
/ special_packages/11622441.htm
microsoft acquire terraserver:
http://www.google.com/search?q=microsoft+acquire+
microsoft buys terraserver:
http://www.google.com/search?q=microsoft+buys+ter
http://www.esj.com/Features/article.aspx?Editoria
"BARC was chartered to develop scalable server technology, and its most visible product was the Microsoft TerraServer. Launched in 1998, TerraServer, which currently runs on a Windows 2000 SQL Server cluster, is existing proof that Windows can reliably serve terabyte datasets to a worldwide audience."
Now, this second bit (excerpts from Dan Gillmor of SJ Mercury News:) is slightly off-topic or dated, but it talks about ms competing with Google and settling (cumulatively $3 billion) with companies it "trampled over"..:
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/bu
"Linux and other open-source software remain the best hope for actual competition, at least in more traditional computing markets. More and more corporate customers are finding open-source at least a plausible alternative.
Microsoft has been forced to lower its prices and offer cheaper versions of its products in several countries where Windows and Office are prohibitively expensive in local terms. If this spreads, it's a good sign. China's Linux push, meanwhile, is adding some pressure."
Now, see:
http://www.jackphelps.net/
which is a CC (Creative Commons) site that has a blurb on Google buying some technology named "dodgeball"...
AND, see:
http://www.broward.com/mld/siliconvalley/business
"Microsoft in deal to launch MSN China"
wherein ms buys "certain technology" from China...
"Microsoft already offers its MSN Messenger instant messaging service and the MSN Hotmail e-mail service in Chinese, but said the new venture will deliver more comprehensive communications and information for the 94 million Chinese who were online in 2004."
I wonder how much of this deal includes a demand to embed citizen tracking technologies into cellphones beyond what is normally possible for cell carriers. PRC might be "PeepHole Remote Control" (pun...intended...)
Bon Read-a-tit...(pun... intended...)
"yea, i don't have a clue what that is :/ im curious tho"
Data-onian/Tuvokian response...
As far as I am able to ascertain, Captain, it appears to be a 20th-century aphorism or threat tactic for "Colon Slash". I surmise it was a technique used to bombard the bullseye of the target's organic disposal chute.
Comment 1:
- 80.074550&spn=0.005622,0.007875&t=k&hl=en
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=33409&ll=26.748651,
is interesting in that Konqueror is not supported by Google.
The site page says:
Your browser is not officially supported by Google Maps. We currently support the following browsers:
IE 5.5+ (Windows)
Firefox 0.8+ (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Safari 1.2.4+ (Mac)
Netscape 7.1+ (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Mozilla 1.4+ (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Opera 7.5+ (Windows, Mac, Linux)
We recommend you download one of the browsers above, or you can try to load Google Maps in your current browser.
Hmm, is this a plug-in feature deficiency or a KDE.org issue not addressed?
Second Comment:
I imagine that regardless of the OS in use, this kind of service will only become more useful to evildoers that want to pinpoint buildings to level, power transformers to breach, and roads to clog up. Geez, thanks! Most people don't need this kind of service, except events planners, infrastructure managers and maybe tour guides, emergency services and real estate manages. But, the average joe/jane probably only will get a "gee, this is nifty stuff..." feeling then move on to the next mesmerising item of the day/web.
I wonder if mshaft (lower-casing/name deprecation intentional/perpetual with me) will trumpet this:
"We innovate! We make it EASIER for Al Quaida to pinpoint their next targets. Since google (lower-casing/name deprecation on the part of my about google intentional/perpetual)" refuses to go global with buildings in more than overhead angles and refuses to expose the world, WE, microbomber, will innovate terrorism by providing 45-degree angles of not only the US, but of the WERLD. We are equo-oppotunity inhancers of tehro-rizm."
"there will be little impetus to apprehend these worthless criminals."
Seems to me,such criminals will be WORTH every penny they collect, heheheh.
What MIGHT be worth LESS is the amount of effort and resources it takes to get the money back.
In Soviet Russia, HONEY nets YOU!
thought...
Ajax and Jason combine forces to rid the world of evil SCUM... (like certain (among but not all of) politicians, world figures, rogue secular/organized religious zealots, baby snatchers, paedophiles, embezzlers, larsonists, arsonists, FUDmasters, ms, and others...
Wow, "To confirm you're not a script,..."
Now, that's reminiscent of the cleanser Ajax, hehe...
If they are:
r s/dun/
i p+naval&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&start=10&sa=N
i p+naval&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
towed into a drydock
secured in a drydock
Not to be persnickety or overly didactic, but I realize that a ship's hull is moored far more often than it is docked, but I served aboard two ships which were drydocked for several months at a time.
But... see:
http://www.shipanalytics.com/MS/SHS.asp
---
http://www.naval-technology.com/contractors/fende
See the (curly quotes) "LASER DOCKING SYSTEMS" section by scrolling down about 2/3rds of the page down...
For reference, here is the Google search I issued:
http://www.google.com/search?q=docking+mooring+sh
http://www.google.com/search?q=docking+mooring+sh
So much for the "lots of complicated maths..." that would "remain a trade secret..."
If this can be done in Matlab or a spreadsheet, then....
Just a matter of time before one of the simulators/games does just this.
Here is my take/spin:
The US will eventually try to tie non-disclosures, non-compete, and punitive measures clauses to entry/exit visas.
Via tested biometrics, security logging, and other apparati, the US will persecute, prosecute, and punish legally any reentering student who managed to exit but who was determined to have broken knowledge clauses prior to or after departing the US with a degree or after having gained access to said sensitive/jealously-guarded knowledge.
Really, though, this is yet another hare-brained US attempt at stabbing the EU and Chile and Brazil and China and others in the eye for taking anti-US stances on patent laws the US has been exporting like cigarettes and ambassadors...
They'll just call the cops like the OfficeDepot (IIRC, or was it WalMart?) employee who called the cops on the man paying his purchase or his balance in $2 bills. But, in this case the cops will arrest you for presenting, carrying or using false/non-personal ID. If you have no conflicting but authentic ID, they'll detain you for 24-48 hours to ascertain your identity. At that time, having confirmed you attempted (or were going to attempt) fraud, they'll arrest you with evidence and charge you accordingly.
If you work in the tech or "trust-demanding" industries, you'll likely lose your job, some creditworthiness, and maybe more. Maybe even do community service, embarrass your family, and set a bad example for kids...
David Syes
Whatever happened to the Reading Room?
I have a friend who has a SHLOAD of PS/2 and similar games (legit, in cases/sleeves). He has them neatly, lovingly stacked/organized, with a sign above:
"Enjoy Here; No Borrowing"
I wonder how long it will be before people go to full-service Internet Cafes which set up policies to pre-alert users that the machines COULD be bugged/wiretapped.
NO federal warrant will EVER prevent ME from posting warnings on my i/cafe machines, should I ever set up one. ALL the machines will be hand-built, from componentes shopped randomly. Each machine will have a cert that ttbook (to the best of our knowledge) no machine was bugged/wiretapped when built. Each is inspected every other day. Under our supervision, you will be allowed to disassemble, RF-scan, and bug check our machines and tell US if they are bugged surreptitiously.
You will have the right to see our sign stating that "As of today, and the previously-named dates, we have not received a federal warrant to wiretap nor any orders not to disclose... in the absense of a date, or should we stop updating, you should assume we've been federally screwed to comply with screwing or attempting to screw you..."
Really, the most sophisticated of the bad guys won't be dumb enough to get caught THIS easily. They'll have ruses and drop sites and even piggyback on legit users, or hijack them outright, and maybe even tunnel right through federal facilities that claim to be secure when they are as weak as anything else out there...
It's GOT to be a trial balloon. IIRC, the patriot act has a number of points or provisions which are to expire soon unless congress (the opposite of PROGress) extends or rewrites them.
Maybe this is a trial, subterfuge vendetta against the librarians who stiffly resisted the initial patriot and other acts that were after library patron information. See, if Illinois approves of it, other states--particularly some of the bible-belt states-- might cause this to be mass-deployed around the US. I do realize that some foreign countries, maybe Taiwan and Singapore, have some rather (western-perspective) invasive mechanisms for tax collection (tho Taiwan just allowed Linux and Mac/Apple users to pay taxes via a recently-deployed piece of software access) and other lawful expeditions/law enforcement, but maybe now the US is seeking out ways of keeping abreast of individual behavior, movements, intents, and such...
"You are under arrest for crimes you WILL commit..." With that, who needs a temporal stability police agency?
BTW, the news jumper-report footage was not of the actual jump-- it was post-leap/splat analysis.
As for the rat and the Deep Rising hero music loop, I can't remember if those of us watching it shoulder-to-shoulder started doing the wave and snapping our necks.
wally censors their Japan-based WalMarts (which happen to be operating under a locally-pronouncable name, vs "wa-dadu-mata-du"...
.....) I mean, the music was KEWL, cuz I'd liked it. It set my mind to figuring the track, and lo and behold I had it in my luggage, JUSt for occasions like this and showing friends in the hostel.
I was in Japan Dec-Feb, and during what we 'merkuns would call afternoon programming, I saw in the local TV some wester b-movie full of church-cringing profanity, along the lines of...
"Give us the money and we'll let you live."
"FUCK YOU. How 'bout you give ME the money and I'll let YOU live?"
It was worse than that.
What was funny and macabre at once was one morning I watched a comedian/variety show which covered restaurants coping with and eradicating rats. One hired a pest eliminator who (after the cameras were mounted strategically) placed super-sticky tape ALL OVER the floor, the counters and against wall/floor edges. Eventually, one hapless mouse/rat got stuck and began gnawing itself to free the majority of its body from the tape, only to become more stuck. All the while, the soundtrack from "Deep Rising" (all dramatic, and gung-ho and such, from where the movie opens and the speedboat Treat Williams is helming cuts through the rough, rained-on waives: 'Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh, Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh,
But, what was trippin' about the rat's fate was the way Japanese comedy/variety/news shows incessantly, didactically replay scenes... over, and over, and over, as if short-term memory effect reigns over Sake or Fundoshis... The poor rat/mouse, its red eyes (photo effect) flared and panned and zoomed...
But, such didactic replays are not limited to darkly comedic pest eliminations. Once, a man or a couple jumped in a suicide pact from a building and the camera footage that showed the jump point to the splat point was repled over and over as if to find out where JFK's bullet came from. Various angles, math, and trajectory-like analysis prevailed, lasting about 4 or 6 minutes, maybe even 8. After a while it made us in the lounge nearly numbed or cold to the sadness that led to the jumpers' fate.
Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh,.. Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh,.. Duh-DUHH-Duhhhh,..
So, maybe Walmart does censor... After all, loopers in the studios add lines to scenes that are otherwise dull when the principal characters have their backs to the screen and nothing is going on. With the sequence timing on-screen, it's easy to have voice talent come in and fix or adjust things during post production, particularly after a test screening has met with lower-than-expected reaction.
David Syes
Heheye, really... non-traceable, non-debilitating?
time ago (in another lifetime)... But, in any case, I'd rather have the fifth bottle in front of me than a fifth frontal lobotomy...
To abominate a teletype typing test line of the USN... ("Now is the time for all good men to serve their country."...)
Now is the time for all good men and women AND foreign governments (and the domestic ones with SPINES and world thoughts, not just domestic thoughts) to join together and buy Red Hat.
Just like the Manchester (or whatever) team's fans might buy them out to hamper some hungry billionaire interested in the team, so should many governments. They could and SHOULD just outright buy up Red Hat. Nevermind that the products are must polished or rushed/commercialized versions of Open Sources/Free/Libre stuff. Just do it as a pre-emptive strike on ms. "Take the war to them", so to speak. Considering the current regime's sentiments about "preemptive strikes", then, fair is fair. Allowing ms to rule all things computerese is tantamount to bolstering "preeminence" of a single nation.
We'll have NONE of that shit. The world belongs to ALL, good and evil, but more to the good, unborn, and those who are tired of the "old-boy network" that pervades in many countries. Now, if only the young would become astute and less greedy and just "retire" the current heads of their respective nations. Maybe we need to retire any politician over the age of 35 or 45 so as to make sure that the country reflects the interests of the eventual caretakers of it, instead of allowing the old stoges to "impress" upon the young THEIR ideas vs those the youth want.
Open Source is an example of what the world COULD be, if proprietary and selfish ideas were to be deprecated.
IBM, Apple, CA and other "large" or potentially more suitable/deserving suitor companies better band together to stop even another HINT of stories like this in which mshaft *might* be thinking of acquiring Red Hat. Red Hat, if bought by ms really WOULD "dead rat".
Not to mention: probably the entire community would scream and fight like hell and fragment like crazy. So, this could be one of mshaft's attempts, and if not an attempt, an eventuality if they fund and fuel the notion they will buy Red Hat...
Moreover, it would be utterly putrid, reprehensible, contemptable, and "votiminus" that mshaft would EVEN get it's bloodied, dirty hands on that much Open Source material and try to "own" or "innovate" it. But, then if others feel the way I do, ms probably would hope for a "mass suicide" or spiritual implosion of the Open Source community. Why? Because many of the licensing schemes designed to PROTECT Linux very well could be used in ms' favor of they buy Red Had lock, stock and barrel. Should that happen, then many devs would either struggle to come up with a new licensed designed to go totally proprietary, thereby undermining the FSF, Lessig, Raymond, and others, OR, mshaft would cause such fear in Open Source developers that they just quit the team out of disgust, thereby, mshaft "puts vinegar in the milk" or sugar in the gas tank.
Disgusting. SHould this happen, I dare say that IF there were to be another target struck in the US and votes were being taken, you KNOW where my ballot would go...
David Syes
Sieg BILE, Sieg BILE...
Oh, wait, that's bilL, heheh...
Where's that bmp/jpg of gates in the brown uniform... I havent' seen it since about 1997 or 98... I guess it's on one of my archived disks...
Meanwhile, beavis and butthead crate their own little:
Lift-Wafter... an IP theft airforce of megalomaniacal and globe-spin-stopping sniff-job... Soon to be Swiffer-Wifter...
Too bad erudition doesn't always lead to employment. Hence, I am in the process of building a screenplay/manuscript tracking application which I hope to release under dual-licensing conditions.
I'd **prefer** it release to F/LOSS users, but since I'm building it (either as a deployable app or as a prototype by which SO/OO.o developers can try to mimic to help give Linux/Open Source users an addition "flagship product") in Lotus Approach (IANAD (I am NOT a developer)), I have to get my timing right. I also have to copyright it officially, initiate an expensive patent pending process (not to obstruct others from what I am doing, but to prevent the microsofts of the screenplay software industry from trying to pinch off pieces and ideas and then patent them themselves... this way, my ideas are open to all, or to none, but not to just a few greedsters or opportunists...) and STILL try to get the attention of the F/LOSS/Open Source database and GUI tools creators.
Far too many Linux-based apps out there have a "geek edge" (I am not necessarily any better, just frustrated...). It's not apparent to me that there is a mogul or philanthropist or IBM of sorts out there acting as a "best runner-up clearinghouse" for deserving OpenSource/FLOSS apps that are whiled away out of passion but sequestered to privacy out of fear of being exploited by others and to the economic exclusion of the inventor.
I hope to release this thing in the next 3 months and then get feedback on it. I tend to think of myself as an "end-user-oriented" database too developer, but being not a programmer, my focus is on "cool", "neat" and "functional". Hence I stick with Lotus Approach, Lotus WordPro, and other parts of Lotus SmartSuite. I am sorely upset that IBM and Lotus aren't allowing the OpenSource community to have pieces of SmartSuite as a challenge to improve the languishing suite. It ought to be criminal that a suite as nice as SmartSuite is sequestered only to windoze land.
For IBM to port or allow external adaptation of SmartSuite for Open Source users would be, simply/simplistically, along these lines:
1. Target skilled, available, passionate developers who know windoze land and its strengths and weaknesses from a non-zealot perspective compared to Linux/F/LOSS and who are passionate about getting more robust and polished apps to Linux users and corporations
2. Set up and deliver some 25 to 50 laptops preloaded with Wine/Linux and Lotus SmartSuite (alternatively, windoze 98 in Mandrake or Fedora or Debian set up with Win4Lin...)-- these laptops would have to be stripped of data-passing ports or interfaces, electromagnetically sealed, data/key-stroked, and running the minimum of apps, excluding ANY development tools.
3. Insist the developers who opt into the program are to use the laptops for up to 5 hours per day or about 20 hours per week, randomly, but log in to the Internet accounts they have, surf, and correspond via documents created in Lotus WordPro, calculate things in Lotus 1-2-3, and develop ad-hoc database apps based on pre-canned activities by IBM and Lotus to ensure the user/dev/tester is forced to develop and think like a hybrid user/developer within the limitations of SmartSuite (eschewing SO/OO.o... Corel and ms orifice...). The MAIN goal here is that the developers get a feel for the capabilities and limitations of Lotus SmartSuite as compared to OO.o/SO, Corel's suite, and ms orifice.
4. As the users wrap up their 2-3 week testing period, the laptops are returned to IBM, inspected for tampering (you KNOW geeks WILL try to crack or nose around the box...), and the level of individual ingenuity and collaborative work integration is evaluated, IBM then selects some 25 engineer candidates to be whittled down to 15 developers who agree to be flown out to an IBM-sanitized/cleanroom site, with minimal to non-existent facilities for outside visitors. (This is to reduce or eliminate the risk of "external contamination".)
5. IBM/Lotus bring from their own or from a cons
Okay, mshaft (lower-casing/deprecation of mshaft's name intentional/perpetual with me...), here we go...
I've got something for you to do: Put one thumb in your mouth, and put the other up your ass. Now, when I say, 'SWITCH!'...
That probably will work for mscarf, too.
Now, we need a new Linux mantra, too.
"Ours works as well, if not better. Ours works because it's open; you have access. We dont' SCREW you with encrypted code; obfuscated code, security dependent upon obscurity. Our's works because you're not locked in.
If you're un-American, or just non-'Merkun, a foreign government, an enemy of the US-state, well, Linux, F/LOSS, and GPL just werk! You're not at the mercy of code going to the NSA, unless you voluntarily build and optimize code on secure Linux ports.
Ours works because it's based on the LIBRE principles and ideas. You can modify it as you need and have few onerous restrictions in the rebranding and commercial exchange department, but overall, when apps become more windoze-like, well, ms you'd BETTER just "get to work" rather than proclaim a la stolen Apple Mantra "It Just Works"...
On second thought: OURS WERKS BETTER."
David Syes
What burns me up about SO/OO.o is that I cannot VISUALLY see a sensible metaphor or user interface for dealing with master/detail documents. That is, When I create or use an existing document and want to include newly-created or other existing, disparate documents within that first document, I NEED to see the flow from page one through to the end.
Currently, as I've seen from SO/OO.o since day one is some kludge where you open the main document, then when you insert another doc, it "goes" into some "rule" or in between two horizontal lines, the text of which is mysteriously "somewhere", but not flowing, not even in print preview.
I've asked Sun and OpenOffice.org over the the years to look at other suites, particularly at Lotus' SmartSuite's WordPro, the outgrowth from Ami Pro. LWP has a BRILLIANT, flawless, intuitive, and working interface, and just like spreadsheets that became ubiquitous and nearly unpatentable, so should the WordPro interface.
As for Base... ughh, don't get me started. I feel a sense of "DEBASE" the users. It boggles my mind that Lotus Approach, Borland/Corel Paradox. and mshaft abscess have for YEARS, no, make that almost 2 decades, had stable, mature USER INTERFACES.
I am SICK of the "for-dev-kludge-interface/ me geek, for --me" syndrome that is fostered by the "we are a different app maker, we don't have to do what they do..." political shortsightedness. Yes, in this forum I rant like hell, but usually for things, reasons beyond myself and far beyond bean counters and piss-ant politicians. Lotus, Borland/Corel, and mshaft have collectively spent BILLIONS on user interface R&D, yet OO.o STILLLLLLL has one hell of a primitive, geek-oriented interface that relies too much on calc.
Base should NOT be dependent upon the spreadsheet app, nor the spreadsheet interface metaphor, except for TWO (maybe more) things:
1. worksheet interface
2. macros/scripts interrface
Beyond that, the END (not GEEK) user needs and interface that as much as possible (legally, practically and programmatically) mimics Lotus Approach.
I really wish--since the IBM/Sun rancor won't go away anytime soon-- that IBM, now that it is going into the "services sector", opens up Lotus SmartSuite so that people such as myself, who are developing apps and interfaces sequestered to Lotus Approach and Lotus 1-2-3, could ONCE AND FOR ALL join in on the dev action. I am not a programmer. I am an end user. But, I end up making many of my own interfaces because no one else out there makes quite what I want, or refuses to add features I need, compelling me to do it on my own. For example, I am an aspiring fiction author. I have created a base of characters, their environment, and their basic personality or personal information. I cannot possibly do this work in SO/OO.o with the ease that I have had with Lotus SmartSuite. I would never dream of doing it in ms abscess, as abscess demands TOO much programming once beyond a certain point. I also tried Paradox, but when I found, or was given, a copy of Approach (well, Lotus SmartSuite for windoze 3.1 and for OS/2) by a former manager and his manager who saw my plight and ignorance in using a word processor and spreadsheet to manage, I was in heaven. Even the venerable FileMaker (which took too damned LONG to get to windoze, and Alpha 3/4/5, which were close but not quite as neat and streamlined as Approach) couldn't do for me what I needed.
Now, I've tried various Open Source alternatives, and for the stage at which I've gone, they cannot compete. They lack various features, have very little developer commitment, or just have geeky interfaces that I won't DARE pass on to end users for profit or for free. I need a simple approach like Approach, which is a non-geek, non-programmer front end to relational databases who DON'T want to program.
Over the years, every single time at which I thought I was at crossroads in having to learn to program, Approach or Approach users in forums gave me tips or insight that yet a
As for the Click Inflators, Google should DEflate them...
Google should hurry up and automate their scripts to track the multi-click abusers and then deny them the ads information.
If the contract (lega/business, not SOCIAL contract) between Google and the ad spot placers is written to account for this, then Google could exercise its option to exORcise the offending ad/content owner, just by not passing and not telling them they have information.
Then, when an inquirer picks up the phone to place an order for a product, an order not directly attributable to the ad on Google, the CSR will log the caller and the claim that that an ad on Google led them to make a purchase (and the number of however many times the con/Prosumer saw and considered the ad prior to making the call for infomation or the consummate a purchase), which then won't jibe with that company's own "placements" they paid for.
THen, Google can say, well, you're playing games with our system, which tries to be fair, but your games are exploitative, deceptive, abusive, and unctuous. You're being uncouth, greedy, manipulative thieves, stealing from US the price you are supposed to pay, or agreed to pay. We could take you to court, but then you'll cost US money and time and personnel resources. So, we'll just delay or deprive you of your ads/banners hits information.
This will either enlighten or starve the abusive companies.
Now, being a Libra and trying to consider the implications of "SOCIAL CONTRACT" of accepting ads for access to free content...
I don't currently believe I SHOULD be bombarded with junk, nor should cookies be foisted onto my system. Cleaning that SHIT up is time-consuming, enraging, and makes me conjure up "get-even" schemes. It's tantamount, no, it's EQUAL to TRESPASS. So, were I a programmer or someone skilled in cookie decryption, I'd break those cookies open, implant bullshit into them, and then send them on their way.
Is there a product to do that? I'd pay $100 for it, JUST to be able to poison, not just delete, cookies and that cookie monster reconstruction stuff that's floating around. When a person says, "DON'T TRACK me", WTF does that mean to ad sponsors? Anything? Nothing? A big "SCREW YOU, browser/person"?
I guess soon, though, the people like me will see their downloads increasingly throttled down as punishment or spite.
I realize that a number of sites DEPEND upon receving ads so they generate revenue to offset operating costs, and I am considering setting up a website, a blog, or other interface that may also dependd upon having advertisers. But, my advertisers of choice will be SCREENED, whittled, and chosen tailored to my site visitors, and now allowed to just willy-nilly/surreptitiously/sneakily obtain any and all kinds of information from my visitors.
Any visitors who DON'T want to be tracked are likely so small a number as to be negligible. Advertisers OUGHT to respect that, and fear it, but they so much fear it or bullishly abuse their position that they force it down most people's throats. Either they are, or the site pushing or receving the cookies from routing sources are spending an INORDINATE (30 seconds, and longer) trying in VAIN to get a response from my and other people's browsers when a damn cookie is being blocked or not allowed onto the machine (yep, I locked down my Konqueror temp cache (gave it to root, but I browse as my own user) for my username so I no longer store cookies. I tell Konqueror and Firestarter to deny such and such IP and host name, and when the cookies from those particular sites I deny still show up, I become enraged, but I don't break any laws. Were I a lesser person, I'd start an "Anti-Cookie Exec Bounty Hunter" organization...
David Syes
WTF?
d =1342234319&site_id=1&request_id=8dfasdfsdf8:
/ B1231090.170;dcadv=852807;sz=728x90;dcopt=rcl;clic k=http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=1246ko9oh/M=320917.6 328163.7310618.313120/D=mail/S=150500004:N/EXP=111 3953061/A=2619669/R=0/*;ord=1113945861811890?:
"Does FIREFOX allow me to 'archive' a web page like Konqueror can?" (Notice in Konqueror on the menu bar that little globe icon with 2 dog-eared corners (SW & NE) and one white dog ear, (SE))
Unless I'm missing it (not sighting it in FIREFOX), THAT is one reason I don't use FIREFOX, and stopped using Opera, for that matter, tho I LIKE Opera. I imagine tho that, if FIREFOX adds the feature, downloads in the windoze land version of FIREFOX may triple. (I don't surf with windoze, only using win98 in Win4Lin 4.0, in Mandrake 10.0 (there was no Mandriva, hehhe, at rel. 10.0), due to my addiction to Lotus SmartSuite, particularly Lotus Approach and Lotus WordPro, for the things they give me won't be available in SO/OO.o for another decade at the rate SO/OO.oo are going... not flamebait, but FACT, as I've asked them to look at and "borrow" to the extent legal, some WP/Appr features, which they can't seem to appreciate from a user's perspective... (slams skull against wall, again...) )
So, FIREFOX/mirrors, get ready for serious bandwidth consumption in the next release. Add site page archiving... Before ms tries to patent it for windoze/iexploder...
=======
As for ad blocking, well, with a combination of Konqueror and Firestarter, I block out unctuous cookie and ad-spammers and usually see:
"An error occurred while loading http://ads.somesite.com/?ad_id=3432234324&alloc_i
Timeout on server
Connection was to ads.somesite.com at port 80"
Or:
"An error occurred while loading http://n3285ad.doubleclick.net/adi/N3285.yahoocom
Timeout on server
Connection was to n3285ad.doubleclick.net at port 80"
But, it is at the price of very slowwwww page downloads. It''s the price I pay (umm, am WILLING to pay) to let them know I have NO SOCIAL CONTRACT with double-dick. I don't want THEM or their kind cataloging me. I can't win, but at least I can slow down their efforts, a little, tiny bit.
I am sure that I won't be buying any Nikon (or any other mfr's (manufacturers')) cameras that use encyrption to stymie users who want to edit or process photos with other than that camera maker's provided tools.
I can see this as a stage or the first stage of kiosks and stores being set up to "help" users whose film/data/property are locked up in the medium or the camera or such.
When will these manufacturers EVER learn? THEY don't own the toll rights or property rights to PICTURES the camera user/owner shoots? The same goes for cell and PDA makers/sellers who wrap audio/visual content in obscure or obfuscated formats that deny the user the right to access their data on non-Mac/non-windoze machines.
Nikon, you better WAKE UP and knock this crap off. Remember the rule about how much work it takes to recover customers after losing them. If you have been applying or plan on applying this encrypted white-balance information to lower end products... shame on YOU.
Interrogative, What THE F..K?
That was a pretty neat:
"OMG F1R57 P057!"
arrangement of "first post" claim by the parent poster.
As for FARK, IFF they have to pay, they'll probably be yelling, "INT WTFARK"?
(And, API might be thinking: "These FARKERS are going to PAY! if they don't PAY...")
(hehehheh, laugh)