Posts by (AMPC) Anonymous and mostly paranoid coward 168 publicly visible posts • joined 13 Jan 2010
Well in the interest of fairness, I tuned into an interview with Senator Christopher Dodd (http://www.bloomberg.com/video/83704616/), who is now chairman of the MPAA. Although once a respected politician, he does seems to epitomize the clueless legions of big money moguls who think they know what is best and say "just get it done and screw the details".
If Hollywood really needs to go after pirates to save their dwindling fortunes, let them at I say. But don't ask for even more restrictive ad useless legislation. There are already courts and lawyers aplenty where you can spend your profits. The WTO's 153 members have all agreed that copyright infringement is wrong. Of course it would be a whole lot cheaper if you could just control the inter-tubes like the airwaves, but it ain't gonna happen because your industry won't live long enough. I'm sure the horse and buggy manufacturers would have loved to stick it to Henry Ford via Congress, but it just won't work
To Senator. Dodd, I would say the real challenge is to find some way to combat piracy which continues to "meet" all of the following criteria:
1) Target real villians (like those who SELL stuff they don't own, as opposed to grandmas who just want to listen to those old show-tunes one last time and are much easier to catch and prosecute). I would lump product counterfeiters into this group as well. I suspect this actual group is relatively small (unless you include Google et al and their many wierd and wonderful links and the entire interweb population who use search engines). That is indeed a very big number. Perhaps the MPAA should target these people as customers instead of crinimal, free-loading scum. I'm sure we would all appreciate it (and you) a lot more.
2) Puts and restricts the power to target truly bad folks (see above) into the hands of legally recognized bodies, i.e. courts, international law enforcement agencies, etc. This is sometimes done (and considered SOP) against real criminals such as drug lords and child pornographers. Such bodies need to be subject to review and face accountability for their actions. We should not use the same techniques against grandma / college students as those used against the billion dollar a year drug baron. No the punishment and enforcement should really fit the crime. Even during prohibition days, the Feds did not hose down the gin drinkers with lead bullets (unless they got in the way).
I personally don't consider the chronic freetard file-sharers as criminals, they are more accurately just misguided (and probably poor). Much like jailing the addict, jailing the freetard will do little to counter the real cause of drug addiction/piracy. Lowering the price of entertainment media would be a more intelligent and creative approach.
3) Allow any people who have been targeted by any cease and desist orders the time to contest and protest these actions, legally. Terms to be defined, oh wait, we already have laws like this. Are they going to be replaced by more anti-constitutional SOPA laws? Are the original laws not working? You mean people will still not take their family to the cinema anymore (which costs about 80 USD where I live). Does that mean we need more laws to change human nature (and econimic sense) and cause people to over-spend? The 1930's Depression was a boom time for the entertainment industry because it helped people forget their troubles. Maybe you should ask your accountants to explain why that isn't happening during this Depression.
4) Definitely not perform "shotgun" censorship of linking sites, domain names etc, this is just criminally stupid. Maybe we do need to force some ISPs to take down some egregiously and outrageously infringing sites, going through the local courts where the ISP is domiciled (even though it will always be a waste of time and money). Yes, the infringers will move elsewhere. No you will never be fast enough to stop them all. So deal with it. Media companies do not need to control internet access any more then they do already, they just need to compete on the provebial level playng field. Sadly, competing inside a new paradigm can be very hard when you can't (or won't) understand it. That would require clear-headed and innovative thinking, something that is clearly in short supply in the media industry's head space.
5) Stop basing bad legislation on bull-shit statistics. How in the hell can online piracy cost the ecomomy 100 billion a year? That's twice as much as people spend on drugs and probably a lot more than is spent on malaria prevention. Where is this money going? Who is getting it? Give us some facts, senator. Show me the money. Show me the freetards living in obscene opulence with their ill-gotten gains (I am not talking about your supporters). Show me why stopping people from getting free music is more important than investing money into better education, renewable power, better infra-structure or simply allowing online commerce to continue flourishing without governmental interference. Do (I am probably going out on a limb with this one) googles, ebays and youtubes ask the government to protect them from the nasty bullys on the playground who stole all their marbles ? No! Successful companies innovate, invest, invent and think about how to best harness one of the coolest things ever created by mankind: THE INTERNET. They then try to make some money with their new ideas. Sometimes they succeed. Why doesn't the MPAA promote that kind of thinking instead? Why do I have to spend so much money to see a film that might be complete garbage? How long do you think that will keep working as a business model?
This is not a Hollywood blockbuster plot line, boys, where shining hero wins against evil pirates with his magical legislative powers and influence. It is the future. And the future is leaving some people very, very far behind. Such a shame that these same people all seem to be concentrated in a few very distinct locations, such as Capitol Hill and the pockets of rich media and entertainment moguls. Good luck....
By their fruits ye shall know them....
Matthew 7: 16
In my humble opinion, this old fart's senile tweeting must surely be the kiss of death for SOPA: Hopefully,it will smother ugly sister PIPA, as well. And if we are really lucky, we might even add the careers of a few technically illiterate legislators to the funeral pyre or force them back into school. Pass the matches and RFCs, please......
Seriously tho, if this latest show of support doesn't bury the SOPA manure six feet under and fast, then we are truly done for. The "Old media" dinosaurs must either get wih the program and learn how to use digital tech properly and ethically or get out of the media business completely and follow Rupert into the yawning tarpit of irrelevance. The world has changed guys, its time to move on. And Hollywood, I don't think your little stealth operation in Congress is gonna raise DVD sales, either. ...Tell all your friends... Rupert Murdoch loves SOPA !!!!!!!!
Bob Roberts, great film download it...
Seriously folks, ONE politician is standing up and protesting against a seriously f*d up bill with sensible arguments. Who cares about his motives? Is it possible he might actually be trying to protect First Amendment rights and the constitution from being permanently fragged for all Internet users? I wish there were a few more like him
An interesting (if not slightly hysterical) take on the whole SOPA shenanigans. In a strange kind of way this video all makes sense, because if you encourage everyone to pirate stuff, you can then tell Congress how terrible it all is and then legislate your way to a full or partial control of the internet. Luckily, the internet doesn't lend itself too easily to centralized control (and shouldn't, ever). Thats the only good news.
Regardless of your stand on internet piracy, any law which allows blanket and unregulated restriction of people's access to the internet is CENSORSHIP and is WRONG. If a site is bad, it should be taken down by legal means or just boycotted. There are plenty of laws out there to combat child porn, hate speech etc. on web sites. I'm OK with that because these laws at least try to stamp out evil behavior with some due process and oversight. But copyright is a CIVIL matter, NOT a CRIMINAL matter. As soon as we start filtering access to "foreign" sites that host MP3 files, we will become as bad as the Chinese. We will turn everyone into a thought (or at least listening and viewing) criminal and everyone will want to become anonymous (pun intended). THIS IS AN EXTREMELY BAD IDEA. A government that takes this dangerous step does so at its own peril.
In fact, if that bill is passed, we will all be very, very sorry, particularly the record companies. People will simply skirt the regulations in their millions. Hopefully, they will also begin boycotting the a*wipe companies who promote this insanity and now have the power to take down their favorite websites.
I don't download music or films, but the next big thing I will be watching is how people work around whatever feeble attempts are made to enforce this idiocy. If you really want to hurt the people who are promoting this transparent land-grabbing crapola, don't waste too much time writing to your "elected representative", write to the bill's sponsors and tell them you will stop buying their products and stop viewing their content. Tell your local news station really they need to look at the SOPA debate and tease out the issues if they are a free press. Tell other people to stop buying their products and their advertiser's products if they don't! I for one, am really looking forward to blackout day. I will celebrate it by leaving the television OFF and seeing how many sites GO DOWN.
This is precisely the sort of govt behavior that data -sharing laws are supposed to protect citizens against.
In this particular case, here are some legitimate questions and possible scenarios:
Under what circumstances will the UK Gov do this cross-referencing? Will it be
1) They need some kind of probable cause before they can cross-check someone?
2) They simply hoover up all the data and do a cross-check on everyone currently claiming tax benefits or the dole?
3) New and old claimants will be required to waive their right to data privacy before they can receive any (more) money?
Out of all the above scenarios, only number 3) seems remotely fair and then only if the people who apply for a credit rating from Experian sign the same waiver.
I don't like people who cheat on benefits either, but I like Big Brother a lot less. How can this possibly work without trampling all over people's digital rights and civil liberties? Not to mention the precedent it sets for even more intrusions in the future. Slippery slope....slippery slope....
I first had my attention drawn to TMS when they were advertising 1,000,000 IOPS for their RAM SAN (that has now been clipped, probably by the marketing mavens or more truth in advertising).
Sho' enough ..... at these prices flash array may soon become a credible altenative to traditional FC, SATA or SAS disk arrays. So please do rock on... Our heavily discounted FC 4 G/B SAN disks still cost us about 1200 £ a TB a couple of years back. But performance? As usual, it depends on how you crunch the numbers. FC can provide a sustained data burst of up to 700,000 IOPS on something like the DS5000 but I'm not too sure how that raw measurement comparably applies to a flash array. The flash vendors may be using average (or constant) rates over a sustained test to come up with a more realistic figure which takes everything into account (like no platters or disk heads). I still haven't seen a decent and honest race comparison between any of these SSD offerings and current "gold-standard" Fiber Channel products.
For those who could only afford SAS or SATA disk arrays, however, the new SSD products will pound them into the proverbial performance dust (which is why SATA and SAS are nearly always used for comparison, methinks). But then the price differential yawns all the more hugely.
The real sex appeal of a flash SAN array comes from its lower power consumption, faster access, and higher reliability (not to mention the reduced space requirements). But is all that worth paying at least 10x the price of today's high end storage products per TB? Maybe, wait and see.....
If a flash array SAN (I think we will soon need a new acronym here, how about a FASAN?) can do what our big-pig, dually-redundant monolithic FC disk structure does today, better and faster (and more affordably? ...oops) we probably wouldn't buy any new FC storage. But that is still a big IF right now. We won't because we must first amortize an initial large investment. SANs have a comforting tendency (for the buyer at least) to stay in production for a long time ( > 5 years). Our last storage array served reliably for nearly 10 years. Hardware prices tend to become much lower when working within such extended time frames. However, for the budding or established cloud vendor who needs to replace a creaky storage infrastructure, now may almost be the time to go flash (depending on their applications and budget, obviously).
Anyway it is all VERY exciting to watch. But I am glad our shop doesn't need to decide now.
Is it just me, or does this document's security advice look like it is about five years out of date? There is absolutely nothing new or useful here. Just another excuse to spend more taxpayer money "doing something"!
"Something" will probably be this:
******* CLAIRVOYANCE MODE ON *******************
Switch on TV:
Rear view of evil looking man in black hat (BOFH) furiously typing on a keyboard and muttering things like "fucking TOR", "there's my new Ferrari paid off" and suddenly "curses...." BLEEPING RED INTRUDER ALERT!!!! flashes onto screen.
Loud knock on door:
Followed by:
Loud explosion as door flies across the room.
The tactical squad sweeps in and tasers the still-muttering,frothy-mouthed evil hacker into unconsciousness. The squad then take turns kicking his quivering body down the stairs into the waiting black police van.
Voice off:
Remember kids.... "free" music and films, unpopular political views, free-thinking, pornography, social networking with other misfits.... it just isn't worth it.
Sign up and join SafeNet today! Be one of the good guys. You don't need no stinkin' internet.
This message was brought to you be the UK/US/Hollywood SafeNet Initiative.
cool and dramatic music and fade to black.
CUT! Its a wrap!
******* CLAIRVOYANCE MODE OFF *********
Yuk..... I think I just had a very clear vision of the murky near future.
Sadly, these recurring visions would be a lot funnier if they weren't so likely to happen.
I'm counting on fellow reg readers to come up with an excellent catch-phrase for this inspiring new initiative. You know, something snappy on the lines of .. "Just say no....to warez". And no... my non.existent ad agency has not been commissioned to do this gov infomercial, yet.
The real gold rush for smart buyers/decision makers? Why buy from dodgy , flood prone manufacturers in 3rd world countries? You too can speed ahead and beyond the curve. Whoops, why has the SSD advert on the reg stopped claiming 1,000,000 IOPS all of a sudden. Sounds like capitaism to me.
At first read, it looks like another bunch of headline-seeking politicos who will try, once again, to shut the barn door after the horse has bolted. In fact, it is much worse.
The most interesting thing is the very marked extra-territorial character of the proposed bill (I guess "foreign-infringing sites" will become the 21st century's version of "yellow devils", "Godless reds" or "Fifth Column").
Under DCMA, sites hosted within a US Jurisdiction could be "taken down" for various infrîngments. In theory that was OK, but in practice it probably just moved any serious infringers somewhere else. A similar phenomenon occurred when drug-trafficking was more or less squelched within Columbia by the local military and American money. The drug barons simply relocated northwards to Mexico (where they could benefit from NAFTA and be much closer to their main market).
But under DCMA, sites outside of a US Jurisdiction cannot be directly shut down by US authorities (no jurisdiction, you see). So this leaves only one other way to stop these naughty web sites. You must filter them so that users within a US Jurisdiction can no longer access their evil content.
Well IANAL, but this sounds an awful lot like what the Chinese and other freedom-loving goverments do whenever someone's expressed opinions that displease them. Personally, I think this is a real, alive and kicking, loudly-quacking, gold-plated attempt at net censorship. I would argue that It is being proposed by a self-absorbed, misguided nanny state that now thinks it knows what is best for its inmates (and some corporate interest groups).
This bill will never prevent any dedicated wikileaks whistle-blower or downloader from doing his thing for very long (the obvious focus of this idiotic legislative proposal) but it could allow the Attorney General to seek a court injunction against ISPs, domain name holders, telcos (and possibly many others) and force them to restrict any incoming traffic that they the government (for and by the people) cannot touch themselves (i.e. they will take sites down logically instead of physically). In a single swoop, every netizen can be presumed guilty of thought crime. A site that sometimes criticizes public officials (like this one) and then maybe links you to sites that MIGHT have infringed somebody's copyright (like You Tube) can now either be prosecuted or banned from Amerikan distribution. I don't really want to see a take-down notice on the Register or any other web site I visit, but apparently some people think that is what it will take to improve record sales.
So NO, I don't like the sound of this at all. It will breed an entire new category of cyber-criminals. The new cyber criminals will be all the many netizens who now must find better and easier ways to work around this law after deserting the soon-to-be shuttered You-Tubes and other fellow traveller web sites in their deperate quest to watch rock videos and old Star-trek episodes for free.
American legislators should not be wasting their energy protecting companies with out-dated business models that can't or won't accept a new wired world (with all of its warts and growing pains). This new world holds a lot of promise for the future (and some sorely needed creative destruction). The US legislators would be better off spending money laying fiber everywhere and letting the cyber chips fall where they may. Then people might stop occupying Wall Street and start building businesses again.
But at the same time, customers aren't complete idiots as the market share steadily disappearing to anti-Iphones will attest. I have an Iphone (dont hit me, I like the interface) but if I could not slip in my favorite SIM or operator, I would dump it pronto for a less restrictive device. If Apples business plan is to lock in operators and users even further, I can not really see that working for long. Poor Steve.... I can not believe this was his last big idea
Finally, an amusing and harmless way to spend a Sunday afternooon...... pure genius!!
I think we need a Facebook page for those clueless wireless neighbors and call it something like ..... I don't know... Wild and Wacky Wireless Pranks? Are there any more good stories out there ? Please share. Nothing like a little hands-on education...
I was an early adopter of SP1 (a couple of days after its release) and I enjoyed the following seamless experience:
1) My work Laptop. SP1 successfully installed via Windows Update after two tries,
2) My fathers Desktop. SP installation failed repeatedly but the system rolled back every time. Mind you, I didn't hit the power button like some end-users might do.
In the end, and after many failed attempts to defeat the evil SP, I took out the Windows 7 upgrade CD (which was fortunately available) and performed an in-situ upgrade of the OS, fully expecting the worst to happen. To my utter amazement, Windows 7 happily upgraded itself (although all subsequent WSUS updates obviously had to be re-applied) and then very happily swallowed SP1 after A SINGLE try. That method was recommended on an MS Blog in response to many desperate inquiries by people like meself.
I am not saying this was fun. And I'm dead certain I'm not the only one who was bitten in the ass by SP1. I am just happy I discovered the good news before approving SP1 distribution on our corporate network's WSUS server (but no one should do that with a major service pack anyway, and yes you don't have to approve every update with WSUS, but you do have to learn how to drive WSUS). So I wouldn't rush to roll out SP1a , I'd wait until MS fixes itsgremlins. Alternatively you can test it in a quiet corner on an unimportant machine if you have an afternoon to spare . And dats da truth, o skeptical ones. The sky does sometimes fall.
We could call it self-defense-ware. You run an app in the background (like an AV program) that detects malicious websploitation signatures or activity and knows their current vulnerabilites, while you surf. Whenever you hit a nasty web-site or link, you get the following pop-up screen:;
https://www2.buggerthemall.net/scamland/poke_me.html has tried to probe your version of IE with the following exploit: my_favorite_trojan.w32
Don't take it lying down!
What would you like to do?
1) Shoot it down !
Download and run latest version of the correct retaliation tool or exploit (default choice)
2) Tell your friends !
Update shared repository with this evil URL so all your fellow app-users can attack it too.
3) Piss and Moan !
Send a complaint to the registration authority and/or ISP hosting this nefarious site.
4) All of the above !
Self-defense-ware INC. is registered in a country with no extradition treaties or liablity laws so don't blame us it when it all goes horribly wrong. This tool has been designed for research purposes only.
As a product launch, we can set up a public internet scoreboard, and download the latest list of identified websploit sites for a day of fun and games. Cool or what ?
Can you imagine the chaos? Sometimes I even scare myself.
When the entertainment and media industry finally realize that digital distribuion is something to be embraced rather than feared, we might finally get somewhere, unfortunately, they and their political lackeys continue to forget some simple facts:
NO ONE (or soon no one, in less than 14 years is my guess and I am being VERY generous) will want to buy, store and then retrieve music, film or TV programs from eco-unfriendly devices like CDs, VHS or vinyl (he he) anymore. Even books and newspapers could disappear one day. This physical distribution model just makes no sense. We want to ênter our homes, our cars, our public transport systems, our friends homes, etc. and quickly fetch that old Bogie film or that obscure or not so obscure new wave or acid-house tune (or the latest block buster) and quickly download it to the nearest wall/PC/Phone screen and watch or listen to it on our I-pod/media streamer, etc. I suspect most of us would pay a fair price for this ULTIMATE convenience, without a second thought. Look how much people will pay for an IPHONE already.
Unfortunately, media companies either do not understand or refuse to understand this new business model. If they weren't all paralyzed by greed and short-sighedness , they might even start calculating how much they could save in production and legal costs by letting go of the old model. But that would be too easy, so maybe a Pirate Party can help reduce the madness or at least start a debate.
There is probably only one practical way to sort out this mess, and here it is,
1) Charge every internet user a set fee for unlimited (or nearly unlimited) digiral media content. Lets say 10 USD a month. Lets multiply that by the number of internet users and see how big that number is,
2) Pool this money into an artists and creative producers fund.
3) Convince artists and CPs to upload their content to a centralized, regulated distribution network which will help manage Internet download and consumption (for a small cut of the profits, not 90 % of it, Hollywood style). Of course, they should be free to distribute their content by traditional channels if they wish.
4) Everytime a user watches or downloads a work of art from this distribution network, give the legal copyright owner a fairly-established royalty payment from this pool, it might only be 0.00001 cent each time, but if your product is good you will prosper. Likewise, if your product is not that good, you might have to keep your day job. This is a much better solution that cutting off people's internet access when they want to listen to your music.
5) Whether we like it or not, this is the model people are already embracing in their millions. They just aren't paying for it.
6) If I were a media mogul, I would be figuring out how to make the above model work for me, or be out looking for a new day job. I would not be lobbying politicians to help stave off the inevitable.
The problem isn't whether or not copyright should be extended or abolished, it is about creating a fair system that benefits producers and consumers. The current system isn't fair which is why people are voting with their keyboards and fast broadband connections. That isn't going to change, no matter how many idiotic laws are passed,
Where the f*K is my remote control?
I think the infatuation comes from all those shock-horror stories of police force's ineptitude in the use of "non-lethal" weapons. It's kind of reassuring to know that jilted lovers can also zap people. Perhaps zap people who are wearing pacemakers, mentally handicapped, intoxicated, epileptic or just incapable of handling the 10 KV joy ride. When we are accustomed to the idea of people settling their differences with miniature pink cattle prods, then gun control might even catch on. Lets face it, most handgun homicides don't even make the front page anymore.
You will only pry my taser from my burnt, still-quivering fingers!
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