Clack

www.ftc.gov/secureyourserver

Does your proxy allow connections from untrusted networks like the Internet? Is there an open relay on your system? Are you using proper access controls for your server? Answer these questions incorrectly and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission would like to have a friendly word with you.

The agency, along with 38 of its counterparts in 26 countries, has -- coincidentally or not -- picked the week myDoom swept the Internet to roll out "Operation Secure Your Server." It is an international effort to reduce the flow of unsolicited commercial e-mail, aka spam.

[...]

It would be impossible to measure the success of the previous campaign, according to Heyder. "We sent out numerous letters and saw a lot of traffic on our Web site. We are assuming people who get this notice would want to address their vulnerabilities for their own sake."

For more information, go the FTC link: www.ftc.gov/secureyourserver.

Full Story on Yahoo!

Now that's one mad cow!

Link via Regressing at its finest

WARNING! Not work safe!

Mad Cow

Watch out for the PLANE!

Link via MeFi

De plane, boss, De plane!

how embarrassing

Georgia considers banning 'evolution'...not the theory, or the curriculum, mind you, but the WORD ITSELF

This was on the front page of the Atlanta-Journal Constitution this morning.

CNN even has a story about it.

From the CNN article:

The state's school superintendent has proposed striking the word evolution from Georgia's science curriculum and replacing it with the phrase "biological changes over time."

[...]

Superintendent Kathy Cox said the concept of evolution would still be taught under the proposal, but the word would not be used. The proposal would not require schools to buy new textbooks omitting the word evolution and would not prevent teachers from using it.

Cox repeatedly referred to evolution as a "buzzword" Thursday and said the ban was proposed, in part, to alleviate pressure on teachers in socially conservative areas where parents object to its teaching.

Umm, excuse me, but don't we have better things to do, like provide a decent education, or, I don't know, maybe, keep drugs and weapons out of schools?

The Stepford Wives Trailer

I heard about this several months ago....The Stepford Wives by Ira Levins is being remade. But, mind you, it's being remade as a comedy. (?)

Starring: Nicole Kidman, Matthew Broderick, Bette Midler, Christopher Walken, and Faith Hill.

You can see the "trailer" (Quicktime required) or visit the Official Movie Site (although, I never found anything about The Stepford Wives on Paramount's site)

Booble infringing on Google's trademark?

I wondered how long this would take....Booble, the adult search engine, has been sent a cease and desist order from Google for trademark infringement. Google says:

[...] We have recently become aware of your website at http://www.booble.com (the Domain Name). This Domain Name is confusingly similar to the famous GOOGLE trademark. Your web site is a pornographic web site. Your web site improperly duplicates the distinctive and proprietary overall look and feel of Google's website, including Google's trade dress and the GOOGLE logo.

Your use of the Domain Name and corresponding web site constitutes trademark infringement and dilution of Google's trademarks and unfair competition under federal and state laws. [...]

Booble's attorney's response? The complete text of both Google's cease and desist letter and the response are here

Update: Funny, funny link inside Booble

men, advertise your size

link from Amorous Propensities: Sex is funny

Liesl Clouse, Senior Sex Columnist suggests advertising the size of your penis to potential hourly/daily/weekly/whatever partners so they can pick what they're looking for without disappointment or astonishment...(oh, and by the way, exactly what's the difference between a Senior Sex Columnist and a Junior Sex Columnist?)

When guys are checking out their prospects for the night, week or whatever, body type is out in the open! There is no "Gee, I wonder if her breasts are big." Everything is visible enough in order to determine size! Guys have it easy. Ladies are unable to scan through the crowd and naturally select the biggest and strongest. Survival of the fittest has no position in this little game. Things could be so much easier if there was some sort of code that we could follow, like those little plastic, colored bracelets in the news recently that the authorities at nearby middle schools thought were sexual innuendos. Well, maybe they should be!

The newest fad - advertise your size! Dark blue for smaller guys, hunter green for medium sized and red hot for those more largely endowed. If you see a guy with a gold bracelet on, that means that he is in prime condition. Not too small, not too big. Slightly different from medium. This new fashion statement will thoroughly aid in the subtle hints that girls should get.

Shh...It's about sex: One size does not fit all

Cardinal Joos faces lawsuit over "pervert" remark

I wrote about the Cardinal's comments earlier in the week.

Now, Yahoo! has a story via UK Gay.com that the Cardinal could be sued under Belgium's discrimination laws.

The country's Center for Equal Opportunities and Struggle against Racism said in a statement that it would push for prosecution over the issue, which it says was made worse by the cardinal's stubbornness.

"The cardinal has stood by his comments, not apologizing and repeating them elsewhere in the media and in front of cameras," it argued in a statement on its Web site on Wednesday.

Meanwhile Catholic authorities in the country have refused to reprimand the 80-year-old Joos, claiming he was speaking in a private capacity.

more referral spam from the Democratic party

remember this entry on Jan 27 about referral spam?

Well, add another to the list:
w_w_w.c_l_a_r_k_0_4.c_o_m

MT-blacklist v1.63 beta is out

from MT-Blacklist/Comment Spam Clearinghouse:

v1.63rc1 incorporates the MT 2.661 feature of comment throttling but also remains compatible with previous compatible versions of Movable Type. This means that you can upgrade MT-Blacklist even if you haven't upgraded to MT 2.661.

Why is that important? Because I have made two badly needed additions to the de-spam functionality. Now, in addition to searching for blacklist matches and IP addresses, you can also search comments/trackbacks for an arbitrary text string or regular expression. This is useful not only for isolating hard-to-find spams or general comments you wish to delete without adding anything to the blacklist, but it is also great for testing out new regular expressions against your current comments or trackbacks for false positives.

Secondly, the de-spam search also includes a 'no filter' option so that you can display all of the last N comments or trackbacks regardless of matching. In light of the recent practice of crapflooding -- where there are not only no URLs or even words, but nothing but random strings included just simply to annoy the ever living crap out of MT users (why must people be assholes?) -- this functionality is essential and obviates the need to clean up via a MySQL interface (if you were even lucky enough to be running MySQL).

Update:Since a lot of people don't read the comments on blogs, Richard (Edifying Spectacle) gives us this link for additional reading:

BurningBird's Stepping Stones to a Safer Blog

What the hell were they thinking?

MeFi (again):

Kaba Kick is russian roulette for kids. The player points the gun at his or her own head and pulls the trigger. Instead of bullets, a pair of feet kick out from the barrel (which is shaped like a pink hippo). If the gun doesn't fire, the player earns points.

The Pink Hippo

You're out!

MeFi gives us this link about Cleveland Indians' minor league pitcher Kazuhito Tadano.

Tadano is asking for "forgiveness" for what he called a one-time mistake. He appeared in a gay porn video.

From the article:

"All of us have made mistakes in our lives," Tadano said, reading a statement in English. "Hopefully, you learn from them and move on."

Shunned by Japanese baseball teams, the 23-year-old Tadano signed with the Indians last March. They think he can make their club this spring.

Tadano gave few details about the video, which he made after his sophomore year at Rikkyo University.

"I did participate in a video and I regret it very much," he said. "It was a one-time incident that showed bad judgment and will never be repeated. I was young, playing baseball, and going to college and my teammates and I needed money.

"Frankly, if I were more mature and had really thought about the implications of what I did, it never would have happened."

Through an interpreter, Tadano added: "I'm not gay. I'd like to clear that fact up right now."

Hmmm, gay for pay? or gay for play?

I hate snakes

OK, it's true. I'm a wuss. But, my natural instinct is to be deathly afraid of the slithering creatures. But, MeFi points to an animated film by Cristobal Vila that is based on a woodcut by M. C. Escher that's beautiful and intriguing both viusally and aurally. Unfortunately, the site is horribly slow, so patience is certainly a virtue here. Watch the film about M. C. Escher's snakes.

Oh, and just for the record, I'm not a big fan of spiders or mice either

CIO of Just Sports responds to SCO

link via Geek News Central:

It seems Just Sports received a letter from SCO to extort request licensing fees for SCO's yet-to-be-proven-in-a-court-of-law intellectual property claims of its code being included in Linux kernels.

Mr. Gavin M. Roy, CIO of Just Sports responds in this letter (Acrobat Reader required).

[...]

Our current understanding of your legal situation is that your organization has yet to prove your claims of SCO intelectual property being included in the GPL based Linux kernel software that SCO itself has distributed under the GPL.

[...]

Before you waste any more of my time or yours, please detail exact information such as the offending lines of code and the kernel version you contend this code is in. Alternatively if your organization agrees, we can re-address these issues after your current lawsuits regarding these issues are finalized.

Rub me the wrong way

None of these links are work safe!

Link via erosblog

Warning: if the sight of large, human mammary glands being self-fondled disturbs you, do not click this link.

Other link of note:Animated Bodies

more referral spam

You know the old saying “Everyday that passes causes me to add another name to the list of people that can kiss my ass?” Well, that’s kinda the way I feel about referal spam on Clack. More referring URLs banned:

w_w_w. v_a_n_i_l_l_a_i_c_e . n_e_t
w_w_w . v_i_s_i_t_c_e_l_e_b_r_i_t_i_e_s . c_o_m

the 1st one sells t-shirts according to a google search for the domain. I couldn’t access the domain, so I couldn’t verify. It is, however, interesting to note that the infamous blogspot.com referral spammer that I’ve talked about before links to the t-shirt place.
the 2nd one was referal spamming adverts for a certain hotel heiress’ porn tape....so....buh bye.

On a lighter note, on January 25, I received over 60 back-to-back comment spam attempts for a certain website that sells a magical pill to increase your “stamina.” They all came from IP address 62.213.67.122 which resolves to rusonyx.ru. A simple note to postmaster including the log files where MT-Blacklist denied the comment resulted in the following message:

Hello!

Our user is notified, at repeated incidents, the contract
will be terminated with him.

So, reporting comment spams to the user’s ISP does bring about results sometimes. Thank you rusonyx.ru for your quick response in dealing with this situation!

New virus alert!

A new virus was discovered yesterday making the rounds. McAfee has now classified W32/Mydoom@mm as a "High Outbreak Risk worm.”

I mention this here simply because the virus spreads so rapidly and spews so many copies of itself through an infected computer that we are having a hard time keeping our mail servers up and running (yes, I work for an ISP).

Please, if you’re reading this and you’re running Windows, make sure your virus scanner definitions are up-to-date!

See this page at McAfee.com for more information.

90% of gays are "sexual perverts" says Cardinal

Link from Bill and Kent's Place on the Web:

A new Roman Catholic cardinal has raised a storm in Belgium - and division within its Catholic hierarchy - by declaring that at least 90 percent of lesbians and gays were "sexual perverts."

"I simply say what thousands of people think. I am willing to write in my own blood that of all those who call themselves lesbian or gay, a maximum of 5 to 10 percent are effectively lesbian or gay. All the rest are just sexual perverts." - Cardinal Gustaaf Joos (story)

Which goes in the shaker with more holes -- salt or pepper?

Ask Yahoo!

... our confidence was strongly shaken when we started researching the matter and learned that this question of dining etiquette is far from set in stone. We found many sources that completely disagreed with each other with complete authority. For example, About.com states that traditionally, pepper was more expensive than its easier-to-come-by companion salt, and so pepper was placed in the shaker with fewer holes to reduce usage. On the other hand, the International Guild of Professional Butlers asserts that salt shakers generally have larger and fewer holes to accommodate the larger, heavier grains that flow faster than pepper, although they do admit there is no manufacturing standard.

CBS says no to moveon.org's TV ad

text from an email I received from MoveOn.org:

During this year's Super Bowl, you'll see ads sponsored by beer companies, tobacco companies, and the Bush White House. But you won't see the winning ad in MoveOn.org Voter Fund's Bush in 30 Seconds ad contest. CBS refuses to air it.

Meanwhile, the White House and Congressional Republicans are on the verge of signing into law a deal which Senator John McCain (R-AZ) says is custom-tailored for CBS and Fox, allowing the two networks to grow much bigger. CBS lobbied hard for this rule change; MoveOn.org members across the country lobbied against it; and now the MoveOn.org ad has been rejected while the White House ad will be played. It looks an awful lot like CBS is playing politics with the right to free speech.

Of course, this is bigger than just the MoveOn.org Voter Fund. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) submitted an ad that was also rejected. We need to let CBS know that this practice of arbitrarily turning down ads that may be "controversial" – especially if they're controversial simply because they take on the President – just isn't right.

http://www.moveon.org/cbs/ad/

Ohio senate passes gay marriage ban

from Yahoo News

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Lawmakers gave final approval Wednesday to a measure banning gay marriage and prohibiting state employees from getting benefits for domestic partners.

The bill is considered among the most far-reaching in the nation because of the benefits ban, which applies to unmarried heterosexual and homosexual couples.

The Senate passed the legislation on an 18-15 vote Wednesday. The House has already approved the bill and Gov. Bob Taft has said he will sign it, pending a legal review.

The measure says same-sex marriages are "against the strong public policy of the state," and aims to counter a 1934 U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) ruling requiring states to recognize marriages from other states in most circumstances.

gay marriage poll annulled

Link via Bill and Ken'ts Place

A couple of months ago, the American Family Association (AFA) posted a poll on its website asking its consituents their postion on gay marriage, but, things didn't go exactly as planned.

According to Wired News

The conservative organization supports a constitutional amendment defining marriage as strictly between a man and a woman, and it planned to forward to Congress the results of the poll, which it expected would support its position, as evidence of Americans' opposition to gay marriage.

[...]

But the AFA never counted on the power of the Internet. And once the URL to the poll escaped its intended audience, everything went haywire. As of Jan. 19, 60 percent of respondents -- more than 508,000 voters -- said, "I favor legalization of homosexual marriage." With an additional 7.89 percent -- or 66,732 voters -- replying, "I favor a 'civil union' with the full benefits of marriage except for the name," the AFA's chosen position, "I oppose legalization of homosexual marriage and 'civil unions,'" was being defeated by a 2-1 ratio.

[...]

Of course, no such poll can be said to represent an accurate picture of popular opinion. But, clearly, the AFA had hoped Congress would take the numbers it planned to produce as exactly that kind of evidence.

Now, Smith says, his organization has had to abandon its goal of taking the poll to Capitol Hill.

"We made the decision early on not to do that," Smith admitted, "because of how, as I say, the homosexual activists around the country have done their number on it."

So what happened?

Against the wishes of the AFA and its members, the poll leaked to the outside. And soon, people like Gabe Anderson began posting it to blogs, social-networking sites such as Friendster and sundry e-mail lists. When Anderson posted it to his blog on Dec. 18, 2003, the anti-gay-marriage position was leading, with 51.45 percent of respondents opposing gay marriage or civil unions.

As of Jan 22, 2004, the poll resuls were:
I oppose legalization of homosexual marriage and "civil unions" 32.50% (280631 votes)
I favor legalization of homosexual marriage 59.68% (515315 votes)
I favor a "civil union" with the full benefits of marriage except for the name 7.82% (67518 votes)

All I have to say is "HA HA HA"

Janklow sentenced to 100 days in jail

This is outrageous! After blowing through a stop sign at 70 miles an hour (see my entry and pictures here), Judge Rodney Steele sentenced Janklow to 100 days in jail....BUT, Janklow will serve the first 30 days in jail, then begin a daytime work release program, in which Steele said he "hoped the former governor would use to teach."

Steele fined Janklow $5700 and ordered him to pay court costs.

So, this is what a motorcylist's life is worth? $5700 + court costs and 30 days in jail? Ridiculous!

Story on Yahoo!

Aerogel used in comet dust collection

from NY Times (free reg required):

On Jan. 2, NASA's Stardust spacecraft flew through a 14,000-mile-an-hour hail of debris from the Wild 2 comet. Under this withering barrage, the ship's objective was not only to survive, but to use a collector made of a bizarre substance to gather an unaltered sample of five-billion-year-old dust and gas ejected by the comet. [...] "It's the lowest density of any solid, and it has the highest thermoinsulation properties. Though it would be very expensive, you could take a two- or three-bedroom house, insulate it with aerogel, and you could heat the house with a candle. But eventually the house would become too hot."

Link to NY Times article found on Kottke.org

WTF?!

so, now, I'm getting referral spammed by the RIAA and the CRIA? I certainly don't give a flying-mouse's ass if RIAA and CRIA scan every page on here, since there's no MP3's on Clack. But, I'm blocking referral spam from them. If they want to visit, go ahead. If they're sending referral URLs as they visit, to hell with them.

The state of whose union?

Andrew Sullivan has a good breakdown of Dubyah's speech last night:

A strong America must also value the institution of marriage. I believe we should respect individuals as we take a principled stand for one of the most fundamental, enduring institutions of our civilization. The premise here is that allowing gay people to marry is an idea that's incompatible with valuing the institution of marriage. But that's the crux of the debate! If this is such an important issue, shouldn't the president explain why he believes that allowing more people to marry is such an insult to the institution? It's not a given. And if it is a given, then the president is simply not "respecting individuals" who differ from him. He's dismissing them as a threat to an institution they merely want to join.

What does the "PT" in PT Cruiser stand for?

Ask Yahoo!

Hooked on crack?

Off to california

Saturn V needs a dermatologist

Having lived in Huntsville, Alabama for a large portion of my adult life, I found this story on /. sad.

It seems that the world's best remaining artificat of the Apollo Program (you know, the one that put Man on the moon the first time?), Huntsville's Saturn V rocket is in a serious state of decay ("'pocked with pits and cracks, and patches of mold and mildew'"). Huntsville has the honor of having what is probably the most complete Saturn V rocket in existence, since the one on display at the museum was originally built for testing. Huntsville's Saturn V is one of only three in existence (and the only one to have been designated a National Historic Landmark), with one of the other two being at Johnson Space Center in Texas and the other at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The US Space and Rocket Center (USSRC) is home to an incredible amount of aviation and space exploration history. There is an SR-71 Blackbird

a full-scale mock-up of the Shuttle

the Saturn V (both upright and a full-scale model on its side), SpaceCamp, Aviation Challenge, and several amusement-park type rides.

From American Society of Mechanical Engineers:

The largest rocket built at the time of the historic first missions to the moon, the Saturn V carried aloft the 45-ton Apollo spacecraft on earth orbital and lunar missions from 1967 to 1972. It also launched the 120-ton Skylab into earth orbit on May 14, 1973.

Design and fabrication of the Saturn V were carried out by a government-industry team, which included the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Boeing Company, North American Rockwell, McDonnell Douglas Corporation, International Business Machines, and their subcontractors. Many of the design features were outgrowths of the earlier development work accomplished by military service organizations and their contractors

USA Today has a story on the musuem's plight to raise 5 million to restore the 30 year old rocket

Alternative Fuel?

A real alternative?

OK, I've kept Anil Dash's entry about an alternative to Real Player in my FeedOnFeeds stories for over a week now because, eventually, I want to try it out. I hate RealPlayer. It's slow, cumbersome, and those stupid ads (they call them "news") that pop up all the time annoy the living crap out of me.

I haven't tried it yet, but if you have, leave me a comment and tell me what you think.

Open up a can of spam

Today's requisite spam entry:

Wired News

In the two weeks since the Can-Spam Act, a U.S. law barring unscrupulous bulk e-mailing practices, took effect this year, providers of spam-filtering software say they're blocking more messages than ever. Spammers, they say, are either ignoring the law or pretending to comply with guidelines for legitimate e-mail marketing.

With the advent of Can-Spam, Jacob said spammers are also increasingly guilty of "faux compliance," exploiting a caveat in the law that permits unsolicited e-mails from legitimate marketers who allow recipients to opt out of future mailings. Unscrupulous junk mailers are pretending to go along with the guidelines by including false return addresses for opting out.

One Nipple, two nipples, three....

link via sxxxy.org (WARNING! NOT WORK SAFE)!

Third Nipple Piercings at bmezine.com

Quick! get the marshmallows!

Once again, MeFi comes through with a link to something that'll make you say "Wow!". Check out this page and watch the video

Spirit rolls off the lander

OK, I know, I know. I'm late with this news. But, in case you have been under a rock (or had some crazy times at work like I have the past couple of days), marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov is a great starting page

and the winner is....

the winners have been announced in MoveOn.org's 30-second George Dubyah ad campaign. You can see them here.

On a related note, MeFi's got a spot about CBS rejecting a request to air the spots. Lots of interesting links there too.

What is a civet cat anyway?

Ask Yahoo!

more on referral spam

My apologies for all the spam related stuff lately, but these low-life scum-sucking pigs irritate the living shit out of me. My mailbox is full all the time (over 800 since Jan 1) and now the fuckers want to use webspace and bandwidth that I pay for so that they make money. No, I don't think so. I don't list referrals on the front page of Clack, so, even if I weren't blocking all the referral spam that comes in, it would serve them absolutely no purpose.

There is an upside to all of this, though. After some help from Zack and Richard getting started, I've learned WAY more about regular expressions, apache, and htaccess than I ever thought I might want to know.

So, without further delays, the latest entry on what a friend and coworker of mine called the "spam blog":

it seems that Starprose is using a new agent string....

172.153.236.119 - - [13/Jan/2004:13:42:57 -0500] "HEAD /blogs/Clack/ HTTP/1.1" 200 0
"http://www.starprose.com/article46.html" "Referrer Advertising System"

it's blocked now on Clack.

no currency in Adobe either

according to this article on Wired News,

WASHINGTON -- Adobe Systems acknowledged Friday it quietly added technology to the world's best-known graphics software at the request of government regulators and international bankers to prevent consumers from making copies of the world's major currencies.
[...]
Adobe, the world's leading vendor for graphics software, said the secretive technology "would have minimal impact on honest customers." It generates a warning message when someone tries to make digital copies of some currencies.

The U.S. Federal Reserve and other organizations that worked on the technology said they could not disclose how it works and would not name which other software companies include it in their products. They cited concerns that counterfeiters would try to defeat it.

The article goes on to mention that "Rival graphics software by Taiwan-based Ulead Systems also blocks customers from making copies of currency."

That brings the total number of graphics programs that I know about that will not open full-size, color images of U.S. currency to three: JASC Software's Paintshop Pro, Adobe Photoshop, and Ulead Systems' PhotoImpact XL.

From the same article:

The technology was designed recently by the Central Bank Counterfeit Deterrence Group, a consortium of 27 central banks in the United States, England, Japan, Canada and across the European Union, where a formal proposal to require all software companies to include similar anti-counterfeit technology already exists.
[...]
"If I were the paranoid-conspiracy type, I would speculate that since it's not Adobe's software, what else is it doing?" [Gene] Spafford said.

You can check out the official rules and regulations for digital copies of US currency on the United States Secret Service site.

Kodak stops selling reloadable film cameras in Western Europe and North America

this story on myway.com say:

NEW YORK, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Eastman Kodak Co. (EK) on Tuesday said it will stop selling traditional film cameras in the United States, Canada and Western Europe, another move by the troubled photography company to cut lines with declining appeal in favor of fast-growing digital products.

But the Rochester-based company will continue to sell one-time use cameras in the West and expand its sales of these and other film-based cameras and supplies in markets such as China, India, and Latin America, where demand is on the rise.
[...]
Blaming declining demand, the Rochester, New York-based company said it would by the end of this year quit making cameras that use the Advanced Photo System (APS) format, as well as reloadable cameras that use 35-millimeter film.

Thanks to gizmodo for the link

T-Mobile: please consider upgrading

the last line of this entry over at ~stevenf is a classic! (link to ~stevenf compliments of die puny humans)

NASA's current Mars exploration amazes me. I don't generally fall into the "space nerd" category, but pictures are something I can understand, and the pictures consistently amaze me. [...] Confidential to T-Mobile: NASA is downloading 36 MB TIFFs from Mars and I only get 2 bars of signal on my cell phone inside my house. Please look into upgrading.

referral spamming continues

interesting to note that even though all referrals from p+a/r_i_s - h=i=l=t@o n - v i d e o . b l o g s_p o t . c o_m returns the spammer a 403 forbidden error, the spammer is continuing to try to use Clack to increase their search engine rankings.

It's also interesting to note that the same spammer has a new site (p a r(i s - h i l t o n - v i,d e o - t a p)e . b l o g s p o t . c o m) that is referral spamming as well. It's already been added to my .htaccess, how about yours?

straight to gay conversion?

According to Regressing at its finest,

A man was left with a "gay" tattoo after an operation was botched.....

The unnamed man had gone for a heart by pass at Leeds General Infirmary but needed a vein to be removed from his tattooed leg to complete the operation.

Surgeons decided to cut through his "I Love Women" tattoo, but failed to notice when they sewed him up that they had changed it to "I Love Men".

Link to original story: uk.gay.com

ReplayTV 5000 series users can legally use auto commercial advance

PVRBlog has an entry to a story I read in the weekly EFF email update.

ReplayTV 4000 and 5000 series machines have the ability to auto-skip commercials and send recorded shows to other 4000 and 5000 series Replays. A couple of years ago, the parent company of ReplayTV, SonicBlue, was sued by the big media companies, saying that show sharing and commercial skipping was copyright infringement and did not fall under the "fair-use" of material.

SonicBlue fought the case, but as a result of the huge cash drain, declared bankruptcy. The ReplayTV line was sold off to the parent company of Denon & Marantz.

About a year and a half ago, the Electronic Frontier Foundation along with five plaintiffs brought a suit against Hollywood studios in order to defend their rights to continue using ReplayTV.

Today, the 28 Media companies named in the suit agreed not to sue ReplayTV users, thus ending the EFF's case. Since this was a voluntary and early ending thanks to the media companies backing down, the court didn't rule that it was unlawful for them to sue in the future, though they have left a provision of protection to other ReplayTV owners in case Hollywood changes their mind.

Quote from the EFF's Staff Attorney Gwen Hinze:

"Skipping commercials is not illegal and neither is sending television shows from your home to your office, as one of our clients does. We're pleased that we were able to protect our clients against unjustifiable copyright claims for exercising their fair use rights."

Quote from EFF's Legal Director, Cindy Cohn:

"This may be first time that the entertainment companies have backed down from a claim of copyright liability. Consumers deserve the full benefits of the digital revolution and specious copyright claims should not stand in their way."

Spammer discussion

Kalsey Consulting Group has a link to google's Usenet archive where spammers discuss the ins and outs of blog and guestbook spamming.

>It made more tha the AP wires as blog comment spam has risen through >the roof since I did those posts! It is working and I will keep fighting >google's artificially high page ranking of the blog companies they own! >ven if it means destroying blog and google credibility.

Comment spam was already a major problem for Bloggers way before you
mentioned it here.

Do you really believe you made so much of a difference to result in
news :-))

It was obvious this would happen since the same occurred with
Guestbooks and anywhere else you can post a link for free.

The article being talked about is this one.

Further in the thread:

>You're becoming too ethical and >that is stopping you from doing better than you can.

You assume too much, when it comes to making money I lower my ethics
considerably. What I don't have though is unlimited time and so I put
my time where I believe long term it will produce most rewards and
right now I don't see spamming blogs, guestbooks etc... giving long
term rewards.

If your interested my time is currently going on site improvement to
increase traffic conversion, since with 5000 visitors a day I don't
need more traffic, I need more sales from this traffic.

Spirit Rover Nearly Ready to Roll

from jpl.nasa.gov

NASA's Spirit rover now has its arm and all six of its wheels free, and only a single cable must be cut before it can turn and roll off its lander onto the soil of Mars. As that milestone is completed, scientists are taking opportunities to take extra pictures and other data.

During the past 24 hours -- the rover's 8th martian day on the planet, or "sol 8" -- pyro devices were fired slicing cables to free the rover's middle wheels and releasing pins that held in place its instrumented arm. The arm was then locked onto a hook where it will be stowed when the rover is driving.

Because one airbag remains adjacent to the lander's forward ramp, the rover will turn about 120 degrees to its right and exit the lander from the side facing west-northwest on the planet -- also the direction of an intriguing depression that scientists have dubbed Sleepy Hollow.

NASA releases hi-res panoramic Mars photo

Thanks to Boing Boing for the link:

The first 360-degree color view from NASA's Spirit Mars Exploration Rover presents a range of tempting targets from nearby rocks to hills on the horizon.

"The whole panorama is there before us," said rover science- team member Dr. Michael Malin of Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego. "It's a great opening to the next stage of our mission."

See the QuickTime VR version here

Other images of the day:
a closeup of the Airbag Trail scientists have dubbed "Magic Carpet"

a 3D color model showing the "Magic Carpet"

Why do people blush when they are embarrassed?

Ask Yahoo!

Y'all are some strange people

OK, so it's fun for me to watch what search phrases are driving people to Clack. I don't know why; maybe it's the voyeuristic side of me. So, the exhibitionistic side of me wants to show these things to you, as well.

The top 11 search phrases for the first eight days of January, 2004 are (ordered by rank):

• spongebob squarepants movie trailer
  
• the spongebob squarepants movie
  
• canspam
  
• biker chicks
  
• testicle theater
  
• clack
  
• spongebob squarepants movie
  
• michael jackson on the run
  
• spongebob movie trailer
  
• top country songs of all time
  
• spongebob the movie
  

I find it interesting that five of the top 11 searches that hit Clack are looking for spongebob.

There were 28 visitors so far to Clack that were searching for some permutation of Clay Aiken ("clay aiken cats", "clay aiken triumph comic insult dog", "clay aiken address" (stalker, maybe?), "clack clay aiken", "clay aiken death" (that one worries me a little), etc.)

There's some funny ones in here too...

• "rogaine for pubic hair" (I'm not sure I want to know)
  
• "idahoans are stupid" (mom, is that you?)
  
• "decerebrated turnips" (WTF?)
  
• "morality defecation nudity christ" (I'm positive I don't want to know)
  

Now, I'm all for fetishes and I'm certainly not judging any of you. But, I'm also not claiming to understand it either. Remember this post about the Japanese site dedicated to recordings made of women farting? It's a much bigger fetish than I ever imagined!

• "women farts"
  
• "woman farts"
  
• "gassy"
  
• "women s farts"
  
• "woman fart"
  
• "woman fart -dog -old -fat -machine -free" (VERY specific search criteria)
  
• "woman fart lover post"
  
• "www.woman fart.com"
  
• fetish of woman s fart
  

Lots of people are hitting Clack searching for entries about spam, and even more are looking for pictures of Ewan McGregor's stuff. Several have hit Clack looking for "uranus", one hit while searching for "clack sex" (?!?!) and three have come to see me with a search phrase of "pooing" :-)

Testing

This shit rawks!

Link via /.

You (yes, you) can now download the same software the Mission Engineers at NASA are using to view and work with the images that are being sent back by the Rover Spirit. It's called Maestro, and versions are available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Solaris. It's a big download (about 40 Meg for the Windows version), but you can get it here.

After downloading and installing Maestro, you should take the time to peruse the JPL In-Situ Instrument Laboratory testbed to familiarize yourself with the software and how to navigate within it.

After you've done that, download the first set of images from Spirit.

Maestro has a little helper window that's scripted that'll take you through part of it complete with audio and hints and tips.

Yes, I really care

In this entry, I lament that really don't care that Brintey Spears married Jason Alexander, and then had it all declared null and void 55 hours later.

I'm sick and tired of hearing about Britney, Christina, Ms. Hilton, and the hundreds of other whiny-assed pieces of cruft that permeates our culture. Besides, I believe the "marriage" was just a publicity stunt for Britney anyway. Jason didn't fare too badly out of the whole thing either, since he's already booking himself all over the talk show circuit and if I remember correctly, I heard this morning on the radio that a book deal was in the works.

But, after reading this entry over at billandkent.com, I may have to rethink my position on caring about Britney's 55 hour marriage stint. billandkent have archived the entire Ellen Goodman piece in their entry.

Early one Vegas morn, after watching that romantic classic, "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," these hometown friends looked at each other and, according to Jason, said, "Let's do something wild, crazy. Let's go get married, just for the hell of it."

Off they went to the Little White Wedding Chapel with Britney in her baseball cap and jeans. After 55 hours, the "I dos" became "I don'ts," the vows were annulled and assorted folks chimed in with the same thought: Hey, a man and woman can get married on a lark, but when a committed gay couple wants to make it legal, they're accused of wrecking the institution?

E.J. Graff, author of "What Is Marriage For?" put it a bit more gently, "God bless 'em, they're allowed to be foolish while lesbian and gay couples who are committed aren't taken seriously."

...
Now repeat the question family law professor Martha Minow asks: "Is this the moment to stand back and ask not who should get married but how to get married?" Should we be more worried about thoughtless, instant, throwaway marriages than same-sex marriages?

As for the idea that same-sex marriage somehow disparages heterosexual marriage? We can put that to rest. Who needs gay couples when you have Britney and Jason?

Squirrels and Nuts and Us Weekly?

Gawker's got the skinny

Umm, excuse me, but is that his dangly bits dangly-ing down there?

Your TV as a spam relay

In a move that scares the crap out of me, Microsoft announced yesterday at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that it has created "Media Center Extended." This software will allow your TV to access video, music and photos stored on other PCs on your LAN.

from Yahoo!

In his annual address at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Gates demonstrated his plan for "seamless computing" with products that connect to or synchronize with PC hardware or Microsoft software.

Gates said Microsoft will unveil products later this year that will allow TV viewers to access live and recorded TV programs, music files, digital photos and other media stored on their PCs.

"Ease of use can be better if the software does it right," Gates said. "These scenarios demand all of these advances work together."

Called Media Center Extender, the new software package will provide up to five televisions remote access to PCs running the company's Windows XP (news - web sites) Media Center Edition.

The software supports the copyright protection system known as digital rights management, so users can order media directly from Internet-based subscription services like Movielink via a TV, Gates said.

Gateway and Hewlett-Packard have already announced they will manufacture TVs with Media Center Extended software embeded in them, and HP, Gateway, Dell, and Samsung will offer set-top boxes.

Microsoft will also release an adapter kit for Xbox that will include the software, a DVD adapter and a remote control for less than $60 that will turn the Xbox into a "media adapter" for any TV.

Great, so now my TV will be susceptible to viruses, worms, trojans, and other security holes and will crash at least once a week. Spammers will take over your TV and force you to watch penis enlargement, viagra, and cheap mortgage commercials in the middle of your favorite TV shows. Oh, I just can't wait!

spam spam spam (the saga continues)....or does it?

this morning I got the following message in Moveable Type's Activity log:

2004.01.08 12:33:05 141.76.1.121 MT-Blacklist comment denial on Clack:gue nsti ge-krank enversich erung.com

(again, the domain has been changed to keep from googlizing and increasing the spammer's ranking).

nslookup on 141.76.1.121 returns:
Name: proxy1.an on-onli ne.org
Address: 141.76.1.121

and perusing an on-onli ne.org's website, I find this:

JAP makes it possible to surf the internet anonymously and unobservably.

JAP uses a single static address which is shared by many JAP users. That way neither the visited website, nor an eavesdropper can determine which user visited which website.
How it works

Instead of connecting directly to a webserver, users take a detour, connecting with encryption through several intermediaries, so-called mixes.

In essence, now, the comment spammers are hiding behind anonymous proxies.

What am I going to do about it? Oh, I'm glad you asked. Simply ban the IP address(es). Anybody surfing Clack anonymously through these proxies will be denied access, and I'm terribly sorry about that, but until the spammers drop off the face of the earth, they leave me no choice.

*poof* 141.76.1.121 is now banned.

Aibo-like soldier helper?

Gizmodo has a link to this story over on defensetech.org:

... military scientists are worried that robots with wheels won't be able to follow their human masters across mountain passes, up stairs and through forest trails.

To make their way across that kind of terrain, the drones will need legs -- maybe even four of them. So the Army's Tank-automotive and Armaments Command, or TACOM, has just doled out $2.25 million to two robotics firms to prototype a big, mechanical dog capable of carrying ammunition, food and supplies into battle.

today's "why didn't I think of that"

ZDNet has an article about the new Western Digital Hard Drive. It's an external, USB drive that also serves as a USB hub. It comes in 250, 200, 160, and 120 GB sizes. It has a USB 2.0 port on the front and one on the back, and two FireWire ports.

And, here's the kicker....according to the PDF spec sheet over at Western Digital's site, it has an 8-in-1 card reader built in! It supports:
CompactFlash Type I and II
IBM Microdrive
SmartMedia
Memory Stick
Memory Stick PRO
MultiMedia Card
SecureDigital Card

Now, why didn't I think of that?

Link to ZDNet article from Geek News Central

Now, that's a view!

There's some Mars images on the official Mars Rovers page that are absolutely stunning.

This image is HUGE (8 MB), but the detail in it is astounding.

There's a smaller version of the picture here

Link to the Press Release Images

FBI gains new power to grab your "financial institution" records

While the nation was distracted last month by images of Saddam Hussein's spider hole and dental exam, President George W. Bush quietly signed into law a new bill that gives the FBI increased surveillance powers and dramatically expands the reach of the USA Patriot Act.

The Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004 grants the FBI unprecedented power to obtain records from financial institutions without requiring permission from a judge.

Under the law, the FBI does not need to seek a court order to access such records, nor does it need to prove just cause.

Previously, under the Patriot Act, the FBI had to submit subpoena requests to a federal judge. Intelligence agencies and the Treasury Department, however, could obtain some financial data from banks, credit unions and other financial institutions without a court order or grand jury subpoena if they had the approval of a senior government official.

The new law (see Section 374 of the act), however, lets the FBI acquire these records through an administrative procedure whereby an FBI field agent simply drafts a so-called national security letter stating the information is relevant to a national security investigation.

And the law broadens the definition of "financial institution" to include such businesses as insurance companies, travel agencies, real estate agents, stockbrokers, the U.S. Postal Service and even jewelry stores, casinos and car dealerships.

The law also prohibits subpoenaed businesses from revealing to anyone, including customers who may be under investigation, that the government has requested records of their transactions.

There's more to the story over at Wired News:

More referral spam

The following sites (the domains have been modified to keep them from being googlized) have been added to the block list due to referral spam:
www.dickgeph   ardt2004.