Recent Posts

1826

Living Room / Re: Hack a Mac, or 500,000

« Last post by app103 on April 08, 2012, 07:49 PM »

What makes this especially bad is the fact that most Mac users do not have an antivirus installed to catch it. They don't think Macs can get malware so they don't bother with it.

1827

General Software Discussion / Re: restart router after few minutes of inactivity

« Last post by app103 on April 03, 2012, 04:25 PM »

My IdleStart application can launch an app after a user specified length of idle time. I just tested it and it works with URL's too.

Just use the URL of the restart page instead of the path to an application in the command line parameters.

It will relaunch that page again and again, whenever that length of idle time is reached, until you either close the application or pause it from the tray icon. So just set it and forget it, and it won't bother you while you are using the PC.

1828

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... a Gateway cure ...

« Last post by app103 on March 31, 2012, 11:37 PM »

If both systems are having the same issue, I'd start by looking at the list of software that they have in common, even if that list is short.

1829

Living Room / Re: Microsoft is Censoring MSN Messenger Chats

« Last post by app103 on March 28, 2012, 08:00 PM »

Back around 2005-2006, I discovered this blocking thing that Microsoft does when I tried to send a friend a link to a page on my website. It was blocked with that same “The link you tried to send was blocked because it was reported as unsafe.” message.

It wasn't targeted at my website specifically, it was targeted at ALL .info domain names, regardless of the content of the website.

I don't know if they still do that. I haven't used MSN in quite awhile.

I also recall there being a default setting in the options that a user could change to remove the block. I do remember having to do something in the options to allow me to send links to my site to people and they had to do the same to be able to receive them. Again, I don't know if that is still the case and if it is still user configurable.

It was supposed to prevent malware from spamming everyone in your contact list with malware URLs, in case you became infected.

It is possible that it's not a piracy related censorship issue and that a lot of people have been uploading malware torrents to TPB, that once installed on a user's system will spam everyone in their contact list with the URL to get the torrent (among other things)...lather, rinse, repeat, and all your friends that trust you are infected, and their friends, and their friends, and so on....without the malware writer having to spend a dime to buy a domain name or for hosting, and no worries about his site getting shut down. Once he uploads his torrent and seeds it, it's self perpetuating....unless someone like Microsoft does something to block it.

If this is the case, then Microsoft may well be justified in adding TPB to their block list.

1830

General Software Discussion / Re: wordpress is unacceptable

« Last post by app103 on March 24, 2012, 10:42 PM »

Instead of using Word to form your blog posts, you could use an actual blog editor application like Windows Live Writer. Here is a guide for setting it up for Wordpress: http://www.howtogeek...your-wordpress-blog/

It has excellent image handling (better than Word) and will allow the font changes you desire (although Carol is right about changing fonts through the style sheet)

It is by far the best post editor I have ever used.

1831

Living Room / Re: Google to Spy on Your Phone Calls Now...

« Last post by app103 on March 23, 2012, 10:32 AM »

Anybody remember this? It's just a matter of time. 

1832

Living Room / Re: Moronic would-be scammers

« Last post by app103 on March 18, 2012, 11:49 PM »

I had one of those phone scammers call me a few months ago. I really wanted to mess with him but the conversation went something like this, because I became annoyed by his thick, difficult to understand accent:

him: Hi, this is Bob* from Microsoft. We have been getting reports that you have a [garbled] on your computer.
me: A what?
him: a [garbled]
me: Can you repeat that again please?
him: You have a [garbled] on your computer.
me: Perhaps you can get someone at your company that can speak English that I can understand?
him: If you could just go to your computer...
me: If you could just call me back when you can speak proper English... [click]

_{*I don't remember if his name was actually Bob or not. I am just using that for lack of a better substitute. No offense intended to any real Bobs out there.}

1833

Living Room / Re: On a lighter note: A Man Said to the Universe

« Last post by app103 on March 17, 2012, 02:11 PM »

The universe does not have corners, Sir.

-PhilB66 (March 16, 2012, 10:59 PM)

It does now.

1834

Living Room / Re: RIAA chief: ISPs to start policing copyright by July 12

« Last post by app103 on March 17, 2012, 02:02 PM »

they are indeed trying to make it illegal to create permanent copies of transitory stuff.

-TaoPhoenix (March 17, 2012, 05:49 AM)

ARE making/trying to make what are indeed supposed to be common sense actions, illegal.

-TaoPhoenix (March 17, 2012, 05:49 AM)

Laws that don't exist yet, don't exist. Only the law that currently exists, applies.

The RIAA, MPAA, and ISPs should not get to act like laws they wish existed actually exist, and the ones they don't like, don't exist. It doesn't work like that, or at least it shouldn't.

1835

Living Room / Re: On a lighter note: A Man Said to the Universe

« Last post by app103 on March 16, 2012, 09:38 PM »

A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"That's ma'am," said the universe,
"Now go stand in the corner till you learn some respect!"

1836

Living Room / Re: RIAA chief: ISPs to start policing copyright by July 12

« Last post by app103 on March 16, 2012, 09:28 PM »

So I believe downloading is absolutely distribution - you become your own distributor to yourself.

-TaoPhoenix (March 16, 2012, 12:21 PM)

Nope, the one that offers it to you is distributing. Whether that person is authorized to offer it to you is the issue, not whether or not you have the right to accept the offer. Nothing in copyright law that prevents you from accepting it or requiring you to check if they have the legal right to offer it before doing so.

If that were the case, everyone that bought that copy of Orwell's 1984 that Amazon deleted from Kindle devices would be guilty of infringement.

How could you ever know for sure if everything you buy or acquire is authorized to be sold or given away to you? How can you ever be sure that none of it is counterfeit or unauthorized?

You have to take the word of the merchant. There is no other way. You'd starve to death tracking down and waiting to hear back from all the copyright holders to find out if the images on the food packaging were not infringing on someone's copyrights.

And you can't just assume that everything free is infringement, because it's not. The RIAA labels themselves give away plenty of free stuff and have been for many years. I have stacks of CD's I have collected over the years that were given away for free at music stores, to promote lesser known artists, that were authorized by their labels.

And you can't just assume that all free digital files are infringement. What about sites like Last.fm that allow artists to upload their works and offer them to the public for download, free of charge?

Oh, that's different?

Well what if someone pretending to be the artist uploads it, unauthorized, and you download it? What if the artist sold the copyrights to it and then uploaded it? He would no longer be legally allowed to offer it to you. But how could you ever know that?

This is why the consumer is never punished for someone else's distribution. This is why there is nothing in the US copyright laws that allows punishing the consumer or end user.

There has never been a single case filed against a downloader in the entire history of copyright. They have only been sued for distribution, uploading, making it available to others.

You know whether or not you have the right to distribute something. Nobody else that accepts it from you really ever does.

And yes, you can legally save a copy of every copyrighted work you view online to your hard drive, as long as you don't distribute it to others without the permission of the copyright holder.

1837

Living Room / Re: RIAA chief: ISPs to start policing copyright by July 12

« Last post by app103 on March 16, 2012, 09:31 AM »

"Last July, Comcast, Cablevision, Verizon, Time Warner Cable and other bandwidth providers announced that they had agreed to adopt policies designed to discourage customers from illegally downloading music, movies and software. Since then, the ISPs have been very quiet about their antipiracy measures. "

-TaoPhoenix (March 15, 2012, 08:05 PM)

It is impossible under current US copyright law to illegally download anything.

The copyright owner has the exclusive right to distribution. Downloading is not distribution. Uploading, giving away, making available would be considered distribution.

At no time has the RIAA or MPAA ever attempted to sue anyone in court for downloading because they would never win. It's not a violation of their rights as spelled out under current US copyright law. They have only sued people for distribution, uploading, making available.

There are many ways to download that do not involve uploading. As long as it doesn't involve uploading, it's never infringement on the part of the downloader.

Additionally, you can not visit a page on any website without downloading copyrighted content unless everything on that page is either CC licensed or the content is so old that it is in the public domain.

When you visit the AP news website to read one of their copyrighted articles or view one of their copyrighted photos, a copy of that copyrighted material is downloaded to your device and then rendered in your browser. You can not view that content without downloading it first. It's impossible. Same goes for streaming content, music, movies, or anything else.

1838

General Software Discussion / Re: Lite version of C++

« Last post by app103 on March 10, 2012, 01:43 PM »

Borland's old command line C++ compiler v5.5 is still available....and it's free.

https://downloads.em...o.com/free/c_builder

1839

Living Room / Re: URGENT Board Mod Request: Sobriety Mod

« Last post by app103 on March 10, 2012, 01:26 PM »

FWIW we'd lose an awful lot of Renegade's entertainment value if that request ever did get implemented. 

-40hz (March 10, 2012, 12:30 PM)

1840

General Software Discussion / Re: looking for a replacement for miranda

« Last post by app103 on March 10, 2012, 11:58 AM »

Instantbird or perhaps emesene?

1841

General Software Discussion / Re: How to remove Windows.old?

« Last post by app103 on March 04, 2012, 07:39 PM »

Quite Interestingly I am still greeted by Fujitsu, not by Dell.

-Curt (March 04, 2012, 05:06 PM)

Why would you be greeted by Dell? You don't have a Dell. Just because the disk you used to install Win7 came from a Dell, it doesn't turn your machine into a Dell. You will still display the Fujitsu stuff on boot because it's still a Fujitsu machine, still has the bios supplied by Fujitsu. That logo displays before Windows even begins to load.


If you really hate that logo, there might be an option in the bios to display post messages or extended post messages. Selecting that might get rid of it. If not, you'll have to replace the motherboard supplied by Fujitsu. I don't suggest you go messing around in the bios unless you know what you are doing, though. Great way to really screw up a computer if you don't.

1842

General Software Discussion / Re: website loading area

« Last post by app103 on March 03, 2012, 05:34 PM »

It's done with Javascript: onmouseover event.

It uses that to change the content shown in one area when the mouse is over another.

There is a simple example at the bottom of the page here that you can play with to see how the code works. Notice how the text changes depending on which object in the image you are hovering your mouse over.

1843

Official Announcements / Re: I want to try an experiment on the site for March 2012

« Last post by app103 on March 03, 2012, 06:32 AM »

and by the way i think the whole "i'll use your cpu coz ur not as smart as me"  thing stinks.

-nosh (March 03, 2012, 01:55 AM)

I didn't mean it that way. I'd love to use the CPUs of smart people too, if I could, but unfortunately for me they don't have a Java plugin enabled or they use noscript. 

1844

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of: Tool to show multiple (hard drive) temperatures in the system tray

« Last post by app103 on March 02, 2012, 05:32 PM »

I like Speed fan but it cannot show multiple tray icons (one for each hd) -- at least as far as i can tell.

-mouser (March 02, 2012, 04:41 PM)

That was why I mentioned that it can log and you could write a custom utility to display the data from the logs as individual icons. When you enable logging, you'll see a question mark button in that tab. Click it to read the info about it in the help file.

1845

Official Announcements / Re: I want to try an experiment on the site for March 2012

« Last post by app103 on March 02, 2012, 05:07 PM »

I have decided to run an experiment of my own this month.

On a bunch of my websites I am using my visitors unused CPU cycles to generate Bitcoins while they are on my website. I will only be using the CPU cycles of anyone that is dumb enough to run around on the internet with a Java plugin enabled in their browser and doesn't use a script blocker.

If I can generate more cash value that way than displaying ads, I may reduce or eliminate the ads on my websites.

Any site where I am doing this now carries the following link near the top of the page:

Why your computer fan turns on when you visit this website.

I'll let everyone know at the end of the month how this little experiment pans out. I don't anticipate continuing it past this month, but I am open to surprises that may change my mind.

1846

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of: Tool to show multiple (hard drive) temperatures in the system tray

« Last post by app103 on March 02, 2012, 04:33 PM »

Speedfan has logging capabilities and it's possible to create a custom utility to display the data from the logs in any way you want.

I used to have a Yahoo widget a few years ago to display Speedfan info. Unfortunately it only worked with an older version of Speedfan and the developer never updated it.

If you can't find an existing utility to do what you want, just the way you want, perhaps making one might not be a bad idea.

1847

General Software Discussion / Re: Help me choose an online backup service

« Last post by app103 on March 01, 2012, 02:44 PM »

They are not a reseller like BeeCloud that might suffer the same fate as Backify

-app103 (February 16, 2012, 12:22 PM)

Looks like my prediction was correct. BeeCloud is out of the reseller business and sent all their users an email informing them that all their data will automatically be deleted from LiveDrive on March 13th. Their website also states they are out of the reseller business but will be back as an online backup news site.

I hope nobody here actually paid for their service and if they did, I hope they can get a refund.

1848

Living Room / Re: Are Creative Commons Licenses Even Enforceable?

« Last post by app103 on March 01, 2012, 02:32 PM »

Interesting stuff.

From what I have seen, it's almost the other way around - everyone who "Shares" something that Infringes Copyright seems to be "Automatically ReLicensing" the original copyright into CC-BY-NC-SA. You know: "Hi Youtube, I posted this episode, it belongs to Warner Studios, no disrespect intended."

-TaoPhoenix (March 01, 2012, 07:59 AM)

Technically, that's not true since the original copyright holder never gave them a license giving them permission to share it in the first place. Sharers that don't have a license to redistribute don't really have much of a leg to stand on in court if they get sued. And neither do those that reshare from them. A takedown notice sent to Youtube would get it removed and the uploader really wouldn't be able to dispute it by saying "but I have a license to redistribute it".

1849

Living Room / Re: Are Creative Commons Licenses Even Enforceable?

« Last post by app103 on February 29, 2012, 02:46 AM »

Part of the problem is that a lot of people don't really understand what they are giving up when they slap a CC license on it. Some think it's a free copyright of some sort for people that can't afford to register their works with the copyright office. They don't know how any of it works. I can understand not understanding copyright, not understanding that things are automatically copyrighted at the moment of creation without the need to register your works.

But to slap a CC license on it without understanding that you are giving people the right to copy your work, thinking that somehow this actually protects your work from being copied is something I do not understand how so many people make that mistake. The license is quite clear about it in easy to understand language.

The CC license badge is not a cool looking decoration to stick on your site. It actually means something. You can not stick it on your site with the thoughts of "I need some cool looking buttons to fill up this empty space over here, hey this little black and white one looks really cute and matches my blog's template."

I have seen blogs with a CC-BY-SA license notice on them, giving people a right to copy the articles right along side a "Copyscape-do not copy" notice. That's a contradiction and shows a lack of understanding of CC licensing.

http://cranialsoup.b...nd-authors-true.html

The blog I linked to in that post is a good example of what is wrong. Back then he had both notices on his blog, one right on top of the other. Today he has neither. Anyone that copied his articles back when he had the CC button on his site can not say "but he gave me permission with that CC license". You can't find any evidence of this anywhere on his website today. How do you prove you have that right if him or his heirs ever decide to sue you for republishing his work?

Requiring an author to register each work individually, every single article, and then publish the CC license registration number at the bottom of the article, will offer the opportunity to remind them each and every time what they are giving up, what others will be allowed to do with their works, and force them to be much more conscious of their decision.

Making them click an "I agree" button each and every time may make them stop and think. It will also make it impossible for them to change their minds later and attempt to take it back, protecting those that reuse the works of an idiot or CC license troll. Simply removing notices from your website and denying they were ever there won't work. The work will still be registered in the database.

1850

Living Room / Re: Are Creative Commons Licenses Even Enforceable?

« Last post by app103 on February 28, 2012, 02:51 PM »

There are at least 3 situations that can arise with CC licensed works that can be quite disturbing.

1. A content creator releases something with a CC license, then dies. His family takes the website offline and then starts suing everyone that used his works, accusing them of copyright infringement. Copyright exists beyond the grave and the copyright now belongs to them. Unless you can prove you have a license to use the work, you will most likely lose the case and have to pay the family of the content creator. How will you prove you had that right if the site is gone? What if there is no copy of the site cached anywhere on the internet at the time you go to court? How do you, the content creator, ensure your family members won't be greedy after you die and go around suing the people you allowed to use your work? What can you do other than threaten to rise from the grave and haunt them for the rest of their lives if they do?

2. A content creator releases stuff with a CC-BY license. He blocks sites like archive.org from caching a copy of his site. He waits till people are using his content, then removes the CC-BY notice from his site and begins suing people for using his works. Or he changes the CC-BY to CC-BY-NC-ND and sues everyone that has used it commercially or remixed it into new works. If you can't prove the original CC-BY license, how do you defend yourself from a CC license troll?

3. You release a work but do not CC license it. Someone else comes along steals it, slaps a CC license on it, and puts it up on their site. Yes, you can sue him for doing that but what do you do about all those people now using your work that don't know the license was invalid?

I have actually had #3 happen to me. I posted a wallpaper on my website a long time ago. Someone came along and cropped it and included a portion of it in a scrapbooking kit, which they CC-BY-NC licensed.

After thinking about it for awhile, I came to the conclusion that even if I pursued the matter and forced the site owner to remove that piece from the kit, there was likely a lot of innocent people out there using it for purposes I never intended or allowed. In the end I chose to CC-BY license the original wallpaper and let it go. Unfortunately, anyone that had obtained the original kit won't be giving credit to me. They will give credit to the site they got the kit from. It's just a chunk of a silly wallpaper, no big deal to me. But what if it had been a book or music that someone else was being wrongly credited for instead of me or something I never intended to be distributed for free, something I created with intent to sell and profit from?

Here is the problem, the way I see it. There is no central database and repository (similar to the USPTO for patents) where content creators must register and deposit a copy of the works they intend to CC license. There are no registration numbers issued for each individual CC licensed work. There is no registration of use by anyone that wants to reuse a CC licensed work. Nobody is keeping track of all of this in one central location. Currently, anyone that wants to CC license a work just needs to slap a statement on it saying that it is. And anyone that wants to use it just needs to slap the same statement on it and link to the author.

If every content creator had to register each CC licensed work and get a registration number for it, then anyone that wanted to reuse that work would have a way of checking and verifying the license, which would continue to exist even after the creator's death. This would offer a lot more protection against scenarios 1 and 2. And if you had to register your reuse, it would offer a way for notifying those that used a work in good faith, in cases of scenario 3, that the license wasn't valid and they need to stop their use and/or distribution immediately.

Such a database and repository could also be good for the commons, if done right, by providing a searchable central archive of all CC licensed works, browsable by the public. It would encourage reuse far better than an author's obscure no-traffic website on some unspidered corner of the internet.