Recent Posts

3701

Living Room / Re: Defense Distributed Domain Stolen!

« Last post by 40hz on April 02, 2013, 06:48 AM »

^Fortunately, I think most of the web news crowd was skeptical. Most didn't take the story and run with it since there was no corroborating evidence any seizure took place. (A phone call to the hosting company was all it would have taken to confirm it.)

Had the thing blown up, gotten massive coverage, and prompted the DoJ to make a formal statement of denial, things might have gone very differently. Because kidding aside, putting a fake seizure page up on your site is not much different than telling the news media that the feds showed up with a warrant, kicked your door in, and confiscated all your computers and data files.

At the very least, there's a copyright violation if those logos are the actual logos of the DoJ or DHS. (There's actually a federal reg that points out they're copyrighted and can only be used with permission.) I suppose you could make an argument for "fair use." But I don't think you could make it stick with something like this.

Anyway, it seems to have blown over with little wind damage. So I doubt the government will want to court the Streisand Effect by doing anything about it - even though I'm guessing they could. Down the road things might go differently however. Defense Distributed has fired an opening salvo. Even if it was intended to be taken purely as a joke with no political agenda intended. (Yeah right!) Unfortunately, that's the sort of move that can put you "on the radar screen." Very dumb IMO. (Rule #1 when challenging the Powers That Be: Pick your venues - and have a clear goal in view when confronting your opponent.) But what's done is done.

Onward!

3702

Living Room / Re: Defense Distributed Domain Stolen!

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 11:51 PM »

Interesting thing is that although the seizure page was a prank, using an image of a badge, logo or insignia of a federal agency without proper authorization (or doing something which may lead someone to reasonably believe you are representing a federal agency) is illegal in the US.

Hopefully, this gag won't backfire on them.

3703

Living Room / Re: Defense Distributed Domain Stolen!

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 04:45 PM »

@stephen re: the above- -LOL  

I'll let Felicia Day (since she's prettier) do my usual expression whenever I'm browsing on the 1st.


        Like seriously?

3704

Living Room / Re: Defense Distributed Domain Stolen!

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 02:43 PM »

ONGOMGOMG!!! And on today of all days!!! Who could have possibly dreamed of this!

-40hz (April 01, 2013, 12:49 PM)

A very sick and twisted joke indeed. And all too real. It would be good if it were a joke.

-Renegade (April 01, 2013, 12:59 PM)

Are we sure it isn't yet? Just askin'

Reason being there's nothing on the major wire services I've seen so far - and the feds tend to try do this sort of thing with a great deal of fanfare. And the domain registration still shows as it used to be (it was registered on GoDaddy) and the IP address the URL is pointing to (141.101.117.93) is found in the Western EU - not likely to be a US DoJ address - so I'm semi-skeptical.

Trace data

TraceRoute from Network-Tools.com to 141.101.117.93 [defensedistributed.com]
Hop   (ms)   (ms)   (ms)        IP Address           Host name
1      6      5      34         24.153.208.145    rrcs-24-153-208-145.sw.biz.rr.com  
2      9      7      7         71.40.237.84            xe-1-0-0-0.reserved.tx.twcbiz.com  
3      12      7      7         24.175.49.7            agg10.dllatx10-cr02.texas.rr.com  
4      9      7      7         24.175.49.8            agg21.hstntxl3-cr01.texas.rr.com  
5      12      7      7         66.109.6.108            ae-2-0.cr0.hou30.tbone.rr.com  
6      10      7      7         66.109.6.39            ae-0-0.cr0.dfw10.tbone.rr.com  
7      5      5      5         107.14.17.234     -  
8      9      6      9         69.31.63.1            xe-2-0-3.ar1.dfw1.us.nlayer.net  
9      5      5      5         69.31.63.182            as13335.xe-4-0-5.ar1.dfw1.us.nlayer.net  
10      5      5      5         141.101.117.93     -  

Trace complete


IP address: 141.101.116.93
Host name: defensedistributed.com

canonical name: defensedistributed.com
141.101.116.93 is from European Union(EU) in region Western Europe

3705

Living Room / Beating ridiculous IP infringement claims by doing things stupidly

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 02:33 PM »

I've been followiong the Aereo lawsuit for some time. And I personally thought the company had found a way to beat the cable and TV networks at their own game by incorporating some of the same technically inefficient and braindead approaches the behemoths use for doing business into their own product offering.

When it came to trial, the judge sided with Aereo, dismissing the circular logic and and contradictory arguments the TV industry tried to sell the court on.

I was waiting for an appeal because it's never over with these guys until it's over - and most times not even then. And an appeal was filed as expected. But much to my surprise, the appeals court also sided with Aereo against the networks. TechDirt covered the story in their usual thorough style (link to full article here). Here's an excerpt:

Aereo Wins Again: Appeals Court Says Its System Is Not Infringing
from the a-good-win dept

As you may recall, Aereo has been in an ongoing legal dispute with the TV networks, who seem to be arguing that anything that disrupts their coveted business model simply must be illegal. While they've won against others, Aereo actually won the first round at the district court level, blocking an attempted injunction. The networks quickly appealed. On appeal, it seemed clear that the judges realized just how insane the situation is. If you don't recall, Aereo sets up a separate individual antenna for each customer, and then streams TV broadcasts to that customer over the internet. This setup makes no technological sense whatsoever. It's inefficient and stupid. But because of the wacky way copyright is interpreted, it's believed to be necessary to avoid being guilty of infringement for doing the same damn thing much more efficiently.

Today, on appeal, the appeals court affirmed the district court ruling, once again blowing a big hole in the networks' arguments. The full ruling (linked above and embedded below) is well worth a read, as it's nice to see the court really try to do its best to truly understand the technology at play, rather than resorting to simplistic and inaccurate analogies, as copyright maximalists often desire. The key to the networks' argument here is that those individual antennas that Aereo sets up are a myth. They claim that it's really one giant antenna. The court disagrees. This issue plays into the big question of whether or not Aereo's service is functionally the same as the (legal) Cablevision remote DVR system, or if it goes too far and is a tool for infringement. The distinguishing factor in that Cablevision case was that Cablevision made a unique copy for every user who requested it (again, stupid and inefficient from a technological standpoint, but this is the life we lead under bad copyright laws). Bizarrely, even Cablevision argued against Aereo here, trying to distinguish its own case (perhaps to handicap a potential competitor).

The court, thankfully, doesn't buy Cablevision's own wacky interpretation, but rather relies on what the court in is case actually said, mainly, that having a unique copy means that it's not doing a "public performance" of the work.
.
.
.

It's a good read, and hopefully an indication that the US court system is beginning to get more technically savvy and less willing to accept at face value the interpretations of reality far too many entrenched industry players are insisting on.

In many respects, courts and judges should be far better at dealing with some of these claims and arguments than they are. (C'mon blackrobes! It is 2013 after all!) However, while it's true most judges don't know a diode from a network node, they are quite good at dealing with issues of logic and definition. And although the law does have its own unique form of logic, the one thing the legal system is (within its own domain) is exceptionally rational and consistent. Even if, at times, it's carried to a fault.

Either way, this case is encouraging. I expect the next move will be for the cable and TV industry to try to bring it before the Supreme Court if they can figure out some totally ridiculous argument to elevate this case to a constitutional issue. But I doubt the USSC will be buying any of it since appeals courts are generally spot on when it comes to matters of judicial scope and interpretation. And it usually takes some extreme question of law or interpretive conflict to get on the high court's docket.

But again - it ain't over till it's over. And I don't see the fat lady with the sheet music warming up in the wings just yet.

Fingers crossed!

3706

Living Room / Re: Defense Distributed Domain Stolen!

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 12:49 PM »

ONGOMGOMG!!! And on today of all days!!! Who could have possibly dreamed of this!

3707

Living Room / Re: Mini Victory for Sanity Against Apple

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 11:41 AM »

While your comment there makes sense for sane people, I find it hard to apply to Apple with a straight face.

-Renegade (April 01, 2013, 11:05 AM)

Agree. You can't give a single inch when dealing with Cupertino. They're the largest consumer of their own kool-aid. They tried not long ago to claim an exclusive right to use the lowercase letter "i" as a prefix to anything despite the fact several products had already used it long before Apple had even come up with the 'itunes' moniker.

Also, when the Mac Mini first came out, they tried to claim exclusive use of the word 'mini' in a computer product name.

Apple is one of those companies that firmly believes that, unless they're specifically told "NO", they have tacit legal permission to interpret things their own way - and have the right to enforce it too!
 

3708

Living Room / Re: Cute jokes' thread

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 11:21 AM »

 

3709

General Software Discussion / Re: Registry cleaning software debunked...

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 10:51 AM »

I've generally found the only place where a decent quality registry cleaner might offer significant benefit is when attempting to cure some persistent oddball system problem in order to avoid a reinstall of Windows.

As a routine maintenance tool, I haven't found them to bring much to the party performance-wise since Win98. With XP they possibly made some marginal performance improvements. But for Win7, I don't suggest using them for anything other than cleaning out recent lists, temp, and junk files like CCleaner's default settings do. Win7 generally seems (to me at least) to work best when you just let it perform its job its own way. Microsoft did a very nice job with Win7 in that regard AFAIC.

For Win7 I keep regular maintenance to a minimum. I'll religiously stay on top of Microsoft's updates - and keep my security software current at all times for obvious reasons. But beyond that, an occasional CCleaner run, and possibly an overnight system disk optimization followed by a full antimalware scan (no more than once a month if that) has proven more than sufficient to keep everything clean and running smoothly on my own machines. YMMV.

Win8 hasn't been out long enough that I'd trust any 3rd party system utility that directly tinkers with the internals or registry settings right now.
 

3710

Living Room / Re: Does anyone here use Bitcoins?

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 10:28 AM »

@Ren - semi-urelated FYI: I just added your feed to my RSS collection. Not too often I add another entry to that carefully vetted list. 

3711

Living Room / Re: Does anyone here use Bitcoins?

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 09:41 AM »

And it's just broken $100! Hit $101!

-Renegade (April 01, 2013, 09:19 AM)

OCD is in full swing today folks!

3712

Living Room / Re: Gorgeous "House Sigils" graphics

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 07:28 AM »

Thx for posting that!

The sigils and mottoes for Facebook, Twitter , and Reddit were positively inspired!

3713

Living Room / Re: Does anyone here use Bitcoins?

« Last post by 40hz on April 01, 2013, 07:21 AM »

For anybody still following this thread, there's an article over at Business Insider that has a copy of an interesting presentation on what Bitcoin is (Surprise!!! - it's a protocol.) and how it works.

It probably won't answer every question you may have. And it glosses just a little too quickly over some important economic concepts IMO. (Note: the presentation was put together by a programmer so I guess that's to be expected) But it's still very informative. And also quite funny in several places  

Well worth the look. Check it out here.  

3714

Living Room / Re: Pirate Vinyl Records! :D

« Last post by 40hz on March 31, 2013, 02:09 PM »

Older binaural recordings used static microphone placements. more modern examples use a variable positioning mechanism and special microphones designed purely for binaural use.  Can't speak for theory too much when it comes to binaural. But from my purely subjective listening to binaural playback with open design headphones, (and from a working musician's perspective) I find it as close to life as it gets.  YMMV.  

I've played classic, jazz, and rock. And I'll have to disagree with the arbitrary distinction separating acoustic from electronic sound generation. Both ultimately depend on creating vibration in the air. So all of it ultimately becomes acoustic sound in the end for live performances. The real difference is found in the method rather than the results. beyond that it's just personal taste.

3715

Living Room / Re: Pirate Vinyl Records! :D

« Last post by 40hz on March 31, 2013, 12:23 PM »

IMHO engineers in concerts can't mix a decent sound at all - I have yet to go to a concert of any band and not be irritated by the bad mixing!

-Carol Haynes (March 31, 2013, 12:06 PM)

Agree. And IMHO the problem is generally worse with British bands. I guess audio engineers are trained differently over in the UK?

The only UK group I've ever heard sound really amazing in a live setting is Jethro Tull. Tull is hands down the best sounding group I ever heard, regardless of which side of the pond a band calls home -  and only somewhat rivaled by the Moody Blues in a large concert venue. The Rolling Stones, The Police, Genesis, and The Who all sounded absolutely awful whenever I've heard them play over here. Which is a bloody shame considering the level of musicianship all these groups are capable of. Go figure...

Note: I left Pink Floyd   out of the above because they occupy a space all their own when it comes to live performance. It wouldn't be fair to most groups (with the possible exception of Jethro Tull) to lump them in for comparison.

3716

Living Room / Re: Pirate Vinyl Records! :D

« Last post by 40hz on March 31, 2013, 11:53 AM »

That said, professional engineers and producers also check and adjust their mix for a variety of speakers and listening environments before committing to a final mix. Because the goal is making things sound as good as possible in as many situations as possible. That's the hardest part of recording and mixing. Anybody can optimize a mix for studio monitors. It takes considerably more talent and skill to make a mix sound really good everywhere. Commercial recording releases are usually masterpieces of audio compromise.



Which is why professional studios have multiple sets of playback speakers with varying degrees of quality. After the preliminary and candidate mixes are completed on a set of near field studio monitors that can cost around $3000 each, the producer next shifts over to high-end audiophile, then quality home stereo, and finally cheap speakers. Old rule of thumb used to be to take your mix out and play it in a car with a standard dealer supplied stereo system - or on a portable "boombox.". If it sounded really good with that, it generally sounded really good anywhere. Today, they're more likely to use digital modeling to emulate club settings, living rooms, headphones, and other anticipated listening environments as xtabber alluded to earlier.

However, for unbelievably realistic and gorgeous sound when recording live performances, nothing IMO can beat binaural recordings. That's as close as you'll ever get to real life because it very closely models how our ears work. And as close to "being there' as you can get with current technology. And the really funny thing is it's one of the oldest and simplest stereo recording techniques ever tried. Goes all the way back to the dawn of audio recording.



The only problem is you need to listen to a binaural recording on headphones to get the full experience, which is why it never became hugely popular.

3717

Living Room / Re: Pirate Vinyl Records! :D

« Last post by 40hz on March 30, 2013, 05:43 PM »

I still prefer vinyl for the more organic ambiance and softness of the sound. But that's what I grew up with so that probably has a lot to do with how I feel about it. It's what I learned sounded "right" - and the preference is now linked too deeply in the neurons processing sound for me to feel differently.

Those who go back to vinyl may remember a company that did half-speed vinyl mastering. They were called Mobile Fidelity. An album by them went for about $15 when a regular LP cost about $5-$8. If you had a really good cartridge in your turntable and a decent stereo amp and quality speakers, the difference was like night and day. No warble, hiss, clicks or pops!

My Garrand turntable (with a high-end Pickering cartridge) running through a homebrew tube preamp and Carver Cube stereo amp attached to a pair of ESS speakers really did half-speed mastered albums justice.

 

3718

Living Room / Re: Pirate Vinyl Records! :D

« Last post by 40hz on March 30, 2013, 12:22 PM »

+1 w/f0dder.

The entire esthetic for what constitutes a "good" recording, along with the techniques and process  used to record it, has changed so radically with the advent of digital that it's pointless to compare analog and digital - let alone to try to estabish (in absolute terms) which is superior. Each is good in its own way. And each has its own unique strengths and shortcomings.

Comparing analog to digital would make as much sense as trying to determine whether an electric guitar, a synth, or a flute is "better."

It all depends on what sounds good to your ears. And no two are exactly alike.

3719

Living Room / Re: Movies or films you've seen lately

« Last post by 40hz on March 30, 2013, 12:04 PM »

^I understand much of it was. Not that it mattered to me. I went to see it as a movie drama. Not to view it as a history lesson.

There are vastly better ways to learn about and study Lincoln and the American Civil War than from a 2 hour Spielberg film. And even then, historical significance and meaning will always be subject to interpretation. Even on those extremely rare occasions when all the facts surrounding a historic event are established and not subject to debate.

Like the DaVinci Code or JFK, Lincoln is only a movie.

3720

Living Room / Re: Has my browser been hi-jacked?

« Last post by 40hz on March 30, 2013, 08:28 AM »

I've run into that with some sites if I'm blocking javascript on them.

I suspect it has something to do with the site trying to dynamically format the page depending on the viewing platform (i.e. phone/mobile/desktop) and blocking scripts screws up its ability to do that.

If you have a script blocker installed (and you should) try whitelisting the site you're having problems with and see if that fixes it.

Luck!

3721

Living Room / Re: The Supreme Court makes a rational decision!

« Last post by 40hz on March 29, 2013, 06:10 PM »

Does this apply to pharma meds?

-TaoPhoenix (March 29, 2013, 08:26 AM)

Isn't really relevant in the US since drug sales and use are already regulated by their own laws. Licenses are required to manufacture, sell, or dispense Rx drugs. And prescriptions are required to buy, consume, or even have them in your possession.
 

3722

Living Room / Re: Movies or films you've seen lately

« Last post by 40hz on March 28, 2013, 04:50 PM »

Speilberg's Lincoln.



A very nicely executed and stylistically old-fashioned historical drama. With some truly outstanding acting on the part of Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Tommy Lee Jones, and Hal Holbrook.

Only two semi-sappy/preachy moments in the entire film. And they weren't so "on the nose" that I felt the urge to start screaming: "Yeah...ok...we get it. We get it already."

Now that has to be some kind of record when it comes to a movie like this.

(BTW: I don't know why I bothered to compliment Tommy Lee Jones. Because (by now) it probably would only be newsworthy if he didn't put in a stellar performance. That guy is just plain good!)

3723

Living Room / Re: What are your favorite movies?

« Last post by 40hz on March 28, 2013, 04:04 PM »

^Yes Deo, you little grouch you!   That's the "willing suspension of disbelief" that makes all fiction and drama possible. Without that, fiction becomes a lie. Which was a major philosophical issue when novels first started getting extremely popular during the Enlightenment era. The Church worried about what knowingly telling and listening to "falsehood" would do to people and their sense of judgement and morality.

Looking back at the last 400 or so years of history, I guess we have our answer to that question.  

In the mean time, shut off the computer. It's Springtime. Get yourself out there and fall in love.  

3724

Living Room / Re: What are your favorite movies?

« Last post by 40hz on March 28, 2013, 12:41 PM »

Just added to my top list. Less than 10 minutes long and absolutely brilliant. It's called Paperman and it's by... Disney?

 

-40hz (March 28, 2013, 07:16 AM)

If you liked that one, you'll probably like this one too.

-app103 (March 28, 2013, 11:56 AM)

Downloading. Looks really good. Thx!

My sister saw Paperman with me and laughed. Said of course I liked the picture. "Who does it look like?" she asked:

     

She's right. That particular look, plus the body language and facial expressions, could be modeled on my GF.

She is the grand master of the "arched eyebrow plus head tilt" and the "half smile over the shoulder" backward glance.

Guess I know what I like huh?

3725

Living Room / Re: Does anyone here use Bitcoins?

« Last post by 40hz on March 28, 2013, 09:32 AM »

I accept Bitcoin donations for my projects but no one donates them. Well then.

-Tuxman (March 28, 2013, 05:06 AM)

Perhaps nobody that is interested in your projects has any Bitcoins to donate?

That was why I considered including an additional link for one to donate their CPU cycles to generate some for me, rather than only accepting actual Bitcoin donations. That way if you were interested in making a "I have no real money" donation, you could still donate something that you do have, even if you don't have any Bitcoins. 

-app103 (March 28, 2013, 08:37 AM)

A quietly brilliant idea.