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5926

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on July 03, 2013, 11:46 AM »

Even UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon comes down on the side of the spymasters. It's as if the EU and the UN are also run by spies, whose no. 1 priority seems to be to make an example of Snowden to show what happens to spies that break the code of secrecy:

-dr_andus (July 03, 2013, 11:40 AM)

Bingo!

The first rule of spycraft is don't get caught.  The second rule is don't play out the results in the media.  Why else do you think that the conditions of Snowden's asylum in Russia were 'stop hurting the US'?

5927

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on July 03, 2013, 08:12 AM »

I think it went something like that.

-40hz (July 03, 2013, 07:21 AM)

That's classic    And probably true 

5928

Living Room / Re: How Google is Killing Honest (Organic) Search

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 06:28 PM »

I noticed that on the link IainB posted about Wave that the Open Source version had a problem that showed Google's new colors...

Subsequently, Google asked the Etherpad code maintainers to remove JSMin from its code tree due to a clause in its license stating, "The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil," which is not compatible with the open source licenses allowed on Google Code.(1)

5929

General Software Discussion / Re: Wave? Good-bye!

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 06:24 PM »

Well, the thing that people don't understand in a lot of cases with Google is that everything is Beta... it's a research project, and they scrap the bad, and repackage the good.  A lot of what Wave was has been repackaged in other products.  Hangouts are a *lot* like what wave was.

5930

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 03:35 PM »

To all of you who claim you don't give a fsck... This is actually what not giving a fsck looks like.   That or a train wreck.  Your pick.

SFW

5931

Living Room / Re: Worth Reading: Trevor Pott's editorial on NSA PRISM and its real ramifications

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 03:33 PM »

^ Sorry if I misunderstood that you were being sarcastic... 

5932

Living Room / Re: 10 signs you may have OCD

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 11:40 AM »

It would have been totally epic if there were only 9 signs on the list...

5933

Living Room / Re: Microsoft ending TechNet subscription activations effective august 2013

« Last post by wraith808 on July 02, 2013, 10:10 AM »

Besides, if at some point I have to move to Linux because I simply refuse to use Windows for whatever reason, then I'll just have to learn to deal. That said it would probably be in my best interest to do what I posted above: Keep my current main box on Windows 7 Pro and setup my previous "main box" with Linux. That way I can take my time and become accustomed to Linux on the other machine; learn what software is available, which ones I prefer, etc. Then if/when the time comes for a complete switch to Linux I would at least be well aware and hopefully as comfortable as I can be with it. As opposed to just committing fully all at once.

Plus this way I can go at a more comfortable pace with Linux.

-J-Mac (July 02, 2013, 09:26 AM)

If I'm honest, this is the main reason that I'm not on Linux.  I tried them side by side rather than jumping in.  And of course, when you're confronted with not having your apps, and what you're familiar with, you go back to that.  I do believe it's an all or nothing proposition (well, other than work).  If you give yourself an easy out, human nature wins in most cases. 

You have to make a decision not to worry about what you don't have and look at what you do... and find alternatives.

At least, that's what I'd do if I was inclined to go back.  But, considering the fact that what I do other than work for a large part is games... well, it's just not there yet.  And I'm not inclined to play in what is basically a VM just so I can say that I'm on a different OS.  If I actually need to switch, the games won't be that important at that point.  But I'm not there.

5934

Living Room / Re: Worth Reading: Trevor Pott's editorial on NSA PRISM and its real ramifications

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 11:26 PM »

Please... that's hypocrisy at work.  The only thing the EU is glad about is that the NSA got caught.  If you don't think that countries don't run ops against their own 'partners' and 'allies', then I have a bridge to sell you in San Francisco.  And I'll throw in some beach front property in New Mexico.

5935

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 11:24 PM »

The next move has been made: WikiLeaks: Snowden requests asylum

And a statement from the man himself.

Statement from Edward Snowden in Moscow

Monday July 1, 21:40 UTC

One week ago I left Hong Kong after it became clear that my freedom and safety were under threat for revealing the truth. My continued liberty has been owed to the efforts of friends new and old, family, and others who I have never met and probably never will. I trusted them with my life and they returned that trust with a faith in me for which I will always be thankful.

On Thursday, President Obama declared before the world that he would not permit any diplomatic "wheeling and dealing" over my case. Yet now it is being reported that after promising not to do so, the President ordered his Vice President to pressure the leaders of nations from which I have requested protection to deny my asylum petitions.

This kind of deception from a world leader is not justice, and neither is the extralegal penalty of exile. These are the old, bad tools of political aggression. Their purpose is to frighten, not me, but those who would come after me.

For decades the United States of America has been one of the strongest defenders of the human right to seek asylum. Sadly, this right, laid out and voted for by the U.S. in Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is now being rejected by the current government of my country. The Obama administration has now adopted the strategy of using citizenship as a weapon. Although I am convicted of nothing, it has unilaterally revoked my passport, leaving me a stateless person. Without any judicial order, the administration now seeks to stop me exercising a basic right. A right that belongs to everybody. The right to seek asylum.

In the end the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned, or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised — and it should be.

I am unbowed in my convictions and impressed at the efforts taken by so many.

Edward Joseph Snowden

Monday 1st July 2013

5936

Living Room / Re: Microsoft ending TechNet subscription activations effective august 2013

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 08:50 PM »

... and that's why we can't have nice things.

That still leaves MSDN, however, right?  Or are they removing it from my ultimate subscription too?  It doesn't appear so...

5937

Living Room / Re: Worth Reading: Trevor Pott's editorial on NSA PRISM and its real ramifications

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 08:48 PM »

And PRISM takes a turn.  I couldn't have predicted this.  Really, I couldn't.

George W. Bush Defends PRISM: 'I Put That Program In Place To Protect The Country'

Holy crap... talk about blurring lines....

"I think there needs to be a balance, and as the president explained, there is a proper balance."

If even a year ago you told me that Bush would come to Obama's defense and would justify their shared unpopular program by referring to Obama's own words, I would have laughed.

One other tidbit... If you read released NSA documents and histories, you can find that Carter was the only president who raised the question of the privacy of citizens in discussions with top spy chiefs in NSA.  It's mentioned in the Thomas R. Johnson , American Cryptology during the Cold War, 1945-1989. The book is classified top-secret Umbra, so the public version is heavily censored.

You can find it online in pdf form from: http://www.gwu.edu/~...iv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB260/

Jimmy Carter- our last honest president. (And I say this as even though I disagreed with a whole lot of his policies, especially economic.  But then we got Reagan after that, so...)

5938

Living Room / Re: Google Reader gone

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 02:02 PM »

I wish DoCo could put something like this (plus some other web services) together for its members. Especially as paid services to get a steady revenue stream in. Because I'd rather drop my plastic here than elsewhere if I'm spending money.

-40hz (July 01, 2013, 01:35 PM)

That's actually a really good idea.  You should create a thread and add the services we're looking for   Then maybe we can persuade Mouser to make it a project!

5939

Living Room / Re: Worth Reading: Trevor Pott's editorial on NSA PRISM and its real ramifications

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 12:12 PM »

Cicero is a great philosopher- one not spoken of in the same tones as Socrates and Aristotle outside of philosophy circles, but one that should be as his writings are more readily applicable to everyday life.

One of my favorites (and I'll have to quote it in English...)

Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century:
Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others;
Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected;
Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it;
Refusing to set aside trivial preferences;
Neglecting development and refinement of the mind;
Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do.

Emphasis mine.

A great man.. I think it also telling that he was the first man in his family to become Senator.  Sort of like the freshmen politicians of our day.  The only difference being he didn't change as time went on, staying loyal to the ideal of the Republic rather than the temporal power he was offered, which leads to another of his quotes that I love:

What is morally wrong can never be advantageous, even when it enables you to make some gain that you believe to be to your advantage. The mere act of believing that some wrongful course of action constitutes an advantage is pernicious.

You can't say it any plainer than that.

5940

Living Room / Re: Google Reader gone

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 11:00 AM »

I'm using The Old Reader also.  Less work than setting up my own, and it works well.

5941

Living Room / Re: Worth Reading: Trevor Pott's editorial on NSA PRISM and its real ramifications

« Last post by wraith808 on July 01, 2013, 10:04 AM »

Non serviam.

-40hz (July 01, 2013, 07:34 AM)

The only response.  To which I add consensus facit legem.

As long as we consent or give in, they will continue to make such things the law with our tacit approval.

Ægroto, dum anima est, spes est

5942

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 29, 2013, 03:20 PM »

And as we talk about games: Biden asks Ecuador president to nix Snowden asylum

Note this quoted part:

At the same time, Correa rebuked the Obama administration for hypocrisy, invoking the case of two bankers, brothers Roberto and William Isaias, whom Ecuador is seeking to extradite from the U.S.

Where's the victim, again?  As a passingly famous Frenchman said when that particular country was on top, “We are either kings or pawns of men”

As an aside, I do believe this is one of the reasons that Snowden is still where he is.  Let the so-called kings play their games, and watch.  The waiting game won't serve him forever, but better to wait for a while than make yourself a pawn.

5943

Living Room / Re: Interesting Amazon MP3 development

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 10:02 PM »

The difference with DVD and BluRay with downloadable content is that I think the license says it is for the owner of the DVD or BD - it would therefore not be the same thing. Also to get the download codes you have to open the package to you can't really sell it as new (esp. since the code, advertised on the pack, has been removed or already claimed).

-Carol Haynes (June 28, 2013, 07:01 PM)

No, that is not true.  On amazon, I purchased a DVD for my wife.  It came with a digital copy.  She received that copy immediately.  I'm not sure we've ever even opened the DVD.

And it's not just Amazon.  I pre-ordered Django Unchained from Best Buy.  I paid $14.99 at the time, and watched it that night, even though the DVD hadn't shipped to the store.  The agreement specifically said that if I didn't redeem my $14.99 by a week (I think) after the release date, I forfeited my chance to apply that money to the price of the DVD.

What is that saying?

5944

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 09:58 PM »

To be perfectly blunt, I haven't seen where any of the so-called "Western Democracies" have behaved in any manner so exemplary that they are now in a position to honestly point fingers at anyone other than themselves.

-40hz (June 28, 2013, 09:22 PM)

This is my point.  To call someone a bully implies that there is a victim in the situation.  The only victim in these situations are the people.  The governments themselves would do EXACTLY THE SAME if they had the power.  And to lose sight of that is to lose sight of the fact that they are all playing games.  That's it and that's all.

5945

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 05:17 PM »

So, you are saying that the US is not a big bully that will do anything to get its way?

I never said the US would consider using nuclear weapons today.

-app103 (June 28, 2013, 04:41 PM)

Those two are opposed.  If they would do anything, they would consider using nuclear weapons.

But your statement made it seem as though because they had used nuclear weapons that is what the intimidation factor is.  My disagreement is based on that.

And truthfully, there is no country that is purely internal facing and that doesn't act in its own best interest.  It's a matter of leverage.  When the UK had the position of power, they used it.  Russia has done the same.  It doesn't excuse the actions of the US, but to single them out such pejoratives makes it seem like they are the perpetrators and the others are innocent.  That's unfortunately not the way the world works.

5946

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 04:13 PM »

A country that would use nukes against an enemy is a country that will do anything to get their way, with no regard for the lives of innocent civilians. Does a small country with not much in the way of defense really want to find out what "anything" means?

-app103 (June 28, 2013, 03:44 PM)

That was a different time, with different stakes.  The geopolitical arena is much different now, and with the advent of the fact that the US is not the only nuclear power, there is definitely a different playing field.  And, nuclear weapons are really a weapon whose time has past as has been correctly stated.  The difference in conventional and non-conventional weapons is not as much as it was at the end of WW2.

5947

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 08:56 AM »

^ Truthfully, that was what I expected from the beginning.  But they didn't play the card early enough.  You have limited time in order to spin and for it not to seem like a cover-up, and they missed that window with the shield and spear clattering.  Without operational knowledge on the line, and the documents already in the wind, they should have immediately changed tacks.

Very bad craft at work there.

5948

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 28, 2013, 07:17 AM »

Strange he's staying so long in that airport... (that is if he is still there)

-tomos (June 28, 2013, 02:43 AM)

The next move is very important.  He's right now in a limbo sort of state as Russia won't go after him.  The next place might not be so forgiving.  This isn't the first time this has happened, i.e. political refugee stuck in an airport.

5949

Living Room / Re: Blowback from Snowden's revelations... this isn't pretty...

« Last post by wraith808 on June 27, 2013, 05:54 PM »

Ok... you can't get more ironic than this.  In response to the Snowden situation, the CIA came up with a system to stop leaks.

It was just leaked....

5950

Living Room / Re: Knight to queen's bishop 3 - Snowden charged with espionage.

« Last post by wraith808 on June 27, 2013, 01:08 PM »

An interesting article, and an interesting development.

Why Snowden asked visitors in Hong Kong to refrigerate their phones

Snowden’s Special Travel Document Is Real but Not Valid, Official in Ecuador Says