Adrian Lamo is now free but he is sticking to his guns over not giving up a blood sample.
http://news.com.com/2100-7348_3-6151385.html
Try this with your CDs:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/19/tdks-durabis-2-coating-protects-200gb-blu-ray-discs/
Understatement of the Century: When asked what was on his Christmas List, Bill Gates replied "I'm always hard to buy for". Heh.
Because it's enormously profitable. Apparently Barnum wasn't even close, there's a LOT more than one a minute.
http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2007/01/spamonomics_101.html
Probably tough to say. Someone who is never short of opinions tho is Thomas Hawk (a pseudonym). His blog can be found here:
Thomas recently did a pretty cool interview with Black Star Photo Agency, a 71 year old photography company that is finally coming into play in a big way in the digital world. Check the interview out here:
http://rising.blackstar.com/myon-5.html
Both Thomas and I release our pictures under creative commons licenses. You can read more about that here:
http://www.creative-commons.org
From Bruce Schneier, one of the worlds most respected authorities on computer security.
http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,72458-0.html?tw=wn_index_19
“So the first attack PRTK performs is to test a dictionary of about 1,000 common passwords, things like "letmein," "password1," "123456" and so on. Then it tests them each with about 100 common suffix appendages: "1," "4u," "69," "abc," "!" and so on. Believe it or not, it recovers about 24 percent of all passwords with these 100,000 combinations.”
Fortunately, Bruce ALSO gives some good advice on how to create an un-guessable password.
“So if you want your password to be hard to guess, you should choose something not on any of the root or appendage lists. You should mix upper and lowercase in the middle of your root. You should add numbers and symbols in the middle of your root, not as common substitutions. Or drop your appendage in the middle of your root. Or use two roots with an appendage in the middle.”
All:
Happy New Year! Welcome to the IT 102-50 course.
As we approach the new semester, I have placed the course syllabus on ecampus for your perusal. If you have never had experience with ecampus, simply open the attachment to this email and I will demonstrate ecampus skills to you during our first class session on _Tuesday_ at _6:00_ pm. At any time during the semester, you will be able to view the course syllabus from the content page in ecampus.
For those of you who simply need a quick refresher, just enter ecampus.monmouth.edu at the URL. Enter your MU email account (s followed by your student number) and your email login on the login screen. After entering ecampus, you may desire to move to the content page to locate the syllabus, or view the dropbox page, the place where you will go to upload all of your IT assignments this semester.
Since the course syllabus contains much information that I know is of importance to you, including the titles of the books we will use this semester and the grading criteria for the course, I ask that you review it carefully before our first class session on _Tuesday_. For those of you interested in getting an early start over the weekend, you may desire to read some of the very interesting articles in the Current Topics book or select a chapter of great interest to you in the Discovering Computers 2007 book.
Should you need to check on anything about our class, the two best resources besides Educator are my MU home page and the Infotechbuzz blog that I keep. Check them both at LEAST weekly!
Class web page:
http://zorak.monmouth.edu/~posten
Infotech Buzz Weblog:
http://infotechbuzz.blogspot.com
Should you need to contact me, the best way is via email or pager
Sam Posten
samuel.posten@l-3com.com
9084617181@vtext.com (short text message pager)
Bill Reynolds will substitute occasionally as my work schedule requires:
William.S.Reynolds@monmouth.edu
Have a great semester; see you in class Tuesday night!
Prof. Posten
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/01/01/self.editingonline.ap/index.html
It takes being beaten over the head sometimes for the obvious to become recognized. The ‘net never forgets, even if you delete it, it’s still archived somewhere, more than likely =)
Sam
Cool list!
http://www.sellsbrothers.com/fun/msiview/default.aspx?content=question.htm
I've heard about a few of these before. The cool thing to remember is there is no right or wrong answers, the idea is to keep your cool and let your personality shine through as you explain HOW you would go about solving it. Novel twists are more important than brute force solves.
Two good articles on why this stuff is doomed from the start and a curse for consumers.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15818852/site/newsweek
http://www.boingboing.net/2006/11/22/audio_from_xbox_hack.html
First, you're bright right? You wouldnt be fooled by one of these scam businesses would you? Shameful I know, but the truth is I thought exactly the same thing and I was scammed myself about 15 years ago, when I was a little older than most of you... Maybe someday I'll write up the whole story and put it on MY blog...
The scams are getting a LOT more convincing and they can totally devastate your life. The worst part is they are actively TARGETING smart people! They focus on people who they can say 'those other losers failed because they werent smart or driven like you are...'
http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/archives/2006/11/network-marketing-is-a-big-fat-scam.html
Variety says it is official, VHS is dead. Someone let my Mom know please!
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117953955.html?categoryid=20&cs=1
British passports cracked, we are scheduled to get this stupid technology soon in the US:
http://it.slashdot.org/it/06/11/17/065214.shtml
PS3 out, riots ensue:
http://games.slashdot.org/games/06/11/17/1414252.shtml
Stupidest thing I've read this week, besides the Higher Education thing from yesterday:
http://www.todaystmj4.com/_content/news/topstories/story_5438.asp
Lots of interesting news up on the sites this morning, lots of stuff on the Japanese PS3 launch and the American media getting their Wiis and PS3s to play with (go to www.engadget.com or www.gametrailers.com to see some great unboxing and initial reactions, or even better, go to EB, Gamestop or Walmart and give the systems a try yourself).
Still think the HBO documentary on Hacking Democracy was all hogwash? Guy voted for himself and still got ZERO votes:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/11/11/zero.votes.ap/index.html
How to write a great resume:
http://www.rockportinstitute.com/resumes.html
Google says free cell phones for everyone (someday maybe)
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061113-8206.html
Vista and Office 2007 already Pirated 40 days+ before retail availability (shocker)
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061112-8204.html
Java is now opensource!
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061113-8205.html
Zune launches tomorrow:
http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/06/11/13/1149228.shtml
Pogue says Zune stinks (I agree, version 2.0 will be a lot better, count on it):
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/09/technology/09pogue.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Vista to feature lame startup sounds (MSNBC has a clip):
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/11/1945244
http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,72045-0.html?tw=wn_story_page_prev2
Security theater really drives me insane. We make things more difficult
for people (and affect them mentally by scaring people needlessly!)
without putting REAL detterents in place. If we give in to these stupid
policies just to show 'hey at least we are doing SOMETHING' then the
terrorist have WON.
