2002-09-19»
cheapo mods»
Want to brighten up your dull grey box? PC fans with colour LEDs, fifteen bucks.
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Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
up in the san jose sky»
We just saw the weirdest thing in the dusk sky above San Jose. Initially, it looked like a very brightly lit jet, with a thick vapour trail behind it. It seemed pretty high, but was far brighter than it should be that altitude. I thought perhaps the setting sun was catching a plane-wing at an angle. Then as we watched, a bowl-shaped vapour plume formed around the dot and behind it (a bit like the vapour blanket you can see forming around the plane halfway down this page, but I guess larger given the apparent distance). The dot carried on for a bit longer, then formed another bowl-shaped cloud. That bowl then appeared to contract in on itself, there was what looked like a scattering of debris from the dot, and the dot disappeared. The whole thing was over in less than a minute.
It was a pretty big deal – the vapour trailed crossed a sixth of the sky or more, about 40° from the western horizon. I’m sure we weren’t the only people to see it. I always wonder where to look for discussions of these geographically constrained phenomena online. Guess I’ll keep an eye on the local papers for a while.
2002-09-17»
koyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaanisqatsi»Alright, now I’ve got my tickets, I feel safer telling you this: Philip Glass and the Glass Ensemble are performing a live accompaniment to a showing of Koyaanisqatsi in San Francisco next month. I’m a bit too excited.
Those who now hate me will be relieved to know that the DVD of the film is already out.
2002-09-14»
junk wifi»Woah. WiFi hotspots have been rolled out in Japan by … McDonald’s and Denny’s? According to Trends In Japan, they are:
Wireless LANs Appearing in Schools and Homes
When wireless LANs first made their appearance, they could be found only in a few hotels or coffee shops, but this year many businesses have been installing wireless LANs for the convenience of their customers. One after another, such chains as McDonald’s, MOS Burger, Mister Donut, Starbucks Coffee, and Denny’s have been creating hot spots in certain model outlets. In addition, rail companies like the East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) have been creating hot spots inside of stations, and some districts and cities are now working to make their entire area a hot spot.
2002-09-12»
the word for lunch is tote bag»Infinite Matrix is a great online sf zine. It’s having a fundraiser. Ursula K. Le Guin has donated a “lunch bag” for auction, embroidered by her own hand. ‘”You can only have lunch once,” she says helpfully, “because it isn’t washable.”‘.
If I was a zombie who developed my prose style by eating brains, I would eat Le Guin’s brain first. You can read her latest short story, set in the Earthsea universe, for $0.91 here. (I know it looks like I’m being paid off by FictionWise, but I just want to applaud their promotion of uncrippled e-texts. For the record, I don’t touch their “secure” editions).
After Ursula, I would move on to John McPhee‘s lobes.
2002-09-11»
great quote on google and usability»Top W3C HTML honcho Steven Pemberton spoke on XHTML2 at BAYCHI yesterday, and included this great quote (from, it looks like, the linux-elitists mailing list).
“Google is, for all intents, a blind user. A billionaire blind user with tens of millions of friends, all of whom hang on his every word. I suspect Google will have a stronger impact than [laws] in building accessible websites.”
“In a world where Google likely has a valuation several orders of magnitude higher than any chrome such as flash, graphics, audio, interactivity, or “personalization”, I see a heady revision.”
Steven this HTML page as his presentation, transforming it into powerpoint-esque viewpoints (outline view, slide-per-page view) with a bunch of stylesheets.
2002-09-10»
drive-by spamming redux»Within a few hours of posting the correction to ZDNet’s article on drive-by spamming, Adrian Wright, the original misquoted expert, e-mailed me. “Saw your comments on Oblomovka. Not exactly professional behaviour for a Sunday Times stringer”, he wrote. I asked him what he thought was unprofessional. As yet he hasn’t replied.
Meanwhile, the original misquote is already beginning to spread. News sources like ZDNet are seen as authoritative sources online and off. From miscellaneous Slashdot posters to Professor Ed Felten, there are now people who cite the piece as proof that there are recorded instances of drive-by spamming.
As far as I know – and more importantly, as far as Adrian Wright, the original source, knows, there exists no such evidence. The lead to the story, “‘Warspammers’ are taking advantage of unprotected wireless LANs to send out millions of junk emails” is simply not true.
Terry Schmidt, of NYC Wireless wrote independently to the ZDNet UK journalist, Graeme Wearden, asking in the light of the new comments by Adrian, admitting that he’d never seen a case of drive-by spamming in real life, ZDNet would correct the original story. Here’s what Graeme wrote:
I asked Wright if he would like me to change anything in my story – he didn’t.
I think that’s because, even if he did say ‘could happen’ rather than ‘is happening’ (and sitting in the middle of that audience, I thought he was discussing something that is taking place, and that’s what I wrote down), Wright thinks it very likely that drive-by hacking is occuring.
That looks like the truth. But it’s very different from the original story. That article – still being spread, still being read – continues to mislead people into believing drive-by spamming is happening right now, and that Adrian Wright had seen it happen.
Misinformation like this has consequences. It encourages people to believe that having an open network is an uncivil thing to do; that they should cower in fear at the spammers stalking the streets, looking for outlets. It encourages people to believe that the only solution to their fear, uncertainty and doubt is to to hire security consultants with experience of this rampant menace. And the more the original misleading article sits there, the further the misinformation spreads.
This seems to be the opposite of what a journalist should do; and the opposite of what a security consultant is paid to advise. I’m not sure who is to blame here: but if anyone is being unprofessional, I don’t think it’s me.
2002-09-06»
drive-by spamming: still a theoretical danger»Quote from Adrian Wright, the expert “quoted” in a ZD Net story which claimed spammers were using open WiFi points to send “millions” of unsoliticed e-mails :
It seems I’ve been everso slightly misquoted in that I actually said ‘could’ in this presentation. i.e. “These people COULD simply drive up to a building armed with their… Apart from that it looks like a good story!
Although I know of no hard evidence that this practice of wireless drive-by spamming is taking place, I would be surprised if it was not happening – given the increasing difficulties spammers face in retaining legitimate ISP access – within the more developed nations anyway.
My emphasis. In other words, “drive-by spamming” is still a something that some people endlessly predict will happen if you leave your AP insecure, but of which no record exists in the wild.
Adrian also said that drive-by spamming had been covered many times (true) and ZDNet was one of the most prominent new sources documenting the existence of this practice. Wait – you’re using as an authority the very organisation who completely misquoted you? On the same topic? Is that wise?
2002-09-05»
drive-by spamming»Hmm. C|Net ZDNet UK is reporting that “millions of mails” are being sent by people who pull up to open wifi networks, and use them to anonymously spam.
Okay, I’m suspicious. Spamming through open networks was always a theoretical possibility (indeed, I remember people referring to drive-by spamming almost as early as wardriving was coined), but I’ve never heard of it happening in the wild. I’ve just left a message with Adrian Wright, the British security expert quoted in the article, to see if he has any concrete cases. I suspect either either he’s pulling the examples out of his imaginary analyst hat, or he’s been misquoted.
2002-09-04»
i fought the law and i won»I’m not sure, but I think Americans believe more fervently in the saving grace of the almighty Law than the British. I occasionally reel off dozens of fantastically repressive UK laws (including the one that forbids gatherings that include “the emission of a succession of repetitive beats”) to looks of perfect horror here. Then I end it all by saying “Of course, no one pays any attention! Ahahaha!”, and watch everybody fall off their seats. In the US, there’s a background buzz that nothing keeps your neighbour in check but the letter of the law and the iron force of the Constitution. Gotta keep the rule of law, or society will collapse in a hail of gunfire, trespassing, double-parking and moider. There’s no pity for those who break the law. In Britain it’s much more “Okay do what you want – but try not to get caught, alright?”
I’ve grown far more sympathetic to the American line over time, but I’ve never seen anyone state the alternative position quite as elegantly D2 Digest. Bit too elegantly, in fact. If you read his work – including the entry on why Lessig is too damn sincere, and why drug laws don’t work, and why we should keep them – you could conclude that they’re the careful posings of a Economista Angry Young Arse. Not surprising – if you’re going to insist that bad laws can have good effects (or Antinomialism, as he calls it), it always helps to be nice young Oxonian who can probably talk your way out of a tight corner with a Christchurch-educated judge when the need arises. But at least he’s not a libertarian Angry Young Arse, right?