In this article we hear that a new DRM scheme has been cracked.

"Otto" who makes a comment on the article says it best.

There is no amount of protection they can ever add that will make this sort of thing impossible to do. They simply cannot prevent copying, and it's easy to explain why.

All DRM measures, work on the notion that "copying" and "viewing" are different things. They want to allow people to view the content, but not to copy it. This is clearly ludicrous. It's as if somebody gave you a book and said that you were not allowed to take a pencil and write your own copy of the book elsewhere. They can say it, but it's wholly unenforceable.

In order to display any content, your computer must read it. If it can read it, then it can write a copy somewhere. Period. This undeniable fact of reality makes all DRM pointless.

In this particular case, the author did not even do anything particularly special.

Well, I can't say that I haven't given it a chance - because god knows that I have.

Internet explorer 7 sucks ass. The majority of CSS rendering problems have not been addressed. They have fixed a couple of things, but not the real issues.

If elected grand supreme poobah of the universe I would decree that Internet Explorer be banned for ever.

Fuck you internet explorer... fuck you.

andre

House Misfires On Internet Safety
US House passes bill to restrict social software

The internet itself is social software. The power of the network is the network of people and their ideas it creates. If you take away the 'social networking' tools, what are you left with? Boring one way 'broadcasting' services and a lousy shopping mall that can't include customer product reviews.

The bill doesn't stop social networking sites from existing, but stops people from accessing them from public spaces like the library or schools.

How stupid is that?

andre

Okay, I am going to spread this virus because the virus itself is interesting.

The story to date in case you missed it:
Subpop band (and personal favorite) Postal Service makes a video for their February 2003 release "Such Great Heights"

Apple makes a commercial for their new Intel based Macs.

The two works are for all intents and purposes the exact same thing. The Apple commercial is a shot for shot remake of the Postal Service video - shot by the same director.

Some people notice the similarity. *update - a better look at the two works side by side

Some people start investigating.

Online Rights Canada has a pledge proposed by Michael Geist that basically asks that if as an MP are going to work on copyright law in the Heritage ministry - that you wont accept campaign contributions from "(i) a copyright lobby group, (ii) its corporate members, or (iii) senior executives as well as (iv) a copyright collective".

The problem is that Sam Bulte wont take the pledge - but will take campaign contributions - and its creating a lot of buzz in her Toronto riding - and around the world.

andre

I caught a bit of SNL last night - and the "Lazy Sunday" video is just too funny. If you don't know what I'm talking about fire up your favourite p2p and take a look.

(Update: You can see it here)

Its interesting to see how technology is permeating popular culture.

I pick up yahoo maps to find the dopest route
I prefer map quest
That's a dope one too
Google Maps is the best
True that
Double True

Yes - Double True.
andre

The father of the WWW has a new web log and he's running Drupal.

andre

The other night I attended the first ever meeting of the Toronto Drupal User's Group at the Linux Caffe.

I would say that for a first meeting it was a success. While there was a little confusion over the date and time of the event, several people showed up and we got to the business of deciding what the group was going to be all about and what format we would like the meetings to use.

We decided:

• The group will meet monthly - likely the 3rd tuesday each month
• There will be beer at all meetings
• There will be short individual introductions to start meetings off
• There will be some sort of professional development presentations made (Demo of some cool Drupal feature, or exciting Drupal site - or related Drupal coolness)
• There will be free form networking / mingling after that

Boy, I've just not been keeping up with my blog.

It occurs to me that some people I know check my blog just to know what is going on in my life.

Professional:
Well - a while back I started a steady paying gig with another company. Like Be Circle they work primarily with not for profits and, in fact, are a non profit themselves. They also happen to be a Drupal shop - so the fit is nice and I'm glad to join their team.

Programming:
I've been playing around with Zend Studio Enterprise and must say that I am very impressed. Having a debugging session with code on a server is very handy. And all the integrated tools/features are nice too.... CVS - FTP - SQL etc. Its a bit sluggish on my desktop machine - since that machine doesn't meet the min requirements (800mhz+) - but it works beautifully on my laptop.

Play:
I've been halloweening with my girlfriend for the past couple of weeks. She's done most of the work, but I signed on for a couple of projects including a "neon" sign I made using EL wire.

Znet ran a story that caught my attention. From reading the story I discovered the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) has released a virus that scans your computer for file sharing programs and either removes them or renders them useless.

The program will also remove 'illegal' music and media files from your computer.

The virus must be downloaded from the IFPI website. This does not make it any less dangerous and may still spread. The virus is spread by social means - i.e. tricking users into downloading by making them think that doing so will make their internet media experience 'safer'.

Don't be fooled. This is scary stuff.

The only thing the software does is delete files and remove legitimate peer to peer technology from the infected machine.

How to protect yourself:

It looks more and more like everything that I Cringely has been saying about apple launching an on-line video service has been true - and the imac mini will be the livingroom entertainment hub.

Quiet. Small. Good looking. Powerful.

Everything you would want in a piece of computer hardware were you to put it in your living room.

I've been toying with the idea of building myself a sleek small sexy little computer for the livingroom... but if the price is right maybe the mini will be the way to go.

Then again - not likely. I am very much more likely to want to build a system of my own - even though the thought of getting something off the shelf is appealing.

But, it doesn't matter what i'll do. Its what all other consumers will do... and THEY will buy mac minis

andre

Earlier this evening I got sucked into watching a special on CNBC about the "ebay effect."

It was quite interesting. Here you have a major success story of the dot com days. 10 years a 150 million registered users later ebay is either poised to take over the world... or (at least for a while) sit on top of the dot com heap for a little while longer.

The show really was like a 90 minute ad for ebay, but it did ask some questions on people's minds. Like:

1) Fees are going up - aren't customers pissed?
2) Fraud is still a problem - are they doing anything about it?
3) With 10 years of explosive growth, can ebay keep it up? Investors are getting a bit nervous that future potential for growth isn't what it used to be - even with an ambitious global strategy that includes China.

At any rate, it was a neat show to watch - especially for those that are interested in the history of the web and ecommerce.

Everywhere you turn you see the words "web 2.0." But, what is Web 2.0?

Web 2.0 is new speak techno-jargon that is utterly meaningless to all but the ignorant.

Let's face it,Web 2.0 is just the web [full stop]. Anyone that has really worked in web development has been building 'web 2.0' applications for years. Web 2.0 is not a new version of the web, or even a new way of looking at the web. It is simply (based on the definitions I have read) an arbitrary name slapped on the current way of doing things (which isn't much different from the way we did things 3 years -or longer- ago).

There wasn't a single event or day when the web magically transformed from version 1.x to 2.0. The web is still the web. The only difference between the web of today and the web of a few years ago is the access to technology.

I Cringely says that Intel is about to buy Apple.

Hmmmm... that'd be interesting. The idea is that if the two merge than Intel would own the Mac OS... and could get OEMs to build machines with that OS pre-installed and then have apple develop more processor intensive apps that would drive future processor sales. And what's Apples motivation? Steve Jobs wouldn't mind kicking Bill Gates' ass.

Interesting theory. But, who cares? The desktop is dead non? Didn't I even say that somewhere? Well yeah, I did say the desktop is dead... or at least that developing software for the desktop wasn't were it was at. But, I will admit that some things are better left to desktop apps. There is always going to be a need for a solid desktop operating system to run some labour intensive apps like video, audio, and graphics editing. And the desktop is a pretty good place for storing things you don't want to share with the world.

If you haven't already guessed I'm a fan of 'I Cringely'.

The past two weeks he has been talking about phishing - or the nasty bit of the digital underworld where meanies try to steal grandma's life savings by having her fork over her bank login information - or stealing uncle ted's identity by getting him to fork over his birthday and social insurance number.

If you haven't already checked out the links to I Cringly in the blocks to the left - He has an interesting take on what the solution to the Phishing problem is. Two weeks ago he proposed some solutions (Phish or Phisher). This week he has some better ones. (Man Bites Phish)

Done reading? Good.

The next time you get a phishy e-mail - do as he says... take 30 seconds out to go to the site and fill out their forms with bogus info. Let the phishers catch too much - so its impossible for them to act on what they have caught.

Derek asked me recently why he should switch to Drupal vs. continuing to develop his own CMS.

Well - instead of coming up with a great reason myself - I'll point everyone to an article.

Charlie Lowe (Drupal Documentation Coordinator) and Dries Buytaert (Drupal Founder and Benevolant Dictator) have written an outstanding piece that might help explain the alure of Drupal. Its not a content management system... its much much more... and CMS's are dead.

It's about the Community Plumbing: The Social Aspects of Content Management Systems

This is certainly a must read for members of the cult of Regoczei.

andre