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Have a geeky holiday and prosperous 2007
Just got back from the neighbors yard to get a Christmas tree (see below) and getting all emotation. This year was a memorable one for this blog, with several record setting postings: take 1, 2 or 3. When we started this blog in November 2004, we never could have dreamed of a single posting getting nearly 200,000 pageviews.
Thank you all for you links, comments and eyeballs. This blog will hibernate for a bit as we gather strength to storm the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas early January.
Bear in mind however that our reporting from this event will be primarily posted on our CESblog.
Image nicked from Sunbelt blog
2007 predictions and 2006 payday
After last year's predictions for 2006 provided a mixed bag of failures (see below), I'll give this punditry thing another try this year. It can hardly go any worse than last year.
Discussion is encouraged, flaming is allowed only if you demonstrate in your that you never read the posting but are commenting nonetheless.
1. After seeing Windows Vista in the wild, customers shrug their shoulders and go back to work. A few geeks and a small army of reporters will line up at stores for a midnight launch, the rest of the world will go on with its real life.
2. Businesses will reward the Micosoft-Novell deal with their dollars and allow Novell to create a genuine competitor for Red Hat. The noise from the religious open source camp will eventually quiet down.
3. Oracle will parade a few customers for its Red Hat Linux support offering in front of press and analysts, but their limited numbers will illustrate that support and bug fixes alone don't make for a viable Linux offering.
4. As online criminals turn increasingly to highly targeted attacks, a small scale worm will target OS X in an effort to conduct industrial espionage. It will exploit a vulnerability in Microsoft Office, allowing Apple to blame the attack on Redmond.
5. Google will fail to find a way to monetize traffic for the user generated videos that are hosted on Google Video and Youtube. To consolidate its position as a leading online video provider, the firm will create a genuine video search engine that indexes video both inside and outside its network.
6. After the embarrassing failure of the new Netscape.com, AOL will acquire Digg.com for several hundred million dollars.
7. AMD will take back the technology lead from Intel in the chip market when it launches it quad core processor. Intel will be forced to continue to drop its prices to maintain market share. To cut back on R&D investments, it will unveil a timeline for a chip that will move Itanium systems to the x86 platform.
8. HP will remain the most boring and passionless company in high tech. Financially it will prosper.
9. The One Laptop per Child project will ship millions of Linux powered notebook computers to developing economies. Horror stories about containers full of OLPCs sitting idle in docks and ending up on the grey market will embarrass Negroponte, but the project ultimately will be declared a success.
10. After a slew of high profile computer security incidents, governments will crack down on the computer industry and adopt legislation that forces proper levels of corporate IT security.
And finally: Payday for 2006 predictions:
(as I'm judge, jury and executioner, I'm sure that you disagree with these scores).
1: Vista launching on time. 0 points
2: Open source develops patent weapon against Microsoft: 0 points
3: iPods iconic status will fail to cause a major shift in Mac sales: 1 point
4: Intel Viiv will fail: 1 point
5: Samsung acquires AMD: 0 points
6: PS3 will kick Xbox 360's but: 1 point
7: Google's valuation will drop: 0 poits
8: RSS adoption will increase to 10 pct: 0 points
9: Users will sue Microsoft for insecure code: 0 points
10: VNU will make many more headlines: 1 point
Total: 4 points
BMW's 2007 prediction: your car will have an espresso cup holder and LCD display in the back. Chauffeur not included.
technorati tags: 2007, predictions
Google users are from Venus, Yahoo's are from Mars
If you were wondering why Google's financial performance is so much butter than Yahoo's, the top search queries for the two will tell everything you need to know.
As the attached table shows, Google's top searches for 2006 shows a very tech savy group of users, with the Bebo social network topping the ranks, followed by myspace. The world cup (soccer) ranks 4th and in the 9th position we find Mininova, a bittorent tracker that allows users to download content without paying for it.
Yahoo searchers however are obsesses with anything shallow: Britney Spears (pictured left), the World Wrestling Entertainment (which has nothing to do with wrestling), Shakira and Jessica Simpson top the search ranking.
Although you'll have a hard time putting advertising next to search results for a user who is looking for copyright infringement networks, there is definitely some potential for all the social projects in the Google ranking. Now try defining a target audience for Britney Spears and Paris Hilton without pitching adult entertainment.
| Google search | Yahoo search |
|
Googlers prefer a guy building a website from a garage over blondes.
technorati tags: google, yahoo, search, britney+spears, bebo
Youtube marketing done right
Will it blend is living the dream of every 10-year-old boy that is trapped in a grown man's body: put items ranging from iPods (pictured right) to gardening racks in a blender and see what happens.
These random acts of senseless destruction are shot on video and then uploaded to the website and Youtube, where they amuse the masses of bored office workers.
But these videos aren't all fun and games. They are produced by a blender manufacturer who hopes that they will increase brand awareness.
I don't know about you, but I have a sudden urge to test the limits of the family blender.
technorati tags: youtube, marketing, blender, willitblend
Bill Gates admits to DRM mess
Bill Gates has some clear advice for consumers: don't buy music from digital music stores, including the Urge store that it backs. Digital rights management technology after all is far too complicated to actually use. His advice" buy a CD and rip it to your hard drive and portable mp3 player.
The words are remarkable coming from Gates. The Microsoft chairman is partly responsible for the DRM mess, as his company created the Windows Media Format. HE seemed to be targeting Apple's iTunes store more than anything else, however.
"At the end of the day, incentive systems [for artists] make a difference, but we don't have the right thing here in terms of simplicity or interoperability," Gates said at a conference last Friday.
You see, in Gates' head, digital rights management by itself isn't evil, as long as you allow all device makers to support the technology. Apple famously won't allow other device makers to build media players that support its Fairplay DRM, where Microsoft will sell a license for its Windows Media to anyone with a wallet.
If Gates is sincere about wanting to create an honest DRM while preventing piracy, he should consider backing Sun's open DRM project, or at least opening up Windows Media.
technorati tags: drm, apple, microsoft, bill+gates,
Silicon Valley Sleuth switches ownership
VNU has sold its European publishing business and trade show business including vnunet.com and this blog to 3i, a private equity fund.
Although it isn't yet clear what strategy 3i has for the company, the transaction ends a period of uncertainty about our ownership. I don't know anything beyond what was in today's press release, other than that we look forward to continue to grow our traffic and serve our readers.
The Financial Times broke the news on Friday, but today's press release didn't bring a confirmation of the alleged 320 euro acquisition sum that the FT cited. The companies are also still discussing a possible acquisition of VNU's publications and trade shows in France.
technorati tags: silicon+valley+sleuth, SVS, VNU, acquisition, 3i
iPhone secrecy bites Apple in the back
Apple on Monday paid the price for its secretive ways when Cisco subsidiary Linksys launched an iPhone.
The iPhone, of course, is that name that bloggers and media have been using for a product that Apple is rumored to be launching. Although rumor has it that Apple has assigned contractors to manufacture the device, its name is shrouded in the level of secrecy that normally surrounds Apple launches.
Either way, Linksys is the big winner.
If (and that's a big if) Apple has a different name for its mobile phone, Linksys today received a ton of free publicity.
But if the models that believed to be rolling of the conveyer belts in China right now are indeed labeled iPhone, Apple has a major trademark battle on its hands.
For Apple to claim ownership of the iPhone trademark, it would need to show that is has used the term over a period of time. Apple's rigid secrecy record prevents the firm from making any such claim. The company may have owned iphone.org since 1999, but never put the domain to any use.
Obsessive secrecy can have consequences.
Reddit hit by identity theft
Reddit is warning users of the social bookmaking service that their online identities might have been compromised.
The company disclosed on a company blog that a backup was stolen that contained a part of the service's database, including user names, passwords and email addresses for its users.
Especially users who have the same login name and password for multiple services (and who doesn't?) should be cautious and are urged to change their passwords.
Reddit recently was acquired by Wired, and big corporate seems to be raising its ugly head in the worst possible way: through severely lacking security protocols and a no encryption.
Synergy used to have a positive meaning.
FSF tells Vista to sod off
Richard Stallman's (picture below) Free Software Foundation has kicked off a new campaign that aims to drive away business from Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system.
BadVista will pick up where the 'Defective by Design' campaign left of. A spoof on Microsoft's secure by design programme, the latter targeted digital rights management technology.
The Free Software Foundation is the group that gave us the general public license (GPL) and its "religious" provisions about patents and DRM.
The group plans the concrete protests for BadVista a surprise, but it will target the Trusted Computing initiative that has given us the Trusted Platform Module (TPM). In addition to securely storing passwords and encrypting the contents of your hard drive, the TPM in theory can also be used to limited a user's access to information, or even prevent a web page from being printed.
The FSF must be on the trail of some of Microsoft's dark plans. Security Startup today is the only technology that uses the TPM today. It allows users to encrypt the data on their hard drives.
While third party applications too can use the chip, that is typically only limited to software that comes bundled with new systems. Some IBM Thinkpads for instance have a TPM to securely store passwords.
But even if there is no dark conspiracy, the first F in FSF stands for free for a reason. The group doesn't like to be locked out. And it's making sure that it is heard.
technorati tags: microsoft, freedom, fsf, free+software+foundation
If you weren't planning on buying a Mac
would this change your mind? (air sickness bag not included)
Allegedly this is Apple's television ad for the 2006 Holiday season. technorati tags: apple, commercial, advertising
Microsoft performs in Vista piracy dance
As crackers come up with new ways to circumvent Windows Vista's anti piracy features, the software vendors is making sure to patch the most popular ones.
In one case crackers crafted a version of Windows Vista by combining pieces of the Vista release candidate with the current release to manufacturing build.
Microsoft is able to single out those systems the next time they contact Windows Update by their product activation keys and force them to go through a product validation cycle. Cracked systems will than be given 30 days to provide a valid product activation key, after which it is effectively disabled.
Surely, users who are desperate enough to slap together their own custom version of Vista are able to instruct their router to block access to the Windows Update service. Being deprived of access to updates is unlikely to cause them any distress. After all, part of their system already is based on beta code.
Microsoft on the other hand has no choice. They need to squeeze Windows Vista for all that it's worth. So whenever crackers make a move, Microsoft will respond. It will make for an interesting dance.
Microsoft is even paying Google to guide surfers away from Vista cracks
technorati tags: piracy, microsoft, windows+vista, vista
How Vonage stays in business
VoIP provider Vonage spends up to $400 for each new customer that it signs up. Given the $25 month subscription price for its flat rate domestic calling plan, customers would need to stay on for at least 16 months to make back these funds. And that would be assuming that Vonage doesn’t have to pay anything for the phone calls that its customers make.
With such outrageous customer acquisition costs, Vonage can't afford to loose a single subscriber. And it seems that they are making every effort to make sure that doesn't happen.
Just ask the cable company that came by to install its digital voice package at my home earlier this week. After hooking up the shoebox-sized new cable modem with integrated VoIP adapter, the technician was unable to activate the phone service.
As it turned out, my current phone number hadn't yet been released by the current provider. When the technician rolled his eyes and sighted when he heard that Vonage was involved. They are causing trouble on a constant basis, he said, by sabotaging the porting of phone numbers.
We now have to start the procedure all over again. Requesting Vonage to release the number will take another 15 days, allowing them to cash in on another $25.
The provider appears to be desperately holding on to any business that it can get. But how else can it sustain its troubled stock price and pay for its convicted-criminal-founders' lavish pay package.
100,000,000 ID theft victims cry for a security clean-up
It took only 21 months for the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse ID theft counter to hit 100 million. And that's just counting US cases of identity theft.
A Boeing employee had the questionable honor of reaching the landmark figure when he or she lost a laptop containing information on 382,000 current and former workers.
Boeing fired the careless employee on Thursday for failing to comply with the company's data policies and his or her managers will be "reprimanded". But the true problem is that Boeing doesn't have the technology in place that prevents its workers storing this data unencrypted.
Boeing faced a similar issue last year, and at the time put policies in place. But you can't rely on trusting workers when it comes to priceless information. You'll have to control them.
How many people will have to suffer from identity theft because schools, corporations or the government fail to protect consumer data?
The problem of inadequate data security is a monetary problem. Companies believe that it's cheaper to deal with security breaches after the fact than invest in proper security. Anybody who has fallen victim to a security breach will tell you that this perception is wrong. The cleanup costs are high, and the damage to a company's image can't be measured.
But simple economics indicates that the price of the risk still
isn't high enough. We need higher fines and jail time for irresponsible
executives. We need to raise the cost of insecurity until its
unbearably high.
Shiny badges don't make for better security.
technorati tags: boeing, privacy+rights+clearinghouse, identity+theft, security, 100,000,000
iTunes sales just fine
There is nothing wrong with the music sales of Apple's iTunes store, contrary to what some media reports claimed.
Analyst firm Forrester Research last week released a study that stated that sales of digital music from Apple's story declined by 58 per cent in the first 6 months of this year. Naturally it good a fair amount of media exposure.
But the fine print paints a picture that is much more balanced.
The data is based on a Forrester analysis of credit card transactions of US households. Of the 5,580 families that participated in the study, a mere 181 purchased digital music from Apple.
To further destabilize the significance of the 58 per cent decline: 32 per cent of the 181 buyers purchased only one song and just 31 per cent purchased six or more.
Just one of the survey participants had to increase or decrease their iTunes buying to have a significant impact on Apple's perceived digital music sales.
The study doesn't really show anything, other than that only 3.2 per cent of the households in the US purchase music from Apple's iTunes store. Any conclusion beyond that faces enormous margins of error and statistical insignificance.
But instead of crying foul over the media reports (not us ;-) ) ignoring the disclaimers and focusing on the 58 per cent drop -- and Apple refusing to share confidential company data, the Forrester analysts shouldn't have put the data in their report in the first place.
If you don't want it quoted in the press, you shouldn't say it in the first place.
Looking elsewhere for blemishes on the iPod success story
technorati tags: forrester, itunes, apple, josh+bernoff, ipod
Emerging economies design their own PCs
Forget about Intel's Eduwise or even Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop per Child project. A computer appealing to people in developing nations will most likely come from designers who understand the local market.
Rather than pouring millions of dollars into a design that is likely to fail, AMD therefore organized a computer design contest in Latin America and will simply provide computer manufacturers with the specifications.
AMD chief executive Hector Ruiz picked a PC dubbed GOTA as the first winner. The design stood out because the creators plan for it to be distributed and financed through local water supply co-ops.
A jury picked e-cipó, a device that turns a television into an computer and internet terminal using GPRS wireless technology and a UHF connection to transmit the image to the television. The device specifically targets isolated communities in the Amazon, enabling government interactions by providing access to educational, medical and citizenship support through the web.
The initiative is part of AMD's 50x15 initiative that seeks to provide access to half of the world's population by 2015. The two winning projects receive $30,000 each.
Intel has been doing ethnographic research around the world and last year opened four so-called platform definition centers in Brazil, China, Egypt and India. The company has launched a community PC that is designed for villages in India as well as a low cost desktop platform that is said to become available in Brazil, Egypt, Ghana, Mexico and Nigeria.
Gota
e-cipó
technorati tags: amd, e-cipo, gota, intel, OLPC, community+pc, emerging+economies, developing+nations
Firefox TV ads air in Boston and San Francisco
The Mozilla Foundation has started to air television commercials for the Firefox open source browser in San Francisco and Boston, according to a schedule posted on the organization's website.
The campaign is scheduled to run about six weeks.
The videos were entered by users as part of the Firefox Flicks
contest last April. The advertising blocks were purchased with
individual donations. The donors are credited in the videos.
technorati tags: firefox, flicks, tv, advertising, open+source
Soft porn actress promotes Windows Live Search
A site promoting Microsoft's Live search has gotten the company more than what it bargained for.
The Ms. Dewey site will respond to your search queries, making witty comments and acting up. Queries that appear to trigger responses include Bill Gates, Apple and Google. If you keep her waiting too long before entering a query, she'll impatiently bang the inside of your monitor.
But as it turns out, the actresses playing Ms. Dewey is willing to go further for the right price. The character is played by actress Janina Gavankar, who starred in the 2004 soft core movie "Cup of my blood".
The movie advertises itself as:
A seemingly random accident leaves porn photographer Jack Fender in possession of Christianity's most holy of Holy Relics.
He must confront Evil's relentless assault of blood soaked murder, sex and deceit for the preservation of an entire faith and his own soul.
Valleywag has some pictures that aren't workplace approved.
Gavankar as Ion in My cup of blood
Business Linux users back Novell-Microsoft Linux deal
A majority of businesses approves of the Microsoft-Novell Linux pact that was unveiled early November, according to a survey that the two vendors published.
An overwhelming majority of 95 per cent of the people surveyed approved of the deal. The survey questioned 201 individuals, 57 per cent of them running both Windows and Red Hat or Suse Linux.
The survey is an obvious PR move that seeks to counter the storm of criticism that the deal has attracted from parts of the open source community.
Especially the religious free software movement opposes the deal, because it violates the spirit of open source and the general public license. They have a fundamental belief that software should be free and that software patents are wrong.
The survey underscores that business users don't really care about all that. They prefer the short term benefit of protection from Microsoft's patents over the long term benefit of free and truly open software.
Don't blame them for it. They only rely on Linux to run their businesses.
Novell's CEO Ron Hovespian and Microsoft's Steve Ballmer applaud Linux pact
technorati tags: linux, novell, microsoft, open+source, floss
Cisco talks up enterprise media adapter
Media adapters might be best known for their consumer applications, allowing you a television to play videos, mp3 and digital photos that are stored you a computer through a wireless network.
When you move the same idea to enterprise applications, you end up with Cisco's digital media player. Hook up the box to a network and attach it to a plasma or LCD display, and you've got yourself an inexpensive way to manage and update digital signs. Advertise company news in the lunch room, stream video of company events or just update signs at a conference.
In the video below you can watch Cisco CEO John Chambers demonstrating the device.
technorati tags: cisco, media+adapter, john+chambers, c-scape
Cisco: the network is the platform
Cisco may be making most of its money from selling routers and switches, the company is actively trying to expand its business to other areas such as security telepressense and home networking. Valid as those efforts may be, in the end they will first and foremost allow Cisco to sell even more routers and switches.
The actual solutions that Cisco is pushing mostly takes up additional network capacity, creating a market for high speed internet connections and mobile data services.
Cisco this week is having its annual analyst conference in San Jose, and in his opening keynote, chief executive John Chambers pretty much reiterated his love for anything that will grow network traffic. He just phrased it slightly different by wrapping it in fluffy marketing speak like "the network is the platform".
Chambers is in love with video, for nothing fills the network like video (and that's even before high definition video grows up). But seeking to even further grow the network benefit, Chambers is hoping that convergence will rise even sooner.
"Youtube is just baby steps" for online video, Chambers claimed. Video won't truly grow up until it can be accessed on any device through any network, he believes. Instead consumers want access any kind of video on any device. That means anything from broadcast TV to home security, on any device ranging from a computer to a digital video recorder.
But then we need standards, where consumer entertainment vendors are desperate to lock in their customers rather than give them choice.
Chambers does his signature crowd surfing
technorati tags: cisco, john+chambers, c-scape, conference
Having fun with the Wii safety manual
Nintendo is looking after its Japanese Wii buyers.
The safety manual that ships with the console warns against a slew of threats ranging from the perfectly understandable to the bizarre. You shouldn't pour liquid on any electronics device or stuff foreign objects in the fan opening. And the warning that Wii's wireless remote could interfere with your pacemaker could be a lifesaver.
But do you really need a manufacturer's warning against slapping other people in the face or dropping the case on the floor?
The folks over at the iCon factory took the warning to the next level, creating a slew of additional disclaimers that Nintendo should consider adding in the future:
Coders take on Hollywood
Software developers of the world unite! The movie industry is doing a great injustice to your creations.
Why does code in movies always show up as text moving around one a monochrome black and green screen, preferably making strange bleeping noises?
"I understand that to the non-savvy person the abilities of a programmer might seem amazingly complex, but do they honestly think we can read shit that isn't sitting still," wonders developer Matthew Inman in a blog posting.
Fact checking and Hollywood don't go together very well. Moviemakers rather follow stereotypes and make up facts that fits their script rather than that they bother about real world facts.
Software developer Matthew Inman has compiled a list of the ten most embarrassing misconceptions about code. The list should scare the humbleness into Steven Spielberg.
So for the record: even if your nephew is an 8-year-old math champion, that doesn't mean that he will be able to hack just any application within five minutes. And when the aliens arrive we will be unable to crash their space ship by infecting it with a computer virus. Unless it is running Windows, of course. But then they never would have been able to undertake the cross galactic voyage in the first place.
Factually incorrect
Online games and their environmental impact
Each avatar in the Secondly online community/game consumes about 1,752 kWh of electricity per year, according to calculations by Nicholas Carr, the author who became famous for arguing that "IT doesn't matter".
What does 1,752 kWh mean? It's only slightly less than the average power consumption of residents of Brazil, he points out. The average for a person living in one of the G7 nations in 2001 was 9,449 kWh/year.
So shame on you, players of Second Life, World of Craft and other online games. The power you spend on stress relief in your virtual fantasy worlds could have powered a washer to clean the mud infested rags of a child in Brazil.
The money that I spend on fancy running shoes that won't ruin my knees could have provided nutritious meals to refugee camps or flood victims. We also choose to commute to an office rather than move into the camp-like manufacturing plants where underpaid workers sweat while they are piecing together our iPods and other gadgets.
But then, they wouldn't even have their underpaid jobs if it weren't for the iPod. Someone might opt to empty an automatic gun on a full commuter train if he didn't have Second Life to create the illusion that his live is valuable.
Remember that whenever you zoom in on a single shackle on a chain. Ripple effects tend to travel far and pop up in unexpected places.
technorati tags: second+life, mmorpg, environment, gaming, kWh
Zeroday database: resource or hunting ground?
Will Eeye's new database of unpatched security vulnerabilities be a valuable resource for IT administrators, or will it put attackers on the trail of new vulnerabilities?
As much as the security vendor wishes to brush over the question, it is a legitimate one. Especially the unsophisticated script kiddies and other wannabe malware authors (think Anna Kournikova virus) will gratefully put such a list to use as a starting point to find exploits, just like today they use standard tools to create derivates of well known worms and viruses.
They may be severely lacking in their malware authoring skills. But they make up for those through the added disruption in the rare cases that they succeed in crafting an exploit, because they certainly don't know how to keep their creations stealthy.
Consumers and companies meanwhile could benefit from a single site that provides a clear overview, allowing them to implement workarounds if available.
All things together, more information is always better. And the threat from virus writers certainly shouldn't be an excuse to stop protecting ourselves. But if anything, we users should be aware that with added knowledge about threats comes an added responsibility to protect ourselves against them.
The enemy is listening (German World War 2 propaganda poster)
Free RSS reader shows off Windows Vista graphics
Why, did you wonder, does Windows Vista require a 3D graphics card with at least 128MB memory?
For all the cynics that failed to get excited about the 3D application switching (while movies will keep playing) feature, Microsoft has now launched the 3D UniverRSS feed reader. It leverages the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) that aims to provide developers with cool graphical eyecandy.
Each feed is represented as a 3D cube that floats around in a three dimensional environment. The size and position of the cube indicate the number of unread news items for each feed and the cube will display the picture that is associated with the feed (if there is any). The user is part of this universe, traveling between the cubes in his quest for news.
The software thrives more on its "cool factor" than that it will increase productivity. But at least it makes you understand why it Vista graphics have insane hardware demands such as 1GB of memory and a 1Ghz CPU.
technorati tags: rss, vista, graphics, windows+vista
Crackers start pounding away at Vista
Crackers have started sinking their teeth in Windows Vista's copyright protection, as they attempt to create workable copies of the operating system that circumvent its anti-piracy features.
![anti-piracy features](<p><img id="Technorati" src="http://siliconvalleysleuth.co.uk/photos/uncategorized/technorati.gif" alt="Technorati" /> technorati tags: <a href="http://www.technorati.com/tags/vista" rel="tag">vista</a>, <a href="http://www.technorati.com/tags/piracy" rel="tag">piracy</a>, <a href="http://www.technorati.com/tags/copyright" rel="tag">copyright</a>, <a href="http://www.technorati.com/tags/copying" rel="tag">copying</a>, <a href="http://www.technorati.com/tags/microsoft" rel="tag">microsoft</a></p>){kind=link}
Vista checks in with a Microsoft Key Management Service twice a year to verify that the registration key is legitimate. But attackers are circumventing those by setting up rogue KMS servers that will fool the software into believing that it is genuine, even if it isn't.
Creating the service can't be that hard. A simple network sniffer will tell you what kind of information the server is supposed to deliver, and thus what data you need to deliver to pirated systems. Next you make redirect traffic for the Microsoft server to your Microsoft-wannabe, and you're done.
Microsoft of course could try to shut down the server, but you can rest assured that others will pop up within minutes. In practice, Microsoft will only take down the ones that become too popular.
More seriously however, criminals could set up rouge KMS servers to spread malware and Microsoft could use them to track down software pirates.
Stealing software isn't worth it. Use Linux if you want free software, or pay Microsoft if you want to use 3D application switching.
Goodiez!
technorati tags: vista, piracy, copyright, copying, microsoft
Spreading worms in the post-email-worm age
How do you make malware viral if you don't want to use a mass e-mailer, which will provide a sure way for the virus to get detected by security vendors?
One creative malware author turned to Myspace. Systems that visit a specially crafted profile page will automatically start downloading a mal-formed .mov file which comes with an embedded javascript file.
The Javascript document will automatically alter the downloader's MySpace profile so that everybody who visits the profile page will be hit with by the same downloader.
It appears that the malware author is out to steal Myspace login information, suggests F-Secure. But what use does anyone have for a bunch of Myspace login information?
Worms reinvent themselves
Nike+Apple leaks speed data
Apple and Nike have failed to encrypt the wireless connection that allows Nike running shoes and the iPod to monitor an athlete's speed.
That means that any hacker that succeeds to stay within a 20 meter radius of a runner will be able to eavesdrop on the connection and steal the valuable data that is being transmitted.
Take a deep breath, and shout: SO WHAT?!?
Except for runners that are ashamed of their speed data because they are morbidly obese, who cares that hackers can listen in? Athletics equipment makers for years have been selling hearth rate monitors that use a wireless connection to transmit the frequency of a runner's hearth beat.
Hackers no doubt can pick up this signal, allowing them to find out if a runner is running within his 80 per cent zone.
The pundits at the University of Washington that discovered the Nike+iPod flaw no doubt will identify this one too as a major "privacy risk".
Next, they can start warning consumers that they shouldn’t walk in the street. Other people can see them there. Privacy risk, you know…
Negroponte: Laptops are like "fat people"
Kicking off the second day of NetEvents
2006, IT industry heavywieght Nicholas Negroponte has hit back at
critics of his $100 One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) scheme by showing off
one of the first production models and by saying that conventional
laptops are like"fat people."
"It's a real computer," he said about his OLPC and illustrated, via slides of the Quanta production facility in Shanghai making the machine, that the OLPC dream is now a working reality.
Explaining his analogy, Negroponte explained that as fat people use most of their muscle to move their fat, conventional laptops need more ever more muscle to move the fat of bloatware on them. This makes them prone to instability, Negroponte said: "My (conventional) computer, Crashes five times a day."
In comparison, Negroponte said that because his OLPC machine is leaner using Linux and that it has been designed for kids rather than for using (Microsoft) Office, it is probably better option than a traditional machine for the purpose it is intended for.
The mission for Negroponte is all about eliminating poverty with education." It's not a lap top project its an education project," he said.
And education for the 1.2bn children in the developing world is the primary focus for Negroponte who explained that in some rural parts of the world, some school kids are only in school two and a half hours a day. So the key, for Negroponte, is to take advantage of the other hours when the child is out of school.
Although the machine is preinstaled with Linux ut this doesn't mean that you can't run Windows on the machine, Negroponte said. " We put in an SD slot just for Bill," he quipped. Negroponte also confirmed that there are currently machines at Microsoft that were being prepped for Windows. But he also revealed that Mirosoft was having a "geniune issue" with open source and that the Redmond giant was "struggling with it."
Sun gives GPL3 its blessing
Sun is rapidly changing camps. After then chief operating office Jonathan Schwartz denounced the GPL as "predatory" as recent as 2005, the company adopted the license for its open source desktop Java implementation in November. And on Thursday the company came pretty close to giving the upcoming GPL3 an official endorsement.
Simon Phipps, Sun's chief open source officer in a blog posting made it very clear that the company doesn't side with Linux inventor Linus Torvalds in denouncing the license.
"I would be very surprised if the final GPL v3 was not an effective tool for some of the communities Sun sustains or will initiate in the future. We are certainly not opposed to it, and it would be a huge mistake to read our use of the GPL v2 that way," wrote Phipps.
"I am frankly amazed by the criticisms some have levelled at the GPL v3 process. They seem to ignore the incredible and positive way it is evolving and just find fault with things that are already the subject of work by the diverse participants on the discussion committees and the web site. We're discussing license activation, software patents, managing DRM and all the other things that are supposedly wrong.
" If the critics were to step inside the process rather than throw rocks from the outside they would discover that. If Sun can participate, for goodness sake, who could possibly feel excluded?"
GPL3 might have lost Linux, but it has a big supporter in Sun, or so it seems.
Simon Phipps... but what on earth is he doing with his hands?
technorati tags: gpl3, sun+microsystems, gpl, simon+phipps