My Writings. My Thoughts.

Nuke with 20/19 kills ?

// March 20th, 2010 // No Comments » // Games

hey mw 2 online players a classmate told me that IW brought a patch that changed the nuke killstreak to 20 kills. is that true? ( i can’t test it ^^ ) regards zuckanfall

ShareConnector disconnected. Forever.

// March 20th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view Music | P2P:- A picture is indeed worth a thousand words, and the one on the right says it all. It accompanies a story posted on the ShareConnector site. “Five years ago, when most BitTorrent sites had only a handful of visitors, ShareConnector was serving eDonkey links to millions of file-sharers every month”, said ShareConnector yesterday, going on: “This popularity didn’t go unnoticed by the local authorities, who were tipped off by BREIN and started a criminal investigation into the operator of the site, as well as the people behind the site Releases4U. “What followed was more than 5 years of legal battles in both civil and criminal court cases.” Now, hash codes are illegal, ShareConnector has a Dutch civil court stating. And with that decision, the site goes offline permanently. All that remains is a criminal proceeding slated to start on April 14. ‘I can’t afford taking any risks’ “Last Monday the guys from BREIN visited me at home to convince me to close ShareConnector or else they will start a civil proceeding with a claim”, said p2pnet . That’s what you saw when you went to shareconnector.com in late 2007. It went on, “Of course, this does not mean I agree with their point of view, it’s just that I can’t afford taking any risks. As of today, November 12, 2007 I decided to close down. If there is anything new to report, you will be informed.” BREIN is the all-in-one RIAA/MPAA-style hit unit used by the cartels in Holland. Said TorrentFreak ’s enigmax at the time > > > Having failed to encourage massive punishment against the administrator of eDonkey link site ‘ShareConnector’ in a criminal trial, anti-piracy outfit BREIN has once more resorted to traditional bully tactics – by turning up on his doorstep and threatening him, face to face. Back in 2004, ShareConnector was an eDonkey force to be reckoned with. As purely a link site (like the vast majority of BitTorrent sites), ShareConnector carried no copyright materials. However, this didn’t stop Dutch anti-piracy outfit BREIN from pressurizing the FIOD-ECD – Fiscal Investigation Unit of the Dutch Police – to investigate and eventually shut down ShareConnector. Initially, ShareConnector’s host had refused to shut down the site stating correctly that offering links is not a crime. However December 2004 saw ShareConnector and another site, Releases4U, raided by the FIOD-ECD, resulting in the seizure of equipment and the arrest of 8 people. At the time, BREIN director Tim Kuik explained they were done waiting: – Our patience was up, after which we went to the authorities – he said . According to p2pnet , Kuik, going for the jugular, asserted that the ShareConnector admin, Adi, should get up to 4 years in jail as he hid behind – false reasoning that illegal files are actually hosted on different servers and that the actual exchange doesn’t take place on their own servers`, which is, of course, a completely and utterly false assertion on Kuik’s part. Eventually, after taking nearly 2 years to come to court, the result for BREIN and the FIOD-ECD was a disaster. The admin of ShareConnector was found completely innocent and just a couple of small fines of approximately $350 were handed out to the admins of Releases4U for uploading copyright material. The FIOD-ECD failed to provide any evidence to prove ShareConnector was involved in copyright infringement nor enough to prove that either organization was criminal in nature. December 19th 2006 saw the triumphant return of ShareConnector, around 2 years after it was shuttered by the police but the return was not to be permanent. Not content with accepting that a criminal trial had taken place at which Adi and ShareConnector were found to be completely legal, BREIN resorted to the tactics it knows best and has had most success with – common bullying. On Monday November 5th 2007, representatives from BREIN knocked on Adi’s door and threatened him face to face with potentially financially punishing civil action. On November 12th 2007, ShareConnector shut down for good. ‘Why does it take 5+ years … ?’ Now, “After the unspecified reason for the delay of the civil case verdict, it finally arrived on March 16th”, says ShareConnector , continuing > > > The first civil case against BREIN has been acknowledged and again it’s been said that it’s no copyright infringement, however it’s a wrongful act to index hash-codes. The results are just what I expected, so nothing surprising here considering all the similar recent cases with just about the same conclusion we see here. The trend has been set by those ignorant old judges that fail to see the logic, contradicting with the rulings from Spain . Spain also legalized non-profit file-sharing (upload & download), which is common sense and the way forward to the worlds largest library of the human creativity. Unfortunately this is not Spain, the dutch legal system is dysfunctional, lacking logic and professionalism. Why does it take 5+ years and so many criminal trials to prove a simple fact? How come all the pathetic private organizations whose main interest is money and not the artists, get away with lies and deceptions spreading their propaganda in the media? The government takes away your property, raids homes and destroys what you built with love without checking on the facts. That’s supposed to be justice in a democraZy huh? They must have smoked a lot of crack or have a bunch of monkeys doing the work, otherwise I don’t have an explanation. I could go on and on with examples but I won’t, maybe another post. Now that I cleared that out of my head and the civil cases chapter is closed, let’s focus on the criminal case which is due on April 14th. Early last week, it got confirmed that the second charge was dropped, that being piracy and copyright infringement. It’s obvious that their case is very weak and will be blown away when Johan Pouwelse explains his rapport to the jury. His rapport examines the various ways of avoiding/disabling uploading of data to other peers when connected with the eDonkey p2p network. It’s an important fact because uploading of copyrighted works in the Netherlands is illegal, while downloading is not, go figure. The entertainment industries greed is killing creativity, not file-sharing. Stay tuned. - … ….. and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi ShareConnector – Civil Appeal Verdict Again Lacks the Logic, March 18, 2010 ShareConnector – Court Shuts ShareConnector Down For Good, March 19, 2010 p2pnet – BREIN disconnects ShareConnector, November 14, 2007 TorrentFreak – Anti-Piracy Outfit Threatens ShareConnector Admin at his Front Door, November 14, 2007 p2pnet – ShareConnector, Releases4U down, December 15, 2004 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? - Click here to learn what technologies might help you bypass censorship in your area.

Week in gaming: PlayStation Move, Metro 2033, pole dancing

// March 20th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

What a week! Post-GDC we share our thoughts on the PlayStation Move after playing with a bunch of the games Sony showed the press, we are pleasantly surprised by a top-down Tomb Raider title, and see just how far gaming has come after playing the XBLA release of Perfect Dark. THQ also continues its string of strong titles with Metro 2033 , a game we review on the PC. Let’s see what stories people were talking about in our gaming coverage. Read the comments on this post

Apple to iPad devs: on your mark, get set, submit!

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Apple is alerting developers that they have just over a week to prepare iPad apps and get them submitted for review if they want them to be in the App Store on April 3. Developers must build their apps using beta 5 of the iPhone OS 3.2 SDK and submit them by 5pm PDT on March 27 to get an initial review by Apple, according to an e-mail sent to developers this afternoon. Reviewers will run the apps on iPad hardware and e-mail developers with notes on the “readiness” of the app, and information necessary to submit the app for final review for inclusion in the App Store by April 3. Only apps that are submitted for the initial review process will have a chance to go on sale at the “grand opening of the iPad App Store.” The crux of the problem is that most developers won’t have access to actual iPad hardware to test and debug their apps before they go on sale. Beyond a select few developers given early access under reportedly rigid security provisions , this is the only chance most will have for their app to run outside of the iPad Simulator unless they wait until after April 3 to test on hardware themselves. Unfortunately, that could mean giving competitors a big jumpstart. The good news, though, is that iPad owners will have more than just Apple’s apps to choose from on day one. Also, developers have observed especially quick review times of late. This suggests that even in the worst case that some apps require an early fix, developers should be able to get it out to users with little delay. Read the comments on this post

What’s fair? Societal structures, not human nature, teach us

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Rousseau, Hobbes, and Locke all meditated on the development of social contracts that they considered necessary for people to operate in large societies. Game theory gives scientists a chance to test some of these ideas with hard data. By having people play anonymous games with money, researchers found that people from larger societies, ones that are more integrated into the market, are more likely to be fair in anonymous dealings; these same people are more willing to punish others when they are unfair. These findings suggest that fairness and punishment in dealings with strangers are largely learned behaviors, and that we need these norms and institutions to prevent our communities from fragmenting. Before ten thousand years ago, localized groups probably had fairly limited contact with more distant human populations. Fast forward a few thousand years, and large, complex, and cooperative societies had become prevalent. Scientists have long been uncertain what facilitated the social changes that allowed people to feel comfortable trading with others they hardly knew. Read the comments on this post

Not all plants will respond equally to climate change

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

As the climate continues to change, some studies suggest that warmer temperatures may help plants bloom earlier and longer. However, that may not be the whole story. An article published in Science details how different plants respond to different indicators of changing seasons, and why that might ultimately shift the balance of some ecosystems. Phenology, the study of how nature responds to cyclical changes, indicates that non-tropical plants need their environment to fulfill three criteria before they’ll start blooming: the degree of winter chilling, photoperiod (the length of the day relative to the night), and temperature. Plant typically handles these cues hierarchically, first registering that the winter chilling period has ended, then taking into account the photoperiod, and then the ambient temperature. While most plants and trees, including those that typically dominate mature forests, use all three variables, others do not take the photoperiod into account. The other two blooming criteria, chilling and temperature, can happen earlier in the year as the climate warms up. This would allow photoperiod-insensitive plants to bloom sooner, possibly getting the drop on the other flora that have to wait around for days to get sufficiently long before they can start their reproductive cycles and restart their growth cycles. The two classes of plants may end up with different access to resources, including pollinators. While this may shift the dynamics of photoperiod sensitive and insensitive trees, there are a number of other factors that contribute to plant prosperity that climate doesn’t affect, such as mineralization of the soil. Still, it’s important to note that, when it comes to plants, there won’t be a single, consistent response to climate change. Science , 2010. DOI: 10.1126/science.1186473  ( About DOIs ). Read the comments on this post

12-core Mac Pros, 27" Cinema Display may be coming soon

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Apple has been very busy on the mobile front, with the iPad launching in two weeks and iPhone OS and hardware upgrades expected this summer. However, Apple hasn’t forgotten about its Mac business—sources for AppleInsider report that long overdue updates to Apple’s Cinema Display and Mac Pro will be also appear by June . Expected to join the 24″ LED Cinema Display that Apple launched in October of 2008 is a 27″ LED Cinema display based on the same panel currently used in the

Your life will some day end; ACTA will live on

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) isn’t just another secret treaty—it’s a way of life. If ACTA passes in anything like its current form, it will create an entirely new international secretariat to administer and extend the agreement. Knowledge Ecology International got its hands on more of the leaked ACTA text this week , including a chapter on “Institutional Arrangements” that has not leaked before. The chapter makes clear that ACTA will be far more than a standard trade agreement; it appears to be nothing less than an attempt to make a new international institution that will handle some of the duties of groups like the WTO and WIPO. Read the comments on this post

p2pnet World Headlines: March 19, 2010

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

Copyright bill this spring; ‘our laws will trump ACTA,’ Clement says Wire Report The Conservative government intends to introduce a copyright reform bill before Parliament’s summer recess, Industry Minister Tony Clement told The Wire Report. The government held national public consultations last summer on copyright reform. Over the past several months the industry and heritage ministers have been taking stock of the consultation submissions and working toward the production of legislation to amend the Copyright Act. MySpace User Data For Sale PC World Social networking just became a little riskier to your privacy. Information from MySpace is now for sale to third parties ranging from academics and analysts to marketers. The data will include any activity or information that is attached to an account. That includes blog posts, location, photos, reviews, and status updates-among others. InfoChimps, an Austin Texas company that collects and sells structured data, is selling the data. Of course, MySpace is perfectly within its rights to work with Infochimps, because it legally owns the data and the server logs. Users wave their right to privacy in exchange for free Web hosting and access to its social features. “Free” comes at a cost. Here’s snippet of what “they” know about you. This is exactly the type of scenario that Eben Moglen, a Columbia University law professor and founder of the Software Freedom Law Center warned of at a seminar about privacy in cloud computing last month. Except I wouldn’t have imagined that MySpace would be one of the really aggressive purveyors of personal data. “Piracy” sounds too sexy, say rightsholders Ars Technica For years, we’ve heard complaints about using the term “piracy” to describe the online copyright infringement—but most have come from Big Content’s critics. As noted copyright scholar William Patry argued in his most recent book, “To say that X is a pirate is a metaphoric heuristic, intended to persuade a policymaker that the in-depth analysis can be skipped and the desired result immediately attained… Claims of piracy are rhetorical nonsense.” That may well be true, but copyright holders have long preferred the term, with its suggestions of theft, destruction, and violence. The “pirates” have now co-opted the term, adopting it with gusto and hoisting the Jolly Roger across the Internet (The Pirate Bay being the most famous example). New password-stealing virus targets Facebook Reuters Hackers have flooded the Internet with virus-tainted spam that targets Facebook’s estimated 400 million users in an effort to steal banking passwords and gather other sensitive information. The emails tell recipients that the passwords on their Facebook accounts have been reset, urging them to click on an attachment to obtain new login credentials … U.S. Official Blasts Google on Buzz Wall Street Journal Citing the recent launch of Google Inc.’s social-networking service, Google Buzz, outgoing Federal Trade Commissioner Pamela Jones Harbour said technology companies are setting a dangerous precedent of publicly exposing consumer data, particularly during the rollout of new products. “Protecting consumer privacy is of utmost importance,” Ms. Harbour said during a Federal Trade Commission roundtable discussion about privacy Wednesday. “Unfortunately, many of the companies that consumers look to as leaders—and that we expect to be leaders—still have not taken this message entirely to heart.” Viacom-YouTube secrets to be exposed in lawsuit Associated Press A legal tussle pitting media conglomerate Viacom Inc. against online video leader YouTube is about to get dirtier as a federal judge prepares to release documents that will expose their secrets and other confidential information. The information expected to be unsealed Thursday will include some of the evidence that Viacom and Google-owned YouTube have collected to prove their respective points, but have kept under wraps so far during their 3-year-old dispute over copyright law. The sensitive material is emerging now because Viacom and YouTube are citing some of the documents as they try to persuade U.S. District Judge Louis Stanton in New York to decide the case without a trial. Stanton isn’t likely to decide on a so-called summary judgment for several more months. Each side will likely be pointing to things that the other might find embarrassing. Conservatives launch protest against proposed iPod levy Canadian Press Conservatives are Canada’s new iPod freedom fighters. Cabinet ministers and MPs are putting up a vigorous defence against the NDP’s move to have a levy applied to all new MP3 players, hard drives and laptops. The money would theoretically go into a fund for Canadian music artists the same way as the current 29-cent levy on blank CDs and cassettes. The proposal is New Democrat MP Charlie Angus’ private member’s bill. It’s unclear whether such a tax measure would go far because legislation that involves financial changes must be supported by the government. - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi March, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? - Click here to learn what technologies might help you bypass censorship in your area.

Polish cops arrest Lodz file sharer

// March 19th, 2010 // No Comments » // p2p

p2pnet view P2P:- Polish police, working for ZPAV, “observed increased activity by a user of a Polish-based cyberlocker” in Lodz, says Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony Music’s IFPI. Hmmmm . Wonder who enlightened them? ZPAV (Zwiazek Producentow Audio-Video) is a kind of Polish BREIN comprising the local arm of the IFPI and FOTA (equivalent to the MPAA in Poland). The economic crime department of the regional police headquarters in Lodz “detained the suspect as he was uploading a new film”, says the IFPI , stating the  alleged file sharer has now been “charged with illegally distributing music and film online”. Using the tired, and hoary, entertainment cartel formula that files shared equal sales lost, and making statements based on unsupported guesswork, “It is estimated that the uploaded files were downloaded by over 400,000 internet users and the initial losses incurred by the music and film industries are estimated to be 7 million PLN (€ 1.8 m)”, says the IFPI. The tame and lame mainstream media parrot every word from the cartels just as though it’s reliable information from credible sources. - … .. … and identi.ca More First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi IFPI – Suspected uploader caught red-handed by police, March 19, 2010 Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to - | | rss feed: http://-/feed -? - Click here to learn what technologies might help you bypass censorship in your area.

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