29.11.05

every time it rains, you're here in my head

  1. sat in your lap
  2. james and the cold gun (live)
  3. babooshka
  4. running up that hill (a deal with god)
  5. night of the swallow
  6. l'amour looks something like ou
  7. this woman's work
  8. under the ivy
  9. hounds of love (alternative mix)
  10. the wedding list
  11. suspended in gaffa
  12. cloudbusting (the organon mix)
  13. how to be invisible
  14. under ice
  15. oh to be in love
  16. the handsome cabin boy
  17. the man with the child in his eyes
  18. the infant kiss
  19. wuthering heights
  20. waking the witch

21.11.05

help me create a kate bush mix


my buddy, jennifer, is not familiar with kate bush. i've been charged with the task of making a mix for her (jennifer, not kate bush). the music jen likes tends to be danceable, which makes this task a bit difficult as my favorite KB stuff is not very danceable at all. i was supposed to work on this over the weekend, but i'm a lazy bastard. which doesn't mean i didn't think about it, i just haven't done it. anyways, tracks i'm thinking of including are:

babooshka
suspended in gaffa
running up that hill
l'amour looks something like you
jig of life
oh to be in love
this woman's work
under the ivy
night of the swallow
the wedding list
wuthering heights
how to be invisible
sunset
cloudbusting
and dream of sheep

so many to choose from...hmm, anyone have any suggestions? this'll be for a regular 80 minute cd.

16.11.05

sony drm (digital rights management)

anyone following this shit? i'll just post a few links, i don't have the technical expertise and i can't say anything more eloquently than what's already out there. however, i can help point you, my peeps, towards information. all hail teh internets! and don't buy any more sony shit.

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=13742205
http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/10/sony-rootkits-and-digital-rights.html
http://www.sysinternals.com/Blog/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/10/sony_drm_trojan/
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/11/08/defend_against_sonys.html
http://www.slysoft.com/en/
http://soryelectronics.com/
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/11/15/sony_infects_more_th.html
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/11/14/sony_anticustomer_te.html
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/#00000691
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4434852.stm

here's the cut/paste version of the timeline from the boingboing article, which is linked above.

Monday, November 14, 2005

Sony anti-customer technology roundup and time-line
Since Hallowe'en, we've been posting the details about he revelations relating to Sony's DRM systems, which show jaw-dropping contempt for their customers, for copyright law, for fair trading and for the public interest. With all these posts strung out over a couple weeks, I thought it was high time we put together an omnibus post, summing up all the posts to date:
Oct 31: Sony DRM uses black-hat rootkits
Mark Russinovich, a security researcher, discovers that Sony has been sneakily installing "rootkit"-based DRM on their customers' computers. Rootkits are black-hat hacker tools used to disguise the workings of their malicious software. Removing Sony's rootkit nukes your Windows installation.

Nov 3: Sony releases de-rootkit-ifier, lies about risks from rootkits
Sony announces a "service pack" for its rootkit DRM. It deceptively downplays the risks the rootkit presented. It turns out that the remover doesn't actually work, either.

Nov 3: Felten on Sony's rootkit-"remover"
Princeton DRM researcher Ed Felten analyzes Sony's rootkit "remover" and concludes that it's a hunk of junk: "they're almost certainly adding things to the system...they're not disclosing what they're doing."

Nov 3: Defeat WoW spyware using Sony's rootkit
Warden, a program used by Blizzard to scour World of Warcraft players' system and report on the contents to the company can be defeated with the Sony rootkit. Blizzard claims that Warden only detects a few programs that facilitate cheating, but researchers have found evidence to the contrary.

Nov 8: Defend against Sony's rootkit with DRM-ripping software
AnyDVD, a DVD-ripping program, advertises that it can also inoculate you against the Sony rootkit.

Nov 9: List of CDs infected with Sony's rootkit DRM
EFF releases a partial list of CDs believed infected to infected with Sony's rootkit. Buyer beware -- you're better off buying music from someone else.

Nov 9: Sony's EULA is worse than their rootkit
EFF attorney Fred von Lohmann analyzes the license agreement that accompanies Sony's rootkit DRM (that's right, a license to listen to an audio CD!). It is unbelievably outrageous, the kind of thing that makes you want to get a torch and a pitchfork and head over to the nearest Sony office.

Nov 9: Wanna sue the pants off Sony?
EFF is looking for people who bought rootkit-infected CDs to join a potential lawsuit against Sony

Nov 10: Sony Music CDs infect Macs, too
Mac users shouldn't be smug -- Sony's audio CDs also contain an app that patches OS X's kernel with unspecified restriction-software; though Mac users have to take a few more steps before their computers are compromised

Nov 10: Fantastic screed against the coders who wrote the previous Sony DRM junk
This isn't the first time Sony's been caught doing crap like this; the last time around a geek wrote an amazing rant excoriating the coders who helped Sony write its anti-customer malware

Nov 11: Sony will stop shipping infectious CDs -- too little, too late
Twelve days after being caught using rootkits, Sony announces that it will stop shipping rootkit-infected CDs. No recall of the existing rootkits, though -- and Sony doesn't come close to apologizing. Buying Sony CDs is a great way to screw up your PC, but a lousy way to acquire music.

Nov 12: Sony's *other* malicious audio CD trojan
Princeton DRM researcher Alex Halderman reports on the other malicious software found on Sony CDs, a Suncomm product called MediaMax. MediaMax is a vicious little bug, which spies on you and reports on your deeds to the mothership.

Nov 12: New Sony lockware prevents selling or loaning of games
Sony patents a piece of software that can prevent you from playing a game that's been inserted into one console on another console; speculation is that this is destined for the PS3. Kiss game rentals, loaning and re-sale goodbye. Also, if your PS3 breaks or is stolen, you might as well toss out all your games, they're useless without it.

Nov 13: Sony's malware uninstaller leaves your computer vulnerable
A Finnish researcher discovers that the "uninstaller" for Sony's rootkit leaves a ton of crap behind that hackers can exploit -- he can reboot your computer just by getting you to load a web-page

Nov 13: Sony's rootkit infringes on software copyrights
There are strong indications that Sony ripped off a Free Software-based library called the LAME Encoder for its rootkit. The LAME Encoder is licensed under the Lesser GPL (LGPL), which was released for free re-use by public spirited programmers who merely requested that they be acknowledged. In Sony's zeal to protect its copyrights, they had no compunction about clobbering the copyrights of those software authors.

Other stuff:

  • Sony lied about its rootkit. They said it didn't phone home with information about your deeds. It does. When they were caught in the lie, they said that they didn't pay attention to the information it sent back, so it's OK
  • Microsoft is building a Sony rootkit-remover into its anti-spyware product
  • Lawsuits against Sony are already underway in Italy and the US
  • At least one piece of malicious software that exploits Sony's rootkit has been discovered in the wild

Update: Christopher sez, "You missed one in your Sony timeline that I think is excellent. A call from Dan Goodin over on Wired to boycott all Sony products until they make amends..."

Update 2: Rob sez, "This a reference to the NPR interview where Sony BMG Global Digital Business President Thomas Hesse puts his foot in it saying, 'Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?'. The NPR interview aired Nov 4."


15.11.05

christmas in november


cc hooked me up with a black ipod nano. i'd been eyeing one for a little while now, and she kinda blindsided me with it. i initially felt a little guilty because it's such an expensive gift and considered returning it to her, but she convinced me to keep it. very cool of her, and now i don't have to carry my cd's with me to work any longer.

crazy 88

on the night this pic was taken, this team (crazy 88) played as well as any team could hope to play. not even counting the fact that we were missing a couple of our female players, so the ones who did show up were absolutely amazing. period. playing with these people is always a lotta fun, even if we get pissed off at each other because of a missed defensive assignment or a bad pass. it's all good in the end. anyways, yeah...we weren't expected to win that night against a couple teams that had kinda manhandled us earlier in the season.

11.11.05

the world of warcraft

i play world of warcraft with some friends. it's enjoyable and addictive. we play a lot, while chatting and talking shit to each other. we're on a pvp server, so we get the added attraction of being able to kill players of the opposing faction. there are two factions, horde and alliance. we're horde, who are the evil baddies. my character is an undead rogue. very fun. here are a few screenshots i've taken recently.

these first two pix are me attacking this alliance guy who went afk. he tried to hide in a lake, but his head was barely sticking out so he wouldn't drown. so i killed him. the second pic is his body hanging in the water. i love that graphic, it looks so real. yeah, i'm desensitized.


the third pic is a paladin i killed. normally, paladins are a bitch to kill. this one was dumb. she tried to kill two monsters at the same time. she finished one off, and i jumped in and killed her while she was trying to kill the second one. after killing her, i had to finish off her monster.


this one is amusing. during the couple weeks leading up to halloween, costumes were implemented in the game. you would go to the local innkeeper and trick or treat them. every so often you'd get a wand that would transform you into something else. in this case, i was turned into a bat. so we were playing in arathi basin (which is like a team-based pvp area) and i left the bat costume on to see what would happen. you can kinda see me in the middle of the pic. the alliance people pretty much ignored me, but got wise after a while. the funniest thing is this horde character called Eatbanana who notices what's going on and calls me "first cuff" in general chat (my character name is Fisticuff). english is probably not his first language (not meant to be racist, just an amusing example of imperfect english). as my cousin would say, how cute.

this last one is just me plowing thru some lower level area while chatting with my cousin. good times.

8.11.05

twelve year itch


while on my lunchbreak, i walked over to virgin records today and picked up the new kate bush album. i listened to both discs a couple times this afternoon. initial impressions:

i'd always suspected, and now it's been proven, that kate bush could sing all (well, not all...) the numbers of pi ("pi") and make it sound goddamn good. she also sings about dirty laundry and washing machines ("mrs. bartolozzi") and it's engaging. the song about her son ("bertie") is really pretty, it's arranged like a traditional irish song, or at least how i'd imagine a traditional irish song to sound. "king of the mountain" doesn't sound as electric as it did when i first heard it. i think that's because a bit of the excitement may have worn off. or perhaps there's a difference between the album version and the single.

the second disc felt a little more dreamy to me, but that may have been because i was exceptionally sleepy at work. probably post-lunch coma. i wasn't too keen on the male voice in "the painter's link", but that may take some time, kinda like "jig of life" did. the last few tracks, especially "nocturn", were spectacular.

the new site is active, and i'm sure all the fansites are buzzing with activity and praise.

www.katebush.com

3.11.05

city mouse or country mouse?


as much as i love san francisco, i've been thinking lately of living somewhere rural. i'm just tired of the crackheads and screaming sirens. tired of wondering if someone's fucking with my car. tired of the city workers with their jackhammers, creating new potholes in the streets so they can fill them again. i'm tired of being asked for spare change when i can't really spare any. i wonder what it would be like to live somewhere that's not easily accessible. it might be cool. i dunno, just thinking.

2.11.05

running up that hill

so last week, through a seemingly innocent inquiry for her phone number, i discovered that my sister is now a born-again christian. here's the disclaimer. i couldn't care if she were muslim, wiccan, or non-practicing catholic, let alone christian. you put your faith where you want and you believe what you believe for whatever reasons make sense to you. i have absolutely no problem with it at all. when people try to convert me and get all up in my grill, that's what upsets me.

my email signature reads "lift your skinny fists like antennas to heaven", which is the title of a gy!be album. i like the phrase, it conjures up an interesting visual. so last week, i realized i didn't have my sister's current phone number and i emailed her asking for it. she replies with the number, letting me know how she and her family are doing and asking me how i am. it's all good. the next paragraph contains the following (para)phrases:

  • i shouldn't be raising my fists in anger at god
  • i should watch pat robertson and the 700 club
  • i should go to church to meet people with integrity and values
  • if i go to church, i might meet a girl who might soften my hardened heart and help crack my shell that i've built up against women

you get the idea.

we go back and forth. she says she took my email signature as a sign that i wanted to religiously connect with her. she says she wanted to share god's promise with me and that everyone in the family was afraid to talk to me because i am unable to communicate in a loving manner. the more she went on, the more she sounded like our mother...just kinda going on and on to anyone who will pause to listen. she said she's always been a christian and always will be. actually, that's not true, she came to visit two years ago and there was not a word about it. she accused me of having a satanic bible, which i do have. the funny thing is i got it from her when we were teenagers. i just wanted to check it out a bit, big deal. i have a king james bible as well, but she didn't see fit to mention or ask about that.

so we went at it pretty good. yeah, i was/am upset with her, but not because of her beliefs. like i said, i couldn't care which religion she subscribes to, as long as i don't have to hear about it. it's such a personal issue. if you find someone to connect with, that's great. if you know the other person isn't interested, then let it go. if they want to ask, they'll ask. the thing that pisses me off is that she's throwing that, plus all this other crap, in my face. it's not fucking cool at all, especially when she doesn't know me half as well as she thinks she does.

i stopped writing her kind of abruptly. she can have the last word, i don't fucking care. anyway, i hate arguing. am i right? no, religion is subjective. i respect her belief and it's my choice not to go that route. am i wrong to get upset? no, we're all individuals. if i didn't get upset, i would think there might be something wrong with me. and while i have plenty of faults, i don't think they're as extreme or pronounced as she makes them out to be.

so what have i learned from this? i'm not sure, really. i do know that i probably won't talk to her for a while, i'll just get bent outta shape if i do. besides, we aren't exactly the closest of brothers and sisters, it's not like we spoke every week. all i do know is that i'm not interested in religion and i don't want anybody trying to get me on their team, so to speak. i did ask her when she converted and why, but i didn't try to talk her out of it. i'm not trying to make myself out to be the victim, i don't think either of us is wrong. i just would rather she not try to convert me, i thought she would know better.