AllTray changelog credit

Out of curiosity I googled myself tonight to see what wonders I might find. I was surprised at how many mentions of myself come up. I am directly connected with almost every result for three pages. One that surprised me however was for the AllTray July 6, 2006 changelog:

Jul 6, 2006: Jochen Baier <email@jochen-baier.de>
- added "Stop" to the xmms menu. requested by me ;)
- get the gnome theme file by reading "XDG_DATA_DIRS". usefull if gnome is not installed in "/usr..."
bug reported by Laurent Hilsz
- fixed shortcut bug. report and patch from Travis Hartwell
- fixed segfault which occur if apps where closed with "FILE->QUIT"
- fixed tooltip location with 2 panels on top. reported by Christer Edwards
- set version 0.69

You see everyone. There really is glory in submitting bugs back to developers!

WGA and Activation Failures Don't Faze Redmond

Yet another story of Windows Genuine Disadvantage screwing the honest customer:

While Microsoft insists that problems with the Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) program are much overblown -- claiming last weekthat "only a fraction of a percent" of the systems that fail the WGAverification are actually legal -- Microsoft's customers keep sayingotherwise. What's worse, the WGA false negatives are leading toincreasing number of situations where customers run afoul of XP'sproduct activation, leaving them to beg Microsoft and/or their PCvendor to help.

Read more in detail at InfoWorld.

TUX magazine moving to paid subscriptions

I came home from work this evening to find an email regarding my TUX magazine subscription. I originally got the tip about the free online TUX magazine from Aaron and have enjoyed reading it since. I have included the email in its entirety for your information. Upon first consideration I doubt I will continue with a paid-subscription. What do some other subscribers think?

Dear TUX Subscriber,

This week you'll notice a change in TUX. It will move from being a
free digital magazine to a paid one. Your current complimentary
subscription will be extended for 6 issues (expiring after the
January 2007 issue). That being said, this is just a note to let you
know what's happening -- there's nothing at all you need to do
today. Your free subscription will continue to be delivered to you
as you had originally requested.

When your subscription does expire, we will send you a notice
offerring you an opportunity to renew at our paid rate of just
$9.95/12 issues. In addition, since you've been a loyal subscriber,
we'll make certain to offer you a very special gift if you do decide
to renew at that time. Again though, there's nothing for you to do
today. Your free subscription to TUX will continue through January 2007.

We started TUX in 2004 because we felt strongly it was a needed
publication within the Linux community (many of our Linux Journal
readers would write in asking for exactly this, and truthfully, many
of our own staff members wanted to learn more about their Linux
desktops also). We invested revenues from our other publication,
Linux Journal, to make it possible. We've seen it as a labor of
love. Today, however, 15 issues later, we need to turn TUX into a
self-supporting publication and that's why we are asking for our
readers' help.

We promise to put more heart and effort into TUX with this
conversion. In the coming months, you can expect several new topics
and article series introduced by TUX Editor Kevin Shockey.

Please let us know how we can make TUX better for you. We strongly
encourage your feedback and suggestions; please send to
info@tuxmagazine.com.

From all of us at TUX Magazine, we sincerely thank you.

Microsoft: We won't be evil, either

Microsoft: We won't be evil, either by ZDNet's Ed Burnette -- Microsoft has outlined a new corporate philosophy of competition that could be summed up in these familiar words: "Don't be evil". While speaking at the New America Foundation luncheon, Brad Smith, the general counsel of Microsoft outlined the "Windows Principles": Twelve tenets that will govern Microsoft's approach to competition in the future, even after the US anti-trust ruling expires next year.

This brings two things to mind.  First, I don't believe a word that comes from anyone at Microsoft.  The trail of bodies they've left behind tells far more than some guy saying they want to be good people.

Secondly, if this is true... wait, in no world I can comprehend can Microsoft be 1) innovative, 2) transparent & honest, 3) provide opportunities for competition.

Internet Tubes

Great clip from the Daily Show about what the internet is.. and how our senators are absolutely retarded old men.

Windows Genuine Disadvantage: 60 million users burned

According to a recent article on ZDNet.com it appears that roughly 60 million users are using stolen or pirated volume license keys.

ZDNET.com reporter Ed Bott has been researching the new Windows Genuine Disadvantage as it progresses from quietly inserted update to known menace. According to his recent article a member of the Windows Genuine Disadvantage management team reports that "about 1 in 5 of the 300 million PCs that have run WGA validation fail." That is a lot of users!

Below are some scenarios where a user could fail a validation check. Some of these are blatant, but how "guilty" are some of the others?

1. High-quality counterfeit copies of Windows. Apparently this numberisn’t very large at all. As Kochis notes, “So far we've providedhundreds of free copies of Windows to users who've been ripped byhigh-quality counterfeit…"
2. The user installs the same copy and key to more than one PC at a time.I don’t understand why this scenario occurs at all. Is the Validationutility really looking at individual keys and identifying people whoare reusing a retail or upgrade copy? In this case, shouldn’tactivation fail when the user tries to install the second copy?
3. A friend or acquaintance offers to “fix” your computer and installs apirated or “cracked” copy of Windows. I can definitely see this onehappening, especially when a system is compromised by a spyware orvirus infestation.
4. You take your PC in to be repaired and the repair shop takes a shortcutby reinstalling a volume-licensed copy of Windows. Again, I can seeexactly why this happens. How many customers bring in their officialrestore media? Not many, I’d wager. How many repair shops want to takethe extra time (and charge the customer) to restore from the officialmedia? What happens when the media that came with the PC is out of dateand the shop has to install a service pack and several dozen patches?In that scenario, should the customer have to purchase a brand-newlicense when they already paid for one?

Since this whole WGA fiasco started I have been reluctant to install the update. It has since become a required update if you want access to anything further (outside of critical security updates). From everything that I've read on the topic I don't like it at all and won't be using it. This is another reason I no longer use XP on my home machines. I have 3 valid keys but due to having lost my original restore CD have used another copy which fails validation. This apparently makes me a pirate. Microsoft, turning honest people into pirates.

Synchronizing gaim-encryption keys between machines

Here is a quick reminder post about how to syncrhonize gaim-encryption keys between multiple machines. Why would you need to do this? If you use gaim at home & at work and want to use encryption you'll need to synchronize your keys.

Linux to Linux synchronization:

Synchronizing between two Linux machines is as simple as rsync. This is what I use:

rsync -avz --progress .gaim/* [DESTINATION.IP]:/home/$user/.gaim/

(this'll synchronize all settings, accounts, preferences & keys between source & destination machine)

If you simply need the encryption keys you'll want to copy the id, id.priv & known_keys files all found in .gaim/.

Windows synchronization:

Synchronizing with windows just takes a few more steps.

Set your folder/file browser to "view hidden folders" (Tools > Folder Options > View > "view hidden")

Navigate to "Documents & Settings > $user > Application Data (normally hidden) > .gaim.

Copy the id, id.priv & known_keys to/from this folder to/from the second machine and you're set.

Net Neutrality Bill

Here is another update video I was forwarded concerning the Net Neutrality Act. It's a light-hearted look at it, but still informative. If you haven't read about Net Neutrality or how it'll affect us as consumers give it a look.

YouTube

Amber Alert Issued for Destiny Norton

On the way to work this morning our radio talk show was interrupted by an Amber Alert for the SLC area. I just wanted to post quickly about it. Hopefully this gets resolved quickly. (Below taken from KSL)

An Amber Alert has been issued for a missing five-year-old girl named Destiny Norton.

Police were searching for a man of interest in the case. But they nowsay that man voluntarily contacted police this morning. Officers aretalking with him.

Destiny has short blonde hair with green streaks, and was last seen wearing ablack and gray adult size shirt.

Police say Destiny was getting ready for bed around 8:30 lastnight at her home near 700 South 500 East. She wanted to stay up later,but was told to get ready for bed, instead. Five minutes later thefive-year old was nowhere to be found.

Police began questioning friends and family, but no one has seen the little girl.

Detectives activated a messaging service that called thousands of residents in the area to put them on the lookout. And they say dozens of people turned out, wanting to help look for Destiny.

Lt. C.T. Smith, Salt Lake City Police Dept.: "They've been goingout in extended areas with flyers we've made up, contacting anybodythey see in the street, trying to find out more information."

Police searched all night, going door to door. But they haven't had any luck.

Anyone with information about the whereabouts ofDestiny Norton is asked to call Salt Lake City Police Department at799-3000.

Google Sitemaps & Link Sharing

I've been doing a lot of research this last week on keywords and search engine optimization. I'm getting decent traffic on my site but, as always, I'd like better. After implementing a few things I've bumped my traffic almost 100%, but there is still more to be done.

The next thing I'd like to implement is popularity rankings. Using the Google Sitemaps tool I notice that only a few sites link to me. For those of you not familiar with some of the Google tools you can find sites linking to you by using the "link:" tool. For example, "link:christer.homeip.net" will show you the sites known to link to my site.

Link Sharing benefits your traffic due to a few reasons. "Popularity by Association" is the idea of ranking your site based on its popularity. If more sites link to you you inherit some of their rank standing. Link Sharing also helps by directly driving traffic from one site to another. I like Site A, which links to Site B, therefore I read Site B as well. Both sites get traffic.

If anyone would like to talk about sharing links just drop a comment. Hopefully we can mutually benefit.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

We saw Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest on Friday night and enjoyed it. There was some great action scenes & amazing special effects. It also kept up to the original as far as comedy. Very funny & light. Johnny Depp pulled off another amazing character with Captain Jack Sparrow. I would suggest seeing this movie.

The only reluctance I have is that it is part two of three so there is quite a cliff hanger at the end in preparation for the third installment of the series. Of course, if you're a fan of the first, you'll want to see this. I know I wouldn't be patient enough to wait for the third and watch them together. I guess Hollywood is banking on that.

Check out Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

Sociable Plugin for wordpress

I've noticed more and more blogs using the Sociable plugin lately and so I installed it myself.  As the internet and browsing seems to be moving more and more towards "social browsing" I think it's a great extension to have.

Basically the sociable plugin allows you to append your posts (as well as pages, archives, searches and single-pages) with selected links to social browsing sites.  You can easily submit a post to sites like Digg, Fark, del.icio.us and many more.  If you'd like to add this to your blog simply grab the sociable plugin.  It's really easy to install.

Winamp: A Response

Well I got a lot of feedback concerning my post about Winamp and it's being pwned by AOL.  I wanted to share some of the suggestions I recieved for those of you not following the comments section (read: everyone).

The player I ended up trying and seemed happy with was Zinf (Zinf Is Not FreeA*p).

The Zinf audio player is a simple, but powerful audio player for Linux and Win32. It supports MP3, Ogg/Vorbis, WAV and Audio CD playback, SHOUTcast/Icecast HTTP streaming, RTP streaming, a powerful music browser, theme support and a download manager.

What I liked about it was that it was lightweight and only worried about playing audio.  I can't stand those "kitchen sink" players that do video + every imaginable codecs, audio + every imagineable codec, ripping, burning, etc etc ad naseum.  I am still testing this app, but as of now it is in use vs research.

Another suggestion I got was for Sonique which is apparently really nice, but no longer in development.  Thanks to Lamont for that suggestion.  I may check that out when I get back into work on Monday.  If I can find a copy he had very good reviews about it.

Winamp pwned by AOL

So I'm back using XP at the office after a long home-based hiatus from all things windows.  I am trying to setup this machine with comparable FOSS apps and I'm having a hard time.  I've grown accustomed to my Linux based apps so these windows apps aren't cutting it.

I installed Winamp today, as I remember using that long ago in my Windows days.  What do I see when I'm installing it? "Nullsoft is a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL/Time Warner."  Whoa, back the truck up!

So I quickly cancel the installation of that.  If there could possibly be a company worse than Microsoft, it'd be AOL.  Microsoft buy & whores out companies that created good apps but AOL simply doesn't have any useful or competitive product.  Overpriced, bloated ISP.. no thanks.

So, for those of you who didn't know, Winamp is pnwd by AOL.  Don't use it.  If I find a useful non-bloated, non-whore of an XP based app I'll let you know.  In the meantime I'm going to start bringing in my Linux laptop from home.