Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 17th Jun 2011 18:49 UTC
Oh boy, what do we make of this? We haven't paid that much attention to the whole thing as of yet, but with a recent public statement on why they do what they do, I think it's about time to address this thing. Yes, Lulz Security, the hacking group (or whatever they are) that's been causing quite a bit of amok on the web lately.
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Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 23:02 UTC, submitted by M.Onty
"Microsoft has sensationally abandoned its controversial plans to restrict the sharing of XBox One games, and has also removed daily online authentication requirements for its forthcoming console", reports The Guardian. They had no choice. Still a good move.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 22:28 UTC
"A snippet of code in the Steam digital distribution platform has revealed that Valve may be planning to let users easily share their games with friends in the future. The Verge has verified the code's authenticity, which was originally spotted by a member of the NeoGAF gaming forum; the code references a 'shared game library' and a notification that would alert a user when their games are currently in use by a borrower." This would change the, uh, game.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."More News »
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2011-01-28
"[jabbotts] I might suggest though that if the person developing the system is not themselves a hacker or employing hackers they are being negligent in there duties."
Soulbender,
"So banks should be employing thieves when they design their bank vaults? Having a generally idea about how hacking works is useful, yes, but specific knowledge is worthless for this purpose."
Wait, how did you get from someone being a hacker to that person being a thief? Or any sort of criminal for that matter? Many hackers are in professional occupations and there is nothing unethical about it.
I think maybe there's cross talking going on due to a difference in the definition of "hacker" - yours seems to imply a criminal element, but many hackers don't consider themselves criminals (and nor does the law for that matter).
"True but unlikely."
Can you elaborate?
"That's a really lame excuse and it's just confirms that these people are indeed assholes."
Maybe they are assholes, but they're still skilled ones.
"Is that like being a law abiding bank robber?"
No, not at all the same thing. Robbing banks implies a criminal element, hacking does not.
"Would probably help if the term 'hacker' wasn't so ambiguous. Are we talking about hackers who write code or hackers who (try to) break into systems? Two different beasts, same term."
Security hackers can break into their own systems, do you agree that it's neither illegal nor immoral? They can hack into third party systems with permission, same deal there, right? It's not the skill of hacking which is evil, it's the intent.
Of course, it may be unwise to hire a hacker who's previously demonstrated skill but has also shown malicious intent. However this doesn't describe the majority of hackers, most of whom just hack their own systems to learn about security.
The only reason we hear about all these "evil hackers" is because they're the ones which catch headlines, the good hackers don't get any attention - it's unfair but that's the media for you.
Edit - I guess this is already the conclusion on this thread, so I didn't need to post. Oh well.
Edited 2011-06-20 02:45 UTC