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zalternate

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Posts posted by zalternate

    Is it the end of "open" wireless hotspots? (England)

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    It happens all over. People use a open wireless signal to download stuff. Now whether that stuff is legal or will get the owner of the IP address jailed for a few years, is up to debate.

    Proof is in the 'actual person' doing the downloading and not just an IP address.  

    This is a dangerous ruling. But Who is actually running the legal system? The government or a Private company that only has dollar signs in it's eyes.

    And why did the Judge rule this way?  A compromise would of been having the 'open hotspot' go to user password connections, to log into the network. So a name and time with the connection internal IP. But then that means DPI and logging data and a higher cost to run the network. Some have just called it quits.

    There was a U.S. town the other week, that shut down it's wireless open access, due to a copyright infringing notice. And the Mafia relented and allowed them to open back up. Threat of file infringement retracted that is.

    The police in Australia cruise for open wireless connections and then lecture the home owner on how to lock down their network.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2009/nov/27/pub-file-sharing-cloud-fine?

     

    A pub owner has had to pay

    Secret copyright enforcement papers(ACTA) needs to be made public

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    And our Rights get that much more stomped on.  And this does apply to Canada as well.  :smiley6600:

    A Right to a fair trial and the court system, that is.

    A Right to Privacy to keep the powers that be from snooping into your data stream to make sure you are not copyright infringing. But thats what DPI(deep packet inspection) does anyways.

    http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091123/1541197061.shtml

      Senators Begin Questioning ACTA Secrecy

    from the this-ain't-the-transparency-we-were-promised dept

    Despite some sweet talk from Hollywood about how important ACTA and its secret negotiations are to America (and, once again, no, the secrecy is not at all "normal," as some industry lawyers would have you believe), it looks like some Senators are finally beginning to question how ACTA is being handled. Senators Bernie Sanders and Sherrod Brown have sent a letter to US Trade Rep Ron Kirk asking for ACTA documents to be made public. The letter points out that "the public has a right to monitor and express informed views on proposals of such magnitude" especially considering that "there are concerns about the impact of ACTA on the privacy and civil rights of individuals, on the supply of products under the first sale doctrine, on the markets for legitimate generic medicines, and on consumers and innovation in general." The letter also takes on the bogus claims of state secrets in protecting ACTA documents:

       We are surprised and unpersuaded by assertions that disclosures of basic information about the negotiation would present a risk to the national security of the United States, particularly as regards documents that are shared with all countries in the negotiations, and with dozens of representatives of large corporations. We are concerned that the secrecy of such information reflects a desire to avoid potential criticism of substantive provisions in ACTA by the public, the group who will be most affected by the agreement. Such secrecy has already undermined public confidence in the ACTA process.... We firmly believe that the public has a right to know the contents of the proposals being considered under ACTA, just as they have the right to read the text of bills pending before Congress."

    Unfortunately, these are just two Senators. Supporters of ACTA likely have many more who will blindly fight to keep ACTA secret and get it approved with little or no substantive input from those it will impact most.

     

    speed test

    in Show off your speed

    Posted

    Look at my score.Just one to ask why my  download speed for a movie is only aroud 280Kbps? Is it okey? I thought i might have more than 1Mbps. :oops:

    Well depending on who your ISP is(roadkill runner?), and how your movies are being downloaded, as in Torrents or a pay for movie download site.

    Online purchase scams

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Have you ever made an online purchase and when you click 'purchase' and then before the confirmation, have you ever gotten an offer to "save $10 now". And if you click "Sure. Why not".  You may of just gotten enrolled in an online club for 'supposedly' saving money on other online purchases.

    There may be lots of 'bold' words saying about saving. But somewhere near the bottom in regular print, it says you have just signed up for an online club, with a monthly payment, that can be hard to get out of.  

    But most people never notice $10 a month being charged to their credit card.  And the ones that do, wonder how the company got their credit card information, without having to fill in a form. The less scummy companies make you enter the last 4 digits of your card number used for a transaction that day.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/17/ecommerce-scams-hundreds_n_361140.html

    Senator Rockefeller released the results of an investigative report into "Aggressive Sales Tactics on the Internet and Their Impact on American Consumers" in advance of a hearing on the subject by the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.

    The research examines "e-commerce business practices that have generated high volumes of consumer complaints" and focused on sales tactics that "charge millions of American consumers for services the consumers do not want and do not understand they have purchased," according to the Staff Report.

    A practice known as "post-transaction marketing" was at the center of the research into the e-commerce business practices.

    TechCrunch offers context on how "post-transaction marketing" works (also see the senate committee report's illustration of the steps involved in an "Aggressive 'Post-Transaction'" sales):

       Background: hundreds of well known ecommerce companies add post transaction marketing offers to consumers immediately after something is purchased on the site. Consumers are usually offered cash back if they just hit a confirmation button. But when they do, their credit card information is automatically passed through to a marketing company that signs them up for a credit card subscription to a package of useless services. The "rebate" is rarely paid.

    The report reveals that numerous well-known e-commerce companies have earned millions of dollars through post-transaction marketing "scams", including sellers such as 1800Flowers.com, Fandango, FTD, Orbitz, Priceline, Shutterfly, Buy.com, Barnes & Noble, Expedia, as well as many, many more.

    The chart below, taken from the committee's report, highlights a number of the companies that have received income from post-transaction marketing, along with an approximation of how much money they've received through the practice:

    In the Staff Report summarizing the investigation's findings, the committee writes,

       Eighty-eight e-commerce companies have earned more than $1 million through using these tactics, including 19 that have made more than $10 million. Classmates.com has made more than $70 million using these controversial practices.

    Senator Rockefeller issued a statement on the report, saying:

       After six months, this Committee has found that the companies we are investigating have figured out very clever ways to manipulate consumers' buying habits so they can make a quick buck. American consumers have been complaining for years about these misleading practices and asking for answers - and rightly so. [...] Millions of Americans are getting hit with these mystery charges every month - we have to do all we can to protect the hard working families relying on us to look out for their wallets and well-being.

    Get the full report and read the Press Release from the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation here.

    http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=5f3f7e3d-210e-4978-9034-f58d33ced8c8&Month=11&Year=2009

    TechCrunch has additional reporting on the committee's findings.  

    http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/17/ptm-scams-scamville-rockefeller-senatehearing-wallofshame/

    The chart below, taken from the senate committee's report, illustrates "Aggressive 'Post-Transaction' Sales Tactics in an Online Purchase":

    click to enlarge and enrage.

    U.N. 'Internet anti-censorship conference' participants get censored.

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Those who control the World, control the destruction of our rights and freedoms everywhere.

    http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1562195/anti-internet-censorship-conference-censored

    Anti-Internet censorship conference is censored

    UN orders posters taken down

    By Ed Berridge

    Monday, 16 November 2009, 11:21

    THE UN has revealed itself to be in favor of censorship, at least when China is involved.

    The United Nations sponsored an Internet Governance Forum in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. As part of the conference an anti-Internet censorship group was disrupted by a gang of UN officials who demanded removal of a poster that mentioned Internet firewalls in China.

    At the heart of the UN's problems was a poster advertising "Access Controlled", a book being introduced at the event.

    The poster was thrown on the floor and protesters were told to remove it because of the reference to China and Tibet. They refused, so security guards came and removed it.

    All this happened in front of bemused witnesses. What angered the UN was a sentence that read, "The first generation of Internet controls consisted largely of building firewalls at key Internet gateways; China's famous 'Great Firewall of China' is one of the first national Internet filtering systems."

    Ron Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies said that it was bizarre that people were not allowed to discuss Internet censorship and surveillance policy at a forum about Internet governance.

    Deibert has filed a complaint against the censorship of the event and sent it to the United Nations Human Rights Commission.

    He said it was an undemocratic act to censor the event just because someone was trying to butter up the Chinese government.

    The UN stance is a little odd because it has previously expressed concern over the human rights situation in Tibet and Eastern Turkestan.

    Hughesnet Motto

    in HughesNet (DIRECWAY)

    Posted

    You send Hughesnet a monthly check(no equipment needed), which entitles you to call support for a total duration of at least 15 hours per month. Or at least until they block your number from calling again for a couple of months.

    :twisted:

    Wild Blue Internet speeds

    in Wildblue / Exceed / ViaSat

    Posted

    A note about those cellular based home wireless Internet cards, is if you have a modern house with low 'E' windows, as it can partly block the signal. Same goes for metal siding.  If at all possible request a outdoor unit. Or if it is just a stick, get a good USB cable and then you can manipulate it. Or even the tin can booster antenna.

    Some people have become quite creative with them. Making all sorts of remote towers to get a good signal on a larger property with hills in the way of the signal.

    But if the cell tower is too far away, you is screwed.

    A post I read on another forum , the user now has Millenicom and a mesh dish for the antenna.

    peak time vs off time

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    I'm on Telus DSL and if they don't have room at the node, well no more signups and then an upgrade has to happen for more card(user) space and bandwidth. I'm running new firmware in my modem that has removed a teeny, tiny glitch in my line signal. Resulting in better streaming. Maybe next time I'm bored, I'll try the latest firmware. But accidentally bricking a modem is always a thought.  But a new one costs 60 bucks.

    Cable unfortunately likes to just keep piling people on to the node and eventually upgrade the bandwidth. But have you heard??? 100Mbps speed packages for the cost of an arm and half a leg.  Download your torrents at 500Kbps, instead of 75Kbps, with all that speed.

    Satellite........... Well surf in the midnight hours and avoid primetime on more populated beams.

    Wireless? Well as long as you have a clean signal without interference, then it's the bandwidth the tower system has.

    This ISP is a bit crappy.

    http://www.google.com/tisp/

    And tech support is all wet.

    The there are those people who rarely surf in the times outside of primetime and don't notice how fast the system can be, when everyone else is working.

    I remember dialup and having a fast connection of 32Kbps, until the kids got to their homes from school and started using the landline phones and then a guaranteed disconnect to a slower 23Kbps. Thanksgiving and mothers day, the speed was about 15Kbps. Not even worth trying to surf.

    Wild Blue Internet speeds

    in Wildblue / Exceed / ViaSat

    Posted

    http://www.propel.com/technology/index.html

    With some of these bloated picture webpages, you could actually kill the graphics with the program. JPegs can't be compressed, unless the image is modified before it gets sent to the user and is more pixilated.

    I was on dialup for a few minutes the other day when I needed a setting for my just flashed DSL modem, and even the 'Google image' loaded real slow. 26Kbps is so blazingly slow now a days. But many webpages have such bloated code. It's like some of these programmers just keep adding to the code instead of making fresh copies every so often.

    I see FireFox has an Add-On, for text only webpages. I don't know if it downloads as text only though. A future fix maybe, if enough people ask for it..

    http://techshali.com/get-text-only-version-of-a-web-page-with-textise-0-1/

    https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search?q=Textise+0.1&cat=all

    Wild Blue Internet speeds

    in Wildblue / Exceed / ViaSat

    Posted

    I've seen that glitch before with the satellite Internet providers(across some various speed test sites). Have not looked into why it happens.

    Maybe the proxy server of the satellite Internet provider causes it?

    Thu Nov 12 2009 @ 12:46:08 am   DN   3072 kB   1062 Kbps (130 kB/s)  

    Thu Nov 12 2009 @ 12:43:10 am DN 25600 kB 16520 Kbps (2017 kB/s) micwa1

    Thu Nov 12 2009 @ 12:40:55 am DN 25600 kB 17530 Kbps (2140 kB/s)

    Google Problems

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Oh and on the DNS stuff.

    An ISP in Canada had an issue last week to do with their IP ranges. I am guessing that they bought some almost gone IPv4 address from another ISP. So people were getting WebPage results of just like if they were living in England or Spain. So the users were banned from accessing the Canadian TV channels streaming TV content, even though they were in Canada.

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