Noggy.Net

So.. we all meet people from time to time that make us laugh and at the same time terrify us at a level that we are not sure whether to stand around and watch what happens next or start legging it to the nearest safe house. I don’t expect any awards for my Internet design or layout or even my incredibly amazing way with words but at least I am not delusional.

This page MostAmazingSiteontheinternet.com just won an award in my eyes as the most terrifyingly bad web site I have ever had the misfortune to see. What amazes me is that after making me want to stab my own eyes out with my mouse he actually has the cheek to ask for a donation to whatever mad cause he has going on in his head at the bottom of the page. I also implore you to read about his comment about guns for that extra tingling “epic mental dude” spine chill feeling. Warning: Pressing the link may make you want to hurt kittens.

If there is one thing I hate it’s smug Mac owners bumping their gums about how bloody secure their system is. As an IT guy myself I have been trying to explain to people for years that the reason there are not that many viruses and trojans for macs and linux is because no one really cares. I mean, are you going to spend hours of your time trying to figure out a loophole in an operating system that 1% use when you can be targetting large greedy companies who run huge networks of over 50000 computers? No.. didn’t think so.

This guy though thought he would shut them up a bit by hacking into the mac in 10 seconds flat. All he needed to do was to get the user to point to a specific url and it was over. Computerworld – Charlie Miller, a security researcher who hacked a Macintosh in two minutes last year at CanSecWest’s PWN2OWN contest, improved his time today by breaking into another Macintosh in under 10 seconds.

Miller, formerly with the National Security Agency, may be best known as one of the first to hack Apple’s iPhone last summer. In August 2007, he also blasted Apple for its sluggish updating of the open-source components it uses in its operating system, calling the practice “negligent.”

Just one day after the French Government passed a law that lets judges disconnect users whose computer networks have shown sufficient evidence of illegal file sharing, the UK government’s plans to disconnect filesharers have also received an unsurprising boost: from the UK music industry.

The Guardian newspaper today quotes UK Music (a consortium of music industry interests here across the pond) saying “The purpose of [the disconnection] powers is to encourage users of unlicensed P2P networks towards existing and future digital music services.” – but we can’t help but question the effectiveness of pulling the plug on Internet connections.

Despite misleading super-extrapolated numbers in industry reports, us Brits are far-from reluctant to buy our music online – in the first half of 2008 the UK saw the biggest increase in digital sales in all the major worldwide markets [PDF]. Yet just last week, the Financial Times reported that EMI (the label owning The Beatles’ back-catalogue) was reluctant to place the recently-remastered Beatles albums online due to fears of online piracy – despite being readily available in almost every other format, legal or otherwise.

Despite clear demand for digital copies, the music labels continue to blame piracy for their bone-headed decisions on online music. However, as long as the labels withhold music in the formats or outlets that consumers love (hello iTunes and 7Digital) it’s clear that there’s plenty the labels could do to help their image and balance sheets before turning to the government and bleating for draconian laws to help shore up their own digital naivity.

Taken from http://www.downloadsquad.com