It is true that the default Windows/Linux hosts file cannot do wildcard matching. However there are some apps like Acrylic or angryhosts which may allow such wildcard functionality. These seem to be Windows only however. For Linux there may be other options like DNS Chef. I am not completely clear however whether DNS Chef would work for this.

Of course hosts file blocking lists like mvps and yoyo would have to be updated to support wildcards. I guess someone could write a simple program to wildcard every domain in those lists and then maybe the list maintainers could be convinced to maintain wildcard versions. I think this is the only way that this DNS based ad blocking can move forward.

Wladimir is taking his thank yous in cash from advertisers wanting in on his whitelist. His idea wasn't original. It just became the most popular version. He's a cunt who has betrayed his users.

Right. Until it autoupdates in a week and re-checks the box (for your convenience) and moves the option back to about:config or takes it away entirely. When a dev cannot be trusted he cannot be trusted. And Vlad definitely cannot be trusted.

The same thing except that it actually blocks ads by default. Even the ones from companies who have paid off the Vladimir The Whore to be whitelisted. How can he be trusted now? I wouldn't trust him.

With every release he will probably try to sneak something in that will allow certain ads to be displayed. Like uTorrent, I think Adblock Plus needs to be viewed as adware now. The developer is motivated by advertising money. He will find ways to sneak in the ads over time. It's always the same story in these cases.

Just a heads up in case you haven't heard adblock 'plus' is now essentially adware itself. Pretty pointless. What you want is adblock edge. It's just a fork that blocks all ads that it can, even from companies who have paid off the original dev who obviously cannot be trusted.

There was also a very interesting endurance test done on extremesystems.org. Very impressive stuff. I don't yet own an SSD, but I'll continue to consider buying one! Maybe next Black Friday. Just waiting for the right deal.

If you are implying that LUKS + dm-crypt is more secure in practice I might mention that hidden containers have not been implemented AFAIK.

To me the most likely and simplest explanation of the strange canary-like behavior is to assume a warrant canary is indeed what we are seeing. Which probably means that 7.1a has not been compromised, but that a compromised version of 7.1a will eventually be introduced into the wild. Hence the need for a trusted repo for windows.

Nevertheless are the changes between 7.0 and 7.1 so significant that it is worth the additional risk of a more recent release? I'm thinking of using my 7.0 download from 2011 instead. A 2 year delay and then suddenly an update might in itself seem suspicious to a sufficiently paranoid individual given what we now know about the aggressive behavior of the NSA. The drawback is that the code verification process is based on 7.1a. Until the verification/cryptanalysis process is complete downgrading to 7.0 temporarily might be worthwhile.

FWIW here are some md5sums for my Windows copies.
5.0a: 4ec2b386f5d786b3017727aaecf28aa8
6.0: ec0827315825a035ff9a4203ddddfef7
6.1a: c413ecd820d2f912996ae86327b0d622
7.0: eadd4ae48541b830638f279d83938497
7.0a: 354e280c4bb56704e3925770f282588f
7.1a: 7a23ac83a0856c352025a6f7c9cc1526

Thanks for the advice. I do. I keep well away.

Really. Have a cite for that?

Define 'adulthood'. And if it can damage a younger brain that makes damage to adult brains a hell of a lot more plausible. Excellent reason for anyone who values whatever intelligence they have to stay far away until or unless long term use has been proven to be safe.

>LOL...we're talking about a much much safer alternative to alcohol, not something that needs placebo controlled studies.

What does alcohol have to do with anything? That's just a question of legality. I support the legalization of all drugs including heroin. So that's irrelevant to me. What I care about is whether Cannabis/THC has been proven to be safe. I don't care if it's safer than driving your car into a bridge support at 50 mph or downing huge quantities of Everclear every waking moment or sniffing acetone all day long or whatever. The question is whether or not regular use of the drug has any negative effects on memory or cognition. AFAIK long term effects have not been studied properly. Based on what I have seen personally in my own life I remain concerned.

I don't think it is easy to draw a particular line between a frequency of use that is harmful and one that is not. If it is harmful at all and obviously such harm has not been demonstrated scientifically (which again does not prove that it is not harmful) then it may be that the harm is proportional to the frequency of use. The relationship may be linear or nonlinear or there may be no harm at any frequency of use. It's impossible to say at this point because I don't think you can legally do such studies outside of Uruguay or Colorado and in any case none have been done AFAIK. I have personally seen anecdotal evidence of such memory decline that seems to follow taking up pot smoking. While that doesn't prove anything. It may just be coincidence, but I'm not rushing out to start smoking myself. I'm not willing to take the risk of my memory getting even worse than it is now.

It's also almost certainly safer than putting a sawn off shotgun against your head and pulling the trigger or dowsing yourself in salt water and then sticking your fingers in a light socket. The amount of harm that alcohol may or may not cause is not relevant except for legalization arguments. Not to belabor the obvious but just because something is legal does not mean it is an intelligent thing to do.

Please cite the part where I claimed to be intelligent. I made no such claim. But I value whatever intelligence I do have. Which is why I give drugs with any evidence, anecdotal or otherwise, of mental decline a very wide berth.

They have? You have a cite for that? Are you seriously claiming the government has done placebo controlled studies comparing marijuana or THC and alcohol, cigarettes and coffee/caffiene?

Actually I have personally read studies that show caffeine and other stimulants like amphetamines to improve the outcome following brain damage. I have also seen plenty of anecdotal evidence that stimulants in general can increase mental performance. So that much is plausible.

Incidentally I don't drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes and I drink coffee only rarely.

If you are referring to a diceware password then 10 words is not particularly impressive. I have a truly awful memory and I also have a ten word diceware password memorized. In any case how good your memory may or may not be at the moment isn't the point. The question is how does it compare to before you started smoking regularly.

It demands no such thing. I run Arch Linux and again I have a terrible memory. I just look up commands when (not if) I forget them. Also this does not speak at all to the question of whether smoking marijuana affects memory. All it proves is it doesn't cause actual brain death or mental retardation. But it still could drop your functional IQ by 10 points for every 3 years of 'wake and bake' or something similar. Since peoples' IQs tend to drop every year after their 18th birthdays in any case this would not be simple to demonstrate.

I assume you meant to use the past tense since he was talking about the late 70s to early 80s and my experience was quite different.

Smart people don't use themselves as guinea pigs on an unstudied drug which may or may not have long term negative affects on memory. Anecdotal experience seems to support some memory decline with long term marijuana use. I wouldn't go near the stuff for that reason alone. Until it has been proven to be safe through long term placebo controlled studies I would hope that most intelligent people would give it a wide berth.

As far as the late 70s to early 80s I have to agree with the observation of potheads and geeks not mixing and that geeks who spent most of their time either playing computer games or Dungeons and Dragons or writing computer games generally did not smoke pot.

Not every corporation is evil, but most of them are. As individuals they would be sociopaths. I don't consider the encouragement of sociopathic behavior to be a particularly good idea. Corporate personhood should be abolished. Oh and I'm a Libertarian.

Oh god. Not this again. What makes you think the replacements will be any better? This whole "vote for change because change is good" is such bullshit. If you are going to vote at least do it intelligently. It's voting blindly without thought that has gotten us into this situation in the first place.

If you are going to vote for someone at least vote for someone who makes specific promises about how he would vote in this sort of critical law and what he promises to do to himself if he votes the wrong way. Suicide would be a good start. That would apply to Obama because he has broken most of his promises. Fucking liar. I'd probably only vote for someone with zero experience in politics because all experienced politicians are liars. Most lawyers too. So no lawyers either. And if both options are bad then don't fucking vote. It's just a waste of everyone's time.

Or vote for a Libertarian or a Socialist or someone else idealistic. At least you'll get more predictable votes from someone who actually believes in something other than making lots of money for themselves in bribes.