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Electricity is a fickle mistress, one moment she's gently caressing your genitals through gingerly applied electrodes the next she's blowing up your data centers.

There's nothing wrong with my ISP. In fact, they're proba

Too much leisure time is one thing, but most people blow some time on pursuits that are purely pleasure, and WoW is no better or worse than most of those. I used to play WoW; I played a lot during a period where I was freelancing and doing contract work. Played a lot less when I started in on a full time job. Less still when my first kid came along.

If I can find time to play WoW, have a full time job, a kid, and a social life, what's the problem? People always treat it like there is some character flaw in playing an MMO, but they ignore the fact that the person'd be playing some other game, reading a trashy novel, or slacking in front of the TV.

Let's face it. People are lazy and getting a bogus humanistic degree is much easier than an engineering one.

Was DOS ready for the desktop? By many definitions, people would say no, but that's exactly what started Microsoft's dominance of the OS market.

Jordan Golson writes "New York Times gadget reviewer David Pogue got into an email back-and-forth with Valleywag after he was tricked into writing an article by advance misinformation on a pre-launch product. In theory, it's good for reviewers to test and write up products before release day, so consumers can make informed choices. In practice, Pogue and we wish the industry standard would change." Personally I think this is why blogs are great- if a product sells 100,000 units, it only takes a few dozen bloggers to encounter problems for the truth to come out. Of course, that doesn't help you if you want to pre-order.

An anonymous reader writes "Dangerous Time To Be Based at Minot, Apparently is a summary of the recent deaths connected directly or indirectly to Minot Air Force Base and the now-infamous B-52 flight that ferried five (or was it six) live nuclear missiles across the USA. Yah, yah, so everybody is going on and on and on about this damn thing and the conspiracy theorists are really working themselves into a frenzy but this blog has added slashdotability because it links to some truly incredibly "connect the dots" conspiracy theories that even include hacking and cyberwar. And that's not all! If you act now, we'll throw in an explanation of how the disappearance of Steve Fossett is part of the New World Order's evil master plan, mur ha ha ha! Seriously, though. If this ain't true then I DEMAND an incredibly movie out of Hollywood off the back of this stuff."
http://nsphere.blogspot.com/2007/09/dangerous-time-to-be-based-at-minot.html

In this Security Insight issue Vlad Borisenko, Malware Analyst at Agnitum, speaks about the ins and outs of his profession. Interesting reading, especially if you realize that there are good people behind good software!

Filed under: Desktops

According to reports that have been slowly making their way through the chip manufacturing community, everyone's favorite underdog, AMD, is planning on launching a new line of three-core processors sometime in the near future. Sure, it sounds weird, but apparently the technique for creating a triple-core CPU is akin to "switching off" one core in a four-sided chip, and the process can yield significant speed enhancements while keeping costs reasonable. Reports speculate that the three-core model could happen partially due to the need to salvage bad four-core chips, but also because the triple-core concept is easy to market, and resistance from Intel will be low. Word on the street is that the new chips will appear on the consumer side to begin with, and might migrate over to the enterprise / server domain if there's sufficient movement on sales. Browse on over to the read link and feast your eyes on a succulent sea of technical mumbo-jumbo.

[Via Techmeme]

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/157201788/

jnakane writes "UBC Engineering Physics students pit prototype operation robots against each other for prizes and bragging rights in the 7th Annual Robot Competition. Offering solutions to handle delicate body parts on a 6-foot long version of the playing surface resembling the board game "Operation" (including the "shock" buzzer), the second-year students designed and built autonomous surgical robots to remove body organs reliably and quickly (well, most of the time). You can also see video footage."

DelMinor writes "Windows Secrets Newsletter Issue 122 2007-09-13 Microsoft updates Windows without users' consent By Scott Dunn Microsoft has begun patching files on Windows XP and Vista without users' knowledge, even when the users have turned off auto-updates. Many companies require testing of patches before they are widely installed, and businesses in this situation are objecting to the stealth patching. Files changed with no notice to users In recent days, Windows Update (WU) started altering files on users' systems without displaying any dialog box to request permission. The only files that have been reportedly altered to date are nine small executables on XP and nine on Vista that are used by WU itself. Microsoft is patching these files silently, even if auto-updates have been disabled on a particular PC. It's surprising that these files can be changed without the user's knowledge. The Automatic Updates dialog box in the Control Panel can be set to prevent updates from being installed automatically. However, with Microsoft's latest stealth move, updates to the WU executables seem to be installed regardless of the settings without notifying users. When users launch Windows Update, Microsoft's online service can check the version of its executables on the PC and update them if necessary. What's unusual is that people are reporting changes in these files although WU wasn't authorized to install anything. This isn't the first time Microsoft has pushed updates out to users who prefer to test and install their updates manually. Not long ago, another Windows component, svchost.exe, was causing problems with Windows Update, as last reported on June 21 in the Windows Secrets Newsletter. In that case, however, the Windows Update site notified users that updated software had to be installed before the patching process could proceed. This time, such a notice never appears. For users who elect not to have updates installed automatically, the issue of consent is crucial. Microsoft has apparently decided, however, that it doesn't need permission to patch Windows Updates files, even if you've set your preferences to require it. Microsoft provides no tech information yet To make matters even stranger, a search on Microsoft's Web site reveals no information at all on the stealth updates. Let's say you wished to voluntarily download and install the new WU executable files when you were, for example, reinstalling a system. You'd be hard-pressed to find the updated files in order to download them. At this writing, you either get a stealth install or nothing. A few Web forums have already started to discuss the updated files, which bear the version number 7.0.6000.381. The only explanation found at Microsoft's site comes from a user identified as Dean-Dean on a Microsoft Communities forum. In reply to a question, he states: "Windows Update Software 7.0.6000.381 is an update to Windows Update itself. It is an update for both Windows XP and Windows Vista. Unless the update is installed, Windows Update won't work, at least in terms of searching for further updates. Normal use of Windows Update, in other words, is blocked until this update is installed." Windows Secrets contributing editor Susan Bradley contacted Microsoft Partner Support about the update and received this short reply: "7.0.6000.381 is a consumer only release that addresses some specific issues found after .374 was released. It will not be available via WSUS [Windows Server Update Services]. A standalone installer and the redist will be available soon, I will keep an eye on it and notify you when it is available." Unfortunately, this reply does not explain why the stealth patching began with so little information provided to customers. Nor does it provide any details on the "specific issues" that the update supposedly addresses. System logs confirm stealth installs In his forum post, Dean-Dean names several files that are changed on XP and Vista. The patching process updates several Windows\System32 executables (with the extensions .exe, .dll, and .cpl) to version 7.0.6000.381, according to the post. In Vista, the following files are updated: 1. wuapi.dll 2. wuapp.exe 3. wuauclt.exe 4. wuaueng.dll 5. wucltux.dll 6. wudriver.dll 7. wups.dll 8. wups2.dll 9. wuwebv.dll In XP, the following files are updated: 1. cdm.dll 2. wuapi.dll 3. wuauclt.exe 4. wuaucpl.cpl 5. wuaueng.dll 6. wucltui.dll 7. wups.dll 8. wups2.dll 9. wuweb.dll These files are by no means viruses, and Microsoft appears to have no malicious intent in patching them. However, writing files to a user's PC without notice (when auto-updating has been turned off) is behavior that's usually associated with hacker Web sites. The question being raised in discussion forums is, "Why is Microsoft operating in this way?" How to check which version your PC has If a system has been patched in the past few months, the nine executables in Windows\System32 will either show an earlier version number, 7.0.6000.374, or the stealth patch: 7.0.6000.381. (The version numbers can be seen by right-clicking a file and choosing Properties. In XP, click the Version tab and then select File Version. In Vista, click the Details tab.) In addition, PCs that received the update will have new executables in subfolders named 7.0.6000.381 under the following folders: c:\Windows\System32\SoftwareDistribution\Setup\Ser viceStartup\wups.dll c:\Windows\System32\SoftwareDistribution\Setup\Ser viceStartup\wups2.dll Users can also verify whether patching occurred by checking Windows' Event Log: Step 1. In XP, click Start, Run. Step 2. Type eventvwr.msc and press Enter. Step 3. In the tree pane on the left, select System. Step 4. The right pane displays events and several details about them. Event types such as "Installation" are labeled in the Category column. "Windows Update Agent" is the event typically listed in the Source column for system patches. On systems that were checked recently by Windows Secrets readers, the Event Log shows two installation events on Aug. 24. The files were stealth-updated in the early morning hours. (The time stamp will vary, of course, on machines that received the patch on other dates.) To investigate further, you can open the Event Log's properties for each event. Normally, when a Windows update event occurs, the properties dialog box shows an associated KB number, enabling you to find more information at Microsoft's Web site. Mysteriously, no KB number is given for the WU updates that began in August. The description merely reads, "Installation Successful: Windows successfully installed the following update: Automatic Updates." No need to roll back the updated files Again, it's important to note that there's nothing harmful about the updated files themselves. There are no reports of software conflicts and no reason to remove the files (which WU apparently needs in order to access the latest patches). The only concern is the mechanism Microsoft is using to perform its patching, and how this mechanism might be used by the software giant in the future. I'd like to thank reader Angus Scott-Fleming for his help in researching this topic. He recommends that advanced Windows users monitor changes to their systems' Registry settings via a free program by Olivier Lombart called Tiny Watcher. Scott-Fleming will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of his choice for sending in a comment we printed. I'll report further on this story when I'm able to find more information on the policies and techniques behind Windows Update's silent patches. Send me your tips on this subject via the Windows Secrets contact page. Scott Dunn is associate editor of the Windows Secrets Newsletter. He is also a contributing editor of PC World Magazine, where he has written a monthly column since 1992, and co-author of 101 Windows Tips & Tricks (Peachpit) with Jesse Berst and Charles Bermant."
http://windowssecrets.com/comp/070913/#story1

qubezz writes "The company MediaDefender works with the RIAA and MPAA against piracy, setting up fake torrents and trackers and disrupting p2p traffic. Previously, the TorrentFreak site accused them of setting up a fake internet video download site designed to catch and bust users. MediaDefender denied the entrapment charges. Now 700MB of MediaDefender's internal emails from the last 6 months have been leaked onto BitTorrent trackers. The emails detail their entire plan, including how they intended to distance themselves from the fake company they set up and future strategies. Other pieces of company information were included in the emails such as logins and passwords, wage negotiations, and numerous other aspect of their internal business."

thefickler writes "Media Defender, a company which offers services to snuff out copyright infringement, has just suffered probably one of the largest blows that any company would have to endure; nearly 700MB of internal emails, spanning 9 months, have been leaked to the Internet. The e-mails are available as, ironically, a Torrent file, the same network that Media Defender tries to infect on a daily basis. A group known as MediaDefender-Defenders posted the file early Saturday morning; though, we know that MediaDefender-Defenders didn't exist prior to uploading this torrent."

Gothmog of A writes "As Richard Dawkins' offcial site reports, an organization called Creation Science Evangelism Ministries has been submitting DMCA copyright requests to YouTube. This has resulted in the Rational Response Squad (RRS) being banned after they protested against videos being taken down and accounts being closed. The RRS videoes attack creationism (AKA intelligent design) and promote the atheist viewpoint. According to the RRS, the copyright requests are without merit since the material in question is covered by fair use or has been declared to be in the public domain. Behind Creation Science Evangelism Ministries is the infamous Kent Hovind (AKA Dr. Dino) who is currently serving jail time for tax evasion."