The computer that I am now using (on my vacation) is not mine. Also, it has Microsoft Windows Vista (and, to be sure, no other OSs on it). I am thus stuck with Vista.When I first started using this computer, to my surprise, it was actually quite quick in loading applications (like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Microsoft Office 2007). As it turns out, this is because the computer (somehow, for whatever reason) has not been restarted in days. Someone else made the computer shut down about a half hour ago. (UPDATE: This was as of yesterday....
Friday, 25 June 2010
Microsoft Windows Vista: Certifiably Terrible
Posted on 02:08 by Unknown
Posted in epiphany, gnome, internet explorer, KDE, konqueror, microsoft, Mozilla Firefox, safari, windows vista, windows xp
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Thursday, 24 June 2010
Nerds Against ACTA
Posted on 02:27 by Unknown
You, the readers of this blog, may have seen on this blog's main page a widget calling on citizens of the world to oppose the passage of ACTA. There are a few details listed explaining why ACTA should be opposed; further details can be found by clicking on the widget. (For those wondering why the logo looks like the world superimposed on Mickey Mouse's head's shadow, the reason for this is because Disney is one of the proponents of ACTA and one of the driving forces behind every major copyright extension in the US (which is extended to other countries...
Tuesday, 22 June 2010
Pay-to-Pirate
Posted on 23:20 by Unknown
This comes from this article (Reuters through Yahoo! Movies) on how many sites hosting copies of movies are now charging customers to access them.It's a rather strange turn of events, and one that I do not support, because now, these sites are actually taking revenue from the studios that produced these movies despite offering little to distinguish their copies from the original copies. That said, the benefit to consumers is probably that these uploaded copies are free of the DRM that comes with the original copies — that's what makes them worth...
Posted in DRM, paramount, pay-to-pirate, public domain, retroactive copyright, rootkit, sony-bmg, spyware
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Sunday, 20 June 2010
Patenting Yoga is Patently Stupid
Posted on 18:35 by Unknown
Or is it?It comes from an article I read yesterday in the ([gasp] PRINT!) newspaper. It deals with the commercialization of yoga and the patenting of yogic asanas in the US.The article says that many asanas are patented in the US, of course just to make a bigger buck. In India, these same asanas cannot be patented as they qualify as "traditional knowledge and methods" (which cannot be commercialized). The problem, of course, is that the US's patent laws preempt all other countries' patent laws, so this may (unfortunately) change in India as well....
Posted in agricultural company, asana, ayurveda, basmati rice, patent, trademark, troll, yoga
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Saturday, 19 June 2010
FOLLOW-UP: The Film Industry's Next Avatar
Posted on 05:37 by Unknown
This comes from this article (writer Enigmax, Torrent Freak) on filmmaker Enzo Tedeschi's plan to distribute his new movie The Tunnel for free through torrent sites. (Yes, I know the site is called "Torrent Freak", but the article is mostly quotes from Tedeschi himself apart from the introduction about the evils of Hollywood's modus operandi.) People get to buy individual frames of the movie for $1 each — $25 gives one second of the movie (because this movie has a frame rate of 25 FPS), so $1500 gets a full minute of the movie. Along with this,...
Posted in copyright, enzo tedeschi, FOLLOW-UP, hollywood, james cameron, movie, mpaa, the tunnel, torrent
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Thursday, 17 June 2010
HP Printers Now Ad Vectors
Posted on 02:35 by Unknown
This comes from an article (Jeremy Kirk, Computer World) about HP's new line of web-connected printers. It describes how HP is collaborating with Yahoo! with regard to its new web-connected printers to also provide targeted advertisements to users. Naturally, I am suspicious. Follow the jump for the rest of my take.Read more...
Posted in 600-series, 600C, 670C, advertisement, hp, printing, web-connected printer, yahoo
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Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Windows 7 on Netbooks?
Posted on 23:54 by Unknown
As per my usual habits, I was browsing Wikipedia's article on Asus and clicked on the link to the article on the Eee PC. I read that Microsoft is working with Asus to optimize Windows 7 for the next generation of the Eee PC.While I don't like Microsoft, I believe they shouldn't be shut out of the development process entirely. That said, I believe they are misguided in their efforts. (I also truly hope that Asus doesn't drop Linux support on the Eee PC.)I believe that Apple (whom I also don't particularly like for some of its products and practices)...
Friday, 11 June 2010
My Blogging Wavelength Increases
Posted on 09:59 by Unknown
(The title really means, "my blogging frequency decreases". Get it? Heh heh. [cricket chirp])I am going to be out of town for 2 months, so I definitely will not be able to blog as much. Sorry about that. I am excited about the vacation, but I may not have 24/7 access to a computer.On the upside, the FIFA 2010 World Cup has begun! Y...
Thursday, 10 June 2010
Review: KDE 4.4
Posted on 18:04 by Unknown
Today, I am reviewing KDE 4.4.Well, I couldn't. Before you tar and feather me (appropriate, no?), hear me out. (This is also why I have no screenshots for you, dear readers, today.)I installed all of the KDE "standard" (not "full" or "minimal") packages in Synaptic. That said, I had installed some packages like KolourPaint and KPackageKit already. This may have contributed to the issue.After all that was said and done, I closed all of my applications, logged out of GNOME, and logged into KDE. I saw the beautiful KDE splash screen followed by...a...
Posted in desktop effects, KDE, kde 4.4, kolourpaint, kpackagekit, review, Unixoid Review
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Wednesday, 9 June 2010
Pearson Owns the System!
Posted on 12:13 by Unknown
I found out today that my school system has essentially sold itself out to Pearson Education in a multimillion dollar contract, which is peanuts compared to the size of the budget, etc.While I can't help but be suspicious about this move, after reading the proposal submitted (or, at least, the first 5 pages of it) by Pearson, I am a little calmed by the fact that Pearson describes itself as committed to "open industry standards for interoperability".Of course, Microsoft says the same quite often, and yet we all know how that turns out in the end....
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Statins in Hot Water
Posted on 18:11 by Unknown
This comes from a discussion I was having with my family about the UK's National Health Service proposing putting statins in drinking water to combat the widespread problems of high cholesterol and triglycerides resulting from widespread obesity. While the idea was floated as early as 2004 (it may have been even earlier, but that was the earliest BBC.com news story I could find about it), as far as I know, it came up again just a few months ago.Follow the jump to read my take on it.Read more...
Posted in 8 glasses every day, national health service, NHS, social policy, statin, UK, water
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Sunday, 6 June 2010
How the Economics of Rewards Relates to Open Source
Posted on 13:31 by Unknown
As I just noticed, this is post #10000000_2, #80_16, or #200_8! (The underscore separates the number (on the left) from the base system (on the right).)I got the idea for this post from a video embedded in an article on the website The Linuxologist. It deals with how incentives affect people's performance - specifically the incentive of a higher reward for better performance. Follow the jump to read the rest.Read more...
Posted in autonomy, cambridge, economics, incentives, madurai, mastery, MIT, money, open-source, profit, purpose, rewards
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Thursday, 3 June 2010
Graduation!
Posted on 16:54 by Unknown
I have graduated!Yet, a really long and grueling week lies ahead.As after next Friday I will be out of the country, my blogging will become much less frequent. Don't expect to see updates very often. However, this blog is not de...
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