taint.org: Justin Mason’s Weblog

Funny: overheard on the radio just now, from the DJ interrupted during a station ident: ‘Your phone’s ringing. What, you have a text message? Fancy!’

Just to remind me I’m in the US ;)

Mind you, the DJ seems a bit out of touch; he’s clearly just discovered the Rock Gods that are The Darkness.

Tags: bit, fancy, funny, ident, message, overheard, phone, radio, station, text, touch

overheard on the radio just now, from the DJ interrupted during a station ident: ‘Your phone’s ringing. What, you have a text message? Fancy!’

Just to remind me I’m in the US ;)

Mind you, the DJ seems a bit out of touch; he’s clearly just discovered the Rock Gods that are The Darkness.

Tags: bit, fancy, ident, message, overheard, phone, radio, station, text, touch

Patents: MS patents ‘phone-home’ failure reporting.

There’s a catch, in that it’s not just plain old ‘phone home’, as seen in probably a hundred products since 1960 — they’ve added a ‘match the reported error messages against a db of known issues on the server side’ step. So that’s vaguely inventive — well, no, it’s totally obvious, but at least nobody I can think of off the top of my head has done that before. (Well, I lie, it sounds a bit like KDE’s crash reporting tool which does a similar search before reporting a bug.)

The notable comment, though, is
this:

There is a significant institutional culture issue that has a strong influence on how the Office functions that took root several decades ago and has, regretfully, increased, monotonically, over time. The management attitude, in a nutshell, is that patents aren’t ‘examined’, they are ‘processed’. The examination process is driven by production ‘goals’; to be rated in the key rating category of ‘Production Goal Achievement’ as ‘fully successful’ you must have at least 95%; less than that you are marginal; less then 90% you are ‘unsatisfactory’, meaning your entire rating is ‘unsatisfactory’ meaning a ‘90 day letter’ to get it ‘fully successful’ else you are fired. Also there are other time related requirements to meet, such as no amended application pending more than two months without an action. Persons get fired (yes, this does happen) almost always for low production or exceeding time limits for actions, almost never for improperly allowing claims.

Great.

Tech: It seems it’s stunningly easy to rip off GPRS customers. Another well-designed system I don’t think.

Tags: catch, failure, home, match, patents, phone, production, rating, reporting, time, unsatisfactory

MS patents ‘phone-home’ failure reporting.

There’s a catch, in that it’s not just plain old ‘phone home’, as seen in probably a hundred products since 1960 — they’ve added a ‘match the reported error messages against a db of known issues on the server side’ step. So that’s vaguely inventive — well, no, it’s totally obvious, but at least nobody I can think of off the top of my head has done that before. (Well, I lie, it sounds a bit like KDE’s crash reporting tool which does a similar search before reporting a bug.)

The notable comment, though, is
this:

There is a significant institutional culture issue that has a strong influence on how the Office functions that took root several decades ago and has, regretfully, increased, monotonically, over time. The management attitude, in a nutshell, is that patents aren’t ‘examined’, they are ‘processed’. The examination process is driven by production ‘goals’; to be rated in the key rating category of ‘Production Goal Achievement’ as ‘fully successful’ you must have at least 95%; less than that you are marginal; less then 90% you are ‘unsatisfactory’, meaning your entire rating is ‘unsatisfactory’ meaning a ‘90 day letter’ to get it ‘fully successful’ else you are fired. Also there are other time related requirements to meet, such as no amended application pending more than two months without an action. Persons get fired (yes, this does happen) almost always for low production or exceeding time limits for actions, almost never for improperly allowing claims.

Great.

Tech: It seems it’s stunningly easy to rip off GPRS customers. Another well-designed system I don’t think.

Tags: catch, failure, home, match, phone, production, rating, reporting, time, unsatisfactory

Wow — this guy won $250,000 on WWTBAM, and blogged it up, in excruciating detail. (His ‘Phone a friend’ friend also details his experiences, too). It sounds terrifying…

Hacking: Real-life UNIX disaster recovery.

Commuting: Guardian: A Life Inside meets commuter hell. The author of ‘A Life Inside’ is a convicted felon, undergoing a gradual release from prison; recently he’s been permitted to commute to a day job outside the big house.

‘I’ve had a good run, I suppose. More than a year of almost incident-free commuting.’ — until this episode, where one of those space invaders – the type who is perfectly happy to push you out of the way to make themselves comfortable — arrives…

I leaned farther away. Soon my back was hurting. Hang on a minute, I thought. I’ve paid the same as him for this seat. I was entitled to sit up straight. So I did. Back came the elbow. I wasn’t budging. And so battle commenced.

A glance at his computer revealed little activity. He was obviously too preoccupied with trying to make me budge. I was determined to resist this blatant act of aggression. I couldn’t help thinking it would never happen in prison - not without ensuing combat. I thought about my pal Toby Turner. This laptop lout was lucky he wasn’t sitting next to him in his heyday. I could just imagine Toby’s reaction to the elbow treatment.

Paying no heed to the mass of silent bystanders, my shaven-headed friend would have been on his feet in a flash. ‘Do you know how many fuckin’ anger management courses I’ve done?’

‘Er, no,’ his startled tormentor would stutter.

‘Six fuckers!’ Toby would yell, ‘and I still ain’t passed!’

Tags: detail, elbow, friend, guy, hacking, life, phone, prison, real-life, wwtbam

No, not the supposedly politically-motivated nul points for the UK, the much more scandalous way that RTE ignored democracy and the popular vote in favour of their own autocratic ‘Star Chamber’ jury. Outrage! Boo!

‘Voters had a five-minute slot in which to register their selections after all of the songs had been performed. Because Ireland was third of the entries to disclose its voting, the phone lines could not be kept open for any longer than the five-minute slot. Eircom, which operated the phone lines, had agreed with RTE’ that it would collate all of the votes within nine to 10 minutes of lines closing. While the company fulfilled its obligation, RTE’ decided to use a jury verdict rather than phone votes. …

(My emphasis.) Hmm… methinks the journo doth protest too much.

Eircom said its decision not to charge voters for their calls was a goodwill gesture and should not be interpreted as an admission of failure on its part regarding its role in the voting. ‘The system and the technology on our part worked as it should have on the night,’ a spokeswoman said.’

Aaaaah. I get the picture.

Tags: democracy, eircom, jury, nul, part, phone, rte, slot, voting, way

(of the phone variety). I’ve been driven mad by telemarketers; one of the more irritating local innovations (thankfully ’sales cold calls’ are pretty hard to operate with European privacy laws, so it wasn’t a problem back home).

Well, Congress over here recently passed a ‘do not call’ list, so you could ring up the maintainers and ask for your number to be added, and hey presto, no more phone spam. Well, CalPundit writes:

The federal law doesn’t cover banks, airlines or phone companies or calls made within a state.

Wow. That’s like saying ‘the law doesn’t cover calls made on a day ending in ‘y’.’ In my experience, those companies make 95% of the calls. Great.

Think I’ll stick with the tried-and-trusted ‘ring through to answerphone during the afternoon and early evening’ filter…

DMCA: IP: Using treaties to lock in DMCA enforcement:

On May 6, President Bush and Prime Minister Goh of Singapore signed the U.S.-Singapore Free Trade Agreement (the ‘FTA’). President Bush has termed the FTA ‘the first of its kind’ - apparently meaning that it is the first free trade agreement between the United States and an Asian nation.

But the FTA is also the first of its kind in another sense, as well. It is the first international trade agreement to demand that the signatories implement anti-circumvention provisions similar to those of the hotly controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act (’DMCA’).

It’s Naomi Klein meets Slashdot ;) Hopefully it’ll be blocked though, since it has serious domestic results too:

This step will have international, as well as domestic consequences: If Congress approves the FTA, it will not able to alter the DMCA without violating its obligations to Singapore.

Of course, according to some correspondents, Ireland’s copyright regime (reformed in 2000) quietly inserted its own DMCA provisions. Of course, nobody noticed, except for the legal lobbyists who were hoping this would happen. Doh. Is nowhere safe for freedom-to-tinker these days?

Tags: agreement, congress, copyright, course, dmca, fta, kind, law, phone, trade

Ben notes this passage from this SFGate story:

‘(Saddam’s) generals have been getting personal messages, including e-mail and cell phone calls, urging them not to fight.’

Then speculates exactly what such a message might look like…

Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2003 12:30:18 -0800
From: ben (spam-protected)
Subject: speculation

Dear friend,
This is for real!!!!!!!!!!!!1
================================================
================================================
This is a ''ONE-TIME MESSAGE'' you were randomly
selected to receive this.  There is no need to reply
to remove, you will receive no further mailings from
us.  If you have interest in this GREAT INFORMATION,
please do not click reply, use the contact information
in this message. Thank You! :-)
================================================
================================================
* Print This Now For Future Reference *
The following opportunity is one you may be interested
in taking a look at.  It can be started with VERY
LITTLE risk and the return is TREMENDOUS!!!
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
You are about to not get killed by the most powerful
military force in the world.
Please read the enclosed program…THEN READ IT
AGAIN!!!
<>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  <>  
The enclosed information is something I almost let
slip through my fingers.Fortunately, sometime later I
re-read everything and gave some thought and study to
it.
My name is Major Hassan al-Ramidi. Twelve years ago,
the unit I commanded at for the past twelve years was
eliminated. After unproductively wandering around in
the desert in terror for a while, I incurred many
unforeseen problems. Enormous numbers of men and
high-tech weapons surrounded me and were trying to
kill me. I truly believe it was wrong for me to be in
trouble like this.  AT THAT MOMENT something
significant happened in my life and I am writing to
share my experience in hopes that this will change
your life FOREVER!!!
In mid-December, I received this program via email.  I
had been sending away for information on various
opportunities for not dying.  All of the programs I
received, in my opinion, were not practical.  They
were either too difficult for me to comprehend or they
involved me getting killed by the US military or dying
of thirst in the desert. 
But like I was saying, in December I received this
program.  I didn’t send for it, or ask for it, they
just got my name off a mailing list. THANK GOODNESS
FOR THAT!!!  After reading it several times, to
make sure I was reading it correctly, I couldn’t
believe my eyes.  Here was a NOT GETTING KILLED
PHENOMENON.
After I got a pencil and paper and figured it out, I
at least had a chance of not dying horribly and
painfully.  After determining that the program is
LEGAL and NOT A CHAIN LETTER, I decided ”WHY NOT”.
I AM LIVING PROOF THAT IT WORKS !!!

Tags: cell, date, information, message, passage, phone, saddam, sfgate, story, thu

Man uses cell phone to take photo up schoolgirl’s skirt. You knew it was inevitable.

Police said Hamano was riding behind the girl on an escalator at JR Kashiwa Station when he took out his mobile phone, held it underneath the girl’s skirt and took a photo. The girl was alerted to his presence by the noise emitted by the phone camera’s shutter. She turned around to catch Hamano with his hands between her legs.

(via 0xdeadbeef, from MDN’s “waiwai” section)

Tags: cell, escalator, girl, hamano, man, phone, photo, police, schoolgirl, skirt

Great article from Heise Telepolis, by Duncan Campbell: How the terror trail went unseen.

“It gives you a window into how it is that Al Qaeda … operates,” he added. Calls were so frequent were so frequent that the phone, rented from 1-2-1, was dubbed the “Jihad phone”.

But, like all the other European phones and lines mentioned in the New York trial, the “Jihad phone” didn’t use encryption to prevent the communications from being intercepted by the police or security agencies. It couldn’t. Yet investigators and surveillance centres apparently knew nothing of what was going on at the time, and were unable to piece together the links being run by the terror group.

Tags: article, encryption, heise, jihad, phone, telepolis, terror, trail, trial, window

A Las Vegas sleaze-merchant reckons that a “shadowy cabal of criminals, corrupt insiders and professional hackers” selectively re-routes phone calls in order to “steal” customers.

Tags: cabal, order, phone