☮☯♡⚮♡☯☮ ⚖ ☮☯♡⚮♡☯☮

Tonight's Playlist
  1. Venetian Snares - Mutant Cunt Sniffer
  2. Biosphere - The Things I tell You
  3. edIT - More Lazers
  4. Coldcut - Everything Is Under Control
  5. Kid 606 - She's=Defective
  6. Xanopticon -Constant
  7. Zazen Boys - Himitsu Girl's Top Secret
  8. Stendeck - Run Amok
  9. Goddess in the Morning - Flower Crown
  10. Kashiwa Daisuke - Requiem
  11. Ryoji Ikeda - Dissonanz
  12. Cycheouts Ghost - Kingdom of Dreams
  13. Gocoo - Celebration
  14. Middle 9 - Island Pull Out
  15. Worriedaboutsatan - You're in My Thoughts
  16. Dalek - Asylum
  17. Teeth of the Sea - Red Soil
  18. Royksopp - Eple
  19. Hauschka - No Sleep
  20. Tunturia - Silence Is Consent
  21. The Ascent of Everest - As the City Burned
☯☮ ⚖ ☮☯

Aaron Funk created Venetian Snares in 1997 and released six significant recordings between then and the turn of the millenium, four albums and two major singles. He produced music for multiple labels in quick succession in those early years, an EP with the company History of the Future, an album with label CLFST, but his self-released creations greatly outweighed that commercial work. In 2000 Funk inked a deal with Planet Mu, a label that has continued to unite the public with Venetian Snares albums throughout the years since then.

Although Venetian Snares comes out of Winnipeg, Manitoba, that has not hindered the success of the music or international recognition, and indeed VSnares has gained a respect and admiration from music lovers the world over. Funk's skill with the electronic medium spans a wide range of elements. It can be both audacious and introspective at the same time, hard hitting and thoughtful. The song included on this playlist comes from the album Invasion from xXx Dimension and provides a fine introduction to the edgier side of Funk's Venetian Snares.

---

The electronic ambient genre encompasses a wide array of styles and talent, a field so incredibly vast that more than a dozen sub-genres easily spring to mind. At times categorizing music can create limitations on listener interpretations and create false preconceptions. Such a thing is absolutely impossible when it comes to Biosphere's album Substrata. The music engulfs the audience and snatches words away, sending them back to the setting where they work the best, silence.

The depth and richness of this modern classic thickens to a point that almost feels like solidified emotions, like liquid sensations, but at the same time roils and bubbles away concerns. Ocean waves and oxygen floating up from the depths far out at sea fit well as a natural comparison to this digital experience. The ears that perceive it bob and sway upon the audio swells.

Geir Jenssen explores the peaks and depths of synaptic experience in this work, outdoing his past artistic incarnations in the process. Not every listener will feel blown away or consider Substrata to be a masterpiece, but none could possibly deny that Jennssen shaped and molded the music to the intense intricacies of his own spirit. Substrata was one of the best offerings to reach the public in 1997, and continues to feel ultra-relevant yet timeless to this day.

---

Edward Ma, member of The Glitch Mob, member of The Variations, created edIT back in 2003. Ma then introduced the world to that appellation in 2004 when he released Crying Over Pros for No Reason. The glitch style of regulated syncopation and arrythmic simultaneity captures the listener's attention and causes every regular beat to come across like treasure scattered just below the surface of the earth, waiting to thrill and enthrall those who bring them to light. The discovery of each new twist and turn in the maze of a single composition brings a sense of freshness and delight. At the same time hard hitting beats and masterfully looped melodies and riffs direct the speakers to grab the audience by the mind and squeeze until every fiber of their being is awake to the experience.

The startling vibrancy of edIT can not easily be forgotten or dismissed; it's difficult to understand why anyone would try. It's possible that some folk could be intimidated by a style of music they do not understand, or that they are frightened by the social and technological advances that made Edward Ma's music possible. Regardless of what detractors might think, and in addition to what fans and admirers feel abut the genre, this music is a sublime taste of pure creative genius.

---

Matt Black and Jonathan More banded together to form Coldcut way back in 1989, when the concept of a DAW was still in its infancy and creating electronica required hardware and instruments on a grand scale. Black brought his expertise in computer programming to the table, More creative intellect and a desire to enlighten the world, that drive so ever present among educators. For almost a quarter of a century the two men have entertained fans and newcomers alike with music heavily influenced by the underground scene, a scene they expanded and fed in turn.

While Londoners have known and enjoyed Coldcut for decades, the success of the duet has been limited in the United States. They played many international venues after the release of their fifth studio album album and have earned respect the world over. Unfortunately many average Americans may never have heard of them due to the restrictions placed on commercial radio by corporate entities such as Clearwater, in partnership with the profit mongering RIAA. It's a shame, because while the music of Coldcut may not be astounding in its influence and engenuity, it happens to be a pleasure.

---

Venezuelan born musician Miguel Trost De Pedro, raised on the West Coast and now a denizen of San Francisco, is Kid606. His tracks most often feature the frantic percussive measures common to happy hardcore in combination with sampled lyrics, the style common to post-industrial dance taken to a higher level. De Pedro's carefully crafted album Don't Sweat the Technics brought innovations to the electronic genre that could not be confined to the designation "trance," innovations that easily defined breakcore and the early stirrings of glitch. Kid606 drops music to work to, music to workout to, sound that makes your body move involuntarily and stirs the urge to dance. Or you could just pop it into the car stereo and drive a couple hundred miles an hour down the interstate. Kid606 is also on the Planet Mu label.

---

Ryan Friedrich, a thirty-two year old from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is more well known as Xanopticon. While Xanopticon's web site summons a lot of dark imagery and sets its sites on a Gothic feel, the music is not industrial nor post-industrial, but just good old glitch from another planet. It's quite an experience, but one thing it also isn't is dance music. Luckily the music speaks for itself, because the web site really fails to do it justice.

---

On the heels of Friedrich's work, Zazen Boys sounds ordinary and simple, but even transitioning out of a brutal glitch-tech nightmare the group's sound hold's together to punch holes in any notion that math rock is an American thing. Mukai Shutoku, the front man for the band, early on in his career demonstrated a talent for a raw, experimental creative approach. Combined with Hinata Hidekazu on bass and Yoshikane Sou on guitar Shutoko and Zazen Boys enjoyed a warm reception from critics, a love affair with smart rock connoisseurs that never really ended. Everything the group releases meets with critical acclaim, and its easy to understand why. It only takes one listen to appreciate their technical brilliance.

---

At this point I have to confess that I haven't heard the rest of the playlist. That's going to put a damper on the review process. To be entirely honest I have heard neither Himitsu Girl's Top Secret nor Xanopticon's Liminal Space in their entirety, in case anyone was wondering why the reviews are so short. In addition to that minor detail about actually listening to the albums I'd like to review, something in RL came up, and depending on how my schedule looks it may be a couple of days before anything here gets updated.

Doxic Journeymanalism

While others slept restlessly or soundly, or full or empty, what point, what dread, someone wrote:
◊ saw the other approaching, ghostly light cascading down extended tendrils. ◊ signaled back assent, a complex pattern of blue and green flickering through ◊'s own extents. The two worked with the spiraling air currents, transferring processing to their aft sections to take advantage of convection.

In time they grew closer, and each flashed indications of intent, identification, internal structure. ◊ spread its tendrils on the side of the other, and observed the other doing the same. Currents and light propulsion brought them together, thin, luminous tendrils intertwining, Thought-light flickered, brightening on the overlapping tenders as they aligned, closed, and, at last, *connected*.

◊'s thoughts spread, traversing familiar but alien paths. Its mind stretched, widened, split and combined, moving across the other's mind-net and returning different, better. The other's mind passed through ◊'s, ideas, memories, and plans colliding and merging where they crossed the same mind-path.

For a brief moment, there was no ◊ or the other, but something else, grand and new. And then the currents carried them apart, the connection broke, and they drifted apart, forever changed, carrying a small part of the other.

:-:-:-:
Internet hacking savants under the name 'Anonymous (Anon)' disabled multiple government and corporate websites including the Department of Justice, the FBI, Universal Music and more Thursday...
That's from The Lantern. Those websites were disabled by Low Orbit Ion Cannon, or High Orbit Ion Cannon, simple tools which can be used by anyone with enough knowledge to load a web page. Thousands of people took part in the Distributed Denial of Service attacks that actually knocked those websites offline. It takes no skill to participate in such activities. James Garcia obviously has no real grasp of his subject matter. Those tools are available in numerous locations, to anyone.

***

As requested, what follows is a list of email addresses for every Teachta Dála in Ireland's Parliament, beginning with long time representative Gerry Adams, as per alphabetical:
gerry.adams@oireachtas.ie, james.bannon@oireachtas.ie, sean.barrett@oireachtas.ie, ceann.comhairle@oireachtas.ie, tom.barry@oireachtas.ie, richard.boydbarrett@oireachtas.ie, pat.breen@oireachtas.ie, my.broughan@oireachtas.ie, john.browne@oireachtas.ie, richard.bruton@oireachtas.ie, joan.burton@oireachtas.ie, ray.butler@oireachtas.ie, jerry.buttimer@oireachtas.ie, catherine.byrne@oireachtas.ie, eric.byrne@oireachtas.ie, dara.calleary@oireachtas.ie, ciaran.cannon@oireachtas.ie, joe.carey@oireachtas.ie, paudie.coffey@oireachtas.ie, aine.collins@oireachtas.ie, joan.collins@oireachtas.ie, niall.collins@oireachtas.ie, michael.colreavy@oireachtas.ie, michael.conaghan@oireachtas.ie, sean.conlan@oireachtas.ie, paulj.connaughton@oireachtas.ie, ciara.conway@oireachtas.ie, noel.coonan@oireachtas.ie, marcella.corcorankennedy@oireachtas.ie, joe.costello@oireachtas.ie, simon.coveney@oireachtas.ie,
barry.cowen@oireachtas.ie, michael.creed@oireachtas.ie, lucinda.creighton@oireachtas.ie, sean.crowe@oireachtas.ie, clare.daly@oireachtas.ie, jim.daly@oireachtas.ie, john.deasy@oireachtas.ie, jimmy.deenihan@oireachtas.ie, pat.deering@oireachtas.ie, pearse.doherty@oireachtas.ie, regina.doherty@oireachtas.ie, stephen.donnelly@oireachtas.ie, paschal.donohoe@oireachtas.ie, timmy.dooley@oireachtas.ie, robert.dowds@oireachtas.ie, andrew.doyle@oireachtas.ie, bernard.durkan@oireachtas.ie, dessie.ellis@oireachtas.ie, damien.english@oireachtas.ie, alan.farrell@oireachtas.ie, frank.feighan@oireachtas.ie, anne.ferris@oireachtas.ie, martin.ferris@oireachtas.ie, frances.fitzgerald@oireachtas.ie, peterm.fitzpatrick@oireachtas.ie, charles.flanagan@oireachtas.ie, lukeming.flanagan@oireachtas.ie, terence.flanagan@oireachtas.ie, sean.fleming@oireachtas.ie, tom.fleming@oireachtas.ie, eamon.gilmore@oireachtas.ie, noel.grealish@oireachtas.ie, brendan.griffin@oireachtas.ie, john.halligan@oireachtas.ie, dominic.hannigan@oireachtas.ie,
noel.harrington@oireachtas.ie, simon.harris@oireachtas.ie, brian.hayes@oireachtas.ie, tom.hayes@oireachtas.ie, seamus.healy@oireachtas.ie, michael.healy-rae@oireachtas.ie, martin.heyden@oireachtas.ie, joe.higgins@oireachtas.ie, phil.hogan@oireachtas.ie, brendan.howlin@oireachtas.ie, heather.humphreys@oireachtas.ie, kevin.humphreys@oireachtas.ie, derek.keating@oireachtas.ie, olm.keaveney@oireachtas.ie, paul.kehoe@oireachtas.ie, bily.kelleher@oireachtas.ie, alan.kelly@oireachtas.ie, enda.kenny@oireachtas.ie, taoiseach@taoiseach.gov.ie, sean.kenny@oireachtas.ie, seamus.kirk@oireachtas.ie, michael.kitt@oireachtas.ie, sean.kyne@oireachtas.ie, anthony.lawlor@oireachtas.ie, michael.lowry@oireachtas.ie, ciaran.lynch@oireachtas.ie, kathleen.lynch@oireachtas.ie, john.lyons@oireachtas.ie, padraig.maclochlainn@oireachtas.ie, eamonn.maloney@oireachtas.ie, micheal.martin@oireachtas.ie, peter.mathews@oireachtas.ie, michael.mccarthy@oireachtas.ie, charlie.mcconalogue@oireachtas.ie, marylou.mcdonald@oireachtas.ie, shane.mcentee@oireachtas.ie, nicky.mcfadden@oireachtas.ie, dinny.mcginley@oireachtas.ie, finian.mcgrath@oireachtas.ie, mattie.mcgrath@oireachtas.ie, michael.mcgrath@oireachtas.ie, john.mcguinness@oireachtas.ie, joe.mchugh@oireachtas.ie, sandra.mclellan@oireachtas.ie, tony.mcloughlin@oireachtas.ie, michael.mcnamara@oireachtas.ie, olivia.mitchell@oireachtas.ie, mary.mitchelloconnor@oireachtas.ie, michael.moynihan@oireachtas.ie, michelle.mulherin@oireachtas.ie, catherine.murphy@oireachtas.ie, dara.murphy@oireachtas.ie, eoghan.murphy@oireachtas.ie, gerald.nash@oireachtas.ie, denis.naughten@oireachtas.ie, dan.neville@oireachtas.ie, derek.nolan@oireachtas.ie, michael.noonan@oireachtas.ie, patrick.nulty@oireachtas.ie, caoimhghin.ocaolain@oireachtas.ie, eamon.ocuiv@oireachtas.ie, sean.ofearghail@oireachtas.ie, aodhan.oriordain@oireachtas.ie, aengus.osnodaigh@oireachtas.ie, jonathan.obrien@oireachtas.ie, willie.odea@oireachtas.ie, kieran.odonnell@oireachtas.ie, patrick.odonovan@oireachtas.ie, fergus.odowd@oireachtas.ie, john.omahony@oireachtas.ie, joe.oreilly@oireachtas.ie, jan.osullivan@oireachtas.ie, maureen.osullivan@oireachtas.ie, willie.penrose@oireachtas.ie, john.perry@oireachtas.ie, ann.phelan@oireachtas.ie, johnpaul.phelan@oireachtas.ie, thomas.pringle@oireachtas.ie, ruairi.quinn@oireachtas.ie, pat.rabbitte@oireachtas.ie, james.reilly@oireachtas.ie, michael.ring@oireachtas.ie, shane.ross@oireachtas.ie, brendan.ryan@oireachtas.ie, alan.shatter@oireachtas.ie, sean.sherlock@oireachtas.ie, roisin.shorthall@oireachtas.ie, brendan.smith@oireachtas.ie, arthur.spring@oireachtas.ie, emmet.stagg@oireachtas.ie, brian.stanley@oireachtas.ie, david.stanton@oireachtas.ie, billy.timmis@oireachtas.ie, peadar.toibin@oireachtas.ie, robert.troy@oireachtas.ie, joanna.tuffy@oireachtas.ie, liam.twomey@oireachtas.ie, leo.varadkar@oireachtas.ie, jack.wall@oireachtas.ie, mick.wallace@oireachtas.ie, brian.walsh@oireachtas.ie, alex.white@oireachtas.ie

*Northern Ireland does not have any representation in the Oireachtas. This information was provided by CabinCr3w and #OpIreland. It would have been easier to just tell you that every TD uses @oireachtas.ie, but shortened names made a full list necessary (e.g. pat.rabbitte for Patrick Rabbitte). Good luck in your endeavors, and here's to hoping Ireland's parliamentarians have a higher opinion of their constituents than do some of our House members.
Old:
1/20/12
After the Blackout: LOIC


Anonymous is bombarding the DoJ, RIAA and Universal Music, and promises have been made that campaign raising abilities of SOPA supporting Democrats will be targeted in the near future. Anonymous has asked that opponents of SOPA not inclined to use LoIC follow #StopSOPA on Twitter and retweet all tweets. (see pic)


This comes on the heels of a unilateral takedown of Megaupload earlier.

Justice dot gov has been down for at least half an hour. Mike Masnick at TechDirt made a very good point earlier today: Democrats may think young people aren't paying attention to this issue, but they are WRONG. If they aren't careful they are going to alienate an entire generation of potential supporters with their asinine authoritarianism, an authoritarianism that is hugely invalid because of the very high level of ignorance among Congressmen concerning the technical aspects of these bills. [writer stops before rage causes temporary blindness again]

also: https://twitter.com/#!/anonops/status/160117673173323776

****

We won, for now, but only against SOPA/PIPA. OPEN is next and is very much alive. The fight is just beginning.

The following is another relic:

STOP PIPA (Senate 968) & SOPA (HR 3261)

Imagine a world without Wikipedia, Google, Craigslist, multi-channels [your favorite sites here]...

News Corp, RIAA, MPAA, Nike, Sony, Comcast, VISA & others want to make that world your reality.

80 Members of Congress are in their sway, 30 against, the rest undecided or undeclared.

Please take a minute to tell your Members of Congress you OPPOSE PIPA & SOPA

Debian_GNU/kFreeBSD

The time for action is now. The Symbols system needs jails(!) kFreeBSD has "jails." Stability demands ZFS(!) The Debian BSD kernel supports ZFS. The author craves both Linux and FreeBSD. Behold, such a thing exists(!) Not only that, but instances of lawsuits over patents and licenses become nil as the operating system leaves the Linux area and draws closer to the Berkeley Software Distribution model. There may be nothing to sue for at this end right now, but the future still exists when last I checked, a few seconds ago.

The sweetness deepens: Operating benchmarks for Debian kFreeBSD are phenomenally inviting. H264 video encoding is faster on AMD64 kFreeBSD than on any other kernel. Benchmark tests show the kernel chalks up almost a frame and a half per second more than in normal Debian 64 bit operations.

That's not as impressive as the 23% improvement in speed over straight Linux during 7zip compression. kFreeBSD wasn't the top performer in every test. It came in second on Gzip and LZMA compression, and in GnuPG encryption. All these tests were reported by Phoronix, and are slightly dated. It would be nice to see a bleeding edge redux of the study because this one was damned impressive and kernels generally improve over time.

There are other nice traits of kFreeBSD. Here's one: Further reading has shown that BSD-loyal developers tend to merge new features rather than create a distribution fork. Having to commit to development course deviations based on progress that could potentially move the system away from improvements in other areas has always been a troublesome aspect of Linux.

Further. A positive quality of FreeBSD which probably would not affect my systems anytime soon is the hardware support advantage FreeBSD has over Linux with a couple of companies. FreeBSD does include some proprietary binary in its hardware driver source code. Agreements have been made in the past to allow proprietary closed code into the FreeBSD kernel to enable a closer working relationship with some hardware manufacturers. That code has been excluded from the Debian_GNU/kFreeBSD release in order to keep it 100% compliant with FOSS standards, but the working relationship still exists. Some hardware may be functional under this kernel that may not be supported under Linux, or at least not supported as quickly. [It is irresponsible and disrespectful to say that Linux reverse engineering and driver hacking could ever entirely fail to support some form of hardware, considering how hard the developers work and the seemingly miraculous things they have pulled off in the past, hence the italics.]

I just had a conversation a few days ago about how much I missed Debian, brought on by the complications I encountered during the aborted migration to BSD. If I had known there was a Linux/BSD hybrid before this week I would have been running it already. There's only one other thing on the planet that gets me as excited as I am right now, and that's sex. An-tici ... pation!

Once Again BSD [Friday Night Update]

Friday Night PC-BSD Party Problems:

ZFS by itself will run with as little as 1 gb RAM, but performs optimally with 4 gb and upward. The way ZFS has been linked into PC-BSD makes 4 gb a requirement. 3.25 causes prefetch disable. Working around that problem hovers on the edge of the catastrophic. Booting into the system can only be accomplished by using BIOS to limit RAM to an OS install 256 mb setting, which isn't really enough to run KDE in PC-BSD. The system makes a valiant effort to work, so at least it dies gallantly as it chokes and collapses.

For me using ZFS was one of the selling points for making the switch to BSD. The idea of a file system that detects and self-corrects file integrity problems makes my mouth water. Having been through some insanely painful data loss debacles because of things like electrical current anomalies, learning about ZFS brought an actual tear to my eye. It sounds so beautiful, and, realistically, it is as wonderful as it sounds. Unfortunately my current system doesn't meet the criteria.

Anybody who does have the requirements should consider using ZFS. Keep in mind that I only decided on PC-BSD out of laziness. Partitioning into a ZFS format can be done with FreeBSD, with a certain amount of hassle. Webmasters and server guardians are migrating to it enthusiastically, heedless of the extra effort required to implement the file system using back door methods. I simply have not done so yet. And it's very simple to migrate during a new install of PC-BSD 9.

PC-BSD has a couple of other sweet points. The ease of file encryption is staggering to someone like me, who has gone through all the partition mounting and unmounting necessary to use file encryption with Linux. Encrypting user data is automated during install, and entering one's password at a prompt during boot completely takes care of enacting usability.

PC-BSD also sports a bubbling test tube background during login. Ahh, science. It may sound like I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel for positive characteristics of the operating system, but mad scientist lab nostalgia is its own brand of awesome. Yeah, though, unfortunately PC-BSD is about to get scrapped because without ZFS there aren't enough checks in the pros category for it to stay. Back to the drawing board!

One more thing should be mentioned. Booting into the system using the OS install RAM limiter caused the computer to sound like an airplane taking off. That's a huge red "x" in the cons column. It never sounded like it was going to explode before. It sounded bad, people, it sounded bad. That experience comes on the heels of reading this quote from a BSD developer: "Sometimes hardware damage is a good thing." Uh, no.

[I am not a computer expert, merely have a lot of experience and a good background. I am not absolutely sure as to the reason why PC-BSD exhibited such problems. I simply hazarded an educated guess.]

I-yie-yie kawaii - Image for tldr:


werds:

After a couple of days tinkering with FreeBSD's latest stable release I decided to chunk it and do an install from PC-BSD. That decision primarily resulted because using ZFS systemwide can be implemented in FreeBSD, but it's a pain in the ass to get it in place. PC-BSD 9.0 Isotope allows ZFS partitioning from the very beginning, as opposed to the default UFS. After much reading, passing up ZFS while switching to BSD seemed like buying a new Corvette body with an old engine. A lot of people hoped that FreeBSD 9.0 would enable ZFS at installation, but it didn't. In fact, it became more difficult to implement because the old method, using fixit, is no longer available.

Not only does PC-BSD support ZFS installation, it uses a graphical installation utility. Having brushed up on installing all packages and enabling a desktop manager from the command line, it became easy to remember just how time consuming the process really is. For me switching over to a new operating system means upwards of four installations, the tedium I would face became tangible. The brevity of the primary requisite command, pkg_add -r packagename, does not cover all of the other steps that are automated by a graphical installer. Bsdinstall made FreeBSD is definitely a lot simpler than the old sysinstall menu, but that's because it completely sidesteps package installation.

The downside to using PC-BSD is that the community is smaller, so any problems that might arise will have to be solved by a much smaller group of people. It's not that the support at pcbsd.ord lacks in any way, but fewer people means greater demands on those who are available. I personally hope to never need support, but in case anybody out there wants to try PC-BSD they should know what they are getting into.

The first step to installation is getting the medium. PC-BSD compact disc and DVD images are available here. Once you've downloaded the iso it needs to be burned to a blank disc. If you're using Windows that means you need Nero, or a program much like it. In Linux you'll need K3B or Brassero. Once it's burned you're ready to boot into install mode. Switching over to BSD means using a file system that's different from Windows and Linux, so any data you have on the target hard drive will be lost during formatting and partitioning.

It is highly recommended that you read up on installing and using BSD before jumping in. Not only does it use a different file system, but the organization is different. This operating system is extraordinarily stable and versatile for web servers and on machines used for data transmission and retrieval. You can still do everything on BSD that's done on Linux and Windows, it just takes a little tweaking. Conversely, BSD does things that would take a lot of work to do from Linux and Windows. BSD is well suited to the use of Nmap and remote shell operations. Another fine example is that virtual honeypots work best from BSD.

After I use PC-BSD for a couple of weeks I'll report back about it. It's based on FreeBSD to the extent that it's almost a clone. You'll hear anything out of the ordinary about it, positive or negative, and about ordinary excellence as well.

The original post follows. I figured it wouldn't hurt to illustrate the difference in my mindset between then and now. The cutesy, matter-of-fact sarcasm sort of makes me want to barf. "Too Easy!:"

Operating system switched from openSuSE 12.1 to FreeBSD 9.0. Essentially I was tired of having an operating system that no longer required any advanced open source system knowledge whatsoever, and by that I mean command line knowledge. I was not disappointed. FreeBSD immediately failed to install on first try, hung up on the ACPI driver, which evidently is sometimes shaky.

Slight headache began to form after disabling ACPI only to have install hang up again a mere two seconds farther down the line. Fixing the failure of the BIOS to assign an IRQ spot proved a lot more difficult. Backed up, regrouped. Still hadn't made it to the SysInstall screen. Turned off all but 256 mbs of RAM of 3 gb. Still failed. Turned ACPI back on, install kicked in, made it to first screen.

Installed hostname, minimal packages [doc, game, man, ports, src], boot daemons, configured IPv4, IPv6, DHCP, added user, added user to groups, set password, then exited base install to get to package installation. That was when having a CD instead of a DVD became a huge handicap. Everything has to be installed from the shell without the DVD. Wouldn't it have been funny if I had been installing to the only available computer in the house and the Internet wasn't available without it? No, it would not be funny, because that's what happened. It was not funny. It was not funny at all, but could have been so much worse.

Many long pages of hand written instructions tediously transcribed to make the installation process easy in the absence of Internet access became completely worthless due to the implementation of bsdinstall over sysinstall. Luckily I just had to switch wires to use Linux again. Detiled installation instructions can be found at Freebsd.org.

Back in the day every Linux distribution upgrade of my operating system required manually configuring KDM because of the fancy schmancy Nvidia graphics. In the case of FreeBSD, dbus and hald had to be added to rc.conf and started, and .xinitrc to start kde4 had to be added. Init 6 and startx enabled the graphical desktop environment people like me use. I would say "people like me" means those whose time is too valuable to waste on doing everything from the command line, but I'll be honest. I'm just lazy, so I like to use windows and widgets and buttons and a mouse.

Anyway, if you ever get bored with your operating system, install FreeBSD. If it doesn't install properly right away you're bound to get a minimum of 4 or 5 hours out of the experience. The installation could get nearly FUBAR, like mine did, in which case you could easily burn 6-7 hours on the install. Ask yourself, is using your computer too easy?

Depth of Winter 2: Nyet, Tovarische

Even as the joyful, uplifted smiles of the brainwashed Republican youth turn to confused grimaces and pouts of imminent political constipation, the old guard grit their teeth and prepare to bombard everything in the nation not approved by Fox News with hatred and venom. The Iowa caucus voting, decided by only eight votes, shows billions of dollars really can buy an election, almost. Just imagine if Rick Santorum hadn't had toilet paper stuck between his teeth, the product of wiping away two years of "discussion." The biggest tragedy of the Republican nomination process has got to be that Ron Paul managed to look very attractive as a candidate next to the rest of the field. Yep, Mitt Romney should just relax, everybody loves him; he's a shoe in. Demand to have Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal speak on behalf of the GOP and surviving candidates will likely ramp up. "Can we get Governor Jindal to speak? Nobody cares how he looks. Let him take the hit again. That's been working great so far"

*

Kurt Havelock completely dropped the ball during final exams for Batshit Insane Manifesto Distribution 101. Due to his failure to target specific individuals instead of just corporations alongside his threats to blow up every airplane that "looked at him wrong," charges against him have been dropped. Justice has been miscarried! Or has it...

This is a victory for the NDAA. The indefinite detention law will apply to someone. It's just a matter of time before Havelock releases the manifesto's second draft. Doing away with guaranteed protections of the law for United States citizens was a good idea after all. We can either have habeas corpus or we can have safety. That's the bottom line. Just ask NDAA supporters. Meanwhile, Havelock fans have a message for their guy: "Don't give up! We know you can prove you're dangerously crazy!"

*

Hana Beshara received a sentence of two years in prison for making pirated movies and television shows available for download. Evidently she never read any of those disclaimers from tracker sites that say "no content is hosted on our servers." Ninja Video's Queen Phara went the extra distance for users of her service and hosted everything. Authorities may have become suspicious because of the website's giant logo that read "Stolen Stuff Here."

Wait... oh no! Terms of her sentencing says she can't have any computers at her residence. Well, the choice is clear. Beshara can't stay at my place when she gets out; the computers are staying.


*
Warning: The following game has hentai sex scenes featuring handicapped, crippled people. Also, this post was so not fair. The game is brimming with sensitivity. If the players who keep falling in love with the characters are any measure, the game is overly sensitive. Biggest complaint heard so far: Can't play more than once, feels like cheating on the character from the first run through. That's why I say the game makes them basket cases.

Do you have no life? Katawa Shoujo! Do you have a life and want to get rid of it? Katawa Shoujo! Extra brain cells? Missing socks? Racing thoughts and voices in your head? Katawa Shoujo! Katawa Shoujo! Katawa Shoujo!

[Note: Author would not play the game for any amount of money, just gets a good laugh when people's lives are ruined. Don't tell anyone the game turns normal people into basket cases. It's a secret.]

A Saturday in 2012


Having a hard time working up the nerve to change header image. It's tough to just discard it. Spent like no time on this 5cm image, a minute or two getting it and getting it into png. That doesn't rep it well to head the site like the hours and hours spent on the current header image.

*

Take this, lawsuit happy association Internet goons: File sharing is now an official religion. It's currently only recognized in Sweden, but practitioners are everywhere. We don't want peyote, just to share knowledge. Can't wait until this gets to SCotUS so Bush appointees can empty the bile pouches in their throats against it. You have to sing hymns, you poor bastards. We sing Rush (well, at times). *__*

*

"We weren't really sure what viruses were, or how to cripple Norton and Symantec, but then we got this stolen source code." Source code for the corporations anti-virus software was stolen this week. Symantec was so all over security they found out someone got root when their code was released, not because they detected it. Thank goodness for them Sec exploits didn't happen without a release. "Credit cards or it didn't happen" did not apply in this case, but you Windows users who pay hefty fees for Norton should be sweating balls over this.

*

Anonymous: "This attention is relevant to my interests. Can be famous tiem nao?" Online hactivists look around and realize they have the world's attention. Suddenly the movement as they envisioned it is a huge success. Some just don't know what to do with themselves, don't see the massive amount of danger and work involved and ahead. Criminal genius (pfft) of the morning: jargon7.

Current leaks:

Organicemporium
http://www.organicemporium.co.za/
Leak: http://pastebay.com/265865

Hydrogen software
http://hydrogensoftware.com/
Leak: http://pastebay.com/265867

Live Out Doors
http://liveoutdoors.co.za
Leak: http://pastebay.com/265868

City Vibe
http://www.cityvibe.co.za/
Leak: http://pastebay.com/265869

Bucky Larson: Born To Be a Star

Christina Ricci brought some light to Nick Swardson's latest release, Bucky Larson: Born To Be a Star, on DVD. It could be argued she managed to make the movie almost tolerable for someone who wasn't drunk, stoned or twelve years old. Even though the movie may have been one of the worst ever made, and it would be difficult to imagine a normal person sitting through the entire movie of their own volition, it had saving graces, of which her role was one. There were other bright spots. Swardson is a genuinely funny guy. The viewer got to see Don Johnson in a truly horrible role, and being unable to hide what appeared to be feelings of extreme discomfort about it at times. Finally the American public can feel they got a little payback from Johnson for what he put audiences through in Nash Bridges. The movie would have been a lot worse if it had not been so bad.

There's a business bearing the name J Day in the middle of it. Thank God it was in Bucky Larson and not one of the gaggle of worthless horror movies that come out every year. Seeing that was no pleasure, however. Considering how much differently things may have gone down for a writer with those letters in his name had the publish button not been so easy to hit, that scene felt like a knife in the stomach. Thank God all of my plans for success aimed at posthumous recognition. Having a name similar to one on a marquee in Bucky Larson is so far my claim to fame.

To be very honest this movie may be funny as hell to some people. It's impossible for a person such as myself to know. I couldn't sit through the entire thing. Whereas little of what I write makes it to the public anymore, shamefully I don't even save most of it, I do a hell of a lot of it. I watched 45 minutes of the movie and went back to typing, because I knew I could get laughs out of that. Yet despite all that negativity, overall, seeing Ricci in a different kind of role made Bucky Larson worth the time I spent on it.

Chapter 17: In Need of Ewers, Truly

Relocated due to disturbing content. However, it was written with comedy in mind.

This version of Chapter Seventeen will likely never reach the completed work, just as the last one is also gone forever. It went too far in the ghastly direction. This title was chosen because I intend to wash my hands of it the way it now stands, just as most people I know will. It's too out of place with the rest of the content. Have a lot of very good ideas along this storyline, though, so there will be salvaging. [the work continues to pile up, book should be called Set's Back]

Security Blog List

These are higher quality links dealing with security: Linux, Unix, Windows. None of them are dead. A large number of them update regularly. Now you can know what I know about the subject. Almost feel the need to apologize about the length.
  1. http://blogs.adobe.com/psirt/
  2. http://anti-virus-rants.blogspot.com/
  3. http://asert.arbornetworks.com/
  4. http://blog.avast.com/
  5. http://www.blackbag.nl/
  6. http://www.bunniestudios.com/wordpress/
  7. http://cansecwest.com/
  8. http://carnal0wnage.attackresearch.com/
  9. http://www.cerias.purdue.edu/site/blog
  10. http://cerias.purdue.edu/site/blog/author/spaf
  11. http://blogs.cisco.com/security
  12. http://blog.clamav.net/
  13. http://blog.commandlinekungfu.com/
  14. http://computer.forensikblog.de/en/
  15. http://www.cryptogon.com/
  16. http://www.cryptome.org/
  17. http://www.cutawaysecurity.com/blog/
  18. http://cyb3rcrim3.blogspot.com/
  19. http://garwarner.blogspot.com/
  20. http://cyberspeak.libsyn.com/
  21. http://ddanchev.blogspot.com/
  22. http://darknet.org.uk/
  23. http://darkreading.com/
  24. http://www.thedarkvisitor.com/
  25. http://blog.didierstevens.com/
  26. http://digfor.blogspot.com/
  27. http://edsmiley.com/
  28. http://emergentchaos.com/
  29. http://blog.emsisoft.com/
  30. http://blog.eset.com/
  31. http://fasthorizon.blogspot.com/
  32. http://www.financialcryptography.com/
  33. http://blog.fireeye.com/research
  34. http://www.forensickb.com/
  35. http://fraudwar.blogspot.com/
  36. http://www.f-secure.com/weblog
  37. http://blog.oxff.net/
  38. http://gleeda.blogspot.com/
  39. http://googleonlinesecurity.blogspot.com/
  40. http://www.sophos.com/blogs/gc
  41. http://grandstreamdreams.blogspot.com/
  42. http://www.hackaday.com/
  43. http://ha.ckers.org/blog
  44. http://www.hexblog.com/
  45. http://holisticinfosec.blogspot.com/
  46. http://honeyblog.org/
  47. http://www.h-online.com/security/
  48. http://blogs.iss.net/
  49. http://invisiblethings.org/
  50. http://theinvisiblethings.blogspot.com/
  51. http://jeremiahgrossman.blogspot.com/
  52. http://krebsonsecurity.com/
  53. http://www.l0t3k.org/en/
  54. http://blog.layeredsec.com/
  55. http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/
  56. http://blog.trendmicro.com/
  57. http://www.malwaredomainlist.com/
  58. http://chargen.matasano.com/
  59. http://www.avertlabs.com/research/blog/
  60. http://blog.metasploit.com/
  61. http://blogs.technet.com/mmpc/default.aspx
  62. http://securityincite.com/blog/mike-rothman
  63. http://www.milw0rm.com/
  64. http://blog.mandiant.com/
  65. http://www.offensivecomputing.net/
  66. http://www.offensive-security.com/blog/
  67. http://www.openrce.org/articles/
  68. http://www.packetstormsecurity.org/
  69. http://philosecurity.org/
  70. http://praetorianprefect.com/
  71. http://www.prevx.com/blog.asp
  72. http://pseudo-flaw.net/log/
  73. http://www.rationalsurvivability.com/blog/
  74. http://rdist.root.org/
  75. http://blogs.sans.org/
  76. https://blogs.sans.org/computer-forensics/
  77. http://www.schneier.com/blog
  78. http://blog.zoller.lu/
  79. http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/
  80. http://www.secsocial.com/blog/
  81. http://secunia.com/advisories/
  82. http://www.securelist.com/en/weblog
  83. http://blogs.securiteam.com/
  84. http://blog.security4all.be/
  85. http://securosis.com/blog
  86. http://www.shmoocon.org/
  87. http://www.shmoo.com/news/
  88. http://blog.snort.org/
  89. http://blog.stopbadware.org/
  90. http://sunbeltblog.blogspot.com/
  91. http://www.symantec.com/business/security_response/weblog/
  92. http://taosecurity.blogspot.com/
  93. http://www.teamfurry.com/wordpress/
  94. http://blogs.technet.com/msrc/
  95. http://blog.threatexpert.com/
  96. http://threatpost.com/
  97. http://blog.tsa.gov/
  98. http://blog.uncommonsensesecurity.com/
  99. http://volatility.tumblr.com/
  100. http://securitylabs.websense.com/
  101. http://windowsir.blogspot.com/
  102. http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/
  103. http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/
  104. http://blog.zynamics.com/
  105. http://www.afcea.org/signal/signalscape/
  106. http://dhs-daily-report.blogspot.com/
  107. https://blog.torproject.org/
  108. http://www.securitywire.com/
  109. http://pauldotcom.com/
  110. http://www.exploit-db.com/
  111. http://www.networkworld.com/topics/security.html
  112. http://www.acunetix.com/blog/
  113. http://www.allspammedup.com/
  114. http://www.gfi.com/blog/
  115. http://www.infosecblog.org/
  116. http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/security
  117. http://www.theemailadmin.com/
  118. http://www.theregister.co.uk/security/
  119. http://seclists.org/
  120. http://www.afcea.org/signal/signalscape/
  121. http://www.woodmann.com/forum/blog.php
  122. http://www.nsa.gov/
  123. http://blogs.technet.com/b/sysinternals/
  124. http://www.securityweek.com/
  125. http://superantispyware.com/blog/
  126. http://www.securitytracker.com/
  127. http://spyblog.org.uk/
  128. http://www.net-security.org/
  129. http://news.cnet.com/security
  130. http://www.fas.org/blog/ssp/
  131. http://cryptocomb.org/
  132. http://anonymous.livelyblog.com/
  133. https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki
  134. http://www.security-ray.com/
  135. http://ticklethewire.com/
  136. http://vulnfactory.org/blog/
  137. https://psal.cs.drexel.edu/index.php/Main_Page
  138. http://www.pgpboard.com/
  139. https://yorkporc.wordpress.com/
  140. http://www.catonmat.net/
  141. http://www.heinz.cmu.edu/~acquisti/shb/participants.htm
  142. http://www.cyberciti.biz/
  143. http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/
  144. http://www.ledge.co.za/software/lpinotes/
  145. http://inciweb.org/
  146. https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/
  147. https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/topics/
  148. https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/
  149. https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/aix/library/
  150. http://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/934274-freeware-alternative-list/
  151. http://www.hackinglinuxexposed.com/articles/
  152. http://dankaminsky.com/
  153. http://blog.bodhizazen.net/
  154. http://askubuntu.com/
  155. Freedom Box: http://wiki.debian.org/freedombox
  156. http://blogs.pcmag.com/securitywatch/
  157. http://labs.m86security.com/
  158. http://www.irongeek.com/
  159. http://rijmenants.blogspot.com/
  160. http://blog.webroot.com/
  161. http://crypto.stanford.edu/
  162. https://ssd.eff.org/
  163. http://publicintelligence.net/
  164. http://www.wikileaks.org/
  165. http://www.itstactical.com/
  166. http://www.forensicswiki.org/
  167. http://p4r4n0id.com/


The list came from Cryptome. I had a great many of the sites bookmarked already, but can not take credit for compiling the entire thing. Would have mentioned this sooner, but find it bothersome linking to the same site repeatedly.

Year of the Poll Rat

Right now it's very early New Year's Day. Exalt in beauty for we still take in air, and until the sun comes rejoice in our old celebration, fleeting as youth. Once solar energy embraces the earth rejoice anew and with even greater vigor, for we who live can always count something in our lives as fortunate if our hearts are in the right place. Also, enjoy the holiday, for in the days ahead the gnarly little creatures who run campaigns, and their fatter, greedier counterparts who seek election, will be much in the news.

[Personal drivel moved to "Comments."]
 
Subscribe by Email. . . RSS. . .
Creative Commons License
Symbols of Decay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License..
Related written works at Angelfire, Sex Symbols, Cymbals of Silence.Repent or Die