As can be seen on this article on ain't it cool news, Lucas intends on altering several of the original movies by adding a few scenes (and presumably making more money off the new versions). So here is my guess as to the nature of the added scene in ep 6: During the ending celebrations, when Luke looks and sees the glowing Anakin, Obi Wan, and Yoda, he will see Anakin morph into the young (Hayden Christensen) Anakin, and then he'll be joined by a young Padme. They'll hold hands, Obi Wan & Yoda will appear younger as well, and then the closing credits will run.

A recently disclosed vulnerability for Windows IE has some serious/amusing (would that be seriously amusing?) consequences.

The vulnerability allows anyone to insert a few lines of HTML that launch any program on the viewing computer. Although this can only launch applications that are already present, the consequences are still very serious.

I must admit though, it's pretty funny when viewing a web page launches the windows calculator. For a demonstration of this, Read More... (currently for NT/2K/XP only)

The idea of Cable Address Translation is one of the stupidest ideas I've come across in a while.

The premise is that cable modem subscribers who use NAT are "stealing cable" because:

1. They're not paying the $4.95 fee for an additional IP Address. Not that they're actually using one...
2. NAT devices create "secret domains" that aren't visible to cable ISPs, and thus the ISPs can't detect the NAT "theft." This assumes that the ISPs have some right to snoop your PC and/or using NAT is actually theft.
3. Worse, if you hook up a 802.11b bridge to your home network, you can let others use your bandwidth for free. This is total BS. I'm buying bandwidth from the ISP, if I want to share it, I can. It's not my fault that they don't know how to provision bandwidth properly.

I can't even begin to express how idiotic all this is. The idea that providing bandwitdh is somehow the same as providing a cable TV subscription is ridiculous. And the idea of replacing NAT with something more friendly... well, all I have to say is, good luck.

At worst, using NAT is a violation of the terms-of-service agreement. If my cable company wants to cancel my account, fine. I'll just take my business elsewhere -- you don't hear this kind of crap from DSL providers.

I guess I take it personally when I'm called dishonest.

A while back, a reference to an FTP mp3/warez kiddies tutorial was posted to one of the security mailing lists I subscribe to. Although the author of the post was lamenting the fact that this information existed, I was really struck by the cleverness of the idea of the "FXP Protocol."

To understand FXP and why it was created, it helps to understand the underground FTP community.

Although the RIAA quickly backed down when people (ie anyone with half a brain) found out about their proposed amendment to the USA Act that would legalize hacking for copyright holders attempting to stop piracy -- presumably by cracking warez sites.

I see this as further evidence that the RIAA (and others) won't be satisfied with digital copyright law until they get a pay-per-play arrangement. Oh yeah, don't forget that the same groups are also working to extend copyright indefinitely, which is not the original intent of copyright law.

The full text of the amendment is posted below:

Some more old news...

As reported in the Register back in November, the latest memo to come out of Redmond outlines Microsoft's new sales strategy -- encourage customers moving away from traditional, expensive flavors of UNIX (Solaris, AIX, HP-UX) to Intel/Linux to switch to Windows instead, seemingly at any cost.

Although it appears that MS is wising up and acknowledging Linux (and other free UNIX flavors) as a viable competitor in the server space, they are again focusing on their larger customers. It is the smaller customers, those with only a few servers, that stand to benefit the most from cheap hardware and free software. And you can bet that the MS sales staff won't be cutting those folks a deal any time soon.

Now that Windows XP has been released, the end is upon us !! Armies of raw-sockets-enabled XP zombies will take down sites at will in massive DDoS attacks !!

Or, perhaps not. The attacks predicted by the self-appointed security expert Steve Gibson have yet to appear, and Steve's theories on raw sockets are as flawed as his idea for LeakTest. Here's a clue, Steve (and ZoneAlarm): If you allow any outbound traffic, you might as well allow all outbound traffic, blocking it is a losing battle.

In an even stranger story, Rob Rosenberger, the man behind the excellent Vmyths website, has spoofed Gibson's rant on XP. What's strange is the death threat he received after posting an article ridiculing Gibson's predictions. (wow) It's amazing to think that Gibson has groupies that devoted.

Rob's latest rant can be read at: http://www.vmyths.com/rant.cfm.

Today, technomagik.net was upgraded from PHP-Nuke 5.2 to version 5.3.1. Most of the changes are back-end fixes and updates to site administration. The only real differences users should see are that some sections (Downloads, Web Links) are now modules, not part of the base system.

The update process has also been streamlined somewhat, so future updates should happen sooner. I will also be catching up on news postings, since I've been busy for the past few weeks.

The official 5.3.1 announcement can be found here, and the source is also available for download.

The preliminary injunction against the distribution of DeCSS has been reversed by the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. The court's opinion is available online in both PDF and DOC formats. Analysis and commentary can be found here on Slashdot. I didn't see any other sources yet, but I would imagine more are forthcoming.

Slashdot had an interview with Wil Wheaton, where he talks about life, being a geek hated by geeks, and his new website. He must be a geek- who else would go on celebrity Weakest Link and choose the EFF as his charity?