Voder-Vocoder

What it looks like: Insane Tom Cruise chose to marry innocent Katie Holmes as part of a cynical publicity stunt.

What we hope it is: Skeptical mastermind Katie Holmes is plotting a cold-blooded, single-handed takedown-from-within of the Church of Scientology.

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What does grokster mean for free software? How can this be related?

Remember that Grokster is a for-profit company that distributes a proprietary P2P application. Since the software only comes from the company, it can be destroyed by destroying the company (id est through legal action against the company).

Contrast this with a F/OSS program like bittorrent, which is based on an open protocol. Since the protocol is open, there are many implementations, so each developer would need to hunted down individually by the MPAA/RIAA. Grokster must operate legally in the united states if they are to collect money from americans. As long as servers exist outside of the US, illegal software can still be developed. Exempli gratia LAME versus Fraunhofer.

Could pirates continue to use proprietary software? Yes, but KAZAA has taught us not to trust proprietary software. People trusted grokster because a company stood behind their product and guaranteed that they would not bundle spyware.

The only reason that we trust Microsoft Office not to contain spyware is that MSFT has so much to lose if they were found out.

Funny. I used to post on /. all the time. I just posted my first random comment in over a year and it got (Score:5, Funny). I’ve never gotten modded up before.

Comedy comes from keeping your mouth shut until something really really funny occurs to you.

I’m pretty happy with my current recipe for Miso soup.

Serves 1.

• 0.5 tsp Dashi (I’ve got Hon-dashi, which is a bonito broth.)
• 2 Green Onions
• 1 tsp Miso Paste (I have Yamabuki Tezukuri Miso.)

Put a bowlful of water into a small pot. Heat to boiling. Cut the green onions up and throw them in. If you let them cook for a little while I think they add more flavor. Throw the dashi in as soon as it begins to boil. Add the miso next and turn off the heat. Stir. As soon as the miso is disolved, serve. Overcooking the miso or dashi will destroy those flavors.

Ever notice how our lifestyle in the 21st century is pretty much last century’s science fiction, except for the stuff about transport? Thermodynamics is like, hard.

Anyway, even if anti-gravity was discovered tomorrow, most of the world would probably still run on fossil fuels for the next fifty years.

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WARNING: boring linux-related post follows!

Here’s how to quickly fix the genres of your mp3 colection.

Get the list of genres

$ lame --genre-list | sort -n | column

Pick one. In general, the lower the number, the more standard it is. Suppose we pick genre #17 (rock).

id3tag --genre=17 filelist

For anyone interested in technology.

The last week…

Last Friday I want to see some really horrible bands, folowed by a good band. There may or may not have been a ninja attack.

Saturday I worked and avoided the universe.

Sunday I vegged.

Monday was Memorial day. I went on a 15 mile bike ride, meeting up with J and with S and H for parts of it. I was in pain by the end of it. My butt was sore for a couple of days.

I avoided the uiverse for the next few days. I did manage to visit with friends Wednesday, though.

This week has not been a highly profitable one in the world of pizza delivery. Something about the first of the month attracts those people who are least likely to tip the driver at all.

Tonight we were over-staffed and I went home early. I was productive and cleaned a lot of my apartment.

Plans for tommorrow (today): Up early, clean, bicycle downtown for brunch, stopping at the post office and at the bank on my way. Stop by the Uni library for some rare Doc Smith books. Bike home. Go to B+N’s if time permits. Go to work. Overcaffinate myself. Stay up all night. Work on some schoolwork sunday.

I finally bought a DVD+-R/RW drive. It even does dual-layer burning.

See! I’ll save money inthe long run! 278 GiB or 64 DVD-Rs in the future.

Additional research shows that I paid too much for that DVD-R spindel at the store.
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