In the name of the environment and saving mankind, mankind negates what makes it special: democracy and free will

At what point did the energy efficiency movement abandon the principles of a democratic republic that power flows from the people to government and not the other way around, and that government exists for mutual needs in concert with individual rights?

Taxes are now accepted as a way of *forcing* other people to do what we want now? Not by me.

It is the job of the technologists to come up with solutions to problems, the job of businessmen to find what will sell, the job of social-public writers to convince people of free will to make changes, but it is not the job of any one group of people to get the government to impose its police powers on the people to force them into compliance with a given set of ideas.

Even less so when those ideas are on the level of faith and beyond discussion or argument which much of the energy efficiency sector's behavior demonstrates and has since the sixties. It comes down to: "Earth will die if people don't do as we say, don't argue, do what we say."

This flies in the face of rational scientific exploration never mind democracy. History has many times heard the argument that doing/not doing X will result in Y hence our solution Z must be implemented or catastrophe will result. None of them ever ends well.

To demonstrate the ramifications of this insistance on abuse of governance to force specific economic and political beliefs, what do you think would happen when the tax suddenly nuclear skyrockets the cost of doing business for cable, satellite, phone, electrical, and other utilities' field services?

Will a simple five minute truck roll costing $200 be worth it to you? Put *your* money where *your* mouth is. If you truly believe a milage tax is okay, start adding a little extra to your utility bills today. Do it at the store too because everything came by truck. And tip everyone you do anything with because they'll be paying more.

I have faith in science and human tendency to come through in the end. I will not be cowed by nonsense pop-environmentalism and fear of catastrophe into giving up on that. We heard dire warnings in the 70s that were supposed to have finished us off by the 90s. I call bs on this and am confident that mankind will overcome.

I think it sets a new standard in irony that arrogant anthrocentrism is leading towards saving humanity by annhilating democracy and free will without which humans are no different than an internal combustion engine.

Fedora Core 5 Verdict

Not that anyone was asking for this, but I feel obligated to say it. With a little over two months of work with it, I have to give Fedora Core 5 an A+++. Excellent repos, much improved stability on KDE, and automatic installation slickness that rocks.

Right now, I have FC5 on a P4 2GHz box w/768MB RAM, and 2x250GB drives as software RAID 0, w/Ext3 on LVM. Samba took only the usual minor configuration to make work as an NT4 PDC for a Windows LAN. I now have what looks like a very stable household file server that kicks some serious ass.

My hat is off to the Red Hat and Fedora Core people on a job well done.

I would only like to request that FC6 contain an option on install to use an encrypting file system with LVM and software RAID to increase security as well as some sort of Gnome/KDE gui goodness to make Samba sit up and bark without tedious smb.conf editing.

Ghost in the Shell thermoptics getting closer

One can hardly wait to go out in one of these for a game of touch football.

I must be taking crazy pills

I must be taking crazy pills
As the gas prices in the USA continue to rise, the political hot air does too. More deadly than a methane clathrate release, this hot air seems to be headed for doing what the sun cannot, and that is slowly baking us to death. Ideal time to be a Montgolfier if you can get close enough to collect some.

I listened to NP(Z)R and their All (NO) Things (Logic) Considered. I watched the nightly network news. I listened to the radio. I read the newspaper. I threw up in my mouth.

IS ANYFUCKINGONE ACTUALLY THINKING LOGICALLY AND CLEARLY AT ALL??? I feel like Mugatu in Zoolander being the only one noticing that every one of Derek Zoolander’s looks is the same one look.

1. Oil Prices
   We’re not out of oil, we’re not running low, and we’re not running into problems getting to it and recovering it. We’re watching yet another market manipulation by OPEC and non-OPEC oil producing nations no different than the so-called energy crisis (that never was) of the 70s when we had even-odd license plate number rationing.If you believe the news, the shortage is being purposely caused by “Big Oil”, which in all cases is defined as strictly American oil companies.


2. Additives
   We’re requiring additives, neither of which are in proper supply, and given the long term supply picture and well known seasonal variations, the suppliers don’t have much of a choice on pricing.We could stop requiring the additives and eliminate a big chunk of the problem and you would think a looming economic disaster as a result of this collective unfunded mandate-a-thon on the people would spur someone to consider it. Well, you’d think that if you were maybe something other than a human from this point in history. The present inhabitants don’t notice this simplicity.


3. EPA Regulations
   Thanks to a congress that has for decades ignored the Constitution and simply delegated their authority away to various executive branch agencies which should not be a problem in the first place since those delegations are to enforce and dream up new regulations which neither branch should be doing under the theory of “government being the lesser competent of the two, the other being the people, they should do as little as possible”, we have an environmentally unhealthy obsession with fact and science free environmentalism where we make up regulations based on politics and not on science and logic. This didn’t work for Mao with the Chinese agricultural system and it won’t work for us.
   
   We have allowed the EPA and the various state environmental agencies to make a simple cost benefit analysis on the subject of renovation of oil refineries to modern EPA standards something so simple, your dog could do it. I’ll spoil it so don’t wait for the cable version: it’s pure profit due to ever increasing demand and obviously decreasing supply to close them down and pure loss to comply.


4. Consumption
   Unless you’re working out of your home, chances are you have to drive to work. I know of no business that wraps its schedule around some group of ninnies’ idiocy about the environment which is becoming yet again one of those lies that people always fall for like “it’s for the children”, “it’s to stop terrorism”, “the check’s in the mail”, and “I won’t come in your mouth”.
   
   Also, since we are becoming more affluent, we are more and more being able to afford to drive to work. If you live within walking distance of work, you either work out of the house or you have a really low end job for all places outside of downtown Manhattan and working in Manhattan can be its own punishment anyhow.
   
   We cannot simply stop driving to work, build ninety mile subway systems, knock down thousands of houses to put in new rail systems, infringe at will on others’ freedoms simply in the name of theories and social engineering.


5. TAXES
   Goodness knows we already pay too much money so the government can bribe us to vote them back in with our own money. In ancient days, robber barbarians noted that if they didn’t totally sack the agrarians, they could sack them just a little each year and then later on sack them a constant basis in return for not actually sacking them in the classic sense. You paid them to protect you from other robber bandits which they’d do anyways since you were their livestock, and if you didn’t they’d sack you themselves.
   
   Thus was born government and other protection rackets.
   
   One of their wonderful slow blood lettings is to hit us for money at the pumps every single time. Federal and state, there are taxes on the gas which serve only to make the situation worse.The government would have it that if it eliminated the taxes that it would be like a shoe horn and have done its job of expanding your wallet enough for that extra room freed up by the tax elimination to be taken up with increased oil company profits. The average consumer is apparently just stupid enough to believe this.

The best the politicians can do is to scream at each other and scream at American oil companies. They pose idiocy such as INCREASED taxes (SAY FUCKING WHAT?!) to force a change in consumption (as if you have a choice in driving to work or roller skating instead), INCREASING the ethanol/etc. blend requirements as if the supply problem that already exists at lower demand levels will magically eliminate itself and supply twice as much additives as they already cannot, TAXING the oil companies and thus giving a big FUCK YOU to countless Americans whose 401K plans invest in those companies, and giving you a $100 rebate check which at the current rate of increase will fill a single SUV in southern California in about one week from now.

Solutions are obvious. Eliminate as many taxes as possible on the gas in this country and give fair warning that taxes on the oil and gasoline companies will follow in retribution should they take up the slack by jacking up the price. Relax the regulations and declare an emergency and stop requiring additives that are in short supply and do everything possible to encourage increasing refinery capacity rather than discouraging it with insane environmental policies which make no sense because as a whole, they are dragging us to economic and social collapse and collapsed societies no longer care about the environment; they only care about survival and that means fuck the environment.

I keep hearing Princess Leia’s words in my ears about the tighter the grip and all. We seem to be locked into a crazy world of crazy people who are truly believing against all logic to the contrary that their actions will the opposite of what logic dictates. Counterproductivity. Inefficiency. Misdirection. Self-delusion. We’re drowning in a sea of idiocy and believing it’s holy water. If only it were gasoline.

What an Easter

What an Easter…
     So, was I the only gentile in a 2-1 Jewish home who got the double holiday?

     It began on Good Friday with my wife telling me about the weekend special dinner. I replied, “we’re not having naked horny guys with furry goat legs over for dinner.” She of course screamed, “that’s seder, s-e-d-e-r, NOT satyr!”

     Yeah, I knew, but it’s a yearly tradition. The only bitter herb I know was on WKRP and she threatened to throw a bottle of horseradish at me.

     So anyhow, we watched The Ten Commandments. Twice. Two different versions. I was aghast at the realistic portrayal of violence in the newer version, and at the future people of Israel being led around by the president of the National Rifle Association in the older one.

     My wife as is her skill waited until the last second to put up the roast, and then kicked it into maximum. Inside of two hours, it was about as tough as an old carpet and about as tasty. All oils had been removed and now encircled the meat in the cooker and the moisture boiled off like spit on an Arizona highway in July.

     Overcooked beef, beef drippings, water, crock pot and seasonings… beef soup.

     We couldn’t afford a lamb bone. Oh well. We couldn’t find candles until the second day of Hanukkah either. I think we got our Christmas tree up within a week of the day and bought Halloween handout candy on October 31.

     (insert rolling eyes emoticon here)

Odds n Ends

Odds n’ Ends
     Well, over this weekend a lot of things got done, and a lot of other things did not. Most importantly, the much needed cleaning and renovation did not. After the mortgage payment, there’s not much left over. Here’s hoping a family member moves back home with some money to kickstart things.

     What also did not get done was to find a good adoptive home for the five brand new kittens gracing our place. Well, sort of new. Old enough to eat like voracious… things that eat a lot. Beautiful gray tigers and one black kitten. Need to get to the vet to get some referrals to adoption centers she trusts. Don’t want them going to some asshole to use to train fighting dogs.

     What got done was my decision to move past shock, anger, and denial at the loss of data on an ext3 Linux partition holding my main Fedora Core 3 workstation’s data. I’ve used that box and abused that box for a year, but I made the spectacularly bad decision to remove an old unused Windows XP Home partition and move and resize the Linux partition using Partition Commander. Should have used Qtparted from a Knoppix boot CD instead. Managed to fuck things up so bad that between fdisk, parted, and fsck nothing could be done to retrieve it.

     This experience did teach me though that the majority of that partition was Linux stuff. Stuff that I installed as part of the full DVD install with everything including the onions, chilli, and the kitchen sink. I lost some PGP keys which I probably backed up to someplace or not. I lost some source code from dozen projects that I can resurrect from memory and improve on them when I do. I lost pr0n that I can download again anytime I want to get aMule up and running again.

     Now into acceptance phase, I decided to go back to experimenting. The FC3 boot disk will allow an FTP/HTTP install no problem. The FC5 disk not. WTF?! Hmmm… I shut down and swap out the cheap CNET Ethernet adapter with a 3Com which I have a case or two of on hand and suddenly the install goes right.

     I went out to do some shopping like buying a cheap USB2.0 external HD case to make use of a spare 40GB drive I had on hand which came with a used Dell into which instead went an 80GB drive from the previous Fedora box which had received a 250GB drive before it was rebuilt from Windows to Linux. When I got back, most of the network install was completed.

     Things like Really Slick Screensavers don’t want to install due to dependency Hell issues, but sooner or later I’ll manage. The new gnome-screensavers paradigm requires a .desktop file and a .xml file to go with each screensaver. Though I did find a nice way to make the skyrocket screensaver my desktop backround. I can get them on my box, just not where the screensaver preferences tchotchke will notice them, and yes, they’ve been copied to the right places and the .sh migration script run. Oh yeah, the new Gnome interface in FC5 doesn’t allow advanced manipulation of the settings for each screen saver. No advanced tab. Not as my normal login and not as root either.

     Oh well.

     I got the WinXPPro box to work, fileshare to work, and the USB external HD. Now I can shovel things about without problems.

     Meanwhile, the anti-stress pills prescribed for me after a stint at the hospital for chest pains are only making be drowsy and dizzy, not lowering my stress level. No, my heart is fine. Supposedly. Docs bombarded me with radiation and hooked up wires to my nipples, I felt so damn kinky. I was still pulling those sticky tabs off parts of me for two days.

     I should, if I can find the interest, start writing more.

VMWare Works

Well, after you spend two days fighting with Windows XP Pro to get that set up right to where you need and want it. Once that is out of the way, no problem.

So far I've gotten CentOS and Ubuntu to work and am going after Fedora Core 5. Windows tchotchke apps and Linux open source stuff all at once. I am in nerdvana...

Python code example for the heck of it...

Can anyone guess what this is?

def routerGet(ip):
     def snmpGet (ip, oidSpecific):
          from os import popen
          return popen("snmpget -v 1 -c public -O qv %s .1.3.6.1.2.1.%s" %(ip, oidSpecific)).read().strip('\n')
     
     def ipAdEntAddr(ip):
          from os import popen
          return popen("snmpwalk -v 1 -c public -O qv %s .1.3.6.1.2.1.4.20.1.1" % ip).read().splitlines()
     
     iAEA = ipAdEntAddr(ip)
     for walk in iAEA:
          if walk[:-1] <> '127.0.0.' and walk <> '0.0.0.0':
               ipAdEntIfIndex = snmpGet(ip, '4.20.1.2.'+walk)
               iAENM = '4.20.1.3.'+ walk
               iD = '2.2.1.2.' + ipAdEntIfIndex
               iT = '2.2.1.3.' + ipAdEntIfIndex
               iS = '2.2.1.5.' + ipAdEntIfIndex
               iIO = '2.2.1.10.' + ipAdEntIfIndex
               iOO = '2.2.1.16.' + ipAdEntIfIndex
               collect = map((lambda arg: apply(snmpGet, (ip, arg))), [iD, iT, iAENM, iS, iIO, iOO])
               ethlist = ['EN1', 'Eth', 'eth', 'ETH', 'ie0']
               wanlist = ['WAN', 'fra', '106', 'wan', 'ATM', 'FR-', '159']
               if collect[0][:3] in wanlist or collect[1][:3] in wanlist:
                    iftype="WAN"
                    if walk[:3] == "10.":
                         iftype="WAN Management:"
               elif collect[0][:3] in ethlist or collect[1][:3] in ethlist:
                    iftype="Ethernet"
               print iftype
               print "IP Address:", walk
               print "Subnet Mask:", collect[2]
               print "Interface Speed:", collect[3]
               print "Octets In:", collect[4]
               print "Octets Out:", collect[5], '\n'

It’s a script for extracting basic router network info from a router, namely SDSL/IDSL routers.

Slashdot post of mine, feeling frisky and ticked tonight

Simple solution(Score:3)
by suitepotato (863945) on Monday March 27, @07:24PM (#15007488)
Design a computer with tcp/ip, http, ftp, etc native onboard with a basic interface. It connects and downloads whatever OS you want and installs it without an OS already being onboard beyond the "super bios" skeleton OS there for doing the aforementioned primary OS download. That ends the chicken and egg argument as to having to have one OS already on there to download the OS you really want. No more "Windows tax", no more preloaded PCs unless you order them that way. Everything is bare.

DRM? Fine, put it on there so that OSes that require authenticity of initial downloaded files have it to check themselves on install. Those OSes that don't, can ignore it. No other shenanigans linking the thing to only those OSes (cough, Windows, cough) that rigidly adhere to the dogma that the PC user should be the b*tch of an **AA organization.

We could have done this years ago with a simple thing like QNX onboard and finished all this crap. No muss, no fuss, no tears. Simple, easy, even a Geico caveman could do it.

Need an architecture to allow the formatting? Fine, default to FAT16 and put the primary files needed there, boot to them, they extract and build and reboot and then connect out to whatever secure servers are needed to get the rest, and finish the customer partitions and formats. This is not hard to do people.

Why does this sort of obviousness keep missing people? MS can do f-all about bundling. I don't care. I actually like them to bundle. F knows I DON'T want to have to deal with a mini-VS to compile every frigging Windows app I want to add. I like it being done already. I like having things already bundled compiled on Linux and being able to add whatever later.

Want to open a can of worms? Which serious Linux user ain't been farked by the distro coming by default with code bases that are completely wrong for something we want to use? Like the wrong net-snmp version to use with yapsnmp? Okay, uninstall, remove, reinstall, rebuild, fail that thirteen times, write off certain other things, make do. I never have to deal with this on Windows. No such thing. I'm reasonably certain writing a wrapper to put SNMP functions in Python or any other language would be a lot easier on Windows than on Linux where the slightest change in files totally fouls everything up.

Okay, I've ranted enough. The quick and dirty and ultimately best solution is right in front of us. Make the average personal computer "smart" enough to be able to go get an OS of the user's choice whenever they need. The standards and frameworks are already on the shelf. We would rather not do it in favor of bashing Microsoft and wrapping our Linux using selves in victimhood. Whatever. Not my bag. I have a night of recompiling to get to.
--
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)

Forget Lords of Acid

Pussy is into Beastie Boys.

My cats were whining and meowing and I couldn't figure out why. They're fine, their bedding was washed recently, their food and water was full. Exasperated, I belted out, "whatcha watcha watch want? Watcha want? Tell me watcha watcha watcha want. Watcha want."

Who knew that cats like the Beastie Boys?

Is this a bad sign?

if (salary_sucks) {
goto = dice.com();

The above is the code seen in a dice.com banner, made with Flash no less. If they're actively hiring coders who use goto despite every training course and book on the subject actively discouraging it, what does that say?

Inactivity Unintentional

     I will be posting something soon, sooner or later, but probably sooner rather than later. I’ve been dealing with a great many things which are stretching my patience very thin and taking a toll on my usual ability to jump past shock, anger, and denial to acceptance between apathy and indifference.

     In the meantime, I strongly recommend www.kingdomofloathing.com to amuse and obsess.

     See you later.

     (Oops, almost forgot completely. This was done in Microsoft Word 2002 thanks to Google’s Word plug-in. I wonder why Google is the darling of the Slashdot geeks when they still haven’t ported Google Earth or this plug-in to any flavor of *nix? Hmmm… Methinks their double and triple standards are showing…)

Vanity, but it's my blog...

This was from a /. posting I felt like saving for posterity's sake.

From the FA:

"""
There are other, smaller options like TCC that is a complete C compiler, but it's too geared to 386+ and Linux to be a good playground. Other open-source C compilers tend to be variations of Small C that, while understandable, don't implement the entire language.
"""

I think that was the entire point. We don't implement the entirety of the English language every day here where I live or in British universities for that matter and we're quite understandable. It might be different if to survive parsing by the listener not to mention quality review by the head of your department, that you had to squeeze in words like obsequious, vituperation, or Charles Schultz' favorite antidisestablishmentarianism.

Except... in programming it is inevitably that the words aren't big and things may reduce to cryptic things like () and ++ which kills the understandability. So sad that something so easily read as Dartmouth standard BASIC should be tossed aside in favor of things that make you want to beat on an IBM Selectric at random to see if it produces a legal string of Perl code.

Actually, chances are that it would and would win the code obfuscation contests, and if submitted to congress mistaken for the EPA's next budget and probably result in ten dozen public deconstruction readings in the local colleges finally being pontificated on in the editorial pages of the New York Post before being sued by Creators Syndicate for infringing on the IP of Johnny Hart as shamelessly stealing the conveyance of comic strip swearing, with three dupe postings in the YRO section of Slashdot.

All because we insist on languages that must be implemented in their entirety to get anything done but are as non-understandable as an obsequious and vituperative antidisestablishmentarian.
--
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)

Post Morgage Depression

        I just picked up my check for what was left of the proceeds from my mortgage refinance and now that it is over and done, I feel so empty and hollow that it is almost frightening. Why? Well… after a two year build up to it, spending that whole time trying to arrange a new mortgage in the first place, for it to be over in the space of a couple of days seems anticlimactic.

        So now I am trying to figure out what to do. I mean, besides sniffing the check for $20,000. It’s as close as I will get to holding $20,000 of my money in my hand for a very long time. It essentially was not my money anymore even before I received it or the “buyer’s remorse” period finished. Beyond the liens whose debts were paid to clear them there are still enough outstanding debts to finish this money off.

        So easy come, easy go. Feels weird to hold $20,000 that will be gone tomorrow. Literally. All of it. Not a cent left over.

        *sigh*

Am I prescient or just playing the odds?

In this Slashdot post of mine...

Is it just irrational hatred of Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
by suitepotato (863945) on Wednesday July 27, @04:55PM (#13179959)

that drives this neverending fascination with fluff non-news about where Linux is being used or is it to cover up and draw attention away from poor Windows skills, or both?

I think both.

I may use Linux but that doesn't mean I care to hear about every single place, thing, entity, etc. that uses some iteration of Linux. Nor do I need to hear endless fawning over Steve Jobs and Apple and OSX as if it was going to bring spiritual salvation.

Fer crissakes people, it's just an operating system. It's not giving you longer life, making you smarter, conferring beauty and handsomeness on you, or sleeping with you (although I'm sure there's some geeks looking to cyberneticize a real doll with Linux and report on it here). I really think we need to get a grip here at Slashdot when it comes to Linux.

I bet if my mother started using Linux at work and my company stopped using BSD it would get rave reviews and seven hundred replies in a day and a half. Meanwhile, there's actual apps being written that do amazing things running ON various OSes and we're too busy short-stroking to see the forest for the trees.
--If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)

...I made the observation as to artificial women and geek desire for same. So of course it follows that this very article should pop up right after, referring to this BBC article.

I think this is frightening. Not because I'm prescient, because it really is just good knowledge of geeks and Murphy's Law (support techs all know his law). No, I'm frightened because this is a step back in the progress of geeks. Next thing you know, you can have your own anime girl fuck toy. How much farther behind can furry animatronic mates be for furries?

Meanwhile in the real world...

Kingdom of Loathing Power Up Trick

If you play Kingdom of Loathing, and you know of the money trick, you may not know of the power up trick which works very similarly.

For those who know neither, know this. On certain days, the legenday Ten-Leaf Clover is to be found in the old Hermit's possession. To get any of his items, as you should know from the beginner quest of the Toot Oriole, you need a worthless item from the sewer in the city and a hermit permit from the market in the city as well.

If you find a ten-leaf clover, trade for it and take it to the Cobb's Knob Treasury which is part of the full Cobb's Knob complex that opens to you when you reach level 5 and then visit the city council. Every time you visit the treasury with a ten-leaf clover, you automatically get a single Dense Meat Stack which sells for 1,000 meat.

Sell the dense meat stack and you get 1,000 meat with which to buy more Chewing-Gum-n-a-Strings from the market so you can adventure at the sewer for a chance at a worthless item. For every worthless item you get and mean to trade, you need one hermit permit. It's a one to one relationship for trading. Gather say ten of these pairs and you then trade them for ten-leaf clovers to then take to the treasury for dense meat stacks which would net you 10,000 meat.

Mind you, if you get other things, some can be useful. A ten-leaf clover and a Casino Permit brought to the Money Making Game at the Thatched Roof Casino on the Wrong Side of Town will get you a Rock. Make one Meat Paste for ten meat for each pairing you need to do and you can use the Seal-Clubbing Club and Seal Tooth from the sewer. First combine the rock and the tooth to get a Seal-Toothed Rock and then combine the seal-toothed rock with the seal clubbing club to get Bjorn's Hammer which is not a bad weapon at the lower levels.

Of course Spices from the sewer when cooked with Dry Noodles by sufficiently advanced Pastamancers who own a E-Z Cook Oven or a Chef-in-the-Box at their campsite get you Spicy Noodles.

But I digress.

Once you can pull the money making trick, you might wish to try the power up trick. If you've managed to get Spooky Grow Fertilizer and a Spooky Sapling, you use the fertilizer and the sapling will grow in the Distant Woods to open up the Hidden Temple.

The Hidden Temple is a slightly risky way of building stats. No monsters are found there, but instead you have various challenges which are engaged automatically every time you adventure in the temple. Most of the time you will have a very good chance of winning and gaining 10 or more points to a sub-stat contributing to Moxie, Mysticality, or Muscle. You could also lose a number of Hit Points or Mana Points temporarily (until you rest at the campsite).

If you adventure with a ten-leaf clover in your inventory however, you always get three challenges, one for each category of stat, and you always win. Each adventure costs you one ten-leaf clover. So far, I've found that you get about one full stat point for every three ten-leaf clover adventures you do at the temple. As you may notice, the higher your level the more you need of your primary stat point to reach the next level. Therefore, on ten-leaf clover days in the game, provided you aren't hurting for money, you might want to instead build up clovers to use at the temple to build yourself towards the next level quicker.

Note that it doesn't necessarily mean you will summarily kick all ass. You still stand a good chance of monsters at the Friar's Gate and Catacombs beating you down fiercely and easily. But it will help you carry more powerful weapons as you find them or buy them from your clan with saved karma.

One other note. If while adventuring in the Spooky Woods to get the fertilizer and sapling you manage to get a lot of Wooden Stakes and Bar Skins, combine them using meat paste to get a bar skin tent and simply use it which will put it at your campground. It adds more hit points and mana points when you rest than the Newbiesport Tent from the market. You can also combine Spooky Shrunken Heads with Spooky Sticks to get Spooky Staffs which when combined with Wooden Stakes will get you a Scarecrow for your campground. So don't let things go to waste that you get while adventuring to gain entry to do these tricks.

Good luck, fellow adventurer.

Fedora Core 3 and Logitech QuickCam Chat

I bought a couple of these as presents for my wife and myself. Windows drivers were no problem. Linux on the other hand...

Well, after a lot of searching, I found exactly what I needed. If you use Fedora Core 3 and maybe even 4, I don't at this moment so I do not know, you can follow these simplified instructions to get this particular webcam up and running under Linux. Read the README file that comes with the following driver for a list of compatible cameras.

First, you need to go to this site.

Second, you need to get this package.

Third, you need to open up a terminal window.

Fourth, you need to be logged in as root or just act like it so...

[suitepotato@fedbox2 ~]$ su -
Password:
[root@fedbox2 ~]#

Now you need to unzip the file. If you're in Gnome then File Roller should do the job nicely. Extract the entire folder spca5xx-20050701 and then...

[root@fedbox2 ~]# cd /home/suitepotato/spca5xx-20050701
[root@fedbox2 spca5xx-20050701]#

Now you need to build it and install it. Plug in the webcam and so...

[root@fedbox2 spca5xx-20050701]# make
(insert a lot of stuff from the machine here)
[root@fedbox2 spca5xx-20050701]# make install
(insert a lot more stuff from the machine here)
[root@fedbox2 spca5xx-20050701]# modprobe spca5xx
[root@fedbox2 spca5xx-20050701]# modprobe videodev

Fedora Core 3 took the Logitech QC Chat model camera fine with just this proceedure and Gnome video conferencing now shows my ugly mug to me. Sweet.

Now if only Yahoo would port their webcam viewing goodness to the Linux version of their instant messenger...

*sigh*

Google Ad Whore? No, just basic opportunism...

So I added Google Ads to my blog. Why not? They host it, they should make some money too. And if I make a little bit on the side, would that be so bad?

Are /. editors actually bots?

Sometimes, you have to wonder about things like this. It seems to be /. Dupe-A-Mania week. Either that, or the /. editors really are bots and we humans are, well, duped.

Whatever the answer, one more question comes to my mind. Does this make /. look stupid because the geeks in charge can't even write a simple Perl script to search for duplicate subject material in the text of their archives or does it merely add to the charm? I guess we'll have to work on a new overused catchphrase for this phenomenon to join the "in Soviet Russia", "I for one welcome our new (insert subject here) overlords" and "1, 2, ,3 ,4, 5. Profit" staples.

On we march towards Ghost in the Shell...

(One of the more lucid and insightful things I've managed to spit out even if it is simply IMHO and possibly at odds with yours, this was written in response to this article on Slashdot:
UK to lnstall Wireless Mics on London Streets

Posted by timothy on Sunday May 08, @05:47AM

from the no-sir-that's-not-at-all-disturbing-no-sir dept.

johnthorensen writes "Looks like parts of London may be seeing wireless microphones on the street sometime soon. At this point, they're looking to use them to monitor noise ordinance violations - if you call about a repeated disturbance, they'll mount one by your place to monitor noise levels for the next several days. The article also notes that they intend to locate them more permanently outside bars and nightclubs. The microphones apparently communicate via wireless Internet connection, although no real details are given as to the nature of said connection. Are London residents getting the boiled frog treatment?")

It seems like over time, we are getting more and more wound up in an us vs. them (whoever we or they actually are at the moment) battle every day. The biggest ongoing one is the one of the people at large vs. the government which is inextricably tied to the people at large by blood and friendship, neighborhood and planet.

Government is in all cases mob rule. Whether the mob is leashed by a king in a monarchy or stumbling like a mass of drunken sailors on shore leave in a democracy. Mobs don't think well. It's a testament to our perseverance and dedication to what's best in and for ourselves that the democratic republics we in the west live under work as well as they do. So I have to take that as a bright note of hope for the future.

Nevertheless, not thinking well, government fears o'ermuch as they once said, and overreacts. So we ratchet up the infringements as much as the courts will let them get away with and the people fight a subversive war both against the unnecessary intrusions of the government and their misbehaving brethren whom the government is overreacting about in the first place. It can get so bad we wonder if the cure isn't worth the disease and the law enforcement worse than the criminals.

That being said, we still make it work somehow so I am not worried about incrementalism taking us to the world of 1984. We're not given to simple jingoistic rhetoric and propaganda, being increasingly disaffected, estranged, and cynical by turns. And we the people at large are somewhat given to superstitious overreaction and propaganda amongst ourselves as well. Our governments are in the end reflection of our own natures. Given that we continuously put into power a succession of people that cold logic and experience tells us flatly will be not the best and brightest, we easily override our intellect and vote with our emotions, largely those based on the idea of "what have you done for me lately?".

And so it goes...

I would just add that acoustic scramblers have been used for point to point phone communications for years by businesses and governments long before the digital age. So will we fear so much as to fit such things into face-masks and be only intelligible to those with proper headsets we choose to give the codes to? I wonder how the governments we put in power will overreact to our overreaction...