Microsoft Could have been Heroes

Re-reading that article on music downloading and DRM, Microsoft could have been deemed heroes of the industry had they not insisted that DRM becomes part of their operating system.

DRM = Digital Rights Management, the electronic system of tagging digital data (graphics, music, movies) so they only work on the original purchaser's equipment.

Had MS rebuked the RIAA and all the other musical cronies, they could not only have still made Vista the operating system of choice, but won over a lot of people as they would have sided with the users not the recording industry.

evilref

Oct. 31st, 2007 05:07 pm (UTC)

Vista is going to be the operating system of choice. Have you tried buying a new computer without it? Have you tried to use the latest version of the business software your customers and suppliers use without the latest hardware?

Don't forget that alongside the battle to protect the copyright of recorded works, there is a similar battle to protect the copyright of software. Micro$oft probably think that if users are prevented from using illegal copies of their products, their profits will vastly increase.

They may even be right, and since the users they want to target are the business users, stronger laws are probably enough to brow-beat those business users into paying up.

Once Micro$oft were behind things like DMCA, their side was chosen.

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Evolution of Spam and Scam

Evolution of Spam and ScamSurely everyone knows by now the Nigerian Scam emails, so why the hell are they still sending them? You must surely be keenly aware that most of the people sending out these emails are simply running their operation out of a internet cafe. You must have seen or be aware that there are Nigerian Scam-Bater websites (people who actually attempt to expose these scam artists by pretending to play along with their game) which show you clearly the people behind these scams are Black, mostly Nigerian, mostly living in Nigeria. My question should be, why havent these people not realised how useless their efforts are now?

Spam hasnt really evolved that much, ever since that first email that landed in your inbox promising untold wealth in exchange for a simple collusion. Send them your bank details, and the money is yours, allegedly.

Now, winning lottery tickets with my email attached to them, arrive in my inbox along with the numbers that were supposedly on the ticket. The numbers are irrelevant so much so that the sender of the spam even duplicated the winning ball numbers, how stupid is that. You only need to read the email carefully to know something fishy is going on.

1. the email address has a .hk or Hong Kong suffix - a little strange for a European lottery dont you think?
2. there is a telephone number which is British, but is a mobile number - a little strange for a professional business to rely on mobile numbers for their trading.
3. just because it looks like a UK mobile number, doesnt mean the person you are ringing is in the UK.
4. the above forementioned duplicate draw numbers in the email - surely an administration error, as you cannot choose the same number TWICE.

Emails were being picked up by spam filters using words that were considered Spam, so then they went one better and deliberately mispelt words, then sent emails with gif images attached and now with PDF attachments begging me to buy stocks in dead companies.

The truth to why they keep sending these messages is that for every million spam emails sent out, one idiot, one person of low intellect, someone who has never been online before gets a sexy email inviting them to collect their winnings will be taken in.

 

I watched my Grand Mother for years believe she was going to win a huge Readers Digest prize. She eventually died before she got to the higher levels.

You sometimes come across a news item or story where some idiot is suckered into trying their damnest to get what is rightfully theirs, some have even been lured to Nigeria to claim the money and ended up dead. But if the money doesnt exist, then they are twice the fool into thinking it does. Why should they randomly choose you to share the money with? Why is it that the appearance of an email in your SPAM inbox is all the sufficient evidence you need to secure these vast millions?