EFF Open Letter to SunnComm (aka The Clowns That Created the Sony Rootkit)
President and Chief Executive Officer
MediaMax Technologies, Inc.
Mr. Clement:
As you know, we have already discovered one security concern arising from the MediaMax software, resulting in the patch issued on Tuesday and the revised patch issued yesterday.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) remains concerned that additional security flaws will be discovered in MediaMax software, in both version 5 and version 3. EFF isn't alone in this concern. Indeed, as Professor Ed Felten has noted, "Experience teaches that where there is one bug, there are probably others. That’s doubly true where the basic design of the product is risky. I’d be surprised if there aren’t more security bugs lurking in MediaMax." See http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=944.
While Sony BMG has taken some steps to address the security vulnerabilities in the MediaMax software, we are very concerned about consumers who purchase "MediaMax'd" CDs from labels other than Sony BMG, such as Cuban Link's "Chain Reaction" by Men of Business Records, Peter Cetera’s “You Just Gotta Love Christmas" by Viastar Records or MediaMax'd releases on KOCH Records. Many of these consumers have not been notified of this security issue, and indeed may be unaware that they even have a security vulnerability.
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Fly with Me: Podcast Recording of Cockpit Discussions of JetBlue Emergency Landing at LAX
Last week, a Jet Blue Air Bus made an emergency
landing at LAX after the pilot determined that
there was a problem with the front landing gear.
CNN covered the landing live. However, I think the
most interesting coverage is this podcast. Joe Deon is a pilot
"for a leading US carrier" and he brings a
recorder with him on his trips.
On the day of the emergency, he recorded the
conversation between the Jet Blue crew and folks on
the ground.
More Cool Google Map Mashups
Wow... so far this is the coolest thing I've seen
so far. Overlaying data on the maps. And in this
case, census and housing information. Type in a
street address, then see the 1, 3 and 5 mile radius
bands and the resulting data. Purty cool. Here is a link to the site to see
sensus data Google mapped.
Google Map Mashups
Google Maps are cool. And now
there are a lot of folks figuring out some cool
stuff to do with the Google Map APIs. Above, is a Google Map with an
overlay of where news events are taking place
around the world... the news events courtesy
of the BBC news feed.
Check out this "Google Map Mashups" blog to
see all the different kind of information and
map melding folks are putting together.
Picture of the Month: Coke in China Town
Last week, I was in San Francisco. While there, I
managed to snap a few photographs. This one, as
soon as I saw it, I knew I wanted it to be black
and white.
Bullseye! NASA Nails the Comet
According to NASA's site,
this image shows the initial ejecta that
resulted when NASA's Deep Impact probe collided
with comet Tempel 1 at 10:52 p.m. Pacific time,
July 3 (1:52 a.m. Eastern time, July 4) . It was
taken by the spacecraft's medium-resolution
camera 16 seconds after impact.
First Google Maps, Now Google Moon Maps (Sorta)
In honor of the first moon landing that took
place 36 years ago today, Google with a little help
from the folks at NASA, have maps showing the landing spots
for the six Apollo lunar landings. Oh, and
be sure and zoom in, some geek humor will be
found 
Picture of the Month: Worldwide Panorama - "Water"
For the third time, I have
contributed to the World Wide Panorama effort.
This project is coordinated by the Geo-Images Project at the
University of California, Berkeley. On the
equinox or solstice, photographers from around
the world are encouraged to take a panoramic
photograph and contribute it to this project.
Each project has a theme by which the
photographers are to interpret as they see fit,
and contribute accordingly. Click on the world
image above to go straight to the Water (the
current theme) website. When you get there, each
of of the "pin points" is actually the exact
location where each of the panoramic photographs
was taken. Purty cool.
To see my contribution, click "Read More..." below.
How to Shoot Fireworks with Your Digital Camera
For those of you in the US getting ready to watch
fireworks tonight, here is a great little article on
how to photograph the bombs bursting in air.
The article is easy to follow and not over-the-top
geeky. Instructions work for both point-and-shoot
digital cameras as well as digital SLRs.
Stop Motion Movie: Star Wars Episode 5.5: Revenge of the Rebel Snow Speeder
So how did we do it? Click through "Read More..." below...
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How to Pour a Guinness: Podcast Style
Where else can you learn the proper technique to pour a Guinness? How about in a London pub? I'm thinking a pub in Cork or Dublin might be better, but London is close enough
So wait no further... direct from Tod Maffin's How To Do Stuff podcast site, advice on Guinness perfection from experts, from a pub in London, England.
How To Pour A Guinness
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Nikon Encrypts White Balance Values
Clowns. That was my first thought when I heard about this early this week [DP Review article, Adobe Forums post by Photoshop creator Thomas Knoll]. Why do I think Nikon are a bunch of clowns? Basically, by encrypting the white balance data, they are limiting the ability for third parties to read the data and manipulate it. So what? Well, if you're a photographer and use Adobe's Raw Camera plugin for Photoshop, you're kinda outta luck.
Instead, it seems Nikon wants you to buy there Nikon Capture app. It silly stuff like this that makes me really happy I decided to be a "Canon guy" a long time ago.
Here is an excerpt from Mr Knoll's post in the Adobe forum:
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Photoshop Action: Canon D30/D60/20D/1D, Fuji S2, Nikon D70/D100 - Sigma 8mm Fisheye Light Fall-Off Correction
I just (finally) got around to updating this
Photoshop action. In addition to the Canon D30 and
D60, this action now supports the following
cameras:
Canon: D30, D60, 20D, 1D
Fuji: S2
Nikon: D70, D100
The old action used to also have some magic in it
for correcting chromatic abberation (color shift).
I had tried to correct for chromatic abberation in
the action for each camera, but didn't have that
much luck. At least to a point that I was able to
prodiuce consistent results. Therefore, I removed
that capability from the script.
What's Raw Anyway? Here is Some Earthbound Insight
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Ding, Dong the (Sony Rootkit) Witch is Dead
Consumers can mail their CDs to the company, and they would receive a new unprotected CD in return.
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JibJab: Second Term
In this latest short movie, the JibJabbers continue down their parody path with an entertaining look at George W and friends singin' about their next four years in Washington. And no JibJab production would be the complete, without a bunch of moping Democrats, world leaders, etc holding their heads in their hands.
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Sony's Stupidity Continues
Oh I wish I can up with that line, but I didn't. That's the best way to describe the beginning of a very bad new year for Sony. And the stupidity keeps getting worse. Now, according to Reuters, Sony has.... um... "liberated" some open source code in their DRM software without acknowledgement or attribution. Way to go Sony. How deep are you in your in your grave diggin' ?
(Source: Reuters via ZDNet News Did Sony 'rootkit' pluck from open source?) Read More...
Crash Scene: The Movie
Trucks, engines and an ambulance
arrive at the scene of the car accident.
Link: Watch Crash Scene: The Movie
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Sony BMG Has Gone Way Overboard on DRM
Molly Wood at CNET has done a great job of summarizing all of this stupidity.
I know that a class action lawsuit has already been issued in California. I heard on Buzz Out Loud that the country of Italy has already started their own class action lawsuite too.
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