asd

Sorry for the lack of posting the past few days. I have been busy working on a new Wordpress theme for my blog. I was tired of the same old themes with different colors and themes that just didn’t feel right for my blog. There was one that I did like, Revolution theme, so I’m using it for inpiration of my own theme. You can view a screenshot of my theme below. Hope you like, once I get it finished I will make it available to the public. Right now, I’m just trying to get each aspect of wordpress working with it, and getting the design hammered out. So check back soon for more updates. Right now the name is, Dark Intentions, if you would like to offer an opinion of a better name I’m open to suggestions.

On Friday June, 20th 2008 the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) said that copyright holders should have the right to sue in amounts as high as $150,000 without proving any infringement. This comes because the MPAA and RIAA say that it is too difficult if not impossible in some cases to prove that actual infringement was committed.

The RIAA has lost many cases and  rarely goes to trial because of this fact. The once case that the RIAA went to trial on was the Thomas case, a mother of 2 who was sued for sharing 24 songs on the Kazaa network. Mrs. Thomas was sued for over $200,000 but the RIAA could not prove that anyone had actually downloaded her songs. The only leg they had to stand on was that Mrs. Thomas had an open share folder.

Read More

Software piracy is a huge problem all over the world. It’s not just a problem on the Internet but also in the real world. Piracy stretches from people like you and me but also to the corporate level. During this article we will take a look at where piracy started and where it is today, why it is such a problem, and why software, film and music companies can not stop it. This article is not intended to promote software, film or music piracy but to open the eyes of everyone to what a huge problem this is.

Brief History of Piracy

You could probably trace forms of piracy way back but we will start with bootleg music. Back in the days before the Internet and Cd’s etc. People made bootlegs which mainly came from compilations of unreleased material or live recordings which were sold. Once the VCR was invented it was like the movie industries worst nightmare, now people could copy and trade/sell copyrighted movies. This was a problem but not as big of a problem as it is now. Once computers became affordable for most homes the BBS (Bulletin Board System) was the home of most software pirates. Users traded software on many floppy disks and such. Once the the CD-burner and the Internet came about things really started to take off because a piece of software that before took up many floppy disks could be fit onto one CD disk along with other software. This is when software piracy really became wide spread.

Read the rest of this entry »

I wrote a post a few weeks ago about how to find a good web host. I found a site, Web Hosting Tutorials that takes my post a little more in depth with articles and tutorials. You can find explanations of services and features that are offered and guides on how to use them. They also offer advice and tips on features and services of web hosting companies. This is a great resource for beginning webmasters that don’t know what to look for, or anyone who is in search of a web host that needs some guidance on the services offered. Also if you take a look at their main site they rate some of the best web host on the web. Note: The main site is still under construction and soon will offer a much broader selection of hosts and a better rating system.

I was trying to figure out an easy way to to convert mp3’s to wav’s the other day on my Ubuntu install and I would like to share what I done. First off I have to give credit to Thund3rstruck on the Ubuntu Forums for creating the script.

Step 1:

Open up your favorite text editor and put the following in the file and name is mp32wav.sh

#!/bin/bash
#Script: mp32wav script (requires mpg123 package)
#Purpose: Loops through a path and convert all the mp3s to wavs
#
#usage: mp32wav [Path]

count=0

Convert(){
mpg123 -b 10000 -s “$x” | sox -t raw -r 44100 -s -w -c2 - “`sed s/mp3/wav/ sedEdit`”
}

syntax_error(){
clear
echo “Mp32Wav - Convert Mp3 Files To Wav Files”
echo “script syntax: mp32Wav <path>”
echo “”
exit 0
}

if [ -n "$1" ]; then
   cd “$1″
   for x in *.mp3
	do
	let “count += 1″
          echo “$x” > sedEdit
	  Convert
	done
else
	syntax_error
fi
echo “$count mp3s found and converted to wavs… [Baileysoft 2005]”
rm sedEdit
exit 0

Step 2:

sudo apt-get install mpg123
sudo apt-get install libsox-fmt-all
sudo apt-get install sox
chmod +x mp32wav.sh
sudo cp mp32wav.sh /usr/bin/mp32wav

Using the Script:

mp32wav <path>

I installed the new version of Ubuntu the other day and have been playing around with it, mostly why I haven’t posted to my blog in a while. I have been using linux since about 1999 off and on, I have to say, things are getting much better in the linux community. There are still some hardware issues but usually all of them can be addressed by changing some config files. I still don’t think I’m quite ready to make a permanent change to linux from Windows yet. Mostly due to gaming and the wife would hate it, lol. All in all I’m fairly happy with my Ubuntu install currently, just needs some tweaking to make it my own. I will post some screenshots soon and a more detailed review with my thoughts.

Ok, I have been thinking about doing this for a long time now and finally I think I have decided to pursue this. I have been wanting to design and code my own PHP Forum and Blogging software. The reason for this post is because I would like to put together a team of experienced people who just love to mess around with PHP and other forms of programming to help build these apps. I know it won’t be easy but I would like to give it a shot. If you think you might be interested in helping out shoot me an email using the contact form on my site. I look forward to hearing from you.

Here is a list of computer and technology films that you may or may not have seen or heard of. Some of the movies on this list are a bit dated but still very interesting films. Please note that these are not listed in any kind of order like a top ten list. If you know of a movie that should be on this list then please leave a comment and I will add it. Thanks.

1. Revolution OS
2. Takedown
3. Anti-Trust
4. Pirates of Silicon Valley
5. Swordfish
6. Sneakers
7. Tron
8. Wargames
9. The Net
10. The Conversation

This is a list of the most commonly pirated software according to the most recent report from The Software & Information Industry Association or SIIA.

1. Symantec Norton Anti-Virus
2. Adobe Acrobat
3. Symantec PC Anywhere
4. Adobe PhotoShop
5. Autodesk AutoCAD
6. Adobe DreamWeaver
7. Roxio Easy CD/DVD Creator
8. Roxio Toast Titanium
9. Ipswitch WS_FTP
10. Nero Ultra Edition

Honestly I thought that Photoshop would be number one and Nero not far under that. I also didn’t expect Norton to be number one since most people I know use the free version of AVG and also because of the subscription required for Norton. Maybe someone found a way around that.

Check back soon for my post on why Piracy will always be a problem and ways big software companies try to prevent it. Later…

I was playing around on Alexa earlier and was looking at the top sites and stuff. I noticed some odd things while checking this out. Take a look at the two lists below and see what you think. Leave a comment and let us know if you see some problems with this list as I do.

Ok here is the Top 10 computer related websites as of this writing:

1. Yahoo
2. Windows Live
3. GMail
4. Yahoo Mail
5. FaceBook
6. MSN
7. Wikipedia
8. MySpace
9. Hi5
10. RapidShare

Here are the top 10 sites in the United States:

1. Google
2. Yahoo
3. MySpace
4. YouTube
5. FaceBook
6. Windows Live
7. Wikipedia
8. MSN
9. EBay
10. AOL