No Mod Required

I don't even like Facebook all that much, for me it's basically just something else to check every day or two. But I have a few connections there I don't have anywhere else, so I'm not quite ready to blow away the account.

Which means I get to pay attention step-by-steps like this one:

Block Facebook Beacon

Here's hoping they don't change the URL.

Regardless, that BlockSite is a potentially useful add-on.

By the way, you have to wait until a site tries to phone home before you can opt out of the program? And you have to do it site by site?

Lame.

I really like Facebook less and less each day*

Privacy Settings for External Websites
Back to Privacy Overview without saving changes.
Show your friends what you like and what you're up to outside of Facebook. When you take actions on the sites listed below, you can choose to have those actions sent to your profile.

Please note that these settings only affect notifications on Facebook. You will still be notified on affiliate websites when they send stories to Facebook. You will be able to decline individual stories at that time.

No sites have tried sending stories to your profile

*and the breathless coverage Facebook gets from some corners doesn't help either.

but this post is teh funny:

Being Stupid And Litigious Is No Way To Go Through Life

The liberal use of the word "Douche" in the comments is especially welcome.

"Help I'm being ROBED"

Fuck the DMCA, fuck the RIAA, fuck the MPAA.

Fuck all that shit.

I'm linking to the boingboing post and not the EFF (of which I am a dues paying member) because of this quote:

" If there was ever an example of why the DMCA needs to die, this is it. The idea that a sixteen-digit number is illegal to possess, to discuss in class, or to post on a news site is offensive to a country where free speech is the first order of the Constitution. The MPAA and RIAA are conspiring to unmake America, to turn this into a country where free expression, due process, and the rule of law take a back-seat to a perpetual set of governmental handouts intended to guarantee the long-term profitability of a small handful of corrupt companies."

Fuck that small handful of corrupt companies. For those of you keeping score, for the RIAA that's Sony, EMI, BMG, Universal, and Warner and for the MPAA that's Buena Vista (The Walt Disney Company), Sony, Paramount, 20th Century Fox, Universal Studios, and Warner Bros. Don't let the acronym cloud your mind. Remember who it is that's actually doing the fucking with these takedown notices…

And if you're pissed off about this sort of thing, write your congressman or woman and throw a dollar or two to the EFF.

Boing Boing: EFF explains the law on AACS keys

This all, of course, ties into the "Digital Bastille Day*" over at Digg, which just made the New York Times…

*I'm not sure if it originated there, but it was referred to as such by a MeFi poster. I like it better than "Digital Boston Tea Party", which I heard somewhere else, so that's my phrase of choice…

After complaining about DRM and iTunes, I decided I really ought to put my money where my mouth is and sign up for eMusic- something I've been meaning to do for a couple of months now (they've been running promotions in Wired.)

My first album:

TTC Bâtards Sensibles

My second album:

Sangue Misto SXM

I get to give money to two groups that I have hard a hard time giving money to (I've never been able to buy anything by Neffa/Sangue Misto and had to buy a TTC album in Paris.)

How cool is that?

I just spent 20 minutes scanning anti-iPhone articles. Some of them even mention my initial concern with the device- lack of tactile feedback. I do a lot with my Treo 700 with one finger and without looking at it, which means a lot considering the places that I'm likeliest to use it- the car, the supermarket, walking across a parking lot, etc. A device that I have to look at to use is right out in a lot of those situations. Not that I was considering one anyway- the iTunes format lock-down being one reason*. Which flows nicely into the actual link:

"It's ironic that a company whose name is synonymous with "Switch" has built its entire product strategy around lock-in. The iTunes/iPhone/iPod combo is a roach-motel: customers check in, but they can't check out."

the roach motel business model

*it being a closed system being another.

"In a nutshell: DRM's sole purpose is to maximize revenues by minimizing your rights and selling them back to you."

Privately, Hollywood admits DRM isn't about piracy

Reading this:

Vista's Content Protection Badness - [Geeks are Sexy] technology news

Led to this:

"Boston, MA—December 15, 2006—The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today launched BadVista.org, a campaign with a twofold mission of exposing the harms inflicted on computer users by the new Microsoft Windows Vista and promoting free software alternatives that respect users' security and privacy rights"

BadVista Blog — BadVista

I'm not down with Vista.

Please Adobe, release Dreamweaver, Photoshop and the rest on Linux, so I can quit Windows painlessly.

DefectiveByDesign

"DefectiveByDesign.org is a broad-based anti-DRM campaign that is targeting Big Media, unhelpful manufacturers and DRM distributors. The campaign aims to make all manufacturers wary about bringing their DRM-enabled products to market. DRM products have features built-in that restrict what jobs they can do. These products have been intentionally crippled from the users' perspective, and are therefore "defective by design". This campaign will identify these “defective” products, and target them for elimination. Our aim is the abolition of DRM as a social practice."

Apparently, they were outside of South Station today.

In separate legal actions yesterday, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an influential digital rights advocacy group in California, and the Texas attorney general filed lawsuits against the music publisher Sony BMG, contending that the company violated consumers' rights and traded in malicious software.

You Go EFF. And that's why I'm a dues paying member.

And while we're at it, let's give it up for Texas. Go Texas.

"It now appears that at least 568,200 nameservers have witnessed DNS queries related to the rootkit."