Saturday, April 16, 2005

Essay Competition. The Melbourne Philosopher Blogger is proposing to hold an Essay Competition for bloggers. It’s just in the planning/brainstorming stage right now, but if you’re interested in the idea pop over there and offer suggestions. [Thoughts Arguments and Rants] 8:26:46 PM    comment []

In Baseball, It Does Seem to Matter How You Start. When it comes to ballplayers, do hot or cold starts matter? It turns out they do. By ALAN SCHWARZ. [NYT > Sports] 8:26:36 PM    comment []

Google and Torrent Digital Signature (hash). I was doing research around tracking torrent distribution of video material via hash signatures. In FAQ for "common users" from bittorrent.com we can read that: BitTorrent does cryptographic hashing (SHA1) of all data. When you see "Download succeeded!" you can be sure that BitTorrent has already verified the integrity of the data. So, in other words hash is a digital signature for the data file... The first experiment is Google search 791b2f5d95a54d1381b85f271b51f71e73964185 , for a hash signature of the famous John Stewart's CNN appearance on Crossfire. The result gives the addresses of (almost all) trackers carrying the clip... Next test was to use filetype:torrent directive in Google search. For example, the search for Sin City gives the extensive list of sites carrying the torrent for the movie. I downloaded couple of listed torrents (not the film!!!), extracted hash signature from the torrents and then searched for that. The results show couple of strains of the video file, repeated and re-seeded over and over ... The conclusion is that Google and hash signature in torrents present a solid base to build noninvasive protection against piracy and finding the source the material originates from ... More ideas, results, and links welcome ... [unmediated] 12:02:59 PM    comment []

A Protest on Video. When videos taken by protesters contradict the official accounts of police conduct, the city has a duty to investigate. [NYT > Opinion] See also coverage from Tuesday here at A blog doesn't need a clever name. 9:41:08 AM    comment []

Goodman. New criminal charges have been brought in the murders of Andrew Goodman, James Cheney, and Mickey Schwerner, young civil rights workers in Mississippi. Steve Post talks with Dr. Carolyn Goodman, Andrews 89-year-old mother. [WNYC New York Public Radio] 9:39:36 AM    comment []

Who Was Afraid of Andrea Dworkin?. Andrea Dworkin, who died last week at 58, lived the stigma of being identified with women. By By Catharine A. MacKinnon. [NYT > Opinion] 9:38:35 AM    comment []

A little more from the site of CFP: ChoicePoint Wins Menace Award. The data broker takes top honors at this year's U.S. Big Brother Awards, which spotlight invasive privacy practices in business and government. Other winners include a California elementary school and the Department of Education. By Joanna Glasner. [Wired News] 9:37:32 AM    comment []

PyMusique Hackers Back to Crack Napster (Donna Wentworth). The group of coders that created a DRM-free interface to Apple's iTunes is now doing the same for Napster. Derek Slater has the scoop in two posts: Napster's WMA DRM Cracked? and The Cracking of Napster WMA DRM. The latter post answers questions about the modus operandi and raison d'etre -- the fruits of Slater's AIM chat interview with one of the coders, Cody Brocious: Cody and co. are apparently very near an implementation of a utility that will allow people to turn songs acquired through Napster Light (the a la carte service) and Premium (the non-portable subscription service) into unencrypted files. You have to have paid for the songs first to do this circumvention, because the keys have to be retrieved from Napster. This tool will actually circumvent and remove the DRM, rather than recording from the sound card or employing other similar workarounds to create unencrypted files. [...] Cody sees his actions as "ethical," irrespective of legality, and he is willing to "fight the DMCA." He wants to be able to play his lawfully acquired Napster music on Linux. [Copyfight] 12:02:57 AM    comment []