Introspection

Stir it up? Pick your battles!

Dean — Thu, 10 Nov 2005 22:00:46 +0000

Well last night was interesting non the less. A supervisor of ours decided to rant at us workers about appropriate uniform wear. The issue at hand was that the old issued fleece jackets we had were zipped up around our necks to keep ourselves warm due to cold weather at night. Now granted our policy states “only approved and company supplied uniform items are acceptable to be worn while on duty. Non-issue clothing shall not be worn etc,” Ok taken to the literal sense we are wrong for even wearing a non-issued item. Looking at the broader picture our uniform issues are in complete disarray. Does the fully zipped up fleece under our issued jackets look un professional or sloppy, possibly if the sack like jackets we now have are left unzipped. It is acceptable to wear a scarf but not the fleece. Okay time to by a scarf. Our new uniforms are sorely lacking in quality in my humble opinion but I am trying to make due and be able be outside for my 10 hr shift and be comfortable.

So the challange was issued with comments like “if you don’t like it then speak to my boss!” So I did via an email that neither complained nor pointed the finger at anyone. The email was merely an question if situation A arises then can option B be done. Well option B is ok with the bosses for the time being. So who won this battle? I say no one because we all look like children and unable to work together, What a waste of bandwidth as my specific question was posed to two people yet the response was fanned out to all field management and now I’m ranting here but mind you this is a blog .

Cyber Deer

Dean — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 21:32:22 +0000

Well I half to say I’m amazed again by the pursuit for knowledge. Man this is a hilarious find on engadget.com . I can see Bubba in his hunting blind right now … “Hey Billy is that a 4 point buck or wun of them stealth deer we’s got over in Iraq?”

Check out CNET for the whole story.

Themes & features

Dean — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 19:56:08 +0000

Well a friend of mine asked me how I got the calender on my WP theme I’m currently using. I was a bit puzzled as in my preview panes and even when I log out I don’t see the calender on the right sidebar. I did see it once in a preview pane so I know I’m not going crazy nor is Larry. I guess it is the kinks that need to be worked with the new service. I hope the WP gurus start turning on more features and themes soon as the basics are a bit on the blah side.

Confessions of a pirate

Dean — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 19:25:20 +0000

Have I downloaded warez/movies/mp3′s? yes

Is piracy bad for business? Yes in some fashion but RIAA and MPAA et al. distort the facts and in general spread FUD for the most part.

Well many a co-worker and friend are always asking me what I suggest for downloading music and various warez. I’m sitting on the fence with this as I use Open source or freeware software exclusively and I always suggest the OS option route first. I do admit that there is software out there that people can’t live without that is non opensource and people should try it and buy it. Many viewpoints can go to the extreme on software/music/movie piracy and I have to say that I’m moderate on the issue. If I was given the opportunity to purchase legit products or services at a fair price and convientent download I would highly encourage people to follow the legit route.

I see RIAA and MPAA dinosaurs are in a battle to maintain status quo in respect to how they do business . Their business model are the problem not the online piracy from “Joe Average.” I believe we are coming to the turning point where these industries will have to change as the public demand dictates and offer reasonably priced and convienent products and services. Look to Itunes, IPTV, podcasts, web based applications (AJAX), and Open source initiatives. These entities are starting new trends and innovations. Support them and the market will hopefully change for the better to allow people to be legitimate. Will it stop piracy completely …. no it won’t.

Sony BMG Rootkit

Dean — Thu, 03 Nov 2005 22:42:00 +0000

I know that this topic is a bit stale now and has been talked to death but I got a laugh out of Sony’s solution to remove it’s “rootkit” DRM software.

“SOFTWARE UPDATES/ PLUG-INS

November 2, 2005 – This Service Pack removes the cloaking technology component that has been recently discussed in a number of articles published regarding the XCP Technology used on SONY BMG content protected CDs. This component is not malicious and does not compromise security. However to alleviate any concerns that users may have about the program posing potential security vulnerabilities, this update has been released to enable users to remove this component from their computers.” from Sony.

OMG… Sony just doesn’t get it and this back peddling and denial is absolute garbage. For an easy to digest explanation for what this malware does check out Steve Gibsons podcast at TWiT.tv .

STOP BUYING SONY!!!

BØrked!

Dean — Sat, 29 Oct 2005 19:30:55 +0000

Well I did it again… I borked my box and screwed the filesystem. Now I was able to recover my important data and do fresh install. So all in all only a few hours of down time and a nice fresh Ubuntu install and all is working like a charm once again. For those that know me constant tinkering is my downfall . In the many system rebuilds I have gained the wisdom on how to save time and frustration in the rebuild. Back up, Back up, Back up!

Anyways back to work and the family.