Nobody Cares: Technology-only Edition

[Veritable Quandry]

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

Musk's fascination with The Culture is particularly surprising. He is literally Joiler Veppers.

 

[Casey Pelous]

I saw Ray Bradbury speak. He said, "People don't understand: I'm not writing to predict these futures, I'm trying to prevent them."

 

[Free]

I saw Ray Bradbury speak. He said, "People don't understand: I'm not writing to predict these futures, I'm trying to prevent them."

The Internet agrees with you!

 

[Casey Pelous]

The Internet agrees with you!

That's ...... concerning.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

I winced and facepalmed while reading this:

TIL the PlayStation 2 Can Run Linux—Here's How It Works

Penguins in the most unexpected places.

www.howtogeek.com

The Linux Kit WAS available outside of Japan, I had one.

Installing it was fairly easy, if you could see the installer screen, since it's the standard RedHat 6.1 installer dialogs. At first it was believed it required a sync-on-green monitor to install, which could be configured to output NTSC or whatever post install. So some installed and configured blind using a howto. But there were a semi-secret controller button combos that let you install on whatever screen type you needed. NTSC, VGA sync-on-green, or DTV (component)

Easiest thing to do was click the install everything button, increase swap a bit, and bingo. By default it started in RunLevel 3, but once logged in a single command of "startx" would start the default graphical environment, which was WindowMaker. Once installed it was a fairly standard RH6.1 variant. It pretty much had everything you'd expect except StarOffice and Netscape. It was an older kernel so USB storage was wonky, though there was a newer kernel available from the community where it worked fine. Printing worked fine, standard RH6.1 printtool.

 

[Essence Lumin]

How can this happen?

I got a notification on my android phone asking if I wanted to place a widget to see what music I have recently listened to. I said to myself why not, let's see. Sure enough, it showed the song I most recently listened to. The bizarre thing is it was something I played with an app called radio.net on my firestick on the tv. radio.net is an app giving access to 1000's of radio stations. Wikipedia says it is made by some German company. The reason I looked that up is seeing if it was owned by Amazon which would give me a clue, but no. radio.net doesn't even display the song or artist playing. But somehow this widget knows. How can that be? I have not installed anything related to radio.net on my phone. My phone and tv are on the same lan. With a little more poking I see the widget is generated from "Android System Intelligence". It seems peculiar and a bit disturbing. All I can think of is it is listening to the traffic on the lan and figuring out what the song is. That seems far fetched but it is all I can think of.

 

[Casey Pelous]

How can this happen?

I got a notification on my android phone asking if I wanted to place a widget to see what music I have recently listened to. I said to myself why not, let's see. Sure enough, it showed the song I most recently listened to. The bizarre thing is it was something I played with an app called radio.net on my firestick on the tv. radio.net is an app giving access to 1000's of radio stations. Wikipedia says it is made by some German company. The reason I looked that up is seeing if it was owned by Amazon which would give me a clue, but no. radio.net doesn't even display the song or artist playing. But somehow this widget knows. How can that be? I have not installed anything related to radio.net on my phone. My phone and tv are on the same lan. With a little more poking I see the widget is generated from "Android System Intelligence". It seems peculiar and a bit disturbing. All I can think of is it is listening to the traffic on the lan and figuring out what the song is. That seems far fetched but it is all I can think of.

Another question -- who/what sent the original notification asking you to install it? (I think you can check in the notification history ...)

 

[Essence Lumin]

Another question -- who/what sent the original notification asking you to install it? (I think you can check in the notification history ...)

From what I can tell, Android System Intelligence is something that comes preinstalled with the phone.

 

[Noodles]

This is why I just use last.fm and scrobble everything.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

With a little more poking I see the widget is generated from "Android System Intelligence". It seems peculiar and a bit disturbing. All I can think of is it is listening to the traffic on the lan and figuring out what the song is. That seems far fetched but it is all I can think of.

Maybe something having to do with Bonjour or Avahi? I know that Linux boxes can send audio to some OTHER machine doing the various Bonjour or Avahi tricks, and Android phones and fireTV's are basically Linux. So your firetv box is probably announcing what it plays to any other android machine using the same protocols.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Weak password allowed hackers to sink a 158-year-old company

Transport company KNP forced to shut down after international hacker gangs target thousands of UK businesses.

www.bbc.co.uk

In KNP's case, it's thought the hackers managed to gain entry to the computer system by guessing an employee's password, after which they encrypted the company's data and locked its internal systems.

KNP director Paul Abbott says he hasn't told the employee that their compromised password most likely led to the destruction of the company.

"Would you want to know if it was you?" he asks.

 

[Kokoro Fasching]

Weak password allowed hackers to sink a 158-year-old company

Transport company KNP forced to shut down after international hacker gangs target thousands of UK businesses.

www.bbc.co.uk

No, lack of proper backups and procedures sank the company.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

They need to tell the employee. It was someone with a level of access that allowed the intruders to cripple the system who was none the less using a weak password.

 

[Isabeau]

Netscape: Remembering the internet’s Big Bang, 30 years later

 

[Free]

Netscape: Remembering the internet’s Big Bang, 30 years later

My only issue with Netscape is that it made Marc Andreessen a very rich man, which means we have to deal with his shit.

 

[Free]

* modem noises drowned out by audible gasps *

AOL announces September shutdown for dial-up Internet access

Around 175,000 households still use dial-up Internet in the US.

arstechnica.com

 

[Free]

I've been listening in on Alexa's new voice.

Alexa new voice

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

It sounds about 10 years younger, a little faster (and more confident), a bit nasally, and I sorta want to punch her face (if she had one). Thankfully, I've discovered my Fire TV Cube does not support it. So Amazon can't even force an upgrade on me!

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

I've been listening in on Alexa's new voice.

Alexa new voice

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

It sounds about 10 years younger, a little faster (and more confident), a bit nasally, and I sorta want to punch her face (if she had one). Thankfully, I've discovered my Fire TV Cube does not support it. So Amazon can't even force an upgrade on me!

she sounds more Perky with a slight touch of vocal fry.

 

[Isabeau]

I don’t have much use for smart watches, but if you’re into gadgets…

We're bringing Pebble back!

Eight years later, you still can't beat a Pebble

repebble.com