Bite Size 5

"Patience is not tolerance, it is an application of forgiveness" - today's sermon

Hacker's Ethics

I was listening to a live stream of my favorite podcasting station, TWiT @ http://live.twit.tv, and they were recording the next episode of Security Now which is one of the greatest security podcasts ever made.  Something that the host said caught my attention.  Before, hacking use to be done for fun, now, hacking is being done for money!

If you think about the evolution, hacking was originally just how slow can you make a computer or make it do things to creep the user out.  Now, hacking is being done to destroy people's lives by taking over their bank accounts, stealing their personal data, and maybe even exposing companies (which may or not be a bad thing).  Another piece he said was that the amateur hacker targets computers but the professional targets people.

Ever since we have started relying on computers more and more to get through our daily, rather mundane lives, it has been making it easier for hacker to target larger demographics of people.  No matter how secure or how blocked off we make a computer, if the user doesn't know how to use it, it's practically useless.  So the weakest link is going to be your mom, dad, grandpa, grandma, sister, and maybe even you.  Try to be informed, there's lots of information floating out there to help you become more secure.

Now, be aware, not all hackers are bad.  There are hackers that work to make sure that YOU aren't hacked.  In fact, you can say most security researches are hackers.  Many antivirus companies probably hire hackers to help develop their software.  Every year, there are countless security conferences to make sure that all hackers are up to date.  So don't just go up to someone who claims they're a hacker and think badly of them, they may be the next person to save you from something bad.

Some advice, despite what anyone says, make sure you update your operating system, whether mac or windows.  Make sure that your browser is up to date as well.  Lastly, make sure you have an antivirus.  The biggest headache most people have is with their antivirus but trust me, its worth it.  If you're running windows, I'd suggest the Microsoft Antivirus.  Totally free and headache free.  Just install and it works.

Big thanks to Steve Gibson for bringing this kind of stuff up.  Catch him and the whole TWiT team at http://twit.tv

Cutting Down

I love being a minimalist.  It may not seem like it though.  If you've ever walked into my room, I got stuff all over the place, most of which seems super redundant.  The problem with me is that I'm a minimalist but I want to be efficient.  You might be thinking that simplifying stuff makes that stuff more efficient.  Sometimes, I don't think so.  There are times when I try to simplify my computer by just completely reformatting it but end up with more or the same amount of junk that I already had on it.

I guess here's what I want to say.  I may be a hypocrite and just say that I'm a minimalist but actually am not.  OR.  I may be a minimalist but still find that my minimalistic ways doesn't directly transfer to being efficient.  I may get rid of more stuff but the more stuff I get rid of, the harder it is to do other things.

Alternatives to kick Piracy

While I did give my take on how piracy may have been better for the industry overall, I don't support it at all.  However, sometimes our wills are weak and we are tempted to download that one last album to complete your collection. Well, there are a lot of alternatives that are legal!

Great places to pay legitimately for the album:
Itunes!!
Amazon!! <-- both are DRM free!

Great places to stream music:
Pandora Radio
LaLa.com

Great places to stream videos:
Hulu
Boxee
Youtube (iffy)

There are a lot more great places but there are many great places that aren't particularly legal or are standing on the gray zone.  The Pirate Bay may be a great place but is (for the most part) pirating!

The Case for Piracy

Don't make any assumptions based on this blog title! Piracy is still ILLEGAL.
However, I do want to state a couple of things that I've heard about piracy and how it is actually working out.  Of course piracy is extremely harmful to the music industry.  However, there are some instances where it isn't.  If you take nine-inch-nails as the primary example, they've created a business model for singers not based on any huge record label and fancy advertising but on piracy.  Google the topic to find out more about it, I'm not wasting my breath here.
Another way to look at piracy is whether or not it is a bad thing for the industry as a whole. It was inevitable. As soon as mp3s became a standard, piracy was sure to break out.  With the internet, its a free distribution platform (well almost, you still gotta pay for internet).  Yet, the internet has also helped the music industry to make even more money through promoting the songs and even selling them on itunes or amazon.  In a way, it also made music (and movies) a lot more convenient to get, legally or illegally.
Piracy forced the industry to adapt to the web 2.0 architecture.  Maybe we would have all still been buying CDs without the piracy issue.  It forced the media to come onto the web and battle it out online and was ultimately better for the consumer.  You can now buy tracks individually without all the wasted plastic and extra charges (like tax).  In a way, it keeps the industry honest.

The Youtube Tutorial

I think we all have been to youtube to watch little kittens and weird japanese prank shows. Sometimes I think that is all that is on youtube but the reality is that there are a lot more useful things on there as well. While we may think that youtube is just a bunch of people filming some concert or them doing some crazy karate, we may be missing a serious educational experience on youtube as well.

While I was being rather bored, I heard an incredible piano piece which struck me so hard that I wanted to learn piano just so I could feel "impressive" that I could play that piece. Don't ask me what that piece was, it was on the radio. I googled in "piano tutorial" and noticed that there were youtube results!

You might not think much of finding people trying to teach you piano on youtube to be impressive but its like getting free tutorials online where you would have, without it, gone to the library to pick up a book or look through the yellow pages to look for a tutor. Not only that, you might not even be able to find a tutor or book to help you out where you're located. With youtube, it's everywhere (except maybe china...). It isn't just limited to piano either. You can learn guitar, flute, computing, php, sql, java, basic, photography, and etc. The list is practically endless. You might even be able to find tutorials on bagpipes or some other exotic instrument!

Holding Back is Painful...

I always wonder what exactly I wanna write about on this blog and I keep thinking about all my interests and can't seem to stick to one. You've seen me write about photography, Christianity, technology, applications, and all sorts of non-sequitor stuff about life. I really dunno where to go with this blog. I was thinking of just keeping it random but I dunno how random I could possible be. Not to mention it makes it hard for adsense to figure out what ads to put.

Anyway, it's the new year so I figure I should make a new year's resolution. Unfortunately, its really hard and really painful. You see, this year, I'm actually thinking of holding back on the buying of gadgetry and niceties that make my life so "techy." As much as I love them and want to use them and find them useful, they really are expensive little trinkets. But even realizing this, it is really hard just to think "no, i don't need it." I don't mean this as in a life or death or even a social status way, I think of this "i don't need" thing on a self satisfying level. Yes, my hobby is merely self-gratuitous and tops the list as one of the most ego-centric things I do. Even so, although I know how iniquitous and horrible and maybe even corrupting thing it is, it is a really hard new year's resolution not to even think of getting things. Just to name off a few things I was actually thinking of getting this year:

more RAM for my computer
upgrading my dSLR to an Olympus E30 (which is like 1000 bucks)
a nice pair of noise-cancelling headphones
building a new computer
and so on....

Yeah, I'm screwed, but I'll still try. (This post probably didn't sound convincing).

Back Up!

Just yesterday, one of my friends' laptop hard drive broke and completely lost it. He wasn't exactly the most tech-savy dude and had a lot of important files on there including pictures, reports, and bank account numbers (which I NEVER recommend you place on your compy alone). Being the not-so-tech-smart man that he is, which I don't blame him for, he didn't even think of buying an external drive or even backing up his stuff on a disk. In fact, he thought that laptops were rock solid and were like desktops, never failing unless you kicked it really, really, really hard.

I just hope that you're never in this situation. To make sure that you don't get yourself in this situation, I reccommend you backup your stuff on disks AND on an external hard drive. why? Becuase I'd hate to say this but laptops have a half life of somewhere between 2-3 years unless you bought some crazy thinkpad (i'm guilty of this, btw) or just never take your laptop off your desk.

Now if you're thinking, hard drives and discs cost money, isn't there an alternative? Well, you're in luck cuz there are a few solutions out there. There is one drawback though, it'll take more time to use it and it doesn't give you much space to work with. For the past few days, I've been ranting on about dropbox which gives you 2 gigs of free online storage. Its a great way to back up your files. On top of that, theres sky drive which also gives out storage. If you're willing to pay just a little cash, carbonite is a really good backup place to put all your stuff. Other things your could try is e-mailing yourself in gmail but thats a real hassle. Another way to do it is if you already have another computer. Then all you gotta do is just transfer the files between the computers (again, you can use dropbox).

Important!!! you don't delete the file off your computer after you've backed it up. The purpose is to have TWO copies of the file in TWO different places so if one goes bad, you have another.

Back from Retreat! More Dropbox lovin'

So I just got back from my church's winter retreat where we all go up to a secluded place, devoid of all distractions and do church stuff (I'm assuming most of my readers don't care much about what I personally did there). Anyway, being the photographing lover that I am, I obviously brought all my camera gear and took probably over 1,000 photos. Unfortunately, facebook doesn't let me upload more than 200 pics at a time, which I think is super duper lame.

I know most of you are probably thinking, why anyone might need to upload more than 200 photos at once, well, I do, so there. Anyway, I came back, found out about the lame limit, and then looked to my dropbox! apparently, if you sync your photos folder, dropbox will actually create a photo album for you so that you can share with all your friends. I find that to be such a neat feature. Not only that, unlike facebook, people can actually get the whole picture and not some lame compressed image. That way, they don't need to keep asking me for the 'actual' photo.

If you really wanna know what I mean, try it out for yourself!