Land of the free

After visiting Mono Lake, CA, we wanted to go back home. Due to bad cellphone coverage we referred to the dutiful Garmin nüvi 250 to suggest a route. It looked something like this:



The route went via CA-108 and not through Yosemite National Park. We figured this was a good choice, because we just went through the park a day earlier: it was Memorial Day weekend and we knew that the park would just be crowded today as it was yesterday. Going via CA-108 instead of CA-120 W (through the park) added ~20 miles but it still felt like a good choice.

When the phone had better reception again, I was wondering what other map services would have suggested:

• Google Maps, via CA-120 W, going through the park
• Bing Maps, via CA-120 W, going though the park
• Yahoo Maps, via CA-108
• Mapquest (Is anyone using this any more?), via CA-108

So why would Google and Bing lead me through Yosemite National Park, adding even more traffic to the already car crowded forest? Both have access to traffic conditions, my Garmin nüvi 250 does not. Also, going through the park costs $20 per car. Sure, its landscape is just beautiful and we had already purchased a permit (Google wouldn't know that, right?) but it's still puzzling why anyone would suggest going through a designated wildlife area to save ~20 miles.

Whooha, auch der CCC macht mit!

Update: theoatmeal.com had a good explanation why SOPA/PIPA is not a good idea:

Get it right, folks!

Oh, yeah...it's all ™ and © by FOX and its related entities, of course.

Ah yes, that's the stuff:

 > We are Wall Street. It's our job to make money. Whether it's a commodity, 
 > stock, bond, or some hypothetical piece of fake paper, it doesn't matter. We
 > would trade baseball cards if it were profitable. I didn’t hear America 
 > complaining when the market was roaring to 14,000 and everyone’s 401k 
 > doubled every 3 years. Just like gambling, it’s not a problem until you lose.
 > I've never heard of anyone going to Gamblers Anonymous because they 
 > won too much in Vegas.

...and so the leaflet from the financial traders goes on to explain why everything is just OK the way it is. Oh well, that's a relief. I was kinda worried, but not anymore...

so I put a bundesregierung.de in your peerlist so you can leech while you seed:

Another mirror just went online :-)

Get it right, folks:


Oh, yeah...it's all ™ and © by FOX and its related entities, of course.

Yes, I've blogged about this earlier. And now, almost a year after setting up a Tor exit-node, I've got my 5th Copyright infringement notice. Apparently I have infringed(?) upon:

• 2010-03-16 - Harry Potter audio books
• 2010-05-16 - Iron Man 2
• 2010-09-29 - Eureka
• 2010-12-24 - Despicable Me
• 2011-01-03 - Naruto
• 2011-01-05 - House MD

...to be continued?

Again, for the record: half of the stuff up there I didn't even know (and, in retrospect, I would've been happier to not have looked them up). Also, with the configured exit policy in place, BitTorrent downloads are not even possible. But how to explain this to a lawyer?

Update: OK, I'm giving in. After another notice only 2 days after the last one and only two weeks after the 4th notice, I've decided to run a bridge node. As I cannot use any of those good hints for running an exit node, I see no other choice than running a bridge. It's better than nothing, I guess :-\

$ diff torrc{.exit,}
19c19
< SocksListenAddress 192.168.0.106:9050
---
> SocksPort 0
24,25c24,25
< SocksPolicy accept 192.168.0.0/24
< SocksPolicy reject *
---
> # SocksPolicy accept 192.168.0.0/24
> # SocksPolicy reject *
168,169c168,169
< #BridgeRelay 1
< #ExitPolicy reject *:*
---
> BridgeRelay 1
> ExitPolicy reject *:*

A bit late in the game, but here's a linkdump covering the recent Wikileaks Cablegate events - don't forget your popcorn!

• Guardian: The US Embassy Cables
• Guardian: Live Updates
• Der Spiegel: Botschaftsberichte 2010
• Washington Post: Timeline of the WikiLeaks cable release
• Don't shoot the messenger
• Fefes Blog
• Wikileaks Mirror

Update:

• Arianna Huffington: The Media Gets It Wrong on WikiLeaks
• Larry Flynt: Why I Am Donating $50,000 to WikiLeaks' Defense Fund (wow! Larry Flynt!)
• WikiLeaks: the emperor wears no clothes (guardian.co.uk)
• Support Wikileaks

OK, so today I stumbled across this. Some German politician cannot read a number with 7 digits. This so reminds me of all this Everybody can be president talk and why this is in fact should not happen at all, m'kay? (skip to 07:36 if you want):

Apparently Anonymous has released a press release but the author "forgot" to remove his/her name from the .pdf? Obfuscation? PEBKAC?

What happend from this (July 2010) to this (December 2010)? A slightly different take, methinks. Somehow I don't know if they're really getting what this is all about. But then again, it's a comedy show (and a great one too!), no more and no less :-)

Today I came across the following sign while shopping for aceto balsamico:

   CALIFORNIA PROPOSITION 65 WARNING
   The red wine vinegars and balsamic vinegars on these shelves contain lead,
   a chemical known to the state of California to cause birth defects or other
   reproductive harm.

Wait, what? Of course, by now I've searched the tubes and these signs have been there for quite a while. And it's widely discussed too, and people go on raving about these bad vinegars and if there are good vinegars and so on - but I did not find the answer to the question: why? Why would anyone still buy lead-containing vinegar, when it's clearly stated that it's harmful to the (human) body. Well, for Californian bodies, that is. As if lead was not toxic in other states :-)

I don't get it. At all.