angels and humanity, i mean humility

angels: good or evil - a history of angels (2003)

this wonderful documentary was on the history channel. (note: i'm the kind of person that would rather watch the movie than read the book.) they didn't just talked about how angels came to be and where and when they were conceived - but also how some angels were present across some of the most prevalent religions of the world and proceeded to explain how they all pretty much came from one; from Judaism to Christianity and Mohammedanism. it was the link with the heavenly and demonic angels that got me thinking.

Luis Royo - Angel Holding Demon

first, just a few things from the show that i never knew before. eve (from adam and eve) was the second women created (after lilith/adamah) to be more submissive for man? the old testament was written in a period of over 800 years? angels were influenced from egyptian and greek mythology that made it's way over to scriptures found in the 3 religions above (with near identical sounding names as well). very interesting stuff.

then, the most amazing thing i got out of the show was where a lot of angels originated from. many were first written when the "old testament" was being put together, but were "cut" from the "final edit" of the hebrew bible. and then someone decided to put them together in a book called the Apocrypha - a.k.a. the "Secret Books". to which i LOL when i thought to myself about the age old question of "why do people still fight wars in the name of the LORD" - was it because "my stories are better than yours?"

w-w-wait, bear with me on this. let's take, for example, the mythos of star wars or the tolken universe and find people who want to believe in those so much that they want to eat, sleep and breath the life.

Force strong for new Jedi church
bbc.co.uk - 21 January 2008

Darkon - A LARP Documentary

"Star Trek" Fan Documentary "TREKKIES"

it is nothing short of amazing how far people will go defending their "way of life" loosing sight of the some of the basic principles of living harmoniously many of these "universes" are trying to teach.

i mean, let's take another example, this time from south park's episode: Christian Rock Hard

Replace Darling & Baby with Jesus

All right, guys, this is gonna be so easy. All we have to do to make Christian songs is take regular old songs and add Jesus stuff to them. See? All we have to do is cross out words like "baby" and "Darling" and replace them with Jesus.
spscriptorium.com

and now as an exercise, let's see how many parallelism can be drawn from the seven sins if you replaced LORD with a pronoun, a person's name or even a demon. let's use cartman now, shall we?

"For great is cartman and most worthy of praise; he is to be feared above all gods"
"Praise be to cartman."

hmm... not very friendly is he? is cartman's ego so fragile and in need of constant attention to boost his level of self awareness he requires daily offerings, daily prayers or else incur the wrath of cartman? i count at least 5 here. i guess he really doesn't want to be forgotten if anything. the LORD is nowhere and everywhere within the Matrix. oops, different article.

so, how about we bring this back to the nerds because you're still reading this.

Star Wars Vs. Star Trek - DMP Edition HQ
via gizmodo.com

Spock At The Star Wars Attack Of The Clones Line

happy holidays!

microsoft, the dying patient

a few months ago i wrote why Microsoft needed to kill OLPC and touched on how add-on perks gave the perception of what's a better value. it seems now, that they have succumbed to the near unlimited developer resources in the open source communities and have begun to accept them.

Microsoft: We're all 'mixed source' companies
cnet.com - October 17, 2008

Microsoft starts distributing open-source Drupal
cnet.com - October 16, 2008

i guess the nerds at redmond figured out how easy it is to become a package distributer, repository pointer or what ever you want to call it; even though there already was one for the windows platform. cygwin is one of the most important must haves on a windows box. it basically gives me all of the tools, utilities, apps -- everything including the kitchen sink that i have always had on my *nix box.

and really, providing any of the many wonderful projects out there is probably one of the most easiest thing they could have done to enhance their existing product line. the kids on the mac platform already does this too. fink seems to be the favor of choice. (dunno what happen to the whole open darwin project though.)

but it is interesting to see how long microsoft has come since their first tirade when the whole open source software movement became a huge thorn on their side. at first:

Microsoft denies Linux threat
original denial: 03.11.98

followed by a long line of dissemination of FUD statements and money funneling scheme to take ownership of the *nix kernel via patent suits through their SCO cronies.

Halloween_Documents - wiki
December 1998 - June 2004

but they will acknowledge linux during 1999 when the DOJ started looking into their monopoly in the software market and then go right back to attacking the viability of these alternative OS with the virtual limitless amount of add-on software packages.

Microsoft rooting for Linux?
12 Mar 1999

next, the interoperability initiative is launched to lure developers back to the windows platform. as well as deals made in lieu of disclosing what patents were supposedly violated.

Microsoft makes Linux pact with Novell
November 2, 2006

and now, it seems they went and skipped the depression stage and right into acceptance by freely distributing software that was once shunned

and called too complex not but a few months earlier:

Microsoft: Open source is too complex
August 07, 2006

anyways, these behaviors show nearly all five stages in the psychology of a dying patient to the tee:

• Denial
• Anger
• Bargaining
• Depression
• Acceptance

does this mean they are dying? well, if another one of my past article, never gonna buy Microsoft hardware again, is any indication, far from it. they have a gazillion dollars to ride this out.

when i say i the command line interface, i really mean all of the tools, utilities, applications, scripts and executables that many, if not all, had their start from the important initiatives of the GNU project.

game makers likes to nickel and dime you too

on one of my previous article, i was originally going to title it "pooping out games - now with ad supplements". but the topic warranted a whole separate article.

Sony, Double Fusion sign in-game ad deal
joystiq.com - July 10 2008

EA, Massive extend in-game ad deal through next two years
joystiq.com - Mar 18th 2008

Study: in-game advertiser says 82% of you don't mind in-game ads
joystiq.com - Jun 18th 2008

now, i'm not saying that the concept is bad. but if the game is going to be designed with ad's first, games second... (and i'm talking about the console market) then you shouldn't be in the video game business. in fact, i hope you go out of business. and i'm calling out the 82% acceptance study bull-$#!t - or they are not telling the whole story.

anyways, let's start with why advertising in video games is something we even need to think about.

Devs Need To Watch Advergaming, Corporate Training
gamasutra.com - October 29, 2008
"the games industry is worth over $40 billion worldwide"... "advertising is a $270 billion industry in the US"...

those are indeed impressive numbers. but i'm sure you've seen the myriad of negative posts, comments and replies about ads in games that all boils down to - if there are ads in the game, the game better be for free or waaaay less than the full sticker price. the fact that many consumers will not see a price break while the publishers will reap on both ends is causing a rift with gamers. the developers (not to be confused with the executive douche bags who happends to work at a video game company) also sees this and feels for the gamers.

Don't like in-game ads? Mercenaries 2 lets you blow that sh*t up
destructoid.com - July 21 2008

now, going back to the billions of dollars Gamasutra article, the speaker went on to say: "Get Involved -- Before Proctor And Gamble Forces You To" -- that has got to be one of the dumbest FUD scare tactic line i have ever heard. i say, go ahead, let P&G do it. it is going to be no different than what burger king has done back in 2006. it was beneficial for BK and i bet the parents loved it when the games were sold for less than the price of a whopper combo.

Eat Like a King. Play Like a King
xbox.com

Over 2 million BK games served
gamespot.com - Dec 20, 2006

Burger King profits up 40% thanks to video games
videogamer.com - Jan 31, 2007

so why does everyone (who isn't a gamer) want to shove ads down your gaming thumbs? i mean, i understand that product placement is a tried and true method of advertising. but do it for the right reasons - or else, the gamer will be thinking they just shelled out $60 bucks for a game that came with nag-ware; ad-ware; ad-banner; ad-supported; fill-in-the-blank-with-more-ads-shoved-down-my-throat-and-ruin-my-escape-from-reality-when-all-i-wanted-to-do-was-frag-my-friends-and-chain-saw-grubs-in-half-and-call-in-air-strikes all day.

was that last line annoying to read? good, because that's what your damn ads would feel like if i played your games. now, back to the douche bag execs who wants to nickel and dime you:

Microsoft contemplating for-pay Avatar accessories
joystiq.com - Aug 1 2008

Free-to-play Battlefield Heroes delayed
arstechnica.com - July 30 2008

EA's future plans for Spore: hope you like expansions
arstechnica.com - July 30 2008

EA would 'love' to charge for Spore parts ... I bet they bloody would
destructoid.com - July 29 2008

now, as for spore's expansion, i don't mind as long as the price is right for the new features. but if it's only for incremental features (such as madden football year after year) - then it better be for $20 or less. better yet - free or less than $10 DLC.

Activision: if we can't run a game into the ground, we don't want it
arstechnica.com - November 06, 2008

Kotick: Vivendi Titles Dropped Due To Lack Of Sequel Potential
gamasutra.com - November 6, 2008

Blizzard: We're Not "Milking" StarCraft
edge-online.com - October 13, 2008

yeah, that last one (starcraft) came at a time when everyone was wearing their sequels haters-pants on. but, and i am such a blizzard fan-boy, hope that all races will have some sort of playable campaign mode so you are not stuck with just one side of the story. it would make the game... well... sort of boring if you, say, only had to play the marine campaign mode to begin with. anyways, back to the player-haters:

Activision no longer cares about games it can't milk to death
destructoid.com - November 06, 2008
"Something tells me that if the videogames market has another crash like the famous one of 1983, Activision will have a big hand in its arrival. "

ok, now that was just uncalled for. the gaming crash of '83 was because of too many games in the market. and i mean, crap games. if you're saying diablo, starcraft and warcraft are going to cause a gaming crashing -- you're on crack. oh, wait -- those are blizzard's games. um... call of duty 6, uh... i guess, um... oh! there's guitar hero... on crack.

huh..., there aren't that many if you ask me. it seems you would have the power to pick and choose which games to buy and which to ignore. a far cry from flooding the market with a whole heap of random and $#!t games. and now, with download-able games -- there will never be another game glut crash when stores will refuse to stock games because of the limited shelf space. if anything, this will help propel games that are worthy of your precious gaming time to receive your attention instead of the shovel-ware garbage.

iPodTouch + QuickPWN = Me Happy

well, it all started when my brother, mikey, got me an iPodTouch for christmas '07. the first thing i did was jailbreak it. no music, no videos, no pictures (even to this day). i just wanted the small form factor with wireless capabilities and touch screen ability.

it's the greatest toy i have ever had the pleasure to poke around in. so why did i want to jailbreak it in the first place? it was like: "damn, why did the iphone get the maps proggy and the iPodTouch didn't?" this was my single most wanted feature. i mean, take a look and compare what came on these two devices when they were first released.
i can understand that the iphone would have extra buttons for the phone, sms and (i guess) the camera. but what really miffed me was, "what? you get the stock thingie, weather and note pad too?" and when i had learned how to add them on (and this was way before the 2.0 firmware was out) i figured, this is how they should have released the iPod Touch.

now, i never had the need to upgrade the firmware on my toy for the longest time. but when i accidentally deleted an iTunes folder from my root (user) directory - i got my iPodTouch stuck in a restart loop. oops. lesson learned. but i still have an itchy trigger "rm -r" finger...

anyways, i have a whole heap of stuff backed up except for the iTunes folder for my root user, obviously, and instructions on how to restore and jailbreak my toy. so on to the internet i go. long story short, i ran into this utility called QuickPWN and wow. it was the easiest thing i have ever used.

first, let's make some fun of these guys.

on sept 12 (maybe around 8am according to the comment section) QuickPWN releases a post with instructions on how to use their utility that's kinda long winded. but what really baked my noodle were these 2 sentences at the very top of the article:

View this guide to learn how to jailbreak your iPod Touch 2.1.

[step] 1. Before you do anything, make sure you have a jailbroken iPod Touch.

O.K. wait... what?

my brain just went on a restart loop. good thing they plastered "DO NOT USE THIS" all over the page... so i chuckled. but then i was wondering where do i go to find this "OTHER POST"...

looking around, i see a list of labels on the side of the page. following the cookie trail, i find the second post. this was posted also on sept 12 (and seems like 11:30am this time) and basically the instructions was this:

run QuickPWN.exe ... and follow the on-screen instructions.

heh. O.K. let's see where this goes. after i had grabbed all kinds of firmware files and restoring my iPodTouch to one of them, i download the QuickPWN utility and run it. wow. yeah, i know i said that before. but this was so quick and painless, that it deserved a second wow.

i am so liking this this stuff! proceeding to install the bare minimum must have packages:

• bsd system
• openssh
• sshd

all in all, there seems to be a few things replaced (since i last jailbroke): Cydia is the new Installer. and Boss* has everything else. BossTool, only used once, and BossPrefs, a nice one stop shop to turn things on and off. but i'd like to still keep SysInfo - it's still the best process viewer and killer.

finally, some updated instructions on stuff i can't live with out:

How to Block Ads on Your (Jailbroken) iPhone
Oct 8 2008

Setting up lighttpd web server on 2.0
Aug 7 2008

after installing the lighttpd web server, make a folder:

/private/var/mobile/Site
your lighttpd "home" folder

and think of this as your "everything" folder. i upload all of my media, docs and whatever into the "Site" folder. and i will also make it my download dumping ground. here's why this is my up/down folder.

if you installed MPlayer:

point /private/var/media
to /private/var/mobile/Site/media

if you installed dTunes (DO NOT [ chmod 777 Downloads ] like dTunes will say - this will be fixed with chown below):

point /private/var/mobile/Library/Downloads
to /private/var/mobile/Site/Downloads
or point to /private/var/mobile/Site/media as well to make things simpler

make sure to [ chown -R mobile.mobile Site ] to keep things kosher.

everything is neatly stored in my "Site" folder and this is what i use for quick backup and (r)syncing scripts.

love it!

now, for your mac owners who don't need all of this brain busting instructions and only need to have the freedom of moving your music from one computer to another, mikey has recommended using Senuti.

senuti (which, cleverly, is Itunes backwards), is
freeware. works like a charm.
-- mikey

i

pooping out games

Wonderman looks like she's trying to drop a mean duce. but it's not as bad as how EA pretty much decided to destroy a fairly popular title by announcing this:

DICE currently working on 5 Battlefield games
June 24 2008

EA Has Five Battlefields In the Oven
June 24 2008

no matter what kind of resources you have to pull this off, the thought of -- "omg, there's going to be 5 games of this?" just makes me want to say: f#ck it. i only want one good game. not 5 mediocre ones.

and if you're gonna $#!t out games year after year - don't be surprised when the public respond with - "didn't that come out last year?"

a title needs to have time between sequels. a lot of gamers are getting to know what studios are producing the fun time-suck games versus the"alternate year" studios. which in my opinion tarnishes the "franchise". [ infinity ward vs. treyarch ]

now, i can't tell you a single person i know who bought consecutive years of the madden games. and if there's someone out there who did, you're a tool. so what about these announcements:

EA craves sequels for Dead Space, Army of Two, and Battlefield: Bad Company
EA: Dead Space, Army of Two, Bad Company sequels in the works
EA Considering Sequels to Dead Space, Army of Two
oct 23 2008 - three games - three links

as long as it's every other year - then i don't mind. but if you're going to shovel it down our face every year - people are gonna start ignoring the marketing blitz. while paying more attention to these kinds of headlines:

EA Laying Off 600 As Revenue, Losses Rise, Citing Weakening Retail
Oct 31 2008

EA promises its games won't be 'crappy' anymore
Aug 5 2008

EA: Investors don't give a sh*t about quality
July 22 2008

Lawsuit flags EA for illegal procedure on football monopoly
June 12 2008

so you poop out "crappy" games because you are only interested in increasing shareholder value? not caring about the ramifications for the long term? (and it really isn't that long: only 18-24 months cycles - for a title.) and trying to squeeze something out in every 12 month (again, of the same project) -- just to see customer loyalty destroyed at the end of the fiscal year? good going f#ck bags.

oh, you want new buyers? thanks for caring. we're the ones who recommends games to your new potential buyers.

if you have nothing new, nothing exciting and not worth paying full price for -- then why do you wonder people are not buying your games. you'd be lucky if someone waits until it hits the bargain bin.

stick to new/multiple titles. don't grind on the same title until it literally turns in to dust. over exposure is a sure way to turn people off. sequels aren't a bad thing (can't wait for diablo3 & starcraft2). but i guess that's not stopping articles (like this one) from flying off the shelf (even though we are all pretty much talking about the same thing):

Insomniac loves sequels, so it should MARRY them
oct 23 2008

Why Are Gamers Cynical Of Sequels?
oct 24 2008

ps. yes, i know the DC characters here have nothing to do with this article, but they were too easy to pass up to make d!ck and f@rt jokes with...

evil telcos - double charge

this post is a side bar to the main P2P article.

network caps. please note that there is a difference between bandwidth size limits and bandwidth rate limits. how are these different? i watch A LOT of internet videos (video length contributes to the file size downloaded) and i don't like waiting through the "buffering..." messages (how fast can the video stream be downloaded).

the speed at which the file can be downloaded is dependent on how fast your ISP will plow the files to your home. in fact, when looking into or recommending an ISP to others - i look for the fewest "buffering" message moments. some ISPs do not seem to get this. (yes, speed is also dependent on how fast the source server is - but we are talking about the ISP services to your home. major internet video broadcast networks makes use of CDNs - content distributed networks. and some even distribute their shows on torrent networks. but it all comes down to how tight the pipes gets closed when the ISP's rips you off.)

now i understand that they should be charging more for people with a faster network pipe (which they already do). they have T-1, T-3, OC-3, OC-12, OC-48 and OC-192 dedicated lines. and they come with (most of the time) unlimited transfer sizes. remember, it's a dedicated line. (and i say most of the time because, for example, it seems to be regional for academic institutions. who knows why - maybe some crazy legislation is why. see my previous article.)

in a nuttshell, the evil-telcos want to double charge you for the same product and services. here's what i mean. a T-1, for example, is a 1.544 megabits per second pipe. a T-3 is 43.232 Mbps, which has 28 times the capacity of the T-1. or in other words, it would take 28 times longer to push the same amount of data on a T-1 than on the T-3. (by the way, a T-3 is just 28 T-1's bundled together. and yeah yeah yeah, packet data [payload] versus packet header [overhead] bliz blaz.) but, keep this simple math in mind as we continue.

Comcast's New Network Management Will Slow Down Heavy Users for Up to 20 Minutes
Aug 20 2008

Comcast to slow down heaviest 'Net users to DSL speeds
Aug 21 2008

we see they no longer wish to honor the services they said they will provide when they have no problem charging you money every month for it. here's where the double charges come in:

It's official: Comcast starts 250GB bandwidth caps October 1
Aug 28 2008

"there was also buzz that Comcast might try to charge customers $15 for every 10GB they went over the limit."

HA! nickle and dime, i tells ya! although this is just a rumor, i'll bet the air you're breathing that this will happen.

ok, back to the double charge and the basic math i mentioned earlier. most DSL and cable modem provider charge you a certain amount of dollars for a certain bandwidth rate.

AT&T DSL price quote as of Oct 19 2008
price	up stream	down stream
$14.99	384 Kbps	768 Kbps
$25.00	384 Kbps	1.5 Mbps
$30.00	512 Kbps	3.0 Mbps
$35.00	768 Kbps	6.0 Mbps

note: i could have posted some cable modem, fiber and DSL prices here from the P2P unfriendly bastards that are all over the newsfeeds. but, this is just an example of the price scam i want to bring up. and you can do your own math with the ISP you're using to see for yourself. oh wait, where's the $10 package AT&T said they are offering? i would put the link here but it doesn't seem to be up anymore. evil and greedy f#ck bags. note: AT&T was required by the FCC to offer the low cost service as an agreement for the bellsouth merger. and what do you know, "at" bellsouth, you can find the information on how to get the cheap offereing.

let's say that you want to download a few files that totals to 250 GB - maybe it's every Linux Distro ISO and all of the source codes that were used to make it. let's see how long it would take to download it.

time to download 250GB
rate	days	hours	mins	secs
768 Kbps	32	8	43	22.67
1.5 Mbps	16	13	40	55.77
3.0 Mbps	8	6	50	27.88
6.0 Mbps	4	4	25	13.94

note: 1GB = 2^30 bytes which is then multiplied by 250 and again by 8 to get the number of bits we are looking to download. yeah yeah yeah packet headers, retransmission & delay windows. just consider them all part of the total 250 GB downloaded.

so, on the slowest tier, it would take the whole month for you to download all of that. good for you! you physically can't download it fast enough to even hit the limit. but if you went and upgraded to the faster rate, not only will pay more for it, but will download it faster and faster and hit the "limit" quicker than the month would end. so you would be charged extra in order to keep using the internet feed you already paid for - or spend the rest of the month unable to access the internet. told you the telco's want to DP you in the @$$.

p2p - 2slow4u - up&down

last time, i wrote about the evil telcos and want to wrap this up here.

but this time, it's not about the money. i mean, i understand that a company needs to find ways to keep their business up and running. and if they can milk all the dollars they can from their customers, then good for them. however, their tactics that could lead to the demise of the innovative transport medium technology and products as well as the collateral damage of new and interesting media providers and broadcasters.

these new media may be snuff out by the evil telcos, and this is what i fear the most.

first, it's P2P traffic. and even though, technically, one computer linked to just one other is a P2P network, let's assume for this section it's one computer linked to many others (just like what the carriers are all complaining about).

Verizon: we need freedom to delay P2P traffic when necessary
Aug 21 2008

Comcast sues FCC, wants P2P throttling order overturned
Sept 4 2008

it seems that some companies haven't figured this one out yet. the P2P control freaks are completely out of line here -- and need to know that they MUST NOT F@#K with the P2P traffic. these ISPs doesn't seem to not know about the people who: chat (voice or typing) and play games.

these kind of network traffic are your most common and basic multi-point/distributed P2P network. and if the network provider is the cause of that laggy connection (or worse a dropped connection) - YOU WILL LOSE THAT CUSTOMER. yes, most chats goes to a central server, but it is possible to join a pile of IRC channels from a pile of servers with [insert your favorite multi-protocol social chat client]. yes, while it's most likely that you are not joining 100's of endpoints, it is possible to join at least "a" 100 from one user. and if you have more than one users (i.e. roommates) then it is possible to see 100's of connections coming from one IP address. but if your network caused me to drop my game, you're F@#King with my QoS. don't expect me to keep you as my provider.

next, network caps. please note that there is a difference between bandwidth rate limits and bandwidth size limits. [ i when off tangent here - it went back to being about money (those greedy bastards) and said that this article wouldn't be about it. so i decided to put it in to a separate side bar article. ]

bandwidth rate limits are more in tune with what i wrote above about laggy connections (especially sensitive to quick-action games) - but, what the providers are really asking for is bandwidth size limits. and this is HUGE problem for other reasons.


upload and download limits. as HD videos become more and more prevalent in the video podcast world, these transmission sizes may easily reach the 250GB limit. so, can i see myself hitting that cap? well, let's do some quick paper napkin calculations.

if each HD video podcast is 1GB (which the totally rad show @1280x720 ~1hr @24fps - has sometimes hit), then that means i can watch 250 shows a month. which is about 8 one hour shows per day. that's a lot of video watching. i think most people only watch 2-3 hours of TV. a couch potato may watch up to 4-5 hours. and the video gamer may play games with the video podcast running in the background 4-8 hours. yes, there are days where i would play for 4 hours and other where i would play for up to 12 or even 16 hours. but on average, i have hit a stride of 4 to 6 hours. i also download a lot of financial stock data and listen to a lot of internet radio.

what's my current usage? a little less than 100GB/month according to ifconfig. HA! you say? now re-run the calculations when shows become 1920x1080. the data size for a single 1080 frame would be more than twice that of a 720 frame. now how about at 30fps or 60fps. of course, compression technology will try to keep the file sizes small. however, the best way to keep file sizes small is lower resolution running at lower frame rates. but we are looking into the future.

so why all of the sudden the reason to enforce the P2P restrictions?

• have the carriers met the usage saturation point (i don't think so)
  
• is this a pre-emptive move to contain users from high network usage (on a system that's pretty much a shared network) (maybe, but really, i don't think so)
• do they want to start charging subscribers more money and this is one way to ease it in (plausable)
• do they want to help the RIAA or MPAA stop piracy (i don't think so)
• do they want to help the major broadcast networks stop loosing viewership to the new media networks (i would say more so than stopping piracy but way less than wanting to charge more $$)
  

if you ask me, i think it's some RIAA or MPAA douche bag that has somehow convinced the carriers to fight the P2P wars on their dime. or else they would face lawsuits for allowing P2P traffic on their networks. the anti-P2P systems started to roll out, but the carrier's ultimate reason for doing so is that they can upsell additional services that comes with the higher network speed package (do you really need the triple package now a days?) or charge you extra for a service you already are paying for (remember net neutrality?). there really is no reason to throttle P2P traffic when there are many good uses for it. and many good reasons to show your network is multi-user friendly that will shine well with people who wants to have a fat and fast pipe while not feeling like they are being ripped off.

couldn't resist

free wifi, eh? evil telcos to the rescue!

about a month ago i wrote how telcos want to nickel and dime (and by nickel and dime, i mean $5 and $15) their subscribers for every little feature. i want to expand on that with how they also want to/will kill anything that would threaten their stranglehold on your wireless communication needs their cash cow.

a long time ago, a city wanted to roll out a free or subsidized low-cost wireless network:

Philadelphia Plans $10M City Cloud
aug 31 2004

and in three months, some evil telco convinced the governor to make it illegal for a city to provide such services. how is it possible to make this "illegal" is beyond me.

Philly Negotiates a Cloud
nov 30 2004

Every cloud has a Verizon lining
nov 26, 2004

image courtesy of: prickwear.com

here's a nice article that wraps all of this up from an interesting source. how and why does the UK have any interest in this is amazing.

Wi-fi venture tests Philadelphia
dec 4, 2005

fast forward a few years:

FCC boss mulls free* wireless for all
may 27, 2008

and now, free wifi is under attack as a health scare?

City sneezes at WiFi allergy claims, goes ahead with hotspots
jun 17 2008

although there's no wireless provider officially involved with that uprising, i bet dollars to donuts one of them are. anyways, let's not forget the land based telcos.

the attempted assassination of the internet by twisting the net neutrality principle would have been a major coup for the few ginormous ISPs. the FCC are trying their best to keep the network free and open - but that's not stopping the telcos from going in to their bag of dirty tricks to choke out your options.

Telco to fiber-deploying town: we sue because we care
Sep 11 2008

Comcast Sues FCC to Get P2P Slowdown Ban Reversed
Sep 5 2008

image courtesy of: njvadala.blogspot.com

hell, they'll even resort to bribing, kickback, payout or what ever you want to call it:

Comcast pays $150K to put end to Florida bandwidth cap probe
Sep 8 2008

FCC Order scolds Comcast for changing story on P2P blocking
aug 20 2008

ha! lying - now i see how they get these lawsuits, legislation and health scare "facts" through the system. how naive of me.

or is it because they do not want any competition by making up excuses lobbying for laws that is in the telcos best interest. smash your options if it's going to save you money. and if they can take your money by force law, they will.

German court bans VoiP on iPhone
sept 12 2008

image courtesy of: freemagenta.nl

this rant will be concluded on my next P2P article.