Archive for April, 2007

TV Guardian

Monday, April 16th, 2007

Now you can let your kids watch whatever violence you want on TV, TV Guardian will make sure they don’t hear the swear words (based on the closed captions). I wonder what 150 words it considers foul? Gotta love:

There’s even a special setting that, when turned ON, will mute offensive religious references.

Tarantino just wouldn’t be the same…

The future isn’t Mad Max, it’s Dune

Sunday, April 15th, 2007

As Queensland hits level 5 water restrictions, people have begun stealing water.

Internet Writing Workshop

Saturday, April 14th, 2007

Sometime over the Swancon Easter weekend I found a reference to the Internet Writing Workshop. Includes weekly writing exercises and mailing lists for discussion etc. that might be useful for the budding author :)

Kurt Vonnegut, dead at 84

Thursday, April 12th, 2007

Yahoo News obituary here.

Google takes on Evil

Wednesday, April 11th, 2007

Google have teamed up with the US Holocaust Memorial Museum as part of a Genocide Prevention Mapping Initiative. You can download Crisis in Darfur layers for Google Earth.

US and them

Thursday, April 5th, 2007

I’m watching Four Corners and thinking: 15 British soldiers’ confessions to Iran is as David Hicks’ confession is to ??

Comsec, insecure or just screwed up?

Tuesday, April 3rd, 2007

I just got a confirmation e-mail for $3000 of SST (Steamships Trading) shares that I’d apparently purchased. Complete with my account number and everything.

Check AusCERT, and Google for any phishing references. Log into my account (by typing the URL), no sign of the purchase. Change my password. Call Commsec on 13 15 19 and they confirm that the trade was made, ask me if I’ve given anyone else my password (of course not). Put me on hold. Wait. They come back and offer to investigate it, or sell the shares. Well, I want them to investigate it. She asks if I want to shell the shares (brokerage free). Well, I want to get rid of them, but I’d rather they cancelled the trade I didn’t make (price hasn’t gone up :). She arranges to call me back.

So I get the call back, and apparently they can see that the trade wasn’t made over the internet, they’re going to cancel the transaction, and make a note that I didn’t purchase the shares. They can’t tell me whether they screwed up or it was a malicious attack. They do ask if I’ve changed my password.

So I guess I don’t know if something on my network is insecure, leaking data, or if someone at Comsec screwed up, or if their end is insecure. I’d rather not cancel my account with them, but if they can’t tell me how random trades are being made on my account then there’s really no reason to stay with them. Unless I hear a big “Sorry our computers screwed up” apology on their site tomorrow.

Update - I got another e-mail at 3:22. Rang them up and hassled them to let me know if it was a security problem at my end (this would mean I’d have to work out where the hole is), or them being incompetent. Turns out that they were attempting to process someone else’s trade using my account.

The Dread Pope Roberts

Monday, April 2nd, 2007

Screening on SBS, Sunday night at 10:30pm a 2 part series starring Cary Elwes (Saw, The Princess Bride) as Karol Wojtyla (a.k.a Pope John Paul II). Also includes Christopher Lee, and James Cromwell.

Cardboard furniture

Sunday, April 1st, 2007

Cardboard furniture you can make yourself, via Make.

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