Everyone should read this:

[Sal_gal]

http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,...rss.technology

When technology serves its owners, it is liberating. When it is designed to serve others, over the owner's objection, it is oppressive. There's a battle raging on your computer right now -- one that pits you against worms and viruses, Trojans, spyware, automatic update features and digital rights management technologies. It's the battle to determine who owns your computer.

[SpywareDr]

If left to grow, these external control systems will fundamentally change your relationship with your computer. They will make your computer much less useful by letting corporations limit what you can do with it. They will make your computer much less reliable because you will no longer have control of what is running on your machine, what it does, and how the various software components interact. At the extreme, they will transform your computer into a glorified boob tube. (Over my dead body!)

You can fight back against this trend by only using software that respects your boundaries. Boycott companies that don't honestly serve their customers, that don't disclose their alliances, that treat users like marketing assets. ...

Like I said many years ago, It's MINE!

And when I feel it no longer is, I'll simply unplug it and go back to racing.

[LindaHewitt]

Sal-Gal,

Excellent post.

Thanks,

Linda

[poppy4]

It's really a darn shame that 'human nature' is what it is..
Computers, one of the greatest inventions of my time, has been turned into a battlefield, and for me, limited now in usage.. because of all the malware.....and improprieties one encounters while pursuing the wonders of this technology.

Thanks for the post Sal_gal.

[LindaHewitt]

This was posted on http://blogs.chron.com/techblog/ in the comments area for the topic "Bring Your Open Comments".

Ever heard of Bruce Schneier? For those of you not familiar with him, he's the guy who literally wrote the book on cryptography,

http://slashdot.org/books/99/03/11/1623221.shtml

and since has written books on network security and general security. The guy has a common-sense approach to security that often flies in the face of the kind of "security" that politicians would foist upon us at every turn. For example, Schneier has long maintained that checking IDs at the airport does little to make us safer on airplanes, because the bad guys can always find suicidal volunteers with clean records. Schneier's company, http://www.counterpane.com/, had an algorithm, Blowfish, selected as a finalist for the recent NIST comptetion to choose a successor to the aging DES encryption standard, he has testified before Congress, and he writes tirelessly about security both good and bad at his weblog,

http://www.schneier.com/blog/.

In short, Bruce Schneier is a guy I pay attention to.

In a recent column for Wired News entitled Everyone wants to 'own' your PC,

http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,70802-0.html

Schneier took a fresh look at several issues familiar to readers of this blog: DRM, antivirus software, spyware, automatic updates, and even 'trusted computing'. Many people have said before that these things are bad for various reasons, but Schneier is the first I've seen to look at them all and draw a general conclusion from them: they are all attempts to own your computer... in other words, to take control away from you and sell it off to the highest bidder.

Schneier is a sensible guy. He's not standing on the street, waving a sign, screaming "The end is near!" His warnings are cautiously delivered, but disturbing nonetheless. He outlines a few things we can do to fight the trend, and retain control over our computers, but I wonder whether his good advice will fall on enough receptive ears to make a difference. Read his article and draw your own conclusions. Posted by Jim Thompson 5-5-06

Interesting commentary from security guru Bruce Schneier, called Who Owns Your Computer?,

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archiv...wns_your_c.html

about how some things we take for granted on today's PC actually result in a machine that is not under our control, even though we paid for it.

~EdT.

Cheers,

Linda

[Starman99]

We've got stadium named after products and brands; celebrities who can't open their mouths without listing a long string of products and sponsors, or wearing logoed clothing; reality tv shows where people would sell their mother for a buck. Why would the Internet be any different?

I have a recurring vision of a moustachioed Internet CEO getting off the plane from Beijing waving a piece of paper in their hand, proclaiming, "Product in our time".

Starman*

[Ridgerunr]

There are many other pieces of junk involved with trying to take over your computer,but the one that really fries me is the DRM crap! All the way from Sony's rootkit fiasco to Windows Media PLayer itself(Thanks M$!!!)
Most people don't realize what they may be letting themselves in for if they leave the players settings at default. If you do this,and use the library "feature" and other default "features",when you play commercial music disks,you "can" be tracked! I won't go into detail,but I "will" suggest you go into the "tools" menu and shutdown "all" the DRM and other call home crap. This pertains to any other "free" player you may install also. Good examples are Real Player and QuickTime. There are alternatives for the latter two that will let you play music with their extensions without having the bloated,takeover programs on your PC: scroll down here

Bottom line is,you can still control what your PC does,but it takes some time and thought and common sense along with teaching this to younger members of your family as well. It's just a damn shame that no matter how loud you yell,there will still be those who wander down the road blindly and become easy prey for the money grubbin' low lifes that infest the internet like maggots in a dead animal.

[SpywareDr]

... money grubbin' low lifes that infest the internet like maggots ...

Well said.