My Quiet Life

Well, I am a little slow on the uptake, here, but it turns out that audiogalaxy is, in effect, dead.

They have reached a settlement with the RIAA, detailed here. It basically makes any song undownloadable via audiogalaxy without the expressed consent of the artist.

However, on a rather funny note: People are starting to rot13 filenames to bypass the restrictions. Try searching for "ZRgNYYVPN" ("metallica" rot13ed) on audiogalaxy.

I am quite disappointed, though, as audiogalaxy was one of the first instances of P2P sharing that I actually thought was engineered smartly: a web interface for searching and queuing to a small, non-resource-intensive application to do the actual transfers.

Anyone have any suggestions for a suitable (or better?) replacement?

I usually don't go in for all the slashdot brand of religious eccentricity and holy warring, but there's an article on slashdot this morning that is spot on.

It's about the recent article in various big news sources reporting "New PC virus can infect picture files".

These virus companies drumming up new threats to generate revenue are pretty pathetic indeed.

Someone needs to write a more comprehensive and less vitriolic version of that slashdot article that explains in layman's terms what viruses can and can't do. I would do it, but ah.. I'm busy this week.

Since moving, my wireless network hasn't worked too well in my new apartment. That, combined with wanting to give wireless internet access to my neighbors (upstairs) via our DSL, has got me researching wireless and trying to learn as much as I can.

I think what I need is the Superpass 2.4GHz 9dBi 120 degree antenna. It gives 120 degrees of signal, which is what I need, since my access point is currently in the corner of my house, and relocating it would be difficult. It also gives enough vertical spread (40 degrees) to get to my neighbors.

It's around $60, plus the cost of a pigtail, $20, unless I can mooch one from a friend in the wireless biz. Not too bad, really, but more than my broke-ass can spend right now. So, if anyone wants to give me an early birthday present, you know what to do! And after you buy me the BMW, you could get me this antenna for christmas or something.

Well, I am officially no longer a customer of Bellsouth Fastaccess DSL. The reasons are numerous:

1. Before we moved, I told them to switch my DSL over to the new place on May 23rd (the date we were supposed to move). Despite having a lengthy conversation explaining this, by May 10th my DSL and phone at my old apartment (where we were still living) was cut off, leaving us with no internet access or phone. Strike 1.
2. After we got mostly moved in (on an accelerated schedule, thanks to Bellsouth), I started trying to get my DSL hooked up. It took me nearly 3 weeks working on and off with Bellsouth trying to get it working before I was at my wits' end. Bellsouth was unable to figure out why I couldn't get online, despite having sync on my modem, and were alternately unhelpful, rude, incredulous, incompetent, and sometimes all of the above. Strike two.
3. Finally, I got ahold of a tech support rep that knew his ass from his elbow. I explained at length (one of a number of times I had done so) that I had a DSL modem operating in *bridged* mode, and that I preferred it this way. He informed me that Bellsouth no longer did bridged access, and my new neighborhood didn't even support it. If I wanted DSL from them, I'd have to use PPPoE, meaning I'd have a little dialup connection my windows box and whatnot. I understand there are PPPoE clients for OpenBSD (my current firewall) but I totally don't have the time to mess with that. Not to mention the overhead of PPPoE compared to just doing a straight bridged connection. But anyways. Strike three.

Of course, it's misleading for me to act like I was counting strikes, because I was pretty much bent over, seeing as how Bellsouth was pretty much the only reasonable DSL provider in my area -- or so I thought.

My salvation came in the form of butler.net, a company owned by a friend of mine, Bill Butler. I called him up and he said he had no problems doing a bridged setup, and even got the transfer from Bellsouth's network started for me. If you're in the Tennessee area, I heartily recommend giving Bill a call.

I was online in a matter of days. I am officially relocated off of Bellsouth's network and I couldn't be happier. Score one for the little guy.

The album I've been listening to pretty heavily lately is Bleed American, by Jimmy Eat World.

I'm enjoying it tremendously, and wishing I had checked it out earlier. For me I ignored this band, due to the worthlessness of pop radio at the time they came on the scene. I only assumed they sucked, since they had a pop hit. I need to remember that some great music still manages to make the top 40 these days.