Brian's Blog

So I’m doing a bit of Warsong Gulch and I’m happily running towards the Alliance side, to find the enemy flag carrier in the attempt to get our own flag returned, and apparently the enemy flag carrier was running behind me, and I was obviously looking ahead, towards the enemy (alliance) ahead of me. Then some elitists moron starts spewing all over..

So I was reading an article on ComputerWorld with the author listing what he apparently deems to be “must-have” extensions for Firefox. What I found curious, like many other readers, was why the most popular Firefox extension of them all wasn’t even mentioned with a single word in the article. The extension is of course none other than Adblock Plus. Most of the extensions mentioned actually had nothing that I would call “must-have”, I actually only counted 1, maybe 2 if I’m being nice, that I’d call “must-have” extensions.

In response to that article I’ll write my own Top 20 list. I’ll also tag each extension as either “must-have” (MH) or “nice-to-have” (NtH). MH extensions are extensions that will/should benefit everyone and NtH extensions are those that really depend on each persons individual needs. Read more…

Today APG got their injunction against Tele2 for blocking the Russian MP3 store AllOfMP3.com

Computerworld has an article which goes more in-depth of this case.
Addition: BetaNews.com article.

It’s the Internet Service Provider, who has the responsibility for what the users are doing on the net – that’s the courts decision in the case about the users access to the website Allofmp3.com, where the service provider Tele2 was up against the musicindustry IFPI.

I’m more and more glad that I live in Sweden now instead of Denmark. Apparently control of the internet should be privaticed, for that is what APG is, a private organisation. No one should control the internet in such a way, that tells people what they’re should or should not browse.

I wonder what the hell the US government is on now. Reading a few newsarticles (WLTX, openDemocracy) I found out that USA wants to control Outer Space? If they’re serious about this then I think it’s about time for the rest of the world to put their collective foot down and say stop.

I’ve just finished reading an article from APG (AntiPiratGruppen aka. The Anti Piracy Group) where they write (roughly translated):

The Danish Anti Piracy Group, who handles the music- and filmindustry interests in matters regarding illegal copying of copyrighted material, have today applied for an injunction against the ISP Tele2. This is done as part of APG’s endeavour stop the illegal, russian website AllofMP3’s activities in Denmark.

They’re surely growing balls, or are they?

Looking at the statistics for 2005 it shows that there are 31 ISP’s offering xDSL services in Denmark. The statistics also show that the biggest by far is TDC with a whooping 72% of all xDSL subscribers in Denmark, 2nd. comes Cybercity with 13%, 3rd. is Tele2 with 10% and then the last 5% is spread over the remaining 28 ISP’s offering xDSL services.

I would think that if APG really wanted AllofMP3 blocked and was so sure that it would happen as they seem to think, they would have gone after TDC right away, this would certainly block the biggest amound of connections. But I guess APG is just grasping for straws as always.

Addition:

Tele2 have made a response to APG’s injunction:

It’s impossible to close the access to the russian site AllofMP3.com, states Tele2, after The Anti Piracy Group applied for an injuction against the site. “The only way to do this is to close all access to the Internet”, states Tele2.

From my basic knowledge on how the TCP/IP protocol works, the following methods would be how to block a specifik site, and the drawbacks of those methods.

• Using packet inspection/transparent proxy.
  This method is a simple way to check all trafic from the users, checking if it’s directed toward AllofMP3.com.
  The drawbacks to this are
  • Ressources.
    Running a transparent proxy takes a great deal of CPU and Memory, which in turn drains more power, which in turn cost more money. I somehow doubt APG are willing to pay for the extra expenses they’re forcing on the ISP’s.
  • Encryption.
    It’s really easy to set up an encrypted tunnel, where the packet contents can’t be read. That way anyone can get around this method, and the only way to avoid it is, as Tele2 stated, to close all access to the Internet.
• Blocking IP/IP-ranges.
  Changing the A record on the DNS for AllofMP3 is easy and takes a very short amount of time. Once again the only certain way is to block, if not all the Internet, then all IP’s assigned to Russia.

I wonder when APG stops this nonsense.