Random Thoughts Thread. (Clean version)

[gamefreak94]

Originally Posted by SCHUMI_4EVER

I envy all you people getting buried under snow.

I do too.

__________________

"Don't worry about what people think. They don't do it very often." - Anonymous

[Bakuraiya]

anyone here heard of 'ANONYMOUS' ???
or their new operation?
its called operation TITSTORM.
no im not posting anything that cant be included into a clean post. i live in australia where the jerks in parliament and some moron called Stephen Conroy (the minister for broadband communications) is going to try to force a bill through the Senate & other levels of Parliament to impose ISP-level (no, you can't break it with a circumventor - they'll block them. HTTP tunneling interface? They'll block the download sites too.) filtering on the whole country.
Meaning, not just one state. Not just one ISP. EVERYONE.
This is not an early April Fools joke, this is actually happening.

----

Despite:
-every ISP having refused to participate (largely on the grounds that they "value their customers" or "cannot afford implementation")
-a majority of states/territories having already stated that they will not support this proposal
and, -proof that the filter is ineffective,
it's such a crazy plan, it might just work.

The main issue that people are having is that it will bring internet speeds down by 70%. Now, correct me if I'm wrong (I probably am, I'm very bad at maths) but this leaves almost everyone with high-speed broadband (which is expensive here) will be back at dial-up speed. Dial-up people and those of us relying on wireless/mobile broadband won't *have* a connection.
I have experienced dial-up in the age of Flash websites, CSS, and hi-res images. Believe you me, having your eyeballs removed with a rusty spoon is infinitely preferable to trying to load any modern website on dial-up speed.

The other issue: The broad category of what should be banned.
Tell me, internet: what does 'unwanted content' mean?
It means, 'anything we don't want you to see'.
Refused Classification covers anything that:
*Depict, express or otherwise deals with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified.
*Depict in a way that is likely to cause offence to a reasonable adult a minor who is, or who appears to be, under 16 (whether or not engaged in sexual activity).
*Promote, incite or instruct in matters of crime or violence.
Now, granted, some of this includes sites with instructions on how to make poisons, explosives and dangerous drugs, sites with torture videos, sites depicting some generally not very nice stuff.
It also contains sites that advocate harm-minimalisation approaches to drug addiction, sites seriously discussing euthanasia, sites showing perfectly legal pornography (especially fetish images - nudity or no nudity), and sites discussing the treatment of indigenous people in Australia's past (not a subject we're proud of, but hey, it did happen), among other things. It's a very broad category.

Not that long ago, Wikileaks leaked the ACMA draft blacklist. It's still up, despite threats against Wikileaks. Google it.
Alright. A lot of them *are* some very nasty sites. Some of them shouldn't exist, full stop. But masking the problem is only helping these sick people.
The money spent on this filter would be better spent on the Australian Federal Police's taskforce dedicated to finding and imprisoning these people for the things they have done.

There are other issues at stake here. This whole concept is a fundamental violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as laid out by the United Nations. (then again, the Australian government has never really shown any respect for international law, so it's not likely that they would care about that, even if it *could* get us trade sanctions from some countries that we rely upon for vital goods.) It violates our rights to freedom of speech, association and information as protected under Australian law. And honestly, it's a very big step on the road to totalitarianism. Sure, it's a slippery slope, but we have no reason to start down it!

We are the only democratic country with any form of internet filtering. And if we start, who will stop anyone else from starting?

I could go on for years here. I could post a 5k word essay (if I wasn't keeping a lot of people awake and at my place right now. Sorry, guys, but I'm in rant mode. There's a reason I told you not to let me do this. It's been 20 minutes now.) But, I'm going to stop here, and just say - form your opinion. Research. Do your homework.
Hopefully, you'll see it the way I, and much of Australia, do.

A good place to start is nocleanfeed. Electronic Freedom Australia is another good place to find information. Wikipedia will help you to understand our processes and just what is covered by the filter. Wikileaks will give you the draft blacklist - and it's not going to vanish soon, there's too many mirrors.
Last of all, look at the article for Operation Titstorm on Encyclopedia Dramatica. A warning to everyone: some of the advertising on this site does contain nudity, and you probably don't want to expand any image galleries. But watch the videos on the page, especially second from the bottom (unrelated, but that girl is awesome. I want to hug her. "In before Australia bans this video"? I love it.) and the messages from Anonymous to the Australian Government.

And if you're in Australia: February 20. There are protests countrywide. Adelaide's protest is Elder Park, 10am, march to Parliament House ending 3pm. Be there. No masks, guys, and don't be stupid and throw things or yell, or generally cause trouble - because if you do, you're just giving them a reason to call for us to be outlawed. The masks alienate us from the public - we want to show them that we are them; we are normal people, just like them (also, they just look silly). The rules are on the Operation Titstorm IRL article, which is linked.
We need your help. Nobody is immune. Not the great-grandmother who enjoys playing Farmville on Facebook. Not the two-year-old just learning to write. Not the fifteen-year old doing their homework. Not the twenty-year-old university student. Not the fifty-year-old stockbrocker. Nobody is immune. We are all in danger of being censored. And therefore, this is everyone's war. We are all involved, whether we want to be or not. And if we stay silent, then we will be silenced forever.

tl;dr, we need your help to keep the internet alive.

inb4 the government bans this post

- Dartigen, 13th February 2010

(catch her at Tami (dartigen) on Twitter )

also one final word from dartigen

"The Australian Government has apparently also stated that they are banning 'pornography depicting small-breasted women'. Because it's 'practically pedophilia'.
Not every woman has the lucky genetics to be above a B-cup. Some women just have different genes.

Then again, why am I surprised? Stephen Conroy is a man.
(sorry for the sexism. Couldn't resist. Besides, he's being sexist too.)"

all of the above was written by dartigen on my account so ill just say a bit more then sign off.
if the government does pass this bill then australian internet is absolutely screwed. do not pass go do not collect $200
heh btw here is a link to what we are on about:

Operation Titstorm - Encyclopedia Dramatica *warning this site has some explicit images so if you dont want to see any then just google either "anonymous" or "operation titstorm"
Electronic Frontiers Australia: civil liberties online
No Clean Feed - Stop Internet Censorship in Australia

[SCHUMI_4EVER]

Did you really have to copy the whole damn thing again?

__________________

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The Champ has retired but may his Legacy live on FOREVER !!!!

No$GBA DS FAQ 2.0

Get it right fools! The glass is HALF-EMPTY, not half-full!!!

!!! WARNING: Emulation requires a brain !!! WARNING: Emulation =/= Piracy !!!

[gamefreak94]

I doubt anyone will actually go through it all.

__________________

"Don't worry about what people think. They don't do it very often." - Anonymous

[IronRaven]

(echoing Schumi)The whole damn thing again...thing again....
EDIT: Right you game freak. I don't even know what its all about.

__________________

[Hy-Def]

RT: How do I break a bike chain without the chain tool. I really can't get one where I live. My brother promised me he'll give me his bike if I can fix the bigger one we have that's disassembled. The chain appears to be in a knot so I decided it would be easier to break it then reassemble it as chains do not bend like string.

EDIT: Right you IronRaven and GameFreak94. I didn't even read half of it.

[redlofredlof]

Originally Posted by Hy-Def

RT: How do I break a bike chain without the chain tool. I really can't get one where I live. My brother promised me he'll give me his bike if I can fix the bigger one we have that's disassembled. The chain appears to be in a knot so I decided it would be easier to break it then reassemble it as chains do not bend like string.

EDIT: Right you IronRaven and GameFreak94. I didn't even read half of it.

here's what you have to do.
get the chain off the cog
place it on a small screw (the cavity of the screw should be of the same size as that of the chain's pin
take a screwdriver having the same thickness as that of the the chain's pin.
Now hit the chain's pin while keeping the chain on top of the screw( screw's cavity should be directly below the chains' pin.
=o=o=o=o=o=o=
o is the chain's pin
--|
Oo<----====
--|

__________________

[IronRaven]

I thought you hated bikes, Red...
How do you know all this?

__________________

---

Last edited by IronRaven; February 13th, 2010 at 14:07.. Reason: Automerged Doublepost

[Hy-Def]

Thanks, I'll try that.

[Lex_Light]

Originally Posted by Bakuraiya

anyone here heard of 'ANONYMOUS' ???
or their new operation?
its called operation TITSTORM.
no im not posting anything that cant be included into a clean post. i live in australia where the jerks in parliament and some moron called Stephen Conroy (the minister for broadband communications) is going to try to force a bill through the Senate & other levels of Parliament to impose ISP-level (no, you can't break it with a circumventor - they'll block them. HTTP tunneling interface? They'll block the download sites too.) filtering on the whole country.
Meaning, not just one state. Not just one ISP. EVERYONE.
This is not an early April Fools joke, this is actually happening.

----

Despite:
-every ISP having refused to participate (largely on the grounds that they "value their customers" or "cannot afford implementation")
-a majority of states/territories having already stated that they will not support this proposal
and, -proof that the filter is ineffective,
it's such a crazy plan, it might just work.

The main issue that people are having is that it will bring internet speeds down by 70%. Now, correct me if I'm wrong (I probably am, I'm very bad at maths) but this leaves almost everyone with high-speed broadband (which is expensive here) will be back at dial-up speed. Dial-up people and those of us relying on wireless/mobile broadband won't *have* a connection.
I have experienced dial-up in the age of Flash websites, CSS, and hi-res images. Believe you me, having your eyeballs removed with a rusty spoon is infinitely preferable to trying to load any modern website on dial-up speed.

The other issue: The broad category of what should be banned.
Tell me, internet: what does 'unwanted content' mean?
It means, 'anything we don't want you to see'.
Refused Classification covers anything that:
*Depict, express or otherwise deals with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified.
*Depict in a way that is likely to cause offence to a reasonable adult a minor who is, or who appears to be, under 16 (whether or not engaged in sexual activity).
*Promote, incite or instruct in matters of crime or violence.
Now, granted, some of this includes sites with instructions on how to make poisons, explosives and dangerous drugs, sites with torture videos, sites depicting some generally not very nice stuff.
It also contains sites that advocate harm-minimalisation approaches to drug addiction, sites seriously discussing euthanasia, sites showing perfectly legal pornography (especially fetish images - nudity or no nudity), and sites discussing the treatment of indigenous people in Australia's past (not a subject we're proud of, but hey, it did happen), among other things. It's a very broad category.

Not that long ago, Wikileaks leaked the ACMA draft blacklist. It's still up, despite threats against Wikileaks. Google it.
Alright. A lot of them *are* some very nasty sites. Some of them shouldn't exist, full stop. But masking the problem is only helping these sick people.
The money spent on this filter would be better spent on the Australian Federal Police's taskforce dedicated to finding and imprisoning these people for the things they have done.

There are other issues at stake here. This whole concept is a fundamental violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as laid out by the United Nations. (then again, the Australian government has never really shown any respect for international law, so it's not likely that they would care about that, even if it *could* get us trade sanctions from some countries that we rely upon for vital goods.) It violates our rights to freedom of speech, association and information as protected under Australian law. And honestly, it's a very big step on the road to totalitarianism. Sure, it's a slippery slope, but we have no reason to start down it!

We are the only democratic country with any form of internet filtering. And if we start, who will stop anyone else from starting?

I could go on for years here. I could post a 5k word essay (if I wasn't keeping a lot of people awake and at my place right now. Sorry, guys, but I'm in rant mode. There's a reason I told you not to let me do this. It's been 20 minutes now.) But, I'm going to stop here, and just say - form your opinion. Research. Do your homework.
Hopefully, you'll see it the way I, and much of Australia, do.

A good place to start is nocleanfeed. Electronic Freedom Australia is another good place to find information. Wikipedia will help you to understand our processes and just what is covered by the filter. Wikileaks will give you the draft blacklist - and it's not going to vanish soon, there's too many mirrors.
Last of all, look at the article for Operation Titstorm on Encyclopedia Dramatica. A warning to everyone: some of the advertising on this site does contain nudity, and you probably don't want to expand any image galleries. But watch the videos on the page, especially second from the bottom (unrelated, but that girl is awesome. I want to hug her. "In before Australia bans this video"? I love it.) and the messages from Anonymous to the Australian Government.

And if you're in Australia: February 20. There are protests countrywide. Adelaide's protest is Elder Park, 10am, march to Parliament House ending 3pm. Be there. No masks, guys, and don't be stupid and throw things or yell, or generally cause trouble - because if you do, you're just giving them a reason to call for us to be outlawed. The masks alienate us from the public - we want to show them that we are them; we are normal people, just like them (also, they just look silly). The rules are on the Operation Titstorm IRL article, which is linked.
We need your help. Nobody is immune. Not the great-grandmother who enjoys playing Farmville on Facebook. Not the two-year-old just learning to write. Not the fifteen-year old doing their homework. Not the twenty-year-old university student. Not the fifty-year-old stockbrocker. Nobody is immune. We are all in danger of being censored. And therefore, this is everyone's war. We are all involved, whether we want to be or not. And if we stay silent, then we will be silenced forever.

tl;dr, we need your help to keep the internet alive.

inb4 the government bans this post

- Dartigen, 13th February 2010

(catch her at Tami (dartigen) on Twitter )

also one final word from dartigen

"The Australian Government has apparently also stated that they are banning 'pornography depicting small-breasted women'. Because it's 'practically pedophilia'.
Not every woman has the lucky genetics to be above a B-cup. Some women just have different genes.

Then again, why am I surprised? Stephen Conroy is a man.
(sorry for the sexism. Couldn't resist. Besides, he's being sexist too.)"

all of the above was written by dartigen on my account so ill just say a bit more then sign off.
if the government does pass this bill then australian internet is absolutely screwed. do not pass go do not collect $200
heh btw here is a link to what we are on about:

Operation Titstorm - Encyclopedia Dramatica *warning this site has some explicit images so if you dont want to see any then just google either "anonymous" or "operation titstorm"
Electronic Frontiers Australia: civil liberties online
No Clean Feed - Stop Internet Censorship in Australia

I only have one thing to say...
WTH is that?

__________________
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New one:
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18 November 2009, at 19:59 : Nevar forget.

Originally Posted by sergitox29

check if your mother is compatible with 45nm processors

My Deviantart (WARNING, IT'S MAINLY SPANISH!)

[IronRaven]

Well said Lex.Well said.

__________________

[redlofredlof]

Originally Posted by IronRaven

I thought you hated bikes, Red...
How do you know all this?

Cause I'm awesome

Originally Posted by Hy-Def

Thanks, I'll try that.

Best of luck, don't hurt your fingers.

__________________

[Hy-Def]

Thanks. I tried it once and I hurt my fingers. I'll try it again later.

[ozzgx4]

lol people that live in warm climates want colder weather and the opposite for people living in a cold climate, what a carzy world

__________________

http://ozzgx4.deviantart.com/

When you were born you were crying and everyone
around you was smiling, make it through life so that
when you die you will be smiling and everyone around you will be crying.

[Smooth Criminal]

^stole my words...i dont wanna get baked in 45 degress Celsius again this summer

__________________

and if I don't care , do I still get to suck your scrotum? please say yes xp

^^posted bysonic

[ozzgx4]

Come to the UK, where it is most likey going to rain again in the summer like it did last year

__________________

http://ozzgx4.deviantart.com/

When you were born you were crying and everyone
around you was smiling, make it through life so that
when you die you will be smiling and everyone around you will be crying.

[gamefreak94]

I wish I could.....

__________________

"Don't worry about what people think. They don't do it very often." - Anonymous

[Smooth Criminal]

if you are giving tickets and visa i wud come in my nightdress

__________________

and if I don't care , do I still get to suck your scrotum? please say yes xp

^^posted bysonic

[capo_2k]

What I want more than anything is sunlight! In the UK it's always cloudy and lemme tell you - it TOTALLY SUCKS ASS!

[ozzgx4]

You will have to change your name and location

__________________

http://ozzgx4.deviantart.com/

When you were born you were crying and everyone
around you was smiling, make it through life so that
when you die you will be smiling and everyone around you will be crying.