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So, you think that your password is secure? Let's see: does it contain a mixture of uppercase/lowercase letters, punctuation marks and digits? Yes? Well, even in this case, your password might be still completely insecure. Read ahead why...

To understand the problem, we need first a little rehash of the basic password cracking techniques. The simplest algorithm would be to simply (1) enumerate all English words and names from a given dictionary and (2) check to see if this word matches as your password.

You might say - but in this context we are talking about other characters like punctuation marks and digits that are part of the password. What would an attacker do in this case? Simple - use a little psychology.

The problem is that most people feel that adding digits and other characters is just a burden. When the 'password will expire today' dialog comes, they will be in a hurry to get a new password, maybe an easy-to-remember word, and then alter it in a few ways:    
1) First, the password needs to have a capital letter. Most people will naturally choose the first letter from our English word to be capitalized. So, a word like 'flowers' becomes 'Flowers'.
2) Second, the password needs to contain some digits. The password would look nicer (and easier to remember) when these digits are appended to the word. Even more, people are usually unimaginative here, and just append one digit, or in more complex cases, digit sequences like '123' or '01' or eventually their birthdate.
3) Third, we need some non-alphanumeric characters. Well, let's see. If we replace an 's' with '$', 'a' with '@' or 'o' with zero, then we get what we want, right? It is hard to resist the tentation to replace 's' with '$' at least (and not an 'a' with '$'), and therefore getting a false sense of security. In some cases also using delimiter characters like '!' or '#' to separate the word from the digit sequence.

So, with the example above, the altered forms of the word 'flowers' might be: 'Fl0wer$' or 'Flower$01' or 'Fl0wers#123' and so on and so forth.

The problem with these alteration rules is that they are so predictable. All the attacker has to do is to take the same list of English words, and apply the rules above. He will probably get a longer list by, say a factor of 10-100 which is not that much.

In conclusion, it's not that hard to enter into the minds of regular people, and neither in the minds of attackers. So, if you used any of these rules above, then stop using them. Instead, here are some rules to create strong passwords.

P.S. As for me? I just uuidgen.exe to create a random sequence of digits.

MSN Video Download  apparently went live today with a choice of two membership types  Premium and Basic.  Premium is $19.95 a year and has more content than the free Basic membership.  Not wanting to commit myself to a membership yet I signed up for the Basic membership, thinking I could load some videos on to the miniSD card in my smartphone....

Sign up was easy, I used my passport account, agreed to the terms and installed the download software.  The download status page showed content was downloading from Fox Sports.  In order to sync content to my phone I needed a smart playlist so I followed the instructions to download one.  This was the first problem, the instructions used Windows Media Player 9 and I'm using Windows Media Player 10, a little strange, but not a huge problem.  With the smart playlist in place I thought I'd be good to go...

That wasn't going to be the case though.  I started by trying to play a video in Media Player directly and got prompted for a username and password which was being requested by 'admin.theplatform.com' not 'msnvideodownloads.com'.  I tried my Passport email address and password which might not have been a great idea, but it didn't work anyway.  Meanwhile I could see that Activesync had been trying to sync the content to my phone so I checked the Sync page in WMP.  Nothing had been synced, instead  there was an error message 'Windows Media Player can not synchronize the protected file.  Protected files can not be converted to the required quality level or format'.

Now I have almost half a gigabyte of content (and it's still getting downloaded) and I can't watch any of it.  If anyone gets this working I'd love to know how.

Quicksilver 1.0b49 by Blacktree

Quicksilver is a Mac OS X application that allows you to find what you need quickly and easily, while keeping your hands on the keyboard. For example, if you want to launch an application hidden in the depths of your file system, simply activate Quicksilver with a keystroke, type a few letters of the application's name, then hit Return or Enter to launch it. - posted by sryo

Miranda IM 0.5 Preview Release 1 by Miranda IM Team

Miranda IM is a lightweight instant messanger with plugin support for all major IM network, and many more features. - posted by sryo

Clickonic 1.0.4 by Sergey Gagarin (Inform Seg@)

Clickonic.dll is a LiteStep Desktop module, that provides the ability to view folders on the desktop. Unlike the IconDesk, it is less customizable, but it completely supports drag-and-drop operations, so you can place your icons like YOU want... - posted by sryo

Foobar2000 0.9.3 beta 1 by Peter Pawlowski

Foobar2000 is an advanced audio player for the Windows platform. Some of the basic features include ReplayGain support, low memory footprint and native support for several popular audio formats. - posted by sryo

Related Links:

• blizzle.com/­releases.php
  

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I have known David Strom for a dozen years or so. He is one of the best writers out there. Whether it is hardware, software, audio, or how to do things, David digs deep, analyzes what's out there and writes comprehensive stories. His latest is about blogging, and I was happy to provide some input. If you are looking for tips about blogging, David's story is an excellent reference. His cardinal rule is to "tell the truth". He explains why it is important to find your voice and stick to it. Above all, he says, "be professional at all times". Many organizations are not capitalizing on the power of blogging, but it is not too late. David says "Craft your corporate blogging policy now, understand the mechanics and know your tools". As in all of his stories, this one offers really solid advice.

Other stories about blogging at patrickWeb are here.

In yesterday's announcement of the new Zune media player and Zune Marketplace, Microsoft (and many press reports) glossed over a remarkable misfeature that should demonstrate once and for all how DRM and the DMCA harm legitimate customers.

Microsoft's Zune will not play protected Windows Media Audio and Video purchased or 'rented' from Napster 2.0, Rhapsody, Yahoo! Unlimited, Movielink, Cinemanow, or any other online media service. That's right -- the media that Microsoft promised would Play For Sure doesn't even play on Microsoft's own device. Buried in footnote 4 of its press release, Microsoft clearly states that 'Zune software can import audio files in unprotected WMA, MP3, AAC; photos in JPEG; and videos in WMV, MPEG-4, H.264' -- protected WMA and WMV (not to mention iTunes DRMed AAC) are conspicuously absent.

This is a stark example of DRM under the DMCA giving customers a raw deal. Buying DRMed media means you're locked into the limited array of devices that vendors say you can use. You have to rebuy your preexisting DRMed media collection if you want to use it on the Zune. And you'll have to do that over and over again whenever a new, incompatible device with innovative features blows existing players out of the water. Access to MP3s and non-DRMed formats creates the only bridge between these isolated islands of limited devices.

The real culprit here is the DMCA -- but for that bad law, customers could legally convert DRMed files into whatever format they want, and tech creators would be free to reverse engineer the DRM to create compatible devices. Even though those acts have traditionally been and still are non-infringing, the DMCA makes them illegal and stifles fair use, innovation, and competition.

May this be a lesson to those who mistakenly laud certain DRM as 'open' and offering customers 'freedom of choice' simply because it is widely-licensed. With DRM under the DMCA, nothing truly plays for sure, regardless of whether you're purchasing from Apple, Microsoft, or anyone else.

Take action now to support DMCA reform and to stop the government from mandating more DRM.

[Postscript: In an interview with Engadget, Microsoft Zune architect J Allard pointed out that Zune has sufficient video format support, in part because there's 'Lots of DVD ripping software out there that encodes to those formats, so the most popular formats out there, whether it's MPEG-4 or H.264, we'll support those.' Gee, he isn't suggesting that his business model benefits from customers using tools like DeCSS or Handbrake to evade the DRM on DVDs, right? Especially since Microsoft is furiously trying to squash the FairUse4WM tool, that would seem rather hypocritical.]

(Cross-posted at DeepLinks)

1. Set up your printer so it works locally on the Mac.
   
2. On the Mac, in 'System Preferences', click 'Sharing', and check 'Printer Sharing'.
   
3. On the Ubuntu box, choose 'System', 'Administration', 'Printing'. Double-click 'New Printer'. Choose 'Network Printer', and leave it on 'CUPS Printer'. Type 'http://mac-dns-name-or-ip-address:631/printer/mac-queue-name' as the URI. (If you can't remember the queue name, visit the /printer URI in your browser.) Click 'Forward', choose manufacturer 'Raw' and model 'Queue', and you're done.
   

Thanks for all the nice feedback on the stories about the Business Leadership Forum in Rome. There are two final links that may be of interest. Chris Barger at IBM has posted the audio for the podcast about the demos, Internet technology, and healthcare. You can play it from here. Also, if you like the printed word, there is a single pdf that contains all the stories in one 23 page printable document. You can find it here.

Intro to Roman Rendezvous Stories
Index to Roman Rendezvous stories
Podcast
Transcript of podcast

• Joe Clark is setting up an ambitious accessibility project. The Open & Closed Project aims to write a set of standards for the four fields of accessible media: captioning, audio description, subtitling, and dubbing.

  The project will develop its set of standards through research and evidence-gathering. The standards will then be tested for a year in the real world, after which it training and certification programmes will be developed for practitioners. Finally the project will continue the work of developing and testing improved fonts for captioning and subtitling, and create a universal file format. Like I said, its an ambitious project.

  Ambitious projects need funding – in this case $7 million. But that’s not where you come in. Joe intends to fund raise that sum himself, however that in itself is a full time job, so Joe is looking for micropatronage to subsidize him for four months while he beavers away at the fundraising. Joe is aiming for the lucky sum of $7,777 and you can help by donating as much or as little as you like.

  The Open & Closed Project is not neccesarily a Web accessibilty project, except to the extent that Web sites use multimedia with one or more of those features, but it should benefit millions of people across the globe, in providing access to media both on and offline. I’d love to see it happen, so I’ll be contributing to Joe’s food money over the next few months. If you don’t feel the same way, you could always run one of his banners, which are well worth a look.

• 

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David Burnett talks to the New York Times on what cameras he uses and why he mainly shoots digital now - he's another Canon 20D user.  The article is interesting, but the audio slideshow is much more interesting.  He explains that he uses a number of different cameras depending on the type of photo he's going for and on the slideshow there's a few examples.

I love my 20D, but it's not a camera that I can use all the time, it's just too big, so I also have a Canon SD500 which I've mentioned before.  I'll get different types of photos from each camera; I can't do the same things with the SD500 that I can do with the 20D, but I can take it places a 20D just isn't appropriate.  It's hard to be inconspicuous with a large SLR camera and buy the time I've tweaked the settings the moment is lost.  The SD500 I use for more spontaneous photos, I don't mess with the settings, just accept the defaults and let the camera deal with the situation and most of the time it does a great job, probably better than I could have done manually.  Take this as an example - that was shot at dawn directly into the rising sun with the SD500 and captured the scene exactly as I wanted it.  The 20D on the otherhand lets me get photos like this, which the SD500 wasn't able to manage (subjects lit entirely by candle light on a moving boat).  The SD500 also shoots video, a feature I never thought I'd use as I've always prefered still shots, but I found a few instances when video captured a scene much better than a still image could.  The 20D as you'd expect from an SLR doesn't capture video.  Different tools for different jobs.

The New York Times also has some tips on digital photography, nothing really new to me there, but it might be off interested to any just getting into digital.

The new PodShow+ site, unleashing pretty darn soon, has a personal bio feature called 'The Legend of me'. I just filled mine out. Here's what I wrote:

I'm a programmer with an apetite for timeshifted media. That pretty much sums it up. In 2000, before I'd heard of RSS, I was using Voquette Media Manager to record Real streams of This American Life, which I'd lovingly burn to CD and listen to on long car trips. Later, in the days of 'audio blogging', I used the Radio Userland news aggregator to automatically pull MP3 files from enclosure-bearing RSS from Dave Winer, Chistopher Lydon and Doug Kaye. I'd then locate these on my hard drive and drag them, one at a time, into the media management software for my Neuros MP3 player. It worked, sort of, but was too much effort, and there was still too little content (especially after Chris took a break) for practical daily use. Adam Curry switched me back on in 2004 with a steady stream of daily content, developer feedback, feature ideas and a critical insight that made the medium: we needed automatic sync to the listening device. The early innovations in podcasting were nearly all Mac-only, which as a Windows user drove me nuts. Erik de Jonge's 'iSpider' project had a decent command-line Python/Applescript codebase, and were up for doing a cross-platform GUI product, which is where I wanted to go. Bringing in some modest COM knowledge that Pieter Overbeeke's 'i-podder' javascript helped me learn, I joined the iSpider team and Lemon was born. Nearly two years and one Ceast and Desist later, Lemon is now known as Juice and has accumulated over 2 million downloads. Along the way, Martijn Venrooy and I built the GigaDial 'podstation factory' (October 2004), and in Fall 2005 I joined PodShow and moved my family from Boston to San Francisco. At PodShow I do a mix of engineering (DGAP, Golden Tickets), developer relations (developer.podshow.com, DevCasts), technical reviews of potential partners and, when anyone will listen :-), talent scouting. I'm bullish on New Media and on the lookout for cool new stuff to build, to make listening and viewing better.

Pretty verbose --- it fills the alotted space on my profile page --- yet it barely scratches the surface.

Technology writer, Peter Svensson, wrote an interesting story called "Will video break the Internet?". From a technical point of view there are many factors to consider. If a large number of web "surfers" were using the Internet as their primary way to watch TV, there would be a problem. More capacity is clearly needed, especially as HD-TV becomes more prevalent. The pessimists -- and some telecommunications operators -- see rising fees to pay for the bandwidth expansion. Optimists know that various technologies such as multicasting, caching, digital video recorders, etc. are dramatically improving the Net's ability to deliver video content and in parallel the cost per unit of technology continues to decline. History would suggest the optimistic view is the right one.

During the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta there was a bomb blast. Native Atlanta ex-patriots living in Japan and Germany and other parts of the world wanted to get as much news coverage as possible about the status but had few choices (there were no blogs then). The Internet Technology team at IBM in Southbury, Connecticut was running a large web infrastructure for the Games at the time and one of the engineers, Andy Stanford-Clark, got the idea to "stream" a local Atlanta radio station over the Internet using an IBM technology called Bamba. It was a very successful project but only a handful of people could listen simultaneously due to the limitations of the technology and the Internet. Some people thought that if there were large numbers of listeners "audio would break the Internet". Today millions of people consider audio over the Net as commonplace. (Listening to crystal clear classical music from KUSC-FM in Los Angeles through my Sqeezebox as I write this). Based on the tens of millions of daily visitors to YouTube, it is clear that video has also become commonplace. Another leading indicator is what is happening on campus. A number of universities have decided to use the Internet to deliver cable TV to their dormitories.

One of the issues Mr. Svensson raised in his story is "net neutrality", a term that means different things to different people. The fear is that the really large telecommunications companies that provide parts of the "backbone" of the Internet may decide to not only raise fees but also to be discriminatory. In the extreme it would mean that Verizon would block access to Google because they made a deal with Yahoo! or visa versa. The telcos have never been successful in getting into the content business so a new angle for them might be to make deals with content providers that would make their video move through the Internet backbone at a higher priority in return for fees. These fears have gotten the attention of lawmakers who are now talking about legislation to insure net neutrality. Legislation is the worst possible way to address the issue.

What is really needed is more competition. In Japan, the Internet service available to consumers is significantly faster than in the U.S. and significantly less expensive. For example, Yahoo! Broadband offers 8 million bits per second for about $20 per month. Up to 100 million bits per second is available. What technical breakthrough have they had? None. The breakthrough was to separate the various infrastructure elements of Internet service and allow "Adam Smith's invisible hand" to go to work. More competition means higher speeds and lower prices. In the U.S. we have legions of lawyers and lobbyists at work doing their best to gain protections for themselves and to slow the spread of innovation such as municipal wireless and voice over IP. Will video break the Internet? No. The biggest threat to freedom of choice for content at competitive prices is a lack of competition.

Misguided or overly-prescriptive legislation can have unintended consequences. It can often fix one problem and create two new ones or add yet another layer of protectionism. Mike Nelson, former Director for Technology Policy at the Federal Communications Commission (and former colleague at IBM), says "a lack of competition which lets companies exert monopoly or duopoly power is probably the biggest damper on innovation". Not all legislation is bad. It is possible to use it to increase competition and decrease regulation, to fund e-government pilot projects, "connect the unconnected," or fund university education and research.


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