Build Date: Thu Mar 12 20:50:19 2026 UTC
Bad things happen when you drop a four pack of Guinness on the ground when you are trying to remove it from the car.
-- Johnnie Royale
Keep Your Hands Off of My PC
2002-03-02 19:23:01
In a screeching rant that would make any PDJ author proud, Thom Greene of The Register rips into Senator Hollings (D - SC) and his ludicrous "dog and pony" SSSCA hearings Hollings held early this week.
As most PDJ readers know, any PC that would be legal under the SSSCA would be rendered to nothing more then an expensive VCR/CD that crashed on a regular basis (just to remind you that Microsoft Windows was Inside.) Any sort of real and effective anti-copy protection requires the hardware and the operating system to distrust and disallow all but "validated" programs, applications and content. Under the SSSCA, if some byte hasn't been blessed by one of the few privileged multi-national corporations allowed to bless bytes, you can bet your sweet ass that "your" PC will choke on it. Your PC will probably also be programmed to alert your local police department that you've been practicing unsafe computing. And Linux will never, ever qualify as an SSSCA approved product.
An Intel VP, Leslie Vadasz, echoed this thought, in an uncharacteristic moment of sanity in Sen. Hollings' private little hearing room - which is really more of country club, where only the most generous donors are permitted membership and allowed to speak. And for his efforts, Sen. Hollings berated Vadasz for not marching to the corporate drum. Or at least Sen. Hollings' corporate drum.
First elected in 1966, Sen. Hollings is rapidly setting himself up to become the poster boy of Senatorial term limits. Oblivious to the technical revolution of the past 40 years and obviously in the pocket of his corporate masters, it appears that Hollings is willing to destroy the personal freedoms of millions of computer using Americans, along with permanently crippling US technical leadership in this field, all for just the few shekels the MPAA and RIAA tossed into to his re-election basket.
I'd tell you to write to Senator Hollings and inform him just what a bad idea the SSSCA is, but it is clear that Sen. Hollings thinks that anyone that wants to copy a file or write a program or just use a computer in an "unapproved" fashion is a criminal that should be heavily fined and then locked up. So instead, I urge you to join the EFF and fight for your rights.
Those evil bastards in the House and Senate might have slipped the DMCA over on us when we weren't watching, but not this time... not this time. And we certainly might lose fight against the SSSCA, but at least we'll be watching and protesting. I certainly plan to make myself as annoying as possible to those that support the SSSCA and won't be watching the SSSCA become law with any shred of probity or dignity remaining.
T O P S T O R I E S
The Crossroads are real and The Blues is a place; The enduring myth of Robert Johnson (More...)
California Glory Hole attracts huge crowds
A glory hole at Napa's Lake Berryessa is drawing huge crowds. According to Chris Lee, the general manager for the Solano County Water Agency, the glory hole hasn't been active since 2019, and only restarted operations on Feb 4. (More...)
Republican State Senator busted after soliciting a teenage girl
Republican State Senator Justin Eichorn of Minnesota was arrested for soliciting a teen girl on Monday just hours after he introduced a bill proposing "Trump derangement syndrome" (TDS) as a form of mental illness. (More...)
Parents claim measles is not that bad after having only one child die
The parents of a Texas girl who died from the measles are defending their decision not to vaccinate their daughter. "She says they would still say 'Don't do the shots,'" an unidentified translator for the parents said. "They think it’s not as bad as the media is making it out to be." (More...)
Delusional rich man tries to fire town staff
"I'm mayor now" said write-in mayoral candidate and founder of Pirate’s Booty Snacks Robert Ehrlich after losing the election for Mayor of Sea Cliff, NY. Then he tried to take over the Village Hall and fire everyone. (More...)
Musk claims Xitter security is staffed by idiots
Earlier this month Xitter experienced a massive outage. In an interview, Musk told Fox Business that he believes the attack came from "IP addresses originating in the Ukraine area." (More...)
C L A S S I C P I G D O G
The Innocent San Francisco Mule
Flesh and Abby have moved to an isolated rural location in the United States - equipped only with their sense of adventure. Recently they came down off the mountain briefly to file this report? (More...)
You need to make a fruity tropical drink and you have no recipe? Here's a mix recently tested by Pigdog's crack bevertology team that's made with ingredients available from most any grocery store. It tastes sweet, fruity, and is perfect for guzzling on the last hot days of summer. (More...)
The quest for knowledge never ends at the super top secret Spock Mountain Laboratory, although it is frequently interrupted by beverage breaks. Recently, a team of crack ethnomixologists returned from a dangerous expedition to the frozen expanse of Canada with the much sought recipe for a Spocktail that is destined to replace blunt force head trauma as the major cause of brain damage in the civilized world. (More...)
Canadians Not So Different After All
Nobody wants to be prejudiced. But sometimes you can be biased and not even realize it. I think many Americans are biased in this way against Canadians. I never really stopped to think about it, but I myself used to be this way. I guess I thought that Canadians were "stuck-up" — you know, smarter and better cultured than us. But then I got educated about Canadia. (More...)
Clowns Take on God in Mysterious Annual Ceremony
Last Sunday's (the 6th) Grimaldi Service at a small church in East London was a red-letter day for clowns worldwide. About a hundred old-school red-nosed clowns made the sombre trip to darkest Dalston to pay their respects to clowns who died in the last year and to thank God for the gift of laughter in a bizarre ceremony presided over by the eccentric Reverend Clown Roly, resplendent in a garish red lumberjack shirt with oversized gold lapels. (More...)
A Day in the Life of a Beverotologist
It was starting to look like a very boring Saturday, trapped as I was in the suburban wastelands of the outer Bay Area, so I called my Able Assistant (AA) and proposed that we perform some Spocktail field tests. For some time I've been working on creating the quintessential cinematic beverage and even tho' SMRL does most of its testing during nocturnal hours, this seemed an opportune time to roll up the sleeves of our labcoats and get some science done. While the beverotology creation tested this day (The Neurotoxin) must be deemed a success, this article focuses more the journey of the experimenters, rather then the science of beverotology. (More...)
