Captain X-Ploit: Put your hands together for Sara Boulder

The Adventures of Captain X-Ploit:
“Ladies and gentlemen put your hands together for Sara Rachel Boulder”
– Part 3 of the epic chronicle –
Strangers are just Enemies you haven’t met.

Sara Boulder awoke on that shimmering morning in the softest bed she had scammed her way into yet. She wandered over to her victim’s stereo system scanning the shelves for something good to listen to while she got ready for the day. Her eyes fell upon Seether’s new album “Holding Onto Stings Better Left to Fray”. Well at least this sucker has good taste in music, she thought to herself as she put it in and began to sing happily to “Country song” and…

What? <pause> What do you mean I can’t spend an entire post promoting Seether’s new album? <longer pause> Oh come on, IT ROCKS! <short pause> Ok, ok, fine… anyway.

AFTER getting ready she danced down the stairs and raided her victim’s fridge. The reader might be wondering where the proper owner of this house is. Well, at the very moment she was raiding his fridge he was prancing about the park telling everyone he could, to please visit the nearby pub and tell the bartender the keyword “relevant”. He was under the firm yet mistaken belief that if he could simply get 200 people to visit the pub and do this Sara would go out with him.

One might wonder what thoughts would run through the head of a man this pathetically lonely. Well, his thoughts were as follows. Hmm… I’m really hungry… But I only need to get 192 more people to go to the pub… Damn the park is FULL of balding men today I wonder what they are up to… no bother I’ve got to get this done and then I can win back the keys to my house and a chance with the girl of my dreams…

If he had been a brighter man, he would have noticed that the other balding men were doing the exact same thing with different words Sara had found on a motivational poster in the trash outside of the coffee shop. If he had been a brighter man still he would realize that this, in effect, made it so that none of them would be able to get 20 people to go to the pub let alone 200. If he had been a brighter man still he would not have given her the keys to his house as “collateral for this once in a lifetime chance”.

Sara left his house with a heart melting smile on her flawless face when, in a flash of light,

All time stopped.

She knew this because the people had stopped moving and the door had stopped flying shut in her wake. Hmm, I knew I was pretty but I’ve never broken time with a smile before. Damn… I am magical… hmm, no wait here comes an alien he must want to talk to me… but wait who is that wonderful beast he is dragging along with him, she thought.

“Greetings Miss Boulder, I bring with me…” the alien was in the middle of saying when the gorgeous man interrupted hastily “Wow! A world full of people who don’t move! Oh, I know, we must be in Canada! Yes that’s got to be it.” The alien looked pained by the handsome man’s obvious stupidity as he finished his thought “Maxwell Damian Higgens, perhaps the stupidest life form in existence.”

Note from the author: To my adoring fans I have two gifts. The first is a bit of advice and the second is a promise.

Firstly: Go buy Seether’s new album. It’s good.

Secondly: Since I missed last week due to an amazing and unparalleled bout of apathy I will have a Sunday special edition chronicling the past of one Maxwell Damian Higgens.

Now without further ado, I will leave it to our previously scheduled commenter to discuss this week’s episode of Captain X-Ploit.

If the unexpected back-story detour into the world of Sara Boulder hasn’t given you a severe case of WTF then you probably aren’t paying attention. And what’s up with this new Damian Higgens guy? Guess we’ll find out soon.

This episode’s exploit is a classic. It combines the best (worst) parts of 419 scams with multilevel marketing. Kind of like Nigerian Amway. Seriously though, who hasn’t seen those web sites that offer you something really cool – like say a free iPad – and all you have to do is get 10 friends in on it. In the final analysis nobody gets any free iPads and the spammer gets lots of juicy info from their unwitting down-line. Exactly like the poor balding schmucks trolling the park won’t ever get a date with Sara while she gets free use of their houses.

Following the RIAA from Pirates to Fantasyland

The prestigious Security For All Admiral James Norrington award [named for the primary antagonist in Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies] for most entertaining and ludicrous battle against piracy goes to Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) CEO Mitch Bainwol for his unmitigated audacity in spinning reality well past the breaking point. In this article in techdirt honorary Admiral Bainwol is quoted as follows.

In January, Chinese hackers infiltrated the systems of the biggest technology dog on the global block and, according to the company, stole Google’s intellectual property

In texting parlance, Google has finally had an OMG! moment when it comes to intellectual property. Unfortunately, it took this theft of their IP to flip on the switch.

Frankly, Google has never been very warm to the idea of copyright protections. Google routinely has sided with the “free access” (more aptly the “free of charge”) crowd against those who actually create the intellectual property.

Remember the Big G’s idea to digitize every book in the world and put it in their digital library? That went over so well that Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild of America sued to stop Google from creating the virtual library.

Google argued that they were just trying to make the world a better place by making important works of literature available to people all over the globe. A rather egalitarian idea (unless you’re the authors and publishers who depend on people actually buying books in order for you to make a living).

What’s the effect of IP theft on the U.S. economy? First, let’s look at the IP industry’s share of the economy. A 2007 International Intellectual Property Alliance study found 11.7 million people working in the total copyright industries. That’s 8.51 percent of the U.S. workforce. These industries help drive our nation’s economy. In 2007, IP companies added $1.52 trillion or 11.05 percent to the GDP. When people say “we don’t make anything in America anymore,” just hit them with those facts.

Brilliant! Absolutely freaking brilliant! Where do you even begin to comment on something so thoroughly and patently asinine as the preceding foray out of Pirates of the Caribbean and into Fantasyland following the Pied Piper of Piracy Propaganda. While recognizing that I’m in the presence of a giant (moron), I humbly submit the following fact checks.

1. The now infamous attack on Google [allegedly by Chinese hackers] was an exercise in corporate espionage. Since Google doesn’t produce “Intellectual Property” (IP) of the sort the RIAA is concerned with (music). The connection is more non-existent than tenuous.
2. I’m quite certain that Google did have an “OMG!” moment. Only it was “OMG our famous security has been breeched and we’ve been hacked!” I’m also quite certain that more intrusive, fascist intellectual property laws wouldn’t have made a bit of difference in this case. Even assuming that Chinese hackers give a rodent’s patoot about those laws.
3. It’s easy to imagine that Google has “never been very warm” to the RIAA’s idea of copyright protections, which are stupid and unworkable but I digress. What’s really amazing here is the assertion that those who provide free access to intellectual property – like say me when I give away my music at Christmas time – are “against those who actually create the intellectual property“. Now I’m having a WTF! moment.
4. The lawsuit brought against Google by the Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild of America was settled out of court not in small part because most authors found that when their books were available on Google books sales of the books actually increased. So I’m guessing that authors of books feel pretty much the same way about the AAP and AGA as musicians feel about the RIAA. Not warm and fuzzy.
5. It’s hard to believe that anyone, even a consummate spinmeister like Admiral Bainwol, is still trotting out that tired old – and completely bogus – $1.52 trillion stat. In case you you were wondering that number is derived by taking any business that touches copyright, however marginally, and then assuming that all of the revenue they make is entirely due to copyright. Actually you could just quote Ed Black, from the Computer & Communications Industry Association who posited this equally absurd statistic derived in the same way “Businesses dependent upon exceptions to copyright contribute $2.2 trillion to the U.S. economy. They are responsible for one in eight jobs, for a total payroll of $1.2 trillion in 2006.“.

As if the preceding show of farce weren’t ridicules enough, it was followed up with another post covered in this article in techdirt wherein our honorary Admiral was quoted thusly.

The album [“Hope for Haiti Now”] is now widely available on illicit BitTorrent sites like The Pirate Bay, Torrentz and more. The posting highlights a truly ugly side of P2P piracy — the undermining of humanitarian fundraising efforts via online theft of the “Hope for Haiti Now” compilation. So much for the notion that illegal downloading (“sharing”) is an effort to help advance the plight of artists.

Wow! Just Wow. The boring and decidedly non-piratical facts are these:

1. A group of popular musicians released the “Hope for Haiti Now” digital only album, with proceeds going to Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, Oxfam America, Partners in Health, Red Cross, UNICEF, United Nations World Food Programme, and Yele Haiti Foundation in the wake of the devastating earthquake. “Hope for Haiti Now” did quite well, topping the Billboard sales charts. The entire “Hope for Haiti” effort, including the telethon has raised more than $58 million so far. An excellent and very successful fundraiser for an important cause.
2. While I’m sure that there are pointers to torrents for this – and pretty much every other album in recorded history – on some torrent sites, it’s hard to imagine that the losses due to “piracy” were anything but miniscule. In fact I’m willing to bet they were a lot closer to non-existent than miniscule. I certainly hope that there aren’t many people sleazy enough to torrent a charitable album instead of donating to the cause.

Turns out that MusicAlly wondered the same thing after reading the good Admiral’s piece.

But reading that, I wondered just how popular the album is on file-sharing networks. It might be available, but how many people are downloading it? So I asked someone best placed to answer that question – Eric Garland of BigChampagne, which tracks activity on these networks.

At its peak on 24th January, Hope For Haiti Now was being downloaded 2,680 times a day according to BigChampagne – compare that to [Lady Gaga’s] The Fame Monster’s 63,845 downloads the same day. Meanwhile, by 23rd February, Hope For Haiti Now’s daily downloads had dwindled to 820, compared to 47,971 for the Gaga album.

And then there’s that last sentence: “So much for the notion that illegal downloading (“sharing”) is an effort to help advance the plight of artists“. Say what? I have no idea what that means. Or implies. Or what in the devil it has to do with “Hope for Haiti”. Or anything. So here’s to you Mitch. I stand humbled by your truly awesome BS abilities.

The “Hope for Haiti Now” digital only album is still available at the Amazon and iTunes.

Cyber-bullying by the copyright Gestapo

And though they’ll hunt you like a dog
Well they won’t take you alive
Because you make them piles of money
Stacked up twenty stories high
And the boys in every bar
Will not miss you when you gone
From A Heady Tale by The Fratellis

Whenever I write about copyright issues I like to set the record straight right off the bat. Having been a software developer for my entire career and a musician who records and produces music, I am not in any way opposed to the concept of copyright or copyright law. I’m certainly do not espouse the idea that all software wants to be free nor, much as I dislike the entertainment industry,  do I advocate torrenting music or movies to avoid paying. So having gotten that out of the way, I’m here to tell you that copyright enforcement is a whole other deal. Here in the US we must contend with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) who have apparently decided that it’s far easier to blame any decline in revenue on “piracy” and sue potential customers, or threaten to and hope to settle out of court, than it is to come up with a viable distribution model for the digital age. But this week our European friends get to share the pain and witness the quasi-legal shenanigans that Americans have come to know and loathe. In this story by Nick Farrell in the Inquirer we hear about an episode of what I think can best be described as cyber-bullying by a law firm in the name of copyright enforcement.

So far at least 150 innocent people have been wrongly targeted in a crackdown on illegal file-sharing that’s being conducted by the rogue law firm run amok, ACS:Law.

The outfit has sent out letters to thousands of Brits accusing them of ‘piracy’ – that’s copyright infringement to anyone not trying to whip up public sentiment for their own monetary gain – and offering them a chance to settle by paying about £500.

However, loads of people are being accused with what must be inaccurate information. One was a 78 year-old accused of downloading pornography and others are unaware of having done any downloading at all.

“My 78 year-old father yesterday received a letter from ACS Law demanding £500 for a porn file he is alleged to have downloaded. Apparently the poor bloke does not know what file sharing is and has never even heard of BitTorrent. Nor has he given anyone else permission to use his computer.”

Which? Computing estimates that up to 50,000 letters have been sent out and is outraged that too many innocent people are being wrongly accused. Matt Bath, technology editor of Which? told the BBC that innocent consumers are being threatened with legal action for copyright infringements they not only haven’t committed, but wouldn’t know how to commit. But many “will be frightened into paying up rather than facing the stress of a court battle.”

Andrew Crossley of ACS:Law admitted that some cases had been dropped although he declined to give numbers. He told the Beeb [BBC to us yanks] that the method used to detect the IP address used for illegal downloads was foolproof, although that really does not explain why some cases needed to be dropped.

But behold, there is a glimmer of hope in this story. I mean other than the wicked sick ego and reputation boost for the 78-year-old guy accused of torrenting porn – You go, grandpa! No, I mean that you really can’t get too worried about litigation originating from a group whose spokes-weasel actually says “the method used to detect the IP address used for illegal downloads was foolproof” out loud. In public. To the press. I mean seriously, I can only assume that ACS:Law lawyers are the same class of moron as Mr. Crossley. [Andy, dude! – one word: TOR].

But sadly I don’t believe that Mr. Crossley and the gang at ACS:Law are stupid. They know very well that such a statement is ludicrous on it’s face and that no one with any kind of technical expertise will believe it. You know, the kind of technical expertise it takes to illegally torrent copyrighted material. So ACS:Law knows very well that the only folks naive enough to fall for their threats are not capable of doing what they are accusing them of. And that, my friends, smells a whole lot like cyber-bullying to me.

Meanwhile we have this dubious report by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) [Note: Web of Trust (WoT) rates this site BAD in vendor reliability and privacy so be careful if you follow this link] that claims to provide a basis for such egregious behavior by the copyright gestapo. This article in Sonic State reports it like so.

The IFPI report that 95% of all music downloads are illegal – and they say that “cooperation from Internet Service Providers holds the key to this problem.”

The IFPI made the announcement as part of their Digital Music Report 2009:

Piracy is the major barrier to growth of the legitimate digital music sector and is causing severe damage to local music industries around the world.

Three of the world’s biggest music markets, all heavily dependent on local repertoire – France, Spain and Brazil – have seen a sharp slump in the fortunes of their local music industries:

• In Spain, which has one of the highest rates of illegal file-sharing in Europe, sales by local artists in the top 50 have fallen by an estimated 65% between 2004 and 2009;
• France, where a quarter of the internet population downloads illegally, has seen local artist album releases fall by 60% between 2003 and 2009;
• In Brazil, full priced major label local album releases from the five largest music companies in 2008 were down 80% from their 2005 level.

The report shows that, while the music industry has increased its digital revenues by 940% since 2004, piracy has been the major factor behind the overall global market decline of around 30% in the same period.

Okay… So let me get this straight. All of the music purchased and downloaded from iTunes, Amazon, eMusic, Walmart, Napster and Rhapsody plus all of the smaller independent music label sites like Matador Records and individual artist sites together make up only 5% of music downloads? And that 25% of the internet population of France downloads illegally? And this is what is responsible for the 80% drop in full priced major label local album releases in Brazil? I don’t know what those IFPI guys have been smoking but they’d sure have a better chance of convincing me if I had some too. I mean seriously how would you find out that a quarter of the internet population downloads illegally in France and how can you correlate that to local artist album releases fall by 60% between 2003 and 2009. Hello! This is the internet. It’s everywhere. Like lint. And the copyright gestapo. What’s worse is that these bozos (or is that beau zauxs) are trying to convince ISPs that they should collude with the copyright gestapo. And the really sad thing is that some ISPs are going to buy into this nonsense. Let’s be clear here. I sympathize with the musicians who have seen sales of their albums decline. And I also sympathize with their unemployed fans who can no longer afford to buy music. What I don’t sympathize with is the copyright gestapo and their cyber-bullying.

Gift of holiday music for all – present 3

As my holiday gift to you, loyal readers, instead of security related commentary, this series of posts contains holiday music for you to enjoy. For free. For you and whoever you would like to share it with.

The earlier posts in this series present 1: Impressions of Christmas 2001 and present 2: Christmas Child 2002 were original arrangements of traditional Christmas carols or new compositions performed, recorded and produced by Larry Hall and me. This present is a bit different. It this years collection of holiday music performed by musicians utilizing the Garritan sample libraries.

Composers and arrangers use Garritan Libraries to realize their compositions and to simulate what a real orchestra and a real conductor would sound like. While the state-of-the-art of digital music continues to advance, our goal is to provide tools for musicians and create opportunities, rather than replace musicians. What products like the Garritan Personal Orchestra have done is to bring the possibility of realizing orchestral compositions to everybody from the most renowned composers to Hollywood film scorers to TV jingle men down to amateurs and music students in their dormitory rooms.

The work done in the recordings on this album are a testament not only to the sophistication of music technology, but also to the skill of the composers, arrangers and programmers who have used these tools so remarkably well. Finally, let’s not forget the powerful force of the sentiments of the season and the inspiration behind the music. Each year we come back to these melodies and forms because they inspire us like no other.

Many thanks to everyone who submitted a song for the Christmas CD. A big thanks as well to Dan Kury who organized this effort and mastered the songs for the album.  And many thanks to James Mireau for the cover art.

The Garritan Community Christmas 2009 CD was a collaborative effort of the Garritan Community and was put together in the spirit of giving for the holiday.

This is the sixth year that the Garritan Community has released an annual collection of free Christmas music. While this is not an endorsement of the Garritan products [they don’t compensate me in any way for this], it’s hard not to be completely blown away by the quality of Garritan sound libraries and the talent of the musicians who use them in this project.

A Garritan Community Christmas Volume 6

A Garritan Community Christmas Volume 6

Welcome to the 6th Annual Garritan Community Christmas Album, a unique musical project. A community of musicians from all over the world met on the Garritan community forum and agreed to submit their own recordings of holiday music, to be freely distributed. Each of these orchestral recordings were made not with large live orchestras in vast recording studios at huge expense, but rather were created by a single person working on their own desktop or laptop computer. What they have in common is the use of Garritan libraries representing software musical instruments based on samples of real instruments.

Happy Holidays from Security For All!

Gift of holiday music for all – present 2

As my holiday gift to you, loyal readers, instead of security related commentary, this series of posts contains holiday music for you to enjoy. For free. For you and whoever you would like to share it with.

I should explain where this music comes from. In 2000, Larry Hall and I decided to start recording original arrangements of Christmas Carols. As musicians [Larry is a guitarist, I’m a keyboardist] we were both drawn to Christmas music because traditional Christmas carols are so ingrained in our collective psyche that arrangements can have enormous latitude, exploring different styles and voicing without confusing the listener. By December 2001 we had some material recorded with the help of fellow musicians, drummer Troy Harms and bassist Dean Vendl, so we decided to send the CDs as “Christmas Cards” to those on our collective lists. Thus it began with the music in present 1: Impressions of Christmas 2001.

The “Christmas CD card” idea was such a hit with friends and family that we decided to follow it up with more of the same for the holiday season in 2002. Besides, we already had Larry’s studio configured and a whole bunch of new toys to play with. This musical gift is from that second EP which includes an original composition for which the collection is named. Enjoy.

Christmas Child 2002

1. A Day, Bright Day of Glory – Traditional

2. Patapan (Guillo, Pran Ton Tamborin) – Traditional Burgundian-French

3. We Three Kings of Orient Are – Written by Rev. John H. Hopkins, Jr.

4. Christmas Child – Written by Joe Webster

Larry Hall – acoustic and electric guitars
Joe Webster – keyboards and vocals

Arranged by Larry Hall and Joe Webster
Produced by Larry Hall
Production assistance by Joe Webster
Recorded by Larry Hall at Thirsty Ear Studio
Photograph of Alexis Hall by Robin Morris
Art Direction and Design by Rita Kiefer

This music is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. That means you can use it for whatever you want – play it on your iPod, burn a CD, give it to your friends, use it in your podcast, play it on the radio, use it as the theme music to your hit TV series – whatever you want. Just give credit to the musicians who made it.

In case you were wondering, that cute baby in the cover image is now a bright, beautiful, talented young keyboardist who collaborates with her father far more often than I do these days.

Happy Holidays from Security For All!

Gift of holiday music for all – present 1

It’s the holiday season! I love this season, and in particular I love Christmas music. As a musician I’m partial to Christmas music for several reasons: traditional Christmas carols are so ingrained in our collective psyche that as an arranger one can explore many different styles and arrangements without confusing the listener and the Christmas season is just, well, inspirational.

So as my holiday gift to you, loyal readers, instead of security related commentary, this post and the several following will contain holiday music for you to enjoy. For free. For you and whoever you would like to share it with.

Actually there is a little security related stuff here [hey – you didn’t think you’d get off that easy]. This music is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. That means you can use it for whatever you want – play it on your iPod, burn a CD, play it on the radio, use it as the theme music to your hit TV series – whatever you want. Just give credit to the musicians who made it, which in this case are Larry Hall, Troy Harms, Dean Vendl and me.

Impressions of Christmas 2001

1. Angels We Have Heard on High – A Caribbean Salvation Army Zydeco band, whose normal drummer is replaced by a rocker meets some strolling mariachis.

Larry Hall – Guitars and programming
Troy Harms – Drums
Joe Webster – Keyboards

2. Bring a Torch, Jeanette Isabella_Carol of the Bells – Chris Webster first suggested doing “Carol of the Bells” as a round. It evolved into this quasi-minimalist tone poem somehow.

Larry Hall – Guitars and Mandolins
Joe Webster – Keyboards

3. I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day – Counterpoint. The Longfellow poem counterpoints war with the peace and hope message of Christmas. What began with the idea to counterpoint the two traditional melodies ended up counterpointing many melodies and diverse musical styles.

Larry Hall – Guitars and Mandolins
Joe Webster – Keyboards

4. O Come, O Come Immanuel – In the weeks following September 11, every TV news show had dramatic, mournful theme music featuring a distant trumpet and and a tolling bell. The inspiration for this arrangement came from that theme music.

Larry Hall – Guitars
Dean Vendl – 7-string electric bass
Joe Webster – Keyboards

Cover image by Digital Blasphemy.

Happy Holidays from Security For All!

Doing the copyright limbo

Just when you think that the self-appointed copyright Gestapo can’t sink any lower they kick the old limbo stick down another notch. Now before you jump to the conclusion that I’m one of those “content wants to be free” activists, rest assured that I am not. All of my career has been spent as a code monkey writing software for somebody else (as a “work made for hire” in copyright lingo). And trust me, I’m all about getting paid. Which doesn’t happen if my employer goes broke because their products were pirated. I’m also a musician who composes and records original material. Now my attitude towards copyright protection is quite a bit different with my music because, as Cory Doctorow says in the forward material to his latest book Makers [you can download the e-book  here for free] my problem isn’t piracy, it’s obscurity. But what about that piracy notion? I just said that I won’t get paid if my employer goes broke because their products were pirated. Well guess what? That has never happened. Not to me. Not to anyone. In short, I’m not opposed to copyright or copyright enforcement.

What I am opposed to, and baffled by, is a business model that comes down to “we aren’t selling as much of our stuff as we want, so we will go after people who are pirating it.” The most recent episode in this ridiculous jihad against customers is reported by Cory Doctorow in boingboing.

The MPAA has successfully shut down an entire town’s municipal WiFi because a single user was found to be downloading a copyrighted movie. Rather than being embarrassed by this gross example of collective punishment (a practice outlawed in the Geneva conventions) against Coshocton, OH, the MPAA’s spokeslizard took the opportunity to cry poor (even though the studios are bringing in record box-office and aftermarket receipts).

That’s right, the entire public WiFi net of Coshocton, OH. The same net that is used by Coshocton County Sheriff’s deputies to complete a traffic or incident report without leaving their vehicle. The same net that out-of-town business people can park and use their laptops to make connections. The very same net that during festival times, vendors use to check the status of credit cards being used to make purchases. And the same net that has a single address used by many people, so it’s difficult to tell who made the illegal download (although the county plans to investigate the matter).

Great job MPAA! Way to look out for your own financial interests in blatant disregard for the interests of everyone else. So what exactly have the MPAA clowns (I love Cory’s reference to the MPAA’s spokeslizard) accomplished here. Several things come to mind:

1. Users of Coshocton public WiFi will likely never download another pirated movie again… without going through TOR.
2. Users of Coshocton public WiFi will likely never purchase any movie ever again.

As I said before, I’m not a fan of pirating movies. Quite frankly there is so much stuff legitimately available for free or incredibly cheap that I can’t begin to consume everything I might be interested in. But in addition, I can’t for the life of me see how alienating your customers because somebody downloaded a movie and allegedly deprived you of $10 or less (assuming of course that the perp would have actually paid for it anyway) makes any sense at all. What I can say is that cheesy stunts like this almost make me want to fire up bit torrent and snag some episodes of Desperate Housewives. Just on principle. That and I’ve never seen Desperate Housewives. But I can get it from Netflix way easier. And I don’t have to use TOR. But believe me, I’m not going to purchase any movie or TV show. Not now. Not ever.

On the ninth day of Christmas

The Security for All “Twelve Days of Christmas” series continues.

On the ninth day of Christmas…

Nine Inch Nails album for free

Sorry couldn’t resist. But the release of The Slip is important for several reasons. Not only do Trent Reznor and NIN generate some killer music, but this album is released under a creative commons license. CNet news blog has this article about The Slip release.

Declaring digital sales a success, rock veterans Nine Inch Nails have released another online album, The Slip. Unlike their last album, this one is totally free, and, according to front man Trent Reznor, is a thank-you to the band’s fans.

The Slip is available from Nine Inch Nails’ Web site in a number of DRM-free formats: MP3, FLAC, M4A, and WAVE. The band is also streaming the album on music social network iLike.
So if you haven’t already downloaded The Slip do it now. It will make a great Christmas present. And who can argue with a creative commons license for music. And to keep the format of this series consistent, here is the song list from The Slip.

1. 999,999
2. 1,000,000
3. letting you
4. discipline
5. echoplex
6. head down
7. lights in the sky
8. corona radiata
9. the four of us are dying
10. demon seed

length: 43:45
the slip is licensed under a creative commons attribution non-commercial share alike license.

On the eighth day of Christmas: Eight security tips and guidelines for your WordPress blog

On the seventh day of Christmas: Seven dirtiest jobs in IT

On the sixth day of Christmas: Six new Internet hoaxes

On the fifth day of Christmas: Five scary technologies

On the fourth day of Christmas: Four worst E-Mail errors you can make

On the third day of Christmas: Three tools to search for images online by color

On the second day of Christmas: Two fake Bill Gates quotes

On the first day of Christmas: One Belsec birthday