ISP's to police your downloads

[SteveRiley]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

Anybody have any opinions on good/bad DNS servers? Would like to hear what you think.

EasyDNS maintains a pair of public servers at DNSResolvers.com. I know some folks who like them. From where I am in Seattle, though, the latency is too high -- about 80 ms. I think the servers are somewhere in eastern Canada.

Simply because they're easy to remember, I use the old GTE's primary and backup DNS servers at 4.2.2.1 and 4.2.2.2. They're fast and don't appear to do anything goofy, although I'll admit I haven't explored them all that thoroughly.

The OpenDNS blog recently posted an article on ISP's hijacking search keywords. Looks bad enough that we might get some Congressional hearings about it.

[SteveRiley]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

So I became a bit more curious about DNS performance and discovered NameBench, an open source DNS benchmark utility. The results are very interesting, indeed. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that Google's DNS servers would be the fastest. Second fastest for me was some outfit called Click! US ...never heard of them. OpenDNS was my #3, the GTE (I mean Verizon) 4.2.2.x servers were #7 -- still much faster than my poky local Comcast servers. And those Canadian servers at DNSResolvers.com are slow, too.

UltraDNS and DynDNS are hijacking NXDOMAIN answers, so I'd avoid them. I'd probably also avoid OpenDNS because, IIRC, they filter pr0n and such. I like pure, clean DNS without someone else's moralizing. So I'm thinking I'll just stick with good ol' GTE Verizon (damn, old habits die hard...)

If you try it yourself, you'll probably see in your report that every DNS server shows incorrect or hijacked answers for Twitter, Facebook, and Paypal. According something I saw in a wiki comment, that's because these services add new IPs too frequently for NameBench to keep up with.

[woodsmoke]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

Hi
I forgot to reply to SRs question.

The "interstate commerce clause" has been argued successfully by the U.S. government that "the greater good" is carried out if a person is not allowed to "make/grow/use" stuff that is normally sold through "interstate commerce".

The classic case is the farmer growing wheat for "home consumption" on his farm during world war II that "removed from interstate commerce" money to say.... a flour company that supplied bread or a seed company that provided seed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_A...s_Constitution

The basic idea is that if the actions of an individual, such as you, or an "entity" such as the developers of Kubuntu, "removed income" from a company, such as MS, then the entity, Kubuntu, could be taken to court by the U.S. GOVERNMENT for "potential loss of income" to MS which would damage the national "good".

This is the argument of the RIAA against streaming music. The music "potentially removes income" from say...SONY.

This is precisely what the owner of SOMA FM had to argue against in court against the RIAA a few years ago.

The RIAA used a PAID MODEL in Europe that charged a "subscription" to it's users for listening to streaming music as the "finanical model" for "how much streaming music was worth".

The argument that RIAA made was that the streaming music people "owed" Sony, etc. a certain amount of money for "possible lost income".

The royalties under such a system would, perforce, bankrupt SOMA FM and also Shoutcast.

The Copyright Royalty Board has announced new copyright licensing fees for internet radio stations. The new fees are a staggering increase over our previous annual royalty rate of about $22,000 to over $600,000 for 2006. And the fees are even higher in 2007, based on our current listenership, they'll be over $1 million dollars for 2007! (Which is 3-4 times what we hope to raise in 2007).

http://somafm.com/news/oldnews.html

That is THE REASON why you see advertisings on ShoutCast right now.

If MS successfully argued the clause in court that Kubuntu or DSL were "removing income" from their sales then all of the those, and potentially, all Linuxs would either have to pay MS a "fee" or a) stop production or

and this is the big bugaboo now......Kubuntu, or DSL downloads can be BLOCKED at the U.S. Border, physically, by a mouse click.

The argument against this way back in Xandros days, is that "somebody would figure a way around it" like cell phones.....

ummmm think not, all of this stuff ultimately is routed/switched by satellites...phones, computers, you name it.

BTW the reason I found this thread is that I get a newsletter from DuckDuckGo, as mentioned above. that supposedly "anonymizes" your downloads, searches, etc.

http://duckduckgo.com/

Anybody who was screaming a few years ago about George Bush and warrantless wiretaps and now conveniently turns their heads about Obama renewing and EXTENDING the warrantless wiretaps to.....

cover DAMAGES TO BUSINESS.....

the Commission suggests categorizing US national interests into three categories: survival, critical, and significant. Survival interests are defined as, “without which America would cease to exist as we know it”.[6] These interests encompass safety from direct attacks by hostile states and terrorists through the use of weapons of mass destruction. They also include preserving America’s founding principles as outlined in the US Constitution. Critical interests are defined as, “causally one step removed from survival interests”.[7]

These interests lie in the continuation of key global systems, such as global energy,

economic,

communications, transportation, and health infrastructures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Comm...y/21st_Century

is, in my humble opinion, wearing an astoundingly large set of blinders.

Anyone who thinks that the idea that MS could argue against Linux is SILLY should consider:

a) Bill Gates is a frequent visitor to the White House(although it is argued that the visits were about teacher pay).

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33556933.../#.TrBdO4YWVdU

b) WHO would EVER think that the U.S. Government would SUE a farmer DURING A WORLD WAR...that the farmer was "affecting interstate commerce"?

Think about that.

woodsmoke

[SteveRiley]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

Reading about the farmer and the court's decision definitely illustrates how politics can be perverted into national embarrassment. Not that that's anything new, of course.

I think it's a bit of stretch, though, to extend precedent to a theoretical Microsoft v. Linux et. al. Plainly, the farmer broke the law, and got punished for it. Now we can argue over whether the law is good (I'd mount a vigorous argument against), but there yet exists no similar law stating that, for instance, the Windows monopoly must be preserved such that its market share never decreases below 85%.

In fact, European courts are especially attuned to monopolistic behavior, and while Neelie Kroes is occasionally over-zealous, I suspect any attempt of the US government to preserve a Microsoft monopoly would face -- and lose -- challenges in various courts, not least the WTO.

[woodsmoke]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

Hi Steve,
thanks for the thoughtful reply, but....

It would not be "MS versus Linux et. al."

It would be "U.S. Gov. versus Linux et. al."

And MS would offer "relevant testimony" that it's, and therefore the NATIONAl interests, would be "harmed" by Linux which "could reduce it's income stream".....

In EXACTLY the same manner that the RIAA argued that "streaming music" "reduced the income stream" of "Sony" or other companies.(not of the national interest at THAT time).

The model is already in place in TWO instances....the original instance of the U.S. government suing the farmer and the RIAA(which is a mouthpiece organ for Sony etc.) arguing in U.S. court....

AND.....WINNING!!!

Notice the advertisings on Shoutcast. At the time of this particular post the video at the top left is for GMC, the company that was bailed out by .....the U.S. government.

The advertisings.....were NOT THERE....before the ruling annotated in the previous post.

Going back to Xandros.....the Xandrosians said it would NEVER HAPPEN.......

http://www.shoutcast.com/

woodsmoke

[GreyGeek]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

....
or you can add the site to your /etc/hosts file. As an added benefit, besides bypassing the DNS of your internet provider, it will also speed up your connect time to those sites. Only problem is, sometimes sites IP addresses change.

I use the /etc/hosts file to filter Internet sites. Adding
127.0.0.1 fastclick.net
to it will send all traffic from fastclick.net into the infinite bit bucket, speeding up my browser dramatically. I use that method to block ad, porn and obnoxious business sites.

And, like you say, I also use /etc/hosts as a DNS "server". Instead of 127.0.0.1, use the IP address of the site you want to visit.

SR & Woodsmoke:
The issue Detonate is addressing arose because of S. 968, a bill before the Senate (and Congress) to give unprecedented powers to the Entertainment Industry. They've already bribed (a.k.a. "Campaign Contributions") enough members of Congress to jack punishment for illegal downloads of music from treble damages to tens of thousands of dollars per song! It is so 17th Century -- like sending a kid to prison for life (or the gallows) for stealing a loaf of bread. I like Detonate's original analogy -- the bus company and the passenger.

But, the Entertainment Industry should NOT throw stones. They abuse both ends of the transaction to become the consummate greedy middleman. Courtney Love spelled out their greed in a letter to the artists. Go to the section: Recording Artists Don't Get Paid.

RECORDING ARTISTS DON'T GET PAID

Record companies have a 5% success rate. That means that 5% of all records released by major labels go gold or platinum. How do record companies get away with a 95% failure rate that would be totally unacceptable in any other business? Record companies keep almost all the profits. Recording artists get paid a tiny fraction of the money earned by their music. That allows record executives to be incredibly sloppy in running their companies and still create enormous amounts of cash for the corporations that own them.

The royalty rates granted in every recording contract are very low to start with and then companies charge back every conceivable cost to an artist's royalty account. Artists pay for recording costs, video production costs, tour support, radio promotion, sales and marketing costs, packaging costs and any other cost the record company can subtract from their royalties. Record companies also reduce royalties by "forgetting" to report sales figure, miscalculating royalties and by preventing artists from auditing record company books.

Recording contracts are unfair and a single artist negotiating an individual deal doesn't have the leverage to change the system. Artists will finally get paid what they deserve when they band together and force the recording industry to negotiate with them AS A GROUP.

Thousands of successful artists who sold hundreds of millions of records and generated billions of dollars in profits for record companies find themselves broke and forgotten by the industry they made wealthy.

Here a just a few examples of what we're talking about:

Multiplatinum artists like TLC ("Ain't 2 Proud 2 Beg," "Waterfalls" and "No Scrubs") and Toni Braxton ("Unbreak My Heart" and "Breathe Again") have been forced to declare bankruptcy because their recording contracts didn't pay them enough to survive.

Corrupt recording agreements forced the heirs of Jimi Hendrix ("Purple Haze," "All Along the Watchtower" and "Stone Free") to work menial jobs while his catalog generated millions of dollars each year for Universal Music.

Florence Ballard from the Supremes ("Where Did Our Love Go," "Stop in the Name of Love" and "You Keep Me Hangin' On" are just 3 of the 10 #1 hits she sang on) was on welfare when she died.

Collective Soul earned almost no money from "Shine," one of the biggest alternative rock hits of the 90s when Atlantic paid almost all of their royalties to an outside production company.

Merle Haggard ("I Threw Away the Rose," "Sing Me Back Home" and "Today I Started Loving You Again") enjoyed a string of 37 top-ten country singles (including 23 #1 hits) in the 60s and 70s. Yet he never received a record royalty check until last year when he released an album on the indie punk-rock label Epitaph.

Think of it this way: recording artists are often the writers, directors and producers of their own records. They write the songs, choose the producers and engineers who record their music, hire and oversee the photographers and designers who create their CD artwork and oversee all parts of video production, from concept to director to final edit. Record companies advance money for recording costs and provide limited marketing services for the music that artists conceive and create. In exchange, they keep almost all of the money and 100% of the copyrights.

Even the most successful recording artists in history (The Beatles, The Eagles, Nirvana, Eminem) have been paid a fraction of the money they deserved from sales of their records. This is a very big and very important project and we're in the early days.

To make matters worse, it seems politicians no longer read the bills they vote on. Why should they? The bills were written by corporate lawyers and the politicians have been bribed ("campaign contributions") to vote for them. As long as they get re-elected (with the bribe money being spent on radio and tv ads to swamp opponents who aren't influential enough to bribe or wealthy enough to match the ear-mark money) to keep the perks and benefits coming, what do they care? Their goal is to get elected as soon as they are old enough, receive $200K in income, retire after 10 years or so to receive a lifetime of income and unlimited health benefits, then work part-time as a corporate lobbyist making millions per year, while living the big life.

Write to your senators and congressmen to vote against S. 968 and H.968

[Snowhog]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

I use the /etc/hosts file to filter Internet sites. Adding
127.0.0.1 fastclick.net
to it will send all traffic from fastclick.net into the infinite bit bucket, speeding up my browser dramatically. I use that method to block ad, porn and obnoxious business sites.

Interesting. How does this actually work, or more, why does it work?

[woodsmoke]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

Bravo GG

A local guy that has had a band for over twenty years, has had THOUSANDS of records sold.... and he has received a total remuneration of.... 28 bucks and some odd cents... and he makes his REAL living...painting signs....also the live band stuff he does but almost ALL of that is eaten up in payments for playing the songs that RIAA allows him to play with a certain "liscence".... basically the band gets the money it costs them to go to the gig, and pay for their equipment.

The LEAD pianist...is a NATIONAL player..... and he has had to rely on donations from people like me because he developed a form of pancreatic cancer...... at the end of a career that has billboards spread everywhere....he is a pauper. And he did not "blow the money" on wine, women and song....he has a wife and two kids, and when he was not on the road he was home... after twenty years his wife would know if he was "throwing the money away".

that is one reason why I purchased the Kubuntu "picture" from the guy ...ALL of the money went into his pocket...

and I also bought him a few drinks!!! hic!!

woodsmoke

[sithlord48]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

i just added to my /etc/hosts file two lines

127.0.0.1 fastclick.net
127.0.0.1 doubleclick.net

and boy do pages load faster

thanks for the idea GG

[oshunluvr]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

I use this hosts file with a little over 16000 hosts blocked. I update once every six months or so or when I start seeing ads.

[sithlord48]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

very nice oshunluvr. i think im going to use that list also

[GreyGeek]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

I use this hosts file with a little over 16000 hosts blocked. I update once every six months or so or when I start seeing ads.

That's the host file I use, oshunluvr, plus the occasional addition I make when I see an ad pop through. I just forgot to mention it in my post. Sometimers...

A note of caution... some web sites wait to get a specific return code from the ad server before they display the main content of their pages, which results in the spinning wheel of "busy" for ever. I just move on. Most of the time a Google search will reveal another page with the same content.

[SteveRiley]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

It would not be "MS versus Linux et. al." ... It would be "U.S. Gov. versus Linux et. al."

Yes, I suppose you're right about that. Good call.

In EXACTLY the same manner that the RIAA argued that "streaming music" "reduced the income stream" of "Sony" or other companies.(not of the national interest at THAT time).

I still don't see the RIAA case as precedent for the government stepping in to protect Microsoft's revenue stream. While I'll be the first to admit that RIAA is one of the most evil organizations on earth, despised by many artists they claim to "protect," remember that one of the fundamental drivers for their activity is to thwart theft of intellectual property. Theft in all cases is wrong. But that doesn't justify RIAA's truly nasty tactics.

My choice to download and install Kubuntu is not theft and is not violating any law. To apply the Commerce Clause in the way you suggest here would first require passing some new law that finds yet another means to trigger the Clause.

The issue Detonate is addressing arose because of S. 968, a bill before the Senate (and Congress) to give unprecedented powers to the Entertainment Industry. They've already bribed (a.k.a. "Campaign Contributions") enough members of Congress to jack punishment for illegal downloads of music from treble damages to tens of thousands of dollars per song! It is so 17th Century -- like sending a kid to prison for life (or the gallows) for stealing a loaf of bread. I like Detonate's original analogy -- the bus company and the passenger.

These are pernicious laws, indeed. We've entered a second Gilded Age. We need another Teddy Roosevelt!

I use this hosts file with a little over 16000 hosts blocked. I update once every six months or so or when I start seeing ads.

Additional ad blocking lists:

• http://hosts-file.net/ad_servers.asp
• http://pgl.yoyo.org/adservers/serverlist.php?hostformat=hosts&showintro=0&mimety pe=plaintext
• http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/hosts

These receive more frequent updates than the MVPS one. I found a new ad blocking app for Android: AdAway. It allows you to enter multiple lists and then merges them together into a single /etc/hosts. The MVPS list hasn't been updated since 13 Oct; the others show a new update every other day on average.

[jlittle]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

I use this hosts file with a little over 16000 hosts blocked...

Does this approach have any advantage over using Adblock Plus in firefox, or equivalents? I see ads so rarely with it.

[oshunluvr]

Re: ISP's to police your downloads

I use this hosts file with a little over 16000 hosts blocked...

Does this approach have any advantage over using Adblock Plus in firefox, or equivalents? I see ads so rarely with it.

Probably very little. I use this method because it blocks for all browsers and even HuluPlus and other http/web accessing programs. Plus, I avoid add-ons like Adblock whenever possible. IMO added programs = added room for bugs and more memory/CPU use.