Tech

Tech-focused ramblings. Computers, blogs, and whatever else fits.

Time to put my money where my mouth is?

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Ten months ago, when I was trying to figure out BitTorrent so I could keep up with Battlestar Galactica, I wrote this in a comment:

As it is, I’d gladly pay a few dollars per episode to download high-quality versions of this show (and, theoretically, other shows that I might be interested in in the future), much like I currently do with music from the iTMS (with the caveat that I’d expect any DRM to be no more restrictive than what the iTMS uses).

And wouldn’t you know it — Battlestar Galactica is now available through the iTunes Music Store at $1.99 per episode! Very nice.

Of course, over the past ten months I’ve become accustomed to the quality afforded through captures of HD broadcasts: the episodes I download through BitTorrent are ~350Mb each and widescreen at 624×352 pixels; the episodes Apple offers are ~200Mb and shown at the ‘standard’ (pan-and-scan? cropped?) 4:3 ratio at a much smaller 320×240 pixels. Of course, there is the risk of getting a bad quality rip from BitTorrent that wouldn’t hold up to the norm, while it’s probably safe to assume that the officially sanctioned videos from Apple will be consistently good quality.

As an experiment, I purchased the most recent episode of BSG (‘Pegasus’) and compared Apple’s version to the version I downloaded via BitTorrent.

Battlestar Galactica’s ‘Pegasus’
iTMS BitTorrent1
Filetype: .m4v .avi
Length: 45:27.04 44:19.03
Filesize: 207.26 MB 345.80 MB
Time to download: I didn’t immediately think to time this, roughly 20-30 minutes on my connection. Varies depending upon the number of active BT clients: at best speed should match the iTMS time; at worst speed could take anywhere from hours to days.
Dimensions: 320 x 240 624 x 352
FPS: 24.00 23.98
Video encoding2: -NA- Generic MPEG-4
Audio encoding3: AVC0 Media MPEG Layer 3
Data rate: 636.72 kbits/sec 1106.58 kbits/sec
DRM: Apple FairPlay v2 None
Comparitive: At native sizes, the iTMS video is sharper but noticeably darker. The BitTorrent copy isn’t as crisp, but being a few notches brighter makes it easier to see (a situation exacerbated by my using an old 17″ monitor that already has its brightness and contrast at maximum and really needs to be replaced when I can afford to do so). Even so, the iTMS video is gorgeous: darker and smaller (2/3 the height and 1/2 the width), but better quality — at native size.

At full screen, the smaller size, greater compression and lesser data rate of the iTMS track is very obvious. Compression artifacts not noticeable at 320 x 240 are very visible when blown up to my monitor’s standard setting of 1152 x 870. The BitTorrent video, while softer, doesn’t show nearly as much artifacting (but then, given the larger native size and widescreen ratio of the video, it’s also only being enlarged 247% as opposed to the iTMS version’s 360%).

All in all, while the iTMS video is better quality at native size, the BitTorrent copy is far more watchable when blown up to full-screen.
Notes: 1: Due to the distributed and decentralized nature of BitTorrent, the reported statistics, while representative of the quality of most BT downloads I’ve received, are only definite for this particular copy of this episode.
2: As reported by QuickTime Player’s ‘Window > Show Movie Properties” window under ‘Sound Track’.
3: As reported by QuickTime Player’s ‘Window > Show Movie Properties” window under ‘Video Track’.

So, now what? I did say in the original quote that I’d happily pay for “high quality” copies. At the moment, with Apple’s focus on optimizing the video for the iPod, I’m not sure that the video offerings are quite enough to tempt me away from BitTorrent on a regular basis. It’s close…but not quite there.

Unless someone gives me an iPod video for Christmas, of course. Then I may need to re-evaluate. ;)

Tweaking the ads

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I’ve done a bit of tweaking on the ads served up on the pages of my site. While I certainly have no intentions of becoming an adfarm — I’ve seen weblogs where it’s difficult to find the content in the midst of a sea of ads, and that’s the last thing I want to do with my site — I finally decided that I didn’t mind at least slightly increasing the possibilities of having a few pennies slide my way from time to time.

To that end:

Donations: Two methods of simply tossing money at me are now displayed towards the bottom of the sidebar, using Amazon’s Honor System paybox and a PayPal donate button. No, I don’t really expect these to generate much (if anything), but you never know…I’ve been surprised a time or two in the past.

Advertising: For some time now, I’ve had one Google AdSense box just below the first entry, and an iTunes ad box in the sidebar. To these, I’ve added an Amazon ad box and a second Google AdSense box in the sidebar. Clicks through the Google ads and purchases made after clicking through the Amazon and iTunes ads will send a few fractions of a penny my way.

Now, as I’ve said, I don’t want the ads to overwhelm the content, so for the most part, I’ve made them as unobtrusive as possible — only one Google ad box is visible “above the fold” (visible when the page is first loaded), and the other ads don’t show up until you’ve scrolled through four full screens. Advertising mavens would probably tell you I’m doing this all wrong, but for me, it seems a good balance between having the ads out there and not overwhelming my few visitors.

It’s worth a shot, at least.

Feeds are tagged too

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It’s a good thing I subscribe to my own RSS feeds — the ‘full content’ feed and the ‘full content with comments’ feed have both been updated to include the new tag support. Sorry about the mass-refresh in your RSS readers if you get hit with it.

Folksonomy tag support added

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One of the things I’ve wanted to add to my site for quite a while now has finally been added: tagging, along the lines of del.icio.us or Flickr. Admittedly, I still have a ways to go in getting all my old entries correctly tagged, but that will come with time. For now, they’re showing up in a few places.

  1. On the main page of the site, the tag listings below each post that previously pointed to Technorati search pages for the individual tag now do tag searches internal to this website.

  2. Also on the main page of the site, there is now a ‘This Week’s Tags’ box just below the Table of Contents. This is a quick list of just those tags that have been used on posts within the past seven days…a handy overview of what I’ve been babbling about over the past week.

  3. On individual entry pages, the tag line below the post now searches internally (just as on the front page). There are also now quick links to search on individual tags on del.icio.us, Technorati, and Flickr.

  4. The main archives page now features a tag cloud listing tags used within the past month (31 days, actually). The tag cloud is also size-weighted by the frequency of each tag’s use.

  5. Lastly, I tweaked the tag search results to be a little more useable — rather than a simple listing of links to each result, I’ve added the entry excerpt for each result to give a little more context than just the headline.

All this is thanks to the excellent Movable Type plugin Tags.app.

As with everything I fiddle with around here, questions, comments and words of wisdom are always appreciated (whether or not they’re heeded is another thing entirely, of course…).

Sony’s rootkit

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In one of the (many) stories that have been flying by my radar without being remarked on over the past few weeks, it recently came to light that Sony has been using some incredibly nasty “copy protection” schemes on many of its audio CDs — surreptitiously installing software on Windows-based PCs that cloaks itself, sends customer data back to Sony via the ‘net, leaves a ‘backdoor’ wide open for malicious hackers to take advantage of, and is incredibly difficult to remove (to the point of requiring a re-install of Windows). Sony initially tried to claim that they’d done nothing wrong, and it was only through constant investigation and hammering, first by tech-centric weblogs and then by more mainstream media, before they finally backed down.

Wired News has an excellent rundown of the situation that’s worth reading. This is how the major corporations are treating their customers these days. It’s not a pretty thing.

On Oct. 31, Mark Russinovich broke the story in his blog: Sony BMG Music Entertainment distributed a copy-protection scheme with music CDs that secretly installed a rootkit on computers. This software tool is run without your knowledge or consent — if it’s loaded on your computer with a CD, a hacker can gain and maintain access to your system and you wouldn’t know it.

The Sony code modifies Windows so you can’t tell it’s there, a process called “cloaking” in the hacker world. It acts as spyware, surreptitiously sending information about you to Sony. And it can’t be removed; trying to get rid of it damages Windows.

[…] The outcry was so great that on Nov. 11, Sony announced it was temporarily halting production of that copy-protection scheme. That still wasn’t enough — on Nov. 14 the company announced it was pulling copy-protected CDs from store shelves and offered to replace customers’ infected CDs for free.

[…] When its actions were first discovered, Sony offered a “fix” that didn’t remove the rootkit, just the cloaking.

[…] Sony claimed the rootkit didn’t phone home when it did. On Nov. 4, Thomas Hesse, Sony BMG’s president of global digital business, demonstrated the company’s disdain for its customers when he said, “Most people don’t even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?” in an NPR interview. Even Sony’s apology only admits that its rootkit “includes a feature that may make a user’s computer susceptible to a virus written specifically to target the software.”

[…] Sony’s latest rootkit-removal tool actually leaves a gaping vulnerability. And Sony’s rootkit — designed to stop copyright infringement — itself may have infringed on copyright. As amazing as it might seem, the code seems to include an open-source MP3 encoder in violation of that library’s license agreement.

[…] The rootkit has even been found on computers run by the Department of Defense, to the Department of Homeland Security’s displeasure. While Sony could be prosecuted under U.S. cybercrime law, no one thinks it will be.

[…] Initial estimates are that more than half a million computers worldwide are infected with this Sony rootkit. Those are amazing infection numbers, making this one of the most serious internet epidemics of all time — on a par with worms like Blaster, Slammer, Code Red and Nimda.

Reconnecting

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This is great.

Some time ago — back in April of ’04 — I came across an old Anchorage Press article talking about the “glory days” of the underground/punk/alternative music scene in Anchorage, from the late ’70’s up to the early ’90’s, which touched off my own post reminiscing about my days running around the local scene, from the ’90’s to the early 2000’s.

Touched off by a couple of random Google searches, over the past couple of weeks (starting in August, and really picking up steam in November), that post has become an impromptu meeting point and simple message board for quite a few of the Anchorage scenesters of the ’80’s. While I was just a few years younger and don’t know any of the people who’ve been posting, I have been having an absolute blast watching all the various comments come in as this group of old friends re-connect after twenty-odd years or so.

All I did was provide the right Google keywords and a comment form that these guys have been using to get back in touch…but it’s enough to get a grin on my face whenever I see another comment roll in.

OpinionOutpost Apology

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Last June, I got a comment on my site that as far as I could tell was comment spam advertising a site called Opinion Outpost. Not being a fan of that style of advertising, I posted about it. In the following months I’ve gotten a few comments from satisfied Opinion Outpost customers defending the company — but yesterday, I actually got an apology from the person who originally left the comment that started it all.

I was looking your webpage this morning and wanted to apologize for posting our email on your weblog.  When I first posted on your site I was looking for your email address to contact you about our affiliate program and I could not find it so I thought I would make a post not knowing what I was doing was inappropriate in the weblogging community.  I was new with the company when I posted this and learned very early that this kind of practice was wrong and I haven’t done it since.  I know that what I have done has made you very upset with me and Opinion Outpost.  I ask that you hold nothing against Opinion Outpost, I am the one at fault.

As for this email that you said you sent me, I don’t ever remember receiving it.  I receive large amounts of emails every day and I probably looked at it with confusion (not understanding it or not knowing what I did wrong) and discarded it.  I am very sorry for my actions and hope this post will ease the tension and conflict between you, your weblog and me.

I am willing to post this on your weblog if you would like me to.  Just let me know what you would prefer.  Thank you!

Sounds reasonable to me — it’s a pity my original e-mail got lost, but everyone makes mistakes from time to time, and he was kind enough to send the apology along. The apology is certainly accepted, and I’ve gone back and edited out all the names and contact information from the original post and the follow-up comments.

Opinion Outpost still doesn’t look like the kind of thing I’m interested in for my own needs, but with this, I’ll file them back into the “on the level” bin. :)

Frappr

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Check out our Frappr!There’s a new Google Maps hack/toy out bouncing across the ‘net now: Frappr, which allows people to put their location in (zip code only, so no stalking possible) and have it displayed as part of a group.

I’ve created a group for Eclecticism readers…feel free to drop by and add yourself to the map. I’d love to get an idea of just how widespread my readers are!