You may or may not have been following the story of Sony BMG and the rootkit which has been unraveling recently. Basically, Sony shipped music CDs containing copy protection which did some pretty shady things to user’s computers. Usually when you play one of these copy protected CDs it displays a standard EULA (license agreement) and then installs some player to your hard drive. But the Sony software goes beyond that, actually modifying the kernel (core) of the Windows operating system to hide itself as it spies on your activities, even while the CD isn’t inserted. This activity isn’t even mentioned in the aforementioned license agreement, and there was no indication it was being installed. Needless to say, people were extremely angry when they discovered this was happening to their computers. Furthermore, the Sony rootkit (the part that cloaked itself) was poorly coded and it didn’t take long for somebody to use the functionality within it to hide even more malicious software. There is much more to the story. Sony is now being sued by multiple parties including the Texas Attorney General, and hopefully we will see something good come of it. BoingBoing has a great round up on all of this if you haven’t already seen it.

This behavior by Sony, and subsequent remarks made by Sony and the RIAA, indicate just how little the music industry giants understand their consumers. I will not pay a dime for a Sony product, whether consumer electronics or entertainment, until they come around. If this means never buying from Sony again, so be it. I deeply regret the need to make this decision. Many of my favorite artists are on Sony labels as Sony controls a huge portion of the music industry. I have bought a fair amount of Bela Fleck recently and I am actually regretting it, as those albums were released by Sony. Artists who are currently on Sony labels need to put the pressure on Sony to grow up and stop battling its own customers.

Therefore I am making a request. This holiday season, please do not buy me anything from Sony, CD or otherwise. I do not want Sony products. I have no interest in CDs crippled by malicious software, even if Linux isn’t affected. Please do not buy me any CD marked “Copy Protected,” as I have no interest in it and, frequently, these CDs are error prone and don’t even play on all players. I can only make this request formally for myself, but if you wish to see the record industry return to the days of real CDs that you own as opposed to “rent” in some semi-useful, fair use impeded manner, please join me in my boycott of Sony and copy protected CDs in general.

After a week with the flu, I returned to class today to face a test and a bunch of material I completely missed last week. My primary gulp moment on the test was a low point value question on DMA I/O. Basically, the class covered I/O last week and while I read the book thoroughly there is certain material which we only cover in class. It shouldn’t be too big a loss, and I understand the question after talking to a fellow student after the test.

Thanksgiving break is going to come not a moment too soon. I’ve been really burned out this semester and a week of being sick didn’t exactly help. Fortunately some more quasi-down time will help. Thanksgiving will be busy. As usual, aelscha and I are planning to attend a thanksgiving dinner for each family then head down to New York City on Friday for a CTY reunion. Then we’ll be hanging out with friends there and visiting my father for dinner in New York City on Saturday. On Sunday we’ll be heading back home, optionally stopping at my sister’s for my niece’s birthday. It’ll be a busy vacation, but at least it will be a vacation.

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• I was far far too excited about playing frisbee on Real Grass last weekend, even if it was somewhat, ah, quirky polo fields. But our fields at UNH are soooo trashed right now, since it’s rained so much, that any dry grassy field was just amazing.
• The IRC-on-a-whiteboard from Saturday is still on our fridge.
• I’m discovering the limit to how much stuff I can stay on top of. Right now I have four (admittedly light) classes, work 10 hours/wk in Jill’s lab, work 3+ hours a week at the science center, am playing frisbee, and have rehearsal every evening. It’s a lot going on. But it’s (just barely) okay, and it feels really good to be on top of this much stuff. I’m all “go me!”
• Speaking of rehearsal. Mask and Dagger is putting on Twelfth Night the weekend before Thanksgiving. I’m an ASM, and it’s going to be a good show. </plug>
• That party on Saturday? Three different people came over and made food of some sort. It was amazing. I love my friends. And those triple-chocolate doom cookies are even more amazing when warmed up and eaten w/ ice cream. (And the pie was good too. And the quesadillas. Twas all good. Yay people.)