A Hero’s Final Journey

This is not something I normally do on this blog, in fact I try to stay about as far away from politics as I can, but this is something I felt should be shared. Ask 10 different people how they feel about our current or any past administration and you will get 10 different answers. Some would complain until they are blue in the face about policies and law put in place, others will proclaim their greatness given the lightest of chances, but love our administration or hate them or their policies, including policies about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, we need to support our troops.

Our troops are in the desert to defend our country, they are here on our bases, the bases I have grown up around, to ensure I get to wake up every morning and have the freedoms that I do. They risk their lives to defend these freedoms, and anyone who doesn't recognize the sacrifice of these men and women, the courage and honor in all of them, do not deserve and ounce of the freedom they protect; the same freedom that allows you to criticize the president, and speak poorly about these men and women. Hate the policies if you must, that is your right, but please remember who has died to give you those rights.

Below is a video of Sergeant John C. Beale’s final journey from Falcon Field in Peachtree, Georgia (just south of Atlanta)  to his final resting place; McDonough, Georgia. Sergeant Beale was killed in action in the first week of June, and people gather along the roadway to show their respect for this fallen hero.

I grew up, and currently reside in Hawaii, a state with one of the highest military populations in the country, we have a base for every single branch of the military here. Much of my family has severed in the military, and while I decided to take a different route in life, I have respect for those men and women who wake up every morning, put on that uniform and know that it their duty to protect us. Many close friends have been deployed to Iraq, Kuwait, Korea, and Afghanistan in the last few years, some are their right now, and posts like this are dedicated to all of them.

Thank you for your sacrifice, and please remember, you are always in our thoughts.

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A Joke…

A man in a hot air balloon, realizing he was lost, reduced altitude and spotted a woman below. He descended further and shouted to the lady "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am" 

The woman below replied, "You're in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above the ground. You're between 40 and 41 degrees north latitude and between 59 and 60 degrees west longitude." 

"You must be in I.T . ," said the balloonist. 

"Actually I am," replied the woman, "How did you know?" 

"Well," answered the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically correct but I've no idea what to make of your information and the fact is I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help at all. If anything, you've delayed my trip." 

The woman below responded, "You must be in Management." 

"I am," replied the balloonist, "but how did you know?" 

"Well," said the woman, "you don't know where you are or where you're going. You have risen to where you are due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise, which you've no idea how to keep, and you expect people beneath you to solve your problems. The fact is you are in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but now, somehow, it's my fucking fault!"

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Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

So last night was the premier of Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen, and as someone who loves movies, I was totally down for a midnight showing. Before going, I read up on a lot of the reviews, and was very disappointed with what I saw, I mean Rodger Ebert called the movie “a horrible experience of unbearable length, briefly punctuated by three or four amusing moments.” All I can say to Mr. Ebert is, Suck it.

Now, if you decided to go see Transformers and thought you would be walking into a hear moving, and deeply touching film, then 1. You are an idiot 2. You have no idea what the hell Transformers are and were basically setting yourself up for disappointment. If you went to the movie expecting some awesome giant robots shooting, punching, kicking and stabbing, then you got exactly what you wanted. I thought the movie was great. It was exactly what I wanted, a plot that was only there to tie together giant robots fighting, no more, no less.

Awesome things about the movie:

1. Giant Fighting Robots

 

2. Sexy Women (*cough*Megan Fox*cough*)

 

3. Sexy Cars

Seriously? Do you need more?

Bottom line: No, “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” is not the next Citizen Kane, but it is a decent action flick, and if you want big explosions, fighting robots, and good looking women, go see the movie. If you want a deep, heart warming movie, go see something else.

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NIN|JA 2009

2 of my favorite bands, Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction, along with Street Sweepers have released a free for download compilation album as a preview to the up coming NIN|JA 2009 Tour.

 

Stream it to your computer, or download the Album for free at www.ninja2009.com

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DOLLHOUSE

I'm a big fan of awesome TV shows, and while my taste is eclectic (I love House MD, but am happy to sit back and enjoy some Top Chef) I limit what I allow my self to sit down and watch so I have time for other things (Like this Blog), but recently a new show hit fox, and it get my attention...Ok Eliza Dushku got my attention, but the show still looked cool.

I missed episode 1 and 2 when they premiered (Its rare I watch things at their scheduled time) but I really wanted to give this show a shot, so I headed over to Fox.com and watched it online. (God I love online episodes)

Episode 1 was interesting, a little background on what is going on, a little character development, and an ok story line, and of course Ms Dushku front and center. So, I watched the second episode. Now that was some good stuff. More store, more kick ass Eliza. I think next week, Ill be watching this thing live (yes, we need to do that to the makers get their Ad money and keep making good shows.)

So why am I mentioning this on a technology blog? Well....its my blog, so I can write whatever I want AND the show is based on technology that allows you to program a person to do what ever you want. They image people, like I image computer...and that's cool (albeit a bit creepy).

So check out the show, its looking to be pretty good, and from what I here, it shifts from good to totally awesome in episode 6, so im looking for ward to it.

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Kenny Glenn Caught...

Yesterday a kid in Oklahoma decided it would be a good idea to wake up, and with a friend record him torturing a cat and then post the video to YouTube, this would make him cool right? Wrong!

What Kenny Glenn did not expect was the wrath of the Internet coming down.

The Internet is a powerful place. A place where those who do good and bad on a daily basis come together at times when a single enemy has emerged. Last night, that enemy was Kenny Glenn, and no one held back.

Within hours, his name, address, phone number, school, parents phone numbers, dads business phone number, maps to his house and constant updates were up on their own web site kenny-glenn.com (web site has been taken down, probably for the kids safety.) People were enraged, and these people have the know how to get things done.

How did they find Kenny? The were able to locate the kid via MySpace based on his YouTube user info, they then verified the information because he had some pictures up which showed enough of his house to match with what was seen in the video. His gross green carpet, a drum set, a strange window, and a confederate flag. From there, is was only a matter of a little investigating to get all of his personal information. It was like a game to these guys, and trust me when I say they had fun doing it. The boards were lighting up last night, updates faster than most could read them. Some updates were solid info about the kid and family, verification of information, work some of the best private investigators in the world would take hours or days to do was being done in minutes by an Army. So to gents at 4chan and the DGers who made this their personal mission, good work.

Sine the uproar Kenny was taken into custody, released back to his parents, and from the info I have is set to meet with the DA on Tuesday to determine the charges.

I wont link to the original video because it really is painful to watch, I'm not exactly a cat lover, but this kid deserves everything he is going to get. So let this be a warning for everyone out there who thinks they can be anonymous, who thinks no one will know it was them, be careful. There is an Army out there who love nothing more than to ruin pieces of trash like this.

Oh, and Dusty the cat is ok. He was removed by the sheriffs department last night and taken to vet for treatment. Kenny on the other hand is going to be miserable for a while...

YouTube Video of a local news report

Lawton news (site is slow to heavy traffic)

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Tracking you down by your IP Address

I am a huge fan of crime dramas on TV. Shows like CSI and NCIS are 2 of a short list of things I actually make sure I watch on TV (House MD, is another...but that has nothing to do with this post). But one of my biggest pet peeves when watching these shows is that every single time anyone does anything on a computer that is remotely criminal, the "tech" of the team hops on to their computer and with a few key strokes has tracked down this person using their IP address, and has a map to their house all laid out on their screen in a matter of seconds. So today I wanted to clarify a little on what is and is not possible as far as tracking down people by their IP address.

The first thing we need to talk about are the 2 basic categories of IP addresses. IP addresses are categorized into 2 groups, Public IP addresses, and Private IP addresses. Private IP addresses are essentially a block of possible IP addresses that are used on internal networks (i.e. networks not directly reachable on the Internet) Every computer in your home that is connected to a router or hardware firewall is using a private IP address, as are the vast majority of computers and servers in the work place. Then how are you able to get to the Internet? well, your router (or the router in your work place) has a Public IP address. IP addresses are limited in supply, and because there is a finite number of them, it wouldn't make sense to give every computer one, so routers are designed to take 1 public IP and allow dozens, or even hundreds of computers to use private IP addresses and on the Internet appear as a single public IP through a technology known as NAT. This can be somewhat confusing, so Ill get to the point. If you are being tracked down by your IP, it will be by your public IP address, not your private IP.

Next we need to talk about how IP addresses are assigned to people and companies. Public IPs are assigned both statically (where the same person has the same IP all the time) and dynamically (where the IP changes on a somewhat regular basis). Most businesses use static IP addresses. This means when they sign up for their Internet connection, they are given an IP address and they continue to use that one until their ISP says otherwise. They do this so businesses can set up things like servers or remote connections to their office without trouble, the IP doesn't change, so its basically easier to find them on the Internet. Home Internet connections on the other hand are assigned IP addresses dynamically. This is done because it is much easier to maintain and support that static IP addresses, and because home users don't really have a need for a static IP address.

So now we have a basic understanding of what kinds of IP addresses are available, and how they are assigned. Now for the real question: Can you be tracked by your IP. The answer is YES....BUT, and this is an important but, its not as easy as it looks on TV.

While a business with a Static IP address is actually relatively easy to find using one of many GEO IP databases available for free or paid subscriptions (the paid ones tend to be far more accurate). But even these are frequently wrong if the IP isn't registered properly. So if you did something at work, a person may be able to track your company down pretty quick, but that would be the end of the trace, and in most cases, the address they get is the billing address for the company, which is usually a central office.

Home users (with dynamic addresses) are a whole other story. If you were to track down an IP address that is assigned dynamically, the best you are going to do is get the ISP and MAYBE the city it is coming from (right now my IP is listed as being in Chicago...I'm in Hawaii) so in 30 seconds law enforcement will not be tracking me down by my IP address. BUT they can still track me, and this is how.

1. The agency trying to tack me would get my IP address
2. They would see who the registered owner of my IP is (my ISP)
3. Assuming they have cause, they would go to my ISP and ask who was assigned my IP address on a specific date
4. The ISP can then reference their logs (and yes, they keep logs and are required to do so by law) see which account was accessing that IP address at a given time
5. Your ISP now just checks the address listed on your account (and also the name) and hands it over.

No depending on the ISP and their motivation (i.e. who's asking for it) this could take a few minutes (this is a highly optimistic time frame under the assumption that the people looking for you have direct access to the logs and the ISP is highly cooperative) or a few days. (much more likely for most low risk cases like copyright infringement)

The problems with tracking people by their IP:

1. The most you will get from an IP alone is the registered owner and billing address.
2. Even if you get to the location, you don't know who was actually on the computer (which is my groups like the RIAA resort to threats at first hoping for a settlement. Gathering the real info needed to accuse a specific person takes a lot more time and energy then sending a canned threat to the registered user of an IP)
3. Using things like Proxies make this tracking significantly harder, because the IP the person trying to track you sees, is not really the IP you are connected to. A proxy is essentially a middle man in an Internet connection that you router all traffic through to mask your actual IP info. So the address the people see, is the proxies, not the real one being used. To get the real IP, you need to get the logs from the proxy server and see what the real one is. Many proxies used for illegal activity are outside of US jurisdiction, typically in countries who aren't too big on cooperating with us, or are placed unknowingly on random peoples computer via a virus.

So now you now what can and can't be done with an IP address. What you see on TV is based in fact, but like most things on TV, is made to look much cooler and easier than it actually is.

Fun Fact: The IP address that are shown on most TV shows are not valid IP address. Unlike phone numbers (which have a defined block that can be used on TV so that people don't call them and bother others) IP addresses don't have this, so people just make them up. A real IP address looks like this: 74.125.19.104 (this is  one of Google's in case you are wondering) Each Octet (the sections separated by the .) will contain a number ranging from 1 - 255 and that's all, so the next time you see one on TV that looks like this: 413.295.8.004, you know its fake. This is done, so people don't try connecting to the IP address being shown, although, I'm not sure why they just don't use a private IP instead of a fake one.

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M.I.A.

Hey Everyone,

As most of you have noticed, I have been M.I.A. for the last few months. This is just a formal "I'm Back" message. A lot has happened in the last few month. I got a new job, got my degree finally, and got a handful of new certifications, so check back soon for some actual posts. What does this mean for you all? Well, with the new job comes more challenges for me to write about and hopefully to help you resolve issues quicker. Thanks again for ahnging around, while I was gone, and hope you enjoy what is coming up.

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Pondering the universe

Of all the things in the world to ponder, I have always asked my self the same question; what is beyond the edge of the universe?

Throughout my years of schooling I have taken both science and philosophy courses, and have never been given a good answer to my question. I was asked to stop asking questions by my astronomy professor when I simply asked what was beyond the edge of the universe.

The universe is said to be the whole of everything. It is also stated to be 93 billion light years across. But how can something with a limit, be the whole of everything? in order to place a limit on something, it has to have a start and an end. To have a start, there must be something before it, or you couldn't judge the start. If there is an end, then there must be something beyond that point which a person claims to be the end.

If we state the the size of the universe is infinite, then our teachers have been lying all along.

In addition to this, it is said that the universe is expanding. Where is it expanding to, if it is the whole of everything?

Maybe the key is that the term universe can only be used to accurately describe all the known objects.

Think about it.

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Off Topic... National Health Care

I know this has nothing to do with technology, and is about as far off from my normal blog postings as you can get, but it’s my blog so I get to write whatever I feel like.

One of the biggest topics (aside from the war in Iraq) that the Presidential Candidates have to deal with is the idea of nation health care. Movies like Sicko portray the US Health Care System as inadequate and sub-bar.

Maybe it is because I have lived a health and lucky life. I have had no serious illnesses, no major injuries, and no extended hospital stays, so I have never dealt with an "inadequate" health care system. I remember going to the emergency room a few times, once for a gash on my arm that I needed to get stitches for, another because I had a bad case of tonsillitis and my throat and swelled up and it was hard to breath. Both times I was treated very quickly. My doctors have always been nice when I have gone in for physicals, or just being ill in general. I tore tenants in my hand, and they took care of me, I have a bad knee and Gout and I have always been taken care of.

In addition to this, my Mom has had several extended hospital stays because of severe back injury she sustained, and because of this needed several surgeries. They took good care of her in the Hospital, and the medical bills were taken care of by the state (she was injured while working a state job).

In fact, I don't know anyone who has had a horrible experience at the doctors or at a hospital. So for me, I just don't see this inadequate health system.

So maybe I have been getting this good treatment because I have always had health insurance. My dad is in a union with great benefits, so I got those until I was 21. But I had double coverage for several years because every company I have ever worked for has given me health insurance. Is this a rare thing? I mean I was 16 working at Blockbuster and even they offered me health insurance (and a number of other good benefits like tuition reimbursement). My current Jobs (yes I have 2) both offer health insurance. Heck my primary job offers 3 different types of coverage you can choose from. 2 are free and one costs me 12 dollars a month. (I picked the $12/month one because it allows me to see any doctor when ever I want for a huge variety of things as opposed to selecting a single "primary care" doctor who I would have to see) If I want to add my girlfriend on to my plan I can. You heard me right; we don't have to be married, just living together. That will cost me an extra $150/month I believe. But its great coverage. The only people I know who don't have health insurance are just lazy and don't have jobs. (Or have crappy part time fast food jobs). And in reality, if you are an adult, working a crappy part time fast food job, you need to take a look at your life and do better.

So what benefit would National Health care have for me? None. I would pay more taxes, so other people could get "free" medical. Why should I have to pay more so others can milk a government system because they are too damned lazy to work (welfare proves this over and over again). People in places like Canada who do have a national health care system still need to get extra insurance because their system doesn't cover everything good private insurance does. So it’s not like my company will stop providing health insurance, and then give me a raise which would then balance out the higher taxes. So really, all national health care will do is take more money from me to help people I don't know and who may not even need the help and are just lazy.

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against helping those who really need help. I donate a significant amount of money to charities that I choose to support (usually ones that help fund education and medical research). I also work for a non-profit (where I take a lower salary then I would require from a larger for profit company) because I believe in the work they do and I want to be a part of that. So this isn't about not wanting to help people, it’s about being forced to help people and having no control over it.

The only national health care system I am willing to support would be one focused on children. Where a child would be qualified to receive health care up until age 18. Once they are 18, they are on their own. The reason for this is because a child doesn't ask to be borne, and should have to suffer because they have shitty parents who can’t get a job. If you can't get a job, you shouldn't be having a kid. And no, there is no excuse for not having a job, work a burger king if you have to, but you better damn well have a job. (Obviously there are exemptions to this like those who are disabled but they can get Medicare/Welfare) When you are 18, you can get your own job and your own health care. And don't give me that crap about being in school and not being able to work. I work 2 full time jobs AND still go to school, so it can be done (and it isn't that hard.)

It seems the people I hear complaining the loudest are those who just don’t have health insurance, here is what you do. Go get a job that provides it, or get a private healthcare provider. If your job doesn’t provide health care, or you just can’t afford it, then its time to get another job (a second one even) that will give you the extra cash so you can afford it.

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