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Mike McCarthy

Monday, October 13, 2008

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Thank you,

Mike McCarthy

Freeware

Why Spend Money if you don’t Have To?

By Mike McCarthy

Even in non-economic hardships, it makes sense to utilize a multitude of free software utilities, tools, and applications available on the Internet. These are available free from generous and talented programmers, companies producing products under Open Source, companies which offer their wares free for personal use (commercial users must pay for these), and even some companies with ulterior motives (enter Snidely Whiplash stage left).

Open Source refers to companies, committees, and communities that prescribe to a fundamental and universal concept: Open source code that accepts global contributions from technical people around the world and offers these products to everyone free of charge. Refer to blog http://www.itcaz.com/blog/2008/10/openofficeorg.html for more information regarding Open Source.

Some companies not offering Open Source products may still offer these free for personal use as they generally earn their revenue from large enterprise and commercial clients.

However, beware of all free offers. Some take advantage of the free and Open Source concept to lure you into their lair in order to infect your computer with viruses and or parasites (Trojan horses, worms, add-ware, spy-ware, etc.). Always read the company’s EULA (End User License Agreement) before you click download to be sure you fully understand the consequences, if any.

I’m sure there are hundreds more, but here are some alternative products I have downloaded, tested, evaluated, and or use today:

Internet Browsers
- Chrome – Another free Internet browser; this one from Google

- Safari – Free Internet browser for PCs from Apple

- Firefox – Free, popular Internet browser Mozilla

Email Applications
- GMail – Free email application from Google

- Eudora – Free email application provided by Qualcomm, Eudora has been around since the early to mid nineties and is a trusted and time-tested email application

- Thunderbird – Free email application also from Mozilla

Office Applications
- OpenOffice.org – An Open Source suite of applications to compete with Microsoft’s Office suite

Remote Desktop Applications
- Teamviewer – Free (for personal use) remote desktop application that rivals GoToMyPC, Webex, logmein, and others

Utility Programs
- AlZip – A free alternative to WinZip and WinRar (they now charge for their products), which also offers a number of other free products for personal use such as music, movies, and pictures

- Belarc – A free utility that will generate a comprehensive report of your computer’s configuration, devices, software applications, and operating system

On-Line Music Applications
- iTunes – Apple’s M4P (universally noted as MP4) music player and download store

- RealPlayer – MP3 music player and download store

- dbpowerAMP – MP3 music player and editor/converter

Contact Information:
Mike@itcaz.com
http://www.itcaz.com/


Piracy

Can You Identify Which of these Sites Offer Legal Software for Downloading Pirated Music, Movies, and Software?

(1) Kazaa

(2) LimeWire
(3) Morepheus
(4) Bearshare

By Mike McCarthy

Peer-to-Peer (P2P) technology is the method used by these Internet companies, and others, to lure users into a seemingly safe harbor for free downloads of music, movies, and software. But what most users do not know is that the act of downloading these files is a media copyright infringement and therefore illegal. RIAA (the Recording Industry Association of America) has teamed up with other organizations such as the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the Business Software Alliance (BSA), the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), and the FBI to prosecute offenders. Microsoft has also gotten into the act.

Who is the offender?
It turns out that Kazaa, LimeWire, Morpheus, Bearshare, and others like them are technically not breaking the law. These companies merely offer free P2P technology software that provides a method for computers around the world to connect, view and download files. The way it works is like this:

- Users A and B download the same P2P software to their computers. What they do not realize though is that the default settings (hidden within Options, Profile, or Settings) are set to Sharing. This means the moment you install these P2P programs your computer is open for the world to see.


- User A selects a category such as Music, Movies, or Software, enters specific search criteria, and sends the request on its way.

- The software worms through the Internet visiting all sites with like software and displays results of what it found.

- User A then clicks on Download and the file is transferred from Computer B to Computer A.

Note: The reverse is also possible.

Therefore, up to step 3, no law was broken. However, once User A issues the command to download, we have infringement. This is why those sharing files are not typically held liable and neither are P2P companies (these folks are simply providing you a tool to connect).

Danger Lurking
Most users do not read the EULA (End User License Agreement) that accompanies most software downloads. Here are a few excerpts from one such P2P EULA:

- You may not transmit access or communicate any data that infringes any patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright or other proprietary rights of any party.

- It is your responsibility to ensure that you obtain all consents, authorizations and clearances in any data owned or controlled by third parties that you transmit, access or communicate to others using {this product).

· {The Company} respects copyright and other laws. {The Company} requires all {Product} users to comply with copyright and other laws. {The Company} does not by the supply of the Software authorize you to infringe the copyright or other rights of third parties.

· As a condition to use the Software, you agree that you must not use the Software to infringe the intellectual property or other rights of others, in any way. The unauthorized reproduction, distribution, modification, public display, communication to the public or public performance of copyrighted works is an infringement of copyright.


· Users are entirely responsible for their conduct and for ensuring that it complies with all applicable copyright and data- protection laws. In the event a user fails to comply with laws regarding copyrights, other intellectual property rights, data-protection and privacy, such a user may be exposed to civil and criminal liability, including possible fines and jail time.

With that written, look at a few additional excerpts (from a P2P EULA) that clearly spell out what is possible while P2P sharing is open:

You May Not:
- Transmit or communicate any data that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files or programs designed to interrupt, destroy or limit the functionality of any computer software or hardware or telecommunications equipment.

· "Stalk" or otherwise harass another.

· Modify, delete or damage any information contained on the personal computer of any user.

· Collect or store personal data or other information about other users.

· Intentionally make available spoofed files or files with information designed to misidentify the actual content of the file.


Makes you wonder doesn't it?

What About Spy-Ware and Ad-Ware?
Continuing the EULA:

- "The software application you are about to install is supported by advertising revenue, meaning that we display ads as an integral part of our interface. This allows us to provide you with our software for free: the advertising income we receive supports for our development and distribution efforts."

- "In exchange for downloading the Software at no cost, you expressly agree that you accept the Embedded Third Party Software and that so long as you have not entirely deleted {Product} from your computer you will not take any action, including downloading other software which modifies, is intended to modify or permits others to modify registry or other settings on your computer to, disable, remove, block, prevent the functioning of, or otherwise interfere with any of the Embedded Third Party Software."

More on Piracy
Here are a few (very few) quotes from bloggers that have finally gotten the message:

- “Don't do it...it is illegal. I just read a news story about a guy who is being charged $9000 per song...that's right PER SONG by a record company for not only the tracks he downloaded illegally but also for all the copies he has stored on his computer.”

- “So in other words, you want to start a career in crime, because what you are asking is something that is illegal to do. Tell that to the single mom who just got slapped with a $250,000 fine in Ohio. You all want to ***** and moan about how bad the music that is out now, but what you don't realize is that by downloading illegally, you are pull money away from the labels in order to do better A and R and production. If you think you are not hurting anyone by doing it, you are a complete idiot. You can't get food for free, or a car or shoes so PAY for your music and stay out of trouble!”

- “stealing takes the most money from the band. if you hear a song you like you should pay them for making it. i used amazon to buy 2 songs. i might also use the realplayer site to buy more.”

Now that you know a bit more about what these programs are, and how they work, the choice to allow their continued use is up to you. Keep in mind though, if snagged, you could be facing fines, prison time, or both; depending on how pervasive the downloads are.

For more information click on the links below:

RIAA – What We Do – FBI Seal (
http://www.riaa.com/whatwedo.php?content_selector=whatwedo_fbi_seal)

New Report Examines RIAA Methodology For Detecting Illegal Activity Over Peer-To-Peer Networks http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?news_month_filter=&news_year_filter=&resultpage=2&id=9A412FB1-0D41-5C90-7C70-3674F3FDE752

Jury Renders Guilty Verdict in First Ever Criminal Online Music Piracy Trial http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?news_month_filter=&news_year_filter=&resultpage=3&id=5B7A1145-01B2-EC94-56A1-36A084A8FDC9

L.A. County Board of Supervisors Approves Ordinance Holding Property Owners Accountable for Piracy Activity in Their Buildings http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?news_month_filter=&news_year_filter=&resultpage=3&id=D4BDD54F-5656-84C9-C648-03067EA877DC

RIAA Comments On FCC Decision Affirming Ability Of ISPs To Address Piracy http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?news_month_filter=&news_year_filter=&resultpage=&id=FFFCF818-DA96-9FD0-B5AB-942B8590D5D4

Ashcroft mum as FBI raids school district computer center http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/index.cfm?i=35716&CFID=4149633&CFTOKEN=30401664

How It Does It: The RIAA Explains How It Catches Alleged Music Pirates http://chronicle.com/free/2008/05/2821n.htm

Why I've stopped sharing music http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/internet/06/27/music.sharing.column/index.html

In case you missed it, the RIAA finally sued Limewire http://freeculture.org/pipermail/discuss/2006-august/000816.html

Contact Information:
Mike@itcaz.com
http://www.itcaz.com

Alternative Browsers

Article two of a series of articles entitled, Free Alternatives.

Using Internet Explorer, but want something different? Check out these alternatives!

By Mike McCarthy

A lot of us grew up on the World Wide Web using Microsoft's Internet Explorer (MSIE); which was all we knew at the time. Truth is, before MSIE most of us in the software development industry were using a popular new browser called
Mosaic. Netscape Navigator was released a bit later (under the code name Mozilla) and eventually MSIE was released for both PC and MacIntosh. Mosaic died a slow death over time and Navigator (evolving to Open Source Code) was re-developed as Mozilla by its creators. Netscape was later bought out by AOL (they released Navigator version 6), but was eventually shelved in 2007 (source: wikipedia.com).

Today there are still other choices available to us. The most popular being Mozilla's
Firefox (remember, this was the original Navigator) and the recently released (2007) Apple Safari browser for PCs. For a complete list of current and historical browsers, click here.

Top-Two Alternatives to MSIE
Firefox is the most popular, defacto alternative to MSIE 6.1 and MAC OS X. Firefox was the first browser to utilize tabs instead of pages (one page per instance of the browser). By utilizing one page per tab, Firefox greatly reduced memory overhead and the number of browser instances running in your taskbar.

Note: MSIE 7.0 (utilizing the tab design) is available for XP and Vista users if you like the concept of tabs. However, if you have Windows 2000 or ME, then your most likely alternative is Firefox.

While Firefox had become the defacto alternative for MSIE 6.1/7.0, the Safari browser has become a defacto standard for Macintosh (Firefox is also available to Macintosh users). Safari is crisp, clean, uncomplicated, and supports an attractive browser toolbar that provides you all the features and functionality a PC user has become accustomed to; actually a lot more than that.

Performance
Something to consider -- while MSIE 6.1 and Firefox is relatively easy on your computer's memory, Safari is a bit heavy. In a simple, non-scientific but controlled test, I rebooted my computer and ran all three browsers simultaneously linked to my website (
www.itcaz.com) and sitting idle. I registered their performance via my Task Manager and found:

MSIE 6.1 33,188 MB memory
MSIE 7.0 46,048 MB memory
Safari 52,668 MB memory
Firefox 40,728 MB memory

You can learn more about these two products by linking below:

www.firefox.com
www.apple.com
www.netscape.com
www.microsoft.com

Contact Information:
mike@itcaz.com
http://www.itcaz.com

OpenOffice.org

Article one of a series of articles entitled, Free Alternatives.

Frustrated that you can't open attached Microsoft Office documents in your email and don't want to shell out bucks for Microsoft Office or an Adobe pdf writer? Relax - there is hope.

By Mike McCarthy

I have found a great alternative to the Microsoft Office suite of applications called OpenOffice.org and best of all its Free!

OpenOffice.org (originally StarOffice) is a multi-platform, open source product acquired by Sun Microsystems (the Java folks) in 1999. OpenOffice.org is not only the name of the development project; it’s also the name of the product and website. OpenOffice.org applications rival (and in many cases out-does) the more popular Microsoft Office suite of applications. This includes Writer (similar to Microsoft Office Word), Spreadsheet (similar to Microsoft Office Excel), Impress (similar to Microsoft Office PowerPoint), Base (similar to Microsoft Access), Draw (Microsoft doesn't offer one anymore), and a few other nifty applications end-users might find interesting. One of the attractive things I found in evaluating OpenOffice.org is that I can open, read, and write in a multitude of file formats including Microsoft Office formats (.doc, .ppt, .xls, .dbm) and even read and export to Adobe .pdf format!

OpenOffice.org's license agreement is clear: When you download and install OpenOffice.org you can use it, give it away, join their development team, become a tester, or sign up for product feedback. In general, OpenOffice.org is free to use by any end-user up to and including corporations, enterprises, and any other like organizations. You just can't sell it. Sun Microsystems is the main supporter and contributor of OpenOffice.org, but not the only contributor in the continuing global development and support of OpenOffice.org. According to the OpenOffice.org web site,

“The OpenOffice.org project is primarily sponsored by Sun Microsystems, which is the primary contributor of code to the Project. Our other major corporate contributors include Novell, RedHat, RedFlag CH2000, IBM, and Google. Additionally over 450,000 people from nearly every curve of the globe have joined this Project with the idea of creating the best possible office suite that all can use. This is the essence of an 'open source.' community!”


So far, the only drawback to OpenOffice.org I see is that they do not (yet?) provide an email alternative to Microsoft’s Office Outlook. But then again, you can always download and install Eudora Mail or Mozilla’s Thunderbird. You can learn more about OpenOffice by clicking on the links below:

OpenOffice.org
Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Gnu Lesser General Public License


Contact Information:
mike@itcaz,com
http://www.itcaz.com