Centroid.EU Blog

(this blog is mostly encrypted - adults only)

The Apple magic wore off

January 19th, 2014

Yesterday I found myself looking through PC mainboards and Intel CPU's. I also inquired about whom to donate / hand-down my other PC to when I get the new one. So I likely won't be getting the Mac Pro even though it's a nice machine. I looked at ASUS Sabertooth TUF mainboard, if it's worth telling.

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Donation time again

January 15th, 2014

I'm donating 200 euros to OpenBSD this early in the start of the year. In 2012 I donated over 500 euros to them and a little less than that in 2013, since 2014 seems to be a good year I may match the 2012 donation sum by end of year.

Also OpenBSD is looking for corporate and private support in donations to pay its 20,000 dollar a year electricity bill. Once they have that secured the project will continue otherwise it's threatened with shut-down. If you know anyone or you yourself are using OpenBSD don't you think it's time to open your wallet to a project such as OpenBSD which is in need?

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Is the NSA so much smarter than everyone else?

January 15th, 2014

I don't think so. Mainly they probably get human resources from the tech industry, people that worked on specific platforms. They probably also have access to the source code of closed source programs. It's an area that they can enjoy hiding behind patriotism and laws. And then there is their huge budget. Money can buy smarts.

How does one resist such an organization that has all the resources in the world vs. a lowly system administrator? I've been wondering that all along. I considered going offline again as that is the ultimate way to stop this madness, but that isn't gonna work out as long as I work at a job in north america via the Internet. I'm still pondering this issue...

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What would I do in Virtual Reality?

January 11th, 2014

I'm currently reading the book "Infinite Reality" by Blascovich and Bailenson and I think this book is a real thriller. I think virtual reality is not too far off for the consumer if you follow Oculus Rift progress. So what would I do with it? One idea is that I would create a "god room" as I call it. It's a room or object in the blackness of space, where I would create or architect new rooms.

Another idea is that I would be able to monitor my computers in a 3D fashion. For this I have the idea of using kqueue system calls to monitor filesystem on a host and to make an observer aware that something changed or that activity is in one part of the system, like a 3D popup or a change in colour. The filesystem would be represented as a tree perhaps, very simple to do (sorta). I have experience in networking and (mostly network) programming so I believe creating a virtual reality interface for network operators is perhaps also on the menu. Being able to examine traffic, suspend traffic, block traffic, create traffic and communication is what comes to mind. I poke around the OpenBSD Operating System once in a while to see how I would implement my ideas best when the time comes to have a head mounted display.

These not yet created applications can be used in security and debugging scenarios, which partially attract to me because I'm often paranoid about things. To be able to go beyond what is possible with a keyboard and monitor interface is what is supposed to cure my paranoia and strengthen my trust in things. I think VR can do this, although the possibility exists that no electronic device can be trusted at all,.. ever. In that case the VR Interface is to unearth the threat-level.

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Freifunk Franken

January 10th, 2014

This image shows the franken.freifunk.net access point on my ipod.

Cheers!

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So, who owns the Internet?

January 8th, 2014

Here is an article with the same title and I admit to you I haven't read it. But I'd like to tell you what I think. The Internet is owned by corporations who are in it for profit. Since the profit margin is very small, yet people expect to be paid a lot they devise scarier methods (such as killing net neutrality, killing adfree content) to make even more profit. That is the truth. We, the people do not own the Internet, and we need to wake up and smell the coffee. We are however the soul of the Internet, and we make it a happening place.

So why do we not take ownership of it?

I have started by investing 20 euros into a WRT router that will be hooked up to freifunk.net, which is an initiative to mesh network everyone in germany. There obviously is a lot of gaping holes causing no service. But if people pick up and add their own 20 euro router eventually it'll become a network. And it gives you ownership of it, albeit a very small yet important part of it. I'm looking forward to pioneering this network in my neighbourhood and hopefully people will jump on the bandwagon. More on this later.

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Ordered two books

January 5th, 2014

I have ordered two books from amazon. One dealing with OpenCL programming and the other with virtual reality, who knows where this will take me.

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My IT spendings are just about average in .de

January 2nd, 2014

Apparently a survey done by the European Information Technology Observatory concluded that in 2013 the average spendings for IT per german is 1500 euros. So I'm actually just about at this average, small count of my spendings:

provider m-net 20 euro/month
provider vodafone 24 euro/month
vps provider hub.org 35 dollars/month
vps provider vr.org 20 dollars/month
vps provider hetzner 8 euros/month
KNF (franken.de) 5 euros/month

This comes to about 85 euros per month and then there is other costs involved. I think I'm just about average.

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Why China is fixated on the Moon

January 1st, 2014

Recently in conversation I had with someone the chinese ambitions on the moon came up. They want to exploit the moon for its resources, she said. And I said "I know, isn't it beautiful?". Then I told her about mans quest into space and the earth being a womb to a human baby-mind. She thought I was crazy.

So then I read this BBC article, about why china is fixated on the moon. My opinion is that we should use the moons resources not to bring back to earth but to strengthen the space program. Use the resources to go out further. Also why is the rest of the world fixated on Mars? Does mars have resources more abundant than the moon? Or easier to be stripped? When looking at the moon it is a system similar to that on earth and perhaps there is more abundance of elements there than we'll ever find on mars? If nuclear fusion reactors (which don't exist yet) can be powered by helium-3 from the moon, which is taken as a sort of catalyst or inhibitor in order to control the fusion then I say go for it. That's the only element where I say bring it back to earth because there isn't much of it and it's easily transported. Don't bring back the metals though.. those are too bulky and make better sense to be used in spacecraft beyond moon orbit, or as antennas for dark side listening posts.

In the end, the article says there is potentially 10,000 years of power for the electric needs on earth in helium-3. If that't true it'll probably be a race among chinese and american private power companies to get the most they can. Good luck, humanity!

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