Archive for June, 2012


Some of you might know about the new EU cookie law. Basically, I have to ask for permission to store cookies on your computer. I am using WordPress on this blog and a couple of more website. The problem is, I am using NotCaptcha as an anti-spam measure. This plugin uses, just like my own Capatcha implementation I have used a couple of times on custom websites, uses a PHP Session to store the expected answer, server side. A PHP Session sets a cookie to identify the session.

Therefore I have installed the Cookie Control plugin, to display a notification message about the cookie usage.

The problem is, with this plugin enabled, a PHP session is started every time a page on my blog loads, which is, strictly speaking, in conflict with the new European regulations, as this cookie is being placed before you can click “I am happy with that” in the Cookie Control popup.

The right to read

A while ago, I was browsing through gopherspace, a forgotten corner of the internet. I stumbled across a text named “the right to read”. It can be found at gopher://zaphod.661.org/0/text/right-to-read.txt. If you don’t have a gopher capable client, you can use the floodgap gopher-to-http proxy. http://gopher.floodgap.com/gopher/gw?zaphod.661.org/0/text/right-to-read.txt.

When reading these articles about “Secure Boot” on onnews. http://www.osnews.com/story/26086/Fedora_secure_boot_and_an_insecure_future and http://www.osnews.com/story/26106/UEFI_Secure_Boot_and_Ubuntu and the comments to this article, it reminded me of this text, the right to read.

It was also possible to bypass the copyright monitors by installing a
modified system kernel. Dan would eventually find out about the free
kernels, even entire free operating systems, that had existed around the
turn of the century. But not only were they illegal, like debuggers–you
could not install one if you had one, without knowing your computer’s
root password. And neither the FBI nor Microsoft Support would tell you
that.

The Microsoft certificate required to boot a kernel in a “Secure Boot” environment, and the idea sketched in this story that one would require the “root-password” of the computer to install an alternative OS, those concepts are more-or-less the same. One would require “permission” from Microsoft to use a non-Microsoft kernel/OS.

This, in combination with other forms of DRM, not only restricted to just texts to read, but, in today’s perspective, the right to listen to music, to watch a movie, or any other digital content. Looking at recent development, such as the blocking of the Piratebay, or, less recent, things like data retention, which by the way was again in the news recently. The UK government wishes to extent this data retention to a much larger extent. I am sorry, the article about this is in Dutch. http://tweakers.net/nieuws/82577/britse-regering-wil-vergaande-bewaarplicht.html.

I am concerned about the consequences of these and other recent developments. I am concerned, in a near future, there will be no such thing as freedom. Our freedom taken away by governments and big companies, so called, to protect us…. us? or them?

I wish to point out copyright was initially put in place as a way to control what was printed. It was a form of censorship, and it seems our leaders have not forgotten this fact, and with the means of modern technology, they wish to enforce this upon the people once again.