Soft District

After proving that, from some points of view, their Communism really works, Chinese people are starting to be left behind by the entire world. No, it has nothing to do with the economic growth, the global crisis, and not even with the new president of the USA - this is all about censorship. For example, let's look at the China mobile limited access...

In China, it is obvious that some remote areas don't have mobile access, but I find it rather funny to see them so furiously trying to filter porn in every possible place. I wonder if it's legal to say dirty jokes or not? Well, I wouldn't try that in public, if I were there, but look at what's happening - after shutting down thousands of websites, the Chinese Government is now going for mobile content!

All right, but what can they do? According to ArsTechnica, this could go as far as "blocking the sending of mutlimedia messages, text content, and other mobile media that is deemed inappropriate." Heh, figure that! So are they going to block ALL multimedia content, or keep a few million people busy with checking other people's mobile messages to see if they are decent or not?

In the end, this could create a bunch of jobs, so it can't be that bad, after all. If you want privacy, go on a remote island without any electricity-powered device around, because soon, even your washing machine may listen to you and "report" further...

Damn, I hate all this! Just think about one little fact - the P2P madness is far from being over, and what I really hate is that you're being considered guilty by default in most countries, since they are throttling P2P traffic, monitoring your every bit of data, and so on. I know, it sounds horrible, and it may also be illegal for them to do this in most areas...but do you really think they care?

In a recent article published by ArsTechnica, it is being said that "Law enforcement in Sweden is pushing for the power to get personal information on file sharers who are guilty of lesser copyright offenses. Sweden's police are reportedly preparing to send a report to the Ministry of Justice tomorrow that will request changes to the law so that police can pursue cases beyond those that would warrant prison time, allowing them to gain access to P2P users' phone numbers, e-mail addresses, and more."

As you probably know already, if you're into all this P2P madness, Sweden is the country where the notorious Pirate Bay is located, and a new file sharing bill will turn virtually every file sharer into a criminal. There's one thing these guys will never understand, it seems - if you really like something, you buy it.

That's it. Most people I know downloaded some illegal content one day, sometimes even without knowing what they're doing, but in the end, justice has been done - they got the original discs added to the collection, and that's what really matters, after all.

Originally named SimpleBT client(from versions 0.11 to 0.37), BitComet has been around quite a while, since its initial release happened way back in 2003. If this sounds like something new to you, then let me say only this - P2P-torrent!

Today, we're talking about the best version of BitComet, since I always think the last version of any program is the best one, until proven otherwise. Currently available in 52 languages, BitComet just got a new maturity update, moving another step away from version 1.0, since version 1.09 was released today!

While version 1.09 only comes with a core bugfix, "certain BT task may occur progress error caused by saving file boundary data when task stop," the previous version, released only two days ago, features a longer list of improvements and fixes, so here's the list of changes in version 1.08, from 18 January 2009:

GUI Improved: add filter by file type to file list in BT task properties dialog
GUI Improved: display torrent create software and create date display BT task properties dialog
GUI Improved: support to add mirror URL manually in HTTP task properties dialog
GUI Improved: move the option of "power off or standby after download finish" from option dialog to Tools menu
GUI Improved: remove toolkit VistaTcpPatch.exe, merged into main program
GUI Improved: open torrent file directly if existed in torrent archive when open BC link
GUI Improved: show task archive and torrent collection immediately after program startup, without pending load
GUI Improved: improve the item number info in status bar when filter the torrent archive and torrent collection
GUI Improved: append new torrent to the bottom of torrent archive or torrent collection list
GUI Improved: remove old torrent from the top of torrent collection list, when the torrent number reaches the max number
GUI Improved: new download status icon in torrent archive list, to indicate the task download finished
GUI Improved: add "open save folder" command to the context menu of torrent archive list, available after task download finished
GUI Improved: add "Unhide all" command to the context menu of torrent collection list
GUI Improved: hit Del to delete selected items in torrent archive list, or block selected items in torrent collection list
GUI Bugfix: when the item in torrent archive or torrent collection has no snapshot, click the empty snapshot icon area will open invalid webpage
Core Improve: improve connection algorithm for Long-Time seeding
Core Improve: improve file boundary data dave for BT task
Core Improve: ignore thumbs.db when makiing torrent file
Core Bugfix: download failed from certain video website
Core Bugfix: user name and password info filled in HTTP task don't take effect if reference page not filled

Do I have to add that BitComet is multiplatform free software? To download the best version of BitComet yet, just click here and don't forget to check and double check that the content you're downloading is freely available, so that the RIAA and MPAA won't come after you! ;)

I don't know if you heard about the Conficker worm so far, because today it's my first time. No, it has nothing to do with Tequila, and there's no connection with any of the games in the Worms series, either. Anyway, this worm has been around for a while now, but the hot news say that a slightly different version is on a rampage over the Web these days!

According to F-Secure, quoted by ArsTechnica, "more than one million PCs have been infected with the worm (also known as Kido or Downadup) in the past 24 hours, with a total of 3.52 million machines infected worldwide. According to F-Secure, that 3.52 million is a conservative estimate." That's not something to joke around with, don't you think?

This new version of the digital threat has the following description (via Microsoft):

"Worm:Win32/Conficker.B is a worm that infects other computers across a network by exploiting a vulnerability in the Windows Server service (SVCHOST.EXE). If the vulnerability is successfully exploited, it could allow remote code execution when file sharing is enabled. It may also spread via removable drives and weak administrator passwords. It disables several important system services and security products."

All right, so what can we do to stay away from it? After all, this is all that really matters - prevention is the mother of all cures, at least to myself. Installing MS08-067 seems a good idea to guard against attack from either version of the agent, provided you aren't using weak passwords. For now, the number of infected computers seems to be around 1 million...and rising!

Although Google Apps for businesses is a set of tools released almost two years ago, something kept them at a pretty low level, at least when talking about popularity with home users, as well as media coverage, and I have no idea what. Could it be the fact that Google's free apps are so great? Well, it may be possible, but - according to the search giant, "our expanded Google Apps suite is used by more than 1 million businesses, with 3,000 new companies signing up each day." Great, they just demolished all that I said... or not!


Why not? Well, it seems Google still needs help, and if we can help ourselves by helping them, that's even better! OK, that should give you a clear hint about what's next, so here's the interesting part, right from The Official Google Blog:

"Today we're excited to announce the Google Apps Authorized Reseller Program. With this release, solution providers globally can take advantage of tools that enable bundling of sales, customization and support for Google Apps Premier Edition for customers of all sizes.

We've adapted this program to complement resellers' current business models. Authorized Resellers have the flexibility to combine their existing services with Google Apps. With cloud-based Google Apps there is no new hardware or software to maintain. The Authorized Reseller program benefits include:

• owning the customer relationship and billing structure


• providing consulting, service management and end-user support


• receiving a recurring discount on the annual Google Apps licensing fee


• receiving marketing, sales and technical training from Google

We've been fine-tuning the program for the past few months, working with more than 50 pilot resellers to make sure it's a good fit with our partners' needs. We're excited about the new opportunities that cloud computing is creating for IT solution providers, and we encourage you to visit our program site to learn more about the program and apply."

This sounds like a great challenge, so if you were worried about losing your job, or maybe you want to jump off the boat before it sinks, becoming a representative of Google and the most powerful brand in the world really sounds like a great challenge!