Windows 8 - Deeper Impressions

[Tripredacus]

Microsoft will give you 11 pizzas for free if you optimize your website ( NeoWin 2013-10-28 )

The life of a web developer is a lot like trying to shoot a moving target while riding on the back of a horse going downhill near a canyon cliff edge. With many different browsers on the market and a need to support them all, building a website can become a complicated task.

I vote for a "you first" approach...

http://www.modern.ie/en-us/11percent

Sorry! We found the following errors (301)

http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/validator?profile=css21&warning=0&uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.modern.ie%2Fen-us%2F11percent

20 Errors, 2 warning(s)

http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.modern.ie%2Fen-us%2F11percent

[TELVM]

Apologies if already mentioned: As businesses flee the coming 'XPocalypse,' they're turning to Windows 7, not 8

Medieval Doomsday FUD aside, behold The Tiles Wonder overwhelming success in business:

... It’s impossible to predict the future, of course, but current trends paint a very disappointing picture for Windows 8 adoption in the workplace. Fiberlink, a device management company that helps oversee a million client notebooks, told PCWorld that as many as 98 percent of its client computers have been upgraded to Windows 7, not Windows 8 or 8.1. Meanwhile, of the 479,000 Windows machines tracked by Softchoice from May through September, Windows 7 machines accounted for 41.8 percent of its base, while just 0.2 percent were running Windows 8.

“Most of the migration is from XP to Windows 7,” says Dell’s Raley, simply.

Michael Silver, an analyst for Gartner, told us that his firm’s research shows more than 90 percent of large organizations are moving to Windows 7 ...

So much for the "Tabletizing Universe" cosmological model.

Again apologies if mentioned, this made me chuckle : Windows 8 And Einstein's Definition Of Insanity

... In pushing a product very few people want, a big part of Microsoft's solution is to hang tough and make incremental changes. But another part, unfortunately, is to yell louder: "YOU WILL LIKE THE MODERN UI IF WE KEEP ADVERTISING IT! YOU WILL LIKE THE HOMESCREEN TILES! It reminds me of Einstein's definition of insanity.

What about Windows 8.1? It has some solid additions, such as boot-to-desktop mode and a restored Start button. But it's a coat of paint and not real change. It's too late to significantly change Windows 8 anyway. Consumers and business customers didn't bite ...

Edited October 31, 2013 by TELVM

[JorgeA]

Apologies if already mentioned: As businesses flee the coming 'XPocalypse,' they're turning to Windows 7, not 8

Medieval Doomsday FUD aside, behold The Tiles Wonder overwhelming success in business:

... It’s impossible to predict the future, of course, but current trends paint a very disappointing picture for Windows 8 adoption in the workplace. Fiberlink, a device management company that helps oversee a million client notebooks, told PCWorld that as many as 98 percent of its client computers have been upgraded to Windows 7, not Windows 8 or 8.1. Meanwhile, of the 479,000 Windows machines tracked by Softchoice from May through September, Windows 7 machines accounted for 41.8 percent of its base, while just 0.2 percent were running Windows 8.

“Most of the migration is from XP to Windows 7,” says Dell’s Raley, simply.

Michael Silver, an analyst for Gartner, told us that his firm’s research shows more than 90 percent of large organizations are moving to Windows 7 ...

So much for the "Tabletizing Universe" cosmological model.

Again apologies if mentioned, this made me chuckle : Windows 8 And Einstein's Definition Of Insanity

... In pushing a product very few people want, a big part of Microsoft's solution is to hang tough and make incremental changes. But another part, unfortunately, is to yell louder: "YOU WILL LIKE THE MODERN UI IF WE KEEP ADVERTISING IT! YOU WILL LIKE THE HOMESCREEN TILES! It reminds me of Einstein's definition of insanity.

What about Windows 8.1? It has some solid additions, such as boot-to-desktop mode and a restored Start button. But it's a coat of paint and not real change. It's too late to significantly change Windows 8 anyway. Consumers and business customers didn't bite ...

On the first link: makes good sense. Why would any business in their right mind choose Windows 8 over 7 for their internal operations? Microsoft execs oughta be embarrassed that pros are snubbing their Metro baby.

On the second link: nice find! I liked the metaphor that's quoted in there --

"Microsoft missed the boat on tablets and now they are trying to catch up. The problem is, they jumped in the water after the boat left the dock and now they are swimming against a riptide."

The writer makes a point that I've been saying here:

With SQL Server, System Center, Windows Azure, Lync and Office 365 product lines all healthy and growing, maybe Microsoft should stop trying to wow consumers and be more like Oracle, with its singular enterprise focus.

That would remove all motivation to keep destroying Windows and keep to their highly successful historical strategy.

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

One more UI critique:

Windows 8.1's Calculator app sums up what's wrong with Microsoft's new OS

I know what you're thinking. The Calculator app, really? Let me explain. I hate it. It is, to me, the epitome of everything that's wrong with the one-size-fits-all approach of Windows 8.1. On a small Windows tablet, like the Acer Iconia W4, the calculator app works fine. It does a good job. You can use it to do all the things you'd want to do with a calculator. Add up numbers. Subtract them. Multiple them. Wonderful.

On my desktop PC with its two 24-inch screens, the Calculator app is the most useless thing ever. I launch it and it takes a while to open, and then it's there -- bloody huge -- filling my screen with buttons the size of business cards. It offers a selection of calculator types -- Standard, Scientific and Converter, and each mode looks like it's been designed to be viewed from Mars.

To calculate a sum I have to stop what I'm doing, open up this monstrosity, tap in my calculation, then close the app down. It's an exercise in time wasting.

[...]

So why doesn't the Calculator app detect my large screen and use the space more intelligently? Why, instead of opening full screen, doesn't it just appear in a strip down the side? Why does every app in the OS have to run full screen unless manually resized? Because Windows 8.1 treats every app as if it’s being opened and used on a tablet with a -- at most -- 10-inch screen.

[...]

At the very least, Microsoft could include a wizard that runs the first time you use Windows and lets you choose the features you want, and the features you don't. Instead of just letting us pick a color scheme, how about letting us choose how Windows works from the start, like choosing a desktop-friendly or tablet-friendly setup? Every time the OS detects a change to the hardware it can offer to run the wizard again.

Well, that last suggestion would be entirely too reasonable, so of course it's out of the question.

--JorgeA

[Formfiller]

Opera proudly continues its suicide path (seems to be hip nowadays):

http://my.opera.com/desktopteam/blog/important-announcement-about-your-my-opera-account

We saw My Opera grow into a passionate community site. For us, this whole idea of giving you a place where you could blog and share photos turned into an interesting, and very large, side project. Over the years, we've seen social media and blogging sites pop up, which offer more and better features than we could possibly maintain. These offerings are their sole business. You all know their names and you probably use their services already.

The explosion of these sites and the amount of resources we need to maintain our own service has changed our outlook on My Opera. We have made decision to shutdown My Opera as of March 1, 2014.

The villagers commenting are pissed of course. That's expected though.

[dencorso]

[JorgeA]

Wow, that was a fascinating walk -- thanks!

It's remarkable how many programs still worked and how many settings managed to survive all those successive installations. A tribute to Microsoft's historical concern for its customers, and one reason for their enormous success over time.

The video highlights the tragedy and the folly of dumping the Desktop as Foley and Thurrott report they plan to do.

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

A provocative bit of analysis, with equal applicability to Metro on Win8:

How will psychologists describe the iPhone syndrome in the future?

One of the areas that has fascinated us the most, is the approach that Apple and the iPhone fans have had to the product, and the energy they have spent defending the product despite the shortcomings and limitations of both past and present versions of the iPhone.

--JorgeA

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

Windows XP's OS share in October down slightly; Windows 8.1 rises up slowly ( NeoWin 2013-11-01 )

With just over five months to go before Windows XP reaches its support cut date of April 8th, 2014, the latest operating system data from Net Applications shows that Microsoft's quest to get people to ditch the 12-year old OS stalled in October.

The research firm's newest numbers show Windows XP in second place with 31.24 percent. which is down just slightly from September's 31.41 percent. That's a big slowdown compared to July and August, where Net Applications showed Windows XP's share dipped nearly six percent in those two months.

First a reminder to correct that NeoWin author mistake stating that we saw Windows XP take a "dip" in the recent past. Net Applications played some kind of statistical game three months ago when they changed their methodology to suddenly reduce Windows XP by almost 6 percentage points ...

What actually changed was how they counted all the same computers from one month to the next, and the only "dip" that occurred was in the intelligence shown by fanboys at NeoWin. However, much to the chagrin of those zealots and Microsoft no doubt, Net Applications appear to be unable to squeeze any more "dip" out of it. Since last month according to Net Marketshare Windows XP usage decreased just 0.17 percentage points. Windows 7 share was shaved by a mere 0.01 percent.

Most amusingly to me, but no doubt distressing to them is the fact that Microsoft's chickens have come home to roost. By implementing that crazy plan of a point upgrade nomenclature for Windows 8 they have fragmented its versions just like Mac OS X and now are reaping the benefits! Windows 8.0 has gone down 0.49 percent since last month and its successor Windows 8.1 Blew rose 0.85 percent. Most alarmingly for Microsoft that means Windows 8.x achieved just 0.36 percentage net gain in the last month. Therefore the Windows 8.0 share hits its peak last month at 8.02 percent and now begins to fall while Windows 8.1 Blew climbs from out of it. Will it or any version ever break 10% is the real question. If Microsoft continues their fast release schedule the answer is definitely no.

There's not much more to say about this whole thing really, except that maybe we can now surmise that 75% of the total "desktop marketshare" is thoroughly owned by Windows 7 and XP, the remaining 25% to be divided between everything else including the fragmented various versions of Microsoft Tiles.

Strategy Analytics: 10.2 million Windows Phones shipped in Q3 2013 ( NeoWin 2013-11-01 )

Global Smartphone Operating System Shipments

------------------ Q3 2012 --------- Q3 2013 -----

Android ....... 129.6 million ... 204.4 million

Apple iOS ...... 26.9 million .... 33.8 million

Microsoft WP .... 3.7 million .... 10.2 million

Blackberry ...... 7.4 million ..... 2.5 million

Others .......... 5.2 million ..... 0.5 million

Well that sure speaks for itself. Naturally the bulk of those 10.2 million WP phones was from the 8.8 million Nokia Lumias sold. And this begs the question of whether the death of Nokia, who was a beloved brand especially outside the USA, will decrease the Lumia sales going forward under the Microsoft label. Nokia is still alive presently on its deathbed Q4 2013 as we speak, and in 2014 Q1 we will see the report from this final quarter, the holiday season against refreshed iPhones and a huge Android tsunami.

Next year in calendar Q2 and Q3 of 2014 the reports from Q1 and Q2 show up with MicroNokia phones. Those numbers will tell the tale. I suspect the former independent Nokia just hit its WP high water mark that they will never exceed again.

EDIT: typo, clarity

Edited November 2, 2013 by CharlotteTheHarlot

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

EU regulators to approve or deny Microsoft's Nokia purchase by December ( NeoWin 2013-10-30 )

Today, Reuters reports that Microsoft has formally asked the European Commission to approve their deal to acquire the smartphone portion of Nokia. The deal, thanks to Nokia's own rising stock price, is now worth 5.44 billion euros, or about $7.49 billion. The commission will decide whether or not to approve the Microsoft-Nokia deal by December 4th. It could extend that date by an additional 10 working days if Microsoft offers up any anti-competition concessions.

Well, as seen in that previous article there certainly are no monopolistic or anti-competitive issues at play here I can't see them having a real concern here unless they use a different definition of a "market" than is traditional. But then again, I know very little about the EU so that means nothing. On the other hand, I am surprised that Finland hasn't pulled a rabbit out of its hat by now to block further destruction of Nokia by a foreign company. They've seen their headquarters sold off and huge layoffs and thousands more to be assimilated by Microsoft under this buyout. And that's not even addressing the infiltration of the place by the Trojan Horse Elop.

One must wonder if Nokia employees and Finland itself might see that 8.8 million Lumias as a possible reason to back out now?

There was a very important detail I forgot to mention in this post two days back ...

Nokia sells 8.8 million Lumia Windows Phone devices in Q3 2013 ( NeoWin 2013-10-29 )

From that same NeoWin story ...

"The company sold a total of 55.8 million mobile phones in the last quarter, including its feature devices and Asha phones.

[...]

Overall, Nokia brought in 5.66 billion ($7.8 billion) in revenue and 118 million ($162 million) in operating profit for the third quarter, which was higher than expected."

Ignoring that "better than expected" sentiment that only NeoWin or Wall Street analysts could use here, those numbers are mind-bogglingly strange! ... $7.8 billion revenue and $162 million net ...

$ 7,800,000,000 revenue

$ 0,162,000,000 profit

That's an average of just $2.90 profit per phone ( two dollars, ninety cents )! People must really be wondering about the logic of that deal they made with the devil to use WP without licensing charge in exchange for a Microsoft cash infusion, and whether they would be better off just paying the normal license fee without having to repay those loaned billions which must be the reason for that huge disparity in those figures.

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

Windows XP antivirus updates for Microsoft Security Essentials could end April 8th ( NeoWin 2013-10-31 )

Well another NeoWin FUDfest consisting entirely of children with an unhealthy obsession-compulsive disorder against XP encouraged by their irresponsible Microsoft parents. Reading these threads makes it easy to understand how world history is littered with examples of easily led sheeple following cults of personality leading to everything from simple financial scams to actual atrocities.

In a note sent to ZDNet, Microsoft said it "will not guarantee updates of our antimalware signature and engine" after April 8th. It sounds like the company, in theory, could make a decision to continue its antivirus updates after support for Windows XP ends but is preparing XP users for the worst.

Funny thing about antivirus signatures. As they are nothing more than data they are by definition platform independent. The engines of course are allegedly updated to make them work better but most people know it is only a reason to get you to pay for updates, or in the case of Microsoft make you update the OS. Internet scammers have nothing on the antivirus FUD industry. So Microsoft is in a bit of a quandary here. They can choose to play games with the virus definitions which currently appear nightly in Windows Update and block Windows XP from getting them, but that is simple to defeat by updating a Windows 7 system and then simply grabbing the signature and making it available. Or, they can stop playing around and protect the world from malware by letting MSSE work on anything forever. Which will they choose? Naturally whatever serves their own needs and is contrary to their customers.

Microsoft is also directly quoted as saying ...

"Running antivirus on out of support operating systems is not an adequate solution to help protect against threats. Running a well-protected solution starts with using modern software and hardware designed to help protect against today's threat landscape."

Huge irony in that Microsoft quote! Does that "threat landscape" includes the operating system itself? It takes some real gall to even talk about threats when the company doing the talking is the primary partner in the PRISM spook collaboration and willfully adds compromised code to the very operating system that they demand users upgrade to.

Yes, there is a way to enable the Surface Ethernet adapter on Windows RT 8.1 ( NeoWin 2013-10-31 )

As it turns out, there is in fact a way to enable the Surface Ethernet adapter but it's a tad complicated and could lead to some issues down the road. It's described in a blog post from Paul Deane, who found that Windows RT 8.1 now supports the Realtek USB FE Family Controller driver and the Surface Ethernet adapter happens to have a Realtek chip inside.

If you really want to use this add-on with your Surface or Surface 2, again with Windows RT 8.1 installed, here is how you proceed, according to Deane:

• Plug in the Surface Ethernet Adapter, and then wait for the installation to fail.
• Open Device Manager, and then under Network Adapters right click on the Ethernet Adapter, which Deane says should have a yellow exclamation mark.
• Choose "update driver", then select "Browse my computer for driver software" and then click Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer.
• Deane says if that doesnt take users directly to Network Adapters, they can choose it from the list.
• In the left pane Realtek should be visible; highlight it and there should only be one option in the right pane for the Realtek USB FE Family Controller. Deane says to click Select and next.
• Finally, Deane says if the OS warns users about compatibility they should just accept it.

Boy, that sure brings back beloved memories. The Surface has reinvented early Win9x Plug'n'Pray manual driver repair! And all this just to jump into a wired network via Ethernet, a common scenario for people fixing up computers. Of course if you have a buggy or infected computer in for repairs the last thing you want to do is embark upon a PnP driver trek like this.

Personally I can't stand USB adapters for native interfaces like IDE, SATA and Ethernet. All they had to do was build in the original interfaces, even using a new smaller connector if necessary, to avoid this crap. But when you are intent on building your own walled-garden, everything that worked previously looks like legacy to you.

EDIT: typo

Edited November 2, 2013 by CharlotteTheHarlot

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

PS4 to Have Resolution Advantage at Launch vs. Xbox One ( Tom's Hardware 2013-10-31 )

On the eve of the launch of the two next-generation consoles comes fodder for technical comparisons between the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One. Infinity Ward executive producer Mark Rubin confirmed that Call of Duty: Ghosts will be running at a higher resolution on the Sony platform.

"Hey, been on the road last couple weeks so havent had a chance to update, but wanted to confirm that for Xbox One were 1080p upscaled from 720p. And, were native 1080p on PS4. We optimized each console to hit 60 FPS and the game looks great on both. Still on the road, but glad to see the great reception to Extinction. Cant wait for next week's launch."

Microsoft just can't catch a break with Xbox it seems. It's almost as if Sony had a spy in the ranks at Microsoft considering the fact that on every front they have cut their legs out from under them.

Windows Azure hit with worldwide partial outage ( NeoWin 2013-11-01 )

This is the third such large outage for Windows Azure inside of a year. In December 2012, one server cluster in the south central portion of the US went down for a few days. In February, an outage hit all of its server clusters due to an expired HTTPS certificate.

Impossible! The cloud is our friend, it serves us software, protects our data and is always available.

You do gotta wonder though ... who is it that suffers more from cloud problems? The sheeple that were scammed into using it, or the government spooks that exploit it.

Google reverses promise made in 2005 not to use banner ads in searches ( NeoWin 2013-10-24 ) <--- Last Week

Following Google's lead, Bing Smart Search starts testing giant ads in results ( NeoWin 2013-10-31 ) <--- This Week

Less than a week after we reported that Google is testing out large banner ads on certain search result pages, Microsoft has announced that it is experimenting with a very similar concept in Windows 8.1's Bing Smart Search.

Ill skip commenting for now, and instead offer for your enjoyment the actual reaction of our favorite fanboy ...

NOOOOOOOOOOO! WHY????

Ironically his reaction there mirrors those from the adults a year and a half ago seen in the official Destroying Windows Blog when the murder of Aero was announced, and at many other times over the past two years. So to Dot MetroTard I say ...

( original image from here )

EDIT: typo, clarity

Edited November 2, 2013 by CharlotteTheHarlot

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

LG, Cisco and others looking to create common platform for future "Smart Homes" ( NeoWin 2013-10-31 )

While most folks are still getting used to the marvelous idea that their smartphones are always connected to the internet, some people are already looking towards the future and the so called internet of everything.

Smart Homes, where appliances and HVAC systems are always connected and can be controlled via apps on smartphones are part of this vision of the future, and now a consortium of companies is looking to create a common standard on which this vision can be built.

[...]

The goal is to create the foundation on which all electronics manufacturers can then create an interconnected ecosystem; and while theres no timeframe mentioned in the announcement, the sooner standardization comes to this field the sooner more users will get to experience it.

~tsk~ One bad idea after another. UPnP apparently wasn't enough of a shortcut for the ConnectTards, instead they desire the ability to have anyone walking into any home and turn anything on and off from any cellphone and tablet. Next wave of software growth to respond to this ... apps that promise to guard against threats from strangers controlling your toaster, TV, lights, baby monitors and security alarms! Home security redefined. Let Norton and McAfee guard your house. What could probably go wrong with that. ( well, you'll probably come home one day and find your door unlocked and a message reminding you that your subscription expired, please renew to re-enable home protection ).

But the sheeple will be thrilled at their new ability to turn on lights or the stereo from their cellphone while sitting on their ever-fattening butts on the couch. Future criminals will never have had it so easy. Cellphones with war-dialers that try millions of combinations per second to unlock the victim's front door and then make off with their Xbox and giant LED TV. I wonder who the victim will blame when they come home to find their stuff is gone.

Major Patent Dispute Pits Apple/Microsoft-led Rockstar Group vs Google, Samsung, and Others ( Maximum PC 2013-11-01 )

Microsoft and Apple suing Google with a war-chest of Nortel patents ( NeoWin 2013-11-01 )

Rockstar doesn't refer to Rockstar Games, makers of Grand Theft Auto V, but a consortium made up of Apple, Microsoft, BlackBerry, Ericsson, and Sony. At the heart of the dispute are thousands of former Nortel patents Rockstar purchased for $4.5 billion, and according to the lawsuit, several Android players infringe on these patents.

Google stands accused of infringing on seven patents covering technology that helps match Internet search terms with relevant advertising, Reuters reports. That makes up the backbone of Google's search business, so this is a pretty big deal.

Some of the NeoKids are thrilled naturally. "Good. Finally Google's rein of terror can come to an end and Microsoft and Apple can bring peace to the world of IT." Kids these days, more piercings than brains. But I do love that phrase he used, and it is better applied as Microsoft's Reign Of Terror. Thank you, I will be using that!

Make no mistake, this is about one thing, Microsoft and Android. Microsoft is the new Netscape now, If you can't beat 'em, sue 'em. And with enough bad court decisions they could win and for all practical purposes end up owning Android by being the one who collects the most cash from its use. There already is a Microsoft tax on Android already and now they want to increase it further or in their best case scenario get some court lackeys to completely block its sale the way Apple blocks Samsung. The only playing field that Microsoft can play on is an empty playing field. Clearly the biggest mistake ever made was the scam perpetrated by the DoJ in stopping the court from breaking up Microsoft into little pieces when it had already decided to do just that. Now we are seemingly stuck with this festering sore on our technology like a prostitute stuck with a rampaging venereal disease.

Best comment I saw was at MPC: "I just love how patents protect innovation as intended. Yah patents!". So true. Patents are literally designed to create a monopoly for some arbitrary period of time, and most of the time that period is, well, forever. We need more Benjamin Franklins and fewer Bill Gates, Steve Ballmers, and Microsofts.

Meet badBIOS, the mysterious Mac and PC malware that jumps airgaps ( Ars Technica 2013-10-31 )

'BadBIOS' System-Hopping Malware Appears Unstoppable ( Tom's Hardware 2013-11-01 )

When the malware jumped to other systems over his network, Ruiu did the logical thing and removed the MacBook's Wi-Fi and Bluetooth cards, and unplugged its Ethernet cable. Disconnecting the computer from the network did not help: The MacBook Air continued to broadcast the malware to nearby systems, even those running Windows, Linux or the Unix-based operating system Open BSD.

USB sticks plugged into infected machines were immediately infected and would infect other machines, even though no files were present on the USB sticks. Infected laptops unplugged from networks, running on batteries, and with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth cards removed still managed to infect other machines in the same room.

[...]

If badBIOS turns out to be a hoax or a publicity stunt, Ruiu has nothing to gain and everything to lose. Of course, if it's real, the security world now faces a very big problem: If badBIOS ever leaves the confines of Ruiu's office, any system that comes in contact with it is essentially nuked.

Halloween scare story? That's what I would guess. The story has hoax written all over it. But if it is legit then we are seeing a Stuxnet quality virus with countermeasures and smart code for multiple contingencies, and that probably means something that came out of a government spook lab. As tabloid as they are I do want to give Ars Technica credit for using a cool picture though ...

( Image Source: Ars Technica )

EDIT: typo, clarity

Edited November 2, 2013 by CharlotteTheHarlot

[CharlotteTheHarlot]

Latest Snowden documents reveal the NSA infiltrates Google, Yahoo data center traffic at will ( TechSpot 2013-10-30 )

NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide, Snowden documents say ( Washington Post 2013-10-30 )

Update: Google Denies NSA Cooperation While Expanding Encryption ( Wall Street Journal Blog 2013-10-30 )

NSA Bombshell Shocks Former Spooks: "Why in The World Would We Burn Google?" ( The Cable 2013-10-30 )

The National Security Agency has secretly broken into the main communications links that connect Yahoo and Google data centers around the world, according to documents obtained from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and interviews with knowledgeable officials.

By tapping those links, the agency has positioned itself to collect at will from hundreds of millions of user accounts, many of them belonging to Americans. The NSA does not keep everything it collects, but it keeps a lot.

According to a top-secret accounting dated Jan. 9, 2013, the NSAs acquisitions directorate sends millions of records every day from internal Yahoo and Google networks to data warehouses at the agencys headquarters at Fort Meade, Md.

( Image Source: Washington Post )

( that's a very tiny snippet from voluminous information in those and many other articles )

Another important piece of the puzzle, and one of the oldest and least surprising. In this step the spooks simply tap directly onto communication hubs from the outside and take whatever they want without the operators having idea about it. Most likely they have no need of warrants here because wiretapping this traffic while it is in transit the signals are presumably "secured" and most importantly constitute the "public airwaves" ( even if it is on a wire ) and we citizens long ago lost control of this when we accepted the bad precedent of allowing the FCC to regulate such things.

This is slightly different than the recent revelations of asking for or just demanding direct access into ISPs and telecoms with their own special rooms onsite and with cables connected from there back to government centers, presumably using warrants and/or national security letters.

IMHO, the reason that this outside access is done is because if you are in the SIGINT business you will most definitely want copies of the same communication encrypted and unencrypted which is critical to cracking security methods used and getting passphrases. Having just one or the other leaves ambiguity. The infamous metadata ( that the politicians use as a distraction to greenlight anything and everything ) is the key to synchronizing the two data streams, origination, destination, time of transmission, etc.

If you followed this far you can now imagine that even if the internal cooperative/coerced step gets removed because of political pressure, they would still maintain this legacy approach of positioning taps in-between all comm hubs outside the ISP and telecom centers and MOST IMPORTANTLY they would still be able to unscramble and decrypt at will having learned much from the internal access and cooperation that was widely unknown until this past summer.

The overall picture should be pretty much complete now and it shows that our federal protectors are present at every single point and have every intention of knowing everything possible. All the 1984 big brother jokes over the past decades were in fact understated. We have gone miles past anything ever dreamed now, because in the modern age the first amendment has devolved down to either soapbox speeches or private face-to-face conversations. In the government view, every single other thing is fair game. If you think about it, even a huge public outcry and Congressional hearings or a Warren-style commission ( none of which have even appeared yet ) would really matter. But it's an easy guess of the political strategy here. The spooks went for it all, and got it all, while they could, and will only pull back when the pressure becomes unbearable. Should that happen the politicians and Big Data corporations would get kudos for stopping the "invasion of privacy", but the damage is done as they have the means to continue anyway "from the outside" using the massive knowledge gained.

Silent Circle, Lavabit to take back email privacy with Dark Mail Alliance ( TechSpot 2013-10-31 )

Dark Mail: New Encrypted Service Announced ( Tom's Hardware 2013-10-31 )

Silent Circle and Lavabit may have abruptly shut down in August amid growing pressure from the National Security Agency to hand over user information, but that doesnt mean theyve given up on secure email services. Rather, the two are teaming up under the newly formed Dark Mail Alliance to develop a unique end-to-end encrypted protocol and architecture, which will be released as open source for anyone to implement.

Announced yesterday at at the Inbox Love email conference in California, the new system will be based on the XMPP messaging protocol instead of the old and widely used SMTP, while adding an extra layer of protection by wrapping up all the SSL-encrypted data with Silent Circle's own SCIMP algorithm.

Encryption will apply to an emails content, attachments and metadata such as the to and from fields as well as IP addresses and headers. The service will use ephemeral keys, meaning keys are created on-device so only the owner has access to them, and they are deleted after each exchange of messages.

As founding partners of The Dark Mail Alliance, both Silent Circle and Lavabit will work to bring other members into the alliance, assist them in implementing the new protocol and help proliferate what they call the worlds first end-to-end encrypted 'Email 3.0' throughout the world's email providers. The official launch is slated for the second quarter of 2014 and a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds will begin soon.

Dark Mail would be available free of cost as an add-on or an option to existing e-mail providers -- so Gmail could use it if Google chose to participate -- in a way that is transparent to end users. The goal is to have 100 Lavabit-like services around the world and take back email privacy.

Clear signs of that new growth industry I expected. : This may be the only way to have anything approaching secure communications. I'm withholding my own expectations until I read more on this. As stated above, if the spooks get copies of traffic from the inside and outside ( plain-text and encrypted ) then can put those incredible supercomputers and massively parallel systems to use in developing a database of brute force methods and then run the gamut against encrypted traffic in future scenarios when they have less access than today. Unique ephemeral one-time keys sounds like a good approach at first glance, but who really knows what is effective anymore. It already may be too late since the taxpayer-funded government monster has been operating without restraint or oversight for so long now.

Microsoft, Google and others ask lawmakers to reform NSA data collection efforts ( NeoWin 2013-11-01 )

Google, Apple, Microsoft, and others back bill against NSA surveillance ( TechSpot 2013-11-01 )

It looks as though the tech giants are teaming up against the NSA again. An open letter containing the signatures of some of the world's biggest tech companies including Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, AOL and Yahoo, has surfaced in support of the recent USA Freedom Act. The bill would see amendments made to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that currently governs how the NSA can collect private data.

The letter follows a similar push made by the tech giants previously and is mainly focused on the issue of transparency. These companies want to be allowed to disclose more information regarding government data requests.

Beyond that, the companies are pushing for improvements to "privacy protections" as well as for deeper and more "appropriate oversight and accountability mechanisms" to be put in place with regards to prying government eyes. At this point it appears these protections and oversight improvements are mentioned on a general basis as there is no information on what these measures could include.

Trying to calm down the sheeple. And after some moderate complaining about national security the government will oblige of course, returning privacy back to a less high profile place in the news media. They all win except for us, the customer/consumer/citizen. The government wins by appearing responsive to privacy concerns, the companies win by appearing to be fighting for us, yet neither is the case and nothing really changes behind the scenes.

What's really happening is that these companies who couldn't care less about the customers except that they pay their bills when demanded, are feeling heat from them especially on the international front. See the articles above ( especially about burning Google ) for some details. Now is the time to expect a barrage of placebo actions with one goal, shutting everyone up. The sheeple need to get back to consumin' and stop picking on the providers, and stop driving down the politicians approval ratings.

EDIT: typo

Edited November 2, 2013 by CharlotteTheHarlot

[TELVM]

How will psychologists describe the iPhone syndrome in the future?

8. Apple decides which applications you can install on the phone: This is good, because Apple thereby ensures that you do not get inferior programs on your phone.

9. The app store is a closed universe: Apple knows what is best for end users, which is good for the many iPhone users.

That's slave talk in my book. I'll better switch off my comps for good than ever submit to such nazism. No wonder they call it "jailbreaking" when they manage to escape from that Konzentrationslager.

NOOOOOOOOOOO! WHY????

Ironically his reaction there mirrors those from the adults a year and a half ago seen in the official Destroying Windows Blog when the murder of Aero was announced, and at many other times over the past two years. So to Dot MetroTard I say ...

Homeric!!!

Meet badBIOS, the mysterious Mac and PC malware that jumps airgaps ( Ars Technica 2013-10-31 )