nadams

Joined 12 years ago

Karma
629
Submissions
327
Member since
Dec 19
Hi! I'm a developer and system/network administrator who is easy going and laid back. I also run a source code hosting service, and a 3D printing business.

Feel free to ask me anything - adamsna[at]datanethost.net .

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Recent submissions

Comment · 11 years ago
Comment · 11 years ago
Comment · 11 years ago
> There are no infrastructure changes, or hardware required. This was one of FTC’s guidelines for the contest.

> Unfortunately, Nomorobo is not available on traditional analog landlines or wireless phones at this time.

Sounds like he failed the challenge...

I don't think his idea is revolutionary - one could setup Asterisk to do what he did.

Comment · 11 years ago
No offense but I didn't mention a specific VOIP provider on purpose.

However, callcentric already has it built and much easier to understand than twilio. I'm not saying that service is bad - but the average person doesn't know what API, cloud, or SIP means (or care). Callcentric makes it pretty obvious what their service is and provides and how to use it.

Comment · 11 years ago
> How on earth do "normal" people fall for this?

How do people fall for phishing scams or running malware from an email attachment? The answer to that question is the same to yours. I think it's a combination of lack of public education about scams and the belief that the email or phone call is legit.

And I think it's really interesting. A lot of people talk about "infected" PDFs - I've personally never seen that but what I usually see are:

invoice.pdf.exe

invoice.pdf.js

Most sane email providers should scrub that attachment (or bounce it) - however email providers such as AOL don't. Thanks AOL.

I run my own email service and I get emails like these all the time [1]. And if you are someone who takes the tollway daily it could be a scary email that you open right away.

I do want to mention Amazon's practices. So it appears their system glitches and spews out this email to random people [2]. This email is plain text and, at least the last time I logged into my account, has no indication that they want this information (it does say that "functionality is limited" but those instructions that say to login to the site and submit your information are incorrect which immediately makes me think it's a scam - it even has typos that you would find on a scam email!). It's even been reported that customer service says that it is a scam. However, it is real and an easy template to scam people out of their identity. For less than the cost of a cup of coffee at starbucks you can get an 800 number from a VOIP provider with faxing ability. I've contacted Amazon about it....and they just sent me the same email back. Thanks Amazon. (You don't know how tempted I am to write a cron job that faxes a copy of my drivers license to them every hour)

[1] http://i.imgur.com/GH46n92.png

[2] https://gist.github.com/nadams810/cb1a85514484c2659f1b

Comment · 11 years ago
> Once the relatives get wind of this, there is a simple solution. Get a new phone number for the person in question. And even more critical don't cancel the old one.

Or an even better idea - transfer the number to a reputable VOIP provider and setup the number so that it rejects calls from all numbers except for the ones you specify. Your loved ones can still call but any other scammer would get a busy signal or whatever you specify as the destination. You could even direct unknown calls to you (you can setup a time condition) - and that would give you the ability to add that number to the whitelist if it was a legit caller.

Added benefit - the service will be vastly cheaper.

> If the old number has been cancelled, the scammers know you're on to them.

I can guarantee you that they don't care if you are "on to them". They just stop calling because no one is picking up the line.

Comment · 11 years ago
> I think the burden of proof falls under the one saying youtube-dl is illegal, doesn't?

I kind of figured it would be obvious BUT....

> Two days after YouTube-MP3.org, a site that takes music videos and converts their songs into MP3 files, was blocked from accessing YouTube, the RIAA has asked CNET to remove software from Download.com that performs a similar function. CNET, which is owned by CBS, is the publisher of this news site. [1]

Here is information on youtube-mp3.org [2].

Please do see my other post [3].

I want to make it very clear - I do NOT agree with the rulings and RIAA bullying. If you want to be upset at someone - call your representatives and ask them to start passing laws that are in favor of scraping.

As an aside note - to expand on my original post. Emulators are not illegal by definition (unless they circumvent/bypass encryption - but that's a whole other ball of wax), downloading a free or open source community made ROM for the emulator is not illegal. It is, however, illegal to download a ROM for a copyrighted game. Now, Nintendo isn't going to come after you for playing an old NES game in the privacy of your home - it's still illegal but they aren't going to expend the legal resources and the amount of bad PR to make an example out of you. They may and probably will come after you if you sell or distribute said ROMS.

[1] http://www.cnet.com/news/riaa-to-cnet-follow-google-nix-vide...

[2] https://torrentfreak.com/youtube-mp3-fights-google-with-lawy...

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10355992

Comment · 11 years ago
Comment · 11 years ago
I don't know what country you live in - but in the US it's pretty clear on the court's stance on scraping [1]. I'm not saying I agree with it - but that is the legal precedent.

> Although these are early scraping decisions, and the theories of liability are not uniform, it is difficult to ignore a pattern emerging that the courts are prepared to protect proprietary content on commercial sites from uses which are undesirable to the owners of such sites.

Straight from the youtube TOS [2]:

> Content is provided to you AS IS. You may access Content for your information and personal use solely as intended through the provided functionality of the Service and as permitted under these Terms of Service. You shall not download any Content unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content. You shall not copy, reproduce, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, or otherwise exploit any Content for any other purposes without the prior written consent of YouTube or the respective licensors of the Content. YouTube and its licensors reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Service and the Content.

It's apparent the RIAA that is also against it [3]. If you ask the RIAA - they will most likely say you did not purchase a legal copy of it - so therefore you shouldn't own a digital copy of it. Thus making it piracy.

It appears my original stance got lost - I'm not saying I agree with it - but these are the cold hard facts.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_scraping#Legal_issues

[2] https://www.youtube.com/t/terms

[3] https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110208/01511613004/is-do...

Comment · 11 years ago
I'm surprised to see this on HN. This should be called "Illegally download any song".

I think the project is extremely cool and you have props from me - but I hate it when people try to skate the simple fact that stuff like this is illegal. ROMs and emulators have shown up on imgur many times as "free" - like as if the publishers have released the rights to the game(s).

Comment · 11 years ago
> How often have I wished I could at least see the age of someone when reading through comments.

I don't know if age is as useful as something like list of projects, publications, or contributions. Something to denote saying "yes - this guy has been down the path I have and released it's a dead end" rather than just spewing what he learned in class or some random article on the internet.

Someone laughed at me on reddit when I told them you didn't need a lot of money to make a good game (as you can outsource if you need to - trust me there is someone in India who is willing to create that sprite sheet for less than $20 versus your artist friend would charge $200+). They claimed you needed like $X million. An obvious counter-example would be Terraria - I know not everyone likes it but I think it's a pretty successful and well put together game. It was made by 2 guys sitting in a home office somewhere. I asked him how many games he worked on - I believe he responded with, if I remember correctly, 3.

Comment · 11 years ago
Comment · 11 years ago
That doesn't stop people from trying. I'm sure some manager in some company is angry at his IT staff because he is trying to load 10GB of statistics into Excel and his staff is telling him that he shouldn't do that.

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