Wacko Jacko Humor
By Eric Mattes 07 Feb 2005
For some time-wasting Michael Jackson Humor:
<p>http://www.cagle.com/news/MichaelJacksonTrial/main.asp</p>
<p>I wonder how much time MJ spends in <span class="caps">AOL</span> chat rooms :-)</p> The Legendary Couch-Moving Epic
By Eric Mattes 03 Oct 2003
I would like to share with the readers of thraxil my amazing adventure from last week:
<p><a href="http://www.ericmattes.com/couch/">http://www.ericmattes.com/couch/</a></p> Microsoft Passport Exploit
By Eric Mattes 09 May 2003
I just found out about this today. An unthinkably simple exploit allows anybody to change anybody else’s password to whatever they want. Microsoft found out about the problem after somebody posted it to a public message board. The FTC is considering a ridiculously large fine to punish Microsoft. See article here:
<p><a href="http://theregister.co.uk/content/6/30620.html">http://theregister.co.uk/content/6/30620.html</a></p>
<p><br />Detailed report here:</p>
<p><a href="http://securitytracker.com/alerts/2003/May/1006728.html">http://securitytracker.com/alerts/2003/May/1006728.html</a><br />This brings to mind the issue… MS seems to be suffering from their own popularity. I’ve heard the excuse “nobody ever got fired for choosing microsoft.” It’s true, and I think this is why they can never be dethroned. Unfortunately there are legions of hackers who have devoted themselves to exploiting flaws in MS products and punishing those who use them. So… they will always be number 1 despite the fact that they are notoriously flawed. Obviously there are flaws in competitor’s software, but nobody is trying to write viruses for those programs! It’s sad that so many people depend on MS software.<br />
MS should really hire a team of hackers to hack their software before it is released or else they will never see the end of stuff like this.<br />
Rock, Paper, Scissors
By Eric Mattes 18 Apr 2003
There’s a whole world of RPS out there that I never knew about! Although it’s a pretty trivial game for most people, computer scientists (being who they are) have been exploring the strategy behind this seemingly random game. However, you’ve got to admit that when you play, you do have a strategy of some sort. It is this fact that the computer RPS opponents will attempt to exploit. Check out this page for the current champion:
http://ofb.net/~egnor/iocaine.html
also check this one out for some real-time action that you can play on the web:
http://www.csua.berkeley.edu/~emin/writings/lz_rps/
-E