Because of illegal file sharing, torrents are frowned upon by the general public. Torrent sites have been shut down, sued, and even raided by the FBI. Even with this happening, the sites continue to strive and will not disappear overnight.

Should file sharing be illegal?

No. Definitely not. Sharing files is the Internet. Whether you are sharing music, software, or even text you are sharing files. Whenever you visit a website, a file is downloaded onto your computer. Every time you chat on an instant messenger, text is being transferred across computers. Sharing files shouldn’t be illegal and doing so will push the country back into the 1980s in terms of telecommunication.

Should sharing copyrighted material be illegal?
In my opinion, yes. Artists deserve to get paid as do producers. The claim that buying a CD ‘doesn’t help the artist’ is bogus. The artist does get paid and in some instances as much as 75% of the total retail price. Selling t-shirts and concert tickets are only a small percentage of the overall cash flow an artist receives. If it weren’t for CD sales, many artists wouldn’t be able to support themselves. Remember, the household names are the top 1% in the industry. Smaller bands do not fill concert halls, sell t-shirts in convenient stores, or have posters of themselves plastered around Hot Topic.

The other claim: ‘I wouldn’t have bought it anyway’ is the most retarded thing someone can say regarding illegal downloads. Really? So you went through the time to search for the torrent, downloading it, and listening to it, yet you had no intention to ever buy it? Why the hell did you bother downloading it then? Turn on a radio if you wish to find music you like. There is even a pretty kick ass online radio station you can customize to your listening style.

Here’s another ridiculous claim: ‘It isn’t stealing because they still have the music. It is just duplicating’. Ah, I see. So the artist shouldn’t be paid because he creates art. I guess since cars are ‘duplicated’ it is OK to take one as well. Regardless of what you are thinking, it is the same. Music online is duplicated by using bandwidth, RAM, CPU, and harddrive space. Cars are duplicated by using metal, glass, and rubber. I guess since you can’t actually see the duplication process it is OK. It is kind of like circumcision. It is alright as long as you don’t watch it happen.

As for movies, they are expensive to create. If every person decided to download the movie illegally instead of going to theaters then the movie wouldn’t have been created in the first place. Yes, most films aren’t recorded for home viewing. Actually, the ratio used in theaters is 20% wider. Nonetheless, it happens. And no, the Watchmen isn’t an argument against illegal downloads. You nor I have any clue how many people would have went to the theater if it wasn’t leaked.

If you want to watch movies online, go to YouTube. Because the crap that people put on there is exactly what you would be reduced to watching if it weren’t for Hollywood.

I feel the same way about books, photographs, newspapers, logos, and anything else which can be stolen. Writers are paid to write. Photographers are paid to photograph and designers are paid to design. Once you take the income from them, they can no longer do their job 8-hours a day. Many of the greatest stories over the past hundred years wouldn’t have been written and many of the wonderful photographs wouldn’t have been taken.

And no, the RIAA and MPAA are not ’stealing from the poor’ when they sue. The poor could care less what new song just became #1 on the charts or what movie just hit theaters. They are too busy worrying about how to pay their next water bill and how to put food on the table (if they even have one).

We have become too acclimated to doing what is easy instead of doing what is right. Drive the speed limit? No! I have to get to my destination quicker. Recycle old newspapers? No! I don’t have time. Cook a meal at home? No! I will just pick something up.

America, we are too lazy for our own good. We care too much about ourselves and not enough about our neighbors and those who created our culture. Hollywood is as American as you can get and has, along with music, spread our culture to every corner of the Earth. And how do we repay them? By stealing their property.

What are your views on file sharing?

First, let’s look at what the Featured Posts plugin outputs as HTML when you enable it:


<div class="featuredposts"><img src="http://example.org/img.jpg" class="featuredimg" alt="" width="233" height="175" /><h2><a href="http://example.org/?p=1" rel="bookmark" title="Hello world!">Hello world!</a></h2>This is where the excerpt or custom description appears.<br /><br /><a href="http://example.org/?p=1" rel="bookmark" title="Hello world!">Read the story »</a></div>


This probably looks confusing to someone who doesn’t have much experience with HTML. But don’t worry! I’ll go through what is happening.

<div class="featuredposts"> – This is just saying for the browser to add a layer with the class name “featuredposts”. Everything coming after this and before the final </div> is located inside the layer. If you wish to edit any of the layers properties, you need to change the div.featuredposts selector inside the featured-posts.css file.

What you can change:

What’s entered as default:

• margin – this is the whitespace between the layer and the ones next to it.
• padding – this is the whitespace inside the layer. How much room should be between the content and the border of the layer?
• width – how wide should the layer be?
• height – how tall should the layer be?
• font-size – what size of text should be used for all content inside the layer?
• background – want a different color or want to add an image as the background?
• color – this is the texts color.

Common properties you may add:

• line-height – the distance between each line.
• border – what do you want the border to look like?
• position – make the position absolute and edit a few other properties to force the layer to display anywhere on the page, regardless of where it is on the HTML file.

Actually, you can change just about anything. If you have an idea, there is probably a way to do it. There are many CSS properties you can add, these are just the most common.

<img src="http://example.org/img.jpg" class="featuredimg" alt="" width="233" height="175" /> – this is what displays the image (if you wish to have one displayed). As you can see, it has a class titled “featuredimg” which is used as a CSS selector. alt="" is the default text someone sees when the image does not display in their browser (in the future this will probably be changed to display the title of the post instead of being blank). width="233" is the width of the image. This is used for two reasons: 1) some versions of HTML require it to be used. 2) it helps the plugin resize the image if you set a width within the settings page which isn’t equal to the actual image size or the thumbnail size you specified in your WordPress settings. height="175" is the same as width, but for the height (obviously).

You can change how the image is displayed by editing img.featuredimg.

What you can change:

What’s entered as default:

• float – this is the direction of where the image will be placed. left means the image will display on the left side of the layer.
• margin – this is the distance from the image to the text and border.

Common properties you may add:

• padding – you may feel more comfortable using padding instead of margin.
• border – some images look better with a border.
• background – by using background you can add a drop shadow easily.

<h2><a href="http://example.org/?p=1" rel="bookmark" title="Hello world!">Hello world!</a></h2> – this actually contains two different CSS selectors inside the CSS file.

The header (title of the post) is controlled by div.featuredposts h2

What you can change:

What’s entered as default:

• margin-top – this is the distance between the border of the layer and the title.
• font-size – the size the font will be displayed in.

Common properties you may add:

• margin – you may want to add a margin for the sides or bottom. In that case, you may wish to delete the margin-top property.
• padding – you may feel more comfortable using the padding property instead of margin. Or, you may want both depending on your purpose.
• font-family – you may want the title to display as a different font than the other h2s on your page.
• font-weight – you can make the font bold or unbold it.
• text-decoration – you can italicize or underline the text.
• border – place a border on one sides, two sides, three sides, or all four.
• background – some people like placing icons by the title or changing the background color.

How the title link is displayed is controlled by div.featuredposts h2>a

What you can change:

What’s entered as default:

• color – change the color the title is displayed in.

Common properties you may add:

• text-decoration – italicize or underline the text.
• border – border-bottom is becoming more popular as a replacement for underline because it is more customizable.
• padding – placing a padding along with a border-bottom allows for more customization.
• background – you can even add a background as an alternative to the underline or border.

That’s it! That’s all the selectors added within the CSS file. As you can see, you can do pretty much anything you wish with a little knowledge of CSS.

Wait! There is a few things I want to add.

Even though this is all the default selectors, you can add even more. A common selector added is div.featuredposts h2>a:hover. This will change how the title link is displayed when your mouse pointer ‘hovers’ over it. The most common change is taking away or adding an underline, but with enough imagination you can pull something incredible off.

This article is already over a thousand words, so I’m not going to go into details on what values each property can have. But, I will point you to a nice tutorial site to help you out: w3schools.

Although these accusations may seem silly to you, there are some people who take them extremely serious and continue to spread the word. But, this post isn’t about the past. I have it on good authority that something much weirder and more perverse is happening in front of our very own eyes.

So what is it? An anonymous source within Entrecard’s moderator team has told me a fellow moderator has in fact married a sheep. This moderator has been a member of Entrecard for over 6-months and is extremely well liked within the community.

I admit, when I first heard this rumor I was shocked. I was in disbelief of this actually occurring inside Entrecard. But, the moderator has shown me visual evidence of this horrid act.

The weirdness doesn’t stop there. Graham Langdon, founder of Entrecard, was also seen several weeks ago visiting Google the first day they hired goats to mow their lawn. Coincidence? Let’s hope so.

These acts cannot be tolerated. I suggest we join forces to stop these acts from hurting the sanctity of married!

Therefor, I hereby announce the creation of the Entrecard group “no sheep, no goat, no marriage”.

Here are a few images to help us get the word spread!

<a href="http://impnerd.com/"><img src="http://impnerd.com/wp-content/uploads/no_sheep_no_goat125x125.png" alt="no sheep, no goats, no marriage" /></a>

<a href="http://impnerd.com/"><img src="http://impnerd.com/wp-content/uploads/no_sheep_no_goat80x15.png" alt="no sheep, no goats, no marriage" /></a>

AbiWord offers much the same tools as other word processors: spell checking, alignment, tables, collaboration, lists, word count, dictionary, grammar check (although it needs work), header/footer, along with many others.

The main focus of AbiWord is speed. This document takes just a 3 seconds to open on a laptop several years old. Using Open Office Word it takes roughly 20 seconds to open.

AbiWord is also quite smaller than its competitors at around 10MB for the entire piece of software. Open Office Word by itself is 22.4MB when not including the core, java-common, base-common, etc.

Although AbiWord is lighter, faster, and has been around for ages it still has its problems. One of these just so happens to be a bug with Compiz-the 3D graphics available on several Linux OSes, including Ubuntu.

The problem exists specifically with the cursor and highlighting portion of AbiWord. You’ll see exactly what I mean if you have tried running AbiWord with Compiz enabled.

To fix the problem in Ubuntu, go to Preferences > Appearance > Visual Effects and select ‘None’. Of course, this will also turn off the other flashy features like transparent windows. For some, this may be too much of a setback to run AbiWord. For others, like me, it isn’t. Less RAM is wasted by turning it off and we get to use AbiWord, a much, much faster alternative to Open Office, especially when we just wish to read a simple document.

I do have one specific complaint about AbiWord (other than this one, of course). And that happens to be the default file type: abw. I would love to know why the open source community has put up with this for so long. Why not go the extra step with odt? It seems almost like a pathetic attempt to gain more market share. Sorry AbiWord, but if you don’t have more of a following after eleven years or a major change in direction, chances are that you probably won’t even beat out Open Office anytime soon.

What are the three R’s of waste management?
Reduce, reuse, recycle
- Check out this article for more: The Three R’s of Waste Management

What is the history of nerds candy?
The nerds candy was introduced in 1983. The candy doesn’t have much history in itself, but it has been turned into a cereal (discontinued), bubble gum, Dweebs (a soft, chewy nerd. Dweebs were discontinued), and also a larger version. Nerds are often sold in both single packs and side-by-side packs which offer one sour and one sweet version of the candy.

Where did the name for nerds candy come from?
It is just a brand name. Some guy thought of it and others thought it was a great name and easy to market. Besides, in the early 80s nerds were all over the media. It was easy for them to get their name out and seem ‘in’ at the same time.

What do nerds wear?
Nerds wear exactly what you are wearing right now. You found this page, so you are most probably a nerd. Nerds are not known for their physical appearance but rather their intelligence, for being anti-social, and for being obsessed with technology, science fiction, and possibly fantasy.

You are most probably thinking of ‘dorks’ whom are more generally seen as the physically unappealing.

What is BlogBurst?
BlogBurst is a syndication website which allows your blogposts to be seen on other websites.
- Check out this article for more: Review: The Value of BlogBurst

Are edu links worth more?
The simple answer: no. The long answer: the edu top-level domain is generally worth more simply because they have high quality links pointing towards them. If a different top-level domain contained the same links, it would be worth the same in terms of link juice. On the other hand, edu links have a higher trust rank, thus traffic coming directly from the links may be higher.
- Check out this article for more: Are .edu and .gov links worth more?

What is the best way to grow vegetables in your apartment?
Place the vegetables in a pot (the size depends on the vegetable. Generally 6-9 inches deep works) and place it near a southern window. If you don’t have southern sun, then it will be a lot more difficult for your veggies to grow unless you use a sunlight bulb. Also, be sure to water it regularly. Lettuce and grape tomatoes grow best.

Is Yahoo Directory worth it?
Yes, as long as you follow the directions accurately when submitting your website.
- Check out this article for more: Is Submitting to Yahoo Directory Worth it?

Well, that is all! I’ll most definitely continue answer questions both from my search keywords and from the comments. I’ll have a question round up soon enough.

This latest version of OpenOffice includes several key updates over 3.0:

1. Anti-aliasing for draw – Drawn objects will now be ’smooth’, that is, without rough edges.
2. Better implementation of the Grammar Tool – The tool is now available in the ‘tools’ menu.
3. Minor performance updates throughout – The most improved are the bottlenecks within Calc where most have now been sniffed out.
4. SQL syntax highlights – Colors will now highlight SQL syntax.
5. Macro applications ability – You can now build complete database applications using macros and scripts.

Of course, these are only a few of the many upgrades Ooo made.

So moving on…

In order to use the Grammar Tool in OpenOffice 3.1, you will need to download the latest version from the language tool website. But wait! The process of upgrading isn’t this easy-with open source, it almost never is (which is a pity).

What is the Grammar Tool? It reads your sentences and places a blue squiggly line underneath incorrect grammar usage. It’s nifty!

If you are using Windows, here’s the steps you must take in order for the language tool not to have a Java error and allow you to update:

1. Uninstall the language tool by going to tools > extension manager…
2. Update OpenOffice
3. Download the newest Grammar Tool from the Language Tool website.
4. Open Ooo Writer.
5. Go to tools > extension manager…. and click add and find where you downloaded the file to install it.
6. Restart Ooo Writer.

If you are using Windows but already updated OpenOffice to 3.1 and have the old Grammar Tool installed, you are pretty much screwed. Here’s what you will have to do to fix it:

1. Uninstall OpenOffice 3.1.
2. Install OpenOffice 3.0 (you might as well only install Ooo Writer).
3. Uninstall the Grammar Tool by going to tools > extension manager…
4. Restart Ooo Writer to make sure the Grammar Tool has been deleted.
5. Uninstall OpenOffice 3.0.
6. Install OpenOffice 3.1.
7. Download the newest Grammar Tool from the Language Tool website.
8. Open Ooo Writer.
9. Go to tools > extension manager…. and click add and find where you downloaded the file to install it.
10. Restart Ooo Writer.

Phew. Yes, really stinky. Indeed, I just said ’stinky’. Well, I didn’t really say it, but whatever.

If you are running Ubuntu and already have the Grammar Tool installed, follow these directions:

1. Uninstall the Grammar Tool by going to tools > extension manager…
2. Update to OpenOffice 3.1 (you can use the repositories)
3. Download the newest Grammar Tool from the Language Tool website.
4. Open Ooo Writer.
5. Go to tools > extension manager…. and click add and find where you downloaded the file to install it.
6. Restart Ooo Writer.

If you want to upgrade OpenOffice to 3.1 and don’t have the Grammar Tool, follow these directions:

1. Upgrade/Install OpenOffice 3.1 (you can use the repositories)
2. Install the java common: open the terminal and type “sudo apt-get install openoffice.org-java-common”
3. Download the newest Grammar Tool from the Language Tool website.
4. Open Ooo Writer.
5. Go to tools > extension manager…. and click add and find where you downloaded the file to install it.
6. Restart Ooo Writer.

If you already upgraded to OpenOffice 3.1 and have an older version of the Grammar Tool installed, you must do this:

1. Open Nautilus
2. In your user folder, show the hidden files (ctrl+h or go to view > show hidden files).
3. Open the .openoffice.org folder.
4. Open the 3 folder, then user.
5. Backup uno_packages folder.
6. Delete the uno_packages folder. This will return OpenOffice to the default settings.
7. Download the newest Grammar Tool from the Language Tool website.
8. Open Ooo Writer.
9. Go to tools > extension manager…. and click add and find where you downloaded the file to install it.
10. Restart Ooo Writer.

And there you have it. You have now successfully installed OpenOffice 3.1 and have the Grammar Tool!

The reason why Firefox takes a long time to load several tabs is due to the Firefox team configuring the browser for ‘normal’ use. Normal use does not mean loading several tabs at once, nor does it mean zipping through web pages as fast as possible, having a broadband connection, or even having a ton of RAM to spare.

Luckily, Firefox can be easily configured by going to about:config. All you do is type that into your address bar and press enter.

If a warning message pops up, go ahead and click OK

Now you’ll see a long list of words which you probably have no clue what they mean. Don’t worry, you’ll only have to change a few and I’ll walk you through each one.

Changes for a broadband connection

If you have broadband (meaning DSL, Cable, or Satellite), you can change Firefox to make it request more connections for each page. Here’s how you do it:

1. 1. Type in pipelining into Filter and press return.
2. 2. Change network.http.pipelining to ‘true’. You can do this by right clicking and selecting ‘toggle’.

   This is telling Firefox to make more than one connection.

3. 3. Change network.http.proxy.pipelining to ‘true’.

   This does the same as above, except it does it while you have proxies turned on.

4. 4. Change network.http.pipelining.maxrequests to 8. You can do this by right clicking and selecting ‘modify’.

   This tells Firefox how many connections to make. Any number can be entered hear, but it should be 30 or less. If you are an Entrecarder who opens many tabs at once, you may want this number to be smaller, such as 8.

5. Right click anywhere and select New > Integer. Type in ‘nglayout.initialpaint.delay’ and set its value to ‘0′.

   This tells Firefox not to have a delay before it attempts to load a page.

Turn off prefetch

Prefetch makes Firefox attempt to load webpages in the background from links on a page. For instance, if you visit a webpage, each link on that page will be loaded in the background. This is done so when you click a link, it will at least be partially loaded and seem faster.

The problem with this is that when you have several tabs opened at once, Firefox will attempt to load hundreds of pages in the background resulting in a slower browsing experience. For Entrecarders especially, this blows goats. So we need to turn it off.

If you aren’t an Entrecarder, yet you are using a slow connection, it may seem like forever before a page is loaded. On a slower computer, Firefox will use even more RAM to attempt to load the pages. This can cause crashing, lagging, and even freezing.

Here’s how you turn off prefetch:

1. 1. Type prefetch into the Filter.
2. 2. Change it to ‘false’. This can be done by right clicking and pressing ‘toggle’.

Limit Firefox’s RAM usage

For some reason Firefox uses an enormous amount of RAM. To attempt to control this, you can set Firefox’s memory cache to a lower size.

I just saw this tip a couple days ago and it definitely seems to make a difference.

Here’s how we do it:

1. Type browser.cache in Filter.
2. Select browser.cache.memory.enable and change it to ‘true’. You can do this by right clicking and selecting ‘toggle’.
3. Select browser.cache.memory.capacity and change it to your desired memory size. Go here to find a good number to use.

Change Firefox’s cache capacity

Browser cache is basically files stores on your machine. So when you visit a webpage, it is cached on your harddrive so when you revisit the page, Firefox doesn’t need to request it again (that is, unless changes have been made).

This can result in a much faster browsing experience. A good number to set for cache is however much you feel comfortable with. I use 50MB but you can use as much as you wish, just don’t make the number too small.

1. Go to Edit > Preferences (or Tools > Preferences depending on what OS you are using).
2. Select the ‘advanced’ tab.
3. Change the “Use up to ___ MB of space for cache” to the number you wish.

Tada! All finished. Hopefully this will help you wish a faster browsing experience. If you have any other tips, I would love to hear them.

[edit 2: If you run into the problem you had before, be sure to change the && to ||. I forgot to change it originally in the blog post.]

This has been one of the most frequently requested ‘features’ of the Entrecard toolbar. Basically, the Entrecard toolbar ‘bleeds’ by still displaying some text when turned off. Until now, the requests have gone unanswered. But, today is your lucky day. If you follow these directions you can fix the problem and have no more bleeding!

This should work for all versions of the toolbar, but has only been tested on the non-beta version.

Steps:

1. Find the extensions folder inside your Firefox profile.

   Windows 2000/XP/Vista/ location: %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\xxxxxxxx.default\
   Windows 98/ME location: C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\xxxxxxxx.default\

   Mac OSX location: ~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/xxxxxxxx.default/

   Linux location: ~/.mozilla/firefox/xxxxxxxx.default/

2. Open the folder titled “ec_toolbar@entrecard.com” then “chrome”
3. Go inside the .jar file. You may need to download 7-zip or another unzipping utility (if you are on linux, use Archive Manager). DO NOT UNZIP THE FILE! Simply browse the archive.
4. Open the “content” folder.
5. Open file titled “ec_toolbar.js” with a text editor (gedit or notepad is preferred) DO NOT USE WordPad, OpenOffice or MSWord!
6. Go to line 822.

   It should look like this:

   if ((current_url.indexOf('entrecard.com',0) == -1) && com.entrecard.toolbar.config.get('hide_non_ec')) {
document.getElementById('com_entrecard_toolbar_elements_toolbar').style.display = 'none';
}
return;
}
document.getElementById('com_entrecard_toolbar_elements_toolbar').style.display = '';

   Change it to:

   if ((current_url.indexOf('entrecard.com',0) == -1) || com.entrecard.toolbar.config.get('hide_non_ec')) {
document.getElementById('com_entrecard_toolbar_elements_toolbar').style.display = 'none';
}
return;
}
document.getElementById('com_entrecard_toolbar_elements_toolbar').style.display = '-moz-box';

7. Save the file and close it. You will be prompted to update the archive, click yes.
8. Close Firefox (if open) and open it back up.

The changes are made and everything should be fixed!

Congrats!

Tell your fellow ECers, but please be sure to link back here to give me credit!

These wallpapers are created specifically for Ubuntu 9.04+ and are in SVG format as a result older browsers won’t be able to view the images in full size (thumbnails are png so should show properly). I was getting tired of having a choice of orange or brown-orange, so I wanted to kick it up a notch and try to find something which matches the other themes. I rather enjoy the blue “clearlooks”, thus my favorite is obviously the blue penguin background you are about to see.

With these being vector graphics it gave me a big advantage: there only needs to be one size. So no fiddling around with GIMP just to get it right. Also, there are three backgrounds which you can change the background color by simply selecting the one you wish to use in your background tab (corner, dark-rings, and stix).

Please keep in mind, my vector graphic experience is pretty limited at the moment, but I still think these came out fairly well. Feel free to use and change any of these as you wish. Though, if you enjoy them, please consider linking back to this post and Tweet about it.

Five Ubuntu Vector Wallpapers

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To make the list each cars had to meet four qualifications: 1) The car must be available in 2009. 2) The car must be new in 2009. 3) The car must have at least get a total of 55mpg when you add city and highway. 4) The car must be under $20,000.

10. 2010 Mazda Mazda3 i SV 4-Door
    

    MSRP: $15,045
    24 mpg city / 32 mpg hwy

9. 2009 Ford Focus S Sedan
   

   MSRP: $15,520
   24 mpg city / 35 mpg hwy

8. 2009 Pontiac Vibe
   

   MSRP: $16,100
   26 mpg city / 32 mpg hwy

7. 2009 Toyota Matrix Based 5-Spd MT
   

   MSRP:$16,290
   26 mpg city / 32 mpg hwy

6. 2009 Hyundai Accent SE 3-Door
   

   MSRP: $15,070
   27 mpg city / 33 mpg hwy

5. 2009 Honda Civic Coupe DX 5-Spd MT
   

   MSRP: $15,305
   26 mpg city / 34 mpg hwy

4. 2009 Chevrolet Aveo LT2 4-Door
   

   MSRP: $15,365
   27 mpg city / 34 mpg hwy

3. 2009 Toyota Corolla XLE 4-Spd AT
   

   MSRP: $17,650
   27 mpg city / 35 mpg hwy

2. 2009 Toyota Yaris Sedan S 5-Spd MT
   

   MSRP: $15,080
   29 mpg city / 36 mpg hwy

1. 2010 Honda Insight LX
   

   MSRP: $19,800
   40 mpg city / 43 mpg hwy

Hopefully this is just the start of good things to come. Hopefully in a couple years there will be a few more 40+mpg cars.