Recently I have witnessed a friend's account being compromised by a rouge application/virus. I've done some research, and I have some announcements to make for those who are interested.
This particular piece of malware manifests itself outwardly by posting wall messages or sending private messages to your friends containing nonsensical things. Specifically, the manifestation I have witnessed advertises for "galewher.c0m" Please, do not visit that site. I realize there is a zero in there instead of an "o" so don't fix it and don't visit it.
This malware, along with apparently many others, is making its way around social networking sites. Rouge applications are becoming a problem (isn't it so great that most of you are application crazy...cluttering up my live feed with more application updates than people updates?!). Rouge applications have access to your profile and its information. They can masquerade as you along with stealing your data. Please, be very careful with which applications you install and use. When dealing with rouge applications added to your profile, it doesn't matter how secure your machine is, what software you hide behind, what guru you follow, or even (dare I say it) if you use a Mac or Linux (*gasp* Oh NO!). Your Facebook profile is just as vulnerable to these sorts of invasion. The developer of a rouge application can do things with your profile that even you don't have permission to do, so be very careful.
Also, there are other viruses/malware making the rounds that infect your computer directly. Not only do these take advantage of being able to log everything you type (among other things) and steal your personal data to random Chinese spammers who clutter my SPAM folder with ads for V1AGrA and other such crap, they can also hijack your social networking profiles. Please, keep your anti-virus software up to date, and also take measures to ensure that you have other malware protection (Malwarebytes, Adaware, etc) and that they are up to date. Run these scans regularly and keep up with the updates. Also, do your browser and Windows updates regularly. It's annoying, but they are there for a reason. This happens to be a good example.
Further, please, be careful regarding what you click on. If it looks or sounds suspicious, don't click on it. This applies to the web, Facebook, MySpace, email, and any other electronic media. That's how these things spread. You may even be unaware of them infecting you if you are not careful. There are instances where it can be done "drive by" style. You get redirected to somewhere you obviously didn't want to be, and by then, it's too late. Simply visiting the site can infect you if everything lines up right. If you don't feel like installing virus protection, at least make the effort to hit up an online scan once in a while (TrendMicro for example). It's not just for you, but for all of the other easy targets that are now being made easier with the rise of social networking and all these fun little applications.
Finally, if you see a CAPTCHA (the annoying thing that asks you to type the words you see) pop up ON YOUR COMPUTER rather than the internet, you have a serious problem. You've been infected by something and those behind it are using it to create other social networking accounts since they have already taken control of your machine. The CAPTCHA is the last step in creation, and if you're seeing it in Windows rather than on the net, you're in trouble. Get some help cleaning that if you don't know how to do it.
So, to recap: If you are getting suspicious messages, don't click on them, and kindly alert the person they are coming from. Be careful where you go and what you click on, even if it seems like a safe place (Facebook). Be careful of what you install. You honestly don't know exactly what's going on behind the scenes, and just because it looks cute and fun doesn't mean that's all it is. Protect yourself with updates and appropriate software. If you have any issues, or questions, feel free to contact me. I will be glad to help.
Always use seat belts, sunblock, condoms, and common sense.
End PSA.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Friday, December 18, 2009
Audio Experiment
Today, I had the opportunity of spending some time with my five month old nephew, Chance. I enjoy spending time with the little guy. I find that watching small children explore the world around them and develop into full-fledged people to be fascinating. Children seem to be the only class of people who are actually more amazed by the world around them than I am.
Since I had sometime to spend with Chance, I decided to introduce him to music. At his stage, his brain is rapidly developing, and he is getting the hang of aggregating information across multiple senses. Music provides an opportunity to stimulate multiple cortical areas simultaneously, and easily allows even a young mind to start making correlations between different senses, and thus connections between different areas of the brain.
I sat down in my computer chair with him, and brought up a playlist in Audacious. I started out with Flobots (I've been on a Flobots kick lately). The initial instrumental sounds coming from the speakers piqued his interest. He began looking around attempting to determine where the sounds were coming from. Here we have our first crossover, which happened within the span of a few seconds: hearing for direction, and vision for location. He was at a disadvantage, being five months old and not understanding what speakers or recordings are, but that's not really the point. While he couldn't seem to determine that the speakers were the source of the sounds, he did alternate visual direction between forward facing and looking down (where the subwoofer is). After the instrumental intro, the lyrics began. He met this with wide-eyed amazement. It was clear that he could recognize the sound of a human voice and that it was saying something. He became intensely interested in finding where this person was, and kept alternating wonder-struck looks between me (I was singing along) and the speakers. Within a few songs, it seemed as if he was starting to grasp the abstract concept of "the person who isn't there". I believe this was a good set to start with, because it has sound (auditory cortex), varied and intricate rhythms (parietal lobe for spacial reasoning and mathematics), and an intense amount of language (Broca's and Wernike's areas), along with the attempts to combine auditory information with a visual lock.
Next, we moved on to Jazz, as rendered by the late, great, Maynard Ferguson. This introduced new sound and rhythm patterns, both of which Chance reacted to with interest. His movements, while still not well coordinated by a long shot, showed variance with these rhythms when compared to those from Flobots. This reaction to differences was a neat thing to see. I decided at this point to add a somatic component to the experience. For best effect, I pulled out the subwoofer from under my desk, and placed his feet on it. He's become fascinated with playing with his feet recently, so why not include them? At first the vibrations were slightly startling to him, but he quickly adapted (as children do) and seemed to recognize a correlation between the sounds he was hearing and the vibrations he was feeling from the subwoofer. This made him laugh and smile quite a bit, which I find to be a good thing. He also showed a stronger reaction to the rhythms by trying to "dance" at this point. Now we had all of the previous areas activated and sharing information along with strong senory-motor reinforcement. I also put his hands up on the desk and let him feel the faster vibrations caused by the treble sounds. He enjoyed this, and laughed quite a bit. When I put him back in my lap, he would look down when there was a bass lead, and toward the desk when there was a treble lead. I find this behavior to be fascinating.
Unfortunately, this is where our experience came to an end, as my sister had returned to retrieve her child, who was still smiling as he left. I will have to make it a point to include some of this, and extend the experience each time I get a chance to spend time with Chance.
An unfathomable amount of experience goes into creating a person. There are innumerable connections that are formed and changed as experience is acquired and we, as people, learn to turn what we are into who we are. Given that we are the sum of our past perceptions, I think will try my best to give my nephew the best chances I can at becoming a well-formed person.
....I can't wait to teach him how to talk.
Since I had sometime to spend with Chance, I decided to introduce him to music. At his stage, his brain is rapidly developing, and he is getting the hang of aggregating information across multiple senses. Music provides an opportunity to stimulate multiple cortical areas simultaneously, and easily allows even a young mind to start making correlations between different senses, and thus connections between different areas of the brain.
I sat down in my computer chair with him, and brought up a playlist in Audacious. I started out with Flobots (I've been on a Flobots kick lately). The initial instrumental sounds coming from the speakers piqued his interest. He began looking around attempting to determine where the sounds were coming from. Here we have our first crossover, which happened within the span of a few seconds: hearing for direction, and vision for location. He was at a disadvantage, being five months old and not understanding what speakers or recordings are, but that's not really the point. While he couldn't seem to determine that the speakers were the source of the sounds, he did alternate visual direction between forward facing and looking down (where the subwoofer is). After the instrumental intro, the lyrics began. He met this with wide-eyed amazement. It was clear that he could recognize the sound of a human voice and that it was saying something. He became intensely interested in finding where this person was, and kept alternating wonder-struck looks between me (I was singing along) and the speakers. Within a few songs, it seemed as if he was starting to grasp the abstract concept of "the person who isn't there". I believe this was a good set to start with, because it has sound (auditory cortex), varied and intricate rhythms (parietal lobe for spacial reasoning and mathematics), and an intense amount of language (Broca's and Wernike's areas), along with the attempts to combine auditory information with a visual lock.
Next, we moved on to Jazz, as rendered by the late, great, Maynard Ferguson. This introduced new sound and rhythm patterns, both of which Chance reacted to with interest. His movements, while still not well coordinated by a long shot, showed variance with these rhythms when compared to those from Flobots. This reaction to differences was a neat thing to see. I decided at this point to add a somatic component to the experience. For best effect, I pulled out the subwoofer from under my desk, and placed his feet on it. He's become fascinated with playing with his feet recently, so why not include them? At first the vibrations were slightly startling to him, but he quickly adapted (as children do) and seemed to recognize a correlation between the sounds he was hearing and the vibrations he was feeling from the subwoofer. This made him laugh and smile quite a bit, which I find to be a good thing. He also showed a stronger reaction to the rhythms by trying to "dance" at this point. Now we had all of the previous areas activated and sharing information along with strong senory-motor reinforcement. I also put his hands up on the desk and let him feel the faster vibrations caused by the treble sounds. He enjoyed this, and laughed quite a bit. When I put him back in my lap, he would look down when there was a bass lead, and toward the desk when there was a treble lead. I find this behavior to be fascinating.
Unfortunately, this is where our experience came to an end, as my sister had returned to retrieve her child, who was still smiling as he left. I will have to make it a point to include some of this, and extend the experience each time I get a chance to spend time with Chance.
An unfathomable amount of experience goes into creating a person. There are innumerable connections that are formed and changed as experience is acquired and we, as people, learn to turn what we are into who we are. Given that we are the sum of our past perceptions, I think will try my best to give my nephew the best chances I can at becoming a well-formed person.
....I can't wait to teach him how to talk.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
A night with the World's Most Boring Man
Last night (Friday, December 11, 2009) I decided to chaperon for an overnight community event. In a way, I guess I am a good choice for things like that, for the following reasons:
Conversation with adults was sparse for me, as everyone was fairly busy. When there were opportunities to talk, there were unarguably more interesting folks to speak with. Whenever two or more are gathered together, I am the boring one. Whenever it is a miserable soul trapped with me, it is in the best interest of said miserable soul to talk to themselves. Eventually, those who normally suffer me to speak (or suffer from me speaking, take your pick on word usage) fell asleep. Nearly all of us work in education, which means that we are typically in bed by 10 pm and are no math, even collectively, for a group of junior high and high school students who are wired out of their minds on energy drinks and candy.
This left me as the lame old guy in the corner, which is completely fine with me. It game me time to sit and ponder things that I like to ponder between making rounds to ensure that no new life was being conceived on my watch. I got to do a lot of mental logic and math puzzles. I particularly enjoyed working out recursive solutions for the Tower of Hanoi and 8 Queens puzzles.
To be completely truthful, it did not bother me to be excluded from conversation and events. I was honestly content to sit and do mental work quietly on my little puzzles and problems. I can think of few ways that I would find to spend five to seven hours which would be more enjoyable.
- I am over 18
- I never have anything better to do
- I "hate fun"
Conversation with adults was sparse for me, as everyone was fairly busy. When there were opportunities to talk, there were unarguably more interesting folks to speak with. Whenever two or more are gathered together, I am the boring one. Whenever it is a miserable soul trapped with me, it is in the best interest of said miserable soul to talk to themselves. Eventually, those who normally suffer me to speak (or suffer from me speaking, take your pick on word usage) fell asleep. Nearly all of us work in education, which means that we are typically in bed by 10 pm and are no math, even collectively, for a group of junior high and high school students who are wired out of their minds on energy drinks and candy.
This left me as the lame old guy in the corner, which is completely fine with me. It game me time to sit and ponder things that I like to ponder between making rounds to ensure that no new life was being conceived on my watch. I got to do a lot of mental logic and math puzzles. I particularly enjoyed working out recursive solutions for the Tower of Hanoi and 8 Queens puzzles.
To be completely truthful, it did not bother me to be excluded from conversation and events. I was honestly content to sit and do mental work quietly on my little puzzles and problems. I can think of few ways that I would find to spend five to seven hours which would be more enjoyable.
Raison d'être (Reason for being)
First of all, I want you to know that this will be far from an interesting read. The subject, is, after all, me: the most boring man you will ever meet. I do not have any particularly interesting adventures, and for the most part, everything I do is trivial and easily marginalized. I am all but devoid of social skills and exude an palpable aura that screams "boring" and smells of old books.
I have been approached at times, particularly as of late, by those who wish to tell me that I look like a professor or a scholar. As to that: a professor I am not, but a scholar, perhaps, in a loose sense of the word. I do see wonder in virtually everything around me, and make every attempt to understand what goes on in the universe (excluding popular culture, sports, and a few other select items which are seemingly normal topics of conversation). Perhaps these comments arise from the aforementioned aura, coupled with dressing like a bespectacled mathematics teacher. Typically those conversations end right where they begin. It is one thing to get cheap amusement and a temporary ego boost from making a small joke out of someone different from you, and covertly wrapping it inside of a false compliment. This is not to say that all of these interactions are this way. Some of the compliments are genuine. However, no one really wishes to continue a conversation after that, and they tend to make a hasty exist before I prove their assumptions correct.
On rare occasions, it seems as if it is interesting to hear me speak. I take great delight whenever these small monologues arise, whether the listeners are showing genuine interest or, more often than not, at least feigning it for my benefit. It seems there are times when it is amusing to "wind me up and let me go" whenever there is a lull in the real conversation. Regardless of the motivation for listening, at least someone listens at those times, which does feel good to an extent.
Most of the time, however, it seems that actual conversation with me is a painful process for the other participant(s). Despite being interested in nearly everything, it seems that my interests are orthogonal to those of others. Add to this my deplorable social skills, which cause me to either be viewed as obtuse at times, or cause me to labor endlessly on items which could never engender interest in the person I am attempting to talk to. The majority of my social ineptness is only realized post ex facto, which only leaves things awkward once I finally come to understand where I failed in conversation.
The bulk majority of social interaction with me that is initiated by others takes the form of a search engine query.
I have been approached at times, particularly as of late, by those who wish to tell me that I look like a professor or a scholar. As to that: a professor I am not, but a scholar, perhaps, in a loose sense of the word. I do see wonder in virtually everything around me, and make every attempt to understand what goes on in the universe (excluding popular culture, sports, and a few other select items which are seemingly normal topics of conversation). Perhaps these comments arise from the aforementioned aura, coupled with dressing like a bespectacled mathematics teacher. Typically those conversations end right where they begin. It is one thing to get cheap amusement and a temporary ego boost from making a small joke out of someone different from you, and covertly wrapping it inside of a false compliment. This is not to say that all of these interactions are this way. Some of the compliments are genuine. However, no one really wishes to continue a conversation after that, and they tend to make a hasty exist before I prove their assumptions correct.
On rare occasions, it seems as if it is interesting to hear me speak. I take great delight whenever these small monologues arise, whether the listeners are showing genuine interest or, more often than not, at least feigning it for my benefit. It seems there are times when it is amusing to "wind me up and let me go" whenever there is a lull in the real conversation. Regardless of the motivation for listening, at least someone listens at those times, which does feel good to an extent.
Most of the time, however, it seems that actual conversation with me is a painful process for the other participant(s). Despite being interested in nearly everything, it seems that my interests are orthogonal to those of others. Add to this my deplorable social skills, which cause me to either be viewed as obtuse at times, or cause me to labor endlessly on items which could never engender interest in the person I am attempting to talk to. The majority of my social ineptness is only realized post ex facto, which only leaves things awkward once I finally come to understand where I failed in conversation.
The bulk majority of social interaction with me that is initiated by others takes the form of a search engine query.
"Aaron, what is (insert request for desired information here)?"
(Insert ridiculously lengthy answer, replete with useless asides)
(Other, individual, groaning inwardly for having asked): "Thanks."
(Other individual walks away in a hurry before more conversation starts)
(Insert ridiculously lengthy answer, replete with useless asides)
(Other, individual, groaning inwardly for having asked):
(Other individual walks away in a hurry before more conversation starts)
I have actually been dubbed someone's "personal Wikipedia" when they do not have access to the internet. This is perhaps, my most useful function.
This blog will give continual insight into the life of the world's most boring man. I feel I can eliminate those who do nothing at all from being contenders for this title. Perhaps a better term would be "world's most functionally boring man", but that title seems a little labored. The shorter form will suffice. Should you choose to read, it will unlikely be out of morbid curiosity or to achieve sedation, which typically comes from hearing whatever I have to say. Regardless of your intent, I hope you find enjoyment.
World's Most Boring Man,
Aaron Lockhart
This blog will give continual insight into the life of the world's most boring man. I feel I can eliminate those who do nothing at all from being contenders for this title. Perhaps a better term would be "world's most functionally boring man", but that title seems a little labored. The shorter form will suffice. Should you choose to read, it will unlikely be out of morbid curiosity or to achieve sedation, which typically comes from hearing whatever I have to say. Regardless of your intent, I hope you find enjoyment.
World's Most Boring Man,
Aaron Lockhart
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