"Deceptive Duo" Partner Doing Hard Time

21-year-old Robert Lyttle, a Californian hacker who broke into the computer systems of federal agencies has been sentenced to four months in prison. Lyttle, who was part of a two man team called "The Deceptive Duo", was found guilty of unlawfully accessing computer systems of various federal agencies in April 2002. These systems included the Department of Defense's Defense Logistic Information Service (DLIS), Office of Health Affairs (OHA), National Aeronautic and Space Administration's (NASA) and Ames Research Center (ARC). Lyttle has claimed that he was trying to help these organizations improve their security, if only he had asked their permission first he might not be heading for the slammer now.

U.S. District Court Judge D. Lowell Jensen handed down the sentence following a guilty plea on five counts of unauthorized access to government computers. As well as the four month prison sentence, Lyttle will also have to spend a further four months electronically tagged in home confinement and pay $71,181 in restitution. He will also undergo a three year period of supervised release. The defendant will begin serving his sentence on August 24, 2005.

You may know him under his online handle "Pimpshiz". He is also known for defacing over 200 websites back in 2000 with pro-Napster graffiti messages. In 2002 Robert was raided by the FBI, on suspicion of being a member of the Deceptive Duo hacking group. He also ran the website Sub-Seven.com and was an "acquaintance" of mine at least online. I'm sorry to hear about his conviction, but really he had it coming to him and was easy to catch. For me, I can say it's good that these days I associate myself with more of the security side than hacking side of things.

Neato Is Not A Real Word, But You Can Use It

Little inside post/joke here in hopes it will bring even a small smile to a certain someone's face. See, I can draw too...just not very well. Neato nonetheless though, right? ;)

Celebrity Blogs Including Mark Cuban's

It seems like everyone these days has a little corner on the net. Whether it's their own domain name and website or they just keep a blog going, it's becoming more and more common for people to have a URL alongside of their name, e-mail, cell phone number and home address. Celebrities are no different except they like to keep the majority of the public "out of the loop" when it comes to telling their private/personal contact info. One exception to this rule is that many are putting up their own blogs to interact with the public. It's a safer, less "crazy fan stalking" method of connecting with people. Just like blogs belonging to non-celebrities, some celebrity blogs are personal diaries of their lives and some are more topic oriented.

Now if you know me, you know I'm not much into the Hollywood stuff. Personally, I could care less if Britney got knocked up by some trashy dude or if Tom Cruise is engaged to a girl half his age or even if Oprah has been abducted by aliens...well now THAT I would like to know about so I could cheer. Anyways, I did come across one celebrity blog that interested me. It belongs to a former dot-com millionaire and current owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Mr. Mark Cuban. Cuban's blog takes 2 of my loves and combines them - tech and basketball. How could I not be intrigued to read more? Plus he is from the same city I grew up and live in. I have seen him interviewed on occasion and for whatever reason I can't seem to remember if I liked him or not. He is one of those guys that people either love or hate, usually no in-between. He's cocky and a little on the obnoxious side, but he is bright guy that made big bucks and now he is getting to live out the dream of any big kid spending the money as he sees fit. Rough life huh? Well actually it was BEFORE he made it big in the tech industry.

His first business was selling garbage bags door to door as a kid. He was a stereotypical nerd (and if you ask me, is still nerdy today, just the cash helps in the clothes department). After college he had virtually no knowledge in computers, but founded a tech company called MicroSolutions which he then later sold to CompuServe for a cool $6 million. After that he had an idea of broadcasting live games and events through the internet, which led to him creating Broadcast.com which then was sold to Yahoo for $2 BILLION dollars! Now Cuban has taken his money and bought his own NBA team and is enjoying the good life. God, this would be my dream life! Hitting it big in the tech world and then being young enough to still enjoy life with all that money. I too would be buying my own professional sports team. It's been my dream as a kid to do that and I'm sure it was Cuban's also. He is just lucky enough to actually make the dream a reality!

Now the link you have been waiting for, www.blogmaverick.com is Mark Cuban's Blog. I know there are other celeb blogs out there, I just haven't gone looking for them. So if you have a good link to a celeb blog, post it in the comment section and maybe if there is enough interest and a lengthy enough list going, I will make a section for Celebrity Blogs on my sidebar.

Bloggers's Block Sucks

Everyone has had writer's block, where the mind goes blank when it comes to creative and unique things to say/write. Well I think I've officially invented the term "blogger's block". It's similar to writers block of course, except the only difference being it's related to blogging. Today is my blogger's block moment here on the blog. So since I obviously have nothing good to post because of this, enjoy the below image that comes to you from a true writer's/blogger's block desk area.

Ergonomics Exercises Are Important

The term “ergonomics” is derived from two Greek words: “ergon”, meaning work and “nomoi”, meaning natural laws. Ergonomists study human capabilities in relationship to work demands. In recent years, ergonomists have attempted to define postures which minimize unnecessary static work and reduce the forces acting on the body. All of us could significantly reduce our risk of injury if we could adhere to the following ergonomic principles...

• All work activities should permit the worker to adopt several different, but equally healthy and safe postures.
• Where muscular force has to be exerted it should be done by the largest appropriate muscle groups available.
• Work activities should be performed with the joints at about mid-point of their range of movement. This applies particularly to the head, trunk and upper limbs.

Any attempt to improve workplace conditions can have only limited success if the importance of ergonomics is ignored. Ergonomics help people develop the subtle coordination of thought and physical action required to monitor and alter harmful patterns of posture and movement. This in turn reduces your risk of developing a repetitive strain injury. Ergonomic exercises or stretches (with the above image being an extreme, humorous and somewhat gross example of such) can be necessary. Also helpful are the use of ergonomically correct desks, chairs and other computer/office equipment to help reduce and/or eliminate pain and injury. Take this short quiz of 3 questions to see if you could benefit from ergonomic exercises.

• Do you suffer from Repetitive Strain Injury or Carpal Tunnel Syndrome?
• Do you have a backache or stiff neck and shoulders?
• Do you become uncomfortable when sitting at your computer for long periods of time?

If you have answered yes to any of these questions, then ergonomic exercises could be of great benefit to you! I've located a good website that gives step-by step illustrated exercises you can do right at your office and they only take a few minutes to complete. Best of all, you should start feeling the results immediately. So in the words of rapper Mase, go "breathe, stretch, shake, let it go"! Another solution, you could just buy some weed off the stoned intern and release your pain that way - joking of course. Now go try those exercises because your boss is calling for a surprise pee check this afternoon! :P

Summer Has Officially Begun - WHOPPIE!

In case you didn't already know, the first day of summer kicked off this past Tuesday according to calendars. So with that, I thought I would share my summer time list of "Loves and Hates" for the season. Perhaps you share some of the same with me, or if you feel chatty, you can post your list in the comment section. If you do nothing else, remember to keep the kid running the lemonade stand down the street in business. Sure 25 cents is more than what I sold it for back in the day and granted kids get lazy and make the mix stuff instead of doing the real homemade kind, but hey he needs to buy a pocket bike this summer so let's help him out. (Alex here is selling it for just 20 cents! Damn it. I should of shopped around and saved a nickel - kidding. Maybe Alex's lemonade isn't as tasty as what I bought. Nah, Alex looks like he's got game so I bet it's good too.) Now, here's my list...

Loves...

• the nice warm weather
• a healthy tan
• the long daylight hours
• the crickets chirping at night
• women wearing less and smelling like suntan lotion - yum
• pool parties and outdoor BBQs
• long motorcycle ride home
• pickup basketball games
• spending an evening at the ballpark tailgating with friends
• a good summer romance
• camping out and making smoores
• mountain biking covered in mud and loving it
• practically living in shorts, tees and sandals

Hates...

• that one annoying bird who insists on being the first to sing waking me and other birds up BEFORE dawn
• having the A/C bill run up
• sweating my ass off with leather car seats
• nothing good on TV
• having to work during the day as compared to being a kid and having off
• bad sun burns (fortunately I don't get those anymore, just tan now)
• thinking of new excuses as to why I don't want a summer fling with ex girlfriends
• Harley riders who feel necessary to talk sh*t and flex their beer muscle on younger guys who ride crotch rockets
• sucking lawnmower fumes and getting buzzed by that mixed with sun heat/humidity while cutting grass
• not being able to take my little buddy for a dog walk these days
• hands down my biggest gripe - bug bites

***UPDATE***
Then there is always the shyster. This boy is a prime example. He's taken his entrepreneurship skills high tech and he's on the verge of highway robber in the process. A $1 off your first cup of lemonade? Ah, what are you selling it for if it's a buck off with your website coupon? My advice, stay away from this kid. Chances are if he has the money and know-how to host a website, then he doesn't need to be selling some overpriced lemonade for his summer job. He should look into being a lawyer if he wants to rip people off. Just look at that smug face of his. It screams "you're a sucker and I'll get away with this because I'll play up the inocent little boy act" - mmmwah haha.

Maintenance Scheduled For My Blog

Over the course of the next few days (time permitting), I will be doing a little facelift on my blog. What I mean by that is I will clean up any broken links or missing image files, fix any typos I have made and delete any spam comments left in the posts. In addition to that I will even go thru the "Bloggers Who Commented" list removing or updating users/blogs that either no longer exist or haven't been active in 60+ days. Initially it sounds like busy work that isn't really needed, given the fact that I have other more pressing things that take priority, but it really won't take me more than a few minutes to do this.

I figure after nearly 6 months of blogging, a little cleanup work may need to be completed. I keep throwing around the idea of changing up the blog template to a new tech theme, but of course I can't decide on anything that looks halfway decent and I would like it to be original work. So for now it looks like I am sticking with the one you see before you. I've updated my blog profile by adding my photo and linking to it on the frontpage as well. I'm not crazy about how it look in terms of meshing well with the rest of the layout, so I might move it around trying to improve the overall style of the site. By the way, Blogger announced the other day that it is now offering free image hosting right on their servers! You can store up to 300MB of photos in a variety of formats to be used with your blog. Click here for more details.

So that is what I will be up to on the blog and if you see a glitch here or there, don't worry because I'll work those bugs out pretty fast. I doubt you will notice any problems that a quick page refresh a few minutes later can't correct. So Mr. Fix-It will be doing just that, fixing things here in the blogosphere. Hopefully it is change for the better.