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Thread ID: 47060	2004-07-14 20:54:00	Kazaa collapses - but not if I get up early	Steve Bell (1009)	Press F1

Post ID	Timestamp	Content	User
252331	2004-07-14 20:54:00	In the past couple of weeks, the peer-to-peer application Kazaa Lite has frequently been seizing up completely (ceasing all traffic and displaying a permanent hourglass) without warning or action on my part in the middle of a session. Usually, even an attempt to close the application (in Program Manager or by clicking the close button on the "application not responding" message) has no effect, and I have to reboot the entire system. The odd thing is, it doesn't seem to happen before about 4:45 am. If I get up early enough I can have a good long session on it with no trouble. Has anyone else experienced this? Is it a matter of congestion building up; or is it likely to be a specific "hacking" attempt by someone who logs on at about that time in the morning (or, I suppose, that time of the afternoon or evening somewhere else in the world)? If you've read any of my Computerworld copy or nz.general postings on P2P interference, I'm sure you'll know what's in the back of my mind - action by either a govt agency or someone attached to the recording industry. But could there be an "innocent" explanation? I have only the most general evidence that certain kinds of downloaded files, or rather certain kinds of file NAMES, might be a factor - not enough to "finger" anyone yet, but from what I've experimented with so far, it doesn't seem to be music that's the problem :-) The only .mp3 that seemed to trigger it on one occasion was a track (purportedly) of Michael Moore discussing - censorship. I'd be interested to know if this is a general problem, or whether it's happening particularly to me, or to people who share something in common with me - either software environment or political outlook :-) Connection 256 KB Paradise cable; OS Windows XP Professional. Thanks, Steve B.	Steve Bell (1009)
252332	2004-07-14 21:37:00	I suggest that you go read the Kazaa EULA (www.kazaa.com) - in particular section 12 - before continuing to use software that connects to the Kazaa network. I know it's in the Australian court, but the case of ARIA vs Sharman Networks has seen Sharman ask for the names and addresses of everybody who infringed on copyright, and while they haven't gotten that information yet (and it doesn't seem likely), it certainly wouldn't be nice if something came about in NZ and they tried the same.	agent (30)
252333	2004-07-14 22:42:00	Hi Stephen Have you looked for applicable log files or in Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Event Viewer for any events listed that would point to what application or service is crashing Kazaa or one of its additional components (read, third party affiliates/spyware). In order to help you, we need to fully understand your query. Can you expand on your "software environment or political outlook". I'm sure that you will have no issue sharing this information with us, you use Kazaa after all. Perhaps the following is not a solution for the particular software but, may be a solution for you: A well known cure for Kazaa's and its additional 3rd party components ills, is to go to; Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs > Kazaa > Hit the Remove this software button (with appropriate purpose). Then use Spybot, Adaware, Hijackthis, CWShredder, etc, to thoroughly clean your computer system of any detritus left over. If this fails remove all hard drives and electro magnetic data storage devices from your computer, dispose all over the deep side of your local continental shelf > purchase new hard drive(s), devices, etc, and install Linux, Free BSD or a Mac OS ;) Cheers Murray ;P	Murray P (44)
252334	2004-07-14 22:49:00	I don't want to prolong this sub-thread of the conversation, but I don't seriously think Mike Moore would worry overmuch about someone using Kazaa Lite to download a few minutes of his words of wisdom (even if I could have got them). And if he does come after me with his bank-bought gun, I am certainly willing to hold Mr Sharman completely blameless as per Clause 12. (I thought the crucial clause you were referring me to would be the one that says: Don't use the "clean" version; use our spyware-ridden implementation.) Nor do I think the owners of some of the (legal but probably amateur) erotica I attempted to download would be all that keen on sticking their heads up, and they'd find it very hard to prove anything as I've deleted the part-downloaded files anyway; they're of no use to me. Ditto the first third of a track by an AfroAmerican trio I wouldn't dare name, which was running without interruption but just taking too long. And as for the stuff in my "Messier catalogue" * which usually forms an essential element of snooper tests; any originator of such junk would be cheerfully strangled by a good proportion of the population before he/she got anywhere near a courtroom. Now can I have some help with the core problem? Why the time-specific failures? Maybe it's Sharman. SJB (should have gone under my pewsodonym, but too late now) "Messier catalog": a catalog of things which are not what they seem to be; from a French cometary astronomer who listed for the benefit of his fellow comet-hunters, "things that look like comets but ain't" The most famous entry is M31; the great galaxy in Andromeda. I have a similar list of the most hair-raising filenames which actually prove (like a good deal of "internet porn") to be very mild erotica or completely non-erotic material such as a long slow video pan around someone's computer room; or the one with the go-kart, the one with the toy train or the animated gymnastic beans (that one probably does have an author who put a lot of work into it; I'd cheerfully pay him a few bucks for the use of it; it was quite amusing).	Steve Bell (1009)
252335	2004-07-14 23:18:00	> In order to help you, we need to fully understand your query. Can you > expand on your "software environment or political outlook". I'm sure > that you will have no issue sharing this information with us, you use > Kazaa after all. I have been (in print and on newsgroups) persistently critical of the wide sweep of NZ censorship law, the disproportionate amount of time Internal Affairs spends specifically trying to hunt offending down on the internet, for a paltry number of offenders convicted (30 or fewer per year) and the tactics they use. Imagine, if you will, tooling along the mortorway when a plain-clothes cop in an unmarked car draws up dangerously close to your back bumper and begins hooting and yelling out of the window "Surely you can go faster than that!" When you exceed the speed limit by 1 Km/h you are pulled over and made to drive to your house, where every vehicle on the premises, including that of a friend who parked outside your gate for five minutes, is impounded. You are still waiting two years later to know whether you will be hauled into court or not. The exact analogy of this has happened on the "electronic highway", I am sure more than once (though I know of only one such case). It would not be too much of a stretch of the imagination to suppose that a "law enforcement authority" capable of such blatant enticement and entrapment might also attempt to interfere covertly with data transfer and/or bring down applications, if they thought suspicious files were being transferred. Naturally critics of this kind of "enforcement" would attract their attention and I'm likely to be on their list for surveillance. On one occasion recently, when I warned a major ISP that it was supporting a Usenet newsgroup with a preponderance of almost certainly illegal material, the DIA in the person of Mr Keith Manch threatened me with prosecution if I continued to issue such warnings - because in order to do so, I must have (however broefly) looked at the offending material. In light of this and some "enforcement" that happened soon after in Europe regarding the same newsgroup, I strongly suspect I stuffed up the NZ leg of a "sting" operation. Is it too outlandish to suggest people with this attitude may concentrate not only on real potential offenders (and those they can persuade to offend to keep the numbers up) but also those politically opposed to their hard-line and dubious tactics? I will take your advice re diagnosis. Is there a version of Kazaa Lite that works with BSD :-) ? Steve B.	Steve Bell (1009)
252336	2004-07-15 00:15:00	And if anyone has not realised what the real point of this is (in my opinion, anyway): I suspect that a species of gross interference with the ordinary processes of the internet is going on, in the supposed course of "law enforcement". of one kind or another. I would have thought the possibility may worry a few folks here, particularly as this "fault" is frequently bringing down my whole system and if they're that clumsy with their toolkit, they may be doing damage that could affect a wider range of users than those employing software of dubious provenance. Maybe again it's my peculiar poltical outlook, but I feel the integrity of the internet and basic human rights protections against generalised covert surveillance (fishing) [again, how would you react if they did this with phones?] might concern people a little more than protection of the rights of recording and movie-industry moguls with their infintely extensible copyrights - even over material that no-one's making money out of any more. But then again, maybe the mysteriously time sensitive fault (which didn't exist two weeks ago and seems to have coem from nowhere) is just a software glitch or a common-or-garden hacker. I'd be interested in knowing, quite apart from solving the problem. And, BTW, I don't use Kazaa all that often in any case. Steve B.	Steve Bell (1009)
252337	2004-07-15 01:16:00	I didn't remember it before, but it comes to memory now that when Sharman Networks successfully had Kazaa Lite shutdown, it was reported that they would make a change in their software to try and exclude users of Kazaa Lite. IIRC, this change would only have affected those who were sharing files - and Kazaa Lite K++ has never locked up on me, even after Kazaa Lite was shutdown. But it still doesn't rule out that perhaps you are affected by this? Your political outlook sounds rather interesting - I didn't really suspect that kind of stuff would happen in New Zealand, but then again, we do have that nice little place down in the South Island which is part of some intelligence alliance I've forgotten about...	agent (30)
252338	2004-07-15 01:20:00	> Kazaa Lite K++ has never locked up on me I probably should have made it clear that I don't actually share files.	agent (30)
252339	2004-07-15 03:20:00	> Maybe again it's my peculiar political outlook, but I feel the integrity of the > internet and basic human rights protections against generalised covert > surveillance (fishing) [again, how would you react if they did this with > phones?] might concern people a little more than protection of the rights > of recording and movie-industry moguls with their infintely extensible > copyrights - even over material that no-one's making money out of any > more. Hmm, not so peculiar SB. Do a search on this forum for, corporation, DRM, TCP, copyright, NX, SCO, RIAA, and any number of such subject keys, I think you will find some rigorous debate. Whether people who comment in these threads like it or not, they are making political statements either directly regards governments or socio-political and corporate political machinations. Suspect some who hold firm views choose not to comment either for identity/privacy reasons or because they avoid the tone these discussions often degenerate to. I have no doubt that given some loosely written laws and a crusade that some tax paid employees will/do run as far as they can with it. I also do not trust politicians who say that the real intent of laws are different to objectors submissions and that the courts are the right place sort it out (yeah right). A good analogy to the fishing expeditions would be looking at peoples junk mail as it hits their letter box and successfully prosecuting them on the basis of what is delivered. Would that stick in a court of law, I doubt it would even get past the legal review of its merits? You might want to get yourself some trace/sniffing software and a better firewall than XP's if you don't already have one.. Cheers Murray P	Murray P (44)
252340	2004-07-15 08:59:00	Steve: may I commend to you Occam's Razor which states as follows- "one should not increase, beyond what is necessary, the number of entities required to explain anything" Or, more easily stated, "the most simple explanation is the most likely". Hence in your case, Kazza Lite may be corrupted, or lots of other people are overwhelming the system at these times. Your alternative explanation which requires the deliberate intervention of a third party aiming to get you is much more complex - and thus unlikely.	Winston001 (3612)
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