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“Subject: Urgent Warning”

daniel.haxx.se

31–40 of 184 posts

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#31

Lest Stenberg get tangled up too much in the email-sender's unfortunately troubles, he should likely refer the emailer to Instagram and Spotify's customer support. As an aside, hopefully someone can recommend to the emailer as well to use a different service to host high-quality versions of her photography so that potential clients can evaluate critical clarity in her technique. I'm not sure I'd want to rely on Insta…

> As an aside (#2), who hacks Spotify accounts?

My first guess when reading the article is that her Facebook account is compromised and that she uses facebook login for both spotify and instagram.

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#32
post #28

This reminds me of the case when some state or local agency got the default CentOS / Apache page and they contacted them as if they were hackers. EDIT (thanks mariuolo): http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/24/tuttle_centos/

and the fun had by thttpd: the classic "Attack of the Repo Men" http://www.acme.com/software/thttpd/repo.html

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#33
post #30

Ah, this sort of thing is as old as the moon. We run an eCommerce platform, have a variety of clients using it, they have a number of customers. At least once a week we get an accusation either from a client or an end-user of some outlandish nefarious behaviour, usually due to some complete lack of understanding of the nature of technology. Way back when, we responded, tried to help, tried to explain, but it tends to…

"When you have a conversation with an idiot, nobody watching can tell which one of you is the idiot". They are not idiots, they are average people, tech is complex, I wonder if people who have to be told or explain things to represent a market to attend? Imagine, something were you call a number ask for something to be bought; later someone go picking up the money, you perform the purchase and you later deliver. No c…

If you bellow at a stranger because you don't understand something, you're an idiot, sorry.

I'd like to hope an "average" person would not gloss over gaps in their knowledge and jump to a hostile conclusion.

In your scenario, say you're the phone company - would you think it reasonable if the customer who called in your example blames you for their having made a call and placed an order, because the phone line must have made the call itself and faked the customer's voice?

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#34
The "hacking ring" accusations remind me of the ill person who used to harass a friend from their time at DailyBooth, incredibly weird situation.

It's pretty unnerving because the person clearly needs some assistance but also thinks you are the bad guy.

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#35
post #17
post #4

If you desire to respond, I would relate the topic to her field. She claims to be a photographer. Surely she has a vague idea of copyright law. I would explain that you had developed a piece of Intellectual Property and licensed said property in a specific form -akin to taking a photograph. The person who takes a photograph owns the copyright. It just so happens that Spotify and Instagram, "enjoy your work" and have…

or, even easier to understand analogy: Daniel is the person on the photograph, Spotify/Instagram are the photographers and the hacker is the person who just stole the picture.

I fear you're still overcomplicating it: Daniel is a battery manufacturer. The person complaining bought a camera from Spotify, which came with one of Daniel's batteries inside. Someone stole that camera.

(It's not perfect, but it's probably as close as you're going to get)

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#36
Reminds me of back in the late nineties I developed a freeware email client. The client header in the send emails said "???mail by www.example.com"

I tought it might give me more users... What it gave me was lots of angry emails once someone used my mail client to send out spam. That header was gone pretty quickly.

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#37
Personally this brings up a very ridiculous and rather humorous observation on the nature of ToS agreements:

Intelligent people don't bother reading them closely, and the people who have read them often use the information contained in rather stupid ways.

Granted I have spent many hours over the years reading contest / entry rules and ToS type documents, so I'm pretty comfortable picking on myself a bit here and there. Often I've read a very clear ToS and then observed the responsible company basically disregard their own rules and stated processes. Two notable examples were for a Deadmau5 remix project (he 'lost his laptop' and they stretched the contest for a couple months, barely supplied any promised materials, etc) and a Local Motors contest (routinely lied about what they were looking for as judging criteria, then claimed to contact winners on day X to start authorization process, instead vetted winners in advance and then used day X to announce). I've used these experiences to temper my trust of any online engagement or contest, because it's nearly impossible to hold any provider accountable when they're dishonest or just inept.

Antagonizing bothersome people is a form of entertainment [1] from time to time. If there's nothing to be gained from actually being constructive, then being obtuse might be the most worthwhile course of action. YMMV.

[1] http://dontevenreply.com/view.php?post=111

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#38
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"When you have a conversation with an idiot, nobody watching can tell which one of you is the idiot". They are not idiots, they are average people, tech is complex, I wonder if people who have to be told or explain things to represent a market to attend? Imagine, something were you call a number ask for something to be bought; later someone go picking up the money, you perform the purchase and you later deliver. No c…

If you bellow at a stranger because you don't understand something, you're an idiot, sorry. I'd like to hope an "average" person would not gloss over gaps in their knowledge and jump to a hostile conclusion. In your scenario, say you're the phone company - would you think it reasonable if the customer who called in your example blames you for their having made a call and placed an order, because the phone line must h…

I understand your point, I'm just presenting one of several possible approaches/points of view:

-Defensive: Remove links to: "made by"

-Reactive: Handle the situation every time it appears.

-Proactive: See if this represents an opportunity for you and approach the market.

-Not responding.

Edit: format and form.

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#39
post #30

Ah, this sort of thing is as old as the moon. We run an eCommerce platform, have a variety of clients using it, they have a number of customers. At least once a week we get an accusation either from a client or an end-user of some outlandish nefarious behaviour, usually due to some complete lack of understanding of the nature of technology. Way back when, we responded, tried to help, tried to explain, but it tends to…

"When you have a conversation with an idiot, nobody watching can tell which one of you is the idiot". They are not idiots, they are average people, tech is complex, I wonder if people who have to be told or explain things to represent a market to attend? Imagine, something were you call a number ask for something to be bought; later someone go picking up the money, you perform the purchase and you later deliver. No c…

Senior people who have a hard time understanding technology is one thing. A photographer who uses computers for her job but doesn’t get to understand why a software developer’s name appears in some third party services is a totally different issue. The second case isn’t even about using a service or a product. It’s about understanding intellectual property. His name is there because both services wanted to credit him for his work. How fucking difficult is to understand that? In the same context if I see her name on the photographs of the hotel I happened to stay the other night I should contact her in case I want something from the hotel?

I know it sounds elitist but there are people out there who are completely morons. We have to get used to it.

Re: “Subject: Urgent Warning”

#40
post #30

Ah, this sort of thing is as old as the moon. We run an eCommerce platform, have a variety of clients using it, they have a number of customers. At least once a week we get an accusation either from a client or an end-user of some outlandish nefarious behaviour, usually due to some complete lack of understanding of the nature of technology. Way back when, we responded, tried to help, tried to explain, but it tends to…

"When you have a conversation with an idiot, nobody watching can tell which one of you is the idiot". They are not idiots, they are average people, tech is complex, I wonder if people who have to be told or explain things to represent a market to attend? Imagine, something were you call a number ask for something to be bought; later someone go picking up the money, you perform the purchase and you later deliver. No c…

Part of being a not-idiot is knowing the limits of your own knowledge. If you don't understand how this stuff is put together, fine, that doesn't make you an idiot. But if you just start raging at the nearest available person, rather than doing your research to fill in the gaps in your knowledge, that's an idiot.
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