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Extending only 18" from a closet wall or door, this rack keeps 10 pairs of slacks neatly hung and readily accessible. Only available from Hammacher Schlemmer, it easily mounts to a closet wall or door and has a 10-gauge steel support bracket that holds 10 hardwood dowels so you can hang trousers flush against the wall, then swing them out individually, up to 180�. The 5/8"-diameter dowels reduce creasing of even fine fabrics and one-inch vertical spacing between the dowels allows for easy visibility. Support bracket has solid hardwood back with clear lacquer finish and mounts with self-tapping drywall anchors (included). Imported. Mounting board 20" H x 2 3/4" W.
Lifetime Guarantee
The Closet Organizing 10 Trouser Rack comes with The Hammacher Schlemmer Lifetime Guarantee at no additional charge. If this product ever disappoints you, for any reason, you may return your Hammacher Schlemmer purchase for exchange, credit, or refund.Should you have any questions, we are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Please call 1-800-321-1484 to speak with a product specialist or email us at email@example.com to receive a response within one hour.
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(based on 13 reviews)
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Love it!
By Big Mama
from Hagerstown, MD
I moved in to a new house and my closet space is small. This helps to give me more room.
Bottom Line Yes, I would recommend this to a friend
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Too big
By Leeza
from Maine
Overall, despite the nice wood, this just seems way too bulky and big for the average room. I sent it back right away knowing the recipient would have found it too fussy.
Bottom Line No, I would not recommend this to a friend
So far so good.
By carl
from long island
I can't give this product 5 stars until I've had it at least a year and see if it holds up. So far so good (1 week)
Great, but mislabeled
By prairiegirl
from Wisconsin
Great product!
Perfect Pants Rack
By Jim
from Sebastopol, California
Just plain EXCELLENT!
closet organizing 10 trouser rack
By cat lady
from Easton, Md
I use in my craft room to hold my fabric.Have 2 more in my clothes closets
By Happy wife
from Park City KS
This was super easy to install and works exactly as it should. I got this for my husband and it's helping to give me back some closet space. We've only had it a short amount if time but it seems very sturdy and holds his pants without sagging.
Classy closet addition
By HS
from Indiana
Shipped very quickly, easy to install, looks great
My husband loves it
By Mary Anne
from Indianapolis, IN
This was perfect solution for small closet space for my husbands slacks! He thanked me for finding it and buying it! He says it is very easy to see his slacks displayed.
Perfect for my needs
By Stacie
from Cypress, Texas
I've seen this is the skymall catalog for years and wondered what I could use it for - such a great storage piece.I ended up using it for all my mini garden flags. After a recent move, I noticed my flags all over the place, shoved here and there. I ordered the 10, but should have ordered the 20, as I am still finding flags in various bins in the garage.As the storage 'expert' in my family, I'm now also the envy of neighbors and friends for such a find :)
COPYRIGHT © 2015 HAMMACHER SCHLEMMER & COMPANY, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. W102HAMMACHER SCHLEMMER • 147 E. 57th ST • NEW YORK, NY • 10022 • 1-800-_321-1484


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got Pirates new DIY spade kit.....
very well laid out and it works perfectly!!! trigger assembly is easy to use and very smooth.
only thing you need to watch is: if you mount it too far forward and then your top cover release cant come back far enough.
pix post tonite.
well worth the price. another great improvement from Pirate!!

subset: commoncrawl


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Sites At Penn State gives students, faculty, and staff the ability to create websites and blogs quickly and easily. Get started today!
Engaged ScholarshipUniversity Community Topic
Penn State RugbySports Program
Laura March's ePortfolioStudent ePorfolio
Set Glue Guns to StunStudent Blog by Kaylie Maines
Penn State Cheese ClubStudent Club
Stuart A. SelberFaculty Portfolio
Rhetoric and Civic Life with Adam HaleyEnglish 137H Course Site
Research MattersNews Source
One HeartStudent Organization Website
Lector Book ClubCourse Reading Blog
Blue Out Penn StateStudent Event Website
Tentative to ChangeRCL Blog by Riley Monasmith
Sites At Penn State is proudly powered by WordPress and BuddyPress.


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Visitors to Sweden should schedule at least one night in Stockholm, a city with nightlife well worth the visit. The variety in the types of places, music styles and dress codes means that everyone can find a spot suited to their particular desires.
Stureplan is a symbol of Stockholm's luxurious style in clubs and restaurants. Celebrities, models, media moguls and businesspeople pass through the famous mushroom on the square to enter exclusive clubs and restaurants. Long lines are common to enter the most popular addresses and entry is selective or even denied after the wait. Visitors should try getting on a guest list online for the place(s) they want to visit or get in line very early.
Södermalm provides a combination of bohemian, reggae, rockabilly and electronic music. This is a much less expensive alternative to Stureplan's upscale luxury. Other nightlife areas in this hip neighborhood can be found around Slussen, the trendy SoFo area and Medborgarplatsen.
Kåken provides bar meals, classic styled drinks and relaxing music choices. The décor was inspired by 1940s American movies, with its velvet upholstery and dark wood accents. The annex to the trendy Niklas' Restaurant is a popular spot to go after work to meet the hip local crowd.
In 2001, Brasserie Godot was established and became a favorite of the city's well-to-do. The classic French eatery also includes one of Stockholm's best bars with its large drink list that focuses on liquids including fresh fruit and berries. The simple and stylish small dining hall feels exclusive and inviting at the same time, especially with the great wine list accenting their classic menu.
For elegance and luxury, try the Sky Bar and Cocktail Lounge that provides 360-degree views of the beautiful capital of Sweden: Och Himlen Därtill. This fantastic nightspot sits atop a Sodermalm skyscraper and is one of the few open until 3 am on weekends. A stylish restaurant is part of this unique establishment.
Stureplan is famous for the Laroy Nightclub. Its brave design, large main bar and three mini-bars with stages serve cocktails and snacks catering to young professionals.
There are many more fantastic places to visit in Stockholm – don't delay and book your flight today.
SAS offers more Scandinavian destinations than any other airline in Europe from the US. "Makes your travel easier" is more than just a motto. Enjoy travel benefits not offered by other airlines. Benefits include free baggage allowance, free seat selection and check-in as well as a 24-hour money-back guarantee. You will always receive your money back if you cancel your trip booked within 24 hours.
SAS is a Star Alliance member, so you can earn and spend points with participating airlines as well as every time you fly with SAS through the EuroBonus frequent flyer program.
Book online now for the best fares to get a rocking start to your trip!
Scandinavian Airlines © 2015


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Between the Lines
Literary and Arts Journal
Edmonds Community College's literary and arts journal, Between the Lines, publishes quality short fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, and visual artwork from writers and artists at the college and in the local community.
Between the Lines is funded by the Associated Students of Edmonds CC through the services and activities fee collected from quarterly tuition — giving students the opportunity to experience working on a literary publication from concept through creation.
A Winning Partnership
By participating in Between the Lines, our students get to share their work within a larger community of writers and artists, and our community members get a chance to engage with our arts and cultural initiative at the college.
Get the New Edition: Between the Lines 2013
More than 50 writers and artists are featured in the journal. Edmonds CC students can also get a free copy of the journal by visiting the Center for Student Engagement and Leadership in the Triton Student Center.
Between the Lines 2013 was created by students enrolled in the college's Publications class, including:
Ariel Alfaro, Art and Design Editor;
Jordan Haarberg, Art and Design Editor; and
Catherine Nichols, Literary Editor.
The Faculty Adviser is Amanda Laughtland.
College Events


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A method and system for authenticating a digital optical medium, such as a CD-ROM, determine whether the medium is an unauthorized copy, or the original. The original media is created, or altered, so as to contain anomalous locations from which the transfer of data is accomplished at different rates than a standard digital copy would exhibit. One implementation of the process involves timing analysis of the differences in data transfer rates. Another implementation involves the determination of digital signatures during multiple read operations performed on a data segment. The process can be employed in systems that control access to unauthorized copies, or may be used for other informative purposes. Theft, distribution, and piracy of digital content on optical media, such as computer software (also games, video, audio, e-book content), is often accomplished by copying it directly to another disc using commonly available copy tools and recordable optical media, or the replication of media to another mass manufactured disc. The present invention, which helps to irrefutably identify a unit of optical media as the original, and can correspondingly identify any copy made by any currently available means as such a copy, may prevent an unauthorized individual from making use of any unauthorized copies. This offers significant advantages to content creators who wish to protect their products.
1. A method for authenticating a removable digital medium by determining the presence of an anomaly region corresponding to a data segment of the removable digital medium comprising: performing multiple read operations on a data segment of the removable digital medium to generate multiple corresponding read data results; calculating corresponding digital signatures using actual data values of underlying data of the read data segment for each of the multiple read data results; determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on a comparison of the digital signatures by determining whether any of the digital signatures are equal in value, and if a predetermined number of the digital signatures are not equal in value, determining the anomaly region to be present; and authenticating the removable digital medium in response to the determination of the presence of the anomaly region.
2. The method of
3. The method of
4. The method of
first monitoring a first transfer rate of first read data during one of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored first transfer rate; and
in the event that the presence of an anomaly is not determined as a result of the first monitoring, second monitoring a second transfer rate of second read data during another of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored second transfer rate.
5. The method of
6. The method of
7. A system for authenticating a removable digital medium by determining the presence of an anomaly region corresponding to a data segment of the removable digital medium comprising: a read unit for performing multiple read operations on a data segment of the removable digital medium to generate multiple corresponding read data results; a calculating unit for calculating corresponding digital signatures using actual data values of underlying data of the read data segment for each of the multiple read data results; and a determining unit for determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on a comparison of the digital signatures by determining whether any of the digital signatures are equal in value, and if a predetermined number of the digital signatures are not equal in value, the determining unit determining the anomaly region to be present; and a means for authenticating the removable digital medium in response to the determination of the presence of the anomaly region.
8. The system of
9. The system of
10. The system of
a monitoring unit for first monitoring a first transfer rate of first read data during one of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored first transfer rate; and, in the event that the presence of an anomaly is not determined as a result of the first monitoring, second monitoring a second transfer rate of second read data during another of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored second transfer rate.
11. The system of
12. The system of
This application is a continuation-in-part application of U.S. Ser. No. 10/062,400, filed Feb. 1, 2002, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference, in their entirety.
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application 60/445,045, filed Feb. 5, 2003, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference, in their entirety.
1. Field of the Invention
This invention is related to the field of systems and methods for preventing, deterring and detecting the unauthorized duplication of digital information, such as digital information distributed on optical media. The method relies upon a computing device executing validation code, either stored on the media itself or stored in firmware, volatile device memory provided from an external store or network transaction, or non-volatile device memory within the device, prior to allowing full access to the protected content.
2. Description of the Related Art
The electronic publishing industry, which publishes application software, computer games, appliance-console games, movies, and music on optical media is facing a growing and serious problem; namely, the piracy, unauthorized modification, and use of digital content. Since digital content itself is in essence a sequence of binary 1's and 0's, it may often be copied exactly, wherein a copy of these "bits" is identical in every way to the original, and since the tools that enable such copying are becoming more readily available, the industry is facing ever-increasing losses. Such losses may include the unauthorized duplication of a unit of optical media containing a game, a word processing program, an E-Book, a movie, or musical content.
A number of mechanisms are currently available that may be used to limit or prevent unauthorized access to digital content, including those approaches related to optical media manufacturing, modification, and protection thereof.
The most popular among these methods include methods that insert data errors into the media at the time of manufacture by producing actual bit patterns that are technically out of conformance with published standards and specifications (originally such as those set by Philips Corporation in their CD specification documents sometimes referred to as the "Red Book", "Orange Book", and other industry-standards-book names). In theory, the errors cannot be reproduced by copying processes or devices if those devices or processes are themselves specification conformant. However, such approaches are limited in that they do not take into account that while these bit patterns are not officially sanctioned and not specification conformant, the approach relies on unenforceable voluntary specification compliance. Even as recently as a few years ago, most device manufacturers were in fact working very hard to be specification conformant, and most copy software was also conformant, so these protective methods were effective for a period of time. However, it was realized that by making minor changes to the devices and software, they could be made to copy nearly everything, even protected titles. This resulted in sales of more devices, more copying software, and, of course, more blank media, and such devices are not in any way illegal. Certain usage is, but that is the responsibility of the purchaser. A slippery slope of sorts, but piracy is ubiquitous and part of the reason why many segments of industry and society derive financial benefit from the act of piracy. Devices have intentionally been created which ignore these specification deviations, as have software programs dedicated to copying media such as the popular "BlindRead" and "CloneCD" software products. Examples of devices that deviate from the specifications are for example CD-R and CD-RW drives manufactured under the name "Lite-On" or "Liteon", or devices made by industry giant "Plextor", which are engineered to copy and reproduce all bits on a disc exactly, regardless of specification conformance. Since the methods mentioned above rely on conformance to specifications and on industry consortia applying pressure to manufacturers and software companies to cause them to comply with the specifications, they are inherently flawed, because any number of such companies can, and have, carved themselves a perfectly legal market niche by breaking ranks, doing just the opposite and creating devices optimized for such unauthorized duplication usage. If copying of a medium is physically possible, then it will be copied and distributed. This is the significant challenge faced in this field; to create media authentication mechanisms that depend on detection of repeatable, measurable media properties, and which do not depend on voluntary specification compliance across a broad set of industries.
Conventional implementations of some significance include methods that depend on the existence of media errors and the detection of these errors in order to authenticate the media. These historic methods relied, as described above, upon cooperation and compliance from the makers of copying software and makers of the drives themselves. The intentionally-generated errors used by these approaches were sometimes chosen to be illegal and/or outside the appropriate specification, and the cooperating parties were encouraged to ship only those products that would ignore, or fail to fully, or correctly, copy the bit patterns. Since any and all bit patterns are inherently copyable, it was only a matter of time before one or more of these cooperating parties broke ranks and created copy software (Blind Read, Clone CD for example) and media drives (Plextor, Lite-On) that could generate an exact copy of these "uncopyable errors", invalidating the entire class of protection technologies based on this approach. The very failing of these methods lies in that the property they detected and depended upon can be wholly, or sufficiently copied by digital means. Such prior art "Backup-Resistant" or "Copy Protected" digital media that relies upon validation code executing on a general purpose device, is able to be wholly copied if all available bits of data relied upon by the validation algorithm can be accurately duplicated at a fundamentally low enough level onto recordable media and subsequently read on legacy devices.
A class of these authentication methods are restricted to protecting optical media intended to be used in general purpose computing devices. Such media includes a wide variety of formats such as CD-ROM, CDR, CDI, CDRW, DVD-ROM, DVD-RAM, DVD+, DVDR, CD+ (also called CDPlus or Enhanced CD, or Blue Book). Other such authentication methods can protect content on Audio and Video CD's and DVD's by applying the above methods to algorithmic logic resident in firmware or non-volatile memory within the playback device, itself a computing device whose usage is much like an appliance.
Despite such developments, no current validation methods succeed at preventing accurate duplication of such protected media and the data on the media, either intended for use on general purpose computers, such as mass-produced "stamped" optical digital formats including CD-ROM, CDR, CDI, DVD-ROM, and CD+, or on appliance devices, consumer players, and game consoles.
The present invention provides a system and method for authentication that overcomes the limitations of the conventional approaches. The system and method of the present invention can be utilized on current media formats, as well as future optical formats beyond those mentioned above, and on both media destined for general purpose computing devices (such as personal computers) and appliance computing devices (including but not limited to game console devices, DVD and CD players).
The present invention is directed to an authentication method that detects whether digital information stored on rotating optical media is the original version or a duplicate copy by timing analysis of specific data transfers. Timing measurement and quantification may employ accessing the media at a specific rotation rate if possible, or permitted, on the optical media compatible device. Following the authentication process based on the data transfer rate the system may respond by preventing unrestricted usage, by allowing such usage in whole or in part, or may be merely informative.
The present invention relies upon the detection of especially problematic locations, or anomaly regions, on the original media that a reading device would encounter minor difficulty in reading. The anomaly regions do not necessarily resulting an absolute failure by the device to read the media, or do not necessarily generate any recoverable, or unrecoverable device errors. Rather, the device reacts by attempting to re-read read the information by rotating the media past the read head additional times, or perhaps not attempting to re-read, but rather slowing down the rotation rate of the device, or both. Many contemporary optical media devices do this automatically, at a very low level, even when error correction and error handling is disabled by means of device firmware commands.
Such anomaly regions can be introduced in a diverse number of ways on the top, bottom, or both, surfaces of the media, by any of a number of methods. The anomaly regions may be positioned directly under the read head. Alternatively, they may be positioned such that incidental effects of adjacent track areas interfering with the current track due to refraction effects, polarization effects, or other optical anomalies, may be employed. The anomaly regions may be present during initial creation of the media, or alternatively may be added following replication. A number of techniques for introducing such anomaly regions have been demonstrated. Duplicated media currently utilizes discrete bits and rigidly defined waveforms in data storage representations. Copying devices and associated software cannot adequately replicate such marginally readable anomaly regions.
The invention embodies estimating the anticipated transfer rate with precision and comparing the expected data transfer rate with the measured data transfer rate. Subtle data transfer rates and associated rate changes are detected over time, for example by a general purpose computing device. Such computing devices usually containing a wide variety of reading devices from various manufacturers.
The present invention is intended to prevent, deter and/or detect the existence of unauthorized duplicates of digital information of all types, for example, such digital information as having been originally distributed on optical media of all types.
The devices referred to as read or read/write devices in this context include Compact Disc (CD, CD-R, CD-RW), DVD (all types including DVD-R and DVD-RW), other multi-layer and/or multi-sided media, or any other optical media devices and media as used on such systems. The media referred to may comprise CD, CD-R, CD-RW, DVD and all other variants of disc-shaped single-sided and double-sided media. The present invention is equally applicable to other media types, for example, card-shaped media, other shapes of media, flat or otherwise, in any appropriate reading device for that media, attached to any form of computing device. For example a keycard badge and keycard badge reader would fall under the definition of media (card), drive (reader), and computing system (device the reader is connected to which determines authenticity). This method applies equally well to other forms of data storage media, such as magnetic hard disc drives.
In particular the present invention is related to systems and methods that detect duplicates of original optical media and/or subsequent use of such unauthorized duplicate copies via optical media devices such as those as found on computer systems and consumer-appliance systems. This process of detection is one that can discriminate between duplicates of the original media made by digital duplication processes and the original media itself.
The present invention provides mechanisms that yield measurement capabilities that can distinguish an original media from a copy of the media by means of measuring and quantifying into a reliable media signature the direct and indirect aspects of the performance of the media in the optical drive reading the media, in order to detect media-specific performance anomaly locations. Performance anomaly values may include such data as anomalous rotational speed variations, data rate, and the frequency and type of reported device status messages throughout the process of reading the optical media. Direct measurements may include any form of information that the optical media drive is capable of providing; this varies depending on how the optical media drive is instrumented and depending on what commands are recognized by on-board firmware. Such direct measurements include information about the drive's on-board cache buffer status, the actual rotational speed of the disc within the drive, device status, the device's intended rotational speed, and direct access to data being read without physical caching. Indirect measurements are performed outside the optical media drive, at the system and device driver level, and may include such items of information as the rotational speed of the drive (for example calculated inferentially based on cache performance if direct access to the cache is disallowed), cache status (for example calculated inferentially based on cache performance if direct access to the cache is disallowed), and reported device status. Indirect measurement capabilities such as these may require the services of additional invention mechanisms that filter out other system activities and effects in order to more accurately infer the actual performance and status of the device. For reliability, these event filtration mechanisms are used throughout the system to clarify analysis of the optical media instance performance. This anomaly signature can take the form of a single anomaly, or alternatively a collection of multiple anomaly locations. Data may be encoded by expressing values based on the relationships between the locations and on the degree of the effect on performance a given anomaly has at each location.
The media as successfully identified and read according to the systems and methods of the present invention may include measurable or perceptible areas of performance variation. In one example, the reading optical drive may at times only be capable of delivering a fractional amount of its expected I/O data transfer performance. This fractional performance variation, whether as exhibited in a single instance, or over time, forms the basis of a unique per-unit-of-optical-media performance signature. The inverse may also be deliberately employed, such as common media areas being slower, and detection areas being faster to access. The ability to detect this, and to discriminate and filter actual performance metrics from unrelated system events is challenging. These anomaly locations may be present on the media as a result of the manufacture process (such as non-standard deviations formed during manufacture, or anomaly locations intentionally integrated into the manufacturing process), or, alternatively, the media may be physically modified following the manufacturing process. These anomaly locations may also be present unintentionally or forensically as a result of the "handling history" of a unit of optical media (for example being scratched due to rough handling). These anomaly locations may need not be areas of unreadable, incorrect or damaged data, and may be introduced in many different manners including but not limited to rotationally unbalanced media, optical path interference, or other physical phenomenon that affect readability. The systems and methods of the present invention are concerned with the detection of any and all such media signatures regardless of how they came to be on the media.
In this manner, the present invention does not depend upon the incorporation of unreadable media error block locations or other unrecoverable device and media errors as utilized by many of the conventional methods described above. Nor does the present invention depend upon the detection of media anomalies that are deliberate non-standard bit or wave patterns that are interpreted by the device at higher levels (tokenized) differentially. The present invention further does not depend on the existence or absence of the non-standard tokenized bit patterns that legacy optical media recorders have difficulty in recording.
Data transfer rates can be tracked over time across a range of addressable blocks. The authentication signature as media performance varies over time may be visualized as a series of curves, of valleys in an otherwise ascending (as the drive spins up) or flattening (when the drive is operating at maximum drive speed) slope. By contrast with such performance anomaly locations, unrecoverable error locations such as those used in historic prior art methods represent sustained periods of zero bytes per time unit performance, and exhibit a substantially vertical slope. This indicates an utter failure to read for a measurable period of time, which may be visualized as a flat line at zero. Any such areas of zero bytes per time unit performance caused by any event of any kind are not considered to represent a valid signature. According to the present invention, valid anomaly signatures do not exhibit unrecoverable reported errors during validation, as do the conventional approaches. Note that in such conventional approaches wherein fabricated media errors disallow the reading of any data from that location, it is easily possible to duplicate all such bit patterns today using available optical media copy utilities, and such ease of replication can compromise the effectiveness of authentication procedures.
In a first aspect, the present invention is directed to a method for authenticating digital media. Transfer rate of read data resulting from the reading of valid data stored on a digital medium at a physical location is monitored. The presence of an anomaly region on the digital medium corresponding to the physical location of the valid data on the digital medium is determined from the monitored transfer rate. A determination is made as to whether the digital media is authentic based on a characteristic of the anomaly region.
The digital medium may comprise various forms of readable media, for example optical and magnetic digital media. The transfer rate may be monitored in real time, as the read data is read from the digital medium, and/or following reading of the read data from the digital medium. The monitored data transfer rate may be estimated, and the presence of the anomaly region may be based on the estimated data transfer rate.
The anomaly region preferably causes a modification in the transfer rate of the read data. The modification results from multiple read operations of the data in the anomaly region.
The anomaly region may be located at a predetermined location on the medium, in which case, the characteristic is the position of the anomaly region in the read data. If the position of the anomaly region in the read data matches the predetermined position of the anomaly region, then the digital medium is determined as authentic. If the position of the anomaly region in the read data does not match the predetermined position of the anomaly region, then the digital medium is determined as non-authentic. User access to the digital medium may be permitted or forbidden, or some variation thereof, based on whether the medium is authentic.
The anomaly region in the read data may result from a difficulty in the reading of the read data by a reading device. The difficulty may arise from a modification that affects the readability of data on the medium, for example a mechanical, or optical, modification.
The steps for performing the authentication may reside in software code that is previously stored on the digital medium, prior to authentication. A known characteristic of the anomaly region may be previously stored on the digital medium, prior to authentication, in which case the determination as to whether the digital medium is authentic based on a characteristic of the anomaly region comprises comparing the characteristic to the known characteristic.
An anomaly region in the read data can be identified according to a modification in the transfer rate of the read data. The modification in the transfer rate may comprises a reduction in the transfer rate, in which case the anomaly region is identified based on the extent of the reduction. The modification in the transfer rate may comprise a reduction in the transfer rate, for example a gradual reduction, in which case, gradual reduction of the data rate results in the anomaly region being determined as a genuine anomaly region. The modification in the transfer rate may comprise a reduction in the transfer rate, for example a sudden reduction, in which case the sudden reduction of the data rate results in the anomaly region being determined as a false anomaly region, which may indicate that the medium is non-authentic. Alternatively, the modification in the transfer rate may comprise an increase in the transfer rate, and the characteristic is determined based on the increase.
In another alternative, the modification in the transfer rate may comprise a response comprising a gradual reduction in the data transfer rate followed by a sudden increase in the transfer rate to an increased transfer rate that is greater than a maximum transfer rate, in which case the response indicates that an apparent anomaly region generated by an external source has been detected. The apparent anomaly region may be identified and filtered such that the step of determining whether the digital medium is authentic based on a characteristic of the anomaly region is not based on the apparent anomaly region.
The determination as to whether the digital medium is authentic is based on a characteristic of multiple anomaly regions, or, alternatively, on multiple characteristics of the same, or multiple, anomaly region(s).
In another aspect, the present invention is directed to a method for determining the presence of an anomaly region in a digital medium. Multiple read operations are performed on a data segment of the medium to generate multiple corresponding read data results. Corresponding digital signatures are calculated for each of the multiple read data results. A determination is made as to the presence of an anomaly region in the data segment based on a comparison of the digital signatures.
The data comprises, for example, data selected from the group consisting of: user data, error data, sync data, parity data, header data, and sub-channel data.
The present invention may further comprise monitoring a transfer rate of the read data during at least one of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored transfer rate.
The present invention may further comprise monitoring a first transfer rate of first read data during one of the read procedures, and determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored first transfer rate; and in the event that the presence of an anomaly is not determined as a result of the first monitoring, second monitoring a second transfer rate of second read data during another of the read procedures, and further determining whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment based on the monitored second transfer rate.
The digital signature that is calculated may comprise, for example, MD2, MD4, MD5, Snefru, SHA, NIST DSA, Haval, N-Hash, or RIPE-MD digital signatures.
The determination as to whether an anomaly region is present in the data segment of the medium based on a comparison of the digital signatures may comprise determining whether the any of the digital signatures are equal in value. In one embodiment, if none of the digital signatures are equal in value, the anomaly region is determined to be present. In an alternative embodiment, if a predetermined number of the digital signatures are not equal in value, the anomaly region is determined to be present.
The medium may then be authenticated in response to the determination of the presence of the anomaly region.
The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the more particular description of preferred embodiments of the invention, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which like reference characters refer to the same parts throughout the different views. The drawings are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon illustrating the principles of the invention
The systems and methods of the present invention and various embodiments thereof may be implemented on any of a number of media reading device platforms, including, for example, a personal computer or general purpose digital computer 7 as shown in
The various forms of media to which the systems and method of the present invention are applicable include those in which the media is comprised of a data-bearing surface attached to, or housed within, a reading device, one or both of which is moving with respect to the other. In one popular class of such devices the media rotates and the reading device addresses one or both sides of the media surface by moving a reading head with respect to the rotating data-bearing surface. For example, an optical media disc such as a Compact Disc has data arranged in a spiral pattern and the data is read from the center outwards to the perimeter. The disc rotates and the reading head follows the spiral track of increasing radius by moving the reading device outwardly from the rotational center of the disc. When the data is more difficult to read, for example obscured by a physical deformation of the disc, the reading device may slow its rotational speed and/or re-read portions of the data. The operation of re-reading may occur by keeping the reading head in a fixed location and not moving it in a direction away from the center of the disk as the disc rotates, causing it to re-read portions of the spiral or arc of data. In many cases the reading device will have such retry logic implemented at a very low level and may silently retry and/or slow down the reading operation without issuing any error.
Such slowdown of the media reading operation may be initiated in cases where the media contains instances of anomalies that result in a modification of reading performance. These anomaly locations, or regions, may be present on the media as a result of the manufacture process (such as non-standard media surface, or subsurface, deviations formed during manufacture, or anomaly locations intentionally integrated into the manufacturing process), or, alternatively, the media may be physically modified following the manufacturing process. These anomaly locations may also be present unintentionally or forensically as a result of the "handling history" of a unit of optical media (for example being scratched due to rough handling). These anomaly locations need not necessarily comprise instances of entirely unreadable, incorrect or damaged data, but can instead modify the read performance of the reading device. The anomaly locations may be introduced on the media in many different ways, including, but not limited to, rotationally unbalanced media, optical path interference, or other physical phenomenon that affect readability. Such anomalies may take the form of non-standard physical surface media topology, or optical qualities of materials selected for the physical location corresponding to a data location on that media. Even something as simple as a single or multiple scratches or dents, on either, or both, surfaces of the media may be used to create the anomaly region. The systems and methods of the present invention are concerned with the detection of any and all such media anomaly signatures regardless of their source.
Devices that read rotating data storage media such as optical media usually attempt to read the data on the media as quickly as possible, with error correction and retries enabled, unless a command is issued to the device requesting otherwise. Many such devices perform read operations with great tenacity, and in the event of any difficulty in reading, they will attempt to re-read the data one or more times before reporting an error, and, consequently, will slow the drive's rotational speed as necessary. This re-read of the data usually takes place automatically, and is initiated by the drive. Many such drives perform the retry and re-read operations even when given direct commands to disable error correction and retries. Virtually all drives will treat a successful re-read as a successful read and fail to report any error, even if their status is closely monitored.
Rather than requiring a detection of an outright error during the reading process, or an outright failure of the reading process, the systems and methods of the present instead analyze the drive's reading performance at times when the reading process does not fail or generate any errors, and from that performance divine the properties of the media being read.
As shown in the flow diagram of
After a predetermined amount of data has been read, the detection mechanism of the present invention begins to attempt to screen the read data in order to detect the bounds of an anomaly 11. Detection criteria for an example anomaly are described below in
At any point in time, the drive may be placed into an unusual state by the detection process of the present invention, and it may require reset to a known good state 13; the device commands to do so sometimes work, in some drives, but often multiple commands must be issued, for example in the case of very inexpensive drives, the drive can be reset most effectively by opening and closing the drive door, or by effectively remounting, or resetting, the media logically without opening the drive door. The process of the present invention can optionally make a determination as to whether the drive needs to be reset based on the performance and operational behavior exhibited. The process of discriminating and filtering actual anomaly locations from false ones (as discussed in detail below with reference to
As illustrated in
With reference to
While anomaly locations and their validation are an important aspect, the systems and methods of the present invention are capable of far more than merely identifying media as valid; the validation process can also be used to determine hidden encoded data values. This encoding is achieved using properties of the anomaly locations, for example their absolute and relative locations, their extent, and their severity. For example, a disc with 52 anomaly locations may be used to encode and represent the entire 26 character English alphabet, including lower case and capital letters. The data content of the disc is unrelated to this encoding. In this example, assume that no anomaly produces a fatal read error, and assume that the content of the disc is a software program that calculates one's income tax. Yet the location of each anomaly may be part of a meaningful, higher-level encoding. For example, a distance of one megabyte of data between anomaly locations may represent an encoded "a", a distance of two megabytes between anomaly locations may represent an encoded "b", three megabytes distance an encoded "c", and so on. Further, the anomaly's severity may have meaning, for instance a distance of three megabytes between locations may represent a "c" but only of the anomaly is mild and produces a 25% slowdown in data transfer rate. If the anomaly is more severe and produces a slowdown of between 50% and 75% then it may represent an upper case, or capital, "C". Other embodiments of this encoding technique are equally applicable to the present invention. This encoding technique is sufficient for small quantities of critical data, such as encryption keys and other data items that are important, but not large in size. The encoding is secure because a copy of the original disc cannot represent the slowdown property of the anomaly, and therefore, the critical information is completely lost in the copying process.
Transfer rate is described above as being an important measurement criterion. When the term "transfer rate" is referred to, what is really intended to be measured is the number of bytes transferred in a unit of time. In a real time measurement sense, the number of bytes (or kilobytes, thousands of bytes, or megabytes, millions of bytes) may be referred to as "bytes per second" or "k" per second. In a rolling historic window, looking back across some selected amount of historic time and smoothing, filtering, or averaging the sampled time values, an average, or alternatively, an aggregate transfer rate, is achieved. This aggregate transfer rate is also expressed in bytes per second or other "quantity per unit time" terms, but has been filtered so that performance spikes and deficits that are determined by the filtering logic (described in detail below with reference to
Alternatively the aggregate rate could be arrived it in similar historic fashion, where all 15 transfer rate values could be summed and it is assumed that over the 15 second period, the transfer rate was the sum total, because it represents the true output of the drive over that time period, and therefore, the spike in rate at sample 13 is then meaningful because it began and ended within that period and therefore the apparent slowdown in 12 was nulled out by the apparent speedup in samples 13 and 14 so that the overall aggregate data rate represents the device's actual performance during that 15 seconds.
Real-time measurement of the transfer rate requires an intelligent averaging routine capable of filtering out system-induced non-anomaly performance changes, whereas non real-time measurement using a historic "rolling window" looking back some number of units of time can make use of aggregate values because in the fullness of time these non-anomaly rate changes usually nullify each other. After all, in the example given above, the drive did not actually slow down during sample periods 12, 13 and 14, so that once the situation was rectified by sample 15, the historic view back 15 samples provides an accurate reflection of the amount of data the drive was able to transfer in that time period. Note that had there been an actual slowdown during sample periods 12, 13, and 14, assuming that the drive had been previously operating at full speed, the drive would not ever have been able to catch up during the 15 unit sample and the aggregate total would have been lower. The rolling historic window serves as a powerful analytical tool to truly understand and monitor the device data transfer rate.
Based on the performance signature disclosed in
Unauthentic anomalies in this example above may comprise system performance deficits caused by system resource issues other than media readability, resulting in an inadequate input/output subsystem performance. For example the system may fall behind in read requests to a CD drive and return an apparent data rate of 300 kb/sec, when the drive in fact is operating at a rate much faster than that. Eventually when the system releases a portion of its resources to the input/output subsystem controlling the read operation, the pent up read data will burst at rates much higher than the drive would ever be capable of, and the acceleration in increase of transfer rate would occur at a rate that is not physically possible in a rotating media drive. The overall data rate and the rate of acceleration (depth, height, and/or slope as in the discussion of the curve above) have a relationship, one in which a true data rate slowdown causes an overall reduction in the amount of data transferred over time, whereas an apparent but eventually-determined false data transfer rate slowdown caused by external system events such as large network file transfers can be shown to not show such a reduction over time, if the time window is large enough to encompass the entire false slowdown and the corresponding data burst that was buffered too quickly which inevitably follows such a false slowdown. A specific example is the copying of a large file across a network to such a system while the system was in the process of authenticating media. The network transfer might, under some circumstances, result in a temporary slowdown in the apparent reading performance, and it is preferred that the system be able to recognize such occurrences as not being representative of a true anomaly location.
For example if one were to take a hammer and nail and punch holes or dents into an optical disc, the areas in the center of the punched hole would probably be full of severe, unrecoverable errors, which would cause a read attempt to time out and return a severe error status. Such areas of destruction are far from ideal for the purpose of this invention, and are preferably not used for authentication purposes because media drives sometimes do not recover from reading such areas, and such areas may be digitally copied with ease anyway, so they offer no added security. The systems and methods of the present invention however, as explained elsewhere in this document, does not make use of such areas of unrecoverable error or data destruction, and is not concerned with them. What can be observed, however, is that immediately adjacent such areas of total destruction are often anomalous slowdown zones, as the reading process begins to scan the region of damage. An ideal implementation of an anomaly would consist exclusively of the data rate slowdown region, and no such unrecoverable errors, but in this example an anomalous area was introduced by non-ideal means and the areas of unrecoverable error are undesirable artifacts. No such area of slowdown cannot be transferred to a copied disc, therefore in a situation where the reading process of an original disc may have been observed to have a sequence of "normal data rate→slowed data rate→hard error, no data rate at all", where "no data rate at all" was not a factor in the authentication logic decision, the copy will be observed to perform as "normal data rate→hard error, no data rate at all" without any such data rate slowdown transition. Since lack of such a data rate slowdown transition by definition means that there are no data rate anomaly zones, no digital copy of a disc can possess anomalous data rate regions.
Only the original disc can exhibit such slowed rates of data transfer in specific locations, such as those bordering any such regions of physical alteration, since present digital disc-copying processes are incapable of making such physical modifications to the resulting output disc copy. In one embodiment, the data associated with points 35, 36, 37 are not used for authentication purposes, since the determination is made as of the processing of data related to point 34 that this anomaly location is not authentic.
As shown in
In this discussion, terms such as "apparent anomaly", "false anomaly" and "valid or true anomaly" are used. The process of determining whether a region of the media being read is actually an anomaly results in the anomaly being classified as an "apparent anomaly" when it has some of the characteristics of an anomaly but the remainder of the analysis process (involving an evaluation of performance data before, during, and after the suspected anomaly location) indicates otherwise. A "false anomaly" is one which was initially deemed to be "apparent" but then determined by further analysis to be induced either by system issues or counterfeit copies of the original anomalous media. Therefore an anomaly is usually considered "apparent" before subsequently being judged either "authentic/true" or "false". An example of a non-anomaly which may immediately be determined to be "false" without ever being considered "apparent" would arise from the reading of a disc copy made by certain digital copy tools, in which the performance rate drop-off is immediate and results in a transition from the observed aggregate or average rate of a non-anomaly disc to a rate of zero, wherein the drive encounters an unrecoverable error and is unable to read anything from that location. In such cases there is no zone of transition between normal reading and inability to read, no area of performance rate slowdown, and this is a clear indication that the disc is a copy.
As shown in
The following code example illustrates the process by which real performance anomalies can be discriminated from false or apparent anomalies.
In order to capture the data measurements needed to monitor the data transfer rate, low-level access is required for interfacing with, and controlling, system devices. Authors of operating systems and device driver interfaces for computing devices typically allow for standard programmatic access at high levels of indirection from the actual device. This is intended to provide strong general device utility to the typical user, but this architectural indirection can be too abstracted and too far removed from the actual device, making it difficult or impossible to discern actual device performance. For example, a read operation at such a high level of interface might involve a reading process with a 10 megabyte buffer of data at some point but would provide no ability to know how fast each 512 k was read. Therefore, it is preferred that the systems and methods of the present invention find ways to communicate with the device at lower levels than standard interfaces. In many cases it is possible to access documented operating system interfaces at these lower levels and access the device in much the same level of detailed control as the device driver itself. This can be done in a fashion that bypasses the device driver, and at the same time device driver access can be optionally shunted to disallow any other process from using the device during an authentication operation. The following discussion of
The flow diagram of
Below the standard input/output and vendor specific drivers are the uppermost extent of device type/class specific driver interfaces 59 (for example, CD versus hard disc versus tape), and the device class/type drivers themselves 60. Below these are the bus level interfaces 59 which reside logically above the bus type layer 60 which defines the bus or connection logical transport type (SCSI, IDE, ATAPI) for example). Below this is the lowest level of the driver model, the low-level device interface 63 and the associated driver code 64. Below that are the hardware interfaces themselves (SCSI, IDE ATAPI, IEEE 1394 (FireWire), USB, PCMCIA ATAPI) 65 and the actual hardware 66 (for example a drive) and within the hardware is the read only memory chip-set (alternatively flash or non-volatile programmable memory) which contains the device's configuration and identification information. As is clear from this example layered driver model, hindrance-free access to the device is primarily gained at the interface levels of 65, 66 and 67 direct to the device's ROM or other onboard storage memory. This carries with it a price, correspondingly more work as each layer is a level of added complexity and detail. However, a preferred embodiment of the present invention provides for maximum security by connecting to the device driver interface chain at the lowest level possible, 65, 66,67 and by also connecting at other upper interface levels 55, 57, 59 for example, and comparing query results. If the device is reporting the same performance and configuration and command information at all levels then that can be used as an indicator that the system is not as likely to be a tampered or compromised system. If the device driver interfaces report different values, then that is a strong indicator of a compromised system and or an emulated device, and protective functions can be invoked (such as refusing to authenticate the media under those circumstances, or by executing an alternative authentication method). This intimate connection to the driver layers and the device provide an excellent view into actual device performance and thereby provide the best possible data for the performance anomaly authentication process.
Read data 78 is read from the media disc itself 74, and optionally buffered in a resident physical buffer 76, before passing through a communication channel 78 into an optional system buffer 80 (either dedicated hardware memory within the system, system RAM, or combinations of both in varying amounts). The transfer rate analysis process and system 82 of the present invention 82 performs device control commands, retrieves device status, and reads data from the media reading device 72 using system interfaces 81 at whatever level of privilege required. Upon obtaining device transfer rate performance information by monitoring the data transfer rate 81 over time, the transfer rate analysis unit 82 makes a decision 83 as to whether the disc 74 is an original, and therefore valid, disc 84, or else is a non-authentic copy 85.
The process by which this determination is made, in its simplest form, involves reading data 86 from the optical media 74. The reading process commences at a disc location 87 and ends at second disc location 88 (which may include the entire contents of the disc between them), and the data read 78 is monitored as it is received by the transfer rate analysis unit. If an anomaly 75 is present on the media 88, then the data rate will drop, during the intersection of the extent of read data 86 and the anomaly location 75, as described above.
A more specific example flow is now described with reference to
Once the read device 72 is set to an appropriate and known initial state, commands 81, 77 are issued to select an optimal block size for the device; the determination of what is optimal is done by means of examining the return status 79, 81 of the command and by also attempting to read and examine the actual data rate in response to read commands 78, 81 at various block sizes. When possible, the transfer rate analysis unit 82 gains further control over the device 72 by issuing a device command 81, 77 that requests the device to disable excessive automatic retry attempts. Most read devices can disable some amount of retry operations but their response varies to a degree, even when commanded not to retry. The systems and methods of the present invention are operable regardless of whether the read device 72 ignores or obeys this command. The device's cache 76, 80 is then flushed, by means of direct commands 81, 77 or by causing the device to read an area of the media 74 that is not going to be tested for anomaly behaviors (in other words, in this example of
Assuming the disc 74 has multiple anomaly regions 75 these steps may be repeated for each such anomaly 75, and once they have been discovered and determined to be valid, the data resulting form the anomaly regions may also be analyzed to determine if the regions, or their severity, or their positional relationship has any bearing on a hidden encoding value as discussed above. In conjunction with this post-test process of analysis performed by the transfer rate analysis unit 82, the read device 72 may be reset to its prior state by means of device commands 77 so that it can be reliably deployed by other system processes.
The inventive concepts discussed above can be used in conjunction with other copy protection methods that are used to determine the originality of a digital medium and to prevent unauthorized copying thereof. Such methods are disclosed for example in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 9/960,610, filed Sep. 21, 2001, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 9/989,910, filed Nov. 20, 2001, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/023,424, filed Dec. 12, 2001, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/142,366, filed May 9, 2002, and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/773,103, entitled "Systems and Methods for Optical Media Modification", filed Feb. 5, 2004, each being commonly owned with the present application, and the contents of each being incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
Further to the systems and methods described above for authenticating a medium in response to monitored data transfer rate during the reading of a medium, the following discussion relates to an alternative systems and methods that can be used in replacement of, or in addition to, the above approaches. In the techniques described above, low-level I/O interfaces are employed to measure data throughput, and thereby infer anomaly presence in response to variations in data read rate. However, certain devices are not well-suited for these methods, since they do not produce sufficient variation in data throughput to allow for identification of anomalies.
When reading data from discs containing anomalies, due to the non-deterministic effects of the anomaly, there are data locations within the region of the disc affected by the anomaly where the data read operation appears to vary. In other words, multiple read operations performed on the same region, or segment, of the disk, return different data in these regions. The detection system and method in accordance with the present invention takes advantage of this behavior.
In this approach, a digital signature calculation procedure, for example a message digest algorithm such as MD5, MD2, MD4, SNEFRU, SHA (secure hash algorithm), NIST DSA, HAVAL, N-HASH, and RIPE-MD, and the like, can be employed for this purpose. Digital signature algorithms are commonly employed in computer security operations to procure digital signatures of documents. Changing a single bit in the original document produces an entirely different signature value, and the signature value is always of the same size (usually 128 bits) regardless of the size of the original document. It is noteworthy that message digest algorithms are one-way algorithms in that a digital signature can be produced from a document; however, the document cannot be re-created from the digital signature. Assuming the presence of anomalies in preselected, or known, regions of the disc, particularly anomalies that are known to generate different data during each read procedure, multiple read operations can be performed on the disc in the anomaly regions, and it can be expected that a different digital signature will be produced at each read, owing to the nature of the anomaly, and its effect on the read operation. If the multiple read operations return a digital signature that is different at each pass, then this information can be used to authenticate the medium. Systems and methods for forming such anomalies, in one example, referred to as "borderline" anomalies, are described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/023,424, filed Dec. 12, 2001, and in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/773,103, entitled "Systems and Methods for Optical Media Modification", filed Feb. 5, 2004.
In one embodiment, assuming that an authenticating procedure employs the data transfer rate monitoring procedure described above, and assuming that this procedure leads to an inconclusive result, the present digital signature procedure can be utilized to further determine whether an anomaly is present. The two procedures can operate in conjunction with each other to provide a more reliable result. An example of this is provided in the flow diagram of
If a valid anomaly is not determined at step 106, it is next determined at step 108 whether the first pass had just been performed, and if so, a second pass of the data is initiated at step 110. During the second pass, a variation of the standard data transfer rate anomaly detection procedure is performed at step 112, and a second digital signature is calculated based on the returned data. The variation of the standard procedure may comprise, for example, a more thorough review of the resulting data, or may investigate other forms of data, for example, the first pass may capture and review a first data structure such as user data, while the second pass may capture and review a second data structure such as sync data, parity data, and the like. It is next determined at step 106 whether the data collected under the second pass of the standard anomaly detection procedure indicates that a valid anomaly is present, and if so, the medium is authenticated at step 124.
If a valid anomaly is not determined upon return to step 106, as a result of two passes of the standard anomaly detection procedure, at steps 104 and 112, an additional pass of the data segment is performed at step 114 and a digital signature is recorded for the data returned from that pass. Next, at step 116, it is determined whether a predetermined number of digital signatures, for example four, have been obtained (in this case, two digital signatures from the earlier passes (pass 1 and pass 2) and one digital signature from the present pass. If not, the procedure returns to step 114 to perform additional passes, and to record additional signatures as a result of the data returned from each pass. If so, the operation continues at step 120, where it is determined whether all of the digital signatures DS1, DS2, DS3, DS4 calculated as a result of each of the passes, have different values. If none of the values are equal, then it is determined that the anomaly is valid, and the disc is authenticated at step 124. However, if any of the digital signatures are determined to be equal, then it is determined that the anomaly is not a valid anomaly, and the disc authentication procedure returns a failure at step 122. In alternative embodiments, the presence of a valid anomaly can be determined based on whether a subset of the digital signatures are equal or not equal.
Pseudocode examples of the above operation are provided as follows. In a first example, the data transfer rate based procedure is initially performed, and a digital signature is calculated, based on the data read during that procedure. If the results of the data transfer rate based procedure are inconclusive, three additional passes of the data segment are made and digital signatures are calculated for each pass. If the resulting digital signatures are all different, it is determined that a valid anomaly has been found. If any of the digital signatures are equal, it is determined that a valid anomaly has not been found.
A second pseudocode code example is now provided. In this example a first pass of the data segment is made, and it is determined whether a valid anomaly is located. A digital signature is calculated based on the data recorded during this pass. If not, a second pass of the data is made under a variation of the transfer rate based procedure, and it is determined whether a valid anomaly has been found. Digital signatures are calculated for each of the first and second passes. If, after the second pass, a valid anomaly has not been determined, additional third and fourth passes of the data are made and digital signature is calculated for each pass. Again, if none of the digital signatures are equal, it is determined that a valid anomaly has been located.
The digital signature analysis described above can be applied to any type of data that results from a media read operation, for example user data, error data, sync, data, parity data, header data, or sub-channel data, for the purpose of determining the presence of a predefined anomaly. The digital signature analysis described above can also optionally be applied to predefined regions of the media in their entirety, or, alternatively, applied to subsections of such regions. The data resulting from a read of each region and subsection can be compared to provide an additional level of reliability.
While this invention has been particularly shown and described with references to preferred embodiments thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made herein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
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José Luìs Gómez is making his debut at Oper Frankfurt. This Spanish/Venezuela born artist won the 2010 Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition, since when he has been workring intensively with the hr (Hessen Radio) Sinfonieorchester. He was recently named Principal Conductor of the orchester at the Teatro Social di Como, where he has conducted performances of Le nozze di Figaro. Other engagements this season include La Cenerentola at the Stuttgart State Opera and concerts with other renowned orchestras. José Luìs Gómez began his music career as a violinist, becoming the leader of an orchestra at the age of 11. He studied music and violin at the conservatory in Maracaibo, where he was born, and at the der Manhattan School of Music in New York. This was followed by conducting lessons with Lu Jia, Muhai Tang and John Nelson. José Luìs Gómez won the Sir Georg Solti competition only six months after he began taking conducting lessons. Winning this prize also brought him work with the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, the RTVE National Symphony Orchestra in Madrid, the National Arts Centre Orchestra of Ottawa, the Houston Symphony Orchestra and the Basel Sinfonietta.
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Mostly Cloudy
Wind: 3 mph
When we
built our house in Warren, nearly every appliance and light bulb we installed
was "energy efficient." A few years ago we installed a high-efficiency boiler,
then came the insulated honeycomb blinds.
Thanks in part to Casella, we recycle nearly two-thirds of our waste. We compost our scraps and use them in our garden. We set the thermostats two degrees lower. A lot of us pick up hitchhikers. Some run veggie oil in their cars or own hybrid vehicles. Our farmers' market and local food programs are thriving. We even have a walk-and-bike-to-work week. These pieces, and many others, make up the puzzle we could call being modern, sensible human beings: Take only what you need, use what you take.
Lately, it seems to be getting easier and easier to do the "right" thing. Last year a small group of Valley residents formed the Mad River Valley Energy Network and began drafting ideas to take advantage of some of the new realities. Our goal is simple -- to empower the local community to take responsibility for and ownership of their energy production, consumption and conservation. All the puzzle pieces are on the table: responsible utilities, group net metering laws, federal tax credits, increased efficiency, dropping solar panel costs and forward-thinking landowners. All we have to do is take some time and put them together.
It is now possible to develop larger scale community renewable energy production that we can all be a part of. The investment model we are developing would allow an initial investment of as little as $1,000 to buy a single solar panel. You would be eligible for a 30 percent federal tax credit and get monthly credit on your electric bill for your share of the energy produced. Ideally in 7 to 10 years, your $1,000 investment will have been returned while the panels keep producing for another 15 to 18 years. If you sell your house but stay in the same utility service area, you can move your investment to your new meter. If you move elsewhere, you can bundle the ownership with the sale of your property. Who knows, we may do the right thing for ourselves, our neighbors, our planet AND get a return on our investment. How great will that be?
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How Does Snooki Motivate Herself to Work Out? The Jersey Shore Star Spills Her Fitness Secrets!
It's no surprise that Snooki knows how to get in shape. And even though this sexy new mom shed 44 pounds after giving birth to baby Lorenzo, we're still left wondering just how she got the motivation to do so.
Wonder no longer, Jersey Shore fans! Snooks revealed all of her secrets to working out on the daily, tweeting:
I wanna look good for my man! ✌❤"@3_exoplanet: @snooki how do you keep/stay motivated? because its so difficult for me to do so.."— NiC0LE P0LiZZi (@snooki) February 6, 2013
Aww. That's sweet! Snooki also Instagrammed this workout pic yesterday, captioning it "Time to work off all the wings I ate yesterday." And hey, even with sweatpants on and a high ponytail 'do, she looks great — and we bet Jionni agrees!
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What did you do in class today?
Something someone said on another thread has made me think about why I prefer Bullshido to Sherdog or the Underground. I think the main attraction of this place is the variety of styles in our userbase, so with that in mind, tell me what you trained in your last class.
For us, this evening's program was:
Arcos (twirling sets)
Abesedarios (blocking/striking/footwork drills)
Siniwali (2 stick striking drills)
I also learned form 4 and Katje learned form 1.
I'd also like to take a moment to say how proud I am of my wife, Katje, who has just started training again after more than a year of severe illness and inactivity and who managed to spar for several rounds WEKAF style with a class full of unfamiliar men, several of whom she hadn't met before.
Registered Member
- Join Date
- Nov 2007
- Location
- Fairbanks, Alaska
- Posts
- 554
Posted On:
5/10/2013 5:07pm
Style: Brazillian Jiu Jitsu3
Last night was my first night back to training in about 5-6 weeks after re-injuring my shoulder. Last night was judo, training for the 2013 Alaska State Judo Championships which are next Saturday in Anchorage.
Anyway, we started doing 3 for 3 (you do any 3 throws, than your partner does any 3 throws), then moved onto you go for an attack, and your partner defends and counters. After that we did something similar only with more resistance. Basically we were doing full randori, only one person was to attack constantly, while the other only defended and countered (switching back and forth on each set).
Then we worked some ground work, one person turtles, the other had to roll them over or go for a sub within about 10 seconds.
Good day back to training, shoulder feels mostly good, though I have to be careful, there are certain things I can't really do...
My dog is cuter and smarter than yours.
- Join Date
- Jun 2009
- Location
- Bonners Ferry, Idaho
- Posts
- 6,997
Posted On:
5/10/2013 5:28pm1
Last night we had a short senior (adult and u15 and up) practice after taking club photo for the end of the season. I did uchikomi with one of my shodan, mostly Ippon Seoi Nage. I was emphasizing really hooking up the shoulder of uke and maintaining proper distance (not stepping too close initially). We worked both right and left from right grip (both of us are righties). We also did nagekomi (throwing drills). Two juniors worked on basically the same thing under observation/instruction by another black belt.
So about 30 minutes of training (the other guys had already been through thej junior class and were warmed up). I then went home and went for a quick bike ride because the evening was so spectacularly beautiful.Falling for Judo since 1980
Style: Kendo1
Last judo class we were working on yoko tomo nage, and then a yoko tomo nage transition to juji gatame which you probably can't get away with these days due to needing to grab a leg to make it work.
Last kendo class I got jack **** done as I was outfitting three new people in rental bogu.
Now for a more detailed response. I really like the morning classes of the new place I just started going to.
Start with 5 mins of Yoga
2 rounds of rolling for position to warm up.
Then the couch goes around the circle answering questions.
Then the remainder of the 2 hours is rolling.
after class everyone seems to hang out for a good bit of time and the instructor covers any questions that came up while rolling.
It is mostly made up of Purple Belts and dedicated Blues.
Next monday night me and my wife will go to the "fundamentals" class.
My dog is cuter and smarter than yours.
- Join Date
- Jun 2009
- Location
- Bonners Ferry, Idaho
- Posts
- 6,997
Posted On:
5/10/2013 5:33pm


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Anti' not a conservative valueAugust 17,2014Websters Dictionary defines a conservative as someone who adheres to established practices and who subjects new ideas to rigorous examination before replacing long-held views.
The word conservative connotes or at least used to connote a principled approach to thinking about public policy, particularly in the field of economics, in which the preference for efficiency led to a presumption that unregulated markets are superior to government allocations.
Conservatives used to have sufficient understanding of economics to know when it was necessary to regulate markets to improve their performance. However, for the conservatives who dominate todays politics, this understanding seems to be missing.
Often citing Ayn Rand, they favor limiting the role of government to keeping the peace and protecting property rights. They trivialize public policy: Let the market work free from government interference. Even in those instances in which the preconditions for competitive market efficiency are not and cannot be present, they continue to chant this mantra.
Sole reliance on free-market solutions when they cannot achieve efficiency does not foster freedom; rather, it retards freedom. For example, public utilities (electricity, gas, cable, sewer and water) are typically the sole sellers in their market areas; regulation is required to limit their monopoly power to set unreasonable prices for these vital services. Other exceptions to the free-market paradigm are public goods and services that must be shared, such as national defense and law enforcement.
Public goods must be financed with taxes. Finally, there are services whose efficient provision requires coordination among market and government forces, such as disaster relief, pollution control and health insurance.
Health insurance provides an excellent example of a market that retards efficiency and freedom when unregulated. In the absence of regulation, competitive markets for health insurance will become incompatible with the goal of helping the sick gain access to care. Competitive forces compel insurers to charge premiums that reflect the risks presented by their policy-holders.
Such experience-rating (charging higher premiums to those who pose a higher probability of filing claims) may make sense for car insurance because accident-prone drivers should pay more. However, experience-rated premiums in health insurance result in charging higher premiums to the sick, a perverse outcome if the goal is to finance their means to better health.
To remedy the inherent defects in health insurance markets, the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, designed the basis for Romneycare in Massachusetts and the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). It proposed the creation of health insurance exchanges to regulate premiums and coverage, that is, to prevent free-market experience-rated health insurance premiums.
Other key elements of the Heritage plan include the mandate requiring individuals to carry approved insurance (with subsidies for those too poor to meet their mandate without help), as well as the requirement that sellers guarantee acceptance of those individuals. Thinking conservatives understand the pro-market roots of these plans and the need for these regulations; tea-partiers do not.
Only 10 states have fully implemented Obamacare. So-called conservative governors in the other states are blocking one or more aspects of the law, costing their taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, denying stabilizing financing to hospitals and health-care providers, and refusing to efficiently insure the poor. Meanwhile, the Commonwealth Fund reports that states such as California, New York, Minnesota and Kentucky, where the plan has been fully implemented as designed, are having great success with it.
Current-day tea party conservatives are caught in a dilemma: Freedom from government means abandoning the greater economic freedom available in regulated markets. They are not really conservative in any rigorous sense of the word; their antigovernment reflex merely reflects confusion.
Had conservatives in earlier times rejected a role for government, among the assets the United States would not have today are the interstate highway system and the Centers for Disease Control!
William L. Holahan is emeritus professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee. Charles O. Kroncke, retired dean of the College of Business at UW-M, is also retired from USF. They are co-authors of Economics for Voters.MORE IN PerspectiveIt has been encouraging in recent years to see communities such as Barre and Rutland go through... Full StoryWe are clearly heading toward another great debate about the nature of capitalism. Full StoryWhen Vermonters see a problem, we work to fix it. Full Story
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Bader's reach is 74"
Goose's reach is 79"
Jones' reach is 84.5"
*According to Wiki.
Goose has a reach advantage over most guys at LHW. Jones has a freakish reach advantage over ALL guys at LHW. Does Goose's reach give him an advantage, sure. Does Jones have an advantage over the entire LHW div? Hell yes.
Jones is a great athlete, dont get me wrong, but to discount the massive reach advantage is wrong.


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Google started to show warnings for search results that install malicious software. The same warnings can be seen in image search (one example is an "innocent" query like site:crackserver.com, that shows all the images indexed from crackserver.com). If you click on a thumbnail from the search results, you'll be sent to an interstitial that recommends to try another search result.
In the new interface of image search, the domain name is less visible, as you have to hover over the thumbnail to see it. So these malware warnings could help you avoid sites that might damage you computer.
February 20, 2007
Malware Warnings in Image Search
This blog is not affiliated with Google.


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Russ Huesman
On Davis Tull winning player of the year
"I thought Davis was the best defensive player in the league. I'm proud for him and I'm glad he got it. I've said this before, and I'll probably embarrass him, but people don't realize the work that he puts into it. People don't realize the film study, eating right and the extra work he puts in the weight room. He put a lot into it and he is deserving of it. I'm glad for him. I'm pretty proud of him."
On what makes him player of the year
"I think, obviously, that people have to see you, game plan for you and have to know you're there. I believe that after every game they probably said, 'Aw man, we had to survive that one.' I know he had a great game against Elon, and I think the guy he was on was a second-team all-conference guy. I thought Davis pretty well handled him. Jason Swepson, from Elon, walked off the field and asked me if 90 was a senior. I said he was a sophomore and he said, 'Oh, no.' You know that people notice him. We do. We notice a lot of our guys. We know how well they play but sometimes you can't. If you look at it, the second most tackles for loss was 11 and the next guy was at nine. He doubled the third guy and almost doubled the second guy. And in sacks he probably almost doubled everybody in sacks, too. Davis had 50 tackles and 46 of them were solo. Things like that are unheard of. Even though he didn't have 120 tackles like some people do, I think the 50 are meaningful. Plus he was part of a good defense. I think that helps too. We had a good defense statistically."
On what makes him a great player
"It's speed for sure. He can run and he's athletic. But, also, I think he studies the game. I watch him pregame and pre-practice and he's working on his craft in some capacity. Before the game on Saturday, I told him he needed two sacks. He got two and I told him not to stop there. But he has a lot of ability. He can do everything. He's talked to the coaches about gaining a little bit more weight but he's plenty big enough."
On what it means for the program to win awards like this
"It's a big deal for us as coaches. For the program, it will come and go. People may forget about it in a couple of days. But it will be with us for a while. We're proud of him and we're proud of this accomplishment. I know Coach Fuller and Coach West are proud for him because he's worked hard to get this. It makes your job better when you have these opportunities. I'm glad for it, but does this make our program any better because we got an award like this? No, but it makes us proud of him and excited for him. Now we need to start talking about him and all-American. Whether he gets it this year or not, he better get it next year and his senior year. I think he's had an all-American year this year. That'll be fun to watch for down the road."
Davis Tull, sophomore, defensive end
On what motivates him
"I think a lot of it stems from high school and really wanting to come out and play football. Then being hurt and losing the opportunity. I had to make my own way, so to speak. Coach Huesman and Coach Satterfield got me here as a preferred walk-on. I think about that every single day. Other schools passed up on me or didn't want me because I got hurt. I think that motivates me a lot."
His thoughts on the injury he suffered his senior year of high school
"It was a huge blessing in disguise. If that doesn't happen, there is no telling where I am right now. I can tell you right now, I wasn't working half this hard before. I'm very thankful for God putting me in that situation. It's helped out a lot."
On his rebounding from the injury to being named player of the year
"It's a cool story. It's a testament to the work ethic of this team and this defense and all of us getting better together."
On finding out he was player of the year
"I was a little bit shocked. People had told me I might get it so it was in my head already that there was a chance. When you actually hear it, it's a pretty special feeling, especially with this only being my second year playing. I'm happy and I'm thankful for everybody that's helped me. This award is a testament to the defense more so than me. Without them playing as well as they have I wouldn't have these numbers."
On how he practices his craft
"Josh Williams and I are pretty close. We both love football and we're passionate about the game. We get together probably three or four times a week to work on hands or different football techniques. People can get caught up in running or lifting weights, and that stuff helps, but we don't lift weights. We play football. All that helps and I love doing all that but working on football stuff with Josh probably helped out the most."


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On Wednesday, we held a webinar titled: "Load Balancing in the GoGrid Cloud – Utilizing F5 BIG IP to Manage Traffic Spikes & Uptime". As with previous webinars, we wanted to make this GoGrid webinar public to other users in case you were not able to attend.
The agenda of the webinar was as follows:
- Overview of GoGrid and F5 Networks
- Load balancing with GoGrid and F5 BIG IP
- Benefits of load balancing overview
- Use cases
- Best practices
- Question and Answer Session
(more…) «GoGrid Webinar: Load Balancing in the GoGrid Cloud (Utilizing F5 BIG IP)»


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Chris Bianco Talks Pizza, His New Restaurant in Tucson, and Beyond
You probably heard that Chris Bianco is opening up his second pizzeria, but that's only part of the story. We had a long talk with him to find out about his new place in Tucson, what's driving him thirty years into his illustrious career, and how he got to be so damn good at making pizza. More


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Well I just finished installing the lower parts set into it, I was worried that I would break it while driving in a roll pin or strip out the buffer tube threads. Now I'm waiting on my upper to arrive and then it's off to the range.
It sure is light weight and yes I know it's molded, I hope it's as strong as I was told it is.


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Linguistik-Klassifikation: Computerlinguistik / Computational linguistics
Year of publication
- 2005 (3) (remove)
Document Type
- Conference Proceeding (2)
- Article (1)
- Computerlinguistik (3)
- Japanisch (3)
- Englisch (1)
- Höflichkeitsform (1)
- Maschinelle Übersetzung (1)
- Numerale (1)
- Open-Source Machine Translation with DELPH-IN (2005)
- The Deep Linguistic Processing with HPSG Initiative (DELH-IN) provides the infrastructure needed to produce open-source semantic transfer-based machine translation systems. We have made available a prototype Japanese-English machine translation system built from existing resources include parsers, generators, bidirectional grammars and a transfer engine.
- Annotating Honorifics Denoting Social Ranking of Referents (2005)
- This paper proposes an annotating scheme that encodes honorifics (respectful words). Honorifics are used extensively in Japanese, reflecting the social relationship (e.g. social ranks and age) of the referents. This referential information is vital for resolving zero pronouns and improving machine translation outputs. Annotating honorifics is a complex task that involves identifying a predicate with honorifics, assigning ranks to referents of the predicate, calibrating the ranks, and connecting referents with their predicates.
- Implementing the syntax of Japanese numeral classifiers (2005)
- While the sortal constraints associated with Japanese numeral classifiers are well-studied, less attention has been paid to the details of their syntax. We describe an analysis implemented within a broad-coverage HPSG that handles an intricate set of numeral classifier construction types and compositionally relates each to an appropriate semantic representation, using Minimal Recursion Semantics.