New DVBViewer Skin for Download

[Technofriend]

But if you provide DVBViewer skins for download and additionally use the site for publishing your paranoid speculations as a matter of fact, that's another thing. I'm sure you know that something like that is forbidden by German law.

 

If I have to choose, I choose.

 

This skinpage is permanently closed due to a request by a leading developer of the above mentioned software.

The headprogrammer of this software has been sent a backup of all skins.

 

Good bye.

Technofriend

[Griga]

Well, you removed the skins - why? There were fine! The text is a bit better now... but it would have been better to remove the text and leave the skins. However, let me add something personal:

 

I'm not only familiar with the DVBViewer code - I also got to know Christian. Not as well as the DVBViewer code but well enough to confirm that he's not the kind of guy who will do something behind your back. He's rather quite open with everything. And he isn't one of those racketeers who try to earn money by all means. He's rather a bit lazy and for me it's not imaginable that he puts a lot of effort and energy into collecting tons of data. He's rather suffering from the tons of data he already gets as email.

 

So it would be contrary to all my experience of life...

 

Griga

[Technofriend]

I think, that we are talking about completely different things here. You want to convince me, that Christian is a good and trustworthy guy.

I had never any doubts about that. I DO believe that Christian is a good and trustworthy guy as well.

If any of my expressions implied that that I 'believe' he is not, then I apologize herewith.

 

But even if my own brother had coded the software and it would contain features that 'I' (not the developers) can not be sure about what they are exactly doing when connecting to the net, then I would do all I can to prohibit these connections and to provide others with the knowledge to do it as well, if they wish to do so. In this whole case it is totally unimportant to me what I 'think' or 'believe' about the intentions of the developers...

Privacy is not about believing, it is about ensuring.

 

Unfortunately you made it very clear now that it's your dead earnest.

YES!

 

but it would have been better to remove the text and leave the skins

That's your point of view not mine. eg.: A LOT of people will find it much 'better' to go into holidays and have a lot of fun instead of running through the stupid streets to demonstrate against a stupid war while it is cold and terribly windy. Others don't. So what is 'better' depends a lot on the point of view. More on that later, down below. (No, I don't see myself as an angel or jesus-christ or something, just as an honnest person.)

(And no I'm neighter a stupid little child that doesn't know anything about real life at all. I'm over 30 years old.)

 

But if you provide DVBViewer skins for download and (!)additionally(!) use the site for publishing your paranoid speculations as a matter of fact, that's another thing. I'm sure you know that something like that is forbidden by German law.

 

I really don't want to break the law on that. (As you say it is forbidden.)

So I had to choose whether I want to provide the skins or the tutorial.

(Of course I could make two independent sites without linking them in any way, but I don't want to get Schizophrenia.)

Well: The freedom to express my thoughts will always be much much more important to me than just providing some stupid skins.

I was really searching for a solution, but for the future I unfortunately don't see any way of providing both at the same time,

so I had to choose what is more important to me. That was very easy to decide.

(If you see a solution to continue both things feel free to tell me.)

 

saw you as one of the members who contribute in a positive way instead of being only demanding or even destructive.

 

Maybe one day you will realize that whether something is good&constructive or bad&destructive differs a lot depending on the point of view.

From my point of view (of course) everything I did here was good&constructive,

but I can understand that you see that totally different from your point of view.

e.g: Israel vs. Palestine or USA vs. Iraque: Which side is the good&constructive and which is bad&destructive?

You will get veeeeeery different answers depending on who you ask...

 

Thanx for your time.

[Klausing]

Sorry, guy's but there is a lot of emotions in your discussion. (powered by emotion is not every time the best way)

Every people can warn other people if he belive to know a reason for this! But it shows real grandness if you can say : "Sorry it was a mistake" .

Privacy is really important for me too and if i would hear something about such negativ things in the DVBViewer, you can believe me i would be the longest time a user of this program.

If some people say things which they don't really know or other programs gives a wrong error signal and the result of this is not true, we have to discuss about this.

An example: In the last days we had a virus alarm with a DVBViewer Beta. But it was a problem of AntiVir and not of the DVBViewer. The programmer of AntiVir create an update of their virus signature and everything was OK. The wrong alarm no longer exist.

Thats the way to solve problems and not this way which i see here in this thread.

Maybe a long night can assuage the minds.

 

Steffen

[Griga]

I DO believe that Christian is a good and trustworthy guy as well.

 

So what's the problem?

 

But even if my own brother had coded the software and it would contain features that 'I' (not the developers) can not be sure about what they are exactly doing when connecting to the net, then I would do all I can to prohibit these connections and to provide others with the knowledge to do it as well,

 

Obviously you are using software that connects to the INet, otherwise you wouldn't be able to post here and to administer your site. Do you know what this software really does? Do you think the developers are more reliable than your brother? Strange... there must have been some very bad experience with your family...

 

To summarize: You are using software that connects to INet, but the DVBViewer should not be allowed to do the same. You trust unknown developers, but you get the urge to issue a warning against the software of a 'good and trustwothy' guy. Crazy...

 

Here is what I think: There is no problem with what is going on in the DVBViewer. What is going on in your mind... that's the problem. That's the only place where the problem exists. So I'd recommend to install a firewall - a firewall against unnecessary fears and unfounded suspicions.

 

Griga

[Guest DAvenger]

Funny that you recommended ZoneAlarm, which connects to the net for updates and you can't turn this off (at least that was the case few versions back, I am talking about the freeware version)

[Guest hackbart]

By the way, i tested zonealarm and there is only one "spy" warning message.

As i thought and mentioned it's only caused by the WinLIRC connection (see attachment).

Furthermore there is no warning about the "receive version information"-routine inside the about window. So you just need to disable the winlirc in the options and no warning pops up.

 

You have to understand if people are reacting a bit nervous and angered about fake warnings which are telling others about "spy functions" inside their products.

 

Christian

[Griga]

Just, while I was programming and testing the TSPlayer, ZoneAlarm popped up... see attached picture. I was quite perplexed, since I didn't integrate any spyware (not yet ). Finally the Sonic Video Decoder emerged as the source of the trouble... if it finds an open internet connection, it immediately tries to phone home.

 

Conclusion: If one gets a ZoneAlarm alert while the DVBViewer is running, it may be due as well to DirectShow filters or other software components that are used.

 

Griga

Edited March 14, 2004 by Griga

[Technofriend]

>Maybe a long night can assuage the minds.

Ok. I took some timeout as proposed by Klausing to think about it and to calm down the situation a bit.

Also I rereworked the site and made it as polite and friendly as I could without loosing the informations that I wanted to give to the readers,

but with having the new informations from this thread at hand...

If it is still problematic in the eyes of this community then I simply don't know what to do anymore, other than betraying my convictions or going away.

 

You all obviously didn't read these deleted threads.

There was for instance the idea of collecting data on how long the users are using the program and which encoder they prefer to use and such things. Christian said if I remember correctly that this would be valuable information to improve the DVBViewer.

I wrote that this would imply some privacy-issues. And Christian answered that I should not worry, he wouldn't have the time to dig deeper into the data. Also it would not be published on a user by user basis but only as a statistic.

I wrote that if this features will be implemented, then I would write a tutorial on my website on how to disable them. There was no response FROM NOONE on that and also noone other than me seemed to have a problem with such development-plans. More than that, a few hours later all (two) threads that had informations about these plans, were erased without further notice.

 

So for me it was clear, that a discussion about these plans is not wished here.

And if you use the search-function you will find, that I didn't try to bother anyone here with trying to bring this unwanted topic up again..

Only after Griga explicitly asked me for it.

Instead I wrote on my site what I think about such plans and that I would write how to disable such features if they would ever get implemented.

 

So maybe I got something wrong. And maybe I'm too sensitive on that topic. But do not say, that it was all only in my 'ill' mind.

 

I never said that something IS wrong with the DVBViewer, but I warned that something COULD GET wrong with the DVBViewer.

 

 

There are also some things left that I wanted to answer:

>Obviously you are using software that connects to the INet...Do you know what this software really does?...You trust unknown developers...

No, I can not be 100%ly sure, but as you said I need a program to access the INet. (Nevertheless I should mention that this software is opensource.)

 

>but the DVBViewer should not be allowed to do the same

Because from my point of view it is simply not necessary, as much as it is not necessary for NeroBurningROM6©.

 

>...you get the urge to issue a warning against the software...

I do not think, that I did warn against the software.

I did warn against a possible future of the software, depending on what I had read about the plans for the future of this software.

 

>There is no problem with what is going on in the DVBViewer.

I do believe that there is nothing wrong with the DVBViewer, as well.

The problem was that what I read that it was planned for the DVBViewer...

 

>unnecessary fears and unfounded suspicions

You dind't read those deleted threads, obviously. You know the sources so you can be sure, while I have to rely on what I read...

 

>you recommended ZoneAlarm, which connects to the net for updates and you can't turn this off

I agree that zonealarm© is not perfect, but you could always make it ask for net-connect and then click 'No'.

Now they have fixed the problem you mentioned. I tested SOME firewalls and I think za is one of the better...

 

>So you just need to disable the winlirc in the options and no warning pops up.

Well, YOU must have SET DVBViewer to be 'allowed' or 'forbidden' netaccess.

In the default setting ('ask') you will get pop-up-alerts for all tried netconnects.

 

>You have to understand if people are reacting a bit nervous and angered about fake warnings which are telling others about "spy functions" inside their products.

Yes. I think that this is the reason why this discussion went out of hand here.

But I don't think that I wrote 'fake warnings which are telling about "spy functions"'.

I warned people that those functions could be implemented in the future.

And until a few days before noone ever said: 'No they won't. Nothing like that is planned.'

So I had to believe that it is planned, as the text on my homepage was not secret or something.

I openly posted in the forums, that I would start to write such a tutorial from the very beginning.

And all the time since than the text was there and noone ever complained, that what I write there is wrong and that it is not at all planned that way...

 

So finally I would ask the people mentioned above to also try to understand that others 'are reacting a bit nervous and angered about "spy functions", that were first announced and then all the informations about this announcements were silently erased from the forums and they werde never openly mentioned again.

[Klausing]

The Sonic Codec tryed to use the connection and Your application should be blame !!! Thats realy crazy! Only, because your application use this decoder your application should be an programm which ignore privacy ????

That's really a crazy world where people get as a result of bad programming of other people a bad reputation ot its own programm ...........................

So, you can see: Be careful with your announcement about other programms ...

@Technofriend: its really pretty to hear from you !!!

I don't readed this threads about you spook. But if somebody (Christian included) told such things its not good! I'm not every day here in the board.

Maybe he / they said this or you understand it wrong. Both are possible. I don't know it. Critical voices should be a part of this board. Critical voices are not popular, but necessary! And an free spoken discussion shows the quality of a good board. I'm not a friend of deleted threads ,unless it affront or disparage some people.

If Christian would collect data with the DVBViewer (at what i think he don't do this) and give the user the possibility to decide if he want this or not , its OK. If he would do this without asking the user it wouldn't be OK! And i would advocate you!

 

 

Steffen

[Griga]

@Technofriend:

 

It's true, I didn't read the thread you mentioned - simply missed it.

 

Nevertheless I think that publishing this topic in a way you did is wrong. You can see, what it does, if someone (like me), who does not know what's behind it, reads it. Unexperienced users may be even more affected and may come to all kinds of wrong conclusions. You didn't do enough to make it really clear...

 

And you can see from what I've written above how easily one is mistaken. If the TSPlayer wouldn't have been my own program - just compiled a few seconds before ZoneAlarm popped up - I would have been *very* suspicious. ZoneAlarm didn't report the Sonic Decoder as the source, but the TSPlayer!

 

Now imagine, someone, after having read your text, uses the DVBViewer with the Sonic Decoder. ZoneAlarm-Alert: DVBViewer wants to connect to the internet! He switches off WinLirc... still an alert. To what conclusion would he come?

 

So who is to blame? Finally the people who abuse the internet for all kind of malware, spam and stuff... that's what I think. They destroy confidence and cause a whole lot of mistrust among people. That's their biggest crime. Don't let them win!

 

Griga

[Klausing]

A good board is like a good wedlock.

Sometimes you have to dispute and sometimes you have to love . Once can't exist without the other.

And that we have this discussion is a good sign of the quality of this board!

But neverless you have to play down the apprehension of other people and neverless you have to lose your respect of the free opinion or the fear of your opposite person!

 

Thank's to all which remember this!

 

Steffen

[Technofriend]

I go on travel till beginning of april today.

I have temporarely upped the skinpage and downed the tutorial until I'm back and we find a permanent solution.

 

If you want me to take it down: christian has my email-adress. use this please to contact me until beginning of april.

 

(I decided this way for the benefit of the users of this program. )

 

see ya

Technofriend

 

Edit:

DVBViewer-Service-Center

Edited August 13, 2005 by Technofriend

[Klausing]

Thanks !

[Guest hackbart]

jupp,

 

the mentioned thing with improoving the DVBViewer while collecting data is definitively not made by me - as Griga already mentioned i'm a kind of lazy while checking informations so i would only pee on my own knee reading stuff i'm able to collect.

In reality it's a simple equation: The more you collect on data, the harder it will be to evaluate all the stuff. For example, if i would collect only 10kb of stuff from each user would mean that i'm forced to crawl inbetween millions of byte to get whatever i think it would be interesting.

 

Christian

PS: Nice to hear from you again, technofriend

PPS: @Griga: I suppose you have dsl powered by german telekom - the 62.225.244.197 was probably your dialing adress in Dortmund.

[Guest DAvenger]

PPS: @Griga: I suppose you have dsl powered by german telekom - the 62.225.244.197 was probably your dialing adress in Dortmund.

Oh no! You know our IP addresses? Spyware!

 

I am going to stop using DVBViewer at once and use ... ehm, graphedit or something like that

[Guest hackbart]

ahoj martin,

 

graphedit also forces the same error message. The reason is simple, ones you have a strange behaviour inside a filter the most firewalls are declaring the main application as source of this problem.

I'm not sure what the Sonic DVB Filter does - since i'm not that interested in debugging this thing, but it's a matter of fact that a couple of directshow filters might be "phoning home".

 

Jesus, did you read the information about this Terminator 2 HDTV DVD Edition? You have to get a valid licence for 3 days via internet. If you are non american you are forced to use a proxy to get this damn license... I guess (the german part of this forum has a link to heise which is about the future of digital rights) the video industry will act more and more to restrict people recording videos (hdtv) and more..

 

 

Christian

[Klausing]

Please this thread PortReporter v1.0 from M$