I h8 haxxorz (A rant against Anonymous and LulzSec)

Exams are over! Finally!

*confetti, followed by marching band*

So now what? I don't think my life will be interesting enough to entice you into reading this post... so here's a bit about how I see the state of the internet, and why the image is getting tarnished.

Plus, Happy 20th Birthday, Sonic!


My Thoughts On... Hacktivists
2011 is already becoming apparent as the year of the hack, with a massive Sony security compromise and data 'smash-and-grab' around two months ago shutting it down for a while, collectively aggravating hoards of gamers who were probably going to expel that rage online anyway.

Among other attacks in recent years we include financial institutions, television stations, even high-order organisations like the FBI and CIA. Two groups stand out - Anonymous, and LulzSec.

Why, seriously? According to Anonymous, well... had to pinpoint an exact mission statement, but I reckon it'd be along the lines of "we disagree with you". As for LulzSec, it's "for the lulz".

What are lulz? In simple terms, enjoyment of another one's misfortune. Obviously schadenfreude wasn't a short enough word for them.

Now at this point in the post I am literally so furious with these two groups from their actions that I cannot even figure out how to finish this post. So here's this:

Firstly, Anonymous. Anonymous are everywhere... well, they want to be, anyway. Serious about that - our university newspaper was unfortunate enough to have someone writing a column for them on their behalf consisting of what could've easily been some guy typing up a speech sounding tough to be copied out by thousands at their computers. NOT affiliated with 4chan, although many users claim to originate from there, they are a group that effectively anyone can join. Their motto, or at least what they tend to say at the end of any big long page of text they do is "expect us". "Expect us"? What's that supposed to mean? Oh wait... when you didn't like governments putting forward internet filtering bills you shut their servers down with a denial of service attack.
What the f*** guys? Ok, sure I think net neutrality is great, but I'm sure there are much less agressive means of dealing with this, like...

• Writing a letter (granted, this sounds very nuturing-mother-in-the-80s-like).
• Become president, then you can decide how things will run.

Now how about the attacks against Visa, Mastercard and PayPal when they stopped accepting donations for whistle-blowing site Wikileaks, then Amazon when they didn't let the website use its web services? Well they shut them down, too, because they were bowing to government pressure.

HELLO! THESE SITES DROPPED SUPPORT BECAUSE WIKILEAKS IS LEAKING DOCUMENTS THAT WERE CLASSIFIED! THAT IS ILLEGAL!! (in most or all places).

Again, guys, become president then run the country your way.

As I say this conspiracy theorists are turning in their sleep because now they're gonna be thinking "this guy must support the current government which is being secretly controlled by...", with some more sentences probably involving the words "communist", "apocolypse", "capitalism", and probably "conspiracy" itself. Great job guys, while you're at it you can think of a way to call me a homosexual furry with daddy issues.

Ok, enough about them.

LulzSec: to the media - the new kids on the block. To password owners: well, better change them now. Lulzec gets its kicks from nicking people's details and publishing them online. Consider, in real life, some guy looking over your shoulder at the ATM and shouting the numbers out as you press them. Well, that's LulzSec in a nutshell.

Now, these guys actually admit that what they're doing is wrong. And in their many 'press releases', they actually seem to be taunting law enforcement itself. So now that guy shouting out numbers at the ATM has turned into a triple-murderer leaving obvious clues at the crime scene to be solved by a good-cop bad-cap duo with an emotional connection to the case. Coming soon to theatres.

Taunting us as much as even releasing the information to the public. Really. You can find it here, and it amazes me why the CIA or FBI hasn't put someone in undercover. Or maybe they have. Conspiracy theorists, shut up.

I have now idea what side of the fence this puts me on in a left-wing right-wing argument, if any; and really, I don't want to get politics involved in this. Too much fighting.

Now with all this spiel, I would personally invite a genuine member (proof would be nice) of either of these groups to add their side of the story and why we should be condoning this behaviour in the comments behaviour. So unfortunately this is the part where I degrade by asking you to...

PASS THIS ON TO YOUR FRIENDS AND COMMENT SO I CAN GET THIS FEATURED AND ON THE NEWS HURR DURR

...no, I'm much more sensible than that.

(links are below this post on Blogger).

...AND back to the post.

All hacker groups (yep, there's more out there) are constantly making the internet an untrustworthy place, and for groups posting information so that everyone is on the same playing field...

Conspirasists: *cough* communism *cough*

...it certainly seems like they aren't protecting the internet's image at all. However I do side with groups such as Team Web Ninjas (conveniently with a blog), who are determined to do to LulzSec what they did to the rest of the world - steal their information. I think the phrase might be, "there's a storm brewing".

Don't ask me for what I think the internet should be like, but I certainly think it shouldn't have the amount of malicious content available that it has.

Ok, "freedom of speech"... I think I'm tripping myself up here.

Let me try to sum up...

I thought the internet was going to be a part of life where nothing was dangerous... but the amount of hackers, virus creators and the like aren't making that at all true. Seriously guys, work for a security firm or something. And NOT to take it down from the inside, either. Make the internet a better place.

Comments from Anonymous and LulzSec members are still welcome, of course.

Enough doom and gloom... now for more things featuring the colour blue!

this >= awesome.

...yes, the famous blue blur turns 20 today, among lifting (maybe?) doubts that "the series wasn't as good as it was". Yes, between the 12th and 19th years the series went through a bit of a dark patch with bad rep from reviewers and, rather schockingly, its fans. Although it's now becoming a kind of inside joke in the fandom that Destructoid reviewer Jon Holmes gave the latest release a 4.5. So maybe the fans comprise of guys with a good sense of humor. Glad to see I mixed with a good crowd, then.

But with the up and coming game Sonic Generations, SEGA listened to the fans begging and pleading and finally gave them the most important choice of all: whether to have a Sonic with one of two different colours of eyes! Ha, no... we're not that big a bunch of weirdos... although I admit the amount of detail some people get into on forums is admirable yet conserning.

But more to the point... SEGA did a big jump toward the "fangasm" genre of gaming by releasing gameplay involving both the current 2010 model, and a brand-new, 3D version of the 1991 model. And why shouldn't they? It's been 20 years, and Nintendo tend to do revivals of characters from their games all the time.

I'd like to know what Sonic superfan and webcomic artist Ray Hargreves has to say about this. For those that don't know, the webcomic in question is one I mentioned waaaaaay back (2P Start!)... unfortunately several months after I suggested it as a site they stopped doing stuff regularly. In fact just to bump his Google hitcount and possibly get him to view this blog (in case he Googles himself, I know I do sometimes) here's his name a few more times...

Ray Hargreves, Ray Hargreves, (hi) Ray Hargreves...

(if you are reading, Ray, you have an awesome webcomic. I regret not grave-rising.)

Seriously though, I hope this upcoming game release goes well.

Now, you may have noticed that I haven't mentioned E3. Well, that was a while ago now in gamer's terms, and besides most of the impressions and 'exclusives' (they really aren't exclusive if everyone has them) about the new stuff coming out soon has already been said... so, I'm not gonna comment on it. Apart from that the Wii U seems to be spongign off the iPad a bit, and the Kinect may be losing is lutre quicker than expected. As for Playstation Move... what Playstation Move? Never heard of it... Ok, I'm done.

Wow, you miss posting for a bit, you miss a lot...