[Opensim-users] IAR Files

[Len Brown]

On Tue, Feb 23, 2010 at 5:04 PM, Karen Palen <karen_palen at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Well said Len, that is exactly my problem with the panic and the witch
> hunts!
>
> Karen
>
>
Karen,

     Something just came to mind and I checked it out and had to laugh -
hard...

     I have a Linksys Wireless Router.  No biggie.  Typical cheap-o Wal-Mart
Special.  But I lgged into it like I did when I set up my wifi and
encryption.

     There in black and white it shone out at me - "MAC Address Replicator"
which allows me to plug in my desktop pc, 'replicate its MAC Address' and
then the router will tell my ISP that my router is, in fact, my desktop
computer.

     This has been standard in all routers I can remember, even before
wireless was even a commodity on home computers.  That's because (used to)
many ISPs would grant access to a single desktop computer by its MAC
address.  If you changed to a different computer you had to call your ISP
and have them manually accept the new MAC of the new computer.  Of course,
that is now pretty much history.  With most cable Internet accounts you do
have to restart your cable modem before another computer will be able to
access the Internet.

     Thing is, back in the day the idea was 1 Internet Connection = 1
Computer System.  When routers appeared, to the dismay of ISP's they
immediately included the MAC Address replication feature so the ISP would
think the router was a pc.  Then of course, all pcs connected to it appears
to come from a single computer.

     And with port-forwarding, etc, well the rest is history in the making.

Anyway, just found it amusing to remember the MAC Addy replication thing.
Though if it comes from your house, your ISP still knows it was YOU.

     Unless you learn from the Chinese who learned how to bypass their
firewalls and access the net unrestricted.  Virtual Private Networking is
just the tip of that iceberg.  :)

-- 
- Len W. Brown
  lenwbrown at gmail.com
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