Bonum Certa Men Certa

Patent Troll (Ray Niro) Resorts to Attacking People, Not Just Companies

Web Anonymity is Officially Dead!



Shane and I were never editing anonymously anyway...

Fool us once, Ray Niro, shame on you. Fool us seven times [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], shame on us. Here is the latest update on the Ray Niro/TrollTracker situation:

Ray Niro emailed me yesterday, complaining about the personal attacks being made on him in Slashdot.

[...]

He also tells me he now definitely knows who I am. I'm waiting for confirmation, since he didn't tell me my name. Then we'll see. According to him, one of my "friends" turned me in for the cash. Thanks, whoever you are, if true.

Meanwhile, I might as well get rid of a couple of posts I have saved, and was planning to post next week, when I'm not going to be able to post for various reasons. You know, go out with a bang, so to speak!


In case you are new to this saga, the father of patent trolling (perhaps also the patent holder of patent trolling as a business method) offered a bounty. He became somewhat of a head-hunter seeking to find the identity of a blogger in pursuit of a sane patent system.

Anonymity was killed by the money. For similar reasons, a Microsoft blogger called mini-microsoft no longer blogs much and he rarely criticises Microsoft as much as he used to. The platform he uses, Blogger, has already leaked out details upon demand. It spilled the beans on its own customers.

“Intimidation is becoming a new method for media control, censorship and attacks against criticism.”Intimidation is becoming a new method for media control, censorship and attacks against criticism. This ought to worry you because many anonymous people out there on the Web are proven Microsoft shills. It's not a legend, it's a fact (see examples galore). In other words, wealthy companies can deceive using anonymous figures whereas their critics get threatened.

Speaking for myself, be aware that in USENET and Digg the personal attacks against me pretty much doubled in the past week. It would be about 20 attacks per day, many of which are obscene and slanderous. This is annoying, very annoying. It's distracting. I have asked others whether they have noticed anything similar, especially amid times when we see dumping techniques. I know for a fact that somebody else needed to stop checking E-mail because of abuse that was becoming a handful.

Anyway, getting back on subject, Ray Niro can't just take criticism for his abuse of the patent system. When there is bribery involved, anonymity becomes an impossibility. I have seen friends whose strong desire for anonymity was of no use when they criticised Microsoft. Anonymous people with remailer thrashers and/or proxies went out of their way to publicly post full addresses of the people in question and sometimes made implicit threats. I still get a fair share of death wishes myself.

Didn't some 'special' lady called Maureen O'Gaga spy to Pamela Jones a couple of years ago? Was she just a curious journalist? It is hard to tell, but the situation is appalling. If you think you can exist on the Web anonymously (and I too lived anonymously on cyberspace some years ago), then you ought to think again. If someone wants to know your identity, then you haven't a chance in the world! Even Dan Lyons, who attacked Linux and other rivals of Microsoft under that "Fake Steve Jobs" persona, got exposed.

We covered the Dan Lyons Astroturf phenomenon several times in the past [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]. This is ugly business. Very ugly.

Recent Techrights' Posts

How Not to Build Software
code forges that need a Web browser perhaps fill some 'niche' demand
GAFAM and "MATA"
The use of dark humour there hopefully helps illuminate what a lot of "modern" technology became like and how it interacts with human civilisation (to what ends and whose gain)
Flying in 2025
worse than ever before
The UEFI 9/11 - Part III - Chaos is Scheduled to Happen Second Thursday of September (No Matter What the Microsofters Tell You)
The clock is ticking
Downplaying the Impact of "UEFI 9/11" is a Losing Strategy
we won't publish much whilst on holiday
 
Representing and Speaking for Animals
If I ever choose to take this matter to tribunal with animals-centric NGOs on my side, it'll get some press coverage for sure
The UEFI 9/11 - Part II - Campaign of Censorship and Defamation Against Critics
In dictatorships, humour serves an important role. It's tragic.
In Kazakhstan, Yandex Estimated to be 20 Times Bigger Than Microsoft
Bing is measured as down this month
Shutterstock Not Enough? The Register MS Uses Slop Images in Articles (Seemingly More and More Over Time)
Cost-saving trajectory amid office shutdown?
Gemini Links 30/08/2025: Games, PostmarketOS, and Slop
Links for the day
Links 30/08/2025: Imgur Uproar and Many Ukraine Updates (Mediazona Reports Over 200,000 Russians Died for Putin)
Links for the day
Birds Are Not "Pests and Vermin", Privacy is Not a Crime, and GNU/Linux is Not 'Hacking Platform'
I could not help but think of Free software analogies
The Sites Should Be Very Fast Again
That issue is now resolved
Activists, Including Technical Activists, Need Not Pursue Affirmation
Techrights doesn't play or participate in a "popularity contest"
Government Sites Should Run Free Software
Not proprietary bloatware with buzzwords
LLM Slopfarms Take No Breaks
When people run sites by bots they don't need to worry about "breaks"
GNOME Having a Meltdown Again
Thanks and farewell to Steven Deobald
Gemini Links 30/08/2025: Low Tech and Hunchbin 1.0.6
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 29, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 29, 2025
Financiers and Sponsors of the Slop Hype (Pyramid Scheme Waiting to End, Bubble That Will Inevitably Implode)
It's also burning the planet
Slopwatch: Fake Articles About "Linux", Google Helps Ponzi Schemes and Slopfarms in Google News
Slopfarms are a real pain
Gemini Links 29/08/2025: Retiring at 62 and URL Filtering HTTP(S) Proxy on Qubes OS
Links for the day
Links 29/08/2025: Lisa Cook Sues Convicted Felon and Backdoor Mandate in UK Resisted
Links for the day
Links 29/08/2025: Arti 1.5.0, War on Public Health (CDC), and Slop 'Bros' Made to Pay for Their Mass Plagiarism
Links for the day
No, 4Chan is Not Fighting for You by Lawyering Up Against Ofcom (UK)
Don't mistake proto-fascists for people who "fight for you". They don't.
In Many Places in the World Vista 11 "Market Share" is Going Down, Not Up
In some countries Windows is already down to third place or lower
More Microsoft-Connected Layoffs, at Least Third Time This Month! (Also Another Death on Campus)
Microsoft as a "gaming" company is where studios, projects, games, and even developers come to die
Slopwatch: Fake Articles About "Linux", Slop Images in VentureBeat, Linux Foundation Spam Made With LLM Slop and Slop Images
The only relief or upside - if any exists - is that the pace of slop was down a bit this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 28, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 28, 2025
Gemini Links 29/08/2025: Poems, Games, and Java 25 Performance
Links for the day
Links 28/08/2025: Greenland 'Interferences' by US and Skinnerboxes to Get Banned in Korean Schools
Links for the day
Richard Stallman (RMS) Talk in Ethereum Cypherpunk Congress Will be Remote
This past week RMS received lots of accolades online
The Register MS (Run by Microsoft Operatives): Free Software is Putin, Hence Evil and Dangerous
The current editor in chief is an American Microsofter, the previous one went to work for Google (US)
Links 28/08/2025: Chatbots Distorting/Fabricating History and Also Driving Suicide
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/08/2025: Back in Japan and Why "Hacker News" Sucks
Links for the day
A Much-Needed Wake-up Call to Users of Wordpress.com, Blogspot, Substack and All Those Other Outsourced (and Centralised) Platforms
There are several lessons in there
Open Source Initiative (OSI) Resists Software Freedom, Even by Attacking Its Own
The OSI is compromised
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 27, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Slopwatch: linuxsecurity.com, Slopfarms in Google News, and More
Some readers of ours end up sending us links that are from slopfarms, not realising those are slopfarms