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Hacking Billy

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I love it when I come into work in the morning and I find something in my email that just screams "write about me".

As a couple of people have commented, I have a LOT of toys in my office.  I love collecting them, they're just a huge amount of fun.

One of the toys that Valorie got for me many years ago that I don't particularly care for, but everyone else in my office seems to love is my Big Mouth Billy Bass (yes, I posted a picture for thos that don't have one).:

Billy's really annoying (especially since my version has a bad sector in the sampled "Take me to the River" track, which causes it to screech horribly) but people constantly stop by and push his button, so I'm keeping him.

This morning, one of the people in my group sent me a pointer to this site which describes how to hack a Billy to play random audio files.  Unfortunately, they use Linux, I wasn't able to find a Windows client :(

But it is tempting...

And yes, I know this isn't a new site.  But it's the first I've heard about it...

Comments

  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
    Nice demotivators :)
  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
    Be careful there, the guy who hacked up his Sony AIBO dog (and wrote a website about it) a few years ago was hit with a DMCA suit... very similar circumstances!
  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
    Brutus: The issue is that the source there appears to be GPL. And I can't look at GPL code.
  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
    You can't look at GPL code? That's sad. Human knowledge (although Billy Bass can hardly claim to be a pinnacle of such) is built ontop the shoulders of giants.

    It's like saying "IEEE members can't look at papers published in ACM".

    I hope that policy isn't based upon a flawed understanding of (C) law.

    What about materials published under the Free Documentation License?

    Andrew
  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
    Shame this can't stay on topic of the fish ...
  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
    "Brutus: The issue is that the source there appears to be GPL. And I can't look at GPL code."

    Does this apply to LGPL code too?
  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
    Brutus, I am not a lawyer. But Microsoft does have lawyers. And they have stated that looking at GPL'ed code requires approval.

    And I don't have approval.

    There are Microsoft employees working on GPL products. There are a great number of Microsoft open source initiatives. There are a number of Microsoft employees (like Raymond) who have worked on GPL products in the past.

    But the rules that Microsoft's lawyers have put forth are pretty clear. And they don't permit me to read GPL'ed software.
  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
    James, please don't tell me you submitted this.
  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
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  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
    Wow, you can't view GPL'd code, even on your own time for a hobby-type project? Oppressive.

    I guess this means that you can only look at MS source code, and maybe BSD-licensed stuff, because otherwise it's just as illegal to include generic copyrighted code as it is to include GPL'd code in an MS project.
  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2005
    No /. from me ... I just thought it was a possibility, what with mentioning Linux and the GPL.

    As far as I am concerned, this is still a thread about a fish! Dunno if you watch the Sopranos, but it reminded me of a scene in there where the fish starts talking to Tony.
  • Anonymous
    June 11, 2005
    James, thanks. It's supposed to be about the fish.

    Someone else did submit it (I got a referral from /.) but...