Comments on: ((sum(wrongs) % 2)==0) ? right : er, let’s say moral ambiguity

By: Sara

Sara — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 20:23:17 +0000

I thought the post made some good points on screen scrapers, For screen scrapers i use python for simple things, but for larger projects i used extractingdata.com http://www.extractingdata.com/screen%20scraper.htm which worked great, they build custom screen scrapers and data extracting programs

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 01:21:59 +0000

Hi John. No, I’m not willing to share that knowledge. I don’t think it’s a bad thing to make it only available to those willing to figure it out for themselves–minimizes the pool of potential malefactors to those who can’t be stopped anyway.

By: John

John — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:06:25 +0000

Hi, can you tell me how to create a script to rig another polldaddy poll?

By: ben wolfson

ben wolfson — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:52:24 +0000

That Lizza twerp has seriously pulled ahead. I’m going to post to unfogged.

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:51:51 +0000

I appreciate the tip — I hadn’t realized they blocked for hammering the server. Sounds like it might just be mod_security kicking in on Apache.
And yeah, I don’t know what to say about rdm. I haven’t looked at the code at that level of depth, but I certainly agree that there doesn’t seem to be much parameter-changing required to register a vote. At the moment I’m assuming all that junk represents some disabled features not in use on Fishbowl’s account.

By: ben wolfson

ben wolfson — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:19:34 +0000

Be careful with that—unfogged’s IP got blocked for suspicious voting behavior. (Shoulda slept a little between wgets.)
I find the rdm element of the request kind of bizarre—is the idea that, if they get thousands of votes from the same IP, they can evaluate the randomness of that variable and see whether (a) the person used his browser and deleted cookies, voting manually; (b) same as (a) but the browser has a bad random number generator; (c) the person cheated with mechanical help?

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 21:31:52 +0000

I think that should work, yes, although you may also need to alter the GUID of the package to make it take priority over the existing one. I do sort of like making this one Brian-only, though — best to make sure people know what they’re voting for.
I’ll go run curl ten thousand times on Jeff’s behalf to get the ball rolling.

By: ben wolfson

ben wolfson — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 19:55:44 +0000

Am I correct in assuming that one can simply unzip the xpi, modify the script, and zip it back up? If so, it would be trivial to add a vote for Jeff for every vote for Brian—the current disparity would ensure that the former won’t overtake the latter, and he’ll need to get going if he’s going to make second.
(Closing the gap to make it more dignified would be a more delicate operation, of course.)

By: chris_s

chris_s — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 19:15:59 +0000

Onward and upward.
Votes Cast: 6405
Your Rank: Black Cat bartender
667b1053f77216e422a9763cffb3a952

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 19:05:29 +0000

No, I haven’t done anything on Jeff’s behalf yet, which is the reason for his low total. I was planning to write a last-minute script to get to v(Brian)-1, but you’re right: that might not be realistic given other contestants’ bot use.