Bloghorn

The lockpicks we ordered for Penn State 2600 came this afternoon. When we placed the order, I was thinking that we’d be getting the same pick sets that they had at HOPE this past summer.

HOPE picks

But when I opened the box, they looked very different than I expected.

50 lockpicks

We ordered from a website called LockpickTools.com, who are really awesome guys. They not only gave us a great price on the picksets, but they also upgraded all the sets to their new “laminated ripple core handle” style.

The new 2600 picks

These things have been going like hotcakes ever since. We’ve almost had enough sales to break even, and pretty soon we’ll be making pure profit, hopefully enough to start working towards subsidising some trips to hacker cons this coming year. I still have a whole mess of these things, and $25 buys you your very own set. So stop by if you’re in the area, or shoot me an email if you want a set. And for comparison, here’s the set that I usually use:

My set

I must admit, I really rarely use anything but the 3 picks included in the new set. Might be a good diea to grab a set myself…

So for those who are still a bit fuzzy on what’s going on with PSU2600, here’s where we are:

We’ve applied for official Penn State recognition as a club on campus. The application was turned in last Wednesday, with the promise of having a response within 14 days. Approved constitution here.

We’ve decided to try for IST student organization status. We’re drafting the proposal that we need to submit to the Dean, if anyone has any ideas for language, let me know.

The lockpick tools we ordered are supposed to be on their way. We’ve purchased 50 sets (including a pick, a rake, a half diamond and a torque wrench in each kit), of which about 12 are spoken for by pre-orders. As soon as I get the picks, the price will be going up from $20 to $25 due to the “annoyance fee”, which is the fee I tack on because I’m storing them in my room, and I can’t imagine them taking up any less space than a TV, hence “annoyance”. As promised, all profits will be donated to PSU2600.

The next meeting will be December 5 at 5 PM in the HUB above the sushi place. The lockpicking kits will be there, along with the club’s supply of locks. But we will hopefully be discussing much more than just lockpicking, so come with questions and hopefully leave with answers.

Once in a while, I like to have a binge-like session where I take care of some of the projects I’ve been putting off. Here’s what my workbench looked like this afetrnoon:

Doing cool stuff

So from left to right, installing madwifi drivers on my new Eee PC to get the wifi working, installing Ubuntu on my old X 30 to get it ready for new users, getting ready to recover data from a dead hard drive, and checking someone else’s install on an Eee. All told, it took about 3 hours to finish everything off, but I did everything I set out to (except recovering the data from the hard drive, which was clicking something awful despite liberal application of the refrigerator trick).

As you know, creating the new Penn State 2600 club has been my pet project this semester. For the last few months, we’ve slowly been gaining members and building towards becoming an official Penn State club. After this past Friday, we meet all the requirements, and then some.

The latest meeting was the much anticipated “Lockpicking Workshop”, and much like my mother, I couldn’t help myself from alerting the press. The Daily Collegian sent a pair of photographers and reporters to check out the event, and did a really great job of reporting about what the club was doing in terms of educating the public about security risks. Here’s a link to the article. I’m trying to get the pictures from the event from the photographers, so hopefully they’ll be posted soon.

We approved our constitution, elected the officers (I’m president, big surprise there), and approved Doc Gerry as our advisor. That, combined with the 35 people in attendance (PSU requires 20 minimum) puts us over the line in terms of requirements. All that’s left is for me to get our new advisor to sign off on the paperwork and drop it off in the HUB, and then wait for their response. But even if Penn State doesn’t want to sponsor us, I’m sure meetings will continue unabated for the forseeable future.

After living in New York all my life and watching the Democratic bulldozer blow away the opposition in that state time after time, it was an interesting experience voting in a state where my vote could actually decide the election.

State College votes in Alumni Hall in the HUB. And with about 40,000 students, Penn State students keep that place packed all day long. But the real entertainment came as I was trying to walk through the door to the HUB. It seemed like anyone with their name even remotely on the ballot was there, and even one candidate was there in person campaigning. The Obama crowd was out in full force waiving signs and handing out stickers and buttons, and the McCain campaign was there too, handing out poorly printed (like, home printer and a pair of scissors job) pieces of paper with a couple black and white sentences about McCain.

Campaigns trying to turn last-minute undecideds at the HUB.

Inside, the place was packed. It was like herding cattle. But the cool thing about living in West is that, while others had to wait in extremely long lines, I was in and out in less than 10 minutes.

Alumni Hall

It was nice to see that, instead of the paperless voting machines used in the primaries, the voting machines used this time around were optical scan machines.After all the controversy about paper trails and Diebold machines freaking out, the optical scanners seem to be the best way to tally the votes. The voter bubbles in the oval next to the candidate they want, and the machine reads the ballot and scores it. The ballot is kept locked in the bowels of the machine ready for a recount, and the voter gets a strip of paper with their ballot number on it. I was number 252 today for West Halls (Precinct 33) alone. I’m sure the other precincts have already shot past that mark.

My ballot for the 2008 Presidential election

It was quick and painless. And after we were done, we exited out the back of the hall and onto the street, where the news vans were just starting to pull up. I watched the local NBC newsteam’s van drive by just as I was exiting the polling place.

News crews interviewing voters