Can't copy to removable media

Could you post result of
  ls -al /media
after inserting a SD card or a flash driver (not a MP3 player, please).
Please do a copy/paste to avoid using '1' instead of 'l' (lower case L).

millius@millius-desktop:~$ ls -al /media
total 84
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4096 2010-11-21 14:45 .
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4096 2010-11-12 21:03 ..
drwx------ 8 millius millius 16384 1969-12-31 16:00 C81F-E234
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 21 2010-11-20 20:14 .created_by_python-fstab
drwx------ 11 millius millius 4096 2010-11-20 19:52 expansion_ext
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 2010-11-13 10:58 expansion_ntfs
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 2010-11-07 16:24 floppy -> floppy0
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-07 16:24 floppy0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 2010-11-10 18:38 usb -> usb0
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 1969-12-31 16:00 usb0
drwx------ 8 millius millius 16384 1969-12-31 16:00 usb1
drwx------ 11 millius millius 4096 2010-11-20 19:52 usb2
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-10 18:38 usb3
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-10 18:38 usb4
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-10 18:38 usb5
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-10 18:38 usb6
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-10 18:38 usb7
millius@millius-desktop:~$

N Idea why it wants owner of these media to be root.

These were all working before, but I had to re-install Ubuntu. Now the permissions (owner is set to root) areall wrong. how can I change them?

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Mount
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/MoveMountpointHowto
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DrivesAndPartitions

I looked at those pages and they don't seem to apply. the issue isn't getting them to mount. that is happening just fine, well almost. Removable media with a volume label shows up in nautilus with that label; but can only be viewed using a usb(x) label, which also shows up. Nothing I plug into the Usb ports or hub can be written to, save the ext4 partition on my external HD. As one can see fron the output I sent, the NTFS partition is owned by "root" What I need to do is change the ownership/ permissions of the "file" that represents the usb bus; so I can Copy and paste files to removable media (like flash drives and SD cards) and to external devices ( like Mp3 players) when connected these devices come up with root ownership,.

I have been using Ubuntu for a while now and never have had this issue until I had to Re-install 10.10.

I got a new reading of results of "ls -al /media", and compare with mines (on 10.10) which are:

delance@delance-desktop:~$ ls -al /media
total 16
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 2010-12-11 18:41 .
drwxr-xr-x 26 root root 4096 2010-11-30 17:38 ..
-rw------- 1 root root 0 2010-12-01 17:50 .hal-mtab-lock
drwx------ 5 delance delance 8192 1970-01-01 01:00 WHITEEMTEC

WHITEEMTEC is a USB key.
.hal-mtab-lock is a system hidden file.

It seems your system is a mess.

Could you do a fresh reboot of system, with any USB device in it and post again result of "ls -al /media".
Then insert an external media, and post again result of "ls -al /media".
Do line command:
   sudo apt-get install gparted
and then run
   System->Administration->Gparted (partition manager)
and look at result displayed by Gparted about external media.

OK I did some reading and I figured out a fix:
 Enter into terminal:

sudo nautilus

browse" / " then right click "/media" permissions can be changed from the tab. I put the user account as owner

user in groups
did not change other.

Gave both permission to add/delete files and to read / write.

I don't know if this works with mp3 players, etc yet, but it does with pen drives, flask memory cards etc.

I don't know if this is the best way, but it works.

OK I did some reading and I figured out a fix:
 Enter into terminal:

sudo nautilus

browse" / " then right click "/media" permissions can be changed from the tab. I put the user account as owner

user in groups
did not change other.

Gave both permission to add/delete files and to read / write.

I don't know if this works with mp3 players, etc yet, but it does with pen drives, flask memory cards etc.

I don't know if this is the best way, but it works.

I almost forgot, I disconnected all but the external hard drive and removed their mount points with sudo nautilus by moving those to the trash.

new ls -al /media:

millius@millius-desktop:~$ ls -al /media
total 44
drwxrwxr-x 7 millius users 4096 2010-12-11 17:44 .
drwxr-xr-x 23 root root 4096 2010-11-25 11:57 ..
drwx------ 9 millius millius 16384 2010-12-11 17:44 C81F-E234
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 21 2010-11-20 20:14 .created_by_python-fstab
drwx------ 1 millius millius 4096 2010-12-05 19:13 expansion_ntfs
drwxrwxr-x 2 root root 4096 2010-11-07 16:24 floppy0
drwx------ 4 millius millius 4096 2010-12-11 17:44 New Volume
drwxrwxr-x 11 millius millius 4096 2010-12-11 17:45 usb0
millius@millius-desktop:~$

Others seem to be having a similar issue, this is a fairly simple workaround for we newbies.