A Number For Everything

jtcampbell writes: "Whilst reading the Times today I found this article about a U.S. government idea to give everyone a unique 'ENUM,' that serves as a universal phone number, email address, and fax number. Quite a cool idea, but will everyone adopt the standard? besides, i thought we left numeric email addresses with compuserve a few years back. And remembering these 11 digit numbers could be fun ..."

Comments

Universal SPAM!?

[Maul]

Oh great, now it will be even easier for spammers to make sure their junk reaches everyone.

It isn't a US govt scheme

[Zeinfeld]

Its much bigger than just the US govt, they have a very minor role here. This is an IETF/ITU thing

Re:It isn't a US govt scheme

[jaanderson]

Switzerland has been assigning Distinguised Names and LDAP entries, Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, for every child born. They were among the first but more have joined them, check out National Directories

Re:It isn't a US govt scheme

[Zeinfeld]

I don't know about other European countries, but the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg has a Social Security Number System which uniquely identifies you

Since the entire population of Luxembourg is only 35 the devising of such a scheme can hardly have taxed the inventor.

Re:It isn't a US govt scheme

[cicadia]

Thank you for your input, Slashdot user #202465.

Your sentiments have been duly recorded for posterity in comment #2251343.

ENUM, or new SSN? Sure!!!

[david614]

In a country where people regularly protest business using the social security number as a unique identifier, I can't wait to see the congressional hearings once this hits the fan.

What about identity theft?

[Agent Green]

Looks like something to replace the SSN, actually...and a _lot_ of damage can be done if that falls into the wrong person's hands. "Can I have your phone number?" Eeek.

Speaking of which, I don't think SSNs can be replaced if stolen...maybe if you're in the Witness Protection Program...

Re:What about identity theft?

[hearingaid]

Witness Protection people get new SSNs.

It is commonly believed (and probably true, it makes sense) that No Such Agency and perhaps some of its competitors inside the US government can alter or delete SSNs as well.

That said, if this comes through, I want the ten nines. Barring that, a U-group code.

Hah.

Re:What about identity theft?

[Surak]

That's funny. I had this argument with my Systems Design prof that went something like this:

Prof: So, of these fields for the employee database, which would you use as the primary key: SSN, LAST_NAME, FIRST_NAME, or STREET_ADDRESS?

Me: None of the above.

Prof: Oh? The main requirements for a primary key is that the field be unique, and that the field not change. The SSN seems to fit that bill doesn't it?

Me: No, not everyone has a SSN.

Prof: This is an *employee* database. Of course they're all going to have SSNs.

Me: But these are not in anywway guarnteed to be unique or not change.

Prof: Oh, you're just talking silly things. Of course they're not going to change or be unique.

Me: Do YOU trust the government that much?

Prof: Stop being ridiculous.

So, you see... I *was* right!!! Heh.

Re:What about identity theft?

[Tumbleweed]

Hell yes it's true, SSNs can be changed - didn't you ever see the movie "The Net"!? :)

Re:What about identity theft?

[Tumbleweed]

What about foreign employees? SSN is a U.S. thing, so they wouldn't have SSN numbers, I'm guessing (could be wrong).

Re:What about identity theft?

[erroneus]

The main problem was apparently that most of the systems that I had given my SSN to over the year (government systems, that is) are hard-coded to accept SSN's as the primary key, and that changing it requires going in by hand and sorting out the good and bad keys manually. It tooks several months, but basically things are normal.

EXCEPT for the hundreds of places that have my old SSN on record, and now need to change them. Try telling your bank that your SSN has changed - it will mess their entire world up.


Wouldn't have just been more efficient to kill yourself or your friend?

Re:What about identity theft?

[Ubi_UK]

Is your evidence for the possibiliy of changing your SSN the fact that it's done in a movie???
Sheesh.
I sure hope you haven't seen 'deep impact' or godzilla.

Re:What about identity theft?

[4of12]

What about foreign employees? SSN is a U.S. thing, so they wouldn't have SSN numbers, I'm guessing (could be wrong).

Reminds me of when I was in graduate school a few years ago.

The database system was set up to require an SSN. Of course, the newly arrived students from Greece, U.K., China, etc. didn't have one.

That's OK. Their SSNs all became 888-88-8888.

I just hope that someone's choice of MAGIC NUMBER didn't trod on someone's real SSN! Imagine the chaos!

Sigh, I wish, for once, they'd get off this neanderthal number business and just use names, with sufficient extra identifiers to distinguish one John Smith from another Chang. Just force every one to make their names unique. Thus, John Smith becomes John Smith Iowa 1968 or John Smith, Eater of Chicken Wings, or whatever is unique. Numbers are for computers.

Re:What about identity theft?

[jmauro]

It's _your_ money. If they don't believe you, just take _your_ money and go some where else. They'll get the idea of who's problem it really is really fast.

Changing numbers

[SBChoDogg]

What about changing your number? With regular phone numbers and email addresses you can change them if you get too many prank phone calls or too much spam. If everyone had a unique number issued by the government, which would probably be easy for others to find, I think we would run into all kinds of privacy issues.

Re:Changing numbers

[papa248]

What about changing your number? With regular phone numbers and email addresses you can change them if you get too many prank phone calls or too much spam.

Of course not! This way you can always be spammed, AND Microsoft can always keep track of you!

Re:Changing numbers

[aozilla]

change them if you get too many prank phone calls or too much spam

On the other hand, if everyone had a single unique ID number you would be able to easily block prank phone calls and spam.

Ehhh.

[BiggestPOS]

1984, Brave New World, uhhh whats some other trite analogies. If the "Net" is really going to expand and cover the actual globe, take over every aspect of life, and not crash under its own weight, a system like this, as much as the real geeks would hate it at first, will be necessary. Now granted, I'm thinking fairly far into the future, but the current system deosn't really cut it as far as absolutely guranteeing identity. Privacy should be retained yes, and this system probably isn't going to be the one, but a few false-starts are sure to happen before we find the "right" combination.

Kanji is the way to go!

[Anonymous Squonk]

Instead of 11 numbers, you could use just four kanji characters to cover the spread. And you get the added benefit of learning Japanese or Chinese in the process!

Re:Kanji is the way to go!

[Squeeze Truck]

No need for four of them. A good Chinese dictionary (I mean the biiig ones) has 60,000 characters.

60,000^3 = 216 Trillion combinations.

Chinese people typically have 3-character names. A one-character family name and a two-character first name.

So all we really need to do is give everyone on Earth a unique Chinese name! And since the characters might be hard to remember, you can tattoo it on their foreheads so the won't forget it.

I know Southern Baptists especially will just love this idea!

Re:Kanji is the way to go!

[Squeeze Truck]

I know. In reality there are only about 200 commonly-used Chinese surnames. Even 200(60,000 * 60,000) = 720 billion.

For the 2-character first names, we'll let the Chinese keep their own names and give the nonsense names like "stinky fjord" or "rabbit bowl" to people who don't know the difference.

Re:Kanji is the way to go!

[csbruce]

And since the characters might be hard to remember, you can tattoo it on their foreheads so the won't forget it.

It'd be more practical if we used binary numbers and had bar codes tattooed on our foreheads.

Lean forward please, Sir. *beep* Thank you. Would you like fries with that?

Think, child!

[General_Corto]

And remembering these 11 digit numbers could be fun ...

Well, I'm sure you don't remember lots of (up to) 12 digit sequences that already exist, but have no problems remembering things like 'slashdot.org' and 'www.userfriendly.org'. As in the Internet, so with life. If you want to do this right, you'd have some form of "Personal Name System" to act as an equivalent to the "Domain Name System" we already seem to use quite successfully.

Interesting but what if

[loconet]

i have more than one main telephone number? does one get an enum and the other doesnt? .. do i get two enums? what if i only have one email and two phone #'s?, Im sure they'll sove this problems, yet it should be interesting how they go about doing it.

IPV6

[frleong]

I think that the US government should give everyone an IPV6 address and distribute the addresses via smartcards (or any memory device that can store it properly). It's a great way to mass introduce this new technology. Then, watch for new applications (malicious or not) derived from this unique ID.

Re:ICQ

[jandrese]

I think ICQ UINs work because for the most part we don't care about them. You only need a UIN when you're setting up a new ICQ instance on a computer somewhere, and you only have to remember your own. The rest can be found using the search features of ICQ fairly easily (assuming your friends don't change their information constantly). It's not like you say "Hmm, I want to contact person X, what was his 12 digit number again?"

Not such a good idea.

[mwillems]

This way, when you give someone your phone number you are giving them your social security noumber, tax number, medical identity, etc.

The problem with that is that it opens you up to two things: abuse and honest mistakes. Both for obvious reasons would be real problems.

Example. The credit agency in Canada seems to think I owe BMW money for a car. That is long gone (when the lease ended, I sold that car and bought a different make). Still, it's well neigh impossible to get that off the record. Now imagine everyone had that info!

And another example. I recently changed medical insuramce companies at work, and that needed an AIDS test. Negative, I am happy to say. But if it had not been: if all these systems had been tied together (as they will be soon, with one number) that information would quite easily have got back to the bank, or the employer, etc.

I think we need to be very careful indeed with systems that make it easier for people bad or good to track us and what we do.

Re:Not such a good idea.

[mwillems]

in France, and I guess, in most of Europe, your medical is secret. And a leakage is not taken lightly.

Here it's not quite like that - I'm in Canada, by the way. You cannot get insurance (eg a group plan) without AIDS tests, and you sign a form allowing the release of any of your conversations with your doctor to the insurance company and to your own company. People here are starting to know better than to tell their doctors anything.

Michael

Re:Not such a good idea.

[Satai]

This way, when you give someone your phone number you are giving them your social security noumber, tax number, medical identity, etc.

Oh, but I hear there's a system to manage all that.

Who is Number One?

[CliffSpradlin]

Does anyone else have deja vu? (THE PRISONER TV SERIES)

Re:Who is Number One?

[Vuarnet]

Come on. Everyone knows that Number One was and always will be William T. Riker.

Re:Who is Number One?

[DJerman]

I am a Number! Not a Free Man! --- No. 444a65726d616e

Re:Who is Number One?

[Vuarnet]

Of course, Majel was a nice lady and a good actress, so they let her play Nurse Chapel....

And with her continuing role as the voice of the computer, it's fair to say she's the oldest recurring character (if her voice can be described as such) in the ST series.

Slave New World

[Malc]

Might as well get the number tatooed on to the back of our necks as a bar code... it would be even easier to user then. [- Sepultura]. Personally, I don't want to be easily identified.

Re:Slave New World

[Faux_Pseudo]

I got a barcode of my SSN once. The tat artist would not do it because it would blead and be unreadable by a scanner in just a few years.
What we need to do is embed a non degradable surfice into the flesh of every person so that we can get some reliable scans.

Sort the names out first ...

[os2fan]

The idea of people identifying themselves on the net is rather interesting, but we also have to address that people may have a legitimate need to have more than one name.

The following is a sample of people who might need more than one identity:

• Battered wives hiding from husbands.
• Witness protection programs
• Whistle-Blowers and others wanting to be semi-anomonious
• People having strong gender dysphoria, wishing to have a foot in each gender. [Yes, it's a real condition that has a high suicide rate, because the mind and body don't get along that well.]

So we should consider the identity issues before we start slamming other doors first.

What about home addresses???

[Grishnakh]

This idea really sucks for phone numbers and email addresses, but what about your home address?

I've long wished that the postal system would assign everyone a unique number, and if someone wanted to send you something, they'd address it to that number instead of some street address. The mail is already routed by computers, so it'd be easy for those computers to look up that number, correllate it to your current physical address, and send it there.

This would really be helpful if you move a lot. Right now, you have to file a change of address form, which isn't completely reliable, and that only lasts a few months. After that, if someone hasn't been informed of your new address, it'll go to your old address. There's just no excuse for this any more.

Re:What about home addresses???

[chipuni]

I can see it now... when someone wants directions to my house, I just tell them that it's at 53279153631. Then hang up.

All of the problems that programmers have with pointers would immediately jump into the real world.

Re:What about home addresses???

[Animats]

It's annoying that the US Postal Service hasn't even been able to come up with a unique numbering scheme for physical addresses. Several European countries have that, and you just write the destination mail number in the OCR boxes on the envelope.

Re:What about home addresses???

[PurpleBob]

You can already use a number as a mailing address.

It is extremely unlikely that there will be a duplicate house number within a 9-digit zip code, which usually narrows the area down to a street or neighborhood. So you simply put the house number and the 9-digit zip, resulting in a complete address which looks like 4871 13068-4310. (I just made this up. I seriously doubt this is someone's real address.)

However, postal addresses in the usual form have lots of redundancy built in (especially using the name). In the purely numeric form, if you get one digit wrong, the mail is definitely not going to get to its intended destination.

Re:What about home addresses???

[bluGill]

I can never remember mine

Don't feel bad, they change to every few months. Your 5 diget zip code is always the same, the 4 diget version changes from time to time, and companies that do use it have to pay for the updates. Bulk mailers (magazines) send enough mail that it is worth it, but for most of us the saveings don't outweigh the hasstle.

Re:What about home addresses???

[Cy Guy]

The Post Office DOES have a way to uniquely ID each house. 11-digit zip codes are set up to ID each individual building or apartment on a the mailperson's delivery route, this facilitates machine sorting of the mail.

Assuming you're familiar with 9-digit zip codes which ID one side of a specific block on a given street (or one building in an apartment complex) the number is then extended by the last two digits of the street address (which the USPS calls the 'delivery point code'). So for example, the President's 9-digit zip is 20502-0001, and since the address is 1600 Pennsyvania Ave, the 11-digit version would be 20502-0001-00. 11-digit zips are already useable in postal barcodes. The Univ. of Buffalo runs a service that will generate a PS or GIF image of your address with the barcode here.

About a year ago (*) the Postal Service proposed using this as a the basis for providing a free email address to each of their 'customers' (every resident of the US) they suggested that for individuals within a household the first and last initials could be appended to the 11-digit zip and emailed through a usps mail server so that the President's email address under this system would be gb20502000100@usps.gov and the first lady (who has a different 9-digit zip) would be lb20502000200@usps.gov

* Note: the date I saw this in the news was 10/3/00, but I can't find a link that documents the specific scheme used, though I made a note of how it worked. this page references that the zip + 4 + delivery point code could be used, but proposes a different way of doing and doesn't discuss the system I read about. Send me an email if you find a link that documents the system I outlined.

Re:What about home addresses???

[PurpleBob]

Do you know the zip codes of those houses? I can take a two-minute walk down the street and be in a new 9-digit zip code.

In fact, now I've been informed that the 9-digit zip code plus the last _two digits_ of your house number is enough to uniquely determine your address. So it's very likely you live next to the boundary of three 9-digit zips.

Social Security Numbers and the Real Problem

[Omerna]

And remembering these 11 digit numbers could be fun ...

I've memorized my social security number, and I don't even use it on a regular (everyday/week) basis. The numbers are not the problem.

The real problem is the fact that every right to privacy group would scream bloody murder. Have you seen people's reactions to what they did at the Super Bowl last year? The cameras that find felons in the crowd? I didn't care about that, I mean, finding felons isn't a bad thing.

However, this makes me a little apprehensive. Ever read 1984 by Orwell? This calls that to mind. With everything being wireless now it would be easy for the government (the NSA already monitors practically every electronic signal in the world) to know that:

Number 12345678901: Cellular phone call from 8th and Maple. Withdrew $50 from ATM on corner of 9th and Maple.
Etc.

I'm sure extremist are already envisioning numbers tatooed on people's foreheads. I don't think that would happen, but if this number became the only means of ID I would move to Ireland. (Dual citizenships are cool).

Re:ICQ

[agentZ]

Yes, but ICQ lets you give a user an alias that you see on the screen. You don't get messages from "1636181," they show up as "Tammy says:" Plus, It's far easier for humans to recognize the error between "Stephen" and "Stepehn" than "1636181" and "1631681"

Hrrm....

[Sheeple Police]

Weren't phone numbers created as 7 digit numbers because that's the average segment a person can remember? I remember in psychology talking about the way the memory centers work, and I was thinking it was 7 that was the typical chunk size of a person's memory? For the most part, we don't have to remember area codes, and for those of us who have to use 10 digit dialing, the first 3 digits are nearly uniform for our day to day calling (and thus memorization). How will an 11 character reference work out?

I am not a number!

[bill.sheehan]

Who are you?

I am Number Two.

Who is Number One?

You are Number Six.

I am not a number! I'm a free man!

derisive laughter

I can't imagine an easier way to welcome in a brave new world of tyranny and oppression than this.

Here at the First Federated National Bank, you're not just a number. You're four numbers, a dash, three letters, four more numbers...

Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Squeeze Truck]

16: And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:

17: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

18: Here is wisdom, Let him that have understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six. (666)

Someone was going to post this eventually.

There goes all my karma :)

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Alien54]

Someone was going to post this eventually.

True enough.

Although this goes back to the ancient paranoia of big government of any kind. although originally this was ancient Rome.

There is a large community of people who are always going to oppose things like this just for this specific reason.

Think of what MS could do with this sort of Government Standard, for example.

It all does come down to a matter of trust. and sadly, the number of people and organizations that we normally can trust implicity with this sort of thing are tragically few.

Until then, this sort of thing is probably a bad idea. Just because of the problem of trust, and the few bad apples.

- - -
Radio Free Nation
If You have the Story, We have the Soap Box

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[quintessent]

This is an example of a number game called geometria. The Hebrews (and here the early Christians) would take a word and play with its numerical value to show hidden meanings in the word. For example, you might have something like love + prosperity = peace (not a real geometria) where the numerical values of the first two can be added to get the second.

John the revelator is showing how the word beast is equivalent to the number 666. If 7 is the perfect number, then 6 falls short of perfection, and repeating something three times obviously would be a way to add emphasis.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Squeeze Truck]

What kind of grammar/spelling is this written in? Looks like someone passed it through the english->french->german->english filters in babelfish.

That is English, my friend. Is English not your first language, or did you skip high school?

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Faux_Pseudo]

Romans 13:1-4

Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers.
For there is no power but of God: the powers that
be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore
resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of
God: and they that resist shall receive to
themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror
to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then
not be afraid of the power? do that which is
good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For
he is the minister of God to thee for good.

Even Satin can quote scripture to his own ends. (paraphraseing The Bard)

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[abischof]

660
Approximate number of the Beast

DCLXVI
Roman numeral of the Beast

666.0000
Number of the High Precision Beast

0.666
Number of the Millibeast

/ 666
Beast Common Denominator

(-666) ^ (1/2)
Imaginary number of the Beast

6.66 e3
Floating point Beast

1010011010
Binary of the Beast

6, uh... what was that number again?
Number of the Blonde Beast

1-666
Area code of the Beast

00666
Zip code of the Beast

666mph
The speed limit of the Beast

$665.95
Retail price of the Beast

$699.25
Price of the Beast plus 5% state sales tax

$769.95
Price of the Beast with all accessories and replacement soul

$656.66
Walmart price of the Beast

$646.66
Next week's Walmart price of the Beast

Phillips 666
Gasoline of the Beast

Route 666
Way of the Beast

666 F
Oven temperature for roast Beast

666k
Retirement plan of the Beast

666 mg
Recommended Minimum Daily Requirement of Beast

6.66 %
5 year CD interest rate at First Beast of Hell National Bank, $666 minimum deposit.

$666/hr
Beast's lawyer's billing rate

Lotus 6-6-6
Spreadsheet of the Beast

Word 6.66
Word Processor of the Beast

i66686
CPU of the Beast

666i
BMW of the Beast

DSM-666 (revised)
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the Beast

1232 Octal, Apt. 29A
Beast's hexed address

668
Next-door neighbor of the Beast

333
The semi-Christ

665.9997856
The Number of the Beast on a Pentium

Due credit.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Squeeze Truck]

True story:

When I worked at Packard Bell tech support, my friend got a call from a woman who was distraught that her AUTOEXEC.BAT file was exactly 666 kilobytes. My friend had her edit the file and add

REM SATAN I CAST THEE OUT

to the end of the file. Did a DIR and checked the filesize -- 682k (or something like that.) Problem solved. The woman said "thank you" and hung up.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Perdo]

668, 664 Neighbors of the beast

667, 665 across the street from the beast

66.6% drop in the value of your home when the beast moves in next door.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Howie]

cool story, but how much base memory did she have left to do anything with after 666K of autoexec.bat has loaded it's TSRs and done it's work? And a boot-time measured in hours, I shouldn't wonder.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[ConsumedByTV]

Do what thou wilt is the whole of the law... (can you respond with the correct anwser?)

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[bnenning]

Although this goes back to the ancient paranoia of big government of any kind. although originally this was ancient Rome.

Look at the number of people murdered by their own governments in the last century, and then explain why being concerned about excessive government power is "paranoid".

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Col. Panic]

I'd like to believe that, but think about the sales pitch.

We already have social security numbers;

credit card numbers are stolen at a cost of $?,???,???,???.?? each year;

identity theft is a fairly common problem;

we live in a world with too many numbers already - bank accounts, credit cards, utility and entertainment services account numbers, etc.

It is going to be very easy to sell people on the idea that we need to simplify tracking of these things. Simpler is better, less chance for fraud, etc. Personally, I expect it to happen rather too soon.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[Tackhead]

> John the revelator is showing how the word beast is equivalent to the number 666. If 7 is the perfect number, then 6 falls short of perfection, and repeating something three times obviously would be a way to add emphasis.

So if the Beast is one who consistently falls short of perfection, one can only assume he's a programmer. In what other profession can you consistently screw up (cf. "there's always one more bug", etc) and still retain the respect and admiration of your peers?

This would explain a lot, actually.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[jafac]

In Biblical-Scholar terms, the language of "mark in their right hand or in their forheads" has a meaning which is a bit more than what you'd literally think.
The way it's generally interpreted is more like;
A mark on your right hand - typically referrs to an action - your "hand" is what you do. A mark on your forehead can be the way you think, or something that you say.

Thoughts and deeds.
(remember the movie PI where the rabbis had the scripture wrapped around his arm, and folded up in a box stuck on his forehead? same deal).

Not a literal physical mark like a tatoo on your hand, or something like that.
The mark of the beast on your right hand would mean - something that dictates how you act, and on your forehead would be something that controls how you think or what you say. (what you think to yourself and what you say out loud were generally thought of as carrying the same weight to the authors of the Bible - Jews and Christians are encouraged to control their thoughts). Having lustful thoughts about a woman is the same as committing adultery in your heart.

If you think about it, we already have identifying code numbers. SSN, credit card numbers, phone numbers, Ethernet addr., IP, I think this whole ID number thing as the number of the beast is a big crock.
For that matter, any person could be assigned a number being their timestamp at birth. (and simultaneous births could be serialized via some arbitrary method). All ideas and information can be encoded as a number - and that's ASCII, but it goes back much farther to Qaballa, and Numerology.
I've read other interpretations that say that the Beast was the Roman Empire (which has evolved in present-times to the US/UK/Australia alliance - according to some wackos).

So, we could already be long-gone, as far as the predictions in Revelation are concerned. Or, it may be something much less subtle that will be plainly understood. In any case, anyone wanting to implement the use of such a numbering system is going to have to "sell" it to the Christians to get them to go along with it.

Re:Revelations 13:16 - 18

[quintessent]

Yes, in christian history, there are many numbers deemed to be holier than others. Holy numbers include: 3, 4, 7, 10, 12, and 50. Each has semi-obvious reasons. 4 is the number of gospels and also represents the Earth...

How about universal number portability?

[duffbeer703]

I'd be more interested in number portability between companies, especially cell phone vendors?

For example, I've had a cell phone with SprintPCS for several years. Most everybody I know or do business with calls me on my Sprint number.

So if I want to switch to Verizon or Nextel or Cingular or Voicestream I lose my number. Plus, the cell phone is not listed in the phone book so people I don't talk to often will have trouble getting a hold of me.

Being able to xfer your number across company boundaries, even if it cost more money would be a worthwhile thing.

DNS link?

[imipak]

Someone commented in the earlier story about Passport security that "they'll probably tie it up with ENUM, which links DNS info to phone numbers." I subscribe to the cock-up theory of history - which is not to say that governments don't engage in conspiracies, but rather that they tend to cock it up when they do. The possibilities for cockups with this seem rather immense, though... and what on earth will the "UN Black Helicopters / CIA / They're Tryin' to Take Our God-given right to carry guns away / It's the End Times" brigade make of it? Not that they need an excuse, but it seems silly to give them free *cough* ammunition...

Nameber - Ira Levin's This Perfect Day

[Speare]

In Ira Levin's sci-fi novel, This Perfect Day, everyone was genetically homogenized, and was known by a nameber . They hailed a government run by Uni, a massive computer.

• "Listen, Li RM35M26J449988WXYZ," Papa Jan said. "Listen. I'm going to tell you something fantastic, incredible. In my day--are you listening?--in my day there were
• over twenty different names for boys alone! Would you believe it? Love of Family, it's the truth. There was 'Jan,' and 'John,' and 'Amu,' and 'Lev.' 'Higa,' and 'Mike'! 'Tonio'! And in my father's time there were even more, maybe forty or fifty! Isn't that ridiculous? All those different names when members themselves are exactly the same and interchangeable? Isn't that the silliest thing you ever heard of?"

  And Chip nodded, confused, feeling that Papa Jan meant the opposite, that somehow it wasn't silly and ridiculous to have forty or fifty different names for boys alone.

  "Look at them!" Papa Jan said, taking Chip's hand and walking on with him--through Unity Park to the Wei's Birthday parade. "Exactly the same! Isn't it marvelous? Hair the same; boys, girls, all the same. Like peas in a pod. Isn't it fine? Isn't it top speed?"

Thank you. No, Thank Uni. A pretty decent "hero rebels against the system" kind of story, worth the read. Written in 1969.

Re:Nameber - Ira Levin's This Perfect Day

[FFFish]

Heck, IIRC, the Danish government already requires you to choose from a limited selection of children's names. You *can not* just name your kid whateverthehell you want: it must be a government-sanctioned name...

Weird.

Re:Nameber - Ira Levin's This Perfect Day

[Amanset]

I believe it is France, not Denmark and it is still scary but not *quite* as scary. I did find this link:

"Battles over children's names are nothing new in France. Although French parents are free to pick their children's first names, local officials can challenge the names after the filing of the birth certificate."

Re:Nameber - Ira Levin's This Perfect Day

[gorilla]

Several european countries have restrictions on what you can call kids. I suspect that Zowie Bowie, Heavenly Hirrani Tigerlily, and other kids with silly names probably would appreciate it. BTW, Zowie Bowie now prefers to be called Joe.

My Mother...

[philovivero]

... recalls when the United States government propaganda pointed out that the Soviet Union "gives every citizen a number that identifies them." Of course, it was implied that the United States was better than such a totalitarian regime that treats its citizens like sheep or automatons.

Sigh.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Multiple Identities

[ArticulateArne]

This could be nifty, but one of the great parts of modern technology is being able to use different means of access to regulate people's contact with you. The easiest example, of course, is spam. I have about six different email addresses that I use on a regular basis, and the email address I give to a person or website is based on how I want them to be able to contact me. I have a Hotmail box entirely for the purpose of collecting spam (and boy, does it do a good job). That's the only thing it does, and that's the address that I give out on any website (and any other spam-generating contexts), so I know that anything that comes into there was not requested.

I also have a cell phone, and I'm very careful with whom I give that number. There are some people that I absolutely want to have it; there are other people that, under no circumstances, would I want them to have it. It's the same at work. I give some people my direct desk extension, and I send some people through the secretary. Having a universal access number like that could cause no end of grief for people, and eliminate one of the great ways of escaping contact when that's necessary.

Also, IIRC (and I'm sorry, but I don't feel like checking this out), I thought that originally it was illegal to use a SSN to track anything other than Social Security. Of course, people use it for everything now, but I'm not so sure that's a good idea.

My $.02

Re:Multiple Identities

[dragons_flight]

It may have changed some time in the last decade, but the rule regarding use of the SSN used to go something like this:

1. You must present it when required by approved government organizations.
2. You may refuse to reveal your SSN to any business or institution which is not an approved government organization (w/ a few exceptions for those that will do direct transactions with approved gov. organization on your behalf; e.g. tax reporting, Medicare).
3. Any business may, without penalty, decline to provide service to individuals who do not reveal their SSN.

As you might imagine this leads to some fantastic catch-22's where one gets to decide between secrecy or getting served. For instance to the best of my knowledge all credit card companies require SSNs in order to recieve a card.

The basic issue is that SSNs make a fantastic unique identifier in databases and thus everyone wants to use them that way, since they won't be duplicated by any other US citizen. I can only guess that this time around they figure unique identifiers are so useful that they aren't even making the pretense of limiting their use.

Read the RFC, See the Movie...

[Detritus]

http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2916.txt

For people who like facts with their uninformed speculation.

We doan' need no stinkin' DNS... 216.211.192.203

[crovira]

Now when I come at you with a cattle prod later and threaten your testicles with its repeated and forceful application, I'm sure you'll remember my site's IP address.

Then again, it could just be a made up number. But you won't care either way. You'll be too busy "moo"ing for me.

How about just using my fuckin' finger-prints? (And the differences in skin temperature between the different parts of the print?)

Security based on what can be counterfeited is no security at all. Base it on something existential and you might have a chance.

Who's the fuckin' imbecile of a post-pubescent, pre-menopausal, unpreoccupied, '4F', tea-totaling bitch who came up with that shit.

I know people who can't remember if its their third or fourth martini. A four didit PIN number at the ATM dictates whether they buy or bum another round.

11 digits... Yeah right.

Re:It isn't a US govt scheme ...bah!

[BierGuzzl]

It's no gov't scheme, it's the devil, I tell you... it's Satan! Watch out, do-gooders.... you're gonna be Numbered and you're all going to hell!

This already exists

[Gerv]

As soon as countries standardise on 00 as the international access code (and that's happening) then we will have a global unique numbering system administered by countries. It's called the phone system.

In the UK, we can already get "personal numbers" which you can have redirected to wherever you are. There's no reason why companies in other countries can't do the same thing.

That gives you all the benefits of unique personal numbering without many of the SSN/Big Brother/Brave New World/buzzword-X privacy concerns.

Gerv

Imagine the spam!

[Perianwyr Stormcrow]

Think of this like ICQ numbers. If you want to spam people, you can just send to consecutive numbers- you're guaranteed a hit.

IPs get this treatment regularly (think portscans) but an IP is just a gateway to services, not actual communication.

This sort of numbering is a Bad Thing, even beyond the obvious Mark of the Beast problems.

Re:Imagine the spam!

[dragons_flight]

While I'm not big on encouraging universal identifiers, there is an obvious way to limit the impact of this kind of attack.

Pick a really large domain of potential numbers and then assign them randomly. There are ~6 billion people, so use 16 or 20 digit numbers so only one number in a million or 10 billion is actually active. Alternatively 8 random english characters is enough for 6 billion people, so use 12 character sequences and you are pretty safe from someone randomly hitting one.

Of course this is security be obsurcity which has only limited value when it's your only line of defense, and you pay for it with increasingly more complicated things to remember.

Re:Imagine the spam!

[aozilla]

If you want to spam people, you can just send to consecutive numbers- you're guaranteed a hit.

This is worth it to me for the convenience of being able to set up allow lists for my friends without worrying about my friends switching from AOL to erols. Right now that's the biggest thing stopping me from putting unsolicited email into the big "probably spam" folder.

Re:Imagine the spam!

[onion2k]

Why do slashdotters always immediately assume the negative? Using a UID it'd be much easier to stop spam, and much easier for government/police to trace who sent you what, and whether it was unsolicited. While you're right that it'd make spambombing easier, it'd also make stopping spam easier.

And yet another useless golden goose hits the net!

[BierGuzzl]

Just think! We'd have yet another registrar for the Personal Name system! You'd have to coordinate it with vital statistics, and for those too poor to get their own personal name, we'd let them use a sub-personal name for free. Oh meegosh.

Were talkin' the Post Office here. Not ...

[crovira]

I have moved three times in five years, and coincidentally changed jobs just as often (different months,) and kept the same mailing address and phone number all this time by using a mail box service and a cell phone.

I'm mobile and its my responsibility to pick up my mail and amswer my phone. Its not the phone company's, or the bank's, or my 401k's or the government's hassle where I am, just as long as they can get in touch with me.

You want to move around, go ahead and move around but leave a stable point of reference and you'll have no problems with anybody.

Re:Were talkin' the Post Office here. Not ...

[hearingaid]

You've moved three times in five years. You're mobile?

I'm guessing you're still in the same city, since you've kept the same PO box and area code.

In the past five years, I've moved 11 times (12 times if you count the move I made right about this time five years ago) between 8 different addresses. Plus there was the month I spent travelling a couple years back.

Those 8 addresses include cities on both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

I know exactly what Canada Post's change of address forms look like. Up here, we get six months of mail forwarding to the new address. It's usually been good enough.

I have kept the same email addresses (well most of them). I have of course added a few.

I don't have a cellphone. My last three moves have all been within Ontario so the fact that I've changed area codes each time hasn't mattered: Bell happily forwards my phone calls. I used mass emails and icqs for most of my other phone number changes.

As for jobs, I've held a total of three during this time as well. wow, I'm getting old. the year before, I was knocking back four at once at one point. must be slowing down. :)

You're not mobile, buddy. You're just a guy who moves every so often.

666@everybody.us

[PRickard]

"And he provides that no one will be able to buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name." (Rev. 13:17)

Anyone else suspect maybe this is just a big scheme to use the .us TLD for something besides low-rent local government Web sites? I bet the Postal Service is connected to this idea somehow, if it's for real.

What is wrong with authors...

[A Commentor]

From the article...

There are 100 thousand million potential individual combinations available if all digits between 0 and 9 are employed. It is likely, however, that each country would administer its own numbers and use its own area and country codes, which could further increase the possible combinations.

Just say, 100 Billion combinations...

And in the second part of the paragraph... if each country uses it's own area codes, it would decrease, not increase the combinations...

Re:What is wrong with authors...

[Amanset]

A little used word in the UK is milliard meaning one thousand million. It appears in quite a lot of european languages (examples: Milliard in French and "Miljard" in Swedish).

The Prisoner

[fishbonez]

Prisoner: "Where am I?"

Number Two: "In the Village."

Prisoner: "Who are you?"

Number Two: "The new Number Two."

Prisoner: "Who is Number One?"

Number Two: "You are."

Prisoner: "What do you want?"

Number Two: "Information."

Prisoner: "Well, you won't get it!"

Number Two: "By hook or by crook, we will."

Prisoner: "I am not a number, I am a free man."

Number Two: (laughs)

Someone had to post it. I figure since I used to actually watch "The Prisoner" it's not entirely out of line. First it starts with the "Dr. Who". Next think you know you're watching "The Prisoner" and "The Avengers". That damn anglophilic PBS.

Re:SS number

[guinsu]

My bank's online account system makes me use my SSN as an account name.

666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Louis Savain]

Here is wisdom. Let him that has understanding count the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred threescore and six.

Ok. Just for fun. There are two individuals mentioned in that passage:

Individual #1. He that has understanding and is to count the number of the beast.

Individual #2. The beast.

Now which one of those two individuals is the last sentence refering to? Note that the reader is apparently warned from the beginning that it takes wisdom to understand the sentence. Maybe everybody is wrong about the number of the beast. Which would make sense considering that the book of revelation claims that almost everybody is deceived by the beast.

If you believe in this stuff about 666 being the number of the beast, why do you think that you are not one of the deceived ones? And if the number is given to you, why would the author of the passage ask you to calculate it? Just a thought. Move along now.

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Squeeze Truck]

Now which one of those two individuals is the last sentence refering to?

Just for *more* fun, here is the same passage from the Vulgate Bible. (I know it's not the original, but I understand the King James is mainly translated from the Vulgate.) Maybe this will help clarify whom is being referred to:

16. et faciet omnes pusillos et magnos et divites et pauperes et liberos et servos habere caracter in dextera manu aut in frontibus suis

17. et ne quis possit emere aut vendere nisi qui habet caracter nomen bestiae aut numerum nominis eius

18. hic sapientia est qui habet intellectum conputet numerum bestiae numerus enim hominis est et numerus eius est sescenti sexaginta sex

It seems to me that "sescenti sexaginta sex" refers to the beast here.

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[__aaahtg7394]

"Now which one of those two individuals is the last sentence refering to?"

The original (or, as close to the original as i have available, if you're of that line of htinking) Greek is clear that the number being calculated is associated with the calculatee, not the calculator. you're just used to english, which is a shitty language for this sort of thing, if i may say so. =)

Warning: bad romanization below, missing accents, with breathings:

`Wde `n sophia estiv. `o exwv vouv psnphisatw tov 'apithmov tou phnpiou, 'arithmos yar 'avthrwpou 'estiv, kai `o 'arithmos 'autou "`exakosioi `exnkovta `ex".

"Here is wisdom. The one having understanding, let him calculate the number(-ou) of the beast, for it(-ou) is the number of a man, and the it(-ou) is six hundred sixty six."

and you calculate someone's number by doing magic number games with the letters of their name (i think it's a holdover from the whole letters-as-numbers thing in hebrew, but i really don't know. it's been a long time since we covered revelation in sunday school... keep in mind i haven't been to church in 3 or 4 years now)

things i thought i would never post to /.: translations from the Greek NT...

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Louis Savain]

The original (or, as close to the original as i have available, if you're of that line of htinking) Greek is clear that the number being calculated is associated with the calculatee, not the calculator.

Thanks for that informative post. If I understand what you wrote correctly, the part translated "and his number is..." in English should have been "and it is..."

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Malcontent]

"My grandfather said the number 666 means nothing to him. He said that if you focus on the number you lose sight of the bigger picture, the fact that the work of the devil is all about."

What I find absolutely facinating about christians is that they are so willing to dismiss (or minimize) any passage in the bible they don't like. If OTOH you dare to dismiss a passage they are fond of then they get all over your case. It seems to me if you have the right to ignore any part of the bible then I have the right to ignore part I don't like either.

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[ConsumedByTV]

We call them cafeteria christians.

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[yellowstone]

6^6 = 46,656
46,656^6 = 10,314,424,798,490,535,546,171,949,056
(that)^6 = 1.2041208676482351082020900568573e+168 (169 digits)

Unlike most (all?) of the other aritmetic operators (which associate left-to-right), the exponential operator associates right-to-left.

Thus, 6^6^6 = 6^(6^6) = 6^46,656 = 2.65e36305

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Malcontent]

"And besides, there's some discussion on whether the actual number is "666" versus 6^6^6 (see post below about a 36,000 digit number) versus perhaps this being no more than a demonstration used for literary purposes. "

I just don't get it. God wrote the bible. God surely wrote down what he meant. God knows perfectly well what humans can understand and what they can't. Why would god choose to befuddle? Why would he choose obfuscate? Even worse why would he tell people "do what it says in this book" and then proceed to write a book full of contradictions, nonsense, and cryptic passages. How does he expect you to behave in a manner he chooses when he can't tell you what he want's in a clear and understandable manner.

If I was god and I was writing a book I would start by saying "you see you live on this round planet that goes around the sun" and then proceed to describe the solar system. Maybe I'd talk about math or atoms or calculus or geometry or anything but "kill the homosexuals and exile anybody who wears clothes made out of two different materials".
I find it facinating that the document god wrote for all his children contains not one piece of knowledge that was unavailable to the jews at the time. No mention of polar ice caps, planets, math, science, not even the freaking pyramids. What the hell kind of a instruction manual is that? What kind of a god writes a book that's so full of contradictions that one reader says "god is about love because he tells us to turn the other cheek" and the other says "god is about venagance because he tells us to kill them, kill their wives, kill their children, kill their animals and salt the earth so that not even their plants survive".

'Furthermore, "Chrisitans" are a wide and diverse group of people.'

No doubt about that. But to be a christian you have to believe in the bible. No sane person can believe in every single thing the bible says because the bible is full of vile and despicable acts. This sets up a congnitive dissonance in the mind of most devout christians. The casual ones simply say "it's OK to ignore certain parts of the bible" the devout ones are on the verge of mental disease.

Re:666. Whose Number Is It Anyway?

[Malcontent]

You know I read your post carefully but still it makes no sense to me.

1) if the old testemant is no longer valid then the ten commandments are no longer valid. The whole sabath thing is no longer valid.

2) God created everybody. The jews and their enemies. The idea that god wants to discourage the jews from killing by commanding them to commit genocide and unspeakable evil is just daffy. Besides which it didn't work! If that was gods plan it failed horribly. Not only did mankind not stop killing each other the jews themselves have killed and are continuing to kill hundreds of palestenians. This year alone more then 500 palestenians have been killed and appox three thousand wounded.

And finally I will go back to my original point (which you seem to be agreeing with somewhat). If you are allowed to pick and choose amongst the sections of the bible you like. If you are giving yourself the righ to ignore or "interpret" sections of the bible so that they make sense to you. Then you have to give everybody else the same right. You get to ignore chapter X verse Y and I get to ingnore Chapter A verse B. Same with interpretation. I get to interpret any section of the bible in a way that makes sense to me. It may make sense to you that God intended the jews to commit genocide but maybe it makes sense to me that God takes sides in human affairs and that he values the lives and wishes of jews more then he values the lives and wishes of other humans on the planet. Which makes more sense to you?

This will simplify spam programs

[Animats]

for (long long n=0; n99999999999; n++)
{ send_spam(n,text); }

How to avoid the problems of Gattacka

[quintessent]

By using this number, instead of having to steal your DNA and have it identified with all your personal info, they can just use the phone number you gave them. You know, to save costs and all that.

But did you notice?

[wirefarm]

for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six. (666)

The name of the contributor of the original article?

Damian Whitworth

That's right. DAMIAN

*Now* I've got the heebie-jeebies...

Jim in Tokyo

I reserve my number:

[quintessent]

34601

Re:I reserve my number:

[quintessent]

I wonder who will get 314159265358979. Lucky #@$(*$.

Re:I reserve my number:

[quintessent]

Had the song in my head, but then I started second guessing after I had already posted. Guess the second guess was right. Looks like you've got the number now. Oh well. Reminds me of that 18th century novel, where the family named one of their children Cain in honor of Adam's son that was killed. Of course, later they realized...

numbers vs words

[ukyoCE]

I have always preferred ICQ's "numbered users" scheme over AIM and e-mail having names. With ICQ you can always change your handle without getting and telling everyone a new number/name to reach you at. I've had so many e-mail address in the past 6 years--probably 3 or 4 per year, because I'm always changing ISPs. What I wouldn't give to have had a universal number this whole time, which I could forward to my mailbox at my current ISP.

The one thing, and people have mentioned this higher up, is preventing spam. My suggestion would be to require you to "authorize" other users to contact you. Once we all have PDAs this might be practical. You could also have a "request" sort of thing, like ICQ has...but then you would likely get inundated with "Request for authorization from: teensex00124134 free teen sex at www.teensex.com" sort of authorization messages. maybe if the requests would only show the number&name of the person/organization, rather than a spammable text message...

An old "Peanuts" comic strip

[dido]

I remember reading an old Peanuts comic strip (bless Charles Schulz's memory), where Charlie Brown and Lucy meet a kid whose name is '5'. He explains that his parents gave him and his sisters ('3' and '4') names as numbers as a protest of sorts. Then Charlie Brown muses that what if everyone had numbers for names, and thinks that he'd have 3.1416 as his name...

Just a silly thought...looks like your government is insisting that everyone have numbers for names. :)

more detailed articles

[bcrowell]

The LA Times has a much more detailed article. Can other people read this, or do I have a cookie that lets me read it because I'm a subscriber?

There's a lot of detailed technical info here.

You can ruin someone's life with an SSN.

[jcr]

One woman who was pissed off at her ex-husband filed a tax return in his name, saying that he had a few million in gambling winnings.

The man spent YEARS trying to get the IRS liens off his credit record, not to mention the trouble of trying to convince the IRS JBT's not to steal his house, car, bank accounts, etc.

I don't want the Federal government to have *any* records on individuals, unless they're government employees or convicts.

-jcr

Easy to safeguard against this

[heretic108]

I could see the system working well, and resisting spam, if the following safeguards are put in place
1) No message to be delivered to an ENUM unless it's from another ENUM
2) No interference with existing email addresses - allow these to keep being used
3) Allow ENUM users to set 'privacy policies' on their ENUM, including 'no unsolicited promotional material'. Sending spam to an ENUM in defiance of applicable policies to be a criminal offense.

Re:Easy to safeguard against this

[ichimunki]

To further this, there are already restrictions on sending unsolicited faxes, there are public registries which can be used to prevent unwanted solicitations over the phone, and theoretically someone who requests to be removed from a UCE list has to be.

So additional legislation in this area is largely unnecessary-- not to mention that I personally agree with it being a free speech issue. It's a hard line to draw. If we make a rule like "your email cannot contain a specific offer to sell something" then spammers will just be creative and use words that get around any sale offers. At some point on the grey scale, you get to where your friend can't send you an email invitation to go out to lunch because that is a commercial activity involving buying stuff.

I put this sort of legislation (anti-spam) in the same category as COPA and the DMCA. Too hard to be Constitutional to even bother with. What we don't need is more complex laws.

We need to educate users on email filtering and get them to realize that replying or even reading obvious spam are bad ideas (and thanks to Outlook all they have to do is open the email to be tagged as having read the email-- and if they click on a link in the email, they are being tracked as though the email were just another webpage). Spam must be useful to spammers because the public is not equipped to make it irrelevant. But, of course, those idiots from "Campus Crusade for Christ" are always on the street corners yelling or passing out their endless stream of tracts despite no result, too-- so maybe it's just one of those things we have to deal with.

Re:Easy to safeguard against this

[gnovos]

You forgot something. What happens to the famous people? Sure, Madonna could block MY ENUM account after my first few love-sick-stalker emails, but how does she expect to stop hundreds of millions of those?

Re:and it aint good!

[gilmae]

What could be more individual than a number? It not like there's more than one 123361.

Punctuation Marks?

[Louis Savain]

18. hic sapientia est qui habet intellectum conputet numerum bestiae numerus enim hominis est et numerus eius est sescenti sexaginta sex

It seems to me that "sescenti sexaginta sex" refers to the beast here.

The question is, who does "et numerus eius" refer to? And what happened to the original punctuation marks? I am pretty sure there were punctuation marks in the original Greek.

Re:Punctuation Marks?

[Louis Savain]

Don't you mean original Aramaeic?

No. AFAIK, the book of Revelations was written in Greek on the island of Patmos.

Re:This will never happen.

[Waffle Iron]

Oh, yeah! Those funny-mentalist Xtians are really powerful and influential! Why, thanks to them, evolution is not taught in the schools, there is prayer every day before class, abortion is illegal, every town square has a Xmas creche/manger scene, Xtians are depicted as wonderful people in the media, and atheists live in fear! Damn those influential funny-mentalists and their infuriating influence on government policy!

(sarcasm off)

Really, I don't know which is more stupid: pimply teenage geek morons posting their ignorant drivel on Slashdot, or the morons who mod them as "insightful"!

Well, all the things that you mention would come to pass within weeks if it weren't for the "pimply teenage geek morons" and other good people who work to keep the government relatively free from the grips of you underappreciated, misunderstood, uninfluential, unassuming, nonjudgemental, just-minding-your-own-business, not-into-witch-hunts-anymore folks.

McCarthy-ism/Christianity/Russians/numeric ID

[turbod]

First there is the reference in revelations, for those who believe, but if you don't, take a look at some facts.

Over and over again we are conditioned to believe that our government has our best interests in mind, and only wants to improve our convenience with ID systems, all the while gathering enormous amounts of data that is continuously generated and offered by the citizens of this nation, so they can better plan our cities, etc. But truth be known -- take a look back at RedWitchHunt days of our nation, and genetic purification -- all ID data usually does is allow someone to have a bit of data over on someone else. I know several Russians who were unfortunate to be here during those sad times. Their SSN numbers and linked nationality data were in fact used against them. You say it won't happen again? Whatever... say, I have some land down in Florida I'd like to sell ya... you are just the idi...errr... customer for this special land I have been looking for!

I guess as with all such schemes that deal with the ID of the average citizen, we have once again gotten comfortable with all the easy things that a hash function applied to database key can bring (be it hashed alphabetically on paper, molten silicon switches (tubes), or silicon die with metal on top). Government now believes we are ready to be ID'd with precision, and then additionally, easily located. What happens then when the wrong people get this data, sort of like McCarthy-ism? They know with absolute precision who you are, where you live, and all they have to do is key you into the global routing system (PING) and wham, they can drive the paddy wagon right to your door for easy, no-muss pickup. Say what you want about the wonders about ID technology, nothing about it turns me on. DNA is good enough, after all, the cops are not supposed to have easy jobs. They don't need to find me unless I performed a "crime against humanity" anyway.

So whatever.... if you want someone to know your every thought and move, then fine. Oh, I forgot, this is Richard Stallman's harem. You wouldn't understand, that just as with gun control, the very people who would be best ID'd and tracked are the very ones who will be the ones that stay under (or over) the system. When average people will figure this out instead of mewling in line for the latest public safety/super-duper-consumer convenience fad, then perhaps we will have a truly safe society where the line in the sand over privacy will be clearly drawn.

Additionally, I remember one poster endorsing the idea that a ID system that eliminated privacy would be the great equalizer. You, my son, are no more brilliant than the doorstop my cat knaws on nightly. There will always be those outside of the system, and anyone outside of the system and not subject to its laws, can dominate/play said system ot their sole advantage. Start using your brain, and quit thinking like a socialist. Any communal equalization system will end in failure. It always does, always will. I'm not sure what the blissful fascination with socialism is.... yeah, it looks good on paper, just like a dot com, but it sucks in real life.

I am now wearing a fire suit, and the halon is near. Bring it on!

Good-day to you,

TurboD

Implant more likely...

[wirefarm]

I remember reading about 10 years ago of a new technology that had a magnetic code that was implantable under the skin of an animal.
Initially, this was to be used for pets, to aid in recovery of lost animals.
At the time, I remember thinking that the next step would be to use them on soldiers, to eliminate the need for dog tags.
Eventually, it would be offered as a way of "Keeping Kids Safe" (tm) from abductors.
Eventually, everyone would be required to have one.
If I remember correctly, the implant was a series of magnetic wafers stacked with their polarity representing a binary code, all sealed in a glass or plastic capsule. Never wears out or needs a power source.
Cheers,
Jim in Tokyo

It's already happened...

[s390]

and it is called your Social Security Number. Needed for school registration, credit card accounts, drivers license, all kinds of various identifications.

Any US Citizens here _not_ have their SSNs memorized? Raise your hands. I didn't really think so. Guess what, to Government, you are a number!
(There was some lip-service given to "restricting use" and "preventing abuse" decades ago, but it's been forgotten for the utility of SSN identifiers.)

Too late!

AFAIK, it's not illegal in the US not to have a SSN: it's just illegal to attend most schools, serve in the military, or work for taxable wages without one.

Of course it's also possible to acquire _more_ numbers - if you're ever arrested, you'll get a case number (if convicted and sentenced to jail or prison, you'll get an inmate number too); if sued in civil court, you'll get a docket number, etc., etc. But those happen if you break the law or piss someone off...
But you have more numbers, even if you're an upstanding gentle citizen: drivers license, credit cards, bank accounts, phone number, cellphone, et al.

Bottom line, I think a case can be made for a UIN (Universal Identification Number), for two reasons: (1) it will simplify so many mundane things, from communications (live and electronic) through public records and commercial transactions, and (2) it will require revising almost all the record keeping systems extant, boosting the economy as a great successor to the Y2K convulsion, a good way to get 250,000+ programmers re-employed!

Re:It's already happened...

[UnknownSoldier]

> AFAIK, it's not illegal in the US not to have a SSN

Correct. There is NO law that REQUIRES a person to have one.

> it's just illegal to attend most schools, serve in the military, or work for taxable wages without one.

Show me the law where this is illegal.

Re:It's already happened...

[s390]

OK, try to enroll in college, open a bank account, get a drivers license. You _will_ need a SSN to do these things. Either that, or a good lawyer & $$$.

Re:It's already happened...

[ethereal]

It's mostly possible: http://www.cjmciver.org/free.shtml

Re:It's already happened...

[Kaiwen]

try to enroll in college, open a bank account, get a drivers license.

Enrolling in school and getting a DL, no problem. I simply told my school that I would not give them my SSN and they assigned me a different number.

The DL Bureau I just made up a number. The SS Administration cannot verify SSNs, so they have no way to confirm whether the number I supplied is correct. Ditto health insurers, credit card companies, etc. Per federal law no private organization can require you to provide your SSN, so the most they can do if you're caught is cancel your service.

Banks are a different issue, since they report earnings to the SSA.

Re:It's already happened...

[mpe]

I think a case can be made for a UIN (Universal Identification Number), for two reasons: (1) it will simplify so many mundane things, from communications (live and electronic) through public records and commercial transactions,

This may well be a bad thing. Since it can make identity theft easier. Indeed if you want to make things harder from this POV you need identification numbers with very specific uses. Rather than the current situation where driving licences have acquired all sorts of usage outside their original remit.

Wasn't this already tried? Q number or whatever?

[sinnergy]

I forget what it was called, but it was around about 3 or 4 years ago. Had to do with something called a "Q" number. It was almost exactly the same concept as this. Really kind of stupid, it never caught on (obviously).

Univerisal access to me is not a right for anyone. I prefer to have different channels of access through different means and paths as a method for me to filter out the folks I probably don't want to talk to versus the people that I'm more likely going to want to talk to.

The only thing this would do is make it easier to marketers to peddle crap to us. *grin*

23.5

[ConsumedByTV]

Yea, Everyone knows its 23!

Every Thing Is Fire!

Privacy concerns & Legal means of contact

[hillct]

This is aparently an IETF initiative rather than a U.S. government initiative, however, given government backing, will contact through this mechanism be considered a means of official notification? By this I mean will the government then be able to deliver IRS documents and notifications via Email, and have them be considered legal notifications? This seems to present the potential problem of adoption by older generations of Americans, who either might not own a computer or other device (maybe fax machine) on which to print delivered documents. This would give Kinkos a whole new revenue streams. 'What? you want to recieve your absentee ballot? The printing fee is $5'. While I can't say this is definately wrong or inappropriate, but it certainly leaves an uneasy feeling...

--CTH

Forget primary key 11-digit numbers. Look here

[KFury]

If all my contacts are going to be tied to one number, I'd much rather it work like this: I get assigned a unique id. I can use that unique ID and a system (government, public institution, whatever) that could use that key to generate any number of unique 20 digit numbers (okay, one billion 20 digit numbers) that I could use as one-time or at least one-user contacts.

For example, if my # was 1111-111-1111 I could take the unique ID 000000002-1111-111-1111, run it through this institutions encryption to create a scrambled, but unique, id (this has problems. There would only be one key in this system, and if it was comprimised, though it's only ever used by the intitution, then that would be a problem. It wouldn't even have to be a key, it could just be a relational table, but data compromising issues would still exist). I could give this ID out (at a bar, to an employer, whatever) and when the person used it, by phone, email, fax, whatever, it would get processed by the institution, decrypted, and would reveal the ID and the 'serial number'.

the benefit of this system is the person you give the card to has no way of knowing what your ID is, as it never appears in plaintext, and if you're tired of hearing from that person (or that # ends up on a spam list) you can simply refuse the serial number 000000002. They don't know what 20-digit number would decrypt to 000000003-1111-111-1111, so you're safe.

I could see business cards (and personal cards) with two parts, you detach it when you give it to someone and write the name of who you gave it to on the part you keep. that part has the serial number (000000002) on it so you can trace how someone 'got your number'.

ENUMs as relational pointers

[hyrdra]

As usual, those on slashdot have begun to open their privacy tantrum-mouths again before researching.

ENUMs will be aliases for other services (like e-mail, telephone services, etc.). Each service will require a type of authentication before it can get into the wrong hands. It's just basically a convience measure. Instead of giving all your info to the phone company to get service, you just give them your ENUM, they get your info with a public key issued for phone company service providers. So they have access only to that info which is required under those specific aliases.

If you think of an ENUM as a kind of relational ID in a database for all services, accounts, etc. you have, and only specific people having keys to access that information referenced to by your ENUM, you'll get the idea. So when you give an average citizen your ENUM, you can choose to enable them to have your phone number, etc. if you want. Or you can give them a NULL ENUM, which basically would serve as a number to track you in case you, say, pass a bad check (and would offer no information initially).

Re:ENUMs as relational pointers

[ErikTheRed]

...they get your info with a public key issued for phone company service providers

Oh, so only large corporations will be able to abuse it. That's cool.

Re:Cool Idea??? NOT.

[unitron]

But this thing is gonna be so long it'll have to be continued on the next forehead over!

Re:satan@isonfire.com

[Squeeze Truck]

No no no. He's talking about Satin, the fluffy Persian kitty of the Beast.

Why stop at people?

[aozilla]

I want a unique number for everything. Dogs, streets, cities, countries, schools, houses, cars, computers, words, phrases, commercials, tv stations, URLs... Everything, all with a GUID. Then when I do a search on Google for '"Nicole Kidman" naked' I can do a search for "293180921832 528347338338". Don't have to worry about different Nicole Kidmans, and don't have to worry about different meanings of the word naked.

Won't have to remember it...

[burris]

You won't have to memorize your number since it will be conveniently tattooed to the inside of your forearm.

burris
(blah blah Goodwin's Rule blah blah)

Does anyone else find this dehumanizing?

[Katravax]

I'm a programmer; I love numbers and the ease they lend to certain tasks. However, I find the thought of everything I am being represented by a number as dehumanizing as the switch from being called a "customer" to being called a "consumer."

We're not nameless and faceless; we're not a piece of data, even if we're represented by one in a database. But I think this will tip us just that much further to thinking of each other as somehow less than we are.

It's a PHONE NUMBER, dammit!

[hta]

Please READ RFC 2916.
I know that people are using your phone# as index into customer databases and all sorts of junk.
But this stuff has only ONE purpose:
Given a phone number (whether it is a real phone, an IP phone, or some other thing assigned a number, how can you find out how to call, fax or mail that number over the Internet?
That's ALL. All the other stuff is mainly speculation, FUD and bullshit.

Mod parent up!

[Malcontent]

True or not this is the funniest thing I have heard in a while.

Yes...or no...

[Dictator For Life]

Technically, the word transliterated as "'autou" is ambiguous. It is a pronoun that may have either a masculine or neuter referent, so context must determine which is in view (and there are both neuter and masculine possibilities in this particular sentence in the Greek).

However, it's basically clear from the context that the referent is in fact the beast (so it's neuter in Greek).

On a more significant level: this number has been over-hyped by the devotees of Hal Lindsey, as though it referred to someone who has yet to appear in human history. This turns out not to be the case. It's historically likely that the beast was actually a reference to Nero (or else the Roman Empire itself).

Don't buy Hal Lindsey's snake oil.

Re:Yes...or no...

[Louis Savain]

Technically, the word transliterated as "'autou" is ambiguous.

Well, it seems like I may be back to my original interpretation.

However, it's basically clear from the context that the referent is in fact the beast (so it's neuter in Greek).

I am not so sure about that. Logically speaking, when one is asked to calculate a result, the result is not given. What would be the point?

Having said that, I envy you people's grasp of the NT Greek language. I find it to be a fascinating field, not unlike encryption but much more interesting because it deals with history. Thanks to all of you for your input.

P.S. Which of the following alternatives would you guys recommend as the best way to become reasonably proficient in ancient Greek in a short time? A university course or self-study using a good text book?

Re:Yes...or no...

[Louis Savain]

Personally, I'd recommend a university course, if you can find a good professor and a relatively intelligent class. If you've studied a foreign language, that will be very helpful, especially with the grammar.

Arne, thanks for the advice and your help in transliterating from NT Greek. I really appreciate your informed posts.

"Unique Number Fashion Accessory Ear Rings"?

[erroneus]

Just a thought, but in conjuction with this objously brilliant idea, why not create Unique Number Fashion Accessory Ear Rings (UNFAER). Before you dismiss the idea as a troll, hear me out!

My vision on this is a step above the average! It could be fitted with an electronic system that guaranteed the uniqueness. It would work by emitting a small electronic signal to be picked up by a global array of satelites to be known as Binary Imaging Grid for the Electronic Navigational Devices (BIG.END). This feature would not only be used to detect fraudulent misuse of your personal UNFAER, but also the heat signature of any person not wearing one so that we can determine exactly who is being unfashionable and where they are at any given time and place!

So what do ya'll think?

A few more

[Salsaman]

1/666

Reciprocal of the Beast.

666B Baker Street

Address of Sherlock Beast

999

Beast in the mirror

666A

The other neighbour of the Beast

666.666666666...

The recurring number of the Beast

66

The mini Beast

800-666

Free phone number of the Beast

Stupid idea...

[seldolivaw]

Just make e-mail addresses work for *everything* -- if you contact an e-mail address using a voice protocol, your phone rings, if you contact using an e-mail protocol, your mailbox gets filled. This is not hard to implement, and text e-mail addresses (a) already exist and (b) are easier to remember. Of course, this does mean yet another thing dependent on the DNS system... :-)

Re:Author needs a math lesson.

[Old Wolf]

Maybe it did 30 years ago; everybody uses the American terms now.

In Sweden we have this.

[patrixx]

It's called person-number. It's easy to remember since it's your birth date plus four digits YYMMDD-NNNN like 700516-4953. The first three last digits is a birth number between 001 - 999 that is odd for boys and even for girls. The last digit is a modulo 10 checksum - add the first nine digits and subtract the last digit of the result from 10 to get it. Like 7+0+0+5+1+6+4+9+5 = 37. And 10 -7 = 3.

We've had this system since 1947. The checksum digit was added 1967. When you are born or immigrate to Sweden you receive a person-number and it never canges (except if you get 100+)

This is of course convinient to use in databases, and every public record uses them, it is also very, very easy to combine different databases since this number is a uniqe primary key. This of course is a privacy issue. For eg the police can take their database and combine it with the immigrant office records, and the hospitals records and the...you get it.

You might think there would be problems with the ammount of numbers. There have been cases when people have received an existing person-number, but it's because of human error, since the numbers are plenty. At least for this country (8 million). All that is required is that babies born on the same day get different birth numbers. When you, or if rather, you pass one hundered years the minus sign is changed to a plus sign like 700516+4953 to avoid that new born babies are confused with you.
But yes, old and dead people have received samples of babie dipers etc in the mail. Not all systems are perfect ;-) It's the same as the millennium bug problem.

/Patrik, Sweden

Object IDentifiers - OIDs

[Colin Smith]

http://www.alvestrand.no/objectid/

This is a better scheme!

[marcelvdb]

Why not extending our current scheme?

The email system uses the @ (at) sign to designate people "at" a certain logical location

john.doe@company.com
[john.doe AT Company.com]

why not extend this with

john.doe@company.com#phone or
john.doe@company.com#fax
john.doe@company.com#icq
john.doe@company.com#cellphone
john.doe@company.com#postal
john.doe@comapny.com#anymeans
etc.

[John Doe AT Company.com BY phone]
[John Doe AT Company.com BY fax]
etc.

We have to figure out a convenient character for the "BY" part. I would certainly welcome this scheme and it seems pretty straighforward to integrate in the current scheme of communication.

I reserve mine too...

[FunkyChild]

1337 :)

The difference between username & password

[Justin Cave]

The main problem with the social security numbers being used as identifiers is that far too many places treat it as both a username & a password. They assume, wrongly, that only you know your SSN, so they allow people to identify and authenticate themselves with a single number. If we moved to a system where everyone had a unique identifier that was public knowledge, companies would use it solely as an identifier, not as a means of authentication. That can only be a good thing.

SIN number. (Single Indentification Number)

[neo]

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=81707& lastnode_id=81706

Marking your hand

[dschuetz]

And he causeth all ... to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads

Interestingly enough, this is one of the few remaining strong superstitions I hold. Whenever I'm somewhere and they need to stamp my hand for something, they invariably want to stamp my right hand. Because this passage freaked the shit out of me back in junior high school, I always hold out my left, instead. It's amazing (and very annoying) how these people can't handle that someone might want the other hand stamped.

One of these days, if I'm sufficiently annoyed, I'll just start quoting the verse in a loud voice, shouting religious discrimination, and see what happens. Might help that I'm in a relatively conservative state, too. :)

Re:Limited serial numbers

[KFury]

I'd disagree... Sure, one billion contacts might not be enough (false constraints are bad) but combining both would require computation at time of exchange... I suppose you could do it with a palmpilot, but it's not as convenient as just having a number...

As for the 'obvious problem', I still don't see it. Even if you had your ID tattooed to your forehead, it wouldn't do anyone any good, since it would be that ID plus a PIN or passphrase that would get you access to your account (and your repository of a billion contact #s) with the 'distribution institution'. Just having the number wouldn't do a spoofer any good...

Old idea

[roman_mir]

From the article: Patrik Falstrom, an engineer at the computer giant Cisco Systems Inc, came up with the idea.

Guess what, it is a very old idea. Examples of this idea can be easily found in sci-fi such as Star Treck, but forget that, just read Isaac Asimov's Multivac series.... everyone was recognized by their unique identification number, so computer could run their lives. Sounds great, doesn't it?

I am not a number, I am a free man!

[cryptochrome]

n/t

Don't hate me because my views differ...

[cavemanf16]

Of course I'll get modded down for this, it goes against most slashdotter's opinions, *gasp*! But I don't really care. I'm going to give you a little bit of info here everyone, and you'll hate me for it, until it comes true of course, at which point you'll really hate me anyways:

The Bible! *Another gasp!* Since most of the anti-Christian zealots are now listening: What better reason to require having the 'Mark of the Beast' imprinted on everyone's head and hand? You don't want you number stolen, so the only way to safeguard against that with any pretty reasonable protection would be to have it tattooed, chip implanted, or whatever on two places on your body that are important for everyday life. IE - your head and your hand. Scan everyone's hand at the checkout line, just like those stupid supermarket Saver! cards that are around these days, and you can verify if the person is who they claim to be or not. Plus, you get big savings! (Not to mention the fact that the supermarkets just hike the prices for everything that's "on sale" using their Saver! cards so that anyone who doesn't have 'the card' gets screwed.)

Now look, I won't take part in any universal numbering scheme that requires me to place said number in or on my person (in a permanant fashion, such as a tattoo or embedded chip), but if you people want to, be my guest. I'm just going on the record as saying: "The Bible tells us not to," and it does so because it's just a bad idea, for one thing. The rules and laws contained in the Bible are not to keep us repressed, they're to keep us from harming ourselves, just like parents discipline their kids to keep them from harming themselves. It just so happens that God knows everything, therefore He knows everything that could harm us, even if it seems fun or 'beneficial' at the moment.

Let the flames begin...

Re:ICQ

[DeadSea]

On April fools day a friend of mine got on my computer and swapped the names of many of people on my ICQ list. He swapped himself with my girlfriend and started sending me notes from her. They seemed a bit strange, but hey.

I didn't really catch on until I got a note from my mother that said "Yo, what's up beeyatch?"

It is easy to wrap social engineering around unique IDs. Look at the "The real xxx has slashdot ID number yyy" that people put in their sigs.

You Crazy Americans and your Unique Identifiers

[Frosty26]

You do realize that not all modern democratic nations require that all of its citizens be identified by a unique number? In fact there are many that would argue that a free and democratic society must not force such a system on its citizens.

Americans seem to have grown so used to having "unique" number stamped onto your arm at birth that you assume that it is necessary. Then you wonder why all of you can have your indentities stolen by anyone with $5 and an internet account.

In Canada for instance everyone over 12 has a SIN or social insurance number issued to them. However the use of the SIN as part of an identification system is severely restricted. Further the number itself is not considered unique. In fact it is possible, even in a relatively small group(say 10,000 people) for this number to collide.

No company can require you to provide your SIN for any purpose, including credit card companies or apartment rental companies etc. Nor can they use it to uniquely identify you.

There are a few specific exceptions.

Basically the only purposes for which you must provide your SIN is where the recipient has responsibilities to Canada Customs and Revenue Agency(CCRA), Canada's IRS. For example your employer or other agent for which you will have income. For example an investment bank where interest income will be returned will require a SIN to report income to the CCRA. In this case the number must be only used for this purpose, not for indentification (ie not as a unique key) and must be destroyed upon termination of your relationship (ie you move to a new job).

See the Privacy Comission of Canada's web site for more information.

Even the CCRA does not use your SIN as an standalone identifier. You see the CCRA has learned that in a database you can use multiple DB columns to create a unique id. So in fact your identity is determined by multiple values.

So in Canada you get the benefits of being able to identify someone for tax purposes without all of the danger and flaws in a single "unique" number. A number which even in the US is aparently not all that unique if you read some of the posts.

Now the US government wants to issue a unique number for phone, e-mail and fax?

You americans are crazy.

Re:You Crazy Americans and your Unique Identifiers

[Dr. Sp0ng]

No company can require you to provide your SIN for any purpose, including credit card companies or apartment rental companies etc. Nor can they use it to uniquely identify you.

It's severely restricted in the US as well, but nobody seems to realize this, so companies can get away with asking for it. IIRC it's restricted to banks and employers (both of whom need it for tax purposes).

But I agree with your basic point that we Americans are crazy :\

Re:Oh please!

[Zeinfeld]

It is also a cultural and historical city (country even) People like Goethe or Victor Hugo and William Turner enjoyed Luxembourg.

My ancestor, George Gordon (Lord Byron) enjoyed a significant fraction of the population of Geneva and Rome repeatedly. However even he never managed to enjoy an entire country.

It's an example of crypto to avoid censorship

[Ungrounded Lightning]

This is an example of a number game called geometria. The Hebrews (and here the early Christians) would take a word and play with its numerical value to show hidden meanings in the word. ...

It's also an example of using hidden encrypted information to avoid censorship.

The Roman Empire had strong censorship of criticism of its officials' actions. Death penalty for inciting revolt against the Empire. Of course the official making the call was usually the one criticized, since he'd be the one running things locally and annoying people.

But Rome had a big thing about allowing the subject people their religions, to reduce the incentive to revolt. (That's why "Carthage Must Be Destroyed!" - due in large part to their baby-roasting cult - took so long to get through the Senate.) So religious tracts could be published without restriction.

So a large amount of anti-Roman propaganda and organizational literature was disguised as religious tracts, with well-known codes, such as local-culture referances and local-language puns and rhymes, used for the encryption. The Hebrews were among the big users of this technique and a lot of their work still survives. Revalations is a typical example of the form, criticizing a Roman general, which just happens to have been disguised well enough that it made it into the Christian canon. (I don't recall which general. But it's well known in anthropological circles and the rest of the text matches what he was up to at the time.)

The "Number of the Beast" is how the Hebrew radicals identified the person being discussed. They already had this hashing function for other uses: Replace each letter with its cabalistic value and add the result. So they could identify the person by using "The Number of his Name". To see who they were talking about, apply the function to the names of each of the well-known officials in the area at the time and look for a match.

Re:Vanity Numbers

[hearingaid]

Someone might not, but pizza joints definitely would.

They already pay more for numbers like 310-2222 and so on.

Re:It's a message, like any other.

[Malcontent]

" Hello. My name is Doug."

Hi Doug.
"There are many other posts on slashdot, just as there are many chapters in the bible."

Last I checked God was not posting on slashdot. Are you saying that the word of God is no different then posts on slashdot. I find it very strange that you would equate the bible with slashdot. Most absurd.

"Within each chapter, as within each post, there are verses that are simply there to hold it together--and which can be toned down as not important for whole message. "

This is part I don't understand. All of it is god's word. All of it was written by god. Why would god write irrelevant words? why would you ignore any sentence uttered by god? Even worse why would you take one sentence and pretend that it does not say what it does. I'll give you an example.

In the bible (leviticus I think) it says that "if a man sleeps with another man they should both be killed" (not an exact quote look it up). Now many people point at this sentence and say "see god says homosexuality is a sin". No god does not say that. God says in plain language that the punishment for homosexuality is death. Why aren't the christians who are against homosexuality demanding that homosexuals be put to death? This is a very important question. If you can look at this sentence and say to me "well god didn't really mean that" then I can point at any passage and say "he didn't mean that". If you say "it doesn't count because it's the old testemant" then I can say "the ten commandmends don't count because they are in the old testament". Do you see where I am coming from here. The minute you give yourself the right to ignore, minimize or choose to interpret any way you want any passage in the bible you give me the exact same right.

Maybe you will go to hell for not killing homosexuals have you thought about that? How dare you ignore the word of god.

One little problem...

[fm6]

Oh great, a public LDAP server with everybody's name in it. Talk about a spammers wet dream!!!

Re:It's a message, like any other.

[Malcontent]

"God would write irrelevant words for the same reason that you our I would."

You are presuming that God is just like a human. That he has the same limitations as humans and the same tendencies as humans do. God is omnipotent. If anybody has the power to express his desires he does.

"Sure. Leviticus 18:22 and 20:33. Both of which are translated many different ways--and both of which can give a different message entirely from a hebrew perspective. "

If this is true then it's a horrible failure of God. God knew that people would be trying to follow his will for centuries (he alone knows how long). He knew/knows/willknow the future and knew the languages that would be prevelant in the future. His inability to express his desires in a format understandable by everybody at every time speaks volumes to me.

"Take a look at Ruth 1:16-17 and 2:10-11, which describe Ruth's close friendship with Naomi-"

Once again he could have just come out and said it. He could have but he chose to be coy instead. I wonder why.

"Or, if you'd like, start reading at the Ten Comandments and keep going--there are a lot of laws that simply aren't followed anymore. "

That;s most likely because it's in the old testemant. I have been told that the old testemant was supplanted by the new testament (that's why christians don't call for excution of homosexuals). And besides Christ offers forgiveness of all sins so it makes no sense even have ten commandments.

Learning Greek

[Dictator For Life]

Which of the following alternatives would you guys recommend as the best way to become reasonably proficient in ancient Greek in a short time? A university course or self-study using a good text book?

I think you can learn it yourself adequately well, using a good book (like, for instance, Machen's New Testament Greek for Beginners - if you're interested in the Koine Greek used in the New Testament; I have no recommendation for Classical Greek). Taking it at a university gets you certification ("I took a class on this") but little else, and it's not terribly relevant unless you're seeking further certification associated with the language (of course, there's always the discipline associated with taking a class that should not be ignored, either...). I took it in school, but I think that the texts available are more than adequate for the average man's casual reading of Greek.

I apologize for the delay in replying (you may not even read this... :-), but I hope it may be helpful.