On The State of Wireless

There's a short piece on Mindjack about the state of wireless. Actually, the piece is a minireview of a piece that Nicholas Carroll produced at Hastings Research. Yes, it's a PDF, and yes, it costs money. Having read through it, it's also totally worth it, especially if you are an organization that does basically anything with wireless.

Comments

Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Fourth post?

Slow news day...

[Anonymous Coward]

...... today is a slow news day....

CmdrTaco is definitely overweight

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah.

shame on you Hemos

[ReidMaynard]

I bet you get $0.000000000001 for ever hit

this is worse than msnbc's 'browser lockdown'

I'm boycotting...and no, it's not just cuz I'm cheap :-P

Any Truth to this? I'd like some editor comments.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just found this [slashdot.org] [slashdot.org] at the Slashdot Privacy Watch [slashdot.org] [slashdot.org] page. This article (and the others posted by Slashdot Privacy Watch) present some seriously scary possibilities. I'm posting this in order to have your comments, CmdrTaco.

What is the Slashdot Customer Profile?

Slashdot is owned by VA Linux, and VA Linux is a for-profit Corporation. This means that, like other corporations, Slashdot must maintain a customer profile for every user (yes, even you Anonymous Cowards!). These customer profiles are kept in Slashdot's master MySQL database, which is archived on a frequent basis to preserve VA Linux's valuable Intellectual Property rights to its' customer information. The Customer Profile contains many fields, such as the email address you used to register your Slashdot account. In addition, it contains these fields [slashdot.org] [slashdot.org] which are accessed in users.pl [slashcode.com] [slashcode.com], line 1898.

They're Tracking WHAT?

You may have noticed that the Customer Profile contains a field called $iplist. You're not dreaming, this is a list of every IP address anyone has used to access Slasdot - ever. Slashdot has a perfectly legitimate reason [slashdot.org] [slashdot.org] for maintaining these detailed records on every customer. However, while every Slashdot user understands that the privacy of each Slashdot user is paramount to the current management of Slashdot, we must also understand that Slashdot is property, and that it has been bought - and sold - before. Therefore we must not consider the implication of the existence of Slashdot Customer Profiling under the existing management, but rather the implications under any future management.

Who Would Want my IP?

Let's assume, for the sake of argument only, that VA Linux decides to sell Slashdot to DoubleClick [doubleclick.com] [doubleclick.com] in order to boost its' short-term cash supply. Doubeclick would be looking at Slashdot mainly as an Intellectual Property asset, and its' customer database as the primary portion of that asset (because Slaschode is GPL'd). How, then, can VA Linux maximize the resale value of Slashdot's Intellectual Property assets? By tracking every possible piece of information. The list of IP addresses used by every Slashdot user, reverse-correlated by email, would provide a very lucrative marketing tool to a would-be buyer of Slashdot. Doubleclick could use this Intellectual Property to:

• Correlate web hits to member sites by IP address, sending an email to every Slashdot user who visits a target site.
• Correlate web hits by IP address and present customized content to each Slashdot user who visits a target site, for instance: "Welcome to Superdomains.com, Slashdot user Jamie!"
  
  

It is easy to see why recording the IP profiles of every Slashdot customer maximizes the value of the Slashdot Customer Database. The question is, should you be given the option to opt-out?

Last time I posted this, I was immediately censored. Please distribute this and other Slashdot Privacy Watch publications extensively until CmdrTaco responds satisfactorily.

How to make the world a better place

[Anonymous Coward]

Suck Satan's cock.

I tried it, and it works!

Re:Wireless is definately the way forward.

[Anonymous Coward]

t be clear dat wireless be goin' t'be da damn next big-ass wahtahmellun. Whateva ' Nicholas Negroponte says about 3G, it gots'ta snatch off, and da damn consuma' gots'ta wants' it. Imagine bein' able t'watch "Star Trek - TNG" on yo' mobile phone. Right On!

De real problem wid wireless at da damn moment be security. Slap mah fro! WEP notwidstandin', it be still far t'easy t'take some 802.11b equipped laptop outside some large co'po'ashun, and t'gain acess t'its netwo'k wid little mo'e effo't dan clickin' some mouse. What it is, Mama!

De way de CIA and FBI act on encrypshun now could see wireless drive, o' put de smack down on it off completely. Slap mah fro! Nobody would wants' some insecure wireless service, but if de CIA and FBI git deir way, dat's all dat gots'ta be on offer. Ah be baaad...

So, encrypshun (and guv'mental attitudes toward it) be de key t'all dis.

Re:Hun?

[Port1080]

Do people ever read the article?

Re:Wireless is definately the way forward.

[Anonymous Coward]

"So? Does not having a TV make you a better person?"


Actually, yes it does. Just like not getting drunk everynight makes you a better person.

You're all fucking next

[Anonymous Coward]

All you motherfuckers are gonna pay, You are the ones who are the ball-lickers. We're gonna fuck your mothers
while you watch and cry like little bitches. Once we get to Hollywood and find those Miramax fucks who are making
that movie, we're gonna make 'em at our shit, then shit out our shit, then eat their shit which is made up of our shit
that we made 'em eat. Then you're all fucking next.

Love,
Jay and Silent Bob

Happy Troll Tuesday!

[Anonymous Coward]

Here are the buttons on our office microwave:
potato popcorn pizza
frozen-veg. START soup-bev.
froz.-entree more/less fresh-veg.
power-level quick-on add-30-sec.
kitchen-timer cust.-programs defrost
1 2 3
4 5 6
7 8 9
stop/clear 0 set-clock

if you're thinking wireless...(off topic, no +1)

[zerocool^]

i'll give you that. I'm in the marching band, and as such, i love the football. I go to all the games, scream with the best of them, yell "suck it" to the other team, and "the ref beats his wife" to ... well... the ref.

I was disgusted with our game on saturday against SU. Our team thought they could stroll in to warsham field and sweep everything. We got cocky. And we sucked. We're a better football team than Syracuse, but they deserved to win, cause we didn't even bother to show up.

Plus, its complicated by the fact that Grant Noel can't run, but that you have the good QB (randall) practicing/warming up with the 2nd team, so that you are afraid to put him in when Noel isn't doing so hot. but the real deal is that we have NO offensive line. Our defense is doin great, they're one of the best, and Ben Taylor is Engelberger mach][. But we need to kick our o-line in the ass a coupla times. Noel, even though slow, should have been able to avoid going down every 2 minutes of play - he was getting no coverage. They need to light a fire under it.

Also, our recievers need to learn to hold onto the ball. We fumbled so many balls that game. Notice i'm not blaiming the ref's. There were some bad calls in that game, and might have changed the outcome, but we played an aweful game.

The consolation comes in that everyone lost on saturday, the top5 isn't recognizeable from last week's. Another thing to consider is: if miami beats syracuse, and then we pull off beating miami... who goes to the Big East BCS bowl? Oh well, at least temple is everybody's bitch.

ah well, carry on my wayward son.

~z

Response for sale

[gosand]

In response to this article, I have a little tidbit of information that the govenrment doesn't want you or anyone else to know about. It will affect the way the internet functions in all areas, from personal affairs to business to entertainment.

Click Here to order my response. Cost is only $16.99, all major credit cards accepted.

Sheesh.

Re:Wireless is definately the way forward.

[isorox]

Imagine being able to watch "Star Trek - TNG" on your mobile phone!

Imagine the number of people jumping onto the train tracks when Wesley saves the day!

Re:Important question re. wireless

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for coming to me with this question, motherfucker. If he's allergic to latex, you could try a sheepskin condom, though that is still not entirely as safe as latex and a backup method should be used as well.

Otherwise, I'd recommend contraceptive film or a sponge or one of those old-fashioned fucking forms of contraception. Of course, I have to give you the whole 'it protects from pregnancy, not from STDs' whiney speech. Make sure both of you get tested, make sure he's not sticking his wick in some other fish tacos, and make sure you stay faithful as well you little slut. If you're going to use some other form of birth control, his turgid cock can still inject you with the faggot virus and give you a death sentance. So fucking reign that philly in now.

But most of all, happy motherfucking Troll Tuesday and fuck all you LambdaMOOers!