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Bush Lightens Supercomputer Export Restrictions
MrZeebo writes "According to a story on Yahoo! News, Bush has finally decided to lift the Cold War-era restrictions on how fast an exported computer can be. Now, computers as fast as 195,000 MTOPS (up from 85,000 MTOPS) can be exported to countries such as Russia, China, and Pakistan."
Cool, maybe now the Mac fanatics where I work will stop bragging about how THEIR computers are so powerful they can't be exported from the country.
...now we can re-export playstation 2's.
eBay.ru, here I come.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
when we get screwed by one of these countries because of a computer, we can blame bush!
But anyways, whats the big deal really? These countries can build their own supercomputers, they really don't need our help at it. Whats so hard about buying parts, ya know?
Slashdot Hypocrisy at work?
The tanks that were being used to guard the
iMacs got sent over to Afghanistan.
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Yea, but the $300 check Bush sent me last year isn't enough for ME to buy a computer this fast.
...circumvent the use of encryption on our own shores (Magic Lantern) as well as digitally eavesdropping on all Internet traffic (Carnivore)...give a software company notorious for creating and distributing exploit-laden software power to further abuse it's monopoly, and now we're selling supercomputers overseas. That's just great.
The only comfort I can take is the fact that I didn't vote for that idiotic fuckstick. Small comfort indeed.
El riesgo vive siempre!
Within a year or so PDA's will fall under this rule, since I remember reading somewhere the PS2 (I think it was) technically was over the allowed power.
--- www.f-theocean.com
Aren't american supercomputers made in China and programmed in Pakistan anyway?
RMN
~~~
theregister on the same
...Imagine if we exported a beowulf cluster of these...
Who did what now?
I think after a long time of several users being modded down for this comment, it still has its meaning:
"Imagine a beowulf cluster of theese..."
The power definetely lies in clustering, who wants to/can control which clusters are built?
Some nice 2.2 Ghz Northwoods add up number crunching power very quickly...
As I read it, the scale at which this is working from is substantially over your average desktop machine. Why not just use a cluster of pc's/macs?
Yes, I am aware that network bottlenecks can be an issue with certain varieties of calculations. I work in a national lab. I administer clusters. But I don't think there is an export restriction on myrinet, or any other high performance network. Not to mention that most of the countries that this applies to don't have a lot of money to work with anyways, so perhaps desktops with fast/gigabit ethernet is more the order of the day.
Not only that, but there are other companies that make supercomputers. Hitachi comes to mind, and I think Fujitsu as well.
Perhaps what they should rather do is not require DOE facilities to buy American unless it truly is the better product.
-- Who is the bigger fool? The fool or the fool who follows him? --
A typical U.S. home computer now sold in retail stores is capable of roughly 2,100 MTOPS.
Does anyone have a list MTOP ratings for different computers? Just what computers are now exportable?
Ahhh yess, the obligatory sigh oh, did you say sig?
So... now we can export supercomputers twice as fast as cold-era ones?
Ahem. So them, Bush's Law of Computer Export Speed states that the power of exported computers doubles every twenty years.
Why doesn't this sound like a good thing? Or is this rating not linear?
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
all supercomputers must come with Windows pre-installed making them slightly less than super :)
... just bought themselves another couple of years or so worth of computing progress before mainstream small-busines servers fall into the restricted category. [sigh] This is just as stupid as restrictions on encryption software. When the hell are the feds going to learn that the US isn't the world's only source for computing technology (hardware, software, and combinations thereof) and the only thing these export restrictions accomplish is to weaken US companies against foreign competition?
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Maybe now Iraq can start its stockpile of PS2s.
13 year old white supremacists are shitty web designers.
I think the main purpose behind supercomputer restrictions in the first place was to limit the amount of nuclear research that could be done. Russia obviously already has a stockpile heavy enough to blow a good portion of the earths crust into orbit, perhaps giving the planet a nice debris-ring like saturn or jupiter, and a toasty warmth similar to venus.
Pakistan just figured out how to split the atom for antihumanitarian purposes, and i guess Gee Dubya Srubya figures the indians are going to wipe out the pakastanis who are going to wipe out the indians anyways, so why not give them a computer powerful enough for them to calculate trejectories carefully enough to make sure thats ALL they destroy (directly)
"...And these atomic bombs which science burst upon the world that night were strange even to the men who used them. "
-H. G. Wells, The World Set Free, 1914
Amusing to me that the chipmaker with the smallest share of the supercomputer market is the only one quoted in the article. I'd think this restriction change would be much more important for SGI, Compaq, Cray, HP, and IBM than for Intel at the moment. Admittedly, the industry shills will all say similar things, but geez. Let's try not to push the story of Intel as the only remaining chipmaker too much, huh? Especially in one of the few industries in which they don't have any sort of supremacy.
Certainly a number of above-average workstations or servers clustered together effectively would by far supercede the most powerful machine currently exportable.
And I don't see any limit on telecommunications or gigabit/optical switches that would otherwise limit the ability of such a cluster to be effective.
Is this finally an example of US legislation where a little ignorance actually HELPS the international tech community?
Wasn't it not all that long ago that Ashcroft (and the Bush administration) were beating their chests over the Clinton era "mistake" of lightening export restrictions on encryption software?
Anyone know what the impetus behind this move was?
"Moving through the masses like a fish through water." syrup
This has already been posted here.
There were a couple such steps during the Clinton administration, and probably this has been going on since the Cray 1 was a hot little number.
/. doesn't seem to have years attatched to its articles.
I think I even missed a step, article says current limit is 85 GOPS, last I heard was 12.
Don't forget too that there are different grades of countries we may or may not export "supercomputers" to.
See Dec 11, 2001, Jan 11, 2001, Aug 3, (2000? 1999?
Heh, pity
Start Running Better Polls
I belive this is a good move by the U.S. First of all though getting supercomputers - from the U.S. - was under export restrictions building clusters wasn't because that wouldn't been possible. Another crusial point is that this may have slowed the developement of competanse on supercomputing and certain areas wich requires super computing. Applying the butter-fly-effect to this the U.S. may have been - unwillingly - slowed the economic and democratical development in the countries the restriction applied to. No doubt could such computers be used in design and simulation of nuclear weapons but that is only one branch in wich super computing is put to well - or ill regarding nukes - use.
Look a monkey!
2100 MTOPS is a 900MHz P3. 5333 MTOPS is a 2GHz P4 .
Here is a nice reference from Intel.
~ fact is not dependant upon your belief therein. ~ ~ Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?
Well, giving the worst nation on earth normalized trade status was just plain dumb (China), but at least W isn't dumb enough to keep trade restrictions from 20 years ago on US tech firms in place for no reason. Free trade is good and all, but we shouldn't be giving more business to our enemies in the first place. Our only consolation is that hopefully the increased overseas business for US companies will mean more envelope pushing technologies for 'us', before 'them.'
it matters a lot.
especially to people like me!
and my pet goat, reggie!
I like my goat!
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it matters a lot.
especially to people like me!
and my pet goat, reggie!
I like my goat!
it is a nice goat!
and I like my pet sheep!
warm, fuzzy, happy sheep!
cozy, fluffy, wooly sheep!
sheep sheep sheep!
sp0o0o0o0o0o0oge!
I am a happy happy sheep lover!
it matters a lot.
especially to people like me!
and my pet goat, reggie!
I like my goat!
it is a nice goat!
and I like my pet sheep!
warm, fuzzy, happy sheep!
cozy, fluffy, wooly sheep!
sheep sheep sheep!
sp0o0o0o0o0o0oge!
I am a happy happy sheep lover!
News for turds, shit that splatters!
First he uses an undeclared war to stomp on our civil liberties, now he's our selling high end technology so his business buddies can make some more money. I can't wait to hear what the military is going to say. They view selling our high tech as the same as selling arms to the enemy.
Specially SGI, which is the biggest seller in the Defense and Federal markets. I'm sure that, despite the economic problems in Russia and China, they will save some money to buy some "big iron" from them. I don't think they will base some of their strategic systems in PC-clusters, not even if they run Linux.
First Bush tightens the restrictions on crypto and puts wiretapping laws into effect to make it harder to secure data in that way, and then he makes it easier for other countries to break our weakened crypto! What the fuck is he doing?!
how MTOPS relate to real-life performance?
:-)
I think a P4/2GHz wouldn't 'feel' more than twice as fast as the P3/900MHz. Of course, if it would that means that the scores for the Itanium are very interesting, yielding a fast PC at only 800MHz, which should be pretty easy to keep quiet w.r.t. cooling.
That would've been nice to know for the 64-bit discussion a while back
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The article was written in such a way that pretty much everything in it was misleading. Poor journalism at it's best.
Last time I checked the "real" site (may not now be current) the big loser was Motorola and IBM for home desktops (from a chipmaker's perspective). G3's and G4's did math better than the Intel chips (using the math instruction speed criteria used) and were restricted further than P3's and P4's. Again, it may not be current now, but 800Mhz Itaniums were faster at math than Pentium family computers at 2Ghz and were similarly restricted as G4s.
No mention of strong encryption in the article either (some SW and things like wireless cards were affected).
There are 4 tiers, also poorly noted in the article. Go to the US Department of Commerce's site at:
http://www.bxa.doc.gov/HPCs/Default.htm
Note: does not seem to reflect changes mentioned in the article; nonetheless a lot of good background that will help put the new rules into perspective.
Somebody already posted Intel's site, here is Apple's:
http://www.info.apple.com/support/export.html
The New York Times is also running the story, mostly the same info but with a few interesting facts not mentioned in the Yahoo version.
forma3
Wouldn't clustering be a way to circumvent the law in the first place?
The problems that the law was intended to make difficult to solve (nuclear weapons simulation, aero flow analysis, cryptography, and so on) are, as far as I can tell, problems that can can be attacked in parallel, and so are good applications for clusters to tackle.
Well then, if the restriction prevented the export of any computer faster than x, couldn't a cluster of n export-legal computers of speed y (y x ?
And for smaller values of y, substitute larger values of n to gain the same net power Y.
So really, I would think that clustering technology rendered (heh) the restriction moot a long time ago.
.
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
The renewed concern about nuclear weapons in South Asia comes a little more than three years after the events of May 1998: the five nuclear tests conducted by India at Pokharan in the northwestern desert state of Rajasthan, followed three weeks later by six nuclear explosions conducted by Pakistan in its southwestern region of Chaghai. These tit-for-tat responses mirrored the nuclear buildup by the U.S. and the former Soviet Union, with a crucial difference: the two cold war superpowers were separated by an ocean and never fought each other openly.
m l
http://www.sciam.com/2001/1201issue/1201ramana.ht
If you need text styles to communicate then you don't have a message.
I saw the title and thought it must be a typo - "Bush Restricts Supercomputer Export" Then i read the post and thought "omg! has bush done something _good_ how is that possible?" then i read the article and realise that i never knew there were restrictions, and that it was an idea dumber even than crypto export laws. Why doesn't America understand that they are not the rulers of the world, that there are manufactures, engineers and programmers outside the US who are just as good.
If a country wants nukes all they have to do is buy them from the US, Russia or China, interesting isnt it, how weapons don't have export restrictions...
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Let's try this again.
Wouldn't clustering be a way to circumvent the law in the first place?
The problems that the law was intended to make difficult to solve (nuclear weapons simulation, aero flow analysis, cryptography, and so on) are, as far as I can tell, problems that can can be attacked in parallel, and so are good applications for clusters to tackle.
Well then, if the restriction prevented the export of any computer faster than x, couldn't a cluster of n export-legal computers of speed y (y less-than x ) produce a total throughput power Y (Y greater-than x)?
And for smaller values of y, substitute larger values of n to gain the same net power Y.
So really, I would think that clustering technology rendered (heh) the restriction moot a long time ago.
.
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
With all of the stories about individual people, labs and companies building supercomputers using clustered commodity hardware with freely available tools, software and information. Why would The Bush Administration with to continue to financially hinder US-based computer manufacturers?
It makes little sense. I mean if Cringley can run off and buy around $6000 to build a supercomputer in his garage. What is stopping someone in Russia, Pakistan or Vietnam from running out and buying tons of old Celeron 333 and slightly faster CPUs and then building a powerful Free *NIX-based supercomputer?
The only thing that would now make those people look at the US-built supercomputers are the fact that they won't have to run out and build their own supercomputer. They can take a pre-made solution and plug it into their computer datacenter and get to work much faster, with hopefully, a lower upkeep cost.
Ever since I first started reading about roll-your-own supercomputers, I have always wondered why the US would continue to ban the export of powerful computer systems.
The malarky about keeping 3rd-tier nations from being able to develop nuclear weapons is rather silly as well. I mean, did the US use powerful 195,000+ MTOP supercomputers to develop Fatboy?
Maybe they should ban the exportation of nuclear physics majors. Especially since a large number of foreign born physicists came to the US to learn how to do their thing.
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
i mean.. think about it. if you're the head of some strategic research lab designated for simulating chemical or nuclear reactions for use in arms i'd think it'd be pretty easy to drum up the cash necessary to purchase/build the equipment necessary to do so.
aside from that, what's to stop pakistan, india or anyone else from carrying out tests in any of the manners forbidden by test ban treaties? i seem to remember a story from a couple of years ago about china being lambasted for firing medium range ballistic missles over hong kong and into the ocean.. but maybe it was a dream i had.
seems like a waste of time and effort to me. let them have their nukes if it makes them feel that important.
I'll never forget the top secret Xerox we sold to Iraq. For those that need a reminder: The US Gov teamed with Xerox to include a transmitter that sent a copy of everything Saddam photocopied using that machine.
Brilliant.
------
Today's Top Deals
Now, besides the important issue of 'what is more of a threat?' how about the issue of 'what can realistically be policed'. I would think that it is MUCH harder for a third world country without the machines, methods, designs and trained personal to use them to create the complex physical devices and assemble them into super computers (clustering of existing lower end computers not included :). However, it has been proven already that plenty of intelligent people in these same countries are able to either reverse engineer encryption algorithms, or completely design new (and superior) ones from scratch. Regardless of your views on software as a service, open source and free (as in beer or software) software... it is a well established fact that software is much easier to reproduce and manipulate than hardware. Take all the software home brew in the world's history (cavemen included) and compare it to the equivelent physical creations. The vast majority of the time the physical production requires a rather substantial existing monetary base, in addition to a readily available base of knowledge and experience to utilize directly (as in consultants) or through research of published results.
Sooooo, if it is easy to copy software you might initially say, "Gee dumb bunny! That is why the software is restricted" However, then becomes important the logistics side of things. What is easier to smuggle, large pieces of complex hardware or software? If you think that restrictions on the export of software actually work, then I guess you also think that gun laws work on criminals. There have been previously published reports from various federal agencies that provide proof (although that proof was not the reason for the initial release of the papers) that there are indeed a large number of terrorists and 'bad boys' that use the very things that are restricted from being exported.
Hmmm, that tells me it is not working. However, compare that to the amount of hardware (and I include 'low tech' weapons in here as well) that shows up in nasties' hands in violation of restrictions and you find that software and algorithms are indeed much much much easier to smuggle.
...how many of these countries already have supers? I remember reading somewhere a LOOONG time ago that Sun had gotten themselves into a bit of trouble by selling systems to the Chinese. Alot of people here have pointed out clustering as a way to circumvent the law. This is just a way for American companies to make a few bucks off of it.
"Man, I don't know..."
I think we all agree that beyond the shadow of a doubt this will drastically increase world terrorism. Super computers obviously play a huge role in organizations like al Qaeda. Terrorists will use them to carefully calculating the results of catastrophic activities as well as inform their operatives with strong, uncrackable crypto. (arf arf)
Why bother.
They don't have to get it from somewhere.
e.g. India was denied permission to purchase CRAYs in the 1970s or 80s.
We developed our own supercomputers the PARAM 1000 series which actually cost quite a bit less than similarly powered CRAYs.
Moral of the story: The US can delay it, they can't prevent it - they do not have a monopoly on knowledge, and its application isn't that difficult a problem.
-Shaunak.
Ever hear of the black-market?
Sheesh!
Can Russia, China, and Pakistan?
-Get DVD players in those "super computers"?
-Create a Q3 Clan and attack us with these "super computers"?
-Can their "super computer" do this?
-Will the pr0n banks be depleted as those countries begin the massive dowloading of Anna Kournikova and Stevana?
-Surf the web and see what great pricing we have on our "super camera" the X10?
-Will they be able to run Outlook on these "super computers"?
-Will evil frogs be _more_ evil in Daikatana?
This
why don't they just buy a lot of normal old personal computers (that we can obviously export) and built huge beowulf cluster? wouldn't that be just as fast (if not faster) than these supercomputers, providing youg et enough baby comps? and wouldn't this work a lot better for third world countries who can always split the comps up and say "see, no supercomputer here"? :)
i dunno, i don't really see the need for supercomputers around at all, but that's just me
US had banned export of Supercomputers/ nuclear Tech/ Space tech to India as well. Thanks to that we developed our own supercomputers/nuclear tech/ space tech and we had one major advantage of being way cheaper thus tapping markets which could not afford the US versions anyways.
Currently, world governments are a little concerned with the tensions between India and Pakistan. Both of these countries currently have nuclear weapons and could very easily use them upon one another.
While they could potentially develop ICBM-like launch vehicles, the cost of actually building such devices is terribly prohibitive. The most likely method of use would be with fairly low-tech launch vehicles, similiar to SCUD missiles. They could also use large cannon and the all-time favorite, heavy bomber aircraft.
Considering that most of these countries are more interested in blowing eachother up, than the US. The United States has very little to worry about.
Again, we created our space program as a stepping stone for the ICBM technology. Once more, that was not done with supercomputer technology, but with Human Minds!
You can have all the high technology on the planet. However, it doesn't mean a hoot, if you don't have the minds that know how to take advantage of it and also have the basic knowledge of what you are attempting to build.
I say let them have supercomputers, just ban the brain export. Once more, a good number of the world's rocket scientists have come out of colleges in the US.
If the US government really wants to stop the possibility of a "rogue" nation acquiring the technology to develop weapons of mass destruction, they should simply dissallow foreign nationals the right to obtain such degrees in the US, or take away their right to leave the US after obtaining such a degree.
Supercomputers don't make Nuclear weapons or ICBMs, people do...
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
After reading all these comments, am I the only one who recognizes the absurdity of searching for TECHNICAL meaning in a POLITICIAN's decision?
/. won't change that. If you really care, write your representatives (from the state level on up) and volunteer your technical expertise. Write papers on the subjects that concern you. Publish them. Make your voice heard, instead of shouting into the abyss about the lack of technical knowledge at the higher levels of our government.
There are arguments about how the equipment is in use in those countries anyway, how clusters of "legal" systems can outpower the "illegal" ones, how plenty of dastardly deeds can be done with my TRS-80, etc, etc.
What we have here is a political decision, made by a politician, on the advice and recommendation of other [aspiring] politicians about a technical subject they know nothing about.
If you're looking for deeper meaning behind this decision - you'll find none.
If you're just looking for an excuse to bitch about politicians, doesn't that get old?
If you're looking to impress the world at large with your technical understanding of the subject, and point out the obvious flaws in the politician's point of view... taking candy from a baby becomes the obvious parallel.
I guess I don't see the point of the argument. We've proven over and over again that [most] politicians don't understand the technical issues they make decisions about, but bitching on
Just my $.05 (inflation, you know.)
- Dave
-- "Other than that, how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?"
;)
don't most hardware manufacurers have their plants outside the u.s. anyway? what about all those taiwanese companies? and companies like amd producing their chips all over the world?
I remember running my diploma project program (numerical fluid analysis) in one of jet fighter design bureaus in the 80s on the Convex server. At the time such hardware was well above the threshold. Such servers were imported through 3rd countries.
As for encryption/decryption - KGB used to have their own specialized hardware made in Kursk. I don't know what the status these days - perhaps they use some of the western made CPUs now. I am pretty sure they have people who can put together HPC server from the components.
Not only can they build a beowulf cluster...
Not only could they buy it on the black market...
It just means that they have to wait a little longer for what knowledge they have to be crunched.
You see, computers have no inherent knowledge. If these computers aren't shipped with [insert scary knowledge here {atomic secrets, plans to our Death Star, etc.}] then these countries will have to be clever enough to come up with this knowledge on their own. No amount of number crunching, no matter how fast, would be able to help them.
I say give 'em all the computing power they can handle. Who knows? Maybe they'll use those SGI machines to make some really neat movies, Lucasfilm style!
Useless opinions, worthless observations, and more!
When Chernobyl (sp?) melted down the reason that we were so concerned in the US is that the Jet stream. You know, that thing that is air moving, it doesn't seem to care about international boarders and it surely doesn't care what poisons that it carries with it.
Anyway, some of the fallout from that disaster made it all across a large are in the old-Soviet Union. If I am not mistaken, some of the fallout also came down in China and other areas of the globe.
So, if we were concerned with a meltdown at a nuclear plant, would it be more or less important to worry about the fallout from very powerful weapons that will throw dust and radioactive matter higher up into the sky then Chernobyl? Of course, if those weapons were to be used they wouldn't all be used in one small section of those countries, perhaps all over the place.
It could also (no pun intended) mushroom into a much larger conflict. Currently China has been strengthening their diplomatic ties with India. The US has more or less tossed their lot in with the Pakistan government and several other countries appear to be lining up behind one or the other.
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
I don't care who you think you are and what you think you know. A computer model can only show you so much.
A computer model can give you an excellent look at what could possibly happen when you build the actual thing you are modeling.
To be truly sure of what will happen, you must test the actual product itself. If that means you need to blow something up, then you do that.
What you really learn with computer models, is what will never work. The models simply help you design something that is most likely going to work. Then you pull out your newly built test toy and give it a workout.
Would you honestly get into an airplane that was fully computer-tested, but never tested in the real world? I wouldn't, that is what test pilots are for. Would you buy an automobile that was crash tested only on a computer? I wouldn't, a human mind that programmed the software simply cannot program every single variable that can occur in the real world.
But, back to point that you chose to pick at in my post. Geniuses with supercomputers, building rockets.
Sure, you can design a rocket. I can do that on my PC at home. I know a little about basic rocketry and can create a great model rocket that can go quite a distance.
Now, I just don't have the $10,000 that I figure it would cost to build this micro-launch vehicle and also the safety equipment that I believe would be needed.
Now, multiply this by an incredible magnitude. Then look at the Gross Domestic Product of some of those "rogue" nations. They simply don't have the monetary resources to build such weapons. If they did, their people starve and die by the thousands/millions.
What they can afford is the cost to build large cannons, SCUD-like missiles and large bomber aircraft. Those systems are a little more reusable (save the SCUD) and much more cost effective. Sure, you limit your range, but most of your targets are within a spit into the wind from you.
So, do you spend the incredibly high millions and make your people starve, to be able to hit a country, with one ICBM, anywhere on the planet? Or, do you build many reusable launch platforms that can hit all of your enemies with?
Logic would dictate that you would want to destroy all of your enemies that happen to be right next door to you.
Thinking about Nuclear weapons with a Super-Power mindset is just not right anymore. Smaller non-Super-Power countries have diferent concerns and wish to eliminate their local enemies. Most of them have very few enemies that they could not reach with the extreme range of their current weaponry.
If they do have such enemies, then they would look into suitcase nukes, High-jacking fuel-laden jets and slamming them into buildings as well as other terrorist-based activities.
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
This is clearly a good move by Bush, and we should continue in that direction. Really, there should be no restrictions on exporting any product outside of the United States that is not legal to sell within the United States.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
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see? you dont get it.
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What kinds of chips, etc.?