Slashdot Mirror
Blogging and Sponsorship and Openness
Jane_the_Great writes "In an article in the Wall Street Journal it is "revealed" that during the 2004 primaries, the Howard Dean campaign hired bloggers hoping that positive things would be said of Dean in the blogs. The news is from the horse's mouth." It's hard to believe that the WSJ is equating prominently disclosed campaign consulting with secret payments from the U.S. Government treasury to TV personalities in order to promote Republican policies, but they are. (Obeying media rule #1, "Both sides are equally bad", even if they aren't.) Nevertheless, there's an interesting, deeper issue: how transparent should blogging (and all media) be? How could transparency possibly be enforced?
Slashdot is a million times more "for sale" than the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times, so how about you shut your hypocritical big mouth!!!!!
Manual for the Modern Slashdotter
Golden Rule: You must base your worldview entirely on Slashdot headlines. You must ignore the innaccuracy and editorial shortcomings of the Slashdot staff. You must buy into the groupthink of the comment threads. This is of UTMOST IMPORTANCE.
- Post the lamest, most obvious, and most unfunny jokes imaginable. They will be modded up "+5 Funny." Even Malda couldn't stand it any longer and made Funny mods not count toward karma.
- Everything involving Linux is flawless and perfect.
- Anything involving Mozilla is flawless and perfect. Ignore that Mozilla marks security flaws as "confidential" and keeps them secret. Ignore that this is something Microsoft is endlessly bashed for. Ignore that Firefox has had several severe security flaws, especially for a browser used by so little of the market (1% according to Google Zeitgeist).
- Whenever someone has a criticism of the current moderation system, refer to Taco's "future moderation system."
- You must lean left. You must obsess over George W. Bush and make Bush jokes whenever possible, no matter how irrelevant to the topic. In political articles, you must upmod anti-Bush comments and downmod independent or pro-Bush comments. Use the "Overrated" moderator whenever possible. Remember, Taco is going to fix this in "the future moderation system."
- Use the term "FUD" religiously in everyday conversation. When someone puts out something that disagrees with your worldview, call it FUD matter-of-factly as a way to dismiss the points it raises. Demonization is far easier than debating the issues.
- Whenever Linux Torvalds says anything, it is newsworthy and infallible. Linus does not make mistakes. When he says he doesn't bother looking at the source code of competitors like Solaris [slashdot.org] because he's not interested, herald it as the "wonderful attitude of Linus" even though such a comment coming from a Microsoft employee would get flamed as an example of their arrogance and closed-minded attitude.
- Believe articles like "Microsoft Violates Human Rights In China," based entirely on the idea that Microsoft is evil because Windows is used by the government there. Ignore the fact that China has its own custom Linux distribution called Red Flag Linux. Slashdot is unbiased and holy.
- Ignore that Slashdot is corporate-owned, by a company called OSTG that employs Rob Malda and makes money off selling OSS products. Ignore the conflict of interests in running a "tech news" site that coincidentally posts articles critical of competitors. Ignore that if Microsoft owned a tech news site that did the same, it would be criticized for it.
- Pretend that Linux is ready for the desktop, even though it took you two hours to set up your soundcard, mouse scroll wheel, and 3D card. Ignore that the real reason you refuse to acknowledge that Linux sucks on the desktop is because you don't want to diminish your sense of accomplishment in getting it up and running. Make sure to confuse this sense of accomplishment with the feeling that you have "more control" in a Linux system compared to a Windows system.
- Pretend there's nothing wrong with endless submissions accepted from Roland Piquepaille, who makes several thousand thanks to Slashdot linking to his blog that links to the original article, rather than Slashdot just linking to the original article and cutting out the pointless middle-man. It's okay for Malda to shrug it off as though Slashdot should never consider ethics or morals.
Please redistribute this at will.
-- I'm Howard Dean, and I endorse this message.
We have to learn a new vocabluary in this country, or we will never be able to talk about fairness and accuracy properly.
What appears to be evolving in the crucible of American politics is a startling robust form of doublethink. Conservatives have unquestionably mastered it; it's not clear if other political groups are for the moment less able or less willing.
Fox News is a propaganda organization; it is so biased as to basically redefine the concept of bias in the U.S. media. But how does it defend itself? By exclaiming that it is the most fair, and the most balanced. In fact, by going even further accusing everyone else of bias.
This kind of audacity is more associated with religious figureheads and communist states. But regardless of who is using it most effectively this week (and believe me, I am cynical about all American professional politicians, regardless of professed ideology), the problem is that the approach is sound, and based on good cognitive psych. It exploits a weakness in the way people think and reason. In layman's terms, it short-circuits the brain. Sadly, vehemence and a threatening posture do figure deeply into the calculus of our decision-making.
When you see through it, you realize it's an extraordinarily cynical trick. The problem is that many, many people are confused by it. In fact, much as Orwell observed, the lie is embraced especially well by people who know, on some level, it is a lie. These are many of the people who, for instance, engage in revert wars in Wikipedia over the Fox News entry.
It is the human's great strenght and weakness: we are fully capable of lively psychological engagement with paradoxes and contradictions.
In order to prevent societal free-fall, it will be necessary for each of us to learn to see through this kind of technique, call a spade a spade. To not be confused or intimidated by hypocrisy, in other words.
Tired of Political Trolls? Opt Out!
The Linux Revolution Is Dying
./* | grep -v sizeof', I discovered 4 exploitable vulnerabilities in a matter of 15 minutes. More vulnerabilities were found in 2.6 than in 2.4. It's a pretty sad state of affairs for Linux security when someone can find 4 exploitable vulnerabilities in a matter of minutes." - Brad Spengler
In light of the disastrous 2.6 development model that has given sysadmins everywhere a headache by introducing development code into a production line, Linux has signed its own death knell. With more and more people looking to alternatives like FreeBSD 5.x, OS X, and DragonflyBSD, Linux is slowly shovelling the dirt beneath its feet to dig its own grave.
Linux And Windows
Quite simply, the revolution against Windows has run out of steam. While Linux was a viable alternative in the days of Windows 98, when the rallying cry of geeks everywhere was "Down with M$, Linux never crashes," we now have the majority of the Windows userbase running NT-based operating systems. Except in cases of hardware or driver issues, reliability is no longer an issue in the comparison between Linux and Windows.
Eventually, the movement became one of security. In the years after its release, Windows XP was discovered to have several high-profile security flaws. Microsoft underwent a major code audit and released SP2. The rallying cry for OSS was now about security.
However, the community has discovered major flaws in the Mozilla software suite, including bugs marked "confidential" for years at a time. Additionally, major security holes have been appearing in the 2.6 line of Linux kernels, some having existed for years and affecting the 2.4 line. Declaring Linux to be the secure alternative is no longer as true.
Worst of all, the Linux kernel developers have no clear process, nor any clear contact person, when it comes to security issues.
Evidence: http://lwn.net/Articles/118251/
Evidence: Long-time shell-provider SDF used Linux until they got hacked into. Now, it's a 64-bit version of NetBSD.
Evidence: PaX discovered the mlockall hole. It was fixed in PaX for two years. Linux just now (2005) caught up.
Evidence: "Using 'advanced static analysis': 'cd drivers; grep copy_from_user -r
The New Linux Development Model
With the 2.6 line of kernels, a new model has been adopted that is considered easier for the kernel developers. Instead of branching a 2.7 line, following the model of odd-numbered version numbers denoting development code, everything is now being thrown into 2.6.
"Not all 2.6.x kernels will be good; but if we do releases every 1 or 2 weeks, some of them *will* be good. The problem with the -rc releases is that we try to predict in advance which releases in advance will be stable, and we don't seem to be able to do a good job of that. If we do a release every week, my guess is that at least 1 in 3 releases will turn out to be stable enough for most purposes. But we won't know until after 2 or 3 days which releases will be the good ones." -- Ted T'So
In other words, this Linux kernel developer believes it is perfectly fine for one in three kernels of the stable line to actually be stable. The new development process is anti-user. "Release early, release often" has outlived its reliability and applicability to the real world.
The excuse given is that Linus is only one man, and there are only 24 hours in a day. If that is true, than Linus needs to address this shortcoming of the process; otherwise, the process is poorly managed.
The Community Has Regurgitated Itself
In a frenzy of newbies, the Linux community has grown, with Slashdot as its rallying center. The cycle of self-feeding groupthink has created a userbase unable to see outside its own perceptions. This leads to unrealistic attitudes about the safety and stability of Linux and its applicability to various solutions.
Contrast to the BSD community which employs a more academic approach.
..Makes inauguration day all the more sweet. :)
If you agree with any of this, feel free to repost it in the future.
* If you expect companies to follow the copyright of the GPL, you should support the RIAA going after infringers of its copyright. If not, you're a hypocrite.
* There is absolutely nothing wrong with a company being upset that its product is being pirated freely over online networks. A recent Slashdot poll showed that the majority of Slashotters are unemployed or are students ("academics"), which explains a lot. Try getting a real job sometime and see what it feels like when your work is everywhere, and you start worrying that your days are numbered. Does John Carmack want you to "sample" his new game via the "free advertising" happening on eMule?
* Artists "deserve their money" only in cases in which the RIAA is the bad guy. When it's a P2P article, suddenly ripping artists off and not paying for their music via piracy is magically different from some record companies not paying royalties. This mindset is supposed to make sense.
* At the 2004 WinHEC, Allchin demonstrated an alpha version of Longhorn that played six high-resolution videos at the same time while playing Quake III in the background. An equivalent XP machine couldn't play more than four videos. Meanwhile, I can't even get xmms to play without skipping, and windows to drag without visual tearing! That's because KDE and GNOME are hacks to emulate a desktop on top of the crufty XFree86 architecture that people won't let die (the majority Linux users absolutely fear change...there are rational ones, but they are outnumbered by zealots).
* OSTG-owned Slashdot thinks its niche opinion represents the majority of the world. This is a result of people visiting every day and buying into the groupthink. Nobody outside of Slashdot knows or cares about "Linux," "RIAA", "M$," or anything else Slashdotters think is such a huge issue in today's society. Go to a mall or coffee shop sometime and see what people actually talk about.
* Speaking of OSTG--it's a Linux company...that owns a "tech news" site...that posts news stories negative toward competitors like Microsoft. If a Windows company or even Microsoft itself owned a "tech news" site and posted anti-Linux articles all the time, everyone would be up in arms. But with OSTG, it's okay.
* Slashbots think people don't like the music coming out these days, which is the cause of the piracy. Never mind that if people didn't like the music they wouldn't be pirating it, most Slashbots--again, this goes back to the niche opinion thing--don't realize that most people these days love the music coming out and want to hear all of it. Probing around, you discover that Slashdot is made up of nerds and fogies who listen to things like The Who and Blind Guardian and techno--not what mainstream society enjoys.
* Any company ending in "AA" is evil. Especially if it doesn't want you distributing its works without paying for it. Somehow, this mindset is supposed to make sense.
* The inevitable result of all this is a world in which nothing can be profitable because people simply pirate free copies. Is that really what Slashbots want? OSS and free-ness in general reminds me of the hippie era of the 60s--idealistic socialism that only exists because of the surrounding capitalism around it that provides the environment for it to exist. We all know what happened to that idea.
* Linux rules the desktop, when in reality: Windows = 91%; Mac = 4%; Linux = 1%
* Slashdot editors are abusive. We all remember The Post. It's amusing the editors never mention the issue. The worst editor is michael, who will mod you down, insult you for your post count, and post unprofessional color commentary along with the article. This is the same bizarre person who cybersquatted Censorware for years--even as Slashdot posted articles negative toward cybersquatting! Michael played it off as though he was a stalking victim, which made it all the more biz
which you said would "never invade a country that meant us harm"
That's not what I said, retard. I said Iraq was never a threat to us. Some fifth-rate Arab shithole suffering from over a decade of sanctions, no navy, pitiful air force, outdated, poorly trained and aging army, and only dreams of a WMD PROGRAM. Any chem or bio weapons Saddam had were rendered void by the fact that those kinds of weapons have limited shelf lives. He had NO nuke program. Yet Bush and crew (along with Tony Blair, the english lapdog) tried to sell the world that Hussein had his evil finger on the "nuke everyone" button and that he was in bed with Osama. Of course, all of it was bullshit but Bush invaded anyways. Over a 1000 dead US solders later Iraq may hold semi-stable elections in a few weeks while US soldiers still die daily, and the threat of a civil war increases daily as long as the occupation exists.
But gee, Canada... in 1783... wowsers. I'm wetting myself from the sheer power of your, uh, retort.