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Homeland Security Drops Color-Coded Terror Alerts
Hugh Pickens writes "The LA Times reports that the Homeland Security Department is poised to end its five-tiered, color-coded terrorism warning system, a post-Sept. 11 endeavor that has been called too vague to be useful and has been mostly ignored or mocked by the public. The domestic security advisory system was created in 2002 under then-Secretary Tom Ridge and in 2004, the department began assigning color threat levels to general targets such as aviation, financial services and mass transit. However the Department hasn't changed the alert level in four years, even after the attempted bombing of a flight to Detroit on Christmas Day 2009 and the alert level has only been elevated to red once, on Aug. 10, 2006, when British police disrupted a plot to detonate liquid explosives on airliners. Although it is unknown what, if anything, will replace the color-coded alerts, a senior Homeland Security official, who did not want to speak on the record about a decision still under review, says that 'the goal is to replace a system that communicates nothing.'" Can't we just re-use the big DefCon displays from Wargames?
... that Mauve is the Universally recognised colour for danger.
I bet the replacement will be 2-way switch with labels "Terror" and "More Terror" glued shut in the latter position.
People who like this sort of sig will find this the sort of sig they like.
Oh, and
Burma Shave
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
...as threat indicators, I mean come on, how cool would it be to hear "*ding**dong*The Department of Homeland Security has deemed the current threat level to be 'Tapioca'"
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No no, this is slashdot - stick to the theme. I propose:
-"It's just a PEBKAC"
-"Goddammit, one of the RAID drives died"
-"Aww fuck, the PHBs are switching us over to Outlook"
-"What do you mean, you typed rm -rf?"
-The Data Centre is now a swimming pool"
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
How about "Warning! Some bad shit may happen somewhere on planet Earth! Be careful!"
Ok then, here's my public status indicator: #FFFFFF
That is all.
I think you meant:
-"It's just a PEBKAC"
-"Goddammit, one of the RAID drives died"
-"What do you mean, you typed rm -rf?"
-The Data Centre is now a swimming pool"
-"Aww fuck, the PHBs are switching us over to Outlook"
I agreed with you until you said planet Earth.
The solar system is too large. Someone making a statement could very easily attack the Washington Monument, the face on Mars and the Apollo landing site all at the same time. Limiting yourself to a planet is limiting.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Someone on here had a sig like:
"Be afraid...be yellow afraid...now be orange afraid! Good dog."
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel