I wonder a bit why people/companies/etc are fussing a lot about the strength of passwords. Is it because security experts get anxious about all the ways that they can seemingly be hacked?
Though, it seems rare to me that the weakness of passwords contributes a lot to the actual damage that hackers actually do. Maybe it's because I am a tech layman, but I've never even heard of a company/etc having problems because the passwords were too weak. Rather, it's almost always a malicious worker, someone bringing viruses in via a laptop, keyloggers, hackers impersonating IT staff on the phone, or even the very simple shuffling through the garbage. NONE of which a strong password will do anything against, ever.
After all, trying to brute force, hack, or guess a password is generally very hard.
Problematically, the comparison between 'liberal' and 'conservative' is a false dichotomy anyway.
This is because the terms don't have any specific meaning, and are just flung onto people as some sort of arbitrary separation or disparaging remark (Oh, he's a liberal and you know what that means.)
Even within the ambiguity of the terms, people like Michael Moore wouldn't be well classified into them. 'Liberal' simply doesn't describe anything notable about him as compared to 'Bush hating' and 'anti-corporate;' neither of which are necessary for liberalism or progressivism as they are basically defined. Fox News also doesn't fit into any traditional sense of the word 'conservative,' and it would make more sense to think of terms like 'pro-Republican' and 'sensationalist.'
"but please don't act as if the cost of living is exactly the same there as it is in the US."
The comparison is apt because it is comparing early early industrial western society with China if you look at the comment I referred to. Where, not too long ago, westerners could afford to work for very little because the cost of living, not to mention the standards of living, were considerably lower than it is now; much like in China today where our industry has largely moved to.
"So yes, industrialisation made everyone better off"
Some of that is because we just changed where our poor are.
The minimum wage in the Guangdong province, China (2004) is about $50-100 dollars a month, assuming 40 hours a weeks, is about $0.63-0.31 an hour. Which is about 12% of the current US minimum wage; roughly 8 times less.
I am glad that we are making some headway in solar power, but without better and environmentally safe batteries I don't see the technology really being too useful yet.
You would be locking out the poor from even getting a cell phone at all, since they can't afford to pay the full cost of a phone up front.
I work in the wireless retail business, and as far as I can understand the high prices of those phones are mostly a racket (phones tend to be around $200-350 without a contract). What I mean by that is if you look at some of the pre-paid phones you can get a fully featured camera phone with bluetooth for around $60-80 no contract. If you don't care about being fancy the cheap phones go for less than $20. There is simply no reason that phones need to be expensive like that; it's just a trap to keep people in contract.
In fact, there's no reason you can't use pre-paid phones on the post-paid networks. With GSM phones you can even put your contract phone SIMM card into a prepaid phone (assuming it's the same carrier) and it works the same, which is a nice trick if your GSM phone breaks and you don't qualify for the upgrade rebate.
In fact, I'd sooner hire someone who was bright, creative, well-versed in computer *science*, and doesn't know a compiled language from an interpreted one than hire a wizard at Java who can't think (him|her)self out of a paper bag.
Of course, such a person would never be considered for an interview due to lack of wizard credentials.
I actually like their products, they are still much more put together than any Linux distro has ever managed to be. Of course, what gives me pause about Microsoft and Windows is that for the massive, almost unimaginable amount of money that they make, especially compared to any Linux distro, their product just isn't -that- much better.
I realize that making an OS is one of the hardest things to do in the programming world, and Microsoft maybe sets it's goals in the wrong places, but with billions to spend on development, why isn't it the best goddamn thing ever? That's where I lose my respect for them.
It's not really useful since we have no way of producing a lot of hydrogen without oil. Until we find a better source/method, or if the hydrogen extraction process is somehow better than burning petrol in cars, there isn't a lot of use for the technology.
So this guy is up for 101 years for spamming, but some dirt bag that molested his daughter-in-law for 6 years only serves a 4 year sentence.
Well, it's already been addressed that he's probably getting off easier, but what is being brought up here is an interesting civil question. You seem to be implying here that people should be given jail time based on some sort of moral, or more likely visceral response you have towards molestation. A lot of people might agree with you, however, that isn't a good basis for jail time. If anything, we should be giving jail time, or other punishment, based on the degree of which the crime impacts society, by how hard it is to change the criminals behavior, and by the sheer amount of effort in braking the law that was undertaken.
I suggest this because often in cases of molestation, the criminal isn't really thinking it through as clearly as a criminal who is doing something like fraud or spamming. That said, a molester could most likely be more easily converted into civil behavior, than someone who calculates braking the law would his behavior.
Then again, jail time isn't generally given sensibly in US culture most of the time, so it's a moot point to begin with.
It is interesting that so many of the Slashdot posters are giving 'reasons' why there is this gap, but rarely anything that gives an answer beyond what is already understood.
Firstly, the argument that women are simply 'different' doesn't actually explain the disparity. People are not trying make men and women the same sort of being, but rather they are trying to understand what really is the difference. By the same logic, you could claim that since Australians eat Vegemite at a much higher frequency than Americans, that it must be due to inherent genetic differences between the populations. Additionally, to say that "being different" is enough to cause a gap, that there probably has only been one reason or motive to cause anyone to go into IT or engineering fields, ever; that only one sort of of very specific personality can allow a person to become interested in those fields. This is simply not true.
Secondly, if you use the argument "Women simply don't want to!" as some sort of explanation, you are missing a lot of contextual implications here. It does not help that the argument in question, in a historical context mind you, has always been used as a justification of men (and women, no doubt) as a reason for why there has ever been a societal gap between the sexes in anything. Inherent reasons even! Granted, there may be some reasons due to the enhanced burden of child rearing that women face or some effect of estrogen/testosterone on the brain, but is that the reason? Is there really enough of an inherent advantage or disadvantage on either side to really make a difference? Is a career in IT necessarily more demanding on a woman's life than one in medicine, theater, art, music, etc? I mean, this is the same sort of conversation people were having about women voting and to a large extent (even today), being in politics altogether.
And the whole importance of this sort of question isn't derived from it's specific usefulness, but rather the understanding of the disparity in the first place. Finding out answers to these questions gives us further understandings to ourselves, and to what is truly different between men and women, and what is truly the same. There may still be something, outside of our general inherent genetic natures that we have yet to fully reveal that may yet explain this. Keep in mind that humans are the least instinctual animals on the planet and are therefore the most malleable. Also keep in mind that when you say 'inherent' in regards to humans, you are saying that it is a genetic propensity derived from natural selection in homo sapien sapien's environment of evolutionary adaptation, or at least accidentally related. Unless we happen to find a gene, or a set of genes that regulate who becomes someone in the IT field, it doesn't stand to reason to jump to that conclusion.
Realistically, women are still an underrepresented group, in America, and much more so outside of the 'western world'. Historically, women have been infrequent participants in the workplace in general and have increased their frequency in it after many feminist and civil rights movements, only to show that in most of these cases, there wasn't a particularly good reason women were not involved. I'm not going to say that there isn't a good reason for women not to be in the IT and engineering fields, what I'm saying is that there's really little to no evidence suggesting a good reason for it exists. The fact that people (men?) are so readily jumping on these old unjustified phrases should be raising red flags here.
Slashdot Mirror
Hello hello hello hello.
I wonder a bit why people/companies/etc are fussing a lot about the strength of passwords. Is it because security experts get anxious about all the ways that they can seemingly be hacked?
Though, it seems rare to me that the weakness of passwords contributes a lot to the actual damage that hackers actually do. Maybe it's because I am a tech layman, but I've never even heard of a company/etc having problems because the passwords were too weak. Rather, it's almost always a malicious worker, someone bringing viruses in via a laptop, keyloggers, hackers impersonating IT staff on the phone, or even the very simple shuffling through the garbage. NONE of which a strong password will do anything against, ever.
After all, trying to brute force, hack, or guess a password is generally very hard.
Problematically, the comparison between 'liberal' and 'conservative' is a false dichotomy anyway.
This is because the terms don't have any specific meaning, and are just flung onto people as some sort of arbitrary separation or disparaging remark (Oh, he's a liberal and you know what that means.)
Even within the ambiguity of the terms, people like Michael Moore wouldn't be well classified into them. 'Liberal' simply doesn't describe anything notable about him as compared to 'Bush hating' and 'anti-corporate;' neither of which are necessary for liberalism or progressivism as they are basically defined. Fox News also doesn't fit into any traditional sense of the word 'conservative,' and it would make more sense to think of terms like 'pro-Republican' and 'sensationalist.'
It's an unwritten rule that perjury isn't taken seriously in civil courts.
The comparison is apt because it is comparing early early industrial western society with China if you look at the comment I referred to. Where, not too long ago, westerners could afford to work for very little because the cost of living, not to mention the standards of living, were considerably lower than it is now; much like in China today where our industry has largely moved to.
"So yes, industrialisation made everyone better off"
The 3rd/2nd world is our real labor class.Some of that is because we just changed where our poor are. The minimum wage in the Guangdong province, China (2004) is about $50-100 dollars a month, assuming 40 hours a weeks, is about $0.63-0.31 an hour. Which is about 12% of the current US minimum wage; roughly 8 times less.
I am glad that we are making some headway in solar power, but without better and environmentally safe batteries I don't see the technology really being too useful yet.
You would be locking out the poor from even getting a cell phone at all, since they can't afford to pay the full cost of a phone up front.
I work in the wireless retail business, and as far as I can understand the high prices of those phones are mostly a racket (phones tend to be around $200-350 without a contract). What I mean by that is if you look at some of the pre-paid phones you can get a fully featured camera phone with bluetooth for around $60-80 no contract. If you don't care about being fancy the cheap phones go for less than $20. There is simply no reason that phones need to be expensive like that; it's just a trap to keep people in contract.
In fact, there's no reason you can't use pre-paid phones on the post-paid networks. With GSM phones you can even put your contract phone SIMM card into a prepaid phone (assuming it's the same carrier) and it works the same, which is a nice trick if your GSM phone breaks and you don't qualify for the upgrade rebate.
In fact, I'd sooner hire someone who was bright, creative, well-versed in computer *science*, and doesn't know a compiled language from an interpreted one than hire a wizard at Java who can't think (him|her)self out of a paper bag.
Of course, such a person would never be considered for an interview due to lack of wizard credentials.
I actually like their products, they are still much more put together than any Linux distro has ever managed to be. Of course, what gives me pause about Microsoft and Windows is that for the massive, almost unimaginable amount of money that they make, especially compared to any Linux distro, their product just isn't -that- much better.
I realize that making an OS is one of the hardest things to do in the programming world, and Microsoft maybe sets it's goals in the wrong places, but with billions to spend on development, why isn't it the best goddamn thing ever? That's where I lose my respect for them.
It's not really useful since we have no way of producing a lot of hydrogen without oil. Until we find a better source/method, or if the hydrogen extraction process is somehow better than burning petrol in cars, there isn't a lot of use for the technology.
So this guy is up for 101 years for spamming, but some dirt bag that molested his daughter-in-law for 6 years only serves a 4 year sentence.
Well, it's already been addressed that he's probably getting off easier, but what is being brought up here is an interesting civil question. You seem to be implying here that people should be given jail time based on some sort of moral, or more likely visceral response you have towards molestation. A lot of people might agree with you, however, that isn't a good basis for jail time. If anything, we should be giving jail time, or other punishment, based on the degree of which the crime impacts society, by how hard it is to change the criminals behavior, and by the sheer amount of effort in braking the law that was undertaken.
I suggest this because often in cases of molestation, the criminal isn't really thinking it through as clearly as a criminal who is doing something like fraud or spamming. That said, a molester could most likely be more easily converted into civil behavior, than someone who calculates braking the law would his behavior.
Then again, jail time isn't generally given sensibly in US culture most of the time, so it's a moot point to begin with.
It is interesting that so many of the Slashdot posters are giving 'reasons' why there is this gap, but rarely anything that gives an answer beyond what is already understood. Firstly, the argument that women are simply 'different' doesn't actually explain the disparity. People are not trying make men and women the same sort of being, but rather they are trying to understand what really is the difference. By the same logic, you could claim that since Australians eat Vegemite at a much higher frequency than Americans, that it must be due to inherent genetic differences between the populations. Additionally, to say that "being different" is enough to cause a gap, that there probably has only been one reason or motive to cause anyone to go into IT or engineering fields, ever; that only one sort of of very specific personality can allow a person to become interested in those fields. This is simply not true. Secondly, if you use the argument "Women simply don't want to!" as some sort of explanation, you are missing a lot of contextual implications here. It does not help that the argument in question, in a historical context mind you, has always been used as a justification of men (and women, no doubt) as a reason for why there has ever been a societal gap between the sexes in anything. Inherent reasons even! Granted, there may be some reasons due to the enhanced burden of child rearing that women face or some effect of estrogen/testosterone on the brain, but is that the reason? Is there really enough of an inherent advantage or disadvantage on either side to really make a difference? Is a career in IT necessarily more demanding on a woman's life than one in medicine, theater, art, music, etc? I mean, this is the same sort of conversation people were having about women voting and to a large extent (even today), being in politics altogether. And the whole importance of this sort of question isn't derived from it's specific usefulness, but rather the understanding of the disparity in the first place. Finding out answers to these questions gives us further understandings to ourselves, and to what is truly different between men and women, and what is truly the same. There may still be something, outside of our general inherent genetic natures that we have yet to fully reveal that may yet explain this. Keep in mind that humans are the least instinctual animals on the planet and are therefore the most malleable. Also keep in mind that when you say 'inherent' in regards to humans, you are saying that it is a genetic propensity derived from natural selection in homo sapien sapien's environment of evolutionary adaptation, or at least accidentally related. Unless we happen to find a gene, or a set of genes that regulate who becomes someone in the IT field, it doesn't stand to reason to jump to that conclusion. Realistically, women are still an underrepresented group, in America, and much more so outside of the 'western world'. Historically, women have been infrequent participants in the workplace in general and have increased their frequency in it after many feminist and civil rights movements, only to show that in most of these cases, there wasn't a particularly good reason women were not involved. I'm not going to say that there isn't a good reason for women not to be in the IT and engineering fields, what I'm saying is that there's really little to no evidence suggesting a good reason for it exists. The fact that people (men?) are so readily jumping on these old unjustified phrases should be raising red flags here.