Fortunately, at least as far as the general public is concerned (i.e. not the sort of people that have even heard of Slashdot), _no one_ really cares what Linux users do, much less how many of them do it.
Well, I suppose there is an exception to this - sometimes Linux users get lumped in with other "alternative" choices, such as terrorists and gays. Why would someone choose to do something nonconformist if they weren't looking to subvert our nations principles, right?
(In case it isn't obvious, this post is seething with anger towards people who actually think this way. Which unfortunately includes most voters.)
You can't just magically get files with your average BitTorrent client - you must first download a.torrent file which describes some basic information about the download and lists available trackers. Couldn't companies just track how many times the.torrent files is downloaded? Further, if they are running the tracker themselves, wouldn't they also be able to get a pretty good idea of how many people are downloading the file by, I dunno, _tracking_ connected peers?
I don't know how much merit your "can't determine ratings" argument has upon serious review.
A demand???? By who? The 0.05% of consumers that actually are aware of it? What about all the off the shelf computers - think the mass producers of such things as Dell are going to be jumping to fight this sort of protection being used in the hardware they buy? If you really believe that anyone that actually matters is going to fight this issue on moral/ethical grounds BEFORE it is out there then you are deluding yourself.
Our only hope is that it will become the standard, it will break bloody everything, and then Joe Sixpack is going to care enough to bitch. That will cause software studios to stop using it, so while we'll still be stuck with the hardware (likely permanently do to compatibility), at least we'll still be able to run our software.
True enough, if only it were possible for people to filter content themselves. You know, but some sort of thought process - unfortunately that is not the case, without some form of scripting all we can do is read Slashdot beginning to end, good or bad.
It's nice to see that you care enough about you're family to put them first, above all other considerations. You're kids will grow up far better adjusted having experienced an attentive father who makes an effort to give them his undivided attention.
Oh my... so many possibilities for "accidentally uncovers thermal vent" come to mind. God knows I'm going to try and make some sort of joke and at least one girl I know is going to slap me. I suppose you can't really worry too much about the inevitable though...
Frankly, I think this would be safer in practice than a regular motorcycle - it would of course require paying attention and at least some inherent common sense (painfully true of any type of motorcycle), but would offer great improvements in terms of responsiveness and stability, as well as being able to maintain traction and control under a far larger range of emergency situations (i.e. those that typically result in accidents if a certain narrow safe path isn't taken) due to the three points of ground control (the independent nature of the two guiding wheel arms also increases the intuitiveness of maneuver control). The extended arms may look odd at first glance, but in practice any long Harley is the same (with the front tire on long extension, and the way he designed it while looking elegant is fundamentally simple and has few points of failure (comparable to existing motorcycle design). The actuation points that are referenced in the design go to making maneuvering more natural and solid, but in fact are such that even if they do break (even multiple simultaneous failures) vehicle control would not be lost - it would just feel stiffer and more machine like. In otherwords it would become like an ordinary vehicle.
Unfortunately almost no one who will be responsible for whether or not this product becomes real (nor the political organizations responsible for legislating vehicle design for public use) are capable of realizing that sort of understanding, and will be stuck on it's unconventional appearance. *sigh* Essentially we're still in the "Get a horse you jackass!" days
Actually, this is right on track with Microsoft's established business practice. Start doing something that the public supports and that their customers desire, hype it up, achieve good will, and then give up half way in and drop all support for it (and if possible pretend it never existed).
No more sensationalist headlines?!? But what about our responsibility to the corporate sponsors? Without them how else could I learn to fear foreigners and decide to Do the Dew all in the same 5 minutes!
An LED is not a bad idea, especially considering that it already exists... (i.e. the HDD activity led)
The problem with the LED is that it doesn't really catch your attention unless you are checking it because of a slow down, or happen to look at it incidentally. This doesn't exactly provide the ambient hdd status information that is described by the audible noise of a conventional drive. A small wafer speaker (appropriate for the higher pitch noises of a drive while simultaneously offering a small form factor) would provide the proper audio info if used as an activity indicator. This could be offered as a mod/accessory, receiving it's info from the HDD LED pins and using a cheap chip to appropriately convert that into HDD noises - many creative permutations on this concept present themselves, enjoy.
Hey, USB might have the small downside that it rectangular in shape but not symmetrical in use - minor annoyance if you don't look/can't see the socket.
However it is unfair to say it is worse than things like CAT5, headphone jacks, and D-subminiature. Cat5 Those little locking tabs are always cracking off ethernet male plugs (get caught on something, etc.).
Once that happens they fall out constantly if brushed at all. Headphone miniplugs Headphone jacks have multiple different purposes with identical connectors for all so are annoying to plug in correctly - i.e. Front L/R, Rear L/R, Center/Sub, Mic, Line in. This is further exacerbated by manufacturers such as Sound Blaster who thought it was a good idea to not use standard color coding (green/black/pink, etc.) on higher their end products (ex. Audigy 2 ZS Plat) and just make all the ports GOLD. Always takes me a couple tries before I figure out which one is the frackin mic port. D-subminiature Asymmetrical design doesn't necessarily mean it's impossible to try and put it in wrong! You still have to stop, look, think, and then insert: sure it only goes in one way, but without looking or fumbling how do you know which way that is? Did you consider that before complaining?
The only reason you are annoyed by USB and not others (as much) is because its use is so damn pervasive. With most other connections you tend to stop and consider it more carefully before you go and rush to plug it in, so you tend to not do it wrong - that USB is so simple and omnipresent that you may utilize it a dozen times in day without raising an eyebrow, and yet you don't even bother to slow down and think before trying would seem to be a huge indication of a good practical design. Familiarity breeds contempt I suppose.
Only 50% chance of plugging a USB device in wrong? Nah, much more like 75% (with the exception of memorized things like my flash drive - the led helps). I find that I commonly end up trying 3-4 times when plugging in USB devices when I can't see the port; though this is likely due to my own personal experiences with breaking USB jacks, one time I was even lucky enough to have the side of a case off so I actually saw something on the motherboard explode when inserting a 802.11B dongle improperly*. Hence I'm cautious. That said though I love USB devices on the whole, cheap, simple, reliable, and I don't care at all about the connector once the it is plugged in - I'm just happy my Flashdrive(s)/Hdd(s)/Keyboard/Mouse/IR-Receiver/Biometrics/Webcam/Phone/MP3 Player/Universal Card-reader/Microscope/Dancing Jesus/Midget/etc. all work.
* This incident is probably due to the manufacturer being cheap enough to use cardboard instead of plastic for the little tongue thing the wires are on, it had worn down over time till the connector just crumpled/reshaped itself and went in 2/3's the way, thereby crossing power/data lines. I haven't noticed anything quite so shoddy in years though, so it isn't really a major concern. Additionally, USB specification does state plastic, so it isn't the standards fault.
Lastly, I don't condone assault/homocide; so don't shoot that guy I mentioned earlier. However, if you want to rough him up a little that is entirely up to you. I recommend ice pick + knee cap: the trick is you go in from the back of the knee.
I absolutely agree, unsolicited/unintentional traffic crush the pay-per-bit concept. Horrifyingly enough, they probably really would use something like $1/GB instead of something more reasonable such as $0.05/GB - not to mention additional external pressure (beyond inner greed) they (ISP's) would be subjected to by major software retailers or content providers who want to crush smaller competition. Not too hard to imagine Microsoft enjoying the suckerpunch to linux users (4GB for Fedora, another 4GB for x64 release, couple GB for Ubuntu flavors, that's $10 right there - perhaps worth it to fanboys, but deterring to those just curious or new to the OS. That is not including installing free software via the repositories (Open Office, XMoto, you know, the essentials).) Microsoft sits back fat and happy, because - of course - Microsoft.com pays to be on the unmetered whitelist.
Afterthought: I can average 5-15GB total transfer daily. Beyond the linux installs (perhaps 15GB/month)it is mostly TV shows; I pay for Expanded Digital + 5 Premium Channels, I'd say I earned the right to download the new Boston Legal or Dexter considering a DVR could do the same (yay MythTV). I also buy the boxsets for shows I respect and then download the rips anyway for convenience. I.E. My usage might make me a little more prejudiced against the pay-per-bit idea than some Xanga/Myspace teen or AOL e-mail user.
I'm sorry, but racism??? This is the real world for goodness sake! "living beings"? What about cows, chickens, pigs, lamb, and all the other animals we slaughter and eat by the millions on a regular basis? How about we worry more about the inhumane treatment of _humans_ before we start worrying about those annoying furry meat bags some call pets. (To be fair, humans are meat bags too, except we can attack from a distance and employ tools. Fear us.)
P.S. - Am I alone in occasionally seeing a cow along the highway and having to resist the urge to jump out, tackle it, and take a bite?
Well said, those are rather good ways of describing gamers.
I would be a strategist explorer for one. Example: Crysis - I'm one of those crazy people that walked up to a building, opened a door, and started walking backwards. I found it hilarious when I was looking through the door at a wall, took one more step, and suddenly I was looking at sky/trees/hills through the open doorway. Take one step forward and I was seeing the rendered interior again. I love digging into every last corner of a game, figuring out how the engine works (to be honest, a lot of the time I never get around to actually playing the game). I practically orgasmed at the commentary track for Portal and HL2:EP2.
This is in contrast to many friends of mine who are the twitch type gamer. I was watching one in Crysis, and was confounded as 4 times in a row he proceded to walk up to a field, get blown up, load a save, and repeat. Finally I asked him why he was doing that, and he said he couldn't figure out why he was getting killed. He died, loaded again, walked over about 10 feet, entered the field, and died again. Not able to stand it any longer I pointed out how there were not just holes all over the field, but signs stuck in the ground with pictures of mines and the word "warning" on them. Not to mention several safe routes that were visible everytime he blundered into the minefield.
P.S. - Is it sad that I've actually had dreams about game design? (As in, I am playing a game first person, find something I dislike, jump out to third person, edit the engine/game logic/etc., then resume walking around in first person. Very Matrix like:-P.)
Remove the activation? It's called "Windows XP Pro Corporate". All you do is enter your key, and off you go, never have to activate. - only problem is you have to be a large scale customer to have this privilege, but as always the individual consumer isn't important. As long as they (the consumer) hands over their money, or we can figure out some way to sue/scare/squeeze it out of them, that's all that matters.
Not just the uniformed are vulnerable - if it wasn't for my love of my Logitech G15 I would have bought a wireless keyboard long ago for my main PC (not to mention that I've never thought twice about typing my passwords into the computers I've used at various work places over a wireless keyboard, thinking I was in the clear because as Admin I knew the system was secure). I keep my email/chats secured inside of a triple encrypted partion requiring a random char password in the 15-20 char range. My master password list is similarly encrypted with the added bonus that it is kept on a flash with BartPE to boot from and further requires a keyfile+password to gain access. And then stored in a safe. Then there are the multiple layers of protection/filtering both hardware and software on my internet connection, sandboxed to hell browser restriction (fancy things like java/flash/etc. only enabled on an as needed basis), and various other approaches. God forbid I ever use a wireless network for anything more than wiki'ing some pop culture reference that has missed me by a few yards.
Yet, not once, NOT ONCE, has wireless keyboard security even crossed my mind.
Ok, assuming that the two keyboards did have the same encryption key (more below), and further assuming that this event happened to be seen by you personally (rather than, say, some girls in a dorm somewhere), the best you could hope for is having a friggin ton of text in your password field. To have logged into the system the other guy would have to have unknowingly and coincidentally typed in the other users password, followed by "enter", without having typed anything before hand to mess it up. Oh, and given the nature of graphical interfaces (those chat windows, etc.) and mouse interactions... (you can see where I'm going here). Good job of detailed framing to give your story credibility though, got modded up well enough.
(short rant on probability) Having two identical encryption keys is certainly possible, however extremely unlikely - but so is having two ethernet cards with the same address on the same network; something which happens on college campuses from time to time. The difference being though that the radius on the campus includes 10's of thousands, while a keyboard only has 30-40ft to play with.
Yes, that would be true if ground level facilities and the hardware itself was all freely available. Oh, and construction crews, technicians, engineers, supporting staff, *list goes on*, are also entirely willing to volunteer their time and equipment.
What you should be doing is comparing the cost of this project to a comparably equiped ground level datacenter.
I suggest at least trying to find out what something means before you make broad moral judgments on them. An "unlocked" phone is a phone which is not locked in to a single provider. For some reason many people accept that Sprint has one set of phones, AT&T another, and so forth - this is ridiculous. The hardware itself does not require this at all (except through artificial implementation), and unlocked versions of phones reflect this by allowing you to use the hardware you enjoy with whatever service provider you deem to be the best choice for you. That the majority of us allow this locking in without question is only evidence of how effectively we have been brainwashed (because it makes perfect sense that companies can use our private property after we purchase - not rent - things from them. Wait...)
AOL isn't exactly rare, and employs the load-balancing you mentioned. While not used much by people who utilize the internet in a non-minimalistic fashion, many older users who are only concerned with the occasional e-mail and getting pictures of their grandkids still utilize it. It is also used by some privacy conscious users specifically because of the constantly changing IP (this specific circumstance came up in a PHP course when going over handling logins).
A service such as Gmail serves too broad a range of users for users this sort of "identity confirmation" to be implemented reasonably for every user.
AOL isn't exactly rare, and employs the load-balancing you mentioned. While not used much by people who utilize the internet in a non-minimalistic fashion, many older users who are only concerned with the occasional e-mail and getting pictures of their grandkids still utilize it. It is also used by some privacy conscious users specifically because of the constantly changing IP (this specific circumstance came up in a PHP course when going over handling logins).
A service such as Gmail serves too broad a range of users for users this sort of "identity confirmation" to be implemented reasonably for every user.
Slashdot Mirror
Fortunately, at least as far as the general public is concerned (i.e. not the sort of people that have even heard of Slashdot), _no one_ really cares what Linux users do, much less how many of them do it.
Well, I suppose there is an exception to this - sometimes Linux users get lumped in with other "alternative" choices, such as terrorists and gays. Why would someone choose to do something nonconformist if they weren't looking to subvert our nations principles, right?
(In case it isn't obvious, this post is seething with anger towards people who actually think this way. Which unfortunately includes most voters.)
You can't just magically get files with your average BitTorrent client - you must first download a .torrent file which describes some basic information about the download and lists available trackers. Couldn't companies just track how many times the .torrent files is downloaded? Further, if they are running the tracker themselves, wouldn't they also be able to get a pretty good idea of how many people are downloading the file by, I dunno, _tracking_ connected peers?
I don't know how much merit your "can't determine ratings" argument has upon serious review.
A demand???? By who? The 0.05% of consumers that actually are aware of it? What about all the off the shelf computers - think the mass producers of such things as Dell are going to be jumping to fight this sort of protection being used in the hardware they buy? If you really believe that anyone that actually matters is going to fight this issue on moral/ethical grounds BEFORE it is out there then you are deluding yourself.
Our only hope is that it will become the standard, it will break bloody everything, and then Joe Sixpack is going to care enough to bitch. That will cause software studios to stop using it, so while we'll still be stuck with the hardware (likely permanently do to compatibility), at least we'll still be able to run our software.
True enough, if only it were possible for people to filter content themselves. You know, but some sort of thought process - unfortunately that is not the case, without some form of scripting all we can do is read Slashdot beginning to end, good or bad.
It's nice to see that you care enough about you're family to put them first, above all other considerations. You're kids will grow up far better adjusted having experienced an attentive father who makes an effort to give them his undivided attention.
Oh... wait... hmm.
Oh my... so many possibilities for "accidentally uncovers thermal vent" come to mind. God knows I'm going to try and make some sort of joke and at least one girl I know is going to slap me. I suppose you can't really worry too much about the inevitable though...
Frankly, I think this would be safer in practice than a regular motorcycle - it would of course require paying attention and at least some inherent common sense (painfully true of any type of motorcycle), but would offer great improvements in terms of responsiveness and stability, as well as being able to maintain traction and control under a far larger range of emergency situations (i.e. those that typically result in accidents if a certain narrow safe path isn't taken) due to the three points of ground control (the independent nature of the two guiding wheel arms also increases the intuitiveness of maneuver control). The extended arms may look odd at first glance, but in practice any long Harley is the same (with the front tire on long extension, and the way he designed it while looking elegant is fundamentally simple and has few points of failure (comparable to existing motorcycle design). The actuation points that are referenced in the design go to making maneuvering more natural and solid, but in fact are such that even if they do break (even multiple simultaneous failures) vehicle control would not be lost - it would just feel stiffer and more machine like. In otherwords it would become like an ordinary vehicle.
Unfortunately almost no one who will be responsible for whether or not this product becomes real (nor the political organizations responsible for legislating vehicle design for public use) are capable of realizing that sort of understanding, and will be stuck on it's unconventional appearance. *sigh* Essentially we're still in the "Get a horse you jackass!" days
Actually, this is right on track with Microsoft's established business practice. Start doing something that the public supports and that their customers desire, hype it up, achieve good will, and then give up half way in and drop all support for it (and if possible pretend it never existed).
No more sensationalist headlines?!? But what about our responsibility to the corporate sponsors? Without them how else could I learn to fear foreigners and decide to Do the Dew all in the same 5 minutes!
An LED is not a bad idea, especially considering that it already exists... (i.e. the HDD activity led)
The problem with the LED is that it doesn't really catch your attention unless you are checking it because of a slow down, or happen to look at it incidentally. This doesn't exactly provide the ambient hdd status information that is described by the audible noise of a conventional drive. A small wafer speaker (appropriate for the higher pitch noises of a drive while simultaneously offering a small form factor) would provide the proper audio info if used as an activity indicator. This could be offered as a mod/accessory, receiving it's info from the HDD LED pins and using a cheap chip to appropriately convert that into HDD noises - many creative permutations on this concept present themselves, enjoy.
Hey, USB might have the small downside that it rectangular in shape but not symmetrical in use - minor annoyance if you don't look/can't see the socket.
However it is unfair to say it is worse than things like CAT5, headphone jacks, and D-subminiature.
Cat5 Those little locking tabs are always cracking off ethernet male plugs (get caught on something, etc.). Once that happens they fall out constantly if brushed at all.
Headphone miniplugs Headphone jacks have multiple different purposes with identical connectors for all so are annoying to plug in correctly - i.e. Front L/R, Rear L/R, Center/Sub, Mic, Line in. This is further exacerbated by manufacturers such as Sound Blaster who thought it was a good idea to not use standard color coding (green/black/pink, etc.) on higher their end products (ex. Audigy 2 ZS Plat) and just make all the ports GOLD. Always takes me a couple tries before I figure out which one is the frackin mic port.
D-subminiature Asymmetrical design doesn't necessarily mean it's impossible to try and put it in wrong! You still have to stop, look, think, and then insert: sure it only goes in one way, but without looking or fumbling how do you know which way that is? Did you consider that before complaining?
The only reason you are annoyed by USB and not others (as much) is because its use is so damn pervasive. With most other connections you tend to stop and consider it more carefully before you go and rush to plug it in, so you tend to not do it wrong - that USB is so simple and omnipresent that you may utilize it a dozen times in day without raising an eyebrow, and yet you don't even bother to slow down and think before trying would seem to be a huge indication of a good practical design. Familiarity breeds contempt I suppose.
Only 50% chance of plugging a USB device in wrong? Nah, much more like 75% (with the exception of memorized things like my flash drive - the led helps). I find that I commonly end up trying 3-4 times when plugging in USB devices when I can't see the port; though this is likely due to my own personal experiences with breaking USB jacks, one time I was even lucky enough to have the side of a case off so I actually saw something on the motherboard explode when inserting a 802.11B dongle improperly*. Hence I'm cautious. That said though I love USB devices on the whole, cheap, simple, reliable, and I don't care at all about the connector once the it is plugged in - I'm just happy my Flashdrive(s)/Hdd(s)/Keyboard/Mouse/IR-Receiver/Biometrics/Webcam/Phone/MP3 Player/Universal Card-reader/Microscope/Dancing Jesus/Midget/etc. all work.
* This incident is probably due to the manufacturer being cheap enough to use cardboard instead of plastic for the little tongue thing the wires are on, it had worn down over time till the connector just crumpled/reshaped itself and went in 2/3's the way, thereby crossing power/data lines. I haven't noticed anything quite so shoddy in years though, so it isn't really a major concern. Additionally, USB specification does state plastic, so it isn't the standards fault.
Lastly, I don't condone assault/homocide; so don't shoot that guy I mentioned earlier. However, if you want to rough him up a little that is entirely up to you. I recommend ice pick + knee cap: the trick is you go in from the back of the knee.
I absolutely agree, unsolicited/unintentional traffic crush the pay-per-bit concept. Horrifyingly enough, they probably really would use something like $1/GB instead of something more reasonable such as $0.05/GB - not to mention additional external pressure (beyond inner greed) they (ISP's) would be subjected to by major software retailers or content providers who want to crush smaller competition. Not too hard to imagine Microsoft enjoying the suckerpunch to linux users (4GB for Fedora, another 4GB for x64 release, couple GB for Ubuntu flavors, that's $10 right there - perhaps worth it to fanboys, but deterring to those just curious or new to the OS. That is not including installing free software via the repositories (Open Office, XMoto, you know, the essentials).) Microsoft sits back fat and happy, because - of course - Microsoft.com pays to be on the unmetered whitelist.
Afterthought: I can average 5-15GB total transfer daily. Beyond the linux installs (perhaps 15GB/month)it is mostly TV shows; I pay for Expanded Digital + 5 Premium Channels, I'd say I earned the right to download the new Boston Legal or Dexter considering a DVR could do the same (yay MythTV). I also buy the boxsets for shows I respect and then download the rips anyway for convenience. I.E. My usage might make me a little more prejudiced against the pay-per-bit idea than some Xanga/Myspace teen or AOL e-mail user.
I'm sorry, but racism??? This is the real world for goodness sake! "living beings"? What about cows, chickens, pigs, lamb, and all the other animals we slaughter and eat by the millions on a regular basis? How about we worry more about the inhumane treatment of _humans_ before we start worrying about those annoying furry meat bags some call pets. (To be fair, humans are meat bags too, except we can attack from a distance and employ tools. Fear us.)
P.S. - Am I alone in occasionally seeing a cow along the highway and having to resist the urge to jump out, tackle it, and take a bite?
Well said, those are rather good ways of describing gamers.
:-P.)
I would be a strategist explorer for one. Example: Crysis - I'm one of those crazy people that walked up to a building, opened a door, and started walking backwards. I found it hilarious when I was looking through the door at a wall, took one more step, and suddenly I was looking at sky/trees/hills through the open doorway. Take one step forward and I was seeing the rendered interior again. I love digging into every last corner of a game, figuring out how the engine works (to be honest, a lot of the time I never get around to actually playing the game). I practically orgasmed at the commentary track for Portal and HL2:EP2.
This is in contrast to many friends of mine who are the twitch type gamer. I was watching one in Crysis, and was confounded as 4 times in a row he proceded to walk up to a field, get blown up, load a save, and repeat. Finally I asked him why he was doing that, and he said he couldn't figure out why he was getting killed. He died, loaded again, walked over about 10 feet, entered the field, and died again. Not able to stand it any longer I pointed out how there were not just holes all over the field, but signs stuck in the ground with pictures of mines and the word "warning" on them. Not to mention several safe routes that were visible everytime he blundered into the minefield.
P.S. - Is it sad that I've actually had dreams about game design? (As in, I am playing a game first person, find something I dislike, jump out to third person, edit the engine/game logic/etc., then resume walking around in first person. Very Matrix like
Remove the activation? It's called "Windows XP Pro Corporate".
All you do is enter your key, and off you go, never have to activate.
- only problem is you have to be a large scale customer to have this privilege, but as always the individual consumer isn't important. As long as they (the consumer) hands over their money, or we can figure out some way to sue/scare/squeeze it out of them, that's all that matters.
Not just the uniformed are vulnerable - if it wasn't for my love of my Logitech G15 I would have bought a wireless keyboard long ago for my main PC (not to mention that I've never thought twice about typing my passwords into the computers I've used at various work places over a wireless keyboard, thinking I was in the clear because as Admin I knew the system was secure). I keep my email/chats secured inside of a triple encrypted partion requiring a random char password in the 15-20 char range. My master password list is similarly encrypted with the added bonus that it is kept on a flash with BartPE to boot from and further requires a keyfile+password to gain access. And then stored in a safe. Then there are the multiple layers of protection/filtering both hardware and software on my internet connection, sandboxed to hell browser restriction (fancy things like java/flash/etc. only enabled on an as needed basis), and various other approaches. God forbid I ever use a wireless network for anything more than wiki'ing some pop culture reference that has missed me by a few yards.
Yet, not once, NOT ONCE, has wireless keyboard security even crossed my mind.
Ok, assuming that the two keyboards did have the same encryption key (more below), and further assuming that this event happened to be seen by you personally (rather than, say, some girls in a dorm somewhere), the best you could hope for is having a friggin ton of text in your password field. To have logged into the system the other guy would have to have unknowingly and coincidentally typed in the other users password, followed by "enter", without having typed anything before hand to mess it up. Oh, and given the nature of graphical interfaces (those chat windows, etc.) and mouse interactions... (you can see where I'm going here). Good job of detailed framing to give your story credibility though, got modded up well enough.
(short rant on probability) Having two identical encryption keys is certainly possible, however extremely unlikely - but so is having two ethernet cards with the same address on the same network; something which happens on college campuses from time to time. The difference being though that the radius on the campus includes 10's of thousands, while a keyboard only has 30-40ft to play with.
Uh-oh... GOTO? That's a surefire way to get eaten by Raptors you crazy man! *hides*
Yes, that would be true if ground level facilities and the hardware itself was all freely available. Oh, and construction crews, technicians, engineers, supporting staff, *list goes on*, are also entirely willing to volunteer their time and equipment.
What you should be doing is comparing the cost of this project to a comparably equiped ground level datacenter.
because it makes perfect sense that companies can determine how we can use our private property after we purchase - not rent - things from them.*
Sorry for the typo, I generally catch such things before I post.
I suggest at least trying to find out what something means before you make broad moral judgments on them. An "unlocked" phone is a phone which is not locked in to a single provider. For some reason many people accept that Sprint has one set of phones, AT&T another, and so forth - this is ridiculous. The hardware itself does not require this at all (except through artificial implementation), and unlocked versions of phones reflect this by allowing you to use the hardware you enjoy with whatever service provider you deem to be the best choice for you. That the majority of us allow this locking in without question is only evidence of how effectively we have been brainwashed (because it makes perfect sense that companies can use our private property after we purchase - not rent - things from them. Wait...)
AOL isn't exactly rare, and employs the load-balancing you mentioned. While not used much by people who utilize the internet in a non-minimalistic fashion, many older users who are only concerned with the occasional e-mail and getting pictures of their grandkids still utilize it. It is also used by some privacy conscious users specifically because of the constantly changing IP (this specific circumstance came up in a PHP course when going over handling logins). A service such as Gmail serves too broad a range of users for users this sort of "identity confirmation" to be implemented reasonably for every user.
AOL isn't exactly rare, and employs the load-balancing you mentioned. While not used much by people who utilize the internet in a non-minimalistic fashion, many older users who are only concerned with the occasional e-mail and getting pictures of their grandkids still utilize it. It is also used by some privacy conscious users specifically because of the constantly changing IP (this specific circumstance came up in a PHP course when going over handling logins).
A service such as Gmail serves too broad a range of users for users this sort of "identity confirmation" to be implemented reasonably for every user.