I support your rational, moderate approach to these issues. I'm a letter-writer, too. I agree with the need for compromise over all-out hostility.
In the case of freedoms curtailed due to the example of 9/11, I feel that letter-writing is an ineffective method of pressuring decision-makers to examine the situation with logic. Publicized conflicts over these policies work much better due to the attention focused on the illogic of the situation.
But the reality is that if you talk nicely to the officer and explain what you were taking a photo of, you'll pretty much never be asked to even delete photos.
The thing is, I shouldn't have to explain anything. I should be able to shoot photos of public spaces for whatever reason I like. The real evil-doers are able to covertly photograph their targets for planning purposes, so it makes this scrutiny of public photography ludicrous. When a police officer tells a person, "Don't shoot a photo in the train station," did the police officer prevent a terrorist attack from occurring? Did the terrorist return back to headquarters and tell the rest of the terrorists, "Looks like we have to cancel the bombing for tomorrow. They wouldn't let me take photos of our target."?
This is false security that gives the illusion that the government is taking steps towards protecting the population. When those steps tread on my freedom, I have a hard time compromising. But I respect your ability to do so.
While I believe that your perspective is well-thought-out and backed with experience, I have to chime in with support for aepervius. Yeah, for people with families and 'things-to-do,' confronting police or security and making an issue out of them trampling our rights is a real pain in the ass. I'm one of those people who doesn't have the time to get arrested, go downtown, get bailed out, then follow up with a court visit, etc.
But I also think if you yield to the excessive demands of a security agent, making phone calls the next day to complain isn't likely going to get a policy changed or justice served. Cases like this Amtrak situation help draw public attention to the overall problem of hysteria-fueled security-theater that's propagated post-9/11. Now that this photographer has shouldered the burden of resisting these unreasonable police requests, it will make it easier for others to resist similar incursions on our freedom.
The thing contemporary America doesn't understand is that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are not something that is suspended due to the climate of today. They are the guideposts for getting through difficult times. People who think it's acceptable to surrender their rights for the time being don't appreciate those rights for what they are.
But to the literal situation of refusing the 'delete your photos' request. Cops and seasoned security guards have developed an eye through experience how their authority will be accepted or rejected. They can tell who can be pushed around and who will call bullshit on them. Many stores will hire off-duty cops because it extends the authority of their security force to actually arrest people and issue unreasonable commands (at the behest of the store) that must be followed lest a visitor be accused of 'refusing to follow the orders of a police officer.' These officers have all kinds of verbal techniques they'll use to imply force such as, "Are you going to make a problem here?" to coerce you to do things they have no legal backing for. When you are told to delete the photos, you say sternly, "No. This memory card contains photos of my daughter who was killed by a drunk driver three days ago. These are the last photos I have of her. If we must go to the police station to discuss this matter, by all means, let's go." When cops or security guards realize you are dead serious about making this a situation and understand the limits of their authority, they back the fuck down. The funny thing is, when you take that attitude from the get-go, you never have to press an issue like this with a security guard or cop because they can sense that they can't push you around.
In America you can shoot photos of people on public property and publish them for whatever purpose you want even if the subject objects. If this is different in the EU, please provide a reference.
This Amtrak situation is another example in the continuing trend of hysteria-fueled security theater. If someone is taking a photo overtly of something that could be used for nefarious purposes, do people really think that photographer couldn't perform the same task covertly? I once was shooting a photo of the exterior of a prison for a newspaper article. A security officer promptly told me to stop. Not wanting to get into a huge situation with phone calls, lawyers, etc. I just got in my car, drove by slowly, and shot my photos out the window of the car. I didn't get the quality I wanted, but I certainly got the same photo that could have supposedly been used for a prison break.
My condolences go out to the Journalspace.com operator. It was probably a huge part of that person's life and now it's all gone because of a mistake. I hope it doesn't leave him disillusioned about embarking on other ambitious efforts.
Back in the nineties, a friend of mine was backing his mac system up weekly with a tape drive. The thing is, he was using the same tape to repeatedly back up onto. One day he calls to tell me he needed some help recovering files on his hard drive after a crash. I asked, "What about the tape backups?" He said, "That thing backs up perfectly. The problem is, it doesn't restore at all."
My bank at least also uses a one-time pad system, namely a numbered list of 100 pre-generated codes.
Just to let you know, that's not a one-time pad. Unless you can only perform 100 logins with that pad. "If a one-time pad is used just twice, simple mathematical operations can reduce it to a running key cipher."
If not, you've just admitted tax evasion on a public forum...
That would be city and county sales tax. Just wanted to clarify that this is not the jurisdiction of the IRS as other people assumed you were implying when threw out the ugly term, 'tax evasion.'
Damn easy, great selection, good delivery options, cheap, no crowds... brilliant.
You neglected one extraordinary feature that no one else has mentioned in any of these comments-- no sales tax. When it comes to high-dollar electronic purchases, I always go to Amazon or Newegg. Brick and mortars can not compete when they have to pile on a sales tax. For instance, I just bought a Nikon D90 camera with a couple of lenses. Sales tax in Austin, TX. boosted the price more than a hundred dollars over what Amazon was charging.
As the economy continues to crumble, more people will probably recognize this cost-saving opportunity and Amazon will be able to brag amount recession-resistant sales figures. Not that this article indicates they have actually made more money than in previous years.
Thus SUVs are monstrosities generally while trucks, locomotives and buses are generally efficient.
I just wanted to extend your example of rail efficiencies.
Trains also benefit from tracks that have been built as level as possible. Less energy is required to haul mass up hills or mountains. Roads take cars and semi trucks through many more elevation changes than trains encounter. A train also has very controlled and planned stops and starts. Trucks used to haul goods (and cars) are susceptible to traffic and must burn energy braking and accelerating repetitively throughout their routes. These are massive losses of energy that a train never suffers from.
Rail-based infrastructures work better with higher population densities; otherwise, you're laying an awful lot of track to get from point A to point B.
I grew up in Tokyo, so I know a little something about population density. Higher-value real estate is congregated around rail stations. People want to live with good access to rail stations. They compete for jobs located near rail stations. You can ABSOLUTELY live out in the boonies and have a big yard, etc. in Japan. If you look at photos of Mt. Fuji, you'll see that there aren't pagodas crammed all up against it. There is PLENTY of room to live in Japan.
You argument is common in America. Yes, we have poorly planned cities throughout our country. Installing a rail system now will reorganize these communities and massively shift land values. The same effect will be felt when gas prices return to > $4.00 / gallon. You can choose to be proactive or reactive regarding our transportation system. I choose the former.
I am running the IP35 pro without problems under Mac OS X 10.5.3.
When I bought it, I remember the box saying the capacitors were Japanese-made 100% solid state. It was one of the biggest things promoted on the box. I suppose they wanted to promote that they had addressed the bad-cap issue.
I've been very pleased with the mobo after using it for one year. Sad to hear they're going to close.
A big challenge to any new player getting into the electro-auto market is dealer support. Where is someone supposed to get parts for this thing or a Tesla? Sure, an electric vehicle design should require less maintenance, but even components will need to be replaced due to accidents and road wear.
I've heard people say the auto bailout money should go to a start-up like Tesla. The problem with completely abandoning the American automakers and putting public funds behind a startup is that the big three already have huge infrastructure in place. They already understand production. Bless the hearts of those Tesla idealists, but they're going to spend a BUNCH of money developing dealerships, parts distribution, training mechanics & sales people. And until their production numbers get big, the deals they'll cut with suppliers won't be as profitable as the ones Ford/GM/Chrysler make with their suppliers thanks to the economies of scale they're working in.
I'm not saying there isn't a place for smaller companies to come in and fill a niche demand. But now isn't the time to abandon the American auto companies and watch them perish. If that happens, Toyota, Honda, and Hyundai will assist in a huge transfer of wealth overseas.
In order to support your libertarian perspective, our society would need to be far less generous with healthcare for people who can't afford it. At present, when people injure themselves using drugs, they become a burden to the healthcare system when they go into a coma and have to be put on life support indefinitely. It's just naive to think that a person is only injuring themselves without a cost to society.
The obvious problem with your logic is that a typical dose of heroin, coke, or meth can kill a user. A typical dose of table salt or water will not kill anyone.
LSD, mushrooms, and pot will not kill a user ingesting a typical dosage.
I actually have a customer who wants captcha on their website but is moaning it is too hard to read the words. They want something that is just as hard for a bot to break but easy for a person.
I don't know what website you're developing, but if it's custom-built without common packages, it'll be safe from bots. The bot programmers code for the most widespread web packages because there's more for their code to exploit. It's not so lucrative to invest coding a one-off bot for a single website.
So, if you're not running a common forum package, photo gallery, etc. It's highly unlikely a bot writer will hit your client's site. Even so, simply altering the paths for login pages can derail a bot to the point that it's not worth the time of the coder to customize the bot on a daily basis to hit the site.
You might then offer a money-back guarantee to your client should spam show up on the site.
To state that a single dose is 'usually all it takes to become an addict' is both factually incorrect and at worse simply disingenuous.
Would it be more accurate to say of coke, meth, and heroin that a single does is 'usually all it takes to die?' Unlike pot, LSD, mushrooms, etc. those schedule 1 drugs can kill an experimenter on first use. It's pretty obvious that any legalization of drugs will not begin with an across the board policy. William F. Buckley was pro-legalization. The republicans' "tough-on-drugs" party stance has always illustrated that party losing its way with conservatism.
I originally signed up for Sirius three years ago to listen to Howard. I was blown away, however, by the other programming. Specifically, the Boombox and later Punk channels were terrific. Music unheard on any other broadcast medium. Now that the merger is over, those two channels are gone. The company encourages fans of those channels to listen to Pop2k (top 40) and the Faction (not classic punk), which I don't find to be acceptable substitutes at all. Howard is on vacation every other week, so even that doesn't justify my continued subscription to the service.
2. I'd rather deal with spam, malware, and con artists clogging the internet than vigilantes blowing holes in it.
Girlintraining,
I don't mean to insult you, but you are commenting from a position of ignorance on this topic. There was no vigilantism here. Illegal activity was taking place that also violated contracts between corporations. Third-party complainants contacted both corporations to complain of the illegal activity and contract violations. The corporations chose to dissolve their contractual relationship. Nobody was hurt as a result of the complaints that were levied.
If you do understand this topic, and you are aware of specific innocent customers that were harmed by the upstream providers terminating service to McColo, then you should easily be able to provide a Whois reference for one of these innocent customers.
In this same vein, I came across another massively explosive device-- a tanker ship carrying liquid natural gas. Check out this quote:
"If it was an LNG tanker seized, we're looking at something potentially catastrophic," said Candyce Kelshall, a specialist in maritime energy security at Blue Water Defence, a Trinidad-based company that provides training to governments and companies combating piracy. "An LNG tanker going up is like 50 Hiroshimas."
I share your enthusiasm for Google Apps. I use them all the time to open silly attachments that people neglected to save as PDF before emailing to me. I also enjoy popping open a spreadsheet in Google Apps to run some numbers on a project without having to fire up a full-blown office suite that crushes my laptop's meager memory.
If they make the online version too feature rich and also free, they will hurt their own sales.
The online MS Office offering will only be available to holders of MS Office licenses. It's an additional offering for purchasers of the next release. People won't have the option of using the online version instead of the new release.
Seth
PS- I also use NeoOffice (Mac OS X version of Open Office codebase) when I need to create more complex spreadsheets. I'm wondering if the stats quoted by Ballmer, et. al. are considering the NeoOffice downloaders....
I agree with your post about SMB and would like to add to it....
Even then, I doubt any business would have any box with smb/samba enabled without a firewall preventing internet based or external smb connections.
The modern computing environment is complicated by laptops that travel outside the corporate network firewall. Users frequently enable SMB on their company laptop when at home or at coffee shops, airports, etc. to transfer files between machines. A (computer) member of a zombie bot herd can then exploit a weakness like this to take control of the laptop and add it to the zombie herd. When the laptop returns to the corporate network, it becomes a zombie recruiter.
This is probably how the Obama campaign was compromised.
Slashdot Mirror
SuperKendall,
I support your rational, moderate approach to these issues. I'm a letter-writer, too. I agree with the need for compromise over all-out hostility.
In the case of freedoms curtailed due to the example of 9/11, I feel that letter-writing is an ineffective method of pressuring decision-makers to examine the situation with logic. Publicized conflicts over these policies work much better due to the attention focused on the illogic of the situation.
But the reality is that if you talk nicely to the officer and explain what you were taking a photo of, you'll pretty much never be asked to even delete photos.
The thing is, I shouldn't have to explain anything. I should be able to shoot photos of public spaces for whatever reason I like. The real evil-doers are able to covertly photograph their targets for planning purposes, so it makes this scrutiny of public photography ludicrous. When a police officer tells a person, "Don't shoot a photo in the train station," did the police officer prevent a terrorist attack from occurring? Did the terrorist return back to headquarters and tell the rest of the terrorists, "Looks like we have to cancel the bombing for tomorrow. They wouldn't let me take photos of our target."?
This is false security that gives the illusion that the government is taking steps towards protecting the population. When those steps tread on my freedom, I have a hard time compromising. But I respect your ability to do so.
Seth
SuperKendall,
While I believe that your perspective is well-thought-out and backed with experience, I have to chime in with support for aepervius. Yeah, for people with families and 'things-to-do,' confronting police or security and making an issue out of them trampling our rights is a real pain in the ass. I'm one of those people who doesn't have the time to get arrested, go downtown, get bailed out, then follow up with a court visit, etc.
But I also think if you yield to the excessive demands of a security agent, making phone calls the next day to complain isn't likely going to get a policy changed or justice served. Cases like this Amtrak situation help draw public attention to the overall problem of hysteria-fueled security-theater that's propagated post-9/11. Now that this photographer has shouldered the burden of resisting these unreasonable police requests, it will make it easier for others to resist similar incursions on our freedom.
The thing contemporary America doesn't understand is that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are not something that is suspended due to the climate of today. They are the guideposts for getting through difficult times. People who think it's acceptable to surrender their rights for the time being don't appreciate those rights for what they are.
But to the literal situation of refusing the 'delete your photos' request. Cops and seasoned security guards have developed an eye through experience how their authority will be accepted or rejected. They can tell who can be pushed around and who will call bullshit on them. Many stores will hire off-duty cops because it extends the authority of their security force to actually arrest people and issue unreasonable commands (at the behest of the store) that must be followed lest a visitor be accused of 'refusing to follow the orders of a police officer.' These officers have all kinds of verbal techniques they'll use to imply force such as, "Are you going to make a problem here?" to coerce you to do things they have no legal backing for. When you are told to delete the photos, you say sternly, "No. This memory card contains photos of my daughter who was killed by a drunk driver three days ago. These are the last photos I have of her. If we must go to the police station to discuss this matter, by all means, let's go." When cops or security guards realize you are dead serious about making this a situation and understand the limits of their authority, they back the fuck down. The funny thing is, when you take that attitude from the get-go, you never have to press an issue like this with a security guard or cop because they can sense that they can't push you around.
Seth
In America you can shoot photos of people on public property and publish them for whatever purpose you want even if the subject objects. If this is different in the EU, please provide a reference.
This Amtrak situation is another example in the continuing trend of hysteria-fueled security theater. If someone is taking a photo overtly of something that could be used for nefarious purposes, do people really think that photographer couldn't perform the same task covertly? I once was shooting a photo of the exterior of a prison for a newspaper article. A security officer promptly told me to stop. Not wanting to get into a huge situation with phone calls, lawyers, etc. I just got in my car, drove by slowly, and shot my photos out the window of the car. I didn't get the quality I wanted, but I certainly got the same photo that could have supposedly been used for a prison break.
Seth
My condolences go out to the Journalspace.com operator. It was probably a huge part of that person's life and now it's all gone because of a mistake. I hope it doesn't leave him disillusioned about embarking on other ambitious efforts.
Seth
Back in the nineties, a friend of mine was backing his mac system up weekly with a tape drive. The thing is, he was using the same tape to repeatedly back up onto. One day he calls to tell me he needed some help recovering files on his hard drive after a crash. I asked, "What about the tape backups?" He said, "That thing backs up perfectly. The problem is, it doesn't restore at all."
Seth
My bank at least also uses a one-time pad system, namely a numbered list of 100 pre-generated codes.
Just to let you know, that's not a one-time pad. Unless you can only perform 100 logins with that pad. "If a one-time pad is used just twice, simple mathematical operations can reduce it to a running key cipher."
If not, you've just admitted tax evasion on a public forum...
That would be city and county sales tax. Just wanted to clarify that this is not the jurisdiction of the IRS as other people assumed you were implying when threw out the ugly term, 'tax evasion.'
Seth
Damn easy, great selection, good delivery options, cheap, no crowds... brilliant.
You neglected one extraordinary feature that no one else has mentioned in any of these comments-- no sales tax. When it comes to high-dollar electronic purchases, I always go to Amazon or Newegg. Brick and mortars can not compete when they have to pile on a sales tax. For instance, I just bought a Nikon D90 camera with a couple of lenses. Sales tax in Austin, TX. boosted the price more than a hundred dollars over what Amazon was charging.
As the economy continues to crumble, more people will probably recognize this cost-saving opportunity and Amazon will be able to brag amount recession-resistant sales figures. Not that this article indicates they have actually made more money than in previous years.
Seth
Thus SUVs are monstrosities generally while trucks, locomotives and buses are generally efficient.
I just wanted to extend your example of rail efficiencies.
Trains also benefit from tracks that have been built as level as possible. Less energy is required to haul mass up hills or mountains. Roads take cars and semi trucks through many more elevation changes than trains encounter. A train also has very controlled and planned stops and starts. Trucks used to haul goods (and cars) are susceptible to traffic and must burn energy braking and accelerating repetitively throughout their routes. These are massive losses of energy that a train never suffers from.
Seth
Rail-based infrastructures work better with higher population densities; otherwise, you're laying an awful lot of track to get from point A to point B.
I grew up in Tokyo, so I know a little something about population density. Higher-value real estate is congregated around rail stations. People want to live with good access to rail stations. They compete for jobs located near rail stations. You can ABSOLUTELY live out in the boonies and have a big yard, etc. in Japan. If you look at photos of Mt. Fuji, you'll see that there aren't pagodas crammed all up against it. There is PLENTY of room to live in Japan.
You argument is common in America. Yes, we have poorly planned cities throughout our country. Installing a rail system now will reorganize these communities and massively shift land values. The same effect will be felt when gas prices return to > $4.00 / gallon. You can choose to be proactive or reactive regarding our transportation system. I choose the former.
Seth
I am running the IP35 pro without problems under Mac OS X 10.5.3.
When I bought it, I remember the box saying the capacitors were Japanese-made 100% solid state. It was one of the biggest things promoted on the box. I suppose they wanted to promote that they had addressed the bad-cap issue.
I've been very pleased with the mobo after using it for one year. Sad to hear they're going to close.
Seth
Nobody has even noticed that the name of the car is 'BYD.' In Asian countries this is translated as 'Bury Your Dead.'
Seth
A big challenge to any new player getting into the electro-auto market is dealer support. Where is someone supposed to get parts for this thing or a Tesla? Sure, an electric vehicle design should require less maintenance, but even components will need to be replaced due to accidents and road wear.
I've heard people say the auto bailout money should go to a start-up like Tesla. The problem with completely abandoning the American automakers and putting public funds behind a startup is that the big three already have huge infrastructure in place. They already understand production. Bless the hearts of those Tesla idealists, but they're going to spend a BUNCH of money developing dealerships, parts distribution, training mechanics & sales people. And until their production numbers get big, the deals they'll cut with suppliers won't be as profitable as the ones Ford/GM/Chrysler make with their suppliers thanks to the economies of scale they're working in.
I'm not saying there isn't a place for smaller companies to come in and fill a niche demand. But now isn't the time to abandon the American auto companies and watch them perish. If that happens, Toyota, Honda, and Hyundai will assist in a huge transfer of wealth overseas.
Seth
Enemy Territory will be a great game to put on these free computers. Runs on Linux, Windows. Don't think this free game made it to Mac OS X, though.
Seth
In order to support your libertarian perspective, our society would need to be far less generous with healthcare for people who can't afford it. At present, when people injure themselves using drugs, they become a burden to the healthcare system when they go into a coma and have to be put on life support indefinitely. It's just naive to think that a person is only injuring themselves without a cost to society.
Seth
The obvious problem with your logic is that a typical dose of heroin, coke, or meth can kill a user. A typical dose of table salt or water will not kill anyone.
LSD, mushrooms, and pot will not kill a user ingesting a typical dosage.
Seth
Perhaps the GP is referring to the Steve Jackson Games raid that took place here in Austin, TX back in the eighties.
Seth
I actually have a customer who wants captcha on their website but is moaning it is too hard to read the words. They want something that is just as hard for a bot to break but easy for a person.
I don't know what website you're developing, but if it's custom-built without common packages, it'll be safe from bots. The bot programmers code for the most widespread web packages because there's more for their code to exploit. It's not so lucrative to invest coding a one-off bot for a single website.
So, if you're not running a common forum package, photo gallery, etc. It's highly unlikely a bot writer will hit your client's site. Even so, simply altering the paths for login pages can derail a bot to the point that it's not worth the time of the coder to customize the bot on a daily basis to hit the site.
You might then offer a money-back guarantee to your client should spam show up on the site.
Seth
To state that a single dose is 'usually all it takes to become an addict' is both factually incorrect and at worse simply disingenuous.
Would it be more accurate to say of coke, meth, and heroin that a single does is 'usually all it takes to die?' Unlike pot, LSD, mushrooms, etc. those schedule 1 drugs can kill an experimenter on first use. It's pretty obvious that any legalization of drugs will not begin with an across the board policy. William F. Buckley was pro-legalization. The republicans' "tough-on-drugs" party stance has always illustrated that party losing its way with conservatism.
Seth
I originally signed up for Sirius three years ago to listen to Howard. I was blown away, however, by the other programming. Specifically, the Boombox and later Punk channels were terrific. Music unheard on any other broadcast medium. Now that the merger is over, those two channels are gone. The company encourages fans of those channels to listen to Pop2k (top 40) and the Faction (not classic punk), which I don't find to be acceptable substitutes at all. Howard is on vacation every other week, so even that doesn't justify my continued subscription to the service.
Seth
2. I'd rather deal with spam, malware, and con artists clogging the internet than vigilantes blowing holes in it.
Girlintraining,
I don't mean to insult you, but you are commenting from a position of ignorance on this topic. There was no vigilantism here. Illegal activity was taking place that also violated contracts between corporations. Third-party complainants contacted both corporations to complain of the illegal activity and contract violations. The corporations chose to dissolve their contractual relationship. Nobody was hurt as a result of the complaints that were levied.
If you do understand this topic, and you are aware of specific innocent customers that were harmed by the upstream providers terminating service to McColo, then you should easily be able to provide a Whois reference for one of these innocent customers.
Seth
In this same vein, I came across another massively explosive device-- a tanker ship carrying liquid natural gas. Check out this quote:
Seth
I share your enthusiasm for Google Apps. I use them all the time to open silly attachments that people neglected to save as PDF before emailing to me. I also enjoy popping open a spreadsheet in Google Apps to run some numbers on a project without having to fire up a full-blown office suite that crushes my laptop's meager memory.
The online MS Office offering will only be available to holders of MS Office licenses. It's an additional offering for purchasers of the next release. People won't have the option of using the online version instead of the new release.
Seth
PS- I also use NeoOffice (Mac OS X version of Open Office codebase) when I need to create more complex spreadsheets. I'm wondering if the stats quoted by Ballmer, et. al. are considering the NeoOffice downloaders....
They already know what will happen to them if they get caught by us, so what does it matter if they trust us or not?
The government's trustworthiness comes in helpful when trying to defuse hostage situations.
Seth
I agree with your post about SMB and would like to add to it....
Even then, I doubt any business would have any box with smb/samba enabled without a firewall preventing internet based or external smb connections.
The modern computing environment is complicated by laptops that travel outside the corporate network firewall. Users frequently enable SMB on their company laptop when at home or at coffee shops, airports, etc. to transfer files between machines. A (computer) member of a zombie bot herd can then exploit a weakness like this to take control of the laptop and add it to the zombie herd. When the laptop returns to the corporate network, it becomes a zombie recruiter.
This is probably how the Obama campaign was compromised.
Seth