Such blathering nonsense. You don't need a generator the size of a semi-truck to keep even a large NOC running. The scenario you describe (a single server and assorted network gear) would require a $200 generator - not that you would necessarily need one in this case (a big UPS might work for a few hours... but come on! Generators are CHEAP!)
However, if you run a big site, you better have access to a generator! Nonetheless, even then a generator to hold up a HUGE NOC is several orders of magnitude cheaper than the machines it protecting, and can easily hold up a NOC with thousands of systems for as long as you keep feeding it fuel - not to mention even those large generators (those that run around the size of a few cars stacked up) are not terribly high (10-200K depening on the options, wattage, fuel tank size and so on). Any MIS manager too stupid to do the math and realize the cost of a generator (or co-locating for that matter) versus the cost of an outage that could go on for days, should be fired. It makes no business sense. Generators are cheap!
So the point about utilities is moot even in the smallest case (and in the largest case, what the hell are you doing running a NOC without a generator?!). There are too many cheap solutions to mitigate this risk that its just plan dumb not to build a NOC this way (hell you can buy a decent 40amp generator at Sears that will hold up a dozen boxes for as long as you keep it fueled, for a few hundred bucks!)
Now, would anyone like to comment on how the world did not end, how the power did not go out and how absurd and ignorant it was for this silly company to shut their site down? It sure looks dumb of them to overreact no matter how you slice this. The power did not go out, and if it did the cost of keeping a NOC running is well within the reach of even the smallest company.
Not to mention all the other intelligent reasons for them not to have shut down that I'm not going to enumerate again. This is just chicken little syndrome combined with ignorance and pinch of magical thinking on their part. -- Python
Somebody rate Bruce's post down as flame-bait. (Somehow it got the automatic Oh-My-God-It's-Bruce-Perens-Again 4 point bonus)
Yeah sure, lets make sure no one can read it! Thats always the best way to respond to someone elses argument - deny everyone else the ability to read it! Talk about an irrational response. You should have added your response to his thread and sank with it. Its a bit hippocritical, IMHO, to rate down the original post and yet have your response rated up. Let people read the whole thing.
There are essentially two kinds of IS managers: those with a solid computer science background, and the other kind. To the other kind, computers are magic.
Always good to start off with an irrational assertion.
How is this irrational? There basically are two categories of people in this work, with regards to technology (IT managers are no different): Those that understand how the technology actually works, and those that treat any sufficiently advanced technology as magic. Its not an ad hominem, its not untrue and its not irrational. It explains alot about how people think about and treat technology. So why would this be an irrational assertion?
If your site can hold up on the average day, it should have no problem this weekend.
So you know the status of my electric utility, and the capabilities of my UPS?
How is midnight tonight any different from any other day, when the power could go out just as easily? The power goes out all the time and yet we don't see people pulling their sites down because it might happen. If you have a good disaster recovery plan (which includes things like "what do we do if the power is down for more than a few minutes", backup tapes and so on) it is true that you will survive y2k without any more disruption than you would have on any other day. If what you are asserting is that you are not prepared for what could happen any day, then you have other more important things to be concerned about and maybe you should shutdown altogether. These things can happen at any time. The power could go out for hours at a stretch (look at the ice storms in Canada for an example of that, the power was out for a week!), you could have an Earthquake that might not out your NOC for months, you might have a poor security model that makes your customers lose confidence in you and so on. These are daily risks and if you can't deal with those same risks at midnight tonight then you have bigger problems that shutting down your website for a few hours will not fix.
You talk about being rational, consider for a moment the propability that enough things will go wrong to outweigh the lost profit and the bad press for shutting down your site because you might have a failure. If your business is so unprepared for the midnight rollover, you do need to get a new MIS manager!.
oh yes, if your IS manager calls them "hackers", that's another sign he's not a computer science pro
Right. Using the wrong word is a clear indication of stupidity. And if you say "Afro-American" or "black" instead of "African-American", you're a racist. Thhhppppt!
Your straw man argument aside for the moment (and making funny noises, which is always a clear indication of a poor argument), yes calling a computer criminal a hacker is a clear indicator of cluelessness. Its like calling the internet "Netscape" or similiarly indicating you do not understand what you are talking about. If any MIS manager that works for few me starting calling crackers "hackers" I would look into getting another MIS manager (and yes, I do have MIS managers that work for me, and no none of them are that clueless).
If your company hasn't squared away your computers, programs and network or taken steps to prevent system failure (shutting it all down because you aren't prepared is basically the same thing as a failure) by now you need to fire the person(s) responsible for that. Its not like we found out about this yesterday, everyone has had years to prepare! Closing down your website for a few hours also demostrates a clear lack of understanding about the threats involved as well. Any "y2k" attacks will not just occur at midnight EST5EDT, they won't just happen for a few hours, technically they could have been happening all day (it doesn't just become midnight once on planet Earth). The bugs involved don't just manifest themselves during the rollover, the big bad y2k viruses won't just get sent at exactly midnight EST and so on. Again, I think Bruce is very correct about this: some people treat these technologies like its magic.
Regardless, this is the most ignorant thing I think I've heard of and its going to make a laughing stock out of the companies that do it. And if you can't understand a business case analysis for that, you understand the business word less than you think. -- Python
Are there any white papers out on this? I'd love to read some more on the implementation before I comment. Feel free to e-mail me anonymously (thru a remailer, there is one on at the URL above) if you can't post anything publicly.:-) -- Python
Heres a crazy idea (not well thought out I might add, plus I'm starting to fall asleep) - how about trusted players? Perhaps a player would have to get their key signed by a number of other players on different servers, have their binary signed and so forth, keeping the bad players off the servers, building a "web of trust" and so on. Server admins could place a threshold on the types of players that can get on their servers. You setup tiers of servers, allowing new players to get on Tier 1 servers, make friends, get "vouched for" by other players and so on. Of course, alot of these problems can be solved through private servers and well managed clans. I remember refering a match and catching someone cheating, he was banned from all clan servers. So cheating CAN be prevented with something as simple as a humble human system.
Nonetheless, something like a unique UID for each player a key if you will (or something like it) so you can ban the cheaters, rate the "trustworthiness" of player - sort of like a moderation system like slashdot. Ack... I'm tired so its not totally thought out, but nonetheless the problem with all of these systems is that you have a problem of trust and thats what you need to build. Closing the source appears to solve the problem of trusting the binary, but its a false sense of security. Cheats existed before the source was opened. Hell, people have always tried to figure out some way to beat the game. That, to some people, is what playing a game is all about. Figuring out they can rocket jump to this ledge and no one will see them. Camping in a hard to shoot spot and picking everyone off. Ping flooding people so they can't talk to the server and so on. Some people just suck and can only win by cheating. That happens in every game unfortunately (yes, even the ones in the meat world... thats why they have referees!)
In fairness to ID, it is very hard to build a totally trusted system. Its not impossible, just difficult and requires some thought. It can be done though and the cheating issue can be solved more efficiently through other means as well (human systems, like referees). The determined cheaters will figure out the game and its protocols whether you open or close the source, so closing it, I argue, buys you very little. I suggest everyone read Bruce Schneier's Applied Cryptography for more on problems with trusted systems. Even a blessed binary could be spoofed unfortunately. Anyway, its late and this thread is finally killing my insomnia.
BTW, I'm flattered that someone(s) liked my comments enough to moderate them up and I appreciate everyones comments, even though I'm so tired I can't respond to all of them. Very interesting points on both sides of this issue. For me its a classic trust problem.:-) -- Python
Open Sourcing the Quake code is not what caused the cheating. If that were the case, no security flaw in any closed source product would ever come to light. And yet they do. I'm disappointed in slashdot for perpetuating such a myth. Opening the source does not create the security hole, it just makes it easier to find it and fix it.
So, this is really yet another example, in a long an sordid history, of why building a security model that depends on the client to be honest in a client/server model is a Bad Idea[TM] (can anyone say rexd?). Closing the source would be nothing more than security through obscurity. I guess its time to open that can of worms again and kick that dead horse around. There were cheats before they opened the source, their were cheats for UnReal and I'm sure their are cheats for other games as well. Anytime you rely on the client exclusively to report valid values you shift trust into an untrusted space. The users machine is not trusted, so why does it suprise anyone that someone would cheat? Why is it suprising that its possible? Its possible whether you open or close the source. This bears repeating, trusting an untrusted system (the client) to report trusted values is not possible! Thats the problem. Not the fact that the source is open, its the fact that the client is so implicitly trusted to report valid values.
Hopefully the ID folks will realize that if they want to stop cheating. Preventing cheating in the client alone is never going to work. It will of course take some more work on their part, but its been done correctly before and I'm sure they can do it too. If they're smart they'll embrace this and work with the open source community to get it fixed. -- Python
God as a place holder, as with several other arguments in this piece, is used prceiesly as you have pointed out: as a Content Free place holder to give meaning to an otherwise empty statement. Finally, someone else that can see the vapidness of many of these constructions.
My hat is off to you.:-) -- Python
Re:Silly Religious Parables
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Planet Gattaca
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· Score: 1
That still doesn't speak to the fact that your parable is berift of content. God is a construction that exists in the minds of believers. The point of replacing it with an IPU construction is to point out how absurd the entire parable is. Your old joke is vapid at best, in context with the argument you tried to construct.
And since you used it to construct an argument, I saw fit to tear it down.
Your point is still illogical and falacious. -- Python
Nonsense. You try to prove this with what amounts to a silly religious parable, a straw man at best?
Lets see how silly this parable is shall we?
One day a group of scientists got together and decided that humans had come a long way and no longer needed the Invisible Pink Unicorn. So they picked one scientist to go and tell the Invisible Pink Unicorn so.
The scientist walked up to the Invisible Pink Unicorn and said, "Invisible Pink Unicorn, we've decided that we no longer need you; We're to the point that we can clone people and do many miraculous things, so why don't You just go on and get lost."
The Invisible Pink Unicorn listened very patiently and kindly to the man.
After the scientist was done talking, the Invisible Pink Unicorn said, "Very well, how about this? Let's say we have a man-making contest."
To which the scientist replied, "Okay, great!"
"But," the Invisible Pink Unicorn added, "we're going to do this just like I did back in the old days with Adam."
The scientist said, "Sure, no problem" and bent down and grabbed himself a handful of dirt.
The Invisible Pink Unicorn looked at him and said, "No, no, no. You go get your own dirt.".
Pretty silly story eh? We're digressing now, but your parable is berift of anything other than a funny antecdote and proves nothing. The real point is even more important: Religion, unlike Science can never and has never explained primal causes. Its tried. Its tried and failed miserably every time. Science has replaced everything religion has attempted to explain. The origin of life, the shape of the earth, the age of the earth, the origin of woman, the causes of disease, the weather, ad infinitum.
It is religion, not Science that can never account for the ultimate origin of anything. Through mythology alone it tries to explain everything, all at once, once size fits all - the ultimate UCT (Universal Conspiracy Theory), while proving nothing. The failure to prove everything in one fell swoop, unlike religion, is one of the tests that proves the validity of the scientific method. No real scientist would claim that we have explained everything or try to explain everything in one book! No such claim has been made by Science. But that doesn't change the fact that Science is the best and only method we have for understanding our world.
Not to get off on a tangent, although I think we already have, the key difference is that religion is the stuff of myths and stories, science is about the discovery of truth no matter where it takes us. Religion forces, Science persuades. The real issue at stake with genetics is that its exposing truths that make alot of religious people very uncomfortable, and thats too bad for all of us. A new chapter in scientific discovery is being written and some would rather burn the whole book, because it goes against their cherished and sacred beliefs.
Actually I wasn't taught that when I went through grade school. But that misses the point, and its a straw man to boot. A better point is that Science is about change. Unlike Religion (and Creationism which is a religion), Science is not about protecting dogma or the current view of the universe, but about discovering the truth. Scientists are rewarded handsomely for adding to the collective knowledge of science - and even for demonstrating something new that may disprove some long held theory! This never happens with religions.
When something is found to be wrong scientifically, science drops it (or evolves the prevaling theory to include it). Religion never does this.
That bears repeating: Science changes with the evidence, Religion is about Dogma and never allows evidence to stand in the way of its mythology. Its the flashlight versus the bucket. Science is about looking at all the evidence, religion, when it looks at any evidence, is about only picking out those pieces that comply with dogma and ignoring everything else. So your examples are wonderful proof that science is indeed a pursuit of the truth, and not about preaching its dogma as some creationists have claimed. When new evidence comes to light, science, unlike religion (and creationism) adapts and evolves. Religion forces, science convinces. -- Python
Two major problems with using the Patriot for stopping long range strategic nuclear weapons:
1) Contrary to popular belief, The Patriot is a Theater Based Anti-Aircraft missle defense system and not an Anti-Missle Defense System (it was designed to shoot down planes, not missles). It was retrofitted to engage missles in the gulf war - which explains its interesting performance in the gulf war. It was not designed, or originally intented as a anti-missle defense system. The retrofitting of the Patriot was a lucky break, given that military planners had totally missed the boat on that type of expected threat. Although, in fairness, the SCUD missle was never a tactical threat at any point during the war, and never posed any military threat of any significance to forces in theater. It was a political tool used by Iraq to scare the world, and little more. So it's understandable that the original military response to the SCUD attacks was "So what?" Nevertheless, we had no real anti-missle defense system to speak of at the time. (And we still don't.)
2) The Patriot is a Theater defense system (effective only within a single geographic region). ICBMs are strategic weapons systems (effective globally). What this means, in a few words or less, is that in the best case: You have patriots installed in every single theather of operation you expect a nuclear attack to come from, the Patriot will not engage the ICBM (shoot it down) until its too late. The Patriots maximum effective range makes it only useful for engaging targets within a single theater of operation, or basically only as high as you would expect a typical military aircraft to fly and only as far away as the planners expected an inbound to pose a threat (say a hundred miles or so). In short, the patriots range is too short to be effective against weapons that, when detonated, would encompass the Patriots entire range. So you have the problem of needing thousands of patriot batteries to cover a country like the US, and even then it would be too late for them to be of any use in most cases.
What does this all mean? We do not possess a real ballastic missle defense system. We can not, today, stop any inbound ICBM from reaching any target, unless we destroy it on the ground. -- Python
And? Why should any adult be required to let someone else censor them?
You're tilting at straw men here with bald assertions about just having to advise your ISP that you are using a content filtering software package on Schedule I. The issue is that content filtering is wrong. The mechanism is not relevant to that argument. Censorship is wrong. You're caving in to that argument and accepting censorship with this law. Its that simple. -- Python
I, personally, am reasonably bitter towards the US in this. Whilst you were having grief with your CDA, people -all around the world- were turning their pages black, and protesting quite vocally. Yet, when our moronic government brought this legislation up, which is -much much- worse than the CDA, you quite happily ignored us.
A total of 3 posts to/., and that was about it.
As far as what the IIA have done, I thank them. They've turned this legislation around, from something that would have totally destroyed the internet in australia, to something we're barely going to notice.
So what are you bitter about again? It sounds like you're quite happy with your censorship. Maybe the lack of response in the US of A has been because people like yourself have said "Well, its not going to be that bad". Make your bed, and sleep in it mate.
Perhaps if you yourself were a bit more upset about it, then maybe the rest of us would be. Personally, I think you're a fool for even going along with this law. I would happily break it and suffer the consequences for doing my moral duty of not obeying an unjust law. You should do the same.
Australia is on a slippery slope of its own making with this one. Liberty is rarely something that is taken away all at once. Its almost always chipped away a bit at a time. By the time you realize whats happened, it will be too late. Australia is slidding towards that cliff right now. Its your country mate, do something about it now before its too late! Protest this affront to your rights now!
What a total unwashed cop out! Abe didn't answer these questions, his publicist and editor did! This guy is no geek, he's a media whore! He doesn't even bother answering my questions or really anyone elses. Dodging most of them, and ran around the two questions he supposedly answered of mine. The questions were serious, and I expected serious responses from Abe, not some glib, hip MTVish set of non-answers by a team of hypsters. I hope this is the last time we see this sort of nonsense on Slashdot.
The problem with Abe, and I hope every sees this, is that he's basically trying to glamorize the *worst* sort of behavior and the *worst* possible sterotypes of geekdom. At best he's a wanna-be, trying to pass himself off as a "hacker" when he's really just a script kiddie(or less), and at worst he's a petty criminal, that got his job by breaking into his future employers computers - and is glamorizing the lifestyle of a cracker.
Some role model. No matter how you shake this out, he's the worst possible role model for an geek to emulate. However, this is precisely the image that most of the media has of "hackerdom", and Abe *and* Slashdot are just dragging it into the sewer to fester further. I'm teribbly disappointed in Slashdot for all of this, and frankly I'm a bit disappointed in myself for expecting Abe to answer my questions honestly.
All this has done is further damaged the popular image of real hacking (you know, writing code!) and further solidified the image of geekdom as a bunch of criminals willing to go to any length to get whatever they want: Women, Money, Jobs, etc. The ends does not justify the means. Yet Abe, MTV and Slashdot have just demonstrated that it does. And helped to educate a new generation that all you have to do to get whatever you want is become an Elite Uber-Haxx0r like Abe.
Most of you are not suprised by Abes non-responses and the silliness of the whole thing. I admit a small part of me did expect more, and was willing to give Abe the benefit of the doubt. Further, I think rather highly of Malda and Slashdot and expect alot from them. Hence, my misguided belief that this would not be a total waste of time and that perhaps Abe was on the level. I was wrong.
As a result of this nonsense, my trust level in Slashdot just went down a few notches. I hope Malda picks some real interviewees that actually have some relevance to the Slashdot community (like Alan Cox) and have something *useful* to contribute. Even on the best side of things, all Abe did for the geek community is portray an unrealistic and damaging stereotype of a "hacker". I suspect that he did far more damage to himself and the image of hackerdom that either he, or his fans are willing to admit. Good luck trying to a job that requires *trust* in the future Abe. The corporate world is past the sexy allure of "ex-hackers", and makes a point of not hiring them now. Perhaps college will clue you into the fact that cracking boxes is still a crime and the real world looks *down* at such irresponsible and illegal actions. Split hairs all you want on this point Abe, but you're only fooling yourself. You have seriously damaged any chance you ever have at being taken seriously or at being trusted.
Further, I understand that the Slashdot guys get alot of stuff to go thru every day and will make mistakes like this one (perhaps they're experimenting with a new sub-culture site for the stimulation starved!), but this Abe fellow is a lame excuse for anything geek - you really need to work harder to keep the quality of this site up. Your funded now for heavens sake! This isn't just a hobby anymore, its a business with customers.
I'm washing my hands of the whole thing and chalking it up as a silly digression into hype. Thanks for proving my point Abe. You're a media Whore and thanks MTV for proving that you are still the vast wasteland of the airwaves.
Now can we get on with some *real* interviews of some people that have actually contributed something useful to the world - and not waste our time on negative stereotypes and wannabes? -- Python
Why do you call yourself a hacker, when its obvious that you're a cracker?
Would you consider yourself a script kiddie? (why or why not?)
You claim to have been running ProComm Plus on an 8086 toshiba laptop when you were younger. What model laptop was this?
Are you concerned that your cracking shenanigans and illegal actions as a youth were glorified by MTV and will result in other youth emulating your criminal actions?
Do you ever expect to have a normal life now after MTV?
What line of work do you plan to persue after your 15 minutes of fame with MTV?
Would you recommend that others use your tactics of cracking boxes and breaking into future employers boxes and so on to get a job with them?
How did you use Back Orifice to crack the boxes at Bunim/Murray? The Salon article does not make any sense about how you owned the boxes at Bunim/Murray. In fact, the Salon Article sounds like complete BS on this point (BO is not a tool to get in, its a trojan). So how did you really own their boxes?
It sounds like, in the Salon Article, that you were very cynical about the show and realized it was all BS once you broke into their boxes, so why did you join the show after you figured that out?
You also sound somewhat bitter about the way the show treated you and the way MTV over focuses on violence and conflict in the show. Would you recommend that other people join the show, knowing what you know now about it?
Please. You act as if the police never abuse their authority. What about the New York Police Departments actions with ramming a plunger up a suspects rectum until he had to be hospitalized?
If this sort of incredible abuse of police power occurs in a city like NY, it can happen in *any* police department - and abuses occur ALL THE TIME. Its absurd to expect something as innocuous and as hard to detect as this technology to not be abused by some police officers and departments.
Thats why technologies like this worry people. Your faith in the police is misplaced. They are people just like everyone else, with the same temptations, emotions, irrational responses and so on. The only difference is that they have TREMENDOUS power to ACT on those impulses with impunity which no one else has.
I hate to reuse an oft repeated phrase, but He that gives up essential Liberty for Security, shall recieve and deserves neither. Alot of tools could enhance the polices ability to deter crime, find criminals, even convict criminals. But that ends NEVER justifies the means. Privacy, as difficult as it is to maintain, is still an important right that needs to be protected from further encroachment. Its a RIGHT! Not some lofty goal, or something you "can't have because its hard to keep anything private". Its inalienable. Just because its hard to get true privacy in our society, does not mean that its not worthwhile to get SOME guarantees of privacy. And the whole issue of not being able to get perfect privacy is a red herring anyway. Thats not the point! The point is that police agencies DO abuse their powers, this tool can be used to illegally invade peoples privacy and it is of questionable value in the "war on crime". Is this tool worth the cost to our personal privacy is the issue on the table, not whether or not privacy can be obtained or whether or not the police can be trusted with this technology.
We all want to see a society with less crime. We all want to make it easier to stop the bad guys. Just not at the expense of everything else. This tool will be abused by the police, and the cost to personal privacy is simply worth the supposed benefit of this technology in stopping criminals. -- Python
Yeah, its nothing important, its just evolution. Only the single most important thing necessary to understand biology. Why would anyone want to test that? Ignorance is bliss I suppose. Good luck sending your daughter off to college with a scant understanding of biology. -- Python
The truth is, there is evidence to both sides of the debate. How can we expect people to be able to understand the debate without presenting all the evidence for both sides of it? This standard amounts to nothing more than the Kansas school board dictating beliefs to students while ignoring facts.
Actually, there is no real evidence to support the creationist world view. The creationists know this, which explains why they play their hand in the world of politics and not in the world of science as with evolution. If there were any evidence to support their creationist hypothesis', it would be able to stand on its own in fully peer reviewed journals. The fact that it can't speaks volumes about how vapid creationist premises are, and how worthless it is to even spend time trying to repaint the Genesis myth by any other name as some sort of "science". The truly ironic thing about creationism is how much the creationist spin has evolved to try and make it fit in as some sort of science. Don't be fooled. Creationism is not a science, its a religion, pure and simple. There is no evidence to support it.
Further, in so far as creationism represents itself as the majority opinion held by most Christians, creationism is actually not representative of most christians beliefs. Its an extremely marginalized minority belief system not held by most Christians. Even the Catholic church has embraced evolution, and they were one of the last major hold outs of the major sects of Christianity. Many sects of Christianity have biblical proofs for evolution. In short, some Christians hold it as a matter of faith that evolution occured! So to even pretend that Creationism is the "Christian" idea is just not true. Creationism is part of the very fringe of fundamentalism, and is simply not representative of the whole of Christianity. Christians everwhere should be embarassed to even be associated with it. From wild tales of Noahs Ark being full of dinosaurs, to ridiculous assertions that the Grand Canyon was created by the Great Flood, creationism is simply the worst example of pseudo-science out there and should be entertained as nothing more than flim flam at best, and a dangerous sham at worst attempting to indoctrinate one fringe religious belief system into the minds of students everywhere.
Well, That evolution happens is a fact. Biological evolution refers to the common descent of living organisms from shared ancestors. The evidence for historical evolution, to include the fossil record, genetic evidence, anatomical evidence (look at whales skeleton sometime, what do you think those unused limbs were for?) and so on is so overwhelming evolution is considered to be a scientific fact. There is no debate about whether it occurs. The evidence is overwhelming.
The theory of evolution describes the mechanisms that cause evolution.
The fact that evolution occurs is not in dispute by the scientific community!. We are simply refining the theory to explain what causes it. That it occurs is not, and has not been in dispute for a VERY long time. Evolution is a fact.
There is no scientific debate about this. The only fringe element claiming otherwise is the fundamentalist creationists - and even then its not *all of them*. The theistic creationists at least acknowledge that evolution is a fact. Whats even more pathetic is when you ask the creationists to explain the world, and then watch them argue amongst themselves about new earth versus old earth, intelligent design vs. theistic evolution, as they call each other agents of satan for daring to challenge dogma. These people wouldn't know what real science was if it jumped on their slopping foreheads and started to evolve.
By using some sophisticated tools, [Vendor] experts in Redmond were
Why obscure the vendors name, when its obvious that the vendor here is Microsoft? Unless there is some other OS and MTA vendor in Redmond Washington... -- Python
How the word piracy got co-oped to mean violating someones copyright's is beyond me. Piracy involves boarding someones ship (or plane), taking control of said vessel, killing everyone on board in some cases, and then stealing their stuff. To use the word piracy to refer to something as non-violent as copyright violations is an affront to all the people that STILL die at the hands of real pirates. -- Python
Slashdot Mirror
However, if you run a big site, you better have access to a generator! Nonetheless, even then a generator to hold up a HUGE NOC is several orders of magnitude cheaper than the machines it protecting, and can easily hold up a NOC with thousands of systems for as long as you keep feeding it fuel - not to mention even those large generators (those that run around the size of a few cars stacked up) are not terribly high (10-200K depening on the options, wattage, fuel tank size and so on). Any MIS manager too stupid to do the math and realize the cost of a generator (or co-locating for that matter) versus the cost of an outage that could go on for days, should be fired. It makes no business sense. Generators are cheap!
So the point about utilities is moot even in the smallest case (and in the largest case, what the hell are you doing running a NOC without a generator?!). There are too many cheap solutions to mitigate this risk that its just plan dumb not to build a NOC this way (hell you can buy a decent 40amp generator at Sears that will hold up a dozen boxes for as long as you keep it fueled, for a few hundred bucks!)
Now, would anyone like to comment on how the world did not end, how the power did not go out and how absurd and ignorant it was for this silly company to shut their site down? It sure looks dumb of them to overreact no matter how you slice this. The power did not go out, and if it did the cost of keeping a NOC running is well within the reach of even the smallest company.
Not to mention all the other intelligent reasons for them not to have shut down that I'm not going to enumerate again. This is just chicken little syndrome combined with ignorance and pinch of magical thinking on their part.
--
Python
Yeah sure, lets make sure no one can read it! Thats always the best way to respond to someone elses argument - deny everyone else the ability to read it! Talk about an irrational response. You should have added your response to his thread and sank with it. Its a bit hippocritical, IMHO, to rate down the original post and yet have your response rated up. Let people read the whole thing.
How is this irrational? There basically are two categories of people in this work, with regards to technology (IT managers are no different): Those that understand how the technology actually works, and those that treat any sufficiently advanced technology as magic. Its not an ad hominem, its not untrue and its not irrational. It explains alot about how people think about and treat technology. So why would this be an irrational assertion?
How is midnight tonight any different from any other day, when the power could go out just as easily? The power goes out all the time and yet we don't see people pulling their sites down because it might happen. If you have a good disaster recovery plan (which includes things like "what do we do if the power is down for more than a few minutes", backup tapes and so on) it is true that you will survive y2k without any more disruption than you would have on any other day. If what you are asserting is that you are not prepared for what could happen any day, then you have other more important things to be concerned about and maybe you should shutdown altogether. These things can happen at any time. The power could go out for hours at a stretch (look at the ice storms in Canada for an example of that, the power was out for a week!), you could have an Earthquake that might not out your NOC for months, you might have a poor security model that makes your customers lose confidence in you and so on. These are daily risks and if you can't deal with those same risks at midnight tonight then you have bigger problems that shutting down your website for a few hours will not fix.
You talk about being rational, consider for a moment the propability that enough things will go wrong to outweigh the lost profit and the bad press for shutting down your site because you might have a failure. If your business is so unprepared for the midnight rollover, you do need to get a new MIS manager!.
Your straw man argument aside for the moment (and making funny noises, which is always a clear indication of a poor argument), yes calling a computer criminal a hacker is a clear indicator of cluelessness. Its like calling the internet "Netscape" or similiarly indicating you do not understand what you are talking about. If any MIS manager that works for few me starting calling crackers "hackers" I would look into getting another MIS manager (and yes, I do have MIS managers that work for me, and no none of them are that clueless).If your company hasn't squared away your computers, programs and network or taken steps to prevent system failure (shutting it all down because you aren't prepared is basically the same thing as a failure) by now you need to fire the person(s) responsible for that. Its not like we found out about this yesterday, everyone has had years to prepare! Closing down your website for a few hours also demostrates a clear lack of understanding about the threats involved as well. Any "y2k" attacks will not just occur at midnight EST5EDT, they won't just happen for a few hours, technically they could have been happening all day (it doesn't just become midnight once on planet Earth). The bugs involved don't just manifest themselves during the rollover, the big bad y2k viruses won't just get sent at exactly midnight EST and so on. Again, I think Bruce is very correct about this: some people treat these technologies like its magic.
Regardless, this is the most ignorant thing I think I've heard of and its going to make a laughing stock out of the companies that do it. And if you can't understand a business case analysis for that, you understand the business word less than you think.
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Are there any white papers out on this? I'd love to read some more on the implementation before I comment. Feel free to e-mail me anonymously (thru a remailer, there is one on at the URL above) if you can't post anything publicly. :-)
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Nonetheless, something like a unique UID for each player a key if you will (or something like it) so you can ban the cheaters, rate the "trustworthiness" of player - sort of like a moderation system like slashdot. Ack... I'm tired so its not totally thought out, but nonetheless the problem with all of these systems is that you have a problem of trust and thats what you need to build. Closing the source appears to solve the problem of trusting the binary, but its a false sense of security. Cheats existed before the source was opened. Hell, people have always tried to figure out some way to beat the game. That, to some people, is what playing a game is all about. Figuring out they can rocket jump to this ledge and no one will see them. Camping in a hard to shoot spot and picking everyone off. Ping flooding people so they can't talk to the server and so on. Some people just suck and can only win by cheating. That happens in every game unfortunately (yes, even the ones in the meat world... thats why they have referees!)
In fairness to ID, it is very hard to build a totally trusted system. Its not impossible, just difficult and requires some thought. It can be done though and the cheating issue can be solved more efficiently through other means as well (human systems, like referees). The determined cheaters will figure out the game and its protocols whether you open or close the source, so closing it, I argue, buys you very little. I suggest everyone read Bruce Schneier's Applied Cryptography for more on problems with trusted systems. Even a blessed binary could be spoofed unfortunately. Anyway, its late and this thread is finally killing my insomnia.
BTW, I'm flattered that someone(s) liked my comments enough to moderate them up and I appreciate everyones comments, even though I'm so tired I can't respond to all of them. Very interesting points on both sides of this issue. For me its a classic trust problem. :-)
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So, this is really yet another example, in a long an sordid history, of why building a security model that depends on the client to be honest in a client/server model is a Bad Idea[TM] (can anyone say rexd?). Closing the source would be nothing more than security through obscurity. I guess its time to open that can of worms again and kick that dead horse around. There were cheats before they opened the source, their were cheats for UnReal and I'm sure their are cheats for other games as well. Anytime you rely on the client exclusively to report valid values you shift trust into an untrusted space. The users machine is not trusted, so why does it suprise anyone that someone would cheat? Why is it suprising that its possible? Its possible whether you open or close the source. This bears repeating, trusting an untrusted system (the client) to report trusted values is not possible! Thats the problem. Not the fact that the source is open, its the fact that the client is so implicitly trusted to report valid values.
Hopefully the ID folks will realize that if they want to stop cheating. Preventing cheating in the client alone is never going to work. It will of course take some more work on their part, but its been done correctly before and I'm sure they can do it too. If they're smart they'll embrace this and work with the open source community to get it fixed.
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My hat is off to you. :-)
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And since you used it to construct an argument, I saw fit to tear it down.
Your point is still illogical and falacious.
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Lets see how silly this parable is shall we?
Pretty silly story eh? We're digressing now, but your parable is berift of anything other than a funny antecdote and proves nothing. The real point is even more important: Religion, unlike Science can never and has never explained primal causes. Its tried. Its tried and failed miserably every time. Science has replaced everything religion has attempted to explain. The origin of life, the shape of the earth, the age of the earth, the origin of woman, the causes of disease, the weather, ad infinitum.
It is religion, not Science that can never account for the ultimate origin of anything. Through mythology alone it tries to explain everything, all at once, once size fits all - the ultimate UCT (Universal Conspiracy Theory), while proving nothing. The failure to prove everything in one fell swoop, unlike religion, is one of the tests that proves the validity of the scientific method. No real scientist would claim that we have explained everything or try to explain everything in one book! No such claim has been made by Science. But that doesn't change the fact that Science is the best and only method we have for understanding our world.
Not to get off on a tangent, although I think we already have, the key difference is that religion is the stuff of myths and stories, science is about the discovery of truth no matter where it takes us. Religion forces, Science persuades. The real issue at stake with genetics is that its exposing truths that make alot of religious people very uncomfortable, and thats too bad for all of us. A new chapter in scientific discovery is being written and some would rather burn the whole book, because it goes against their cherished and sacred beliefs.
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When something is found to be wrong scientifically, science drops it (or evolves the prevaling theory to include it). Religion never does this.
That bears repeating: Science changes with the evidence, Religion is about Dogma and never allows evidence to stand in the way of its mythology. Its the flashlight versus the bucket. Science is about looking at all the evidence, religion, when it looks at any evidence, is about only picking out those pieces that comply with dogma and ignoring everything else. So your examples are wonderful proof that science is indeed a pursuit of the truth, and not about preaching its dogma as some creationists have claimed. When new evidence comes to light, science, unlike religion (and creationism) adapts and evolves. Religion forces, science convinces.
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Actually, what you refer to already exists. They are called decoy missles.
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1) Contrary to popular belief, The Patriot is a Theater Based Anti-Aircraft missle defense system and not an Anti-Missle Defense System (it was designed to shoot down planes, not missles). It was retrofitted to engage missles in the gulf war - which explains its interesting performance in the gulf war. It was not designed, or originally intented as a anti-missle defense system. The retrofitting of the Patriot was a lucky break, given that military planners had totally missed the boat on that type of expected threat. Although, in fairness, the SCUD missle was never a tactical threat at any point during the war, and never posed any military threat of any significance to forces in theater. It was a political tool used by Iraq to scare the world, and little more. So it's understandable that the original military response to the SCUD attacks was "So what?" Nevertheless, we had no real anti-missle defense system to speak of at the time. (And we still don't.)
2) The Patriot is a Theater defense system (effective only within a single geographic region). ICBMs are strategic weapons systems (effective globally). What this means, in a few words or less, is that in the best case: You have patriots installed in every single theather of operation you expect a nuclear attack to come from, the Patriot will not engage the ICBM (shoot it down) until its too late. The Patriots maximum effective range makes it only useful for engaging targets within a single theater of operation, or basically only as high as you would expect a typical military aircraft to fly and only as far away as the planners expected an inbound to pose a threat (say a hundred miles or so). In short, the patriots range is too short to be effective against weapons that, when detonated, would encompass the Patriots entire range. So you have the problem of needing thousands of patriot batteries to cover a country like the US, and even then it would be too late for them to be of any use in most cases.
What does this all mean? We do not possess a real ballastic missle defense system. We can not, today, stop any inbound ICBM from reaching any target, unless we destroy it on the ground.
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You're tilting at straw men here with bald assertions about just having to advise your ISP that you are using a content filtering software package on Schedule I. The issue is that content filtering is wrong. The mechanism is not relevant to that argument. Censorship is wrong. You're caving in to that argument and accepting censorship with this law. Its that simple.
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A total of 3 posts to /., and that was about it.
As far as what the IIA have done, I thank them. They've turned this legislation around, from something that would have totally destroyed the internet in australia, to something we're barely going to notice.
So what are you bitter about again? It sounds like you're quite happy with your censorship. Maybe the lack of response in the US of A has been because people like yourself have said "Well, its not going to be that bad". Make your bed, and sleep in it mate.
Perhaps if you yourself were a bit more upset about it, then maybe the rest of us would be. Personally, I think you're a fool for even going along with this law. I would happily break it and suffer the consequences for doing my moral duty of not obeying an unjust law. You should do the same.
Australia is on a slippery slope of its own making with this one. Liberty is rarely something that is taken away all at once. Its almost always chipped away a bit at a time. By the time you realize whats happened, it will be too late. Australia is slidding towards that cliff right now. Its your country mate, do something about it now before its too late! Protest this affront to your rights now!
The best forms of censorship are.
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Why does he need an editor? Two words: Media Whore. MTV is pimping him.
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The problem with Abe, and I hope every sees this, is that he's basically trying to glamorize the *worst* sort of behavior and the *worst* possible sterotypes of geekdom. At best he's a wanna-be, trying to pass himself off as a "hacker" when he's really just a script kiddie(or less), and at worst he's a petty criminal, that got his job by breaking into his future employers computers - and is glamorizing the lifestyle of a cracker.
Some role model. No matter how you shake this out, he's the worst possible role model for an geek to emulate. However, this is precisely the image that most of the media has of "hackerdom", and Abe *and* Slashdot are just dragging it into the sewer to fester further. I'm teribbly disappointed in Slashdot for all of this, and frankly I'm a bit disappointed in myself for expecting Abe to answer my questions honestly.
All this has done is further damaged the popular image of real hacking (you know, writing code!) and further solidified the image of geekdom as a bunch of criminals willing to go to any length to get whatever they want: Women, Money, Jobs, etc. The ends does not justify the means. Yet Abe, MTV and Slashdot have just demonstrated that it does. And helped to educate a new generation that all you have to do to get whatever you want is become an Elite Uber-Haxx0r like Abe.
Most of you are not suprised by Abes non-responses and the silliness of the whole thing. I admit a small part of me did expect more, and was willing to give Abe the benefit of the doubt. Further, I think rather highly of Malda and Slashdot and expect alot from them. Hence, my misguided belief that this would not be a total waste of time and that perhaps Abe was on the level. I was wrong.
As a result of this nonsense, my trust level in Slashdot just went down a few notches. I hope Malda picks some real interviewees that actually have some relevance to the Slashdot community (like Alan Cox) and have something *useful* to contribute. Even on the best side of things, all Abe did for the geek community is portray an unrealistic and damaging stereotype of a "hacker". I suspect that he did far more damage to himself and the image of hackerdom that either he, or his fans are willing to admit. Good luck trying to a job that requires *trust* in the future Abe. The corporate world is past the sexy allure of "ex-hackers", and makes a point of not hiring them now. Perhaps college will clue you into the fact that cracking boxes is still a crime and the real world looks *down* at such irresponsible and illegal actions. Split hairs all you want on this point Abe, but you're only fooling yourself. You have seriously damaged any chance you ever have at being taken seriously or at being trusted.
Further, I understand that the Slashdot guys get alot of stuff to go thru every day and will make mistakes like this one (perhaps they're experimenting with a new sub-culture site for the stimulation starved!), but this Abe fellow is a lame excuse for anything geek - you really need to work harder to keep the quality of this site up. Your funded now for heavens sake! This isn't just a hobby anymore, its a business with customers.
I'm washing my hands of the whole thing and chalking it up as a silly digression into hype. Thanks for proving my point Abe. You're a media Whore and thanks MTV for proving that you are still the vast wasteland of the airwaves.
Now can we get on with some *real* interviews of some people that have actually contributed something useful to the world - and not waste our time on negative stereotypes and wannabes?
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Would you consider yourself a script kiddie? (why or why not?)
You claim to have been running ProComm Plus on an 8086 toshiba laptop when you were younger. What model laptop was this?
Are you concerned that your cracking shenanigans and illegal actions as a youth were glorified by MTV and will result in other youth emulating your criminal actions?
Do you ever expect to have a normal life now after MTV?
What line of work do you plan to persue after your 15 minutes of fame with MTV?
Would you recommend that others use your tactics of cracking boxes and breaking into future employers boxes and so on to get a job with them?
How did you use Back Orifice to crack the boxes at Bunim/Murray? The Salon article does not make any sense about how you owned the boxes at Bunim/Murray. In fact, the Salon Article sounds like complete BS on this point (BO is not a tool to get in, its a trojan). So how did you really own their boxes?
It sounds like, in the Salon Article, that you were very cynical about the show and realized it was all BS once you broke into their boxes, so why did you join the show after you figured that out?
You also sound somewhat bitter about the way the show treated you and the way MTV over focuses on violence and conflict in the show. Would you recommend that other people join the show, knowing what you know now about it?
What does Susie think about you now?
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If this sort of incredible abuse of police power occurs in a city like NY, it can happen in *any* police department - and abuses occur ALL THE TIME. Its absurd to expect something as innocuous and as hard to detect as this technology to not be abused by some police officers and departments.
Thats why technologies like this worry people. Your faith in the police is misplaced. They are people just like everyone else, with the same temptations, emotions, irrational responses and so on. The only difference is that they have TREMENDOUS power to ACT on those impulses with impunity which no one else has.
I hate to reuse an oft repeated phrase, but He that gives up essential Liberty for Security, shall recieve and deserves neither. Alot of tools could enhance the polices ability to deter crime, find criminals, even convict criminals. But that ends NEVER justifies the means. Privacy, as difficult as it is to maintain, is still an important right that needs to be protected from further encroachment. Its a RIGHT! Not some lofty goal, or something you "can't have because its hard to keep anything private". Its inalienable. Just because its hard to get true privacy in our society, does not mean that its not worthwhile to get SOME guarantees of privacy. And the whole issue of not being able to get perfect privacy is a red herring anyway. Thats not the point! The point is that police agencies DO abuse their powers, this tool can be used to illegally invade peoples privacy and it is of questionable value in the "war on crime". Is this tool worth the cost to our personal privacy is the issue on the table, not whether or not privacy can be obtained or whether or not the police can be trusted with this technology.
We all want to see a society with less crime. We all want to make it easier to stop the bad guys. Just not at the expense of everything else. This tool will be abused by the police, and the cost to personal privacy is simply worth the supposed benefit of this technology in stopping criminals.
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So how do you know, what you know? Or do you know nothing at all?
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Yeah, its nothing important, its just evolution. Only the single most important thing necessary to understand biology. Why would anyone want to test that? Ignorance is bliss I suppose. Good luck sending your daughter off to college with a scant understanding of biology.
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Actually, there is no real evidence to support the creationist world view. The creationists know this, which explains why they play their hand in the world of politics and not in the world of science as with evolution. If there were any evidence to support their creationist hypothesis', it would be able to stand on its own in fully peer reviewed journals. The fact that it can't speaks volumes about how vapid creationist premises are, and how worthless it is to even spend time trying to repaint the Genesis myth by any other name as some sort of "science". The truly ironic thing about creationism is how much the creationist spin has evolved to try and make it fit in as some sort of science. Don't be fooled. Creationism is not a science, its a religion, pure and simple. There is no evidence to support it.
Further, in so far as creationism represents itself as the majority opinion held by most Christians, creationism is actually not representative of most christians beliefs. Its an extremely marginalized minority belief system not held by most Christians. Even the Catholic church has embraced evolution, and they were one of the last major hold outs of the major sects of Christianity. Many sects of Christianity have biblical proofs for evolution. In short, some Christians hold it as a matter of faith that evolution occured! So to even pretend that Creationism is the "Christian" idea is just not true. Creationism is part of the very fringe of fundamentalism, and is simply not representative of the whole of Christianity. Christians everwhere should be embarassed to even be associated with it. From wild tales of Noahs Ark being full of dinosaurs, to ridiculous assertions that the Grand Canyon was created by the Great Flood, creationism is simply the worst example of pseudo-science out there and should be entertained as nothing more than flim flam at best, and a dangerous sham at worst attempting to indoctrinate one fringe religious belief system into the minds of students everywhere.
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The theory of evolution describes the mechanisms that cause evolution.
The fact that evolution occurs is not in dispute by the scientific community!. We are simply refining the theory to explain what causes it. That it occurs is not, and has not been in dispute for a VERY long time. Evolution is a fact.
There is no scientific debate about this. The only fringe element claiming otherwise is the fundamentalist creationists - and even then its not *all of them*. The theistic creationists at least acknowledge that evolution is a fact. Whats even more pathetic is when you ask the creationists to explain the world, and then watch them argue amongst themselves about new earth versus old earth, intelligent design vs. theistic evolution, as they call each other agents of satan for daring to challenge dogma. These people wouldn't know what real science was if it jumped on their slopping foreheads and started to evolve.
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It was a movie. Thats why it didn't scare some people.
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Ugh... City Folk.
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Why obscure the vendors name, when its obvious that the vendor here is Microsoft? Unless there is some other OS and MTA vendor in Redmond Washington...
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How the word piracy got co-oped to mean violating someones copyright's is beyond me. Piracy involves boarding someones ship (or plane), taking control of said vessel, killing everyone on board in some cases, and then stealing their stuff. To use the word piracy to refer to something as non-violent as copyright violations is an affront to all the people that STILL die at the hands of real pirates.
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