In the long run it is not a viable country, I'm not talking about any wars or possible wars either, but just simple demographics. The Arab/Palestinian population is growing faster than the Israeli/Jewish population, and the fastest growing demographic of the Jewish population is the Orthodox Jews. They are not obliged to serve in the Israeli military and some don't believe Israel should be a separate nation (as it is a right reserved for god's judgement only, not man's). Simply from a demographic standpoint, the way things are cannot be sustained exist in Israel, regardless of wars or extremism.
Actually, some terrorist groups do make their own munitions and weapons. The weapons shops in the tribal areas of Pakistan crank out everything from ak-47 and H&K MP5 knockoffs to light anti-aircraft guns. In Palestine, HAMAS is well known for making its own Qassam artillery rockets, mortars & shells, and anti-tank missiles like the Yasin and Batar RPG's. Hezbollah operates their own UAV's along with a large rocket supply both foreign and domestic makes. A simple remote-control car-bomb is not that far off to be honest.
More to the point, if they were military labs, the schlubs responsible for the security cockups would have been in the brig and awaiting a court-martial long ago. The knowledge that your "employer" can clap you in prison and then have you shot for almost a trivial incident is, to borrow a phrase, tremendously attention-focusing. Security at many DOD installations isn't much better to be honest. Didn't we have an article month or two back about the Secretary of Defense having his pc broken into?
My personal experience with the NMCI project (Navy-Marine Corps Intranet) is that it isn't very secure. A cheap social engineering hack such as a phone call to the tech guys will pretty much guarantee you a password to access the network. No ones getting shot or being court-martialed because the government in question is fairly incompetent to begin with.
Didn't we also have a story a little while back about Homeland Security's networks getting hacked a couple hundred times in the last two years. This isn't just a few labcoats who don't value security, the military fares no better, and neither do the Homeland Security guys.
I can't wait, and if they say "No" just don't allow them into the site, because how can you trust them if they say no to an extra special secure connection, can you? I can't wait for the future where our choices are root-kitted slave or web pariah!
Do these same veterans groups attack Yahoo, MSN, and Altavista for not decorating their logos with militaria on Veteran's Day? This is a non-news post about a bunch of whiners if you ask me. Google's decoration can be purely voluntary and random for all I care.
--As a USMC veteran to all the whiners, shut up.
Time and history has shown us that when you're number 1, you don't give in until you absolutely have to - because you don't need to. Umm... ok, but Facebook isn't number one according to this its number 3 and the total membership of social networks in the summary blows Facebook out of the water. Please don't turn this into a myspace/facebook fanboy turf war, if that was your intention. If not then my apologies, carry on.
As for the article, I'm not sure that it's enough pressure to get Facebook to change, as social networking sites have a pretty low barrier to entry and can easily get by on ad revenue. Which is why I believe there is room for multiple very popular social networks to exist. There will be people with accounts on 3 or 4 and others with accounts on just 1, but the requirements and overhead per account are really so low (a few developers for basic layout and options, everyone else is tending the server farms and that's about it) that it is possible for many to coexist (a commodities market). Whereas elsewhere (such as the OS wars) once Microsoft got on top in the 90's, the inertia of software already developed for it and systems in place created a high barrier to entry (resulting in the de facto monopoly we see today).
Likewise, Natalie Portman -- beloved of geek fanboys worldwide since long before her Star Wars turns -- is an accomplished psychology student with two published papers under her belt, but psych isn't strictly a science or tech pursuit. (Waaahbulances will please park in the designated Comments section.) One of those papers is on the beneficial psychological effects of her pouring hot grits down a Slashdotter's pants.
I use 3DS Max and Blender myself and I definitely have to say Blender's UI is horrible and I mean that. I don't know what the developers are thinking, but damn they need serious help in making that user interface more friendly. The only time a I use Blender is for when I do some modeling and art for open source games and mods that have and export function for Blender (such as xmesh in Vega Strike). Other than that its 3dS max for me, though from what I've seen Maya is great too. Lightwave used to be a great program, but it seems to have performed worse in this comparison than I'd have thought.
Again, I can't stress enough what a pain Blender's UI is compared to these other programs. I normally try to recommend FOSS programs to people, but this is one of those programs I'd only recommend if the person couldn't afford one of the other programs here.
I did, thats who. I said this before, but about the Linux games scene. 'Gaming' is a niche market that appeals to only to about 10% of the people out there when you only account for the major titles like GTA, Gears, Halo, Quake, etc. The other 90% are content with playing the 'popular' games. These games are simple don't go for next-gen anything, but they are fun. Games like tetris, golf, etc. If you make those games fun again, then you're catering to the 90% while the other two consoles are catering to the 10%. Why does this pertain to Linux, it shows that appealing to hardcore gamers isn't important, appealing to the 90% is.
What no storm botnet on there? It's the most powerful supercomputer in the world!
Seriously though this list isn't that good and their are many things I could think of that could just as easily be on there. Doug Englebart's ideas (NLS and the mother of all demos in 68) now that is a wonder we are still trying to implement successfully and yet hardly anyone has heard of it. But instead we have world's smallest computer running Vista? Pretty lame list here folks...
Four formats now? And you know what, in the end their will just be the all-in-one player for CD/DVD/HD-DVD/Blu Ray/HD-VMD/CH-DVD/etc. And the thousands of man-years of effort developing the winning product will go to waste having tried to re-invent the wheel for the 6 or 7th time. And some crazy cracker will break their DRM features one-by-one, piracy will run rampant, and all the engineering effort will have been a waste anyways.
Slashdot Mirror
In the long run it is not a viable country, I'm not talking about any wars or possible wars either, but just simple demographics. The Arab/Palestinian population is growing faster than the Israeli/Jewish population, and the fastest growing demographic of the Jewish population is the Orthodox Jews. They are not obliged to serve in the Israeli military and some don't believe Israel should be a separate nation (as it is a right reserved for god's judgement only, not man's). Simply from a demographic standpoint, the way things are cannot be sustained exist in Israel, regardless of wars or extremism.
Actually, some terrorist groups do make their own munitions and weapons. The weapons shops in the tribal areas of Pakistan crank out everything from ak-47 and H&K MP5 knockoffs to light anti-aircraft guns. In Palestine, HAMAS is well known for making its own Qassam artillery rockets, mortars & shells, and anti-tank missiles like the Yasin and Batar RPG's. Hezbollah operates their own UAV's along with a large rocket supply both foreign and domestic makes. A simple remote-control car-bomb is not that far off to be honest.
-sarcasm?
or was it hacked???
My personal experience with the NMCI project (Navy-Marine Corps Intranet) is that it isn't very secure. A cheap social engineering hack such as a phone call to the tech guys will pretty much guarantee you a password to access the network. No ones getting shot or being court-martialed because the government in question is fairly incompetent to begin with.
Didn't we also have a story a little while back about Homeland Security's networks getting hacked a couple hundred times in the last two years. This isn't just a few labcoats who don't value security, the military fares no better, and neither do the Homeland Security guys.
--In Soviet Russia, internet connection owns you!
As freelance coders such as Hiro Protagonist move underground, while the government falls apart.
First post!
No Slashdot thread is complete without RMS's opinion on the matter.
Do these same veterans groups attack Yahoo, MSN, and Altavista for not decorating their logos with militaria on Veteran's Day? This is a non-news post about a bunch of whiners if you ask me. Google's decoration can be purely voluntary and random for all I care. --As a USMC veteran to all the whiners, shut up.
Forget cancer research, there are more pressing concerns such as cracking HD-DVD and Blu Ray that these botnets should be working on. I keed... :D
As for the article, I'm not sure that it's enough pressure to get Facebook to change, as social networking sites have a pretty low barrier to entry and can easily get by on ad revenue. Which is why I believe there is room for multiple very popular social networks to exist. There will be people with accounts on 3 or 4 and others with accounts on just 1, but the requirements and overhead per account are really so low (a few developers for basic layout and options, everyone else is tending the server farms and that's about it) that it is possible for many to coexist (a commodities market). Whereas elsewhere (such as the OS wars) once Microsoft got on top in the 90's, the inertia of software already developed for it and systems in place created a high barrier to entry (resulting in the de facto monopoly we see today).
Which agency is in charge of Gundam for the United States?
Hey isn't Linus Torvalds from Finland? ;)
Damn you beat me to it. I was going to make a joke about this.
I use 3DS Max and Blender myself and I definitely have to say Blender's UI is horrible and I mean that. I don't know what the developers are thinking, but damn they need serious help in making that user interface more friendly. The only time a I use Blender is for when I do some modeling and art for open source games and mods that have and export function for Blender (such as xmesh in Vega Strike). Other than that its 3dS max for me, though from what I've seen Maya is great too. Lightwave used to be a great program, but it seems to have performed worse in this comparison than I'd have thought.
Again, I can't stress enough what a pain Blender's UI is compared to these other programs. I normally try to recommend FOSS programs to people, but this is one of those programs I'd only recommend if the person couldn't afford one of the other programs here.
Ssshh, quiet you don't want Darl to start suing Slashdot for unfair competition do you? :D
Maybe they wouldn't be hacked so much if they used a secure operating system?
When is Google gonna have a "We're officially evil!" press release? Sorry for the troll, can't help it.
I did, thats who. I said this before, but about the Linux games scene. 'Gaming' is a niche market that appeals to only to about 10% of the people out there when you only account for the major titles like GTA, Gears, Halo, Quake, etc. The other 90% are content with playing the 'popular' games. These games are simple don't go for next-gen anything, but they are fun. Games like tetris, golf, etc. If you make those games fun again, then you're catering to the 90% while the other two consoles are catering to the 10%. Why does this pertain to Linux, it shows that appealing to hardcore gamers isn't important, appealing to the 90% is.
You can woo him with a pink slip...
What no storm botnet on there? It's the most powerful supercomputer in the world! Seriously though this list isn't that good and their are many things I could think of that could just as easily be on there. Doug Englebart's ideas (NLS and the mother of all demos in 68) now that is a wonder we are still trying to implement successfully and yet hardly anyone has heard of it. But instead we have world's smallest computer running Vista? Pretty lame list here folks...
Four formats now? And you know what, in the end their will just be the all-in-one player for CD/DVD/HD-DVD/Blu Ray/HD-VMD/CH-DVD/etc. And the thousands of man-years of effort developing the winning product will go to waste having tried to re-invent the wheel for the 6 or 7th time. And some crazy cracker will break their DRM features one-by-one, piracy will run rampant, and all the engineering effort will have been a waste anyways.