Genetic design is still a *long* way off...
on
Frankenstein Time
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· Score: 2
The idea that we're suddenly going to be having "franken-babies" any time soon is laugh-out-loud funny for those who have even the slightest inkling of what we don't know in cellular mechanics (or, to translate into hype-speak: nano-biology)
Salon magazine recently had a good primer on the reasons why this nightmare scenario ain't happening any time soon. You can find it here.
Each state has it's own rules about what is acceptable media for petitioning, and this is not affected in the least by the proposed federal law.
For instance, in my state of Oregon, digital signatures are already considered invalid media. In fact, there is a current ballot proposal being presently gathered, in which many of the signatures have been rejected because they were written on the wrong type of paper stock.
Conversely, even before now, there is nothing that prevented a state from accepting digital signatures for initiatives, other than the fact that none of them did.
The federal digital media signatures is largely intended for the purpose of interstate contract law. It has no jurisdiction over state politics.
While compression cannot guarantee anything better than a 1:1 ratio (note change in emphasis), the system IBM has outlined does not require it.
What IBM is proposing is nothing more than a compressed-RAM disk-cache, in combination with a LRU memory cache for frequently used data. If the compression fails, at worst all you have done is to put an unnecessary step into saving your data to disk. It doesn't require OS support to work, or even the OS to know about it.
This also has been done before by various disk-controller manufacturers. I'm afraid this probably won't keep IBM from trying to patent the entire technique tho:-(
I suspect that those who thought this "funny" is the poster himself.
It's not really all that hard to scam the Slashdot moderation system. You can sign up with a bunch of unique emails, and when you get a random chance to be moderator, you spend all your points on some lame post you write with your other accounts. Given enough time and effort, you can probably make enough accounts to get a kind of permanent moderation status.
You don't even have to be as smart as your average script-kiddie to do this. All you need is a combination of immaturity and way too much time on your hands.
A pretty obvious reason for developing on Linux that hasn't been stated yet...
With M$, you only have a matter of years before they decide your app is good enough to plagarize. If your customers still prefer your APP to theirs, you can expect the standard application of FUD, marketing muscle, intimidation applied to your investors, inhibiting your distribution channels, special undocumented OS hooks designed for their latest APP's features, and if you still dare to sell a product that is superior to theirs, bundling their APP into their OS distribution.
What I don't understand is why any ISV would EVER design a product for Windows. It's like investors have no intelligence whatsoever.
Why bother? If your intent is to piss off all your customers, you can filter based on URL. There's nothing technical that prevents AOL from blocking ABC's web site, just like Time Warner recently blocked ABC itself over it's cable system.
You can even lie if you want and say "Unable to Connect".
The only problem with this is that when you start pissing your customers off, they stop being your customers -- that is, if you're lucky. If you're unlucky, they sick their Congressmen on you (as happened to Time Warner when it tried to block ABC).
Steve "Sick of GuvMint/Corprat Conspiracy Theories" Maurer
> When reiser, xfs, ext3 and all are finished and stable, which of them do you feel will become the de facto standard for Linux systems?
Since the "API" of file systems are identical for nearly all applications - except those apps that decide to explicitly use dependent features - I would expect all of them to peacefully coexist in the market. If there's significant differentiation between them, people will probably have more than one running on different disks/partitions on their systems.
The last FS that impacted anyone was FAT's absurd 8.3 convention, but even M$ is trying to stick a nail in that one.
The only caveat might be problems with file sizes that need to be 64 bits (as opposed to 32). That's a ways off through.
Adero, Akamai, AdForce, Inktomi, Yahoo, they all use this business model. That's why when you load broken sites, you can often still get the banner ads (we've all had this happen, admit it).
True ROUTING prioritization won't happen unless TCP/IP changes significantly, because the packets don't contain enough information about the true originator. It may not even be possible, because the security overhead would offset any reasonable gain from the prioritization.
So if you like the net as it is, don't worry, be happy.
Slashdot Mirror
The idea that we're suddenly going to be having "franken-babies" any time soon is
laugh-out-loud funny for those who have even the slightest inkling of what we don't
know in cellular mechanics (or, to translate into hype-speak: nano-biology)
Salon magazine recently had a good primer on the reasons why this nightmare scenario
ain't happening any time soon. You can find it here.
Oh phuleeeze - not another "bad government for enforcing the laws" rant.
Establishing a monopoly through merger != Corporate Progress
Each state has it's own rules about what is acceptable media for petitioning,
and this is not affected in the least by the proposed federal law.
For instance, in my state of Oregon, digital signatures are already considered invalid media.
In fact, there is a current ballot proposal being presently gathered, in which many of the signatures
have been rejected because they were written on the wrong type of paper stock.
Conversely, even before now, there is nothing that prevented a state from accepting digital signatures
for initiatives, other than the fact that none of them did.
The federal digital media signatures is largely intended for the purpose of interstate contract law.
It has no jurisdiction over state politics.
While compression cannot guarantee anything better than a 1:1 ratio (note change in emphasis), the system IBM has outlined does not require it.
What IBM is proposing is nothing more than a compressed-RAM disk-cache, in combination with a LRU memory cache for frequently used data. If the compression fails, at worst all you have done is to put an unnecessary step into saving your data to disk. It doesn't require OS support to work, or even the OS to know about it.
This also has been done before by various disk-controller manufacturers. I'm afraid this probably won't keep IBM from trying to patent the entire technique tho :-(
I suspect that those who thought this "funny" is the poster himself.
It's not really all that hard to scam the Slashdot moderation system.
You can sign up with a bunch of unique emails, and when you get a random
chance to be moderator, you spend all your points on some lame post you
write with your other accounts. Given enough time and effort, you can
probably make enough accounts to get a kind of permanent moderation status.
You don't even have to be as smart as your average script-kiddie to do this.
All you need is a combination of immaturity and way too much time on your hands.
Steve "moderate" Maurer
A pretty obvious reason for developing on Linux that hasn't been stated yet...
With M$, you only have a matter of years before they decide your app is
good enough to plagarize. If your customers still prefer your APP to theirs,
you can expect the standard application of FUD, marketing muscle, intimidation
applied to your investors, inhibiting your distribution channels, special
undocumented OS hooks designed for their latest APP's features, and if you
still dare to sell a product that is superior to theirs, bundling their
APP into their OS distribution.
What I don't understand is why any ISV would EVER design a product for Windows.
It's like investors have no intelligence whatsoever.
Filtering based on LOGO?
Why bother? If your intent is to piss off all your customers,
you can filter based on URL. There's nothing technical that prevents
AOL from blocking ABC's web site, just like Time Warner recently blocked
ABC itself over it's cable system.
You can even lie if you want and say "Unable to Connect".
The only problem with this is that when you start pissing your
customers off, they stop being your customers -- that is,
if you're lucky. If you're unlucky, they sick their Congressmen
on you (as happened to Time Warner when it tried to block ABC).
Steve "Sick of GuvMint/Corprat Conspiracy Theories" Maurer
> When reiser, xfs, ext3 and all are finished and stable, which of them do you feel will become the de facto standard for Linux systems?
Since the "API" of file systems are identical for nearly all applications - except those apps that
decide to explicitly use dependent features - I would expect all of them to peacefully coexist
in the market. If there's significant differentiation between them, people will probably have
more than one running on different disks/partitions on their systems.
The last FS that impacted anyone was FAT's absurd 8.3 convention, but even M$ is trying to stick
a nail in that one.
The only caveat might be problems with file sizes that need to be 64 bits (as opposed to 32).
That's a ways off through.
Steve Maurer
Adero, Akamai, AdForce, Inktomi, Yahoo, they all use this business model.
That's why when you load broken sites, you can often still get the banner ads
(we've all had this happen, admit it).
True ROUTING prioritization won't happen unless TCP/IP changes significantly,
because the packets don't contain enough information about the true originator.
It may not even be possible, because the security overhead would offset any reasonable gain
from the prioritization.
So if you like the net as it is, don't worry, be happy.
Steve Maurer