Mugabe doesn't NEED ammo. Do you think he's survived all these years because of legal niceties and the ability to prosecute people on facts? He don't need no stinkin' facts! He's a dictator and dictators have never needed facts to support their case. The fact that this ONE time the facts give him some support is irrelevant. The implication of your comment is that its Wikileaks' fault (specifically "Lord High Julian") that Zimbabwe will now continue to be under dictatorial rule. Bullshit.
He will continue to rule for as long as the people of Zimbabwe do not rise up and thrown the bum out. If the people of Zimbabwe are more concerned at Tsvangirai's connections to Western powers than Mugabe's rape of the nation then that tells you what their priorities are. The western powers are even less interested in Mugabe than they are Kim Jong Il and even if they were - it ain't their job to tell other peoples how to run their states.
Oops! My bad. When running a bridge, the Tor client has already encrypted the request and decrypts the response. It's ONLY the exit node that can see what's going on (assuming an unsecure protocol).
This may well be true in practice - particularly in the "free speech zones" in the US where protesters are herded into a fenced in area far from where any politicians are likely to be.
However, as quoted above, Article 19 specifically grants the right to "seek" (search for), "receive" (listen, as per your response), as well as "impart" (speak) information. What I like about it is the "through any media" and "regardless of frontiers".
What it does, is basically show up almost every country on the planet as hypocritical when it comes to Article 19. If there is any country that can honestly claim to grant their people rights as per Article 19, I'd love to know where they are.
Fair enough - this is precisely the "chilling" effect on free speech that fear generates. The authorities know this.
However, you do have some options when running as a relay. You can control whether you wish to be an exit node and if so which protocols (http, ssl, pop, imap etc) you will allow.
If you choose not to be an exit node, you can still be a relay (encrypted in - encrypted out; you have no way of knowing what or where).
Alternatively you can choose to be a bridge (an "entry" point) for users. If they are using an unencrypted protocol (e.g. http) then you do have the ability to see what is being requested. This may open you up to the same sort of problems as being as exit node.
Presumably, even if running as an exit node, you can (ironically) filter this through something like privoxy, safesquid or any number of customisable filters (or alternately just wait a while and route through Australia when our mandatory kiddie-safe internet feed is enabled). Although, it then begs the question - how committed to free speech are you? In any case, you do have some control.
Personally, I'm running a relay that limits exit to SSL. This presumably limits my legal liability as I have no way of knowing what's in the conversation.
I accept that my choice may be seen as somewhat cowardly and not putting my bandwidth where my values are. I'm thankful that there are still a few that are running unrestricted exit nodes.
If, instead of the current ~2,000 relays, we had say, ~2,000,000 then (assuming the software can scale), Tor would be far more useable and used than it is now.
It is becoming clear that the censorship cat is out of the bag. Western countries are now joining their totalitarian counterparts and other tinpot regimes in openly trying to restrict free speech, contrary to Article 19 of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
More than ever, if you have the bandwidth, no matter where you are, please consider running a Tor relay, bridge or exit node. http://torproject.org/
I know that solar=thermal base-load approaches have been tried before - to my recollection pumping heated oil under pressure into rock strata to heat the rocks, while a different set of parallel pipes transfer the heat from the rocks to water turning it into steam. Kind of like man-made geothermal. I can't find the article now but my memory tells me they had some problems at a pilot plant (minor tremors or something?).
In any case, its great to see solar thermal being exploited as a source of base-load power. I'd love to see this all over the Australian outback.
Something tells me the reason the FSB are interested is because of the potential that Wikileaks have documented evidence of Putin's alleged $40 billion personal fortune and how it may have been gathered: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/dec/21/russia.topstories3
Nice one troll. Had you even heard of Wikileaks before Assange started cultivating public attention?
For the record, Wikileaks HAS been exposing "bad stuff" in the world way before the iraq/afghan/cablegate stuff. SInce about 2006. Although you totally fail to understand their modus operandi. Releasing thousands of "random" (read "whatever they're given") classified documents is all they can do. They don't have the resources to analyse all the stuff they get. Hence recruiting the media to do the analysis for them. However, we already know that the media has kept shtum on most of these stories, so Wikileaks and Julian Assange must _become_ the story in order to get any attention at all.
As for the stuff they've released in the past you can still access most of it through one of their mirrors. Check out: http://mirror.wikileaks.info/
And as for the "potentially causing unnecessary harm". Please name a single documented case where this has happened due to WL. As opposed to the well known, documented, hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths caused by corrupt governments around the world.
Me? I'm seeding the WL insurance file and will be till I get cut off. I've also donated. All you rah-rah types who claim to believe in 1st amendment freedom of speech - most of you have exposed yourselves as no different to most other statists.
> Or maybe people in those countries don't send Wikileaks stuff to publish?
Who says they haven't? There's no reason the leakers of the US info had to be American.
Is it possible that perhaps a state actor with an extremely high level of technical espionage capability and whose massive and on-going exercise of that capability (read: cyber-attacks) against the US, might lead to the bulk capture of such material? Is it possible that having gained access to such material, they might forward it to WL through a US front?
Personally, I think its far more plausible than that some mid-ranking US officer had access to the sheer volume of diplomatic cables that is being published here.
I thought twice about replying to this but I can't help myself so hear goes nothing...
1. Your (presumably bad) experience with "process people" may not be everyone's experience.
2. Slavish adherence to anything (incl. processes) MAY be ill advised at times. Typically, standards and/or processes are instituted for a good reason. This does not remove the need to consider whether they are appropriate in all cases. Process does not remove the need to think.
3. Capturing requirements is pretty useful and having a repeatable, reproducible way of doing this is also useful. Need to take over some other person's 3 year old steaming pile of spaghetti? Requirements are a good start. Need to replace a home-grown system with a market solution? Requirements are pretty useful in negotiating a contract with the vendor (unless you don't mind the vendor nailing your balls to their invoice because you couldn't actually tell them what you needed their software to do).
4. Customers typically only care about the utility, quality and cost of the end product. They care about how the sausage tastes, not how its made. However, to achieve those things you will require some process. You cannot have worked on any large project and think otherwise.
5. I agree that even where "best practice" processes are in place, there are still inordinately many failures. However in my experience (25 years), this is almost ALWAYS down to people/political issues. My own hypothesis is that there is no system, process, methodology or framework that can enforce appropriate behaviour and that cannot be "gamed". The best you can do is try and minimise the opportunities for gaming the system. Irrational agents (at any level) can (and will if given enough time) completely bugger up the best laid plans.
I agree that IT is still incredibly immature when compared to a discipline such as (say) civil engineering. However these things are all part and parcel of developing that maturity.
When I hear criticisms of IT processes like this I'm reminded of people criticising democratic forms of government and Churchill's response "democracy is the worst form of government...except for all those others that have been tried".
My dear fellow, at the top end of the scale you and I might call "corrupt", there are no suitcases full of cash, or gold bullion secreted in vaults. There are no-bid-contracts and consultancy fees. All above board and quite legal you know.
Enrique1218, on a personal level I totally agree with you. I am a western atheist and I personally couldn't stand to live in a medieval, religious tyranny. However, most of the locals are perfectly HAPPY with their religious bullshit and are all for the kind of fucked up, oppressed world where every aspect of life is circumscribed by idiots. Who are we to tell them otherwise?
The thing that gets me, is that we are in there trying to change the lives of people who (on the most part) don't want to change. Yet the people who DO want to change and make their own (dangerous) decision to get the hell out of there (i.e. refugees), make it to our shores only to be called "boat people" and "illegal immigrants" and we lock them up in detention centres and yell at them to go back to the shithole they came from. Way to fucking help. We're all for human rights until you get to our borders. Then its "back the fuck up!"
Talk about mixed messages. Is it any wonder that people in the third world views the motives of the first world with suspicion?
Oh, so YOU would choose US occupation every time. What about the poor bastards living in those shitholes? Do they get a choice? What if their choice is different to your choice? What then?
Sorry, which people have been named/harmed from the leaks? Can anyone point them out or are we just supposed to believe whatever the Dead Tree Media repeats? I don't believe for a second that any of the hacks which pass for journalists these days have actually gone through the thousands of documents that have been released.
Furthermore, people here are questioning the value of the leaked material on...just what exactly? The word of the government spokesperson? The vacuous opinion pieces in the media? Releasing the material may well have prevented or altered some course of action which only the leaker and/or the actors involved know about.
As for the uninformed moralising on the cost in lives, let me just point out that more blood is spent deliberately every single day in our names for significantly more questionable purposes and less tangible benefits. I find it particularly galling that those calling for Assange and co to be charged with treason are the very same people who sent troops to die in Afghanistan knowing that their blood would be spilled by the hands of our supposed Pakistani allies and their Afghan mercenaries. Treason indeed.
Overheating is my biggest problem (D-Link in the roof-space).
Can anyone recommend a "thermally" reliable ADSL2+modem and/or Wireless N router (don't care if its one or two devices). Alternatively, anyone got any ideas (or even better, out of the box solutions/something I can buy) that will keep devices cool in my roof space (I've recently been thinking of putting a wine fridge up there and sticking my devices in it).
Slashdot Mirror
Mugabe doesn't NEED ammo. Do you think he's survived all these years because of legal niceties and the ability to prosecute people on facts? He don't need no stinkin' facts! He's a dictator and dictators have never needed facts to support their case. The fact that this ONE time the facts give him some support is irrelevant. The implication of your comment is that its Wikileaks' fault (specifically "Lord High Julian") that Zimbabwe will now continue to be under dictatorial rule. Bullshit.
He will continue to rule for as long as the people of Zimbabwe do not rise up and thrown the bum out. If the people of Zimbabwe are more concerned at Tsvangirai's connections to Western powers than Mugabe's rape of the nation then that tells you what their priorities are. The western powers are even less interested in Mugabe than they are Kim Jong Il and even if they were - it ain't their job to tell other peoples how to run their states.
I'm interested. Isn't there some rule or other that State laws cannot trump federal laws? e.g. California can't legislate to enslave hobbits.
I don't know what the relative status is of covenants by international treaty.
> 'violates a celebrity's right of publicity.'
Sorry. Which amendment to the constitution was that? Or is this from the UN charter of human rights?
Oops! My bad. When running a bridge, the Tor client has already encrypted the request and decrypts the response. It's ONLY the exit node that can see what's going on (assuming an unsecure protocol).
This may well be true in practice - particularly in the "free speech zones" in the US where protesters are herded into a fenced in area far from where any politicians are likely to be.
However, as quoted above, Article 19 specifically grants the right to "seek" (search for), "receive" (listen, as per your response), as well as "impart" (speak) information. What I like about it is the "through any media" and "regardless of frontiers".
What it does, is basically show up almost every country on the planet as hypocritical when it comes to Article 19. If there is any country that can honestly claim to grant their people rights as per Article 19, I'd love to know where they are.
Fair enough - this is precisely the "chilling" effect on free speech that fear generates. The authorities know this.
However, you do have some options when running as a relay. You can control whether you wish to be an exit node and if so which protocols (http, ssl, pop, imap etc) you will allow.
If you choose not to be an exit node, you can still be a relay (encrypted in - encrypted out; you have no way of knowing what or where).
Alternatively you can choose to be a bridge (an "entry" point) for users. If they are using an unencrypted protocol (e.g. http) then you do have the ability to see what is being requested. This may open you up to the same sort of problems as being as exit node.
Presumably, even if running as an exit node, you can (ironically) filter this through something like privoxy, safesquid or any number of customisable filters (or alternately just wait a while and route through Australia when our mandatory kiddie-safe internet feed is enabled). Although, it then begs the question - how committed to free speech are you? In any case, you do have some control.
Personally, I'm running a relay that limits exit to SSL. This presumably limits my legal liability as I have no way of knowing what's in the conversation.
I accept that my choice may be seen as somewhat cowardly and not putting my bandwidth where my values are. I'm thankful that there are still a few that are running unrestricted exit nodes.
If, instead of the current ~2,000 relays, we had say, ~2,000,000 then (assuming the software can scale), Tor would be far more useable and used than it is now.
It is becoming clear that the censorship cat is out of the bag. Western countries are now joining their totalitarian counterparts and other tinpot regimes in openly trying to restrict free speech, contrary to Article 19 of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers ."
More than ever, if you have the bandwidth, no matter where you are, please consider running a Tor relay, bridge or exit node.
http://torproject.org/
I know that solar=thermal base-load approaches have been tried before - to my recollection pumping heated oil under pressure into rock strata to heat the rocks, while a different set of parallel pipes transfer the heat from the rocks to water turning it into steam. Kind of like man-made geothermal. I can't find the article now but my memory tells me they had some problems at a pilot plant (minor tremors or something?).
In any case, its great to see solar thermal being exploited as a source of base-load power. I'd love to see this all over the Australian outback.
> I think the insurance is reserved for more extreme occurrences.
Like when he takes off for Sweden...and doesn't land there.
Something tells me the reason the FSB are interested is because of the potential that Wikileaks have documented evidence of Putin's alleged $40 billion personal fortune and how it may have been gathered:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/dec/21/russia.topstories3
Nice one troll. Had you even heard of Wikileaks before Assange started cultivating public attention?
For the record, Wikileaks HAS been exposing "bad stuff" in the world way before the iraq/afghan/cablegate stuff. SInce about 2006. Although you totally fail to understand their modus operandi. Releasing thousands of "random" (read "whatever they're given") classified documents is all they can do. They don't have the resources to analyse all the stuff they get. Hence recruiting the media to do the analysis for them. However, we already know that the media has kept shtum on most of these stories, so Wikileaks and Julian Assange must _become_ the story in order to get any attention at all.
As for the stuff they've released in the past you can still access most of it through one of their mirrors. Check out:
http://mirror.wikileaks.info/
And as for the "potentially causing unnecessary harm". Please name a single documented case where this has happened due to WL. As opposed to the well known, documented, hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths caused by corrupt governments around the world.
Me? I'm seeding the WL insurance file and will be till I get cut off. I've also donated. All you rah-rah types who claim to believe in 1st amendment freedom of speech - most of you have exposed yourselves as no different to most other statists.
Armored vehicles you say?
Pick yourself up a nice little armored Mercedes, Range Rover, Landrover or Jaguar at the same site!
http://www.edisposals.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/WFS/Disposals-Public-Site/en_US/-/GBP/ViewProductDetail-Start;pgid=MieqQ4wkQg8000ArvQ_8K1sp0000NCyk19hx?ProductUUID=kpvAqBIQorgAAAEs_4FaBaCk&CatalogCategoryID=VaLAqBELPagAAAED8GeasfoP&JumpTo=OfferList
Absolutely. I wasn't trying to suggest your point was invalid, just that very few people think about the import of alternative scenarios.
> Or maybe people in those countries don't send Wikileaks stuff to publish?
Who says they haven't? There's no reason the leakers of the US info had to be American.
Is it possible that perhaps a state actor with an extremely high level of technical espionage capability and whose massive and on-going exercise of that capability (read: cyber-attacks) against the US, might lead to the bulk capture of such material? Is it possible that having gained access to such material, they might forward it to WL through a US front?
Personally, I think its far more plausible than that some mid-ranking US officer had access to the sheer volume of diplomatic cables that is being published here.
I thought twice about replying to this but I can't help myself so hear goes nothing...
1. Your (presumably bad) experience with "process people" may not be everyone's experience.
2. Slavish adherence to anything (incl. processes) MAY be ill advised at times. Typically, standards and/or processes are instituted for a good reason. This does not remove the need to consider whether they are appropriate in all cases. Process does not remove the need to think.
3. Capturing requirements is pretty useful and having a repeatable, reproducible way of doing this is also useful. Need to take over some other person's 3 year old steaming pile of spaghetti? Requirements are a good start. Need to replace a home-grown system with a market solution? Requirements are pretty useful in negotiating a contract with the vendor (unless you don't mind the vendor nailing your balls to their invoice because you couldn't actually tell them what you needed their software to do).
4. Customers typically only care about the utility, quality and cost of the end product. They care about how the sausage tastes, not how its made. However, to achieve those things you will require some process. You cannot have worked on any large project and think otherwise.
5. I agree that even where "best practice" processes are in place, there are still inordinately many failures. However in my experience (25 years), this is almost ALWAYS down to people/political issues. My own hypothesis is that there is no system, process, methodology or framework that can enforce appropriate behaviour and that cannot be "gamed". The best you can do is try and minimise the opportunities for gaming the system. Irrational agents (at any level) can (and will if given enough time) completely bugger up the best laid plans.
I agree that IT is still incredibly immature when compared to a discipline such as (say) civil engineering. However these things are all part and parcel of developing that maturity.
When I hear criticisms of IT processes like this I'm reminded of people criticising democratic forms of government and Churchill's response "democracy is the worst form of government...except for all those others that have been tried".
My dear fellow, at the top end of the scale you and I might call "corrupt", there are no suitcases full of cash, or gold bullion secreted in vaults. There are no-bid-contracts and consultancy fees. All above board and quite legal you know.
They could alternatively just whack a giant mirror up in space, to reflect real daylight onto the town.
Kind of like what they did in Viganella: http://fractalenlightenment.com/124/uncategorized/the-sun-is-going-to-shine-in-viganella
but on a slightly grander scale.
This is Slashdot after all...
Enrique1218, on a personal level I totally agree with you. I am a western atheist and I personally couldn't stand to live in a medieval, religious tyranny. However, most of the locals are perfectly HAPPY with their religious bullshit and are all for the kind of fucked up, oppressed world where every aspect of life is circumscribed by idiots. Who are we to tell them otherwise?
The thing that gets me, is that we are in there trying to change the lives of people who (on the most part) don't want to change. Yet the people who DO want to change and make their own (dangerous) decision to get the hell out of there (i.e. refugees), make it to our shores only to be called "boat people" and "illegal immigrants" and we lock them up in detention centres and yell at them to go back to the shithole they came from. Way to fucking help. We're all for human rights until you get to our borders. Then its "back the fuck up!"
Talk about mixed messages. Is it any wonder that people in the third world views the motives of the first world with suspicion?
Oh, so YOU would choose US occupation every time.
What about the poor bastards living in those shitholes? Do they get a choice? What if their choice is different to your choice? What then?
At the FBI, we take customer service seriously.
Missing persons who wish to file a customer service complaint can contact us via telephone, email or postal address:
http://www.fbi.gov/contactus.htm
We value your feedback. Have a nice day.
Sorry, which people have been named/harmed from the leaks? Can anyone point them out or are we just supposed to believe whatever the Dead Tree Media repeats? I don't believe for a second that any of the hacks which pass for journalists these days have actually gone through the thousands of documents that have been released.
Furthermore, people here are questioning the value of the leaked material on...just what exactly? The word of the government spokesperson? The vacuous opinion pieces in the media? Releasing the material may well have prevented or altered some course of action which only the leaker and/or the actors involved know about.
As for the uninformed moralising on the cost in lives, let me just point out that more blood is spent deliberately every single day in our names for significantly more questionable purposes and less tangible benefits. I find it particularly galling that those calling for Assange and co to be charged with treason are the very same people who sent troops to die in Afghanistan knowing that their blood would be spilled by the hands of our supposed Pakistani allies and their Afghan mercenaries. Treason indeed.
I hear you.
Overheating is my biggest problem (D-Link in the roof-space).
Can anyone recommend a "thermally" reliable ADSL2+modem and/or Wireless N router (don't care if its one or two devices).
Alternatively, anyone got any ideas (or even better, out of the box solutions/something I can buy) that will keep devices cool in my roof space (I've recently been thinking of putting a wine fridge up there and sticking my devices in it).
Anaesthetised and bleating.
"Baaaa." ...?"
"Where's my corn syrup?"
"Baaaa."
"Where's my brewski?"
"Baaaa."
"Er..."
"Baaaa."
"Um..."
"Baaaa."
"Excuse me, may I just
--- ZZZZZZT!!! ---
"Baaaa."
> Perhaps in the eyes of ... evolution, STDs are a ... form population control
Dude, in the eyes of evolution, EVERYTHING is potentially a form of population control. Hell, Gentoo Linux is a form of population control.
Maybe he wants to follow in the illustrious path of this former alumnus:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Yoo#Regarding_torture_of_detainees_and_children_of_detainees