Whats amusing is that the author took the time to blur out the SSN's but left the names, and addresses of the "offenders" in the picture. How much do you want to bet some overzealous reader of that article is going to be sending something fun to one of those addresses?
I understand your comparison, however, I think this situation differs when the equipment and information that is being used is a function of your business. If the usage of my phone, and my computer, and my servers, is a function of MY business and I stand to lose money/business, or even go to jail when that equipment is mis-used. Then I feel I have every right to monitor that.
However, in the situation you describe, said equipment and infrastructre is not a function of your employers business. You pay for your privacy and you are entitled to it, and you personally would be held responsible for the mis-use of that equipment.
Oh and by the way, its not illict interception if you make EVERY employee aware that ALL of they actions on company equipment are being logged. This was clearly stated in the emplyee handbook as well as on the login banner and in every company resource that contained sensitive information.
I agree with you there is some ethical barrier that should not be crossed. However, I have worked for companies in the past that did this for one very legitimate reason. Employees dealt with credit card and social security numbers and other personal information of customers.
More than once, people were caught sending this information out of the office. Thus it was mandated that all emails, IM's etc. were logged to prevent information leaks. And I 100% agree with the reasoning behind it. We went so far as to block all but sanctioned websites which excluded all online mail sites, as well as blocking all IM traffic and using our own custom internal IM server. Of course we also stripped pretty much all user rights from the user to prevent installation of anything that wasn't approved software. Some programs, even disallowed cell phones on the sales floor, and had key loggers on every machine!
Having been on the corporate side of this argument, and having to deal with the consequences of an open work environment, I have to say I completely disagree with you. In my opinion the company has every right to monitor every aspect of what is happening on their equipment, especially if their business is on the line and depends on the security of that information.
Simple fact of the matter is, people can not be trusted, and if I own the infrastructure on which these people are working I would be monitoring them as well.
You might make the argument that your employees would be disgruntled and upset that they are so restricted. However if you don't give them reason to wander, or a the need to be wasting time online then this is not really an issue. They all have desk phones with their own personal lines and can be reached in the event of an emergency. And the company provides quite a bit of entertainment and incentive to keep working, so it becomes a non-issue after a while. The turnover rate is not as bad as you might think.
Your comparison to restroom privacy is not really relevant as that is a completley different realm of privacy. The "equipment" with which you deficate is entirely your own, and thus you are obviously entitled to your own level of pivacy. Nevertheless, your comparison is just plain rediculus and does not warrant a place in this discussion.
You cant kill the beast but cutting its head off when the beast has a million heads. There will always be people willing to take advantage, the only thing we can do is make it difficult or impossible for them to do whatever it is they do.
Wouldnt it be possible to log "bot" traffic and systematically, using the same exploits that the bot trojans used to infect the hosts, infect these machines with a virus that removes the bot and deletes itself? Sort of like an anti-bot virus?
Might be a little unethical, but hey drastic times call for drastic measures!
Well I realize they are competitive in the business sense. The competition of which I speak is that of a weighted or timed physical competition such as the Olympics or lifting or something along those lines. I realize it is still similar; competing for medals or competing for funding, but I think you understand the distinction.
As a lab, and ultimately a business, competing for funding is part of your business model. And as long as you are adhering to the rule of law you can go about your business with whatever means necessary. "Cheating" in a competitive sense is not really a factor as it pertains to enhancing your ability to do business.
Anyhow my comments were directed at the use of the word, and their comparison to athletic competition. Though conceptually similar; they are by no means ethically comparable.
I can understand the drama when a competitive athelete uses performance enhancing drugs to gain an advantage. However, science is not a competition, if a scientist uses a "cognitive performance-enhancing drug", WHO CARES??? If they are obtaining these drugs illegally then sure they should be subject to the law. However, obtained legally, it's nobodies business but their own.
But honestly, taking a drug to improve your concentration is not "cheating" in the same way that taking steroids is for an athlete. The simple fact of the matter is that it does not allow you to do anything that you werent already capable of doing. Aside from that, its not as though we are talking only about students in school here. In the real world "cheating" in the sense that it is being used in this article; is not a matter of right and wrong, its a matter of getting the job done faster and more efficiently.
If some scientist working on a cure for cancer could improve his progress by taking some drug by his own choice, wouldnt you encourage him to do so? Seriously, whats the big deal?
I have been a WoW subscriber since its inception. However, most of you have a completely misconstrued idea of the typical WoW player. Yes, I will concede that there are some whom you might consider addicted. Those that play for 10-15+ hours a day and take the game way to seriously. This however does NOT represent the majority of player base at all.
A vast majority of the people that I have met, and those whom I know personally are adults. Ages 20ish to 30. Many of whom live successful lives, are married, own their own houses, etc. The game is not just a bunch of pimple faced teenagers and hopeless introverts. There are quite a few women who play as well, many of whom are the wives and girlfriends of other WoW players. Fact of the matter is, WoW is more like a social club than a MMO. Its happens to be a common similarity and a social enabler of many of todays working sub 30 adults.
Of course there are quite a few younger subscribers as well. My 9 year old son even plays on occasion, with the chat disabled of course!
I have been around, I've seen my share of MMO, and I've played many of them simply because I enjoy that genre better than any other. However, I can honestly say it is NOT WoW itself that keeps me playing, if it weren't WoW it would be something else. WoW is just the path of least resistance in terms of MMO's. I enjoy playing and and the vastness of the world itself keeps me from getting bored with it.
There is some grinding involved in WoW however it is not nearly as bad as EVERY other MMO that I have played. And I guarantee you, the average player will never even have the opportunity to experience some end game content let alone repeat it endlessly as some you have suggested. Over the course of 3 years, across all my characters, I have logged only 24 days total "casual" played time, and have taken several extended vacations in between. Nevertheless, I am just as well geared and/or equipped as 80% of those on the server on which I play. My point is, you do not have to be some lifeless introvert to enjoy and progress in this game, and THAT is why so many people play it.
Interesting move on googles part, seems like a lot of work for nothing however. Maybe they are trying to pave the way for their new google phone, piggy-backing on somebody elses network?
Just to clarify, Im not a fan boy, I use windows at work and linux/windows at home. With my windows box being pretty much a dedicated gaming box and nothing more, and my Gentoo box doing the real work.
Anyhow, thebetaguy didnt mention some of the other improvements of windows 7. The entire architectural structure of windows 7 is being changed to be modular. Meaning you can strip down the OS to nothing but the command line and the core OS if need be. Much like the windows server 2008 core installation. The main idea behind this is that it allows customized installations for different applications without making a completely different version altogether for things such as mobile phones, and htpc's.
I don't have a lot of faith in the quality of the product but this is definitely a more sensible approach. It allows the possibilities to pay for and install only what you need, and nothing more. Or remove certain aspects of the OS that you want to replace with something else such as the GUI itself with more integration. Not like LiteStep which still uses all of the native windows(explorer) function calls. Its a modular approach that allows them to keep the kernel small and the entire os generally more secure.
Yea, its still Microsoft, but its definitely a step in the right direction.
Im aware of that... I was responding to this comment:
"Everything that's illegal and/or generally not approved of by the US government "supports the terrorists"."... not his comments on marijuana. Pardon me for not quoting that in my origonal comment.
Who said anything about Pot or Cocaine for that matter? I was talking about opium and simply pointing out that Afghanistan IS one of the worlds largest producers of opium. I have no problem with weed, I smoke it on occasion myself as a matter of fact.
Im simply implying that its not too far fetched for a terrorist group leader/dictator to rely on local drug harvesting for supplemental funding. Were I a terrorist leader in a third world country that was a large producer of narcotics I sure as hell would be taking advantage of the situation. Its simply naive to think that it didn't in some way support Bin Ladins organization.
Of course I obviously could not back up such an accusation, but read the bottom of that wiki article, there has been documented testimony from known terrorists regarding connections with the drug "lords".
In my opinion they need to stop trying to take over the internet and look internally to focus and improve their core product lines. The release of vista and its lack of acceptance in the business sector was a huge blow to their reputation. I personally am aware of several VERY large companies that were considering Vista a year ago and have completely turned 180 degrees towards open source. I dont know how far MS thinks they are going to get by forcing Vista down the corporate throat.
Im not a microsoft hater, in fact I depend on MS products to make a living, but I know Im not alone on this sentiment.
The program does not make a copy of any of the game files, it simply reads the memory space that wow.exe loads into and responds to certain procedure calls and what not in the memory. For example, a monster is on the map and the client loads it in memory to prepare it for rendering. Even if the player cant see it, the program can because wow.exe loaded it into memory. The program can see and interact with the wow.exe executable by reading what wow puts in the memory.
I would have to agree with you, those are some of the worst designs I have ever seen. Though the oily blob thing we originally intended to give blind people a more interactive interface, its not really intended to be used as a normal input device.
Slashdot Mirror
Whats amusing is that the author took the time to blur out the SSN's but left the names, and addresses of the "offenders" in the picture. How much do you want to bet some overzealous reader of that article is going to be sending something fun to one of those addresses?
I understand your comparison, however, I think this situation differs when the equipment and information that is being used is a function of your business. If the usage of my phone, and my computer, and my servers, is a function of MY business and I stand to lose money/business, or even go to jail when that equipment is mis-used. Then I feel I have every right to monitor that.
However, in the situation you describe, said equipment and infrastructre is not a function of your employers business. You pay for your privacy and you are entitled to it, and you personally would be held responsible for the mis-use of that equipment.
Oh and by the way, its not illict interception if you make EVERY employee aware that ALL of they actions on company equipment are being logged. This was clearly stated in the emplyee handbook as well as on the login banner and in every company resource that contained sensitive information.
I agree with you there is some ethical barrier that should not be crossed. However, I have worked for companies in the past that did this for one very legitimate reason. Employees dealt with credit card and social security numbers and other personal information of customers.
More than once, people were caught sending this information out of the office. Thus it was mandated that all emails, IM's etc. were logged to prevent information leaks. And I 100% agree with the reasoning behind it. We went so far as to block all but sanctioned websites which excluded all online mail sites, as well as blocking all IM traffic and using our own custom internal IM server. Of course we also stripped pretty much all user rights from the user to prevent installation of anything that wasn't approved software. Some programs, even disallowed cell phones on the sales floor, and had key loggers on every machine!
Having been on the corporate side of this argument, and having to deal with the consequences of an open work environment, I have to say I completely disagree with you. In my opinion the company has every right to monitor every aspect of what is happening on their equipment, especially if their business is on the line and depends on the security of that information.
Simple fact of the matter is, people can not be trusted, and if I own the infrastructure on which these people are working I would be monitoring them as well.
You might make the argument that your employees would be disgruntled and upset that they are so restricted. However if you don't give them reason to wander, or a the need to be wasting time online then this is not really an issue. They all have desk phones with their own personal lines and can be reached in the event of an emergency. And the company provides quite a bit of entertainment and incentive to keep working, so it becomes a non-issue after a while. The turnover rate is not as bad as you might think.
Your comparison to restroom privacy is not really relevant as that is a completley different realm of privacy. The "equipment" with which you deficate is entirely your own, and thus you are obviously entitled to your own level of pivacy. Nevertheless, your comparison is just plain rediculus and does not warrant a place in this discussion.
Why does stuff like this make it to the front page of slashdot?
You cant kill the beast but cutting its head off when the beast has a million heads. There will always be people willing to take advantage, the only thing we can do is make it difficult or impossible for them to do whatever it is they do.
Wouldnt it be possible to log "bot" traffic and systematically, using the same exploits that the bot trojans used to infect the hosts, infect these machines with a virus that removes the bot and deletes itself? Sort of like an anti-bot virus?
Might be a little unethical, but hey drastic times call for drastic measures!
Well I realize they are competitive in the business sense. The competition of which I speak is that of a weighted or timed physical competition such as the Olympics or lifting or something along those lines. I realize it is still similar; competing for medals or competing for funding, but I think you understand the distinction.
As a lab, and ultimately a business, competing for funding is part of your business model. And as long as you are adhering to the rule of law you can go about your business with whatever means necessary. "Cheating" in a competitive sense is not really a factor as it pertains to enhancing your ability to do business.
Anyhow my comments were directed at the use of the word, and their comparison to athletic competition. Though conceptually similar; they are by no means ethically comparable.
I can understand the drama when a competitive athelete uses performance enhancing drugs to gain an advantage. However, science is not a competition, if a scientist uses a "cognitive performance-enhancing drug", WHO CARES??? If they are obtaining these drugs illegally then sure they should be subject to the law. However, obtained legally, it's nobodies business but their own.
But honestly, taking a drug to improve your concentration is not "cheating" in the same way that taking steroids is for an athlete. The simple fact of the matter is that it does not allow you to do anything that you werent already capable of doing. Aside from that, its not as though we are talking only about students in school here. In the real world "cheating" in the sense that it is being used in this article; is not a matter of right and wrong, its a matter of getting the job done faster and more efficiently.
If some scientist working on a cure for cancer could improve his progress by taking some drug by his own choice, wouldnt you encourage him to do so? Seriously, whats the big deal?
I have been a WoW subscriber since its inception. However, most of you have a completely misconstrued idea of the typical WoW player. Yes, I will concede that there are some whom you might consider addicted. Those that play for 10-15+ hours a day and take the game way to seriously. This however does NOT represent the majority of player base at all.
A vast majority of the people that I have met, and those whom I know personally are adults. Ages 20ish to 30. Many of whom live successful lives, are married, own their own houses, etc. The game is not just a bunch of pimple faced teenagers and hopeless introverts. There are quite a few women who play as well, many of whom are the wives and girlfriends of other WoW players. Fact of the matter is, WoW is more like a social club than a MMO. Its happens to be a common similarity and a social enabler of many of todays working sub 30 adults.
Of course there are quite a few younger subscribers as well. My 9 year old son even plays on occasion, with the chat disabled of course!
I have been around, I've seen my share of MMO, and I've played many of them simply because I enjoy that genre better than any other. However, I can honestly say it is NOT WoW itself that keeps me playing, if it weren't WoW it would be something else. WoW is just the path of least resistance in terms of MMO's. I enjoy playing and and the vastness of the world itself keeps me from getting bored with it.
There is some grinding involved in WoW however it is not nearly as bad as EVERY other MMO that I have played. And I guarantee you, the average player will never even have the opportunity to experience some end game content let alone repeat it endlessly as some you have suggested. Over the course of 3 years, across all my characters, I have logged only 24 days total "casual" played time, and have taken several extended vacations in between. Nevertheless, I am just as well geared and/or equipped as 80% of those on the server on which I play. My point is, you do not have to be some lifeless introvert to enjoy and progress in this game, and THAT is why so many people play it.
Thats: Yes, No, and Both! All at the same time! Ahh the marvels of quantum computing!
Interesting move on googles part, seems like a lot of work for nothing however. Maybe they are trying to pave the way for their new google phone, piggy-backing on somebody elses network?
Does it run linux?
Just to clarify, Im not a fan boy, I use windows at work and linux/windows at home. With my windows box being pretty much a dedicated gaming box and nothing more, and my Gentoo box doing the real work.
Anyhow, thebetaguy didnt mention some of the other improvements of windows 7. The entire architectural structure of windows 7 is being changed to be modular. Meaning you can strip down the OS to nothing but the command line and the core OS if need be. Much like the windows server 2008 core installation. The main idea behind this is that it allows customized installations for different applications without making a completely different version altogether for things such as mobile phones, and htpc's.
I don't have a lot of faith in the quality of the product but this is definitely a more sensible approach. It allows the possibilities to pay for and install only what you need, and nothing more. Or remove certain aspects of the OS that you want to replace with something else such as the GUI itself with more integration. Not like LiteStep which still uses all of the native windows(explorer) function calls. Its a modular approach that allows them to keep the kernel small and the entire os generally more secure.
Yea, its still Microsoft, but its definitely a step in the right direction.
If you try to fail and you succeed, have you succeeded or have you failed?
Im aware of that... I was responding to this comment: "Everything that's illegal and/or generally not approved of by the US government "supports the terrorists"." ... not his comments on marijuana. Pardon me for not quoting that in my origonal comment.
They were weeding out the ones that wouldn't pay up! ;)
Who said anything about Pot or Cocaine for that matter? I was talking about opium and simply pointing out that Afghanistan IS one of the worlds largest producers of opium. I have no problem with weed, I smoke it on occasion myself as a matter of fact.
Im simply implying that its not too far fetched for a terrorist group leader/dictator to rely on local drug harvesting for supplemental funding. Were I a terrorist leader in a third world country that was a large producer of narcotics I sure as hell would be taking advantage of the situation. Its simply naive to think that it didn't in some way support Bin Ladins organization.
Of course I obviously could not back up such an accusation, but read the bottom of that wiki article, there has been documented testimony from known terrorists regarding connections with the drug "lords".
Afghanistan IS one of the worlds largest Opium producers... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_production_in_Afghanistan
It was likley to embarassingly high to note. You know that if only 1% fell for it they probably would have reported that. Easily above 25%! haha
I dont even remember the last time I went to CNN.com, I get all my news from slashdot! haha
Agreed. At this point its clear they favor quantity over quality.
In my opinion they need to stop trying to take over the internet and look internally to focus and improve their core product lines. The release of vista and its lack of acceptance in the business sector was a huge blow to their reputation. I personally am aware of several VERY large companies that were considering Vista a year ago and have completely turned 180 degrees towards open source. I dont know how far MS thinks they are going to get by forcing Vista down the corporate throat.
Im not a microsoft hater, in fact I depend on MS products to make a living, but I know Im not alone on this sentiment.
The program does not make a copy of any of the game files, it simply reads the memory space that wow.exe loads into and responds to certain procedure calls and what not in the memory. For example, a monster is on the map and the client loads it in memory to prepare it for rendering. Even if the player cant see it, the program can because wow.exe loaded it into memory. The program can see and interact with the wow.exe executable by reading what wow puts in the memory.
I would have to agree with you, those are some of the worst designs I have ever seen. Though the oily blob thing we originally intended to give blind people a more interactive interface, its not really intended to be used as a normal input device.