Hm... well, we did find something useful out, didn't we?
Make an attempt to organize a large protest against the scanners (and get enough P.R. going), and they shut them down.
Therefore:
1) Plan a national opt-out day every month or so on a specific day. Choose a day that's the busiest of the month - most are end of the month holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving).
2) The TSA either a) shuts down the scanners on those days or b) leaves them in place, during which loads of people opt out and slow things down.
3) As this spreads via news and word-of-mouth, people learn what the opt-out days are. If the TSA consistently shuts down the scanners, then people will know that these are the better days to travel. If they don't, then people will avoid traveling on those days.
4) As time goes by the TSA would come to one of two conclusions depending on the actions taken: either use the scanners and have things slow down horribly, or avoid using them and have things sped up.
If we followed a plan like this in a year or two we'd be rid of the damn things I imagine.
You could always play on Peaceful... creativity for creativity's sake.
I also tend to use VLC running a movie or something with Always On Top and Minimal Interface enabled (so it's just the video and a title bar floating on the top left of my screen). It's relaxing - for me at least - to zone out and mine while watching a movie.
Well if citizens wanted to do that whole civil disobedience bit again...
I'm sure a metal detector is nowhere near as expensive as these scanners. Whereas Martin Luther King Jr. had his marches, maybe the geeks of the world could unite and figure out ways to covertly fry and irreparably damage the things from a distance.
A less violent and more peaceful alternative is to DDOS the system, as it were, by having long lines of people opt out from the scanners in order to cause delays and make the entire thing unfeasible.
So how would you expect an elderly person to defend themselves in a home invasion? Calling 911? The police will arrive just in time to draw the proverbial chalk outlines.
How about a dog? Dogs aren't particularly effective defenses unless you mistreat the dog so it hates everybody equally or you've trained it to be an attack dog.
If someone breaks into your home with the intent to steal your property and/or harm you, are you supposed to just let someone walk out of your house with your stuff or let your wife get murdered?
I wouldn't really call it a lie. The jury's still out on that one. Yes, I'm linking to Wikipedia. There are sources cited, look them up if you feel so inclined.
More thorough studies need to be done with larger sample sizes but from what I've read I do believe that the prevalence of HFCS over sugar in our food supply is one of the many contributing factors to our modern obesity epidemic.
Part of it is that, pound-for-pound, HFCS has a higher fructose content that normal table sugar. It's not much, but that little bit adds up. Moreover, HFCS is really, really cheap and so it's put in goddamned near everything. Remember when mum said too many sweets are bad for you? Well now everything is a damn sweet.
The parent post is most certainly not Flamebait. This does happen and has been documented many times.
FCC analysis shows that average (mean) actual speed consumers received was approximately 4 Mbps, while the median actual speed was roughly 3 Mbps in 2009. Therefore actual download speeds experienced by U.S. consumers lag advertised speeds by roughly 50%.
Not that I'm in favor of having these scanners everywhere, but we do have metal detectors in nearly every government building - even on the city level in many places.
I'd rather have a higher murder rate so long as it goes hand in hand with the ability to defend myself easily, especially if I were infirm or outnumbered.
(Terribly sorry about the music, but thanks to the zealots from the MAFIAA it's damn near impossible to just find honest-to-goodness clips from movies nowadays.)
I have been reading Slashdot for many years now and this is the most insightful and on-topic first post I have ever seen. It's well-balanced and expresses your opinion thoughtfully and clearly.
Quite obviously it is the end of days, for this is surely one of the signs of the apocalypse.
Well, I actually tend to agree with you in that we need fewer laws, but honestly in this day and age it's more likely that a new law will get written rather than an old one get amended or appealed.
Slashdot Mirror
If you do that then the soldiers might start asking why they're not outfitted with better armor in the first place.
It's (possibly) failed on one big day, largely because they didn't use the scanners. Wouldn't that be mission accomplished?
Keep doing opt-outs enough and eventually they'll stop using them altogether.
Scanners = opt-outs = slowdowns = money lost
Who says you have to go outside? There's always a lonely secretary in the building and your desk is the perfect support for standing doggy style.
Hm... well, we did find something useful out, didn't we?
Make an attempt to organize a large protest against the scanners (and get enough P.R. going), and they shut them down.
Therefore:
1) Plan a national opt-out day every month or so on a specific day. Choose a day that's the busiest of the month - most are end of the month holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving).
2) The TSA either a) shuts down the scanners on those days or b) leaves them in place, during which loads of people opt out and slow things down.
3) As this spreads via news and word-of-mouth, people learn what the opt-out days are. If the TSA consistently shuts down the scanners, then people will know that these are the better days to travel. If they don't, then people will avoid traveling on those days.
4) As time goes by the TSA would come to one of two conclusions depending on the actions taken: either use the scanners and have things slow down horribly, or avoid using them and have things sped up.
If we followed a plan like this in a year or two we'd be rid of the damn things I imagine.
You could always play on Peaceful... creativity for creativity's sake.
I also tend to use VLC running a movie or something with Always On Top and Minimal Interface enabled (so it's just the video and a title bar floating on the top left of my screen). It's relaxing - for me at least - to zone out and mine while watching a movie.
Really, I think coyotes would be better suited to a roadrunner infestation.
Actually, on second thought...
Well if citizens wanted to do that whole civil disobedience bit again...
I'm sure a metal detector is nowhere near as expensive as these scanners. Whereas Martin Luther King Jr. had his marches, maybe the geeks of the world could unite and figure out ways to covertly fry and irreparably damage the things from a distance.
A less violent and more peaceful alternative is to DDOS the system, as it were, by having long lines of people opt out from the scanners in order to cause delays and make the entire thing unfeasible.
So how would you expect an elderly person to defend themselves in a home invasion? Calling 911? The police will arrive just in time to draw the proverbial chalk outlines.
How about a dog? Dogs aren't particularly effective defenses unless you mistreat the dog so it hates everybody equally or you've trained it to be an attack dog.
If someone breaks into your home with the intent to steal your property and/or harm you, are you supposed to just let someone walk out of your house with your stuff or let your wife get murdered?
Hey now, it's Scotland, so use Scottish currency.
The equivalent is 2 healthy sheep and a bolt of Tartan cloth.
I wouldn't really call it a lie. The jury's still out on that one. Yes, I'm linking to Wikipedia. There are sources cited, look them up if you feel so inclined.
More thorough studies need to be done with larger sample sizes but from what I've read I do believe that the prevalence of HFCS over sugar in our food supply is one of the many contributing factors to our modern obesity epidemic.
Part of it is that, pound-for-pound, HFCS has a higher fructose content that normal table sugar. It's not much, but that little bit adds up. Moreover, HFCS is really, really cheap and so it's put in goddamned near everything. Remember when mum said too many sweets are bad for you? Well now everything is a damn sweet.
Oh snap!
Maybe there needs to be like a write-once, read-only backup service so that can't happen.
It would be awfully nice insurance to know that even a disgruntled IT admin couldn't destroy it.
The parent post is most certainly not Flamebait. This does happen and has been documented many times.
FCC analysis shows that average (mean) actual speed consumers received was approximately 4 Mbps, while the median actual speed was roughly 3 Mbps in 2009. Therefore actual download speeds experienced by U.S. consumers lag advertised speeds by roughly 50%.
Source (Warning: PDF): http://www.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2010/db0813/DOC-300902A1.pdf
Not that I'm in favor of having these scanners everywhere, but we do have metal detectors in nearly every government building - even on the city level in many places.
And, quite happily, those idiots than handle guns improperly will be removed from the gene pool, thereby making the human race better as a whole.
I'd rather have a higher murder rate so long as it goes hand in hand with the ability to defend myself easily, especially if I were infirm or outnumbered.
Or they could use a pen or a magazine!!
(Terribly sorry about the music, but thanks to the zealots from the MAFIAA it's damn near impossible to just find honest-to-goodness clips from movies nowadays.)
Unfortunately, kites are only really effective in areas over land with loads of hot air being exhausted into the atmosphere, such as Washington D.C.
I want to buy a bunch of these and spell out "I want you inside me" on my chest with them, just to see the look on the TSA employee's face.
Texting is (relatively) silent. If you're hiding in a closet from a gunman, do you really want to open your mouth?
I have been reading Slashdot for many years now and this is the most insightful and on-topic first post I have ever seen. It's well-balanced and expresses your opinion thoughtfully and clearly.
Quite obviously it is the end of days, for this is surely one of the signs of the apocalypse.
Ah, so that's why developers never comment their code - it's to protect industrial secrets!
Well, I actually tend to agree with you in that we need fewer laws, but honestly in this day and age it's more likely that a new law will get written rather than an old one get amended or appealed.
Well the chose Obama on the suggestion of a Mr. Titor, who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2045.
(e.g. an unlocked door absolutely does mean access is granted.)
But what about a box of stuff out on the sidewalk?
According to a lot of municipalities this constitutes "abandoned property" and is up for grabs. It's there and anyone could take it.
We need something similar for Internets law. If you post it and it can be accessed (without hacking in), you can't sue someone for looking at it.