Code generally goes through peer reviews and quality assurance before it is accepted into the main stream. Say waht you want
about MS, but I'm sure they do these things (they can afford it!)
I'm sure they do it, but a few minutes using any of their products will show you how well they do it.
The bigquestion is how would anyone tell the evil terrorist bugs nd security holes from the normal microsoft incompeitence bugs and security holes.
The fact is digital works should not be treated the same as physical goods as digital works have effectively zero __reproduction__
costs.
Which is why copyright is needed more for digital works.
I think the people who created quake, for instance, deserve to make a mint. For that we need control. That control can come from copyright or licencing. I suspect most of us here don't like the licencing model.
I think Richard Stallman should have the right to put the restrictions he wants on use of his code. For that we need copyright.
There's no one here except computer geeks. If you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
More tpo the point, if you have a big, hot noisy hammer which eats electricity as if it's going out of style and takes up most of your desk, everything looks like a way to make a smaller, cheaper, cooler, quieter hammer.
[BTW, if it works, why wasn't it on the market almost immediately? ]
Lack of funding.
If it worked they'd have funding comeing out of their ears.
Conversely, if they can't persuade people with money it workes, they can't have much to show. These people pumped money into.coms fer KaTe's sake, not the hardest audience to convince.
Its Star Trek. By definition it's bollocks. That is the defining characteristic of the franchise.
If you doubt consider what would happen if you got the peopl behind, for instance, B5 to produce a new ST series. They'd try and be consistant, they'd have a plot, they'd deal with big questions, in short they'd make science fiction. All very nice but it wouldn't be ST would it...
The reason the first episodes are bad is that they haven't had time to set up all the running gags.
Just because it "plays there," the store is not removed of liability. The are essentially selling a product that
they advertise (by the very nature of having it on their shelves) meets a certain standard.
However, they could claim that that big sign defines what they are claiming for their product.
Anyway, if the rules about `fit for the purpose for which it was sold' were enforcable anymore Microsoft would be out of business.
Having a properly monitored and regulated central database of personal info is far better than the completely insecure mishmash of crap we
have today.
Any computer person should see the flaw in this. You are setting up a massive SPOF.
At the moment if someone finds a way to start using my credit card, say, I can spot it on the statement and the CC company will deal with it. At worst I lose the use of that card for a while if I have to cancel it.
Under a centralised system, any break in security would open up my whole life. I would potentiallly be open to anything and if the ID had to be withdrawn I would be unable to function as a member of society for however long the beurocray takes to issue a complete new identity with all the bells and whistls. _And_ it would be the government doing this, not a company who can't afford too much bad publicity as with the credit card, so imagine th elevel of service.
The core issue really isn't that people can find out stuff about you -- they always could and will always be able to -- the issue is who can find out how much. A one-stop-shop where they can go and find out anything is such a honeypot that you can guarantee it will be broken in to.
For instance, if your system had gone into place when ISDN was "the leading edge", right now they would still be
working with standardized boxes to make ISDN ubiquitous and nobody would have broadband.
As a counter example, consider broadcast TV. There is effectively a common network defined by the allocated bandwidth and the broadcast standards.
The providors built technology to put signals into that defined space and the consumers bought hardware to get them out.
While broadcast TV _is_ conservative, it hasn't stuck with the lest common denominator. Thre have been 2 major jumps in the UK (vhf to UHF and B&W to colour) and another is in progress (analogue to digital). I don't know if the US missed the first of those by being a late adopter:-).
The road connection to my flat is a lot more reliable than the cable IP connection, dispite the cable not having to cope with multi ton trucks etc.
To continue the transport analogy, consider railways. It is places where the state has shown an interest in railways that have moved with the technology. France and Japan have high speed rail networks. No UK private rail operator would think of investing in such a thing, the closest is the government backed link to the chunnel which may actually happen sometime.
I'm not saying public is best or private is best, just that life is more complex than the pure free marketeers or the pure public provision addicts would like to believe.
You weren't surprised that the "happy ending" to the last Narnia book involved the child protagonists turning out to
be dead?
Have tyou read Revalations?:-)
Christianity is all about what a great thing it is to be dead (assuming you've sacrificed the right kinds of chickens).
So, I don't think Narnia its into the list of dissapointing extensions which was posted. Like it or not, the ending of the Narnia stories isn't an extension, I'm sure it was planned in right from the start.
Well, up to a couple of weeks ago I would have agreed and said you hsould buy a Psion.
Sigh.
If you can't put it in your pocket and use it for 20 hours at a stretch, what's the point?
Now there is nothing available with a future I'd spend money on.
OTOH, I have one of the big brick like Inspirons and that is a great portable computer, in the sense of being something I could take to some other building with a desk to use there if needs be.
Remember when all the kids got killed, and Aslan turned into Jesus, in C.S. Lewis's The Last Battle?
Er, this came as a suprise to you? He was sacrificed and came back from the dead to redeem Narnia in the first book. Lewis was not subtle about these things.
The wonderful thing about (the best bits of) RD is that it actually manages to do some SciFi in with the humour.
Eg in Polymorph II they come up with a (so far as I am aware) novel solution to the old `how do you tell real person from copy' puzzle.
And it doesn't preach. Rodenberry infected all US TV SF (acronyms, ya gotta love 'em) with the disease of sanctimonious preaching. Even B5, by far the best of the bunch, suffers from this.
I also agree with someone else who mentioned Blakes 7. a wondeful antidote to ST. A villain you had to admire (lust, lust) and a `hero' who was a scheming selfish bastard. And (in the early series when it was worth watching) a great spaceship. Pity about the effects budget though.
The SciFi network here just finished showing The Prisoner. If that lets me count it as SF then I vote for that in the top few too.
Probably not an option for those in California etc. but in Edinburgh it's geat. Holds Psion, Leatherman, MP3 player, business card case full of flash cards. And an umberella of course. And a magazine to read. And some spare batteries. and a notebook (dead tree kind). And a map. And handsfree kit for mobile. (mobile lives in shirt pocket or hung around my neck on a leather thong).
Of course you get the occasional worried look from Eastern European tourists who think their past has caught up with them.
To avoid the problem of trivial changes to the message one would need to check the bits of the message they don't have control of. The middle bit of the Received: list would seem like a candidate.
Eg if we assume that much of the spam problem is from open relays, then recognising that >N% of local users have gotten a message mailed through a given relay may be enough to flag it suspicious.
Doesn't help the mailing list problem of course.
I think the best anti-spam measure is simply to divide email into high quality and low quality lists based on the sender and have the user say which senders should be treated as high quality in future. If people you sent mail to were added to the high quality list by default that would take much of the work out of it. Since this way you are trying to pick out good stuff rather than remove spam, it is harder to counter.
Add to that a magic word system. Messages with the magic word in the subject are tagged as high quality. Then you can give people you really want to hear from the magic word along with your email address. Change the word regularly and old information won't come back to spam you. _O_
They should anounce that they have installed the ultimate firewall which is guaranteed impervious to cracking. Then just wait for some indignant black hat to find a way through it. _O_
if you are driving in a city, the power requirements are actually higher than on a highway.
How is this chaneg in the laws of physics implemented?:-)
this can be easily proven by looking at
how vehicles are rated for gas mileage.
Standard IC engines have a most efficiant running speed (hence the gearbox). Also Much of the problem is that you have to keep stopping, turning the kinetic energy you just payed for into heat. There may also be issues of drag and friction from the aerodynamics, the suspension and so on being designed for some range of speeds.
For city use a vehicle should be designed for maximum efficiancy at whatever the average commuting speed is and also have a regenerative breaking system of some kind. Some busses are like this (eg the ones with chuffing great flywheels for energy storage).
_O_
It is simply not possible to propel a 2 ton object to sustained speeds of 70mph based only
on the solar energy absorbed by the top surface of the vehicle.
I don't know about the US, but the average speed of cars doing the popular journeys (commute, school run, shopping) in the UK is a long way below 70 MPH. IIRC the average speed of a car driving in london was measured down nearer to 10:-).
Besides which you don't need to drive the car totally by solar. If you have a car with some kind of hybred power system and if coverring the flat surfaces with cells cut your fuel/recharging bills by, say, 5%, then that is a win.
(obviously it depends on the cost and efficiancy of the cells, which is what this kind of challange is supposed to drive forward). _O_
Slashdot Mirror
How else do you explain Outlook Express?
I'm sure they do it, but a few minutes using any of their products will show you how well they do it.
The bigquestion is how would anyone tell the evil terrorist bugs nd security holes from the normal microsoft incompeitence bugs and security holes.
By slightly overestimating the chances of damage they can make a small profit on each insured delivery.
Thus the only reason they would not offer insurance is if they know the chance of damage is so high you'd choke on the premium.
We won't insure it basicly means `we plan to break it'.
They don't. if you think they are charging too much, don't pay and if there is consensus the price will drop or the product will disapear.
Which is why copyright is needed more for digital works.
I think the people who created quake, for instance, deserve to make a mint. For that we need control. That control can come from copyright or licencing. I suspect most of us here don't like the licencing model.
I think Richard Stallman should have the right to put the restrictions he wants on use of his code. For that we need copyright.
Shocking pink fun fur with big wobbly eyes. Then install it in a machine room where the suits will see it and make sure it is running something vital.
More tpo the point, if you have a big, hot noisy hammer which eats electricity as if it's going out of style and takes up most of your desk, everything looks like a way to make a smaller, cheaper, cooler, quieter hammer.
Lack of funding.
If it worked they'd have funding comeing out of their ears.
Conversely, if they can't persuade people with money it workes, they can't have much to show. These people pumped money into .coms fer KaTe's sake, not the hardest audience to convince.
If you doubt consider what would happen if you got the peopl behind, for instance, B5 to produce a new ST series. They'd try and be consistant, they'd have a plot, they'd deal with big questions, in short they'd make science fiction. All very nice but it wouldn't be ST would it...
The reason the first episodes are bad is that they haven't had time to set up all the running gags.
However, they could claim that that big sign defines what they are claiming for their product.
Anyway, if the rules about `fit for the purpose for which it was sold' were enforcable anymore Microsoft would be out of business.
<paranoia>
Check the guy for a history of GPL advocacy:-).
</paranoia>
have today.
Any computer person should see the flaw in this. You are setting up a massive SPOF.
At the moment if someone finds a way to start using my credit card, say, I can spot it on the statement and the CC company will deal with it. At worst I lose the use of that card for a while if I have to cancel it.
Under a centralised system, any break in security would open up my whole life. I would potentiallly be open to anything and if the ID had to be withdrawn I would be unable to function as a member of society for however long the beurocray takes to issue a complete new identity with all the bells and whistls. _And_ it would be the government doing this, not a company who can't afford too much bad publicity as with the credit card, so imagine th elevel of service.
The core issue really isn't that people can find out stuff about you -- they always could and will always be able to -- the issue is who can find out how much. A one-stop-shop where they can go and find out anything is such a honeypot that you can guarantee it will be broken in to.
Given how rarely this happens, If this is a primay advantage it must make all the advantages pretty small.
As a counter example, consider broadcast TV. There is effectively a common network defined by the allocated bandwidth and the broadcast standards. The providors built technology to put signals into that defined space and the consumers bought hardware to get them out.
While broadcast TV _is_ conservative, it hasn't stuck with the lest common denominator. Thre have been 2 major jumps in the UK (vhf to UHF and B&W to colour) and another is in progress (analogue to digital). I don't know if the US missed the first of those by being a late adopter:-).
The road connection to my flat is a lot more reliable than the cable IP connection, dispite the cable not having to cope with multi ton trucks etc.
To continue the transport analogy, consider railways. It is places where the state has shown an interest in railways that have moved with the technology. France and Japan have high speed rail networks. No UK private rail operator would think of investing in such a thing, the closest is the government backed link to the chunnel which may actually happen sometime.
I'm not saying public is best or private is best, just that life is more complex than the pure free marketeers or the pure public provision addicts would like to believe.
Sure, that's easy to say now, but not 200 years ago. 200 years ago, a lodestone was *the* magnet. It was a piece of rock that attracted iron filings.
Consider that even that poor old lodestone is outpulling the Entire Earth when it picks up it's iron filings.
How much does a Space Shuttle booster tank cost to fill?
How much would that amount of energy in batteries to power a hypothetical anti-gravity drive weigh?
Have tyou read Revalations? :-)
Christianity is all about what a great thing it is to be dead (assuming you've sacrificed the right kinds of chickens).
So, I don't think Narnia its into the list of dissapointing extensions which was posted. Like it or not, the ending of the Narnia stories isn't an extension, I'm sure it was planned in right from the start.
BTW, The Screwtape Letters is a better read.
Sigh.
If you can't put it in your pocket and use it for 20 hours at a stretch, what's the point?
Now there is nothing available with a future I'd spend money on.
OTOH, I have one of the big brick like Inspirons and that is a great portable computer, in the sense of being something I could take to some other building with a desk to use there if needs be.
Er, this came as a suprise to you? He was sacrificed and came back from the dead to redeem Narnia in the first book. Lewis was not subtle about these things.
Eg in Polymorph II they come up with a (so far as I am aware) novel solution to the old `how do you tell real person from copy' puzzle.
And it doesn't preach. Rodenberry infected all US TV SF (acronyms, ya gotta love 'em) with the disease of sanctimonious preaching. Even B5, by far the best of the bunch, suffers from this.
I also agree with someone else who mentioned Blakes 7. a wondeful antidote to ST. A villain you had to admire (lust, lust) and a `hero' who was a scheming selfish bastard. And (in the early series when it was worth watching) a great spaceship. Pity about the effects budget though.
The SciFi network here just finished showing The Prisoner. If that lets me count it as SF then I vote for that in the top few too.
Of course you get the occasional worried look from Eastern European tourists who think their past has caught up with them.
Eg if we assume that much of the spam problem is from open relays, then recognising that >N% of local users have gotten a message mailed through a given relay may be enough to flag it suspicious.
Doesn't help the mailing list problem of course.
I think the best anti-spam measure is simply to divide email into high quality and low quality lists based on the sender and have the user say which senders should be treated as high quality in future. If people you sent mail to were added to the high quality list by default that would take much of the work out of it. Since this way you are trying to pick out good stuff rather than remove spam, it is harder to counter.
Add to that a magic word system. Messages with the magic word in the subject are tagged as high quality. Then you can give people you really want to hear from the magic word along with your email address. Change the word regularly and old information won't come back to spam you.
_O_
They should anounce that they have installed the ultimate firewall which is guaranteed impervious to cracking. Then just wait for some indignant black hat to find a way through it.
_O_
Maybe the spammers were trying to email him some clues.
_O_
How is this chaneg in the laws of physics implemented? :-)
this can be easily proven by looking at how vehicles are rated for gas mileage.
Standard IC engines have a most efficiant running speed (hence the gearbox). Also Much of the problem is that you have to keep stopping, turning the kinetic energy you just payed for into heat. There may also be issues of drag and friction from the aerodynamics, the suspension and so on being designed for some range of speeds.
For city use a vehicle should be designed for maximum efficiancy at whatever the average commuting speed is and also have a regenerative breaking system of some kind. Some busses are like this (eg the ones with chuffing great flywheels for energy storage).
_O_
I don't know about the US, but the average speed of cars doing the popular journeys (commute, school run, shopping) in the UK is a long way below 70 MPH. IIRC the average speed of a car driving in london was measured down nearer to 10:-).
Besides which you don't need to drive the car totally by solar. If you have a car with some kind of hybred power system and if coverring the flat surfaces with cells cut your fuel/recharging bills by, say, 5%, then that is a win.
(obviously it depends on the cost and efficiancy of the cells, which is what this kind of challange is supposed to drive forward).
_O_