I don't imagine it would make any difference. The issue in people's minds (given the wording of the question) was "do you think there should be a right to put other people's personal information on the Internet". You could ask that question with any group in place of "blog" (god do I ever hate that word) and probably get the same results. Especially given that identity theft is pretty fresh in people's minds.
I figured it was all total hype until I started installing it to see what it was like. When I found that it kicked the collective asses of every other distribution I have ever tried (Redhat, Slackware, Debian, Mandrake, SuSE, Turbo, Storm, Gentoo, and others) in terms of hardware detection and configuration, I figured out what the fuss was about. Otherwise it is ok, nothing particularly special, but damn can it detect and correctly configure some obscure hardware.
Scarier than the fact that Sony just patented something that they did not in fact create or even prove was possible, is what happens if they DO manage to create it? Is this the fabled "closing of the analog hole" that will make DRM into a reality instead of the laughable snake oil it is today? Digital media never needs to be converted into analog data since it will be beamed into some patented sony device that feeds it directly into your head, bypassing those DRM unfriendly organs like eyes and ears.
Kind of a dumb, far off idea but you know someone out there is salivating just thinking about it.
This sounds like a good idea, but any such system would surely require that the user definitely erases the HD on any machine they sell.
Yes, because today it is perfectly ok to sell a system without erasing the hard drive. I mean for real, who stores private or important data on a computer?
Finkployd
Re:I've been seeing the same thing
on
Return of the Mac
·
· Score: 1
Right, and I do that at home with my imac.
Carrying around a usb (or better, bluetooth) mouse to use with my laptop seems pointless. The majority of computer users clearly prefer multibutton mice (and I don't know anyone who uses a single button mouse with a desktop), so how hard would it be for apple to just make a two button mouse for powerbook? Have it shipped so that by default it is only one button if they are afraid of confusing unfrozen cavemen or other people who would be frightened and disoriented by the extra button.
Telling people "plug in an external mouse if you want the same functionality every other laptop on earth has had for decades" is not a very good answer.
At Higher Education conferences like the ones that eduCause and Internet2 host, the amount of Mac laptops has gone from around 20% to 60-70% in recent years. I switched after using a Thinkpad with Linux for years. The fact that it can be put to sleep and wake up properly (something that seemingly nobody can get working reliably under Linux), and can easily work with projectors without editing a configuration file sealed the deal for me.
Damn one button mouse though, I wish Apple would just give up on that.
You work at a LAW FIRM who (presumably) after reading Microsoft's EULA has come to the conclusion that Microsoft can be held accountable?
What law firm is this? Just so I never make the mistake of using them...
(ok, that was harsh but you get my point)
Finkployd
Re:Security with a stick does not work...
on
VoIP Wiretapping
·
· Score: 1
If you think that most federal elected officials have any primary interest beyond their own power, you are deluded. They'll screw over any corporation they can.
Their power is directly derived from campaign contributions. That comes from corporations. They will never screw over a corporation that is giving them significant funding (unless it is to the benefit of a corporation that gives them more).
Finkployd
Re:Security with a stick does not work...
on
VoIP Wiretapping
·
· Score: 1
Except for the junk about "corporate masters". I think its more special interest groups that cause the problems than corporations.
Special interest group, corporate masters, let's just say "groups with a lot of money that have more influence on the system than voters".
Finkployd
Re:Security with a stick does not work...
on
VoIP Wiretapping
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
And over the past 20 years, under republican control, we have lost many rights your grandparents took for granted.
Boy, you had me until that, and then you proved yourself to be totally clueless regarding this issue. Please consider reading "The Electronic Privacy Papers" and learn about this little thing called "The Clipper Chip" that Al Gore was the champion of (and Clinton was certainly behind). What almost happened there was significantly worse than this legislation. In fact, this legislation has no teeth BECAUSE the democrats failed in the Clipper initiative.
Get off your "it is all those damn republicans" high horse and realize that both parties could care less about your privacy. We are too stupid/ignorant/evil/uncontrolable to be trusted with privacy, and that is the feeling across party lines. Until people stop pretending one party is somehow better than the other they will both be successful in passing this kind of crap. You are being tricked right into their game, and they play it well.
Yes, this was more angry and flamebaitish than most of what I post and it is not directed specifically at you. I am just getting really tired of seeing otherwise smart people fooled into the "good cop, bad cop" game that both parties play on this kind of issue. Those on the right think it is all the democrats fault and those on the left thing it is all the republicans fault. While you are bickering back and forth they are laughing as they shit on the constitution in the name of their corporate masters.
The problem is not one of absolutes. 2048 bit RSA is not unbreakable, but as there are no known attacks other than brute force, the prospect is quite daunting, when the keys are handled properly.
In DRM, the keys are not handled properly, making the prospect of compromise so laughably simple one wonders why even use RSA (I suppose to pretend there is some teeth to it).
It is not a problem of computation, so Moore's law and large key spaces don't really apply. It is simply security by obscurity. Where did they try to hide the private key on my machine?
Palladium actually gives DRM some teeth, assuming it really is tamperproof.
The tit for tat can go on forever, but the companies may begin to question why they are blowing so much money on something so easily broken.
DRM is a cryptographically unsound concept. Flawed at its very core. Nobody who understands PKI (and is being honest) actually believes in it, just clueless media providers (and the techies who take advantage of them by building DRM).
Allow me to give you a quick refresher on public key encryption. With public key encryption Alice has a public key and a private key. Anything encrypted with the public key can only be decrypted with the private key. So Alice keeps her private key private and allows Bob to have her public key.
Now let's look at how DRM tries to turn this upside down and fails. With any DRM, the basic concept is that Bob is going to give Alice her private key, but try to keep it totally private from her. By definition it needs to be stored on her device (PC, ipod, whatever) to decrypt what Bob sends her, but he does not want her using it in any way that he disapproves of. So convoluted schemes of symmetric encryption and security by obscurity are developed to store this private key in such a way that only certain programs on Alice's device can access it, but nothing else can (nor can Alice access it directly). However, since the machine is under Alice's control it is only a matter of time before she finds it or figures out how to use it to decrypt data as she pleases. This is why nearly every DRM scheme in history has been broken.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't imagine it would make any difference. The issue in people's minds (given the wording of the question) was "do you think there should be a right to put other people's personal information on the Internet". You could ask that question with any group in place of "blog" (god do I ever hate that word) and probably get the same results. Especially given that identity theft is pretty fresh in people's minds.
Finkployd
Linux is a clean room implementation of Unix derived from the open, published, standards and documentation.
Unless you believe SCO.
Finkployd
Speaking on behalf of those who use Mutt, Pine, any accessibility software (text to speech), or any other text based clients: Fuck!
It's email folks, not a website.
Ah, I'm done being a grumpy curmudgeon for now.
Finkployd
I figured it was all total hype until I started installing it to see what it was like. When I found that it kicked the collective asses of every other distribution I have ever tried (Redhat, Slackware, Debian, Mandrake, SuSE, Turbo, Storm, Gentoo, and others) in terms of hardware detection and configuration, I figured out what the fuss was about. Otherwise it is ok, nothing particularly special, but damn can it detect and correctly configure some obscure hardware.
For that reason alone, I recommend it to newbies.
Finkployd
the perps should be beaten with rubber hoses
Unless the perps are into that kind of thing, in which case we should withhold their precious rubber hose beatings.
Finkployd
Scarier than the fact that Sony just patented something that they did not in fact create or even prove was possible, is what happens if they DO manage to create it? Is this the fabled "closing of the analog hole" that will make DRM into a reality instead of the laughable snake oil it is today? Digital media never needs to be converted into analog data since it will be beamed into some patented sony device that feeds it directly into your head, bypassing those DRM unfriendly organs like eyes and ears.
Kind of a dumb, far off idea but you know someone out there is salivating just thinking about it.
Finkployd
I have no problem with typos, just grammar :P
I suggest you buy MarkusQ a dictionary, as he seems to think you have misused the work "gifted" when in fact, you have not.
Perhaps not, it is the only day likely to be dupe free.
I never said destroy, I said erase.
Finkployd
This sounds like a good idea, but any such system would surely require that the user definitely erases the HD on any machine they sell.
Yes, because today it is perfectly ok to sell a system without erasing the hard drive. I mean for real, who stores private or important data on a computer?
Finkployd
Right, and I do that at home with my imac.
Carrying around a usb (or better, bluetooth) mouse to use with my laptop seems pointless. The majority of computer users clearly prefer multibutton mice (and I don't know anyone who uses a single button mouse with a desktop), so how hard would it be for apple to just make a two button mouse for powerbook? Have it shipped so that by default it is only one button if they are afraid of confusing unfrozen cavemen or other people who would be frightened and disoriented by the extra button.
Telling people "plug in an external mouse if you want the same functionality every other laptop on earth has had for decades" is not a very good answer.
Finkployd
Like it or not, he makes more money than most reading slashdot.
I can sleep easy at night feeling good about what I do and knowing that millions do not personally hate me for it. I like my way better.
Finkployd
They did....
So powerbooks have two button mice built in? When did this happen?
Finkployd
At Higher Education conferences like the ones that eduCause and Internet2 host, the amount of Mac laptops has gone from around 20% to 60-70% in recent years. I switched after using a Thinkpad with Linux for years. The fact that it can be put to sleep and wake up properly (something that seemingly nobody can get working reliably under Linux), and can easily work with projectors without editing a configuration file sealed the deal for me.
Damn one button mouse though, I wish Apple would just give up on that.
Finkployd
You work at a LAW FIRM who (presumably) after reading Microsoft's EULA has come to the conclusion that Microsoft can be held accountable?
What law firm is this? Just so I never make the mistake of using them...
(ok, that was harsh but you get my point)
Finkployd
If you think that most federal elected officials have any primary interest beyond their own power, you are deluded. They'll screw over any corporation they can.
Their power is directly derived from campaign contributions. That comes from corporations. They will never screw over a corporation that is giving them significant funding (unless it is to the benefit of a corporation that gives them more).
Finkployd
Except for the junk about "corporate masters". I think its more special interest groups that cause the problems than corporations.
Special interest group, corporate masters, let's just say "groups with a lot of money that have more influence on the system than voters".
Finkployd
And over the past 20 years, under republican control, we have lost many rights your grandparents took for granted.
Boy, you had me until that, and then you proved yourself to be totally clueless regarding this issue. Please consider reading "The Electronic Privacy Papers" and learn about this little thing called "The Clipper Chip" that Al Gore was the champion of (and Clinton was certainly behind). What almost happened there was significantly worse than this legislation. In fact, this legislation has no teeth BECAUSE the democrats failed in the Clipper initiative.
Get off your "it is all those damn republicans" high horse and realize that both parties could care less about your privacy. We are too stupid/ignorant/evil/uncontrolable to be trusted with privacy, and that is the feeling across party lines. Until people stop pretending one party is somehow better than the other they will both be successful in passing this kind of crap. You are being tricked right into their game, and they play it well.
Yes, this was more angry and flamebaitish than most of what I post and it is not directed specifically at you. I am just getting really tired of seeing otherwise smart people fooled into the "good cop, bad cop" game that both parties play on this kind of issue. Those on the right think it is all the democrats fault and those on the left thing it is all the republicans fault. While you are bickering back and forth they are laughing as they shit on the constitution in the name of their corporate masters.
Finkployd
Remains to be seen, but "trusted computing" certainly makes it seem less pathetic.
DRM still does nothing about the analog hole in either case, unless you are going to have "trusted speakers", which I believe they are working on.
I wonder how far they will try to take this? CTCSS tones built into recorders that respect a sub audio "broadcast flag"?
Finkployd
The problem is not one of absolutes. 2048 bit RSA is not unbreakable, but as there are no known attacks other than brute force, the prospect is quite daunting, when the keys are handled properly.
In DRM, the keys are not handled properly, making the prospect of compromise so laughably simple one wonders why even use RSA (I suppose to pretend there is some teeth to it).
It is not a problem of computation, so Moore's law and large key spaces don't really apply. It is simply security by obscurity. Where did they try to hide the private key on my machine?
Palladium actually gives DRM some teeth, assuming it really is tamperproof.
The tit for tat can go on forever, but the companies may begin to question why they are blowing so much money on something so easily broken.
Finkployd
I kinda kick myself for not holding onto it longer and getting even more money. But then it could have just easily plumeted.
Hindsight...
Finkployd
DRM is a cryptographically unsound concept. Flawed at its very core. Nobody who understands PKI (and is being honest) actually believes in it, just clueless media providers (and the techies who take advantage of them by building DRM).
Finkployd
There is nothing flawed about DRM.
Allow me to give you a quick refresher on public key encryption. With public key encryption Alice has a public key and a private key. Anything encrypted with the public key can only be decrypted with the private key. So Alice keeps her private key private and allows Bob to have her public key.
Now let's look at how DRM tries to turn this upside down and fails. With any DRM, the basic concept is that Bob is going to give Alice her private key, but try to keep it totally private from her. By definition it needs to be stored on her device (PC, ipod, whatever) to decrypt what Bob sends her, but he does not want her using it in any way that he disapproves of. So convoluted schemes of symmetric encryption and security by obscurity are developed to store this private key in such a way that only certain programs on Alice's device can access it, but nothing else can (nor can Alice access it directly). However, since the machine is under Alice's control it is only a matter of time before she finds it or figures out how to use it to decrypt data as she pleases. This is why nearly every DRM scheme in history has been broken.
It is a fundamentally flawed concept.
It was fun. And it turned out to be slightly profitable.
Finkployd