The full statement clearly indiciates they oppose education programs meant to change opinions/behaviours.
Stop judging based on comments out of context.
So education should never change opinions or behaviors?
What is the availability of books in non-DRM formats? The vast majority of the periodicals to which I subscribe are available in PDF (or HTML, which is a win for the Kindle's browsing ability). But how likely am I to find current books available outside of Amazon's (or Sony's?) store(s)?
One of the big pluses for me of the Sony readers is the expansion card. But what do you mean by "worked better" in comparing memory stick to SD?
Thanks...Andrew
Does the Sony require a Microsoft or Apple environment on a PC? I'm Linux-only, and - as far as I've been able to tell - the Sony is a non-starter for me because the only way to buy is by using their special software.
Even if I did have a Microsoft or Apple PC, I'd be frightened of Sony's "special software" given their rootkit history.
So: Am I wrong? Is there a way to purchase for the Sony w/o requiring a Microsoft or Apple PC environment?
Thanks...Andrew
I've an old IBM laptop (w/o remote, unfortunately) acting as a MythTV client connected to my family's main TV. My MythTV setup predates HD, though, so I've still some work to do...
You can't spoof an IP thru a router you don't control.
It depends upon what you mean. You *can* send a package with a forged source IP through a router you don't control. It requires that nothing filter on the "bad" source IP (which is still far too common, from what I've read). This also would never get a successful TCP connection; you could send a SYN this way but the ACK would never get back to you (it would be sent to the forged source instead).
But this can be enough for a DOS.
Honestly, though, I'm not sure how important source IP spoofing is nowadays. There are so many MSFT machines participating in one more more zombie armies that spoofing would seem to add little value. The attacks really are coming from all over.
...Whether it is caused by humans or not, it doesn't really seem to matter. Let's focus on making this place a nice place to live. Clean air, clean water, clean land. These are things no one is going to argue with. Let's start making this a better world for you and for me.
Seems like a no-brainer, no? But that's pretty much the topic here: no brainers.
Honestly, though, I see the failure of American thinking as far more of a problem than Global Warming. The latter can do a lot of damage to the environment to which we're used. But, aside from our own perspective, so what? A few cities get flooded? We might care, but the Earth won't.
On the other hand, we need clear and decent thinking - analysis, reason, etc. - to deal with this issue. And the next. And the next. Maybe Global Warming is the fault of humans this time. The next problem might not be. But that doesn't mean that we don't have to deal with it.
Dealing, though, is where we'll fail if we cannot apply science and engineering to design and implement rationally chosen solutions. And our schools are not churning out people trained in rational and critical thinking, much less scientists and engineers.
There's too much political advantage to be had in keeping people ignorant and backward, I fear, for schools to ever receive the long-term correction that is likely required.
My experience: I've been doing Taekwondo now for perhaps 20 months. Before this, I'd tried exercise programs, but nothing stuck as well. The reason: I do this with family and - apart from that - it's fun! I find that I exercise outside class because that's become fun too, in a way that it never did when it was "just exercise".
This brought me down an inch or so at the waste. Then, weight watchers brought me down a few more includes over just a few weeks.
Both really are important.
For the blocks of time when work doesn't permit much else, there are plenty of exercizes that can be done at work. Isometrics. Get an exercise band; many of these can easily be done at or near a desk or in a corner somewhere. Perhaps even small weights for arm work at the desk (though this is one I've not done myself (yet)).
It would be a big help if coworkers can get involved too, as this makes it easier to do at work and it also adds to the motivation.
This is absurd. What in your mind constitutes an "abuser" of a service that is advertised as unlimited?
Right. That's what this is all about. Some of the connectivity providers are being caught out, selling more bandwidth than they have. Rather than shifting into an honesty mode, they're trying to classify those that actually make use of what they've bought as "abusers". It's as if a restaurant were to complain of the abuse of those patrons that ate their entire meal.
They lied before because there wasn't enough demand for them to be caught. That's changed, and their dishonest ways have been exposed.
In general, I agree with the disagreement. The ability to replace Some::Package::someFunction() with someFunction() saves the writer time, but it costs time later. The reader needs to do more work to determine from where the function comes, for example.
And since there are typically many readers but only one [original] writer, the time of the reader is more valuable.
The points about name clashes and such are also good.
On the other hand, what happens when some maintainer wants to replace Some::Package::someFunction() with Some::Other::Package::someFunction()? Multiple points in the code to be changed vs. one point? Recall that each change adds a potential bug.
A compromise:
$f = Some::Package->new();
$f->someFunction();
might make sense if someFunction() is used repeatedly. But even this is imperfect, in that the new() may be sufficiently distant from the ->someFunction() that it's not a lot better than "use" in terms of readability. But at least it avoids namespace conflicts.
One form - which is I think how the original article used it - is that individual statements accomplish little work. For example, they move a byte into a particular location in contrast to languages which have statements that do things like apply filters to lists' content. These are languages which require verbosity on the part of the author to accomplish work.
These are more work to write because one must break tasks down further. They're also more work to read because the reader must assimilate a greater number of statements to grasp the work being performed from a higher level perspective.
Another form of verbosity is intended to provide additional context for subsequent readers of code. APL can provide the counter-example of this, where code can be so terse that the original intent is lost.
Too many still forget that the time of the reader of the code is more valuable that the time of the writer in most cases, for the simple reason that there's one writer but many readers (including the writer him/herself a few days/weeks/months/years later *grin*). Making code that's easier to read is important for maintenance and extension.
Even after the most severe snowstorms, you'd be able to fly over the snow sooner than the roads would be ploughed.
-jcr
Just guessing, but...
Small aircraft are vulnerable to icing. During a snow storm, this is actually not an issue. But you don't want to be in wet clouds or rain with the temperature anywhere near 0c.
At greater cost de-icing is available. But even high-end systems can be overcome by a sufficient rate of accumulation.
Then there's the simple matter of wind and turbulence. Stuff about which cars don't care make life uncomfortable or dangerous for pilots. Is the usual automobile driver going to know the penalty in runway length caused by a 5kt tailwind?
Autopilots are great...until they fail. Or a sensor clogs. Or the alternator trips.
We'll have flying cars eventually, I suspect. But we're not likely to own many. They'll be taxis in the near future. Even once automation is sufficiently safe, they'll still be more efficient as a public utility than everyone owning one.
I don't think I've ever tried a standard motherboard from ASUS. But I've one of their laptops, and it runs Fedora 7 w/o any difficulty. Even the video camera works, although I vaguely recall that I had to add a module for that.
I'd have no trouble giving their motherboards a try.
I don't disagree with the collusion of lawmakers and the large media companies. But this doesn't eliminate the fact that artists are still signing away the copyright. And that collusion to which you referred is only about copyright. The "protection" offered by the laws written by the large media companies still apply even of the copyright holder is a small media company or even an individual artist.
The point about the distribution monopoly is perhaps the most important factor, in that (1) it is what convinces artists to sign away their rights but (2) it is the most fragile part of the situation today. And that fragility makes it the best point of "attack": we need to somehow convince artists that they can distribute w/o the large media companies.
Fortunately, the Internet provides a basis for this. But beyond that, I'm not sure what's out there for artists. That is, are there sites that aggregate art for display and sale?
Frankly, I'd think this a natural choice for Internet Radio sites being hit by their own copyright problems.
Further, if someone incapable of reviewing/fixing code is truly blocked in some way, there are two choices. The first choice is the same as that with closed source: await a fix from someone else. But the second choice is closed to closed source: hire someone to do the fix.
Open Source can be treated as closed source by any given user; it is therefore no worse. But it offers options and possibilities that closed source cannot.
I too have been reasonably (albeit less than perfectly) happy with RH support, having used it pretty much only for Cluster Suite-related issues. I'd not want to be completely dependent upon them, but that's part of why we use Linux, isn't it?
On the other hand, I recently attempted a 64 bit Oracle install on 64 bit RH. It was a nightmare, not the least because Oracle support was a nightmare. I was routed around from group to group, taking *days* to reach a group that actually dealt with the DB server product on Linux.
At one point, I was directed to a group that supports some inventory management product. What brilliance caused that, I still wonder.
And even once reaching the proper group, the support was pretty poor. The basic problem I was experiencing was dependency upon a great many 32 bit components, and they couldn't provide me with a definitive list of these. I'm sure *someone* in the company has the DB server running on a 64 bit RH install, and the answer to my question could have been had with a simple rpm query (modulo that this could include unnecessary RPMs). But finding this machine, or running this query, seemed well out of the scope of what Oracle support was willing to do.
So I was told "install until something breaks", figure out which RPM is needed, install the RPM, return to step 1.
Her question wasn't all that unreasonable. More, it can be answered in a useful way that brings home the cost of global warming to the individual. This would be especially true for someone living in a hurricane-heavy zone, and who may very well be living not terribly high above sea level.
It's all well and good to speak of "the larger issue". But if you want most people to spend or vote on an issue, they need to see the impact upon their own lives. All we can do in the case of Global Warming is offer approximations and possibilities, which does make it a tough sell to a population that thinks ten tosses of a coin yielding heads means that the next toss is likely tails. On the other hand, some of those possibilities are pretty scary.
Wouldn't one want to avoid even the chance of them?
Bush et. al. understands this. They don't sell the larger issue of "war on terror", for example, but instead sell "WMD in the schools" or such. And that's why they've taken so strong a stand on hiding coffins or any other even symbolic view of shared sacrifice. If most voters aren't sacrificing, then most won't care enough to vote on an issue.
Before anyone takes the complacent perspective of "well, Bush's party lost the last election", consider by how little that loss occurred.
I should be able to put out all my personal details and still no one should be able to do business as me using that info. Now, why is that not possible?
You know the answer: because some of that information is used to verify that you are you.
If we used (for example) public keys for identification, then it would be foolish to send someone your private key. And I guarantee: some people would do that on request.
If we used biometrics for identification., then it would be foolish to send someone your genome. And I guarantee: some people would do that on request.
The only protection that would work is to deny the owner of the identity access to the information defining that identity. Ironically: a form of security through obscurity. Therefore, this opinion of mine should be immediately mistrusted.
The mention of children leads me to believe you are not a university student.
The claim that people aren't interested in the pictures rather preclude that poster from being a parent too. We parents all know just how deperately the world awaits our next couple of Gig of pictures (and video!). And when I take pictures at various events (ie. a school field trip), all the parents want to see the pictures.
On the other hand, Facebook is far too limited. My "alumni" account from grad school has long since aged away. And when I left undergrad, campus-wide email was a gleam in some dean's eye. And, of course, there's not a lot of overlap between the universities I've attended and those attended by all the parents of my childrens' classmates.
Perhaps a geographic network (which I believe Facebook now supports) would work, but why bother? We've our school's extranet which serves very well for this purpose (as well as many others). And when it's beyond school, I've my own family website on my server for the placement of photos. Given what's been happening with disk space recently, I've been moving videos there too w/o concern.
Perhaps its my age or culture, but there's little reason to depend upon someone else's server or some limited concept of "network". And I know where my backup is, which is another source of comfort.
Re:Response from Kevin Finisterre, second bug
on
Month of Apple Fixes
·
· Score: 1
it was only an application
You're ignoring that there's a real [potential] cost difference in an OS bug vs. an application bug. Hopefully, the vendor of either will provide a quick fix and all will be well.
But the worse-case for an OS bug is large. Replacing an OS at a nontrivially sized site is a big deal. It likely will also involve replacing applications.
On the other hand, replacing a single application - while potentially annoying - is not a problem of the same scale.
Of course, all of this is aside from the real issue of this thread (that being that the MOAB is supposed to actually refer to A's Bs {8^). But the difference between an OS problem and an application problem is a significant one.
I'm having trouble resolving this comment with the topic of the thread, namely "Lost GMail Emails."
Indeed. Isn't the first issue "how could GMail permit this sequence of events to occur?" After all, any mail service provider has a collection of choices involving protection of content from loss. Google seems particularly well-suited to make highly protective choices. Why weren't they made?
Google's policy is clear: "Unfortunately, we're unable to recover messages or Contact entries that have been deleted from your account." The cited Techcrunch article makes it appear as if Google is attempting recovery in some cases, but what could "attempting recovery" possibly mean in a firm where backups are being done properly? That is, what is preventing restoration?
Are backups being done properly? I know that some technologists mistake RAID/Mirroring type solutions for backup. Surely Google wouldn't make that mistake, but might they actually have a policy of not performing "proper" backups?
A second issue is, as has been discussed, the question of outsourcing vs. insourcing. There are a few different factors involved in this decision (ie. privacy), but let's limit our examination to the protection of our information against loss.
One of the concerns here is flexibility and choice. If some exploit in my IMAP server, for example, permitted a break-in and removal of my email, I've a clear recovery path. Of course, I can restore the missing content from backup. But how to I make use of the content while better protecting it than before? That is, how do I properly recover from this incident so it doesn't reoccur? I could enhance external security (ie. limit IMAP access to VPNs, for example). I could fix the IMAP software. I could switch to different IMAP software.
I have all these options because I own the data. If GMail owns the data, then I've no choice at all. In a sense, even GMail's choices are limited. I could, for example, choose to switch my mail to Yahoo. GMail cannot make that choice for me.
But this isn't completely an issue of outsourcing vs. insourcing. I get exactly the same power of I outsource but I maintain my own backups. This doesn't address privacy or security issues, of course, but it does answer the issue of protecting against information loss.
Why don't more GMail users do this?
I'd suggest that the same people failing to backup their GMail accounts would fail to backup their local servers. But I've no proof of that beyond it being the same failure to consider possibilities in both cases.
Honestly, I don't see how it damages the institution of marrage either. However, the fact that you and I, as well as many others, disagree with something that group feels is so fundamentaly important is the reason the issue gets so much attention.
What if you don't "see how" because the statement is a lie? What if people aren't against gay marriage because it would "damage marriage"? What if people are against gay marriage for the same reason that people are against mixing of the races, women having the vote, or that other religion being permitted to meet in an other wise good, my religion town?
Why were so many people against rights for blacks? Fear of competition? Hatred of anything different? Something else?
Does it really matter why they're this way? The reality is, lots are that way. Does having a lot of bigots in our town/state/nation mean we should permit bigoted laws?
This is why we've things like the Bill of Rights in this country. This is why we've something to fear in a tyranny of the majority.
Those that would consider voting with their bigoted natures should realize the conceit in the assumption that they are safe because they're in the majority. Demographics evolve. Those promoting an intolerant society will only have themselves to blame when they're the next target of intolerance.
Slashdot Mirror
The full statement clearly indiciates they oppose education programs meant to change opinions/behaviours. Stop judging based on comments out of context.
So education should never change opinions or behaviors?
have to high five you for this.. it was funny. have you seen the "unix based os" internet meme where it says "i reboot about as often as i get laid"?
Where is this meme?! 3
Here. Now.
What is the availability of books in non-DRM formats? The vast majority of the periodicals to which I subscribe are available in PDF (or HTML, which is a win for the Kindle's browsing ability). But how likely am I to find current books available outside of Amazon's (or Sony's?) store(s)?
One of the big pluses for me of the Sony readers is the expansion card. But what do you mean by "worked better" in comparing memory stick to SD? Thanks...Andrew
Does the Sony require a Microsoft or Apple environment on a PC? I'm Linux-only, and - as far as I've been able to tell - the Sony is a non-starter for me because the only way to buy is by using their special software. Even if I did have a Microsoft or Apple PC, I'd be frightened of Sony's "special software" given their rootkit history. So: Am I wrong? Is there a way to purchase for the Sony w/o requiring a Microsoft or Apple PC environment? Thanks...Andrew
I've an old IBM laptop (w/o remote, unfortunately) acting as a MythTV client connected to my family's main TV. My MythTV setup predates HD, though, so I've still some work to do...
You can't spoof an IP thru a router you don't control.
It depends upon what you mean. You *can* send a package with a forged source IP through a router you don't control. It requires that nothing filter on the "bad" source IP (which is still far too common, from what I've read). This also would never get a successful TCP connection; you could send a SYN this way but the ACK would never get back to you (it would be sent to the forged source instead).
But this can be enough for a DOS.
Honestly, though, I'm not sure how important source IP spoofing is nowadays. There are so many MSFT machines participating in one more more zombie armies that spoofing would seem to add little value. The attacks really are coming from all over.
...Whether it is caused by humans or not, it doesn't really seem to matter. Let's focus on making this place a nice place to live. Clean air, clean water, clean land. These are things no one is going to argue with. Let's start making this a better world for you and for me.
Seems like a no-brainer, no? But that's pretty much the topic here: no brainers.
Honestly, though, I see the failure of American thinking as far more of a problem than Global Warming. The latter can do a lot of damage to the environment to which we're used. But, aside from our own perspective, so what? A few cities get flooded? We might care, but the Earth won't.
On the other hand, we need clear and decent thinking - analysis, reason, etc. - to deal with this issue. And the next. And the next. Maybe Global Warming is the fault of humans this time. The next problem might not be. But that doesn't mean that we don't have to deal with it.
Dealing, though, is where we'll fail if we cannot apply science and engineering to design and implement rationally chosen solutions. And our schools are not churning out people trained in rational and critical thinking, much less scientists and engineers.
There's too much political advantage to be had in keeping people ignorant and backward, I fear, for schools to ever receive the long-term correction that is likely required.
My experience: I've been doing Taekwondo now for perhaps 20 months. Before this, I'd tried exercise programs, but nothing stuck as well. The reason: I do this with family and - apart from that - it's fun! I find that I exercise outside class because that's become fun too, in a way that it never did when it was "just exercise".
This brought me down an inch or so at the waste. Then, weight watchers brought me down a few more includes over just a few weeks.
Both really are important.
For the blocks of time when work doesn't permit much else, there are plenty of exercizes that can be done at work. Isometrics. Get an exercise band; many of these can easily be done at or near a desk or in a corner somewhere. Perhaps even small weights for arm work at the desk (though this is one I've not done myself (yet)).
It would be a big help if coworkers can get involved too, as this makes it easier to do at work and it also adds to the motivation.
Can't one automate download of the /etc/hosts file from SRI?
This is absurd. What in your mind constitutes an "abuser" of a service that is advertised as unlimited?
Right. That's what this is all about. Some of the connectivity providers are being caught out, selling more bandwidth than they have. Rather than shifting into an honesty mode, they're trying to classify those that actually make use of what they've bought as "abusers". It's as if a restaurant were to complain of the abuse of those patrons that ate their entire meal.
They lied before because there wasn't enough demand for them to be caught. That's changed, and their dishonest ways have been exposed.
In general, I agree with the disagreement. The ability to replace Some::Package::someFunction() with someFunction() saves the writer time, but it costs time later. The reader needs to do more work to determine from where the function comes, for example.
And since there are typically many readers but only one [original] writer, the time of the reader is more valuable.
The points about name clashes and such are also good.
On the other hand, what happens when some maintainer wants to replace Some::Package::someFunction() with Some::Other::Package::someFunction()? Multiple points in the code to be changed vs. one point? Recall that each change adds a potential bug.
A compromise:
$f = Some::Package->new();
$f->someFunction();
might make sense if someFunction() is used repeatedly. But even this is imperfect, in that the new() may be sufficiently distant from the ->someFunction() that it's not a lot better than "use" in terms of readability. But at least it avoids namespace conflicts.
Engineering: The Art of Tradeoffs.
There's "verbosity" and there's "verbosity".
One form - which is I think how the original article used it - is that individual statements accomplish little work. For example, they move a byte into a particular location in contrast to languages which have statements that do things like apply filters to lists' content. These are languages which require verbosity on the part of the author to accomplish work.
These are more work to write because one must break tasks down further. They're also more work to read because the reader must assimilate a greater number of statements to grasp the work being performed from a higher level perspective.
Another form of verbosity is intended to provide additional context for subsequent readers of code. APL can provide the counter-example of this, where code can be so terse that the original intent is lost.
Too many still forget that the time of the reader of the code is more valuable that the time of the writer in most cases, for the simple reason that there's one writer but many readers (including the writer him/herself a few days/weeks/months/years later *grin*). Making code that's easier to read is important for maintenance and extension.
That kind of verbosity is a Good Thing.
Where are you getting that from?
Even after the most severe snowstorms, you'd be able to fly over the snow sooner than the roads would be ploughed.
-jcr
Just guessing, but...
Small aircraft are vulnerable to icing. During a snow storm, this is actually not an issue. But you don't want to be in wet clouds or rain with the temperature anywhere near 0c.
At greater cost de-icing is available. But even high-end systems can be overcome by a sufficient rate of accumulation.
Then there's the simple matter of wind and turbulence. Stuff about which cars don't care make life uncomfortable or dangerous for pilots. Is the usual automobile driver going to know the penalty in runway length caused by a 5kt tailwind?
Autopilots are great...until they fail. Or a sensor clogs. Or the alternator trips.
We'll have flying cars eventually, I suspect. But we're not likely to own many. They'll be taxis in the near future. Even once automation is sufficiently safe, they'll still be more efficient as a public utility than everyone owning one.
I think the point is that you're taking the exam all your life, but you only get to see the grade after you're dead.
That seems ridiculously unfair to me, so add this to the list of reasons why - even if there is a God - he or she or it is on his/her/its own.
Of course, if there are make-up exams I might change my mind *laugh*.
I don't think I've ever tried a standard motherboard from ASUS. But I've one of their laptops, and it runs Fedora 7 w/o any difficulty. Even the video camera works, although I vaguely recall that I had to add a module for that.
I'd have no trouble giving their motherboards a try.
I don't disagree with the collusion of lawmakers and the large media companies. But this doesn't eliminate the fact that artists are still signing away the copyright. And that collusion to which you referred is only about copyright. The "protection" offered by the laws written by the large media companies still apply even of the copyright holder is a small media company or even an individual artist.
The point about the distribution monopoly is perhaps the most important factor, in that (1) it is what convinces artists to sign away their rights but (2) it is the most fragile part of the situation today. And that fragility makes it the best point of "attack": we need to somehow convince artists that they can distribute w/o the large media companies.
Fortunately, the Internet provides a basis for this. But beyond that, I'm not sure what's out there for artists. That is, are there sites that aggregate art for display and sale?
Frankly, I'd think this a natural choice for Internet Radio sites being hit by their own copyright problems.
Further, if someone incapable of reviewing/fixing code is truly blocked in some way, there are two choices. The first choice is the same as that with closed source: await a fix from someone else. But the second choice is closed to closed source: hire someone to do the fix.
Open Source can be treated as closed source by any given user; it is therefore no worse. But it offers options and possibilities that closed source cannot.
I too have been reasonably (albeit less than perfectly) happy with RH support, having used it pretty much only for Cluster Suite-related issues. I'd not want to be completely dependent upon them, but that's part of why we use Linux, isn't it?
On the other hand, I recently attempted a 64 bit Oracle install on 64 bit RH. It was a nightmare, not the least because Oracle support was a nightmare. I was routed around from group to group, taking *days* to reach a group that actually dealt with the DB server product on Linux.
At one point, I was directed to a group that supports some inventory management product. What brilliance caused that, I still wonder.
And even once reaching the proper group, the support was pretty poor. The basic problem I was experiencing was dependency upon a great many 32 bit components, and they couldn't provide me with a definitive list of these. I'm sure *someone* in the company has the DB server running on a 64 bit RH install, and the answer to my question could have been had with a simple rpm query (modulo that this could include unnecessary RPMs). But finding this machine, or running this query, seemed well out of the scope of what Oracle support was willing to do.
So I was told "install until something breaks", figure out which RPM is needed, install the RPM, return to step 1.
Her question wasn't all that unreasonable. More, it can be answered in a useful way that brings home the cost of global warming to the individual. This would be especially true for someone living in a hurricane-heavy zone, and who may very well be living not terribly high above sea level.
It's all well and good to speak of "the larger issue". But if you want most people to spend or vote on an issue, they need to see the impact upon their own lives. All we can do in the case of Global Warming is offer approximations and possibilities, which does make it a tough sell to a population that thinks ten tosses of a coin yielding heads means that the next toss is likely tails. On the other hand, some of those possibilities are pretty scary.
Wouldn't one want to avoid even the chance of them?
Bush et. al. understands this. They don't sell the larger issue of "war on terror", for example, but instead sell "WMD in the schools" or such. And that's why they've taken so strong a stand on hiding coffins or any other even symbolic view of shared sacrifice. If most voters aren't sacrificing, then most won't care enough to vote on an issue.
Before anyone takes the complacent perspective of "well, Bush's party lost the last election", consider by how little that loss occurred.
You know the answer: because some of that information is used to verify that you are you.
If we used (for example) public keys for identification, then it would be foolish to send someone your private key. And I guarantee: some people would do that on request.
If we used biometrics for identification., then it would be foolish to send someone your genome. And I guarantee: some people would do that on request.
The only protection that would work is to deny the owner of the identity access to the information defining that identity. Ironically: a form of security through obscurity. Therefore, this opinion of mine should be immediately mistrusted.
The claim that people aren't interested in the pictures rather preclude that poster from being a parent too. We parents all know just how deperately the world awaits our next couple of Gig of pictures (and video!). And when I take pictures at various events (ie. a school field trip), all the parents want to see the pictures.
On the other hand, Facebook is far too limited. My "alumni" account from grad school has long since aged away. And when I left undergrad, campus-wide email was a gleam in some dean's eye. And, of course, there's not a lot of overlap between the universities I've attended and those attended by all the parents of my childrens' classmates.
Perhaps a geographic network (which I believe Facebook now supports) would work, but why bother? We've our school's extranet which serves very well for this purpose (as well as many others). And when it's beyond school, I've my own family website on my server for the placement of photos. Given what's been happening with disk space recently, I've been moving videos there too w/o concern.
Perhaps its my age or culture, but there's little reason to depend upon someone else's server or some limited concept of "network". And I know where my backup is, which is another source of comfort.
it was only an application
You're ignoring that there's a real [potential] cost difference in an OS bug vs. an application bug. Hopefully, the vendor of either will provide a quick fix and all will be well.
But the worse-case for an OS bug is large. Replacing an OS at a nontrivially sized site is a big deal. It likely will also involve replacing applications.
On the other hand, replacing a single application - while potentially annoying - is not a problem of the same scale.
Of course, all of this is aside from the real issue of this thread (that being that the MOAB is supposed to actually refer to A's Bs {8^). But the difference between an OS problem and an application problem is a significant one.
I'm having trouble resolving this comment with the topic of the thread, namely "Lost GMail Emails."
Indeed. Isn't the first issue "how could GMail permit this sequence of events to occur?" After all, any mail service provider has a collection of choices involving protection of content from loss. Google seems particularly well-suited to make highly protective choices. Why weren't they made?
Google's policy is clear: "Unfortunately, we're unable to recover messages or Contact entries that have been deleted from your account." The cited Techcrunch article makes it appear as if Google is attempting recovery in some cases, but what could "attempting recovery" possibly mean in a firm where backups are being done properly? That is, what is preventing restoration?
Are backups being done properly? I know that some technologists mistake RAID/Mirroring type solutions for backup. Surely Google wouldn't make that mistake, but might they actually have a policy of not performing "proper" backups?
A second issue is, as has been discussed, the question of outsourcing vs. insourcing. There are a few different factors involved in this decision (ie. privacy), but let's limit our examination to the protection of our information against loss.
One of the concerns here is flexibility and choice. If some exploit in my IMAP server, for example, permitted a break-in and removal of my email, I've a clear recovery path. Of course, I can restore the missing content from backup. But how to I make use of the content while better protecting it than before? That is, how do I properly recover from this incident so it doesn't reoccur? I could enhance external security (ie. limit IMAP access to VPNs, for example). I could fix the IMAP software. I could switch to different IMAP software.
I have all these options because I own the data. If GMail owns the data, then I've no choice at all. In a sense, even GMail's choices are limited. I could, for example, choose to switch my mail to Yahoo. GMail cannot make that choice for me.
But this isn't completely an issue of outsourcing vs. insourcing. I get exactly the same power of I outsource but I maintain my own backups. This doesn't address privacy or security issues, of course, but it does answer the issue of protecting against information loss.
Why don't more GMail users do this?
I'd suggest that the same people failing to backup their GMail accounts would fail to backup their local servers. But I've no proof of that beyond it being the same failure to consider possibilities in both cases.
Honestly, I don't see how it damages the institution of marrage either. However, the fact that you and I, as well as many others, disagree with something that group feels is so fundamentaly important is the reason the issue gets so much attention.
What if you don't "see how" because the statement is a lie? What if people aren't against gay marriage because it would "damage marriage"? What if people are against gay marriage for the same reason that people are against mixing of the races, women having the vote, or that other religion being permitted to meet in an other wise good, my religion town?
Why were so many people against rights for blacks? Fear of competition? Hatred of anything different? Something else?
Does it really matter why they're this way? The reality is, lots are that way. Does having a lot of bigots in our town/state/nation mean we should permit bigoted laws?
This is why we've things like the Bill of Rights in this country. This is why we've something to fear in a tyranny of the majority.
Those that would consider voting with their bigoted natures should realize the conceit in the assumption that they are safe because they're in the majority. Demographics evolve. Those promoting an intolerant society will only have themselves to blame when they're the next target of intolerance.