The market for IT is horrible right now and will probably get worse before it gets better. All the jobs are contract, temporary, and there's a high ratio of applicants to available positions. And the disconnect between those doing the hiring and those who have the ability do evaluate your technical skills? Let's just say HR can put on their job requirements "Five years Windows Vista" and will not look at your resume (for being honest), while some joker will get the job because he's willing to taylor his resume to whatever lies HR is looking for. There is no oversight. There are few left in this industry that actually do the hiring/screening and so a bunch of useless requirements now pervade many job listings. Legitimate workers can't find legitimate work because they're not being hired by anyone in the industry anymore... Everything (and I mean everything) is outsourced, contracted, subcontracted, then thrown in the basement bound and with a ball gag in its mouth. It's reinforced by the attitude that IT workers are a nearly unlimited and with 10% unemployment rates in some areas now and schools pumping out "msce certified technicians" by the boatload -- the industry itself is rotting due to an inability to actually see real talent in all the crap. It doesn't help that most of the jobs that used to be here are now overseas.
My advice? Start filling out applications for customer service, or find some really rare niche tech job and learn it. But the entry level is saturated to the point of disbelief, as far as I can tell.
And in the interim, I'd add that as a CONVENIENCE feature only, if there's any doubt complain to them and then wait for the fix. I'm certain CapitalOne has a 1-800 number or similar to conduct the same inquiries with a human being, and the telephone system doesn't have a multitude of hackers in it; Just a bunch of government spooks. I'm not allowed to say which government though.:)
Short version: "We're sorry we changed something that worked and everyone was used to, but hey -- it's compliant with a standard." If this were Microsoft, we'd give them a healthy helping of humble pie, but because it's Linux and the magic word "POSIX" gets used, I'm sure we'll forgive them for it. The workaround is laughable -- "call fsync(), and then wait(), wait(), wait(), for the Wizard to see you." How about writing a filesystem that actually does journaling in a reliable fashion, instead of finger-pointing after the user loses data due to your snazzy new optimization and say "The developer did it! It wasn't us, honest." Microsoft does it and we tar and feather them, but the guys making the "latest and greatest" Linux feature we salute them?
We let our own off with heineous mistakes while professionals who do the same thing we hang simply because they dared to ask to be paid for their effort. Lame.
It might be more accurate to say the OS does not manage or provide services for the SMM. Any code executing in the OS with sufficient access rights can make "unsafe" calls to trigger SMM events, or to any other hardware device in the system. The OS only recognizes the SMM to the point of saying "If you don't finish what you're doing within N clock ticks, I'll crash", and then it syncs with the clock upon the SMM releasing control back to the OSS. If it exceeded that timeframe, the OS simply throws its hands in the air and says "Frack you." Anything loaded into the SMM would have to be very compact, and would be incidentally detectable much the same way software can detect when it is running in a VM -- by looking for delays.
Wait... You have to get your code running in ring 0 and then you can do anything you could do with ring 0 access? Wow. Quite an exploit. -_- And a reboot removes the code.
These flaws have been reported in many mainstream press outlets, investigated by a half-dozen independent groups, and yet it was still cleared for use in state, county, and federal elections. Let's ignore Diebold for a minute -- I know plenty of other people here will (rightfully) hang them. This points to a major systemic flaw in our certification programs for voting machines. Period. End of discussion.
This isn't just Diebold. This is dozens of state, local, and federal agencies that abjectly failed in their duties to their constituents to protect the voting system. This is huge. Epic. I cannot stress enough the damage this has caused to the confidence in the system. Again, let's ignore Diebold and ask the really hard question -- Where do we go from here? Can e-voting systems be trusted? What changes need to be made to the system (and they better be major)? What do we do to restore voter confidence in a system that just got skinned, gutted, and mounted?
Terrorists? On MySpace? What, are they going to attack the train stations in their horned-rim glasses, striped shirts, excessive mascara, and tight girl pants? Unless they have the Perspective Gun (HHGTTG) that won't do a lot of damage. Really, even if they have razorblades they're just going to use them on themselves.
And Facebook. I can see it now... 11:15am - Jihad has been called! We are all so very excited, yes-m. 11:27am - is feeling very blue (they left to go get mcdonald's without me) 11:52am - Achmed didn't bring all the parts to build the bomb. We're watching House instead 12:56pm - Cutty really is a bitch! We must issue fatwa on her. 02:45pm - took nap. Unemployment called, they say I get free dollars. woo woo! 05:17pm - Achmed returns with rest of parts to build bomb, but comcast triple play package more fun 08:59pm - Got call from head of cell. Wants to know about bomb. What bomb? We lost bomb. 11:36pm - Go to bed. Really loving these american TV dinners.
Or not. Seriously -- we're just going to encrypt the crap out of everything in a few more years anyway, and the UK and other governments and piss off. Or we'll go back to having pseudonyms and fake identities online and only our friends will know the truth. *shrug* Terrorists... christ. I wish they would come and blow something up, just so we had the reminder they weren't entirely a figment of our imagination. In another 10 years, nobody will believe 09/11 happened because of all this screaming by politicians about 'teh terrorists' will have gotten so old people will start subconsciously rejecting anything to do with it.
Shhhh!! It's just a talent contest for the geeks who didn't get to be in one in high school. Don't spoil their chance to wear a nice gown and walk down the aisle just once.
No, it's just that I have to be somewhere in an hour and it's going to be hard to get into the car with a wrinkled troll with giant teeth still attached to my leg, hissing and drooling.
It's still organic computing. We've already demonstrated that there are some classes of computational problems that are massively parallel and can benefit from the use of organic instead of synthetic design. This is decades-old news. The problem is doing this on a mass and automated scale, and then figuring out how to reintegrate these systems into the digital ones we use now. Digital systems are very fast, but lack capacity. Organic systems are very slow, but have incredible capacity. What's needed is a bridge between these two developing systems. The good news is... Research on organic computing has been very slow... people are far more interested in silicon right now, so there's no real rush.
If people are concerned about their privacy and don't trust Google then they will avoid google products. Plain and simple.
Ah, not necessarily. You assume that people care more about privacy than accessibility and ease of use. This fails to account for people that may be concerned about their privacy, don't trust google, but use it anyway because their level of risk (loss of privacy) is less than the amount of benefit in continuing to use Google. I could argue that market forces allow Google more egregious violations of privacy than its smaller competitors; And further that this is okay because people are making a conscious decision to sacrifice their privacy to gain the "google advantage" (apologies for the market-speak). Please carefully note I am not supporting either position here, merely informing you that they exist.
If the government steps in and starts requiring companies to comply with various privacy regulations etc. it will only serve to discourage new entry into the industry, helping Google to secure a monopoly on online services. It would do the exact opposite of what privacy advocates want.
Your health care records are protected by federal privacy laws. There is no monopoly (there IS a large broken system, however) in that area. As well, California has passed numerous privacy laws that do not seem to encourage monopolistic behavior. As long as the burden of protecting privacy does not create a significant addition to the total cost of entry for a new competitor into the market in question, this principle should be broadly applicable to all industries (including search engine / service providers).
There are lots of alternatives out there if you don't want Google to have access to all of your e-mail and search history etc.
I would argue they all suck. Google at least makes that information readily accessible and usable to me. The alternatives still get all my e-mail and search history, but I don't get even a cuddle afterwords.
We don't need the government to help us make these decisions.
And what decisions should the government "help us" on, if not in the area of civil rights and liberties, of which the Supreme Court has recognized privacy as an inalienable human right (even though there is no language in the constitution providing for it -- under the assertion that rights not specifically delegated to the State are reserved by the People).
We can think and choose for ourselves, and discussing these issues is the first step to informing people who don't know.
I would argue some of us are merely rearranging our prejudices in what passes for thought. And nowhere is discussion more valuable or prevalent than on the legislator's floor, or in his/her office.
Asking government to keep us safe helps to safe-guard public ignorance, since they know that Big Brother will always have their backs and thus there is no need to think, listen or do research for themselves. That spells a far worse privacy nightmare than the current situation.
The government, at least in theory, is of, for, and by the people. I don't think corporations can say the same. For privacy to be effective, it has to be universal. Because otherwise the economic incentive to people who aren't playing the "privacy game" will remain and so no lasting industry alliance will ever form. The only way to assure privacy across the board is to legislate it.
This thing won't be more than a novelty if it's light aeroframe can't survive an impact with one of those giant SUVs driven by some guy yelling at his girlfriend on a cell phone... You'll be the jelly between two pieces of fiberglass. Plus, until it can land on a public street, and pull into a parking spot, and then take off again on the same street, without violating the speed limit, I don't see it having much practicality to Joe Average.
That said... Good job. We here at Slashdot love seeing what bored engineers are capable of. Especially if it has high speed internet wired into it.
Footnote: I really hate Firefox's auto-spell check/fix. I meant their, not there, and "fish", not "finish". u_u I have now disabled that misfeature (again). Firefox likes to eat my config file and I wind up resetting my settings every month or so because of this.
Do you care about privacy? Enough to fork over your own money to watchdog organizations that hold potential privacy breachers accountable?
Yes and yes. I have donated to the EFF and the ACLU before, multiple times. I also participated in various privacy protests here locally in Minnesota and have written letters to my legislators on approximately a half-dozen occasions.
Basically your entire concern here is a strawman, albeit one that is may be rooted in your own naivete.
Sir, you need to accept that you just might not know what the hell you're talking about. You make an assumption about me based on nothing I have posted on this forum or online, I do not know you personally, so there is no way you could be aware of my level of involvement in these issues. I am not going to disclose my level of involvement here either beyond what I have stated above, but you may safely assume it is far above average for the demographic reading this post. Also, my "argument" -- such a big word for a simple observation -- is not a straw man. I have made no statement regarding the validity of EPIC's claims about Google. I am merely stating that EPIC has weakened their position by including monentary payment as a remedy. EPIC is a small-time lobbying group, and there are other organizations better suited and with lower administrative overhead, to representing my personal privacy needs... Which is why I have donated to those groups and not EPIC.
Well, these days, even EPIC could use a little bit of a bailout. As an AIG employee, it seems like a perfectly reasonable request to me. We cannot allow privacy groups to fail.
EPIC's gross income for FY2007 was less than a million dollars, and they have about $2 million in assets. They've been steadily losing ground in the donations department. A $5 million "public fund" they could dive into would assure there continued existance (and $128k yearly salary for their president) for some time. I think the financial motivation here is quite clear. Their relevance, however, is not. The ACLU, by comparison, had $80 million in revenue in Q3/07 alone. The administrative overhead is also lower, and they claim to also be advocating privacy. Frankly, EPIC is a tiny finish in a big pond--they need to grab headlines to survive, and attacking Google seems carefully calculated to do just that. Google's "do no evil" slogan opens themselves up to groups like this who want a handout and can manipulate the press to get Google to sign over some of their $5.2 BILLION in revenue for FY2008, and $12.1 BILLION in assets.
So for Google to pay them some hush money wouldn't even earn a mention in their financial highlights, but for EPIC, it would be, well, epic for them to pull in $5 million.
Instead, people seem to react as though the existence of climate change is somehow a political question rather than a scientific question.
It became political the moment it became obvious that it would cost something to fix. The evidence may not be in doubt, but like all finite resources, the mindset today is "take what you can now" -- not plan for tomorrow. The collapse of the social security system, medicaid, the global recession, all point to a fundamental lack of interest in the future. Politics globally has aquired a hedonistic taint. The evidence could be indisputable and as solid and proven as gravity but it wouldn't change people's reactions.
You know, I might have taken them a bit more seriously if the summary didn't end with and urged Google to donate $5 million to a public fund. So that's what it's about then -- money. Political statements that end in requests for donation do a good job of discrediting themselves simply because it's hard to believe that someone could be walking the high road of idealism while at the same time asking for a handout.
Slashdot Mirror
Speaking as someone who's been involved in IT for 30+ years, allow me to shout at you...."You're going the wrong way!!!"
Kara Thrace, is that you?
The market for IT is horrible right now and will probably get worse before it gets better. All the jobs are contract, temporary, and there's a high ratio of applicants to available positions. And the disconnect between those doing the hiring and those who have the ability do evaluate your technical skills? Let's just say HR can put on their job requirements "Five years Windows Vista" and will not look at your resume (for being honest), while some joker will get the job because he's willing to taylor his resume to whatever lies HR is looking for. There is no oversight. There are few left in this industry that actually do the hiring/screening and so a bunch of useless requirements now pervade many job listings. Legitimate workers can't find legitimate work because they're not being hired by anyone in the industry anymore... Everything (and I mean everything) is outsourced, contracted, subcontracted, then thrown in the basement bound and with a ball gag in its mouth. It's reinforced by the attitude that IT workers are a nearly unlimited and with 10% unemployment rates in some areas now and schools pumping out "msce certified technicians" by the boatload -- the industry itself is rotting due to an inability to actually see real talent in all the crap. It doesn't help that most of the jobs that used to be here are now overseas.
My advice? Start filling out applications for customer service, or find some really rare niche tech job and learn it. But the entry level is saturated to the point of disbelief, as far as I can tell.
- in the Midwest, YMMV.
THIS is why a) microsoft can't ever truly fix something and b) why using proprietary software screws over the user.
As opposed to linux, where developer's can't get something working and then leave it alone? I fail to see any difference in end result as a user.
Or would you rather have OSS software do the same as proprietary software vendors and work around problems forever but never fixing them?
Right, because Linux has never had a problem that was just too costly to fix and so a workaround was devised.
Saw that shiny 'run in IE7 mode' button in IE8? that's what you'll get...
As opposed to the shiny 'All your data are belong to us' button on EXT4?
Your post is nothing more than FUD, it's just pointing the other way now.
Who the fuck modded this "informative"
Hopefully people who don't need to use "fuck" to justify their argument.
Get out the fucking basement
This sentence no verb.
It's certainly something to complain about.
And in the interim, I'd add that as a CONVENIENCE feature only, if there's any doubt complain to them and then wait for the fix. I'm certain CapitalOne has a 1-800 number or similar to conduct the same inquiries with a human being, and the telephone system doesn't have a multitude of hackers in it; Just a bunch of government spooks. I'm not allowed to say which government though. :)
Hello, IT, have you tried turning it off and back on again?
Ah... another tech support call. Sure, what's the problem?
Are the certificates a mismatch or is my browser bellyaching for nothing?
Yes. And maybe yes too.
Is the certificate mismatch a security hazard?
Common sense would suggest it wouldn't be in a big popup dialog labeled "WARNING" if it wasn't.
If someone poisoned my local DNS routers would it be obvious in the URL?
No.
How would I prevent such a thing?
Stop clicking "Okay" or "Yes" to every security warning you don't understand.
If everything was working correctly, would the certificate alert me to DNS poisoning, or is this just cosmetic security?
If the certificate isn't properly signed, a warning like the one you were presented with should throw a dialog box in the web browser.
Short version: "We're sorry we changed something that worked and everyone was used to, but hey -- it's compliant with a standard." If this were Microsoft, we'd give them a healthy helping of humble pie, but because it's Linux and the magic word "POSIX" gets used, I'm sure we'll forgive them for it. The workaround is laughable -- "call fsync(), and then wait(), wait(), wait(), for the Wizard to see you." How about writing a filesystem that actually does journaling in a reliable fashion, instead of finger-pointing after the user loses data due to your snazzy new optimization and say "The developer did it! It wasn't us, honest." Microsoft does it and we tar and feather them, but the guys making the "latest and greatest" Linux feature we salute them?
We let our own off with heineous mistakes while professionals who do the same thing we hang simply because they dared to ask to be paid for their effort. Lame.
It might be more accurate to say the OS does not manage or provide services for the SMM. Any code executing in the OS with sufficient access rights can make "unsafe" calls to trigger SMM events, or to any other hardware device in the system. The OS only recognizes the SMM to the point of saying "If you don't finish what you're doing within N clock ticks, I'll crash", and then it syncs with the clock upon the SMM releasing control back to the OSS. If it exceeded that timeframe, the OS simply throws its hands in the air and says "Frack you." Anything loaded into the SMM would have to be very compact, and would be incidentally detectable much the same way software can detect when it is running in a VM -- by looking for delays.
Wait... You have to get your code running in ring 0 and then you can do anything you could do with ring 0 access? Wow. Quite an exploit. -_- And a reboot removes the code.
These flaws have been reported in many mainstream press outlets, investigated by a half-dozen independent groups, and yet it was still cleared for use in state, county, and federal elections. Let's ignore Diebold for a minute -- I know plenty of other people here will (rightfully) hang them. This points to a major systemic flaw in our certification programs for voting machines. Period. End of discussion.
This isn't just Diebold. This is dozens of state, local, and federal agencies that abjectly failed in their duties to their constituents to protect the voting system. This is huge. Epic. I cannot stress enough the damage this has caused to the confidence in the system. Again, let's ignore Diebold and ask the really hard question -- Where do we go from here? Can e-voting systems be trusted? What changes need to be made to the system (and they better be major)? What do we do to restore voter confidence in a system that just got skinned, gutted, and mounted?
Terrorists? On MySpace? What, are they going to attack the train stations in their horned-rim glasses, striped shirts, excessive mascara, and tight girl pants? Unless they have the Perspective Gun (HHGTTG) that won't do a lot of damage. Really, even if they have razorblades they're just going to use them on themselves.
And Facebook. I can see it now...
11:15am - Jihad has been called! We are all so very excited, yes-m.
11:27am - is feeling very blue (they left to go get mcdonald's without me)
11:52am - Achmed didn't bring all the parts to build the bomb. We're watching House instead
12:56pm - Cutty really is a bitch! We must issue fatwa on her.
02:45pm - took nap. Unemployment called, they say I get free dollars. woo woo!
05:17pm - Achmed returns with rest of parts to build bomb, but comcast triple play package more fun
08:59pm - Got call from head of cell. Wants to know about bomb. What bomb? We lost bomb.
11:36pm - Go to bed. Really loving these american TV dinners.
Or not. Seriously -- we're just going to encrypt the crap out of everything in a few more years anyway, and the UK and other governments and piss off. Or we'll go back to having pseudonyms and fake identities online and only our friends will know the truth. *shrug* Terrorists... christ. I wish they would come and blow something up, just so we had the reminder they weren't entirely a figment of our imagination. In another 10 years, nobody will believe 09/11 happened because of all this screaming by politicians about 'teh terrorists' will have gotten so old people will start subconsciously rejecting anything to do with it.
And finally, what are you still doing here?
Protecting my investment in the rope manufacturing industry.
Don't let me keep you. I hear that Devry University is a stickler about tardiness.
That's good to know if I ever decide to enroll with you.
Shhhh!! It's just a talent contest for the geeks who didn't get to be in one in high school. Don't spoil their chance to wear a nice gown and walk down the aisle just once.
Because you need one to stand on?
No, it's just that I have to be somewhere in an hour and it's going to be hard to get into the car with a wrinkled troll with giant teeth still attached to my leg, hissing and drooling.
Please get off my leg.
It's still organic computing. We've already demonstrated that there are some classes of computational problems that are massively parallel and can benefit from the use of organic instead of synthetic design. This is decades-old news. The problem is doing this on a mass and automated scale, and then figuring out how to reintegrate these systems into the digital ones we use now. Digital systems are very fast, but lack capacity. Organic systems are very slow, but have incredible capacity. What's needed is a bridge between these two developing systems. The good news is... Research on organic computing has been very slow... people are far more interested in silicon right now, so there's no real rush.
If people are concerned about their privacy and don't trust Google then they will avoid google products. Plain and simple.
Ah, not necessarily. You assume that people care more about privacy than accessibility and ease of use. This fails to account for people that may be concerned about their privacy, don't trust google, but use it anyway because their level of risk (loss of privacy) is less than the amount of benefit in continuing to use Google. I could argue that market forces allow Google more egregious violations of privacy than its smaller competitors; And further that this is okay because people are making a conscious decision to sacrifice their privacy to gain the "google advantage" (apologies for the market-speak). Please carefully note I am not supporting either position here, merely informing you that they exist.
If the government steps in and starts requiring companies to comply with various privacy regulations etc. it will only serve to discourage new entry into the industry, helping Google to secure a monopoly on online services. It would do the exact opposite of what privacy advocates want.
Your health care records are protected by federal privacy laws. There is no monopoly (there IS a large broken system, however) in that area. As well, California has passed numerous privacy laws that do not seem to encourage monopolistic behavior. As long as the burden of protecting privacy does not create a significant addition to the total cost of entry for a new competitor into the market in question, this principle should be broadly applicable to all industries (including search engine / service providers).
There are lots of alternatives out there if you don't want Google to have access to all of your e-mail and search history etc.
I would argue they all suck. Google at least makes that information readily accessible and usable to me. The alternatives still get all my e-mail and search history, but I don't get even a cuddle afterwords.
We don't need the government to help us make these decisions.
And what decisions should the government "help us" on, if not in the area of civil rights and liberties, of which the Supreme Court has recognized privacy as an inalienable human right (even though there is no language in the constitution providing for it -- under the assertion that rights not specifically delegated to the State are reserved by the People).
We can think and choose for ourselves, and discussing these issues is the first step to informing people who don't know.
I would argue some of us are merely rearranging our prejudices in what passes for thought. And nowhere is discussion more valuable or prevalent than on the legislator's floor, or in his/her office.
Asking government to keep us safe helps to safe-guard public ignorance, since they know that Big Brother will always have their backs and thus there is no need to think, listen or do research for themselves. That spells a far worse privacy nightmare than the current situation.
The government, at least in theory, is of, for, and by the people. I don't think corporations can say the same. For privacy to be effective, it has to be universal. Because otherwise the economic incentive to people who aren't playing the "privacy game" will remain and so no lasting industry alliance will ever form. The only way to assure privacy across the board is to legislate it.
This thing won't be more than a novelty if it's light aeroframe can't survive an impact with one of those giant SUVs driven by some guy yelling at his girlfriend on a cell phone... You'll be the jelly between two pieces of fiberglass. Plus, until it can land on a public street, and pull into a parking spot, and then take off again on the same street, without violating the speed limit, I don't see it having much practicality to Joe Average.
That said... Good job. We here at Slashdot love seeing what bored engineers are capable of. Especially if it has high speed internet wired into it.
Footnote: I really hate Firefox's auto-spell check/fix. I meant their, not there, and "fish", not "finish". u_u I have now disabled that misfeature (again). Firefox likes to eat my config file and I wind up resetting my settings every month or so because of this.
Do you care about privacy? Enough to fork over your own money to watchdog organizations that hold potential privacy breachers accountable?
Yes and yes. I have donated to the EFF and the ACLU before, multiple times. I also participated in various privacy protests here locally in Minnesota and have written letters to my legislators on approximately a half-dozen occasions.
Basically your entire concern here is a strawman, albeit one that is may be rooted in your own naivete.
Sir, you need to accept that you just might not know what the hell you're talking about. You make an assumption about me based on nothing I have posted on this forum or online, I do not know you personally, so there is no way you could be aware of my level of involvement in these issues. I am not going to disclose my level of involvement here either beyond what I have stated above, but you may safely assume it is far above average for the demographic reading this post. Also, my "argument" -- such a big word for a simple observation -- is not a straw man. I have made no statement regarding the validity of EPIC's claims about Google. I am merely stating that EPIC has weakened their position by including monentary payment as a remedy. EPIC is a small-time lobbying group, and there are other organizations better suited and with lower administrative overhead, to representing my personal privacy needs... Which is why I have donated to those groups and not EPIC.
Well, these days, even EPIC could use a little bit of a bailout. As an AIG employee, it seems like a perfectly reasonable request to me. We cannot allow privacy groups to fail.
EPIC's gross income for FY2007 was less than a million dollars, and they have about $2 million in assets. They've been steadily losing ground in the donations department. A $5 million "public fund" they could dive into would assure there continued existance (and $128k yearly salary for their president) for some time. I think the financial motivation here is quite clear. Their relevance, however, is not. The ACLU, by comparison, had $80 million in revenue in Q3/07 alone. The administrative overhead is also lower, and they claim to also be advocating privacy. Frankly, EPIC is a tiny finish in a big pond--they need to grab headlines to survive, and attacking Google seems carefully calculated to do just that. Google's "do no evil" slogan opens themselves up to groups like this who want a handout and can manipulate the press to get Google to sign over some of their $5.2 BILLION in revenue for FY2008, and $12.1 BILLION in assets.
So for Google to pay them some hush money wouldn't even earn a mention in their financial highlights, but for EPIC, it would be, well, epic for them to pull in $5 million.
Instead, people seem to react as though the existence of climate change is somehow a political question rather than a scientific question.
It became political the moment it became obvious that it would cost something to fix. The evidence may not be in doubt, but like all finite resources, the mindset today is "take what you can now" -- not plan for tomorrow. The collapse of the social security system, medicaid, the global recession, all point to a fundamental lack of interest in the future. Politics globally has aquired a hedonistic taint. The evidence could be indisputable and as solid and proven as gravity but it wouldn't change people's reactions.
You know, I might have taken them a bit more seriously if the summary didn't end with and urged Google to donate $5 million to a public fund. So that's what it's about then -- money. Political statements that end in requests for donation do a good job of discrediting themselves simply because it's hard to believe that someone could be walking the high road of idealism while at the same time asking for a handout.
(woahoah! Any guess what their target market is? Any? at all?)
What, as if the price tag and pushing aesthetics (not a single real tech spec there) didn't give it away?