If this is accurate, there are only 256 possible keys! Wow. That is actually just like ROTX where X can be any number from 0 to 255. If the encryption is really that bad, I think you could make a strong argument that it is not actually encrypted at all. CSS looks like a well-honed 256-bit cipher in comparison. Jeez.
Looking at people as they pass by isn't one of them.
No, but stopping everybody and checking their ID is. I would argue that this system is much more like an identification checkpoint (which is illegal in general) that just innocent "people watching" as you seem to feel. Just because the ID check can be done faster than you can walk past the camera does not change the nature of the act.
The exact same thing happens to you that would happen to you now if a cop walking by thought you looked like some murderer.
Only, less often, since the software is more accurate.
I think this is hopelessly naive. The average cop has not memorized the faces of every single criminal who has a warrant out for them. I think the reality is that most cops probably wouldn't even recognize everyone on the FBI's most wanted list. As systems like this get deployed, you can be assured that various jurisdictions will pool all of their "wanted" info into a shared database. You won't just be having your face compared to the handful of local criminals who are wanted. Your face will be compared to the face of every wanted criminal in the entire country. Do you really think your local beat cops have memorized the mugs of every wanted person in the entire country? Because that is what your argument hinges on.
More importantly, if systems like this get to be widespread, some people can expect to get harrased by cops on a regular basis. If their face triggers the system, they will get stopped all the fsck'ing time.
I guess we're all OK with that as long as cops aren't allowed to use it, right?
Um, yeah? Why is that a strange idea? There is this little thing called the "Bill of Rights", which is primarily a list of things we don't let the government do. Granted, some corporations now seem to be attaining a level of power which approches that of the goverenment. But I digress. There are lots of things which priviate citizens are allowed to do which the goverenment is not.
You are forgetting, the quantum key exchange is based on sending single photons! If alice sends a photon to bob, eve can't see it in her telescope. Why? Because the photon went to bob's telescope, not eve's!
If you send lots of photons for each bit, so that multiple copies of each photon are available to both bob and eve, then eve can crack the key! Eve can just receive multiple copies of the photon, and perform all three polarization tests which bob might perform, and the whole thing falls apart.
Remember, quantum crypto is based on sending single photons. That's why it works. Alice measures a photon and then sends that exact same photon to bob. Not a copy. Not a hundred copies. Certainly not enough that anybody with a telescope for five miles can see it! One photon.
So, how do you broadcast a single photon everywhere? That's the key. If you send the message everywhere, you are obviously not sending single photons. If you can send a single photon reliably from point a to point b, you have figured out how to make sure it doesn't get lost in between.
No, I'm not a reading major (which I don't think exists). But my english comprehension is pretty good, which is why I don't think this story makes sense.
In the fiber-optic version of quantum crypto, each key bit is obtained from alice creating a single photon, measuring it, and sending it to bob to measure. Although I'm sure it's quite tricky, it's not hard to imagine putting a single photon into a fiber, and being able to detect that single photon at the other end.
But how the hell are you supposed to do this via a satellite? I find it simply incomprehensible that a single photon could be successfully bounced off of a satellite and detected when it hit the Earth. Or even successfully shot between two points on the Earth. And if you can manage to send single photons between two points, why not just send plaintext? Sure, someone might tap a fiber without your knowledge. But "tapping" open space without anyone noticing?
Hmmm, boss, there seems to be a van with dark windows parked between alice and bob. Maybe we should stop transmitting? Dont' get me wrong, quantum crypt is neat stuff. And I definitely think it has applications. But not for sending messages thru open space. By the time you have solved the engineering problem of sending single photons reliably over long distances outside, the crypto is meaningless. If you want to see if any one is listening, just look. If your enemies figure out how to make their eavesdropping equipment invisible, you have bigger problems to deal with!
So, there are no adverse affects to humans from herbicides and pesticides at all? Is that your claim? If I look at a package of pesticide it won't have any warnings on it because it isn't toxic right? You should perhaps read up a little bit on the history of the industry. The current chemical-oriented focus in farming is actually a biproduct of the military buildup of WWII and after. Factories which had produced explosives for bombs during WWII converted to producing nitrogen-based fertilizer after the war. The compounds are remarkably similar. A lot of pesticides are related to chemical warfare compounds. Don't believe me? Here's a link documenting which pesticides the FBI belives to be most likely to be used by a terrorist in a chemical warfare attack: FBI contacts for suspicious pesticide/OP nerve gas incidents Or perhaps this article in which the Pentagon claims the level of sarin gas troops were exposed to in the Persian Gulf is safe because it's below the limit established for pesticide workers? Pentagon notifying 100,000 soldiers of possible nerve gas exposure? Or perhaps when CNN simply says Pesticide similar to nerve gas you will be convinced?
So, you can claim I am overreacting by calling herbicide and pesticdes poisons. But, in fact, it is you who is underreacting.
Giving the example of penicillin isn't the best either. After all, it is a controlled substance which you can only obtain upon the recommendation of an expert. And he can only give you permission to use it because it has been thru years of extensive testing to determine safe ways to use it. As soon as biotech firms sign up to have their GMO's tested as extensively as penicillin has been, I'll stop worrying so much about it.
Actually, one of the main uses of genetic engineering so far is to make plants produce poison. Or were you under the impression that herbicides and pesticides were not poisonous?
The current spin the biotech industry is just that: spin. They are trying as hard as they can to put a happy smiley face on bioengineered food. At the same time, they are fighting against all efforts at regulation, testing, and labeling. That's where the problem is. Not that the technology is used at all, but that they want to be able to produce these organisms, release them into the wild, and sell them as food without any regulatory oversight at all.
That's what really gets people upset. These companies will tell you how wonderful and necessary GMOs are, and then in the next breath tell you how it's just like selective breeding and hence should not be regulated. Then take a look at their patent portfolios, and how they require farmers to license the seeds instead of buying them. Go read the Rambus article just above this one, because the biotech industry is full of the same greed and duplicity. These people are a bunch of greedy liars and cannot be trusted with our food supply.
And that part number will be for a single-mode part. That was my issue. It sounds like you know what you are talking about, so I assume it's just a mistake. But really, when it's all said and done, you still can't show me a multimode part number that goes any significant distance. No body runs wide-area multimode fiber, it just doesn't work. Makeing comments like you did, I almost started to think you worked for Qworst.
It seems pretty clear that M$ is trying very hard confuse the issue of when the GPL kicks in. In reality, the GPL affects very few potential users of GPL software. If a company uses Linux as a server OS, or serves their web pages with Apache, or edits their files with Emacs, then the GPL has basically no effect.
But, this reality is not helpful to M$'s propaganda. So, they are intentially confusing the issue of when the "viral" part of the GPL kicks in. It only applies if you are writing software which includes source code which is GPL. The reality is that very few companies are in the business of selling software. The vast majority of companies are merely end users, and these are the companies M$ is trying to scare.
Notice how they frame their restriction:
(ii) not using Potentially Viral Software (e.g. tools) to develop Recipient software
The confusion is created with the vague use of the word use. For most companies, use means to simply run a program. That's what I think of when I talk about "using" a program. I "use" Linux. I "use" MSWord. I "use" Windows. Technically, I'm sure they will claim that use means "include source code in another program" if pressed, since that is the only time that their claims are true. But, you will see these claims made again and again with vague references to "using" GPL software.
We can hope this will backfire on them. After all, it's really a non-issue. If you are in the software development business, you damn well better read and understand the license on any source code you plan to include in your product, GPL or not. On the other hand, if you are just and end user of software, the GPL is about as close to public domain as you can possibly get. The mere "use" (i.e. running) of GPL software creates no obligations on the user. Contrast this to the EULA that M$ applies to all users. M$ is the one that requires users to agree to pages of dense legalese to understand what circumstances they can run the software under, not the open source community.
No, they are not the same thing at all. Getting a bill for $450 dollars is not the same thing as having all the money taken out of your checking account without your knowledge or consent. I think what you mean is that, in theory, they are the same. In fact, they are not the same at all. In one case, you are in the very strong barganing position of requiring the other party to sue you if they want to force you to give up the money. In the other case, you are in the very weak position of being A) broke, and B) having to convince either them or your bank to give the money back.
If you still are not convinced, compare these two scenarios:
1) I send you a bogus bill for $500 dollars.
2) I steal $500 dollars in cash from you.
If you think these are the same, you live in a fantasy land. Debit cards are just a way for Visa et al. to get the benefit of credit cards (a tax on all purchases) without any of the risk (fraudulent use and bad debt.) They are not for the consumers benefit at all.
The technical term for a debit card is "dumbass card". The risks of using these cards is so vast is isn't even funny. I can't believe that they are even legal. It's is exactly as bad as including a book of blank pre-signed checks with every payment you make.
If he had used a credit card, he could have just refused to pay. Then, it would be ACME that has to go to court and justify the $450.00. But, since he used a debit card he is probably SOL. Even if he gets his $450 back, he'll have to give it to his lawyer. Also, notice that it says his account was "drained". It's quite possible that ACME just took as much money as it could. If he had had $4500 in his account, they probably would be claiming that they clocked him speeding 30 times instead of three.
"Yes, your honor. He was speeding at 4:13, again at 4:17-4:18, 4:20-4:23, etc. etc. It's all here in the logs."
Bah. I have no sympathy for the rental company, and hope the guy gets his money back. But, he is a dope for using a debit card.
You are absolutely right when you say that production and distribution of cocaine, etc. have serious geo-political, social and criminal side effects. Which is precisely why they should be legalized. The illegal drug trade is causing serious problem and is in desparate need of regulation. That's right, we need to regulate the drug trade.
The reality is that the trade is currently almost completely devoid of meaningful regulation. By pushing the market underground, we have made it impossible to monitor and regulate the drug business. Why aren't drug manufactures following relevant environmental regulations? Why aren't drug importers and exporters sending their products thru customs like other importers and exporters? Why aren't they paying duties and tariffs? Why aren't the marketers required to get licenses to sell like other retailers and wholesellers? Why aren't any taxes being collected? Why aren't food and drug safety/purity laws being applied to these products?
These are the questions that drug warriors will refuse to answer. By persisting in the fantasy that the drug trade can somehow be eliminated, the drug trade is allowed to run amok almost completely free of regulation. Then, the damaged caused by the lack of regulation is used as "proof" that we shouldn't legalize and regulate these markets. Total bullshit thinking. The only beneficiaries of these policies are the drug dealers and manufactures and the prison-industrial complex. The drug dealers because they get to skip all the regulations that normal businesses have to follow, and they benefit from the increased profits brought about by the inflation that criminialization brings. The cops and prisons benefit from the perpetual inflation in their budgets and power which come from fighting the endless drug war. And it will never be one. Make no mistake: the only way out is "give up" and begin regulating these markets like we do the markets in other potentially dangerous goods.
You can make up whatever definition you want for monopoly, but legally the absolute absence of competition is not required. AT&T never had 100% of the market, yet they were regulated as a monopoly. Most utilities do not have absolute monopolies, because after all, you can always buy bottled water and run your own generator! But this does not excuse them from being regulated as a monopoly.
The simple fact is that Microsoft has been legally found to be a monopoly. Even if the appeals court finds that they have not abused that monolpoly, it is unlikely that they will reverse the finding that they are in fact a monopoly. So, the fact remains, Microsoft is a monopoly. That is a legal fact. You can say otherwise all you want, but the existence of their monopoly is a simple fact.
As long as ISP's let their customers forge the source addresses, this problem will continue. It's not really that big of a deal if the hacker pretends to be Bob next door. Any ISP worth it's salt can track down the true source of any traffic inside their network. And, if the network portion of the address is correct, I know which ISP to call to report the problem.
The reason DDoS attacks are as bad as they are is due almost entirely to lazy ISP's who don't do ingress filtering. The days of routers not being fast enough to do simple filtering is long past. I personally think ISP's should be held liable for allowing their customers to send out spoofed packets. Maybe then the situation would improve.
As somebody who has had to deal with the fallout of these attacks more than once, I would say no. They are never justified. If you are flooding enough traffic to affect the target, you are almost certainly affecting lots of other people who just happen to share a pipe with the target. If you DoS some web site, what do you think that does to other sites on the same server? Other folks who just happen to be at the same co-lo site? What about the folks who just happen to have the same local or upstream ISP? Is it OK for me to DoS you because I don't like your neighbor? Is it OK for me to DoS all of optonline.net because I don't like your political views?
Even if you accept the premise that it's OK to DoS innocent people, a DoS is a piss-poor political statement. No body is going to notice at all. If I find that riaa.org is unreachable, am I going to suddenly telepathetically reach some conclusion about their politics? No. If you want to make a political statement, you have to actual say something. Merely screaming nothing at the top of your lungs accomplishes nothing.
1) The telephony-only version of Clipper was merely the first to market and the most well known. There were also data-oriented versions designed, referred to as "Capstone" chips, which were put into PCMCIA cards known as "Fortezza" cards. I actually have marketing liturature at home from Mykotronix (the chip foundry for Clipper chips.)
2) True, in that it is harder to spy on people using Clipper than it is to spy on people using no encryption at all. The goal of the program was not to encourage people to start using encryption. The goal was to get Clipper-based products into the market to forstall the adoption of products without LEAF features. As the article states, outlawing non-LEAF encryption was clearly discussed.
Of course, the slow uptake of encryption in the mass market despite the failure of Clipper indicates that maybe they had nothing to worry about. On the other hand, we might see a surge in the use of encryption at any time now. The CPU and network speeds are certainly there now to handle the overhead. Look at the success of SSH. I think nothing now of encrypting all of my files during transit using scp now. A few years ago, the performance overhead was significant. Now, it's minor.
If your PHB's like passing audits, perhaps you should invite the BSA to have M$ over for a little audit party? After all, these audits are for their own good, and they should be more than willing to pay such a small price for quality software and peace of mind, right?
Perception is everything, and the perception that M$'s ever-tightening licensing demands coupled with their ever-faster upgrade cycles and ever-more-aggressive lawyers is a significant cost of their "solution" needs to be reinforced. If M$ can be egged into reinforcing that perception themselves, that's even better;-)>
But what would be the motivation for a court to do that? I'll admit, if someone was to release code without properly marking it as copyrighted, it's possible for it to be declared public domain. I suppose. But it's hard to imagine given the reverence paid to copyright. Also, it wouldn't be a GPL matter at all. It's just as likely to happen with a shareware binary, or even a demo-only binary.
There is basically zero chance that Sony would try to get the GPL overturned in court. The reason why is simple. If they go to court and get the license declared invalid, they no longer have any rights to distribute the source of binary at all! This is why the GPL will never be tested in court. They will either comply, or they will stop distributing the emulator. But they won't go to court.
Think about it. If not for the privilges granted to them by the GPL, they would be committing criminal copyright violations by redistributing the code or the binary! You would have to have the dumbest lawyers in the world to trade up from a civil suit (violation of a license agreement) to a criminal copyright violation. Duh. The GPL will never end up in court. Unlike a normal software license which only takes rights away, the GPL grants rights which Sony is relying on to redistribute the code. The same is true for every company which is redistributing GPL'd code.
The only one of the watermark systems that the SDMI folks care about is the Verance system. The others are almost childish in their simplicity, and were probably never serious contenders. On the other hand, the Verance watermark is apparently already in use. The question is, on what? I've heard DVD-Audio. Does this mean that all DVD-Audio discs have a Verance watermark? Or only some?
Given that it is possible to go and buy media with the Verance watermark, and that the same music is almost certainly available in other watermark-free formats, it should be possible to redo this work without any complications arising from the "Hack SDMI" agreement.
It sounds like Princeton is willing to stand behind Prof. Felton, but some of his collaborators' sponsers aren't so brave. By redoing the work with a Princeton-only crew and new media, those issues would disappear. A new paper could be written on the Verance watermark. Such a paper would clearly be legal, for many reasons. The Verance watermark tech is patented, which means cries of "trade secret" are BS. Not to mention that no devices on the market use the watermark to control "access", so right now code which removes the watermark could not be considered a circumvention device. After all, what is is circumventing? Nothing! Finally, even the corrupt DMCA is full of verbiage allowing academic research. The SDMI folks don't stand a chance in court.
Most people figure, what's the big deal with a supermarket knowing what I buy? Well, the reality is that the supermarket couldn't care less what you buy. But, other companies do care, and they buy that information. What companies might be interested? Well, the one that's really scary is the insurance companies. I bet that a person's food-buying habits provides some excellent information about their health, and the likely long-term cost of insuring their health care. I don't know of any companies doing this for sure, but the insurance companies really have both a legal and fiduciary responsibility to shareholders to at least investigate the predictive value of the data.
So, next time you think those cards are just going to earn you a bunch of junk mail, think again.
I'm quite aware of how akamai works, you are right that "primary" content is not normally hosted on their servers. However, the helix-update program goes to whatever URL is built into it. It could just as easily be http://a1234.akamai.net/helix/mirrors.xml instead of http://spidermonkey.helixcode.com/mirrors.xml They just have to stuff a copy into the same directory as the rest of the files they copy to akamai.
Remember, we are not talking about web pages here. The fact that HTTP is being used is irrelevant. There is no real "first page" in the normal sense.
Slashdot Mirror
If this is accurate, there are only 256 possible keys! Wow. That is actually just like ROTX where X can be any number from 0 to 255. If the encryption is really that bad, I think you could make a strong argument that it is not actually encrypted at all. CSS looks like a well-honed 256-bit cipher in comparison. Jeez.
Looking at people as they pass by isn't one of them.
No, but stopping everybody and checking their ID is. I would argue that this system is much more like an identification checkpoint (which is illegal in general) that just innocent "people watching" as you seem to feel. Just because the ID check can be done faster than you can walk past the camera does not change the nature of the act.
The exact same thing happens to you that would happen to you now if a cop walking by thought you looked like some murderer.
Only, less often, since the software is more accurate.
I think this is hopelessly naive. The average cop has not memorized the faces of every single criminal who has a warrant out for them. I think the reality is that most cops probably wouldn't even recognize everyone on the FBI's most wanted list. As systems like this get deployed, you can be assured that various jurisdictions will pool all of their "wanted" info into a shared database. You won't just be having your face compared to the handful of local criminals who are wanted. Your face will be compared to the face of every wanted criminal in the entire country. Do you really think your local beat cops have memorized the mugs of every wanted person in the entire country? Because that is what your argument hinges on.
More importantly, if systems like this get to be widespread, some people can expect to get harrased by cops on a regular basis. If their face triggers the system, they will get stopped all the fsck'ing time.
I guess we're all OK with that as long as cops aren't allowed to use it, right?
Um, yeah? Why is that a strange idea? There is this little thing called the "Bill of Rights", which is primarily a list of things we don't let the government do. Granted, some corporations now seem to be attaining a level of power which approches that of the goverenment. But I digress. There are lots of things which priviate citizens are allowed to do which the goverenment is not.
You are forgetting, the quantum key exchange is based on sending single photons! If alice sends a photon to bob, eve can't see it in her telescope. Why? Because the photon went to bob's telescope, not eve's!
If you send lots of photons for each bit, so that multiple copies of each photon are available to both bob and eve, then eve can crack the key! Eve can just receive multiple copies of the photon, and perform all three polarization tests which bob might perform, and the whole thing falls apart.
Remember, quantum crypto is based on sending single photons. That's why it works. Alice measures a photon and then sends that exact same photon to bob. Not a copy. Not a hundred copies. Certainly not enough that anybody with a telescope for five miles can see it! One photon.
So, how do you broadcast a single photon everywhere? That's the key. If you send the message everywhere, you are obviously not sending single photons. If you can send a single photon reliably from point a to point b, you have figured out how to make sure it doesn't get lost in between.
No, I'm not a reading major (which I don't think exists). But my english comprehension is pretty good, which is why I don't think this story makes sense.
In the fiber-optic version of quantum crypto, each key bit is obtained from alice creating a single photon, measuring it, and sending it to bob to measure. Although I'm sure it's quite tricky, it's not hard to imagine putting a single photon into a fiber, and being able to detect that single photon at the other end.
But how the hell are you supposed to do this via a satellite? I find it simply incomprehensible that a single photon could be successfully bounced off of a satellite and detected when it hit the Earth. Or even successfully shot between two points on the Earth. And if you can manage to send single photons between two points, why not just send plaintext? Sure, someone might tap a fiber without your knowledge. But "tapping" open space without anyone noticing?
Hmmm, boss, there seems to be a van with dark windows parked between alice and bob. Maybe we should stop transmitting? Dont' get me wrong, quantum crypt is neat stuff. And I definitely think it has applications. But not for sending messages thru open space. By the time you have solved the engineering problem of sending single photons reliably over long distances outside, the crypto is meaningless. If you want to see if any one is listening, just look. If your enemies figure out how to make their eavesdropping equipment invisible, you have bigger problems to deal with!
So, there are no adverse affects to humans from herbicides and pesticides at all? Is that your claim? If I look at a package of pesticide it won't have any warnings on it because it isn't toxic right? You should perhaps read up a little bit on the history of the industry. The current chemical-oriented focus in farming is actually a biproduct of the military buildup of WWII and after. Factories which had produced explosives for bombs during WWII converted to producing nitrogen-based fertilizer after the war. The compounds are remarkably similar. A lot of pesticides are related to chemical warfare compounds. Don't believe me? Here's a link documenting which pesticides the FBI belives to be most likely to be used by a terrorist in a chemical warfare attack: FBI contacts for suspicious pesticide/OP nerve gas incidents Or perhaps this article in which the Pentagon claims the level of sarin gas troops were exposed to in the Persian Gulf is safe because it's below the limit established for pesticide workers? Pentagon notifying 100,000 soldiers of possible nerve gas exposure? Or perhaps when CNN simply says Pesticide similar to nerve gas you will be convinced?
So, you can claim I am overreacting by calling herbicide and pesticdes poisons. But, in fact, it is you who is underreacting.
Giving the example of penicillin isn't the best either. After all, it is a controlled substance which you can only obtain upon the recommendation of an expert. And he can only give you permission to use it because it has been thru years of extensive testing to determine safe ways to use it. As soon as biotech firms sign up to have their GMO's tested as extensively as penicillin has been, I'll stop worrying so much about it.
Actually, one of the main uses of genetic engineering so far is to make plants produce poison. Or were you under the impression that herbicides and pesticides were not poisonous?
The current spin the biotech industry is just that: spin. They are trying as hard as they can to put a happy smiley face on bioengineered food. At the same time, they are fighting against all efforts at regulation, testing, and labeling. That's where the problem is. Not that the technology is used at all, but that they want to be able to produce these organisms, release them into the wild, and sell them as food without any regulatory oversight at all.
That's what really gets people upset. These companies will tell you how wonderful and necessary GMOs are, and then in the next breath tell you how it's just like selective breeding and hence should not be regulated. Then take a look at their patent portfolios, and how they require farmers to license the seeds instead of buying them. Go read the Rambus article just above this one, because the biotech industry is full of the same greed and duplicity. These people are a bunch of greedy liars and cannot be trusted with our food supply.
And that part number will be for a single-mode part. That was my issue. It sounds like you know what you are talking about, so I assume it's just a mistake. But really, when it's all said and done, you still can't show me a multimode part number that goes any significant distance. No body runs wide-area multimode fiber, it just doesn't work. Makeing comments like you did, I almost started to think you worked for Qworst.
Bullshit. Show me a part number for a multimode anything that goes 200Km. Go ahead. I dare you.
It seems pretty clear that M$ is trying very hard confuse the issue of when the GPL kicks in. In reality, the GPL affects very few potential users of GPL software. If a company uses Linux as a server OS, or serves their web pages with Apache, or edits their files with Emacs, then the GPL has basically no effect.
But, this reality is not helpful to M$'s propaganda. So, they are intentially confusing the issue of when the "viral" part of the GPL kicks in. It only applies if you are writing software which includes source code which is GPL. The reality is that very few companies are in the business of selling software. The vast majority of companies are merely end users, and these are the companies M$ is trying to scare.
Notice how they frame their restriction:
(ii) not using Potentially Viral Software (e.g. tools) to develop Recipient software
The confusion is created with the vague use of the word use. For most companies, use means to simply run a program. That's what I think of when I talk about "using" a program. I "use" Linux. I "use" MSWord. I "use" Windows. Technically, I'm sure they will claim that use means "include source code in another program" if pressed, since that is the only time that their claims are true. But, you will see these claims made again and again with vague references to "using" GPL software.
We can hope this will backfire on them. After all, it's really a non-issue. If you are in the software development business, you damn well better read and understand the license on any source code you plan to include in your product, GPL or not. On the other hand, if you are just and end user of software, the GPL is about as close to public domain as you can possibly get. The mere "use" (i.e. running) of GPL software creates no obligations on the user. Contrast this to the EULA that M$ applies to all users. M$ is the one that requires users to agree to pages of dense legalese to understand what circumstances they can run the software under, not the open source community.
No, they are not the same thing at all. Getting a bill for $450 dollars is not the same thing as having all the money taken out of your checking account without your knowledge or consent. I think what you mean is that, in theory, they are the same. In fact, they are not the same at all. In one case, you are in the very strong barganing position of requiring the other party to sue you if they want to force you to give up the money. In the other case, you are in the very weak position of being A) broke, and B) having to convince either them or your bank to give the money back.
If you still are not convinced, compare these two scenarios:
1) I send you a bogus bill for $500 dollars.
2) I steal $500 dollars in cash from you.
If you think these are the same, you live in a fantasy land. Debit cards are just a way for Visa et al. to get the benefit of credit cards (a tax on all purchases) without any of the risk (fraudulent use and bad debt.) They are not for the consumers benefit at all.
The technical term for a debit card is "dumbass card". The risks of using these cards is so vast is isn't even funny. I can't believe that they are even legal. It's is exactly as bad as including a book of blank pre-signed checks with every payment you make.
If he had used a credit card, he could have just refused to pay. Then, it would be ACME that has to go to court and justify the $450.00. But, since he used a debit card he is probably SOL. Even if he gets his $450 back, he'll have to give it to his lawyer. Also, notice that it says his account was "drained". It's quite possible that ACME just took as much money as it could. If he had had $4500 in his account, they probably would be claiming that they clocked him speeding 30 times instead of three.
"Yes, your honor. He was speeding at 4:13, again at 4:17-4:18, 4:20-4:23, etc. etc. It's all here in the logs."
Bah. I have no sympathy for the rental company, and hope the guy gets his money back. But, he is a dope for using a debit card.
You are absolutely right when you say that production and distribution of cocaine, etc. have serious geo-political, social and criminal side effects. Which is precisely why they should be legalized. The illegal drug trade is causing serious problem and is in desparate need of regulation. That's right, we need to regulate the drug trade.
The reality is that the trade is currently almost completely devoid of meaningful regulation. By pushing the market underground, we have made it impossible to monitor and regulate the drug business. Why aren't drug manufactures following relevant environmental regulations? Why aren't drug importers and exporters sending their products thru customs like other importers and exporters? Why aren't they paying duties and tariffs? Why aren't the marketers required to get licenses to sell like other retailers and wholesellers? Why aren't any taxes being collected? Why aren't food and drug safety/purity laws being applied to these products?
These are the questions that drug warriors will refuse to answer. By persisting in the fantasy that the drug trade can somehow be eliminated, the drug trade is allowed to run amok almost completely free of regulation. Then, the damaged caused by the lack of regulation is used as "proof" that we shouldn't legalize and regulate these markets. Total bullshit thinking. The only beneficiaries of these policies are the drug dealers and manufactures and the prison-industrial complex. The drug dealers because they get to skip all the regulations that normal businesses have to follow, and they benefit from the increased profits brought about by the inflation that criminialization brings. The cops and prisons benefit from the perpetual inflation in their budgets and power which come from fighting the endless drug war. And it will never be one. Make no mistake: the only way out is "give up" and begin regulating these markets like we do the markets in other potentially dangerous goods.
You can make up whatever definition you want for monopoly, but legally the absolute absence of competition is not required. AT&T never had 100% of the market, yet they were regulated as a monopoly. Most utilities do not have absolute monopolies, because after all, you can always buy bottled water and run your own generator! But this does not excuse them from being regulated as a monopoly.
The simple fact is that Microsoft has been legally found to be a monopoly. Even if the appeals court finds that they have not abused that monolpoly, it is unlikely that they will reverse the finding that they are in fact a monopoly. So, the fact remains, Microsoft is a monopoly. That is a legal fact. You can say otherwise all you want, but the existence of their monopoly is a simple fact.
It would also be trivial to modify DeCSS so that it would never open a file. If it's only output is to STDOUT, this argument goes right out the door.
As long as ISP's let their customers forge the source addresses, this problem will continue. It's not really that big of a deal if the hacker pretends to be Bob next door. Any ISP worth it's salt can track down the true source of any traffic inside their network. And, if the network portion of the address is correct, I know which ISP to call to report the problem.
The reason DDoS attacks are as bad as they are is due almost entirely to lazy ISP's who don't do ingress filtering. The days of routers not being fast enough to do simple filtering is long past. I personally think ISP's should be held liable for allowing their customers to send out spoofed packets. Maybe then the situation would improve.
As somebody who has had to deal with the fallout of these attacks more than once, I would say no. They are never justified. If you are flooding enough traffic to affect the target, you are almost certainly affecting lots of other people who just happen to share a pipe with the target. If you DoS some web site, what do you think that does to other sites on the same server? Other folks who just happen to be at the same co-lo site? What about the folks who just happen to have the same local or upstream ISP? Is it OK for me to DoS you because I don't like your neighbor? Is it OK for me to DoS all of optonline.net because I don't like your political views?
Even if you accept the premise that it's OK to DoS innocent people, a DoS is a piss-poor political statement. No body is going to notice at all. If I find that riaa.org is unreachable, am I going to suddenly telepathetically reach some conclusion about their politics? No. If you want to make a political statement, you have to actual say something. Merely screaming nothing at the top of your lungs accomplishes nothing.
Ummm, you are a little off on both counts.
1) The telephony-only version of Clipper was merely the first to market and the most well known. There were also data-oriented versions designed, referred to as "Capstone" chips, which were put into PCMCIA cards known as "Fortezza" cards. I actually have marketing liturature at home from Mykotronix (the chip foundry for Clipper chips.)
2) True, in that it is harder to spy on people using Clipper than it is to spy on people using no encryption at all. The goal of the program was not to encourage people to start using encryption. The goal was to get Clipper-based products into the market to forstall the adoption of products without LEAF features. As the article states, outlawing non-LEAF encryption was clearly discussed.
Of course, the slow uptake of encryption in the mass market despite the failure of Clipper indicates that maybe they had nothing to worry about. On the other hand, we might see a surge in the use of encryption at any time now. The CPU and network speeds are certainly there now to handle the overhead. Look at the success of SSH. I think nothing now of encrypting all of my files during transit using scp now. A few years ago, the performance overhead was significant. Now, it's minor.
If your PHB's like passing audits, perhaps you should invite the BSA to have M$ over for a little audit party? After all, these audits are for their own good, and they should be more than willing to pay such a small price for quality software and peace of mind, right?
;-)>
Perception is everything, and the perception that M$'s ever-tightening licensing demands coupled with their ever-faster upgrade cycles and ever-more-aggressive lawyers is a significant cost of their "solution" needs to be reinforced. If M$ can be egged into reinforcing that perception themselves, that's even better
But what would be the motivation for a court to do that? I'll admit, if someone was to release code without properly marking it as copyrighted, it's possible for it to be declared public domain. I suppose. But it's hard to imagine given the reverence paid to copyright. Also, it wouldn't be a GPL matter at all. It's just as likely to happen with a shareware binary, or even a demo-only binary.
There is basically zero chance that Sony would try to get the GPL overturned in court. The reason why is simple. If they go to court and get the license declared invalid, they no longer have any rights to distribute the source of binary at all! This is why the GPL will never be tested in court. They will either comply, or they will stop distributing the emulator. But they won't go to court.
Think about it. If not for the privilges granted to them by the GPL, they would be committing criminal copyright violations by redistributing the code or the binary! You would have to have the dumbest lawyers in the world to trade up from a civil suit (violation of a license agreement) to a criminal copyright violation. Duh. The GPL will never end up in court. Unlike a normal software license which only takes rights away, the GPL grants rights which Sony is relying on to redistribute the code. The same is true for every company which is redistributing GPL'd code.
The only one of the watermark systems that the SDMI folks care about is the Verance system. The others are almost childish in their simplicity, and were probably never serious contenders. On the other hand, the Verance watermark is apparently already in use. The question is, on what? I've heard DVD-Audio. Does this mean that all DVD-Audio discs have a Verance watermark? Or only some?
Given that it is possible to go and buy media with the Verance watermark, and that the same music is almost certainly available in other watermark-free formats, it should be possible to redo this work without any complications arising from the "Hack SDMI" agreement.
It sounds like Princeton is willing to stand behind Prof. Felton, but some of his collaborators' sponsers aren't so brave. By redoing the work with a Princeton-only crew and new media, those issues would disappear. A new paper could be written on the Verance watermark. Such a paper would clearly be legal, for many reasons. The Verance watermark tech is patented, which means cries of "trade secret" are BS. Not to mention that no devices on the market use the watermark to control "access", so right now code which removes the watermark could not be considered a circumvention device. After all, what is is circumventing? Nothing! Finally, even the corrupt DMCA is full of verbiage allowing academic research. The SDMI folks don't stand a chance in court.
Most people figure, what's the big deal with a supermarket knowing what I buy? Well, the reality is that the supermarket couldn't care less what you buy. But, other companies do care, and they buy that information. What companies might be interested? Well, the one that's really scary is the insurance companies. I bet that a person's food-buying habits provides some excellent information about their health, and the likely long-term cost of insuring their health care. I don't know of any companies doing this for sure, but the insurance companies really have both a legal and fiduciary responsibility to shareholders to at least investigate the predictive value of the data.
So, next time you think those cards are just going to earn you a bunch of junk mail, think again.
I'm quite aware of how akamai works, you are right that "primary" content is not normally hosted on their servers. However, the helix-update program goes to whatever URL is built into it. It could just as easily be http://a1234.akamai.net/helix/mirrors.xml instead of http://spidermonkey.helixcode.com/mirrors.xml They just have to stuff a copy into the same directory as the rest of the files they copy to akamai.
Remember, we are not talking about web pages here. The fact that HTTP is being used is irrelevant. There is no real "first page" in the normal sense.