If I load an image or a link from spam, it's possible that a spammer could be validating my e-mail address for future sale, or perhaps increased spamming since he knows someone is actually reading the message
Except that once many people have the auto-URL'ing filters, this would no longer be true. The spammer wouldn't be able to tell if you were responding to his email or if it was just your filter checking for spamminess and automatically throwing the email away afterwards. (Presumably 99.9% the hits he got would be the latter)
Who cares about the code? If the machines generated a voter-verified paper trail, you could check the results for accuracy. Since they don't, you can never be sure that the results were correct, no matter how carefully the source was scrutinized.
Once upon a time there was a village in the countryside. It was a pleasant enough village, but there was no convenient source of running water. In order to get a drink of water, the villagers had to walk five miles to the nearest river, which was very inconvenient. So one day all the villagers got together and decided to build a water pipeline from the river to the village. Everybody pitched in, from the richest to the poorest. After several years of hard work, the pipeline was finished. Now everybody in the village could enjoy fresh, clean water any time they wanted, without having to trudge five miles. Everybody was happy.
Then, one day, one of the villagers announced that certain pieces of the pipeline were his, and had been used without his permission. Because of that, he said, the pipeline belonged to him, and anybody who wanted to get water from it had to pay him ten dollars for each bucket of water they took from the pipeline. The villagers offered to replace his stolen pipe sections with their own spare sections, and return the stolen ones to him, but the villager didn't want that -- in fact, he refused to even tell the other villagers which sections were the stolen ones. "Just pay me the money you owe me", he said, "and I'll let you use my pipeline."
The villagers gathered together again, to determine what to do about this new problem. After several minutes of debate, a plan was devised. That night, they went to the villager's house with torches and pitchforks, burned it to the ground, and fed the villager to the stray dogs.
However, simply giving copies of the software away and saying that it's just a free copy is also a bad idea, and I'll tell you why: It gives the commercial software industry a lever against open source. If we appear to be encouraging the free copying of *any* software, we could be accused of the same things that P2P developers have been
Um, no. I don't think that follows, not even in today's lawyer-happy society. Giving away GPL'd software has nothing to do with encouraging copyright infringements -- in fact, it discourages software piracy, since someone with a legal copy of a GPL'd program has less incentive to pirate the equivalent commercial program.
Oooh, insurance is so evil. Guess what, if you hate it, don't buy it!
Well, actually it is -- okay, maybe not evil, but unworkable. The whole idea of insurance is based on the assumption that bad things can't be predicted in advance. As medical science and DNA techniques become more widely used and reliable, this assumption becomes less and less true. Eventually every genetic disease will be predictable with 100% accuracy, at which point health insurance will be useless, because the only people who can get it will be those who don't need it. At that point, I think universal health coverage will be the only workable option.
wow, clever how you thought to change rights management to restriction management.
No more clever than the original creators of DRM implementing a method to restrict what you do with your own property and putting the word "rights" into the name to insinuate that doing so somehow empowers you.
If you can control the words people use, you can (to a degree) control what they think. Orwell knew this, Bush knows this, Microsoft knows this, and now, you know it.
So, the USA is consuming the lion's share of a global resource, and doesn't see any need to change its ways because most of the pain is being felt elsewhere.
English is not a language. Or rather, it resembles one but is more not than is, IMO. It is a large collection of idiomatic expressions that changes quite rapidly
You are actually arguing that English is not a dead language. Every language that is actually in use by large numbers of people is as you describe.
Actually this system reminds me a lot of the good old Bayesian Spam detector algorithms... but instead of trying to determine what category of content an email contains, the statistical classifier is trying to determine (e.g.) what English phrase a Russian phrase most closely matches.
Given the impressive progress made by Bayesian algorithms in spam detection, I wouldn't be surprised to see impressive results from this method either.
So bravo for Franz Och! He's taken what appeared to be an intractible problem requiring magic AI to solve, and perhaps found a way to solve it effectively using the stupid brute force methods computers are so good at.
Using SCO software is a bad idea for the same reason Windows is a bad idea -- if you feed the alligator, the best thing you can hope for is that he'll eat you last. Sooner or later, you will get bit.
It's not going to be legal to park them nose to the curb any time soon because it's clear that they are a car
I could be wrong, but I think what matters is not the vehicle type, but whether or not the vehicle fits into the marked parking area. And even if this is not the case, I don't think it would be difficult to convince a city council that it should be made the case, once these cars are in use.
If health care was entirely bought and paid for by each individual, then people who couldn't afford healthcare -- and their children -- would not be able to afford healthcare, and would therefore go untreated. Until society is ready to stand by and watch people suffer and die from curable diseases, the Libertarian laissez faire solution just isn't going to fly.
You may like big government or hate big government, but the fact is that either we provide a way for poor people to get health care, or poor people won't get health care. Given that "let 'em die" isn't an acceptable option (at least not in the US), we might as well go for the next best thing, which is to provide basic health care to everyone who needs it. Doing that is actually less expensive to the taxpayer than our current system, which lets health problems fester untreated until they are life-and-death emergencies, and then provides expensive emergency-room care at the last minute.
You know, I've come to wonder what issues people really honestly have with DRM.
Simply put, I want my computer to do what I tell it to do. Not what some faceless corporation wants it to do. My computer's purpose is to empower me, not to restrict me.
I've read the almost all of the big cats (lions, tigers, etc) kept in zoos die at around the same age, and for the same reason: their steady diet of nothing but meat causes their kidneys to go out. Unfortunately, they refuse to eat anything else.
I don't know if that same problem occurs in humans or not, but it wouldn't surprise me.
Contrary to popular belief, there are multiple people with differing views posting to slashdot. Seeing these differing views expressed is NOT an indication of hypocrisy, it's an indication of diversity.
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I think a plurality of 15% or less (which is quite likely in a race with so many candidates) is also rather preposterous....
Except that once many people have the auto-URL'ing filters, this would no longer be true. The spammer wouldn't be able to tell if you were responding to his email or if it was just your filter checking for spamminess and automatically throwing the email away afterwards. (Presumably 99.9% the hits he got would be the latter)
Who cares about the code? If the machines generated a voter-verified paper trail, you could check the results for accuracy. Since they don't, you can never be sure that the results were correct, no matter how carefully the source was scrutinized.
Sure, have at it... I hereby place the story in the public domain :^)
Then, one day, one of the villagers announced that certain pieces of the pipeline were his, and had been used without his permission. Because of that, he said, the pipeline belonged to him, and anybody who wanted to get water from it had to pay him ten dollars for each bucket of water they took from the pipeline. The villagers offered to replace his stolen pipe sections with their own spare sections, and return the stolen ones to him, but the villager didn't want that -- in fact, he refused to even tell the other villagers which sections were the stolen ones. "Just pay me the money you owe me", he said, "and I'll let you use my pipeline."
The villagers gathered together again, to determine what to do about this new problem. After several minutes of debate, a plan was devised. That night, they went to the villager's house with torches and pitchforks, burned it to the ground, and fed the villager to the stray dogs.
And they all lived happily ever after.
The End.
gives the commercial software industry a lever against open source. If we appear to be encouraging the free copying of *any* software, we could be accused of the same things that P2P developers have been
Um, no. I don't think that follows, not even in today's lawyer-happy society. Giving away GPL'd software has nothing to do with encouraging copyright infringements -- in fact, it discourages software piracy, since someone with a legal copy of a GPL'd program has less incentive to pirate the equivalent commercial program.
But presumably you could copyright your kids' DNA as a derivative work that you did create?
Well, actually it is -- okay, maybe not evil, but unworkable. The whole idea of insurance is based on the assumption that bad things can't be predicted in advance. As medical science and DNA techniques become more widely used and reliable, this assumption becomes less and less true. Eventually every genetic disease will be predictable with 100% accuracy, at which point health insurance will be useless, because the only people who can get it will be those who don't need it. At that point, I think universal health coverage will be the only workable option.
The military's mission is to protect the country. Killing people is only a means to that end, and not an end in itself.
No more clever than the original creators of DRM implementing a method to restrict what you do with your own property and putting the word "rights" into the name to insinuate that doing so somehow empowers you.
If you can control the words people use, you can (to a degree) control what they think. Orwell knew this, Bush knows this, Microsoft knows this, and now, you know it.
Time will also tell if you get to keep the salmon or not. :^)
How is this news?
You are actually arguing that English is not a dead language. Every language that is actually in use by large numbers of people is as you describe.
Kneejerk /. second-order response -- slashdotters are kooks, the US gov't would never do such a thing.
Given the impressive progress made by Bayesian algorithms in spam detection, I wouldn't be surprised to see impressive results from this method either.
So bravo for Franz Och! He's taken what appeared to be an intractible problem requiring magic AI to solve, and perhaps found a way to solve it effectively using the stupid brute force methods computers are so good at.
Having your throat slit is nothing compared to what Klingons do to people who put smiley-faces in their text messages...
Using SCO software is a bad idea for the same reason Windows is a bad idea -- if you feed the alligator, the best thing you can hope for is that he'll eat you last. Sooner or later, you will get bit.
I could be wrong, but I think what matters is not the vehicle type, but whether or not the vehicle fits into the marked parking area. And even if this is not the case, I don't think it would be difficult to convince a city council that it should be made the case, once these cars are in use.
If you think the only way to lessen pollution is to repeal the second law of thermodynamics, you're going to be waiting a long, long time.
It can't be any less safe than a motorcycle, and probably much more comfortable when it's raining....
You may like big government or hate big government, but the fact is that either we provide a way for poor people to get health care, or poor people won't get health care. Given that "let 'em die" isn't an acceptable option (at least not in the US), we might as well go for the next best thing, which is to provide basic health care to everyone who needs it. Doing that is actually less expensive to the taxpayer than our current system, which lets health problems fester untreated until they are life-and-death emergencies, and then provides expensive emergency-room care at the last minute.
Simply put, I want my computer to do what I tell it to do. Not what some faceless corporation wants it to do. My computer's purpose is to empower me, not to restrict me.
Are you sure that was a governor and not just a crappy engine? :^)
I don't know if that same problem occurs in humans or not, but it wouldn't surprise me.
Contrary to popular belief, there are multiple people with differing views posting to slashdot. Seeing these differing views expressed is NOT an indication of hypocrisy, it's an indication of diversity.