The article says: "... he argued that such a disc lost as much as 2% of its weight."
Just because the reporter phrased it as "weight", which is the layman's way of explaining it, doesn't mean that the researcher actually said "weight" instead of "mass".
I also wonder if it would be ROM or if it would be rewritable
Well if you read the article you would see it is read-only. You'd also see it is not about unrolling the tape and rolling it back up, etc., so it does NOT involve advanced media decay, stretching from heat, or other problems non-readers-of-the-article are postulating. In fact, it has potentially much less risk than a hard disk, because you keep the roll of tape fixed and only rotate a laser-bouncing mirror in the center of the roll's donut space, as opposed to a hard disk where the whole platter spins and the drive head remains relatively stationary. This means fewer balance problems, and potentially much higher speeds.
In short, for those of you who can't be bothered to read the article, it's not about using scotch tape as a tape-backup medium. It's about using scotch tape (not the 3M brand, but similar) in a roll, using the fact that a laser can penetrate to any given layer in the roll at once. This also has holographic storage implications. In short, read the article.
I was just reading an old ZD story on how EBay went down, and there was an ad touting Quote.com's switch to Microsoft (hmmm... interesting ad placement). In fact, Microsoft created a whole site about it: http://www.quotestory.com/.
Here's my favorite part so far:
"Today, using Windows NT Server Enterprise Edition running on Compaq ProLiant Servers, reboots are only done as part of a regular maintenance cycle despite increasing demands. There has been no downtime from problems with Windows NT Server - what problems they have had were power or ISP outages, Paris notes. "
... And, of course... the regularly scheduled reboots!:-)
"Constellation 3D, Inc., formerly known as C3D, Inc. prior to its name change on 28 December 1999," has links to other news reports on its site (http://www.c-3d.com/), such as stories from Bloomberg and EETimes (most informative, with quotes from the IBM folks who started DVD). Also interesting is that they own Strata, which makes a well-known 3D-editing/rendering package.
It seems there were TWO versions of this article. By the time I got to it, it was the second, tamer version, with the "Windows good, Linux/Solaris bad" stuff removed. Then they removed the "sanitized" version, probably because they were slashdotted.
Also, if you go to myCIO.com, you can find their press release. It is a "nice" version: "'These DDoS attacks show how easily systems - even Solaris and Linux systems - can be compromised without a user's knowledge,' continued Nelson." Quite different from how Newsbytes quoted him in their original article.
Zach Nelson is president and CEO of myCIO.com, which is owned by McAfee. According to the press release there was a conference call about all this Friday morning at 10am Pacific. THAT would have been an excellent time to ask Mr. Nelson which position he really holds. However, even after the fact, Slashdot is now a big, legit news source, so I suggest that Rob (who posted the story) call up Zach Nelson and get his story. Then call up Mr. Fridman (sic) at Newsbytes and get his story.
First, find a faster-loading version of the article at newsbytes, here. (Even in the original, author forgot to tell us who "Nelson" is).
Article does NOT blame Linux. It's just a minimally-retouched press release for an update to McAfee's CyberCop on Linux and Solaris.
The software update addresses some DDoS pattern(s), and that's all that's claimed in the article. Nobody is quoted as saying the attacks came from Linux computers. In fact, it's the same kind of story as the FBI's Linux and Solaris tools released yesterday. No FUD here.
McAfee and Dittrich (author of "FBI" tools) just don't have versions available to patch Windows. Maybe it's more difficult, which would make Linux look good. That's a good question for Dittrich.
Newsbytes also has a followup article here, although it's mostly similar.
IANAL, but if Northwest Airlines sues you, you are not protected by the 5th amendment. The 5th Amendment specifically applies to criminal cases, not your case, and you are bound by the rules of discovery and evidence for the appropriate jurisdiction (state or federal, depending where they sue you). So it is up to those rules, and your judge's interpretation of them, to determine how far the plaintiff can go in demanding evidence from you.
Generally speaking, I can't see a judge requiring you to turn over documents but not require you to provide a key for decryption. To run with your example, that would be like telling the judge, "my conversations with my broker are transcribed or recorded on papers or tapes in this here safe, and I choose not to give the court the combination." You'd be found in contempt of court, I expect. (And if you think the principle is worth it, go to jail for it.)
HOWEVER, if you're not talking about a few specific encrypted documents, but a complete hard disk, or a complete, unedited In-Box full of mail, the plaintiff and the court don't need all that stuff. They don't need your diary, love letters, purchases from fatbrain, or anything else irrelevant to the case.
The question then becomes, how does the court a) determine what the appropriate scope of evidence is, and b) become convinced that all appropriate evidence has been turned over? These questions exist whether the evidence is analog (paper or tape) or digital.
So, you lawyers out there, care to explain how discovery is generally scoped and operated? If someone sues Microsoft, isn't it up to Microsoft's own lawyers to collect and send over all evidence they believe relevant, under penalty of contempt of court? I don't belive Caldera gets to go over to Redmond and examine the hard drives and filing cabinet contents of all Microsoft employees. How is the procedure determined, please?
No great orator ever started a movement with only point-by-point logical responses. Think of Aung San Suu Kyi, King, Ghandi, Wilberforce, Bryan, Lincoln, Adams, Spartacus, anyone else you like. They had logical arguments on their side. But their successes came not by presenting a legal brief, but by speaking to people's hearts.
Jamie says: Nobody is interested in terms like keyword blocking, overbroad blocking or underblocking, nor even information on effectiveness or First Amendment legal issues. The issue will be decided purely on the basis of emotion.
This is the most interesting part of the article. Jamie realizes that all the careful, rational arguments he makes have no effect. But instead of being discouraged by that, you have to say "Okay, this is how most people make their decisions, and now that I'm faced with that, I will come up with emotional 'arguments' for my side that are better [more emotionally stirring] than their emotional arguments are."
Once you have countered with powerful emotional arguments of your own, most people will listen to you more and you can follow-up with other, less-emotional arguments. But until you win their hearts, they won't open up their minds.
I'm not saying you shouldn't have any substance to your arguments, and should only use fear-mongering tactics. Rather, present your logical arguments but wrap them in an emotional description of what's at stake, much as the other side does.
This is part of the art of rhetoric (Webster's: "the art of speaking or writing effectively"). The Ancient Greek concept of an argument included: 1. logos, the logical component, 2. pathos, appeals to emotion, and 3. ethos, counting on the credibility of the speaker. Despite our scientific advances since Ancient Greece, these elements together are still what persuade people to feel and think differently. (The ethos component was also missing from Jamie's side; few heavyweights were shown opposing the filters, and the speaker even distanced himself from the gay and lesbian group, discrediting his whole side.)
What kind of pathos can be generated to oppose filters? Well, think about what makes you angry or fearful when you imagine filters installed in your library. Maybe it's the personal insult to adults. Maybe it's frustration at governmental stupidity. Maybe it's disgust with politically-motivated businesses with hidden agendas. Think about what makes you emotional about this, and create vivid descriptions.
(Actually, by the *security* issue I mean that the browser will accept cookies from the ad image's server, even if it's in a different domain than the web page.
So you think you're only viewing xyz.com, but quietly your browser is accepting cookies from doubleclick.com via the ad image retrieval.)
Here's the email I just sent to the c|net reporter...
Hi Paul,
I just read your article on Weekly's reverse engineering of the Napster protocol. Maybe an editor chose the headline (Copyright defendant Napster finds its code posted), but I think it's misleading.
Weekly's page describes the protocol between client and server. It says nothing at all about how Napster *implements* the protocol, yet the headline suggests either the client or the server source code was posted. That would be like saying that knowing the HTTP protocol is the same as having the source code to IIS or Netscape Enterprise.
Why is this important? Because reverse engineering is legal (in general), while publishing someone's source code is not.
There's also this interesting quote:
"Kessler said an important difference between Weekly's actions and those of the Macster programmers is that they did not publish their source code."
Good question, but its a separate cookie. There's a security design issue (bug) in the browsers where they'll allow a cookie in the headers sent with an image. When your browser retrieves the URL for the ad image, it's in that request-response that the doubleclick cookie gets sent.
Frankly, I'm disappointed at the weak bill "Ms." McGrath has offered. It's just leftist tripe that panders to the special-interest student lobby. Here's what goes unsaid in her bill:
* Libraries Libraries are precious, taxpayer-funded resources. Yet any day of the week you'll find people taking off the shelf any book that strikes their fancy, whether assigned or related to a class or not. They'll sit their smug, I-love-to-read butts down in one of the limited chairs available -- a chair which should be reserved for students performing actual classwork -- and read just as long as they want, at the state's expense!
* Unsanctioned Discussions Students go to college to learn their coursework. In that light, friendly discussions about assigned work can be educational (as long as said discussions do not degenerate into cricitisms of the faculty or administration). But there are still students who spend some of their time discussing concepts NOT RELATED to their assigned courses!
Not only is this a misuse of public resources (time, opportunity cost, available seating, heat, oxygen), but such students often take advantage of more innocent students who don't know, on their own, what is worth discussing. That's why we have courses and assigned work. If the people of Arizona wanted their money to be spent so that students could talk about Archaeology (non-Greek) or Urban Planning, then arizona.edu would have departments for them. It doesn't, which means those know-it-alls should stick to their program or keep their mouths shut. Of course, they always have two other options as well: transfer to another school, or go back to Russia!
What if a student hears about some new molecule, such as fullerene or cubane, and is interested? In such a case, the student should trust that the appropriate department (Chemistry) will examine the issue in due time, and if the subject matter warrants creation of a class, said student will be free to take such class (providing student is still enrolled at the time, and is a Chemistry major with required minimum GPA). Meanwhile, it is in the Chemistry Department's scope to examine the topic, NOT the student's.
* No Punishments? Suppose "Ms." McGrath's bill passes and yet some student still uses the Internet without a specific educational purpose, what then? While some people might want to give a warning first, I say the law is the warning, and you need a zero-tolerance policy. That student is stealing taxpayer resources. First, the student must be fired; any pension or 401K contributions for that semester must be forfeited, as well. Then, the state's District Attorney should be notified of the theft. Anything less is just coddling young brutes who have no understanding of civilized behavior.
I'm looking at the Dec. 6, 1999 issue of PCWeek, page 58. Big ad from Microsoft, which says:
"Surprisingly (to some), Microsoft has not gone the way of the brontosaurus. The proof? Microsoft(R) Windows(R) DNA, our comprehensive platform for easily building distributed Web apps today. More proof? There are more Web sites (including Ask Jeeves, drugstore.com, Dell.com, and Nasdaq(R)) running on our platform than any other, including Sun Solaris *. *Netcraft Survey (September 1999).
What the hell are they talking about? Anyone can see Apache ran on twice the number of host names as Microsoft in September (and today). Maybe Microsoft likes to think of "platform" as being an operating system plus web server etc. Well, not only is the operating system not provided by Netcraft, but on the page where Netcraft summarizes "platform groupings", the groupings are NT, Apache, Roxen, and Macintosh. So Netcraft certainly considers Apache a platform.
I cannot think of any reasonable explanation for Microsoft's claim. IANAL, but I think the ad is highly misleading. And at the very least, they should be made to remove the footnote to Netcraft. Thoughts?
"Just to illustrate this take any given news site. Today they might have articles about Clinton, tomorrow it might be news about a big fire. Search engines can't just direct you to those sites based on queries because who knows what data they have."
Well, what you need is a search engine for news. One that is constantly crawling news sites so you can search on "Clinton" or "fire" and get current or recent results.
Shameless plug: My own site, NewsBlip.com, is just coming out of beta now. Fast searching now, more features coming. Built on Open Source (Apache, PHP, etc.). End of shameless plug.
First of all, what the current belief WAS, up until the last year, was that adults could not create new *neurons* (brain cells), but everyone agrees that adults continue to create new dendrites (branches off of neurons) and synapses (junctions between dendrites and parts of other neurons), although at a slower rate than young children.
I once found a videotape showing, side by side, time lapse footage through a microscope of an 8-year-old brain and a 40-year-old brain, and man, that 8 year old's dendrites were running circles around the 40 year old's. I showed it to a kid I was tutoring, to try to convince him he had to make the best use of his peak brain-growing years.
But over the last two years, neuroscience has been turned upside down with discoveries that animals, including mammals, DO continue to create new neurons throughout adulthood. The old view was largely an old wive's tale, handed down for several generations. Much like the unquantifiable and meaningless malarkey that we only use 10% of our brain.
from http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/99/q4/1014-brain. htm , this October...
"...Princeton scientists have shown that new neurons are continually added to the cerebral cortex of adult monkeys. The discovery reverses a dogma nearly a century old... 'This is an absolutely novel result,' says William T. Greenough, director of the neuroscience program at the University of Illinois' Beckman Institute. 'These data scream for a reanalysis of human brain development.' "
I have two perspectives on this conference and the protests, one as a journalist for NewsBlip.com, and another as a resident of a besieged neighborhood.
(You can say it was besieged by a loud mob, or besieged by riot police, or just besieged with the conflict, etc., based on what you saw or heard.)
Here are some of my experiences, from mildest to wildest:
1. Overheard from protesters after the action of Tuesday night: "Dude, you want to go drinking or something?" "Nah, I've got to go home and write a term paper for my International Business class. But I don't know what to write about." Hello?
2. In press conferences, I asked Undersecretary Larson and Ms. Barchefsky's panel what specific process reforms they'd like to see to make the WTO more open and responsive. The proposed working group on core labor standards was the only on-point response (which is issue-based, not process-based).
3. Became immobilized by tear gas (due to a change in wind). Stings, but blurring of vision is more disabling.
4. Worried whether bad eggs in that crowd 2 blocks from my home were going to cause me trouble. Or whether police would prevent me from getting home. In the end I was fine, but it was a little worrying.
5. In an alley between a police vs. protester standoff, saw some kids start to push a dumpster toward the police, downhill. They gave up shortly and left, but if they got it going, the police would have had to either risk injury by trying to stop it, or risk the it going off the Pine St. bridge, falling onto the highway below.
I haven't reached many firm conclusions yet, as I keep reading about new stories from different angles. There are certainly some people who behaved in ways that I can not excuse.
By the way, when I checked in to get my press credentials, I was given a nice set of gifts, paid for by Boeing, Microsoft, and other sponsors of the [Seattle] Host Organization. These corporations have a lot at stake with the WTO (Boeing: ability to move work overseas. Microsoft: wants to extend ban on e-commerce taxes.) I'm not sure what the delegates themselves received.
I've put the gifts up for auction on ebay, with all of the proceeds going to the Fund for Investigative Journalism (http://fij.org).
I agree with most of this. With the exception of some recent folk who are only in it for the money, people go into the computer field because it's easy (to them) and has these benefits: * Good working conditions (no grease). * Opportunity for creativity (does a mechanic get to invent a new alternator very often?). * Network effects (too many to list here, but as more people and services go online, there are more opportunities and rewards for creating additional services). * The most significant limits are under your control, because it's rational ("Can I figure out this bug?" versus "Can I persuade Congress to pass this bill?").
Regarding the jokes about "if GM built computers"... I think the network effects we're just starting to see will speed things up even more, at least in the short term. But don't forget that the principle reason we can buy a 400 MHz machine for $400, while a 70 mph Geo is still $9,000, is the economics of physical production. You still need roughly the same amount of steel (or plastic now) to build a car as you did 50 years ago, but small improvements in lithography lead to disproportionately huge improvements in chip specs (i.e., Moore's Law).
It is kass-kades, after the mountain range that separates western Washington and Oregon (the lush green parts) from eastern Washington and Oregon (the dry, wheat and apple-growing parts). The mountains trap the moisture coming in from the Pacific, which is why the Pacific Northwest can grow trees hundreds of feet tall.
The mountains can be pretty rugged, and it's likely they were named the Cascades because streams cascade down them. (That's a guess, though.)
In Washington, the Cascades used to be isolated until recently (check out North Cascades National Park). But with rapid growth in the Seattle metro area, particularly the many new housing developments in the vicinity of Redmond and beyond, people are building homes closer and closer to the foothills of the Cascades. Eventually, the Cascades will be... assimilated.
The NYTimes had a similar story on Tuesday, which probably prompted this Post story. Interesting point: it says several studies show Metro DC has more engineers and programmers than Silicon Valley or Route 128.
Here is the MS press release from March, at http://www.microsoft.com/PressPass/press/1999/Mar9 9/SQLEntpr.htm...
"As part of the first Web cast, Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard Co. will unveil an innovative solution to the same business problem posed by Oracle Corp. in its million-dollar "Challenge," matching Oracle's performance - for less than one-sixteenth the cost. "
The "same *business* problem" phrase is careful Microsoftese for "pretty much, but not necessarily, the same thing." If they had met the challenge requirements, with the actual benchmark, they darn well would have trumpeted that fact. There would probably be a quote from the irrepressible Ballmer to the effect of "when can I pick up the check, Larry?" Ask Wall Street if Ballmer can be kept quiet.
Microsoft does not claim in this release to have met the specific requirements of the challenge. If anyone has found quotes from a Microsoft officer that claims they have indeed met the requirements, then MS shareholders should force MS to demand payment from Oracle, or issue a retraction of the comments. The beauty of the release is its ambiguity; you just *think* Microsoft has claimed victory, and Larry is a nitpicking baby for not paying up. Not true. Microsoft press releases are the highest form of flack art, no?
- Stalin was a priest. Hrm. Can you offer documentation of this?
Well, it wasn't my post, but I can document it. Joseph Stalin went to a seminary. He was "originally trained for the priesthood" before joining an underground Georgian revolutionary movement in 1900. This is from Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1985, Micropaedia vol. 11, p.205.
Likewise, encyclopedia.com (based on Concise Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia) says "he joined the Social-Democratic party while a seminarian and soon became a professional revolutionary."
Note that in that place and time the church was often the best or only place a poor person without many connections could acquire a profession (that is, not just get a job but move into the "professional" class). So it's specious to conclude that he was a serious Christian because he was a seminary student. You'd need to start with a detailed biography to find an answer to that question. IMHO.
I've read a couple of comments like this, and it really floors me. Although they might not remember or might not want to admit it (why not?), each of those posters has been encouraged in their past ("Bill's our resident computer whiz!").
Their arguments claim that: 1) encouragement isn't effective at guiding ambitions, and 2) if you go into computers because you were encouraged, you won't have any drive for it. Both are wrong.
Let's take drive first. This argument assumes a scenario like this: "Well Julie, you say you've got no idea which school to go to, and you couldn't care less what you study. Notre Dame is closer, but CMU sent you a really nice letter and a discount at the campus computer store. Might as well go there, eh?"
Well duh, of course that person's not going to be the next Alan Cox. But that's not the person CMU's trying to reach. They're trying to reach smart girls with an interest in computers who would like a reassurance that CMU's not going to be like a rehash of high school, with the taunting and the catty remarks (from boys, girls, teachers, and maybe their family).
Forget about male/female for a minute. Imagine you grew up in the 'hood. Where so many of your peers have an attitude against anyone who shows ambition ("he's acting white!"), how do you think you would have fared if you were not only ambitious but a computer nerd? And imagine you first tried computers say 4 years ago, before there was the slightest chance your peers might think the Internet was cool. You'd probably give it up. Can you face that reality? You'd probably give it up if no other kid in your school thought computers were an acceptable thing to be doing.
In many, many schools, that's how it is with girls who used to like math, science, and technology. Most had that desire squashed in junior high by friends and enemies. Many by teachers. My sister was told, flat out, by her teacher, that physics is not for girls. Out of 15 kids in the class, she was the only girl. True, she stuck it out til the end to spite the teacher, but it took a lot of energy. She ended up majoring in English, where teachers gave her a lot of positive feedback (coincidence?). Female friends have told me that happened to them, too.
Now let's talk about whether encouragement actually... encourages. Whether it gives them courage to get into computers without being self-conscious about it, because that's when they'll thrive.
Heck, even without encouragement, the absence of negative pressure would be a huge boost. If my sister's physics teacher had instead said "Good job!", can you really doubt she would have been more interested, more confident? If she thought at the time she wanted to be a physicist (or a doctor, engineer, programmer, or anything on the "same side of the brain"), can you really doubt that she would have been more likely to choose such a major with the encouragement than with the discouragement?
I spent some time tutoring young kids, ages 5-8. Unlike older kids, they don't hide their emotions very deeply. When they discover they've learned something and are proud of themselves, it shows. When they see that you're proud of them and approve of their work, their pride in that shows, too. That's how I know I reached these kids.
When a kid finally understands fractions, which everyone else in his/her class seems to know already, the kid feels empowered. They're not going to stay back another year. They're going to do just as good at math as they do at reading! Then you teach the kid something fun, like how to estimate the number of bricks in the school building. They've never thought about anything like that. "Hey, math could be my secret weapon, the thing that makes me special, the thing that lets me do what other kids can't do, maybe do things adults haven't thought of yet!"
Encouragement works. Now, after the putdowns of junior high and high school (far more than the geek boys endured), some of these girls could benefit from a little more encouragement. CMU's doing it, and that's a good thing.
Slashdot Mirror
The article says: "... he argued that such a disc lost as much as 2% of its weight."
Just because the reporter phrased it as "weight", which is the layman's way of explaining it, doesn't mean that the researcher actually said "weight" instead of "mass".
I also wonder if it would be ROM or if it would be rewritable
Well if you read the article you would see it is read-only. You'd also see it is not about unrolling the tape and rolling it back up, etc., so it does NOT involve advanced media decay, stretching from heat, or other problems non-readers-of-the-article are postulating. In fact, it has potentially much less risk than a hard disk, because you keep the roll of tape fixed and only rotate a laser-bouncing mirror in the center of the roll's donut space, as opposed to a hard disk where the whole platter spins and the drive head remains relatively stationary. This means fewer balance problems, and potentially much higher speeds.
In short, for those of you who can't be bothered to read the article, it's not about using scotch tape as a tape-backup medium. It's about using scotch tape (not the 3M brand, but similar) in a roll, using the fact that a laser can penetrate to any given layer in the roll at once. This also has holographic storage implications. In short, read the article.
I was just reading an old ZD story on how EBay went down, and there was an ad touting Quote.com's switch to Microsoft (hmmm... interesting ad placement). In fact, Microsoft created a whole site about it: http://www.quotestory.com/.
:-)
Here's my favorite part so far:
"Today, using Windows NT Server Enterprise Edition running on Compaq ProLiant Servers, reboots are only done as part of a regular maintenance cycle despite increasing demands. There has been no downtime from problems with Windows NT Server - what problems they have had were power or ISP outages, Paris notes. "
... And, of course... the regularly scheduled reboots!
"Constellation 3D, Inc., formerly known as C3D, Inc. prior to its name change on 28 December 1999," has links to other news reports on its site (http://www.c-3d.com/), such as stories from Bloomberg and EETimes (most informative, with quotes from the IBM folks who started DVD). Also interesting is that they own Strata, which makes a well-known 3D-editing/rendering package.
"grammer" is actually spelled "grammar" :-)
It seems there were TWO versions of this article. By the time I got to it, it was the second, tamer version, with the "Windows good, Linux/Solaris bad" stuff removed. Then they removed the "sanitized" version, probably because they were slashdotted.
Also, if you go to myCIO.com, you can find their press release. It is a "nice" version: "'These DDoS attacks show how easily systems - even Solaris and Linux systems - can be compromised without a user's knowledge,' continued Nelson." Quite different from how Newsbytes quoted him in their original article.
Zach Nelson is president and CEO of myCIO.com, which is owned by McAfee. According to the press release there was a conference call about all this Friday morning at 10am Pacific. THAT would have been an excellent time to ask Mr. Nelson which position he really holds. However, even after the fact, Slashdot is now a big, legit news source, so I suggest that Rob (who posted the story) call up Zach Nelson and get his story. Then call up Mr. Fridman (sic) at Newsbytes and get his story.
First, find a faster-loading version of the article at newsbytes, here. (Even in the original, author forgot to tell us who "Nelson" is).
Article does NOT blame Linux. It's just a minimally-retouched press release for an update to McAfee's CyberCop on Linux and Solaris.
The software update addresses some DDoS pattern(s), and that's all that's claimed in the article. Nobody is quoted as saying the attacks came from Linux computers. In fact, it's the same kind of story as the FBI's Linux and Solaris tools released yesterday. No FUD here.
McAfee and Dittrich (author of "FBI" tools) just don't have versions available to patch Windows. Maybe it's more difficult, which would make Linux look good. That's a good question for Dittrich.
Newsbytes also has a followup article here, although it's mostly similar.
An interesting discovery... If you go to google and search on "Bill of Rights", the first result is Microsoft's home page. !!!
IANAL, but if Northwest Airlines sues you, you are not protected by the 5th amendment. The 5th Amendment specifically applies to criminal cases, not your case, and you are bound by the rules of discovery and evidence for the appropriate jurisdiction (state or federal, depending where they sue you). So it is up to those rules, and your judge's interpretation of them, to determine how far the plaintiff can go in demanding evidence from you.
Generally speaking, I can't see a judge requiring you to turn over documents but not require you to provide a key for decryption. To run with your example, that would be like telling the judge, "my conversations with my broker are transcribed or recorded on papers or tapes in this here safe, and I choose not to give the court the combination." You'd be found in contempt of court, I expect. (And if you think the principle is worth it, go to jail for it.)
HOWEVER, if you're not talking about a few specific encrypted documents, but a complete hard disk, or a complete, unedited In-Box full of mail, the plaintiff and the court don't need all that stuff. They don't need your diary, love letters, purchases from fatbrain, or anything else irrelevant to the case.
The question then becomes, how does the court a) determine what the appropriate scope of evidence is, and b) become convinced that all appropriate evidence has been turned over? These questions exist whether the evidence is analog (paper or tape) or digital.
So, you lawyers out there, care to explain how discovery is generally scoped and operated? If someone sues Microsoft, isn't it up to Microsoft's own lawyers to collect and send over all evidence they believe relevant, under penalty of contempt of court? I don't belive Caldera gets to go over to Redmond and examine the hard drives and filing cabinet contents of all Microsoft employees. How is the procedure determined, please?
No great orator ever started a movement with only point-by-point logical responses. Think of Aung San Suu Kyi, King, Ghandi, Wilberforce, Bryan, Lincoln, Adams, Spartacus, anyone else you like. They had logical arguments on their side. But their successes came not by presenting a legal brief, but by speaking to people's hearts.
Jamie says:
Nobody is interested in terms like keyword blocking, overbroad blocking or underblocking, nor even information on effectiveness or First Amendment legal issues. The issue will be decided purely on the basis of emotion.
This is the most interesting part of the article. Jamie realizes that all the careful, rational arguments he makes have no effect. But instead of being discouraged by that, you have to say "Okay, this is how most people make their decisions, and now that I'm faced with that, I will come up with emotional 'arguments' for my side that are better [more emotionally stirring] than their emotional arguments are."
Once you have countered with powerful emotional arguments of your own, most people will listen to you more and you can follow-up with other, less-emotional arguments. But until you win their hearts, they won't open up their minds.
I'm not saying you shouldn't have any substance to your arguments, and should only use fear-mongering tactics. Rather, present your logical arguments but wrap them in an emotional description of what's at stake, much as the other side does.
This is part of the art of rhetoric (Webster's: "the art of speaking or writing effectively"). The Ancient Greek concept of an argument included: 1. logos, the logical component, 2. pathos, appeals to emotion, and 3. ethos, counting on the credibility of the speaker. Despite our scientific advances since Ancient Greece, these elements together are still what persuade people to feel and think differently. (The ethos component was also missing from Jamie's side; few heavyweights were shown opposing the filters, and the speaker even distanced himself from the gay and lesbian group, discrediting his whole side.)
What kind of pathos can be generated to oppose filters? Well, think about what makes you angry or fearful when you imagine filters installed in your library. Maybe it's the personal insult to adults. Maybe it's frustration at governmental stupidity. Maybe it's disgust with politically-motivated businesses with hidden agendas. Think about what makes you emotional about this, and create vivid descriptions.
(Actually, by the *security* issue I mean that the browser will accept cookies from the ad image's server, even if it's in a different domain than the web page.
So you think you're only viewing xyz.com, but quietly your browser is accepting cookies from doubleclick.com via the ad image retrieval.)
(Paul wrote back and said "good point"; he'll mention it to his editor.)
Here's the email I just sent to the c|net reporter...
Hi Paul,
I just read your article on Weekly's reverse engineering of the Napster protocol. Maybe an editor chose the headline (Copyright defendant Napster finds its code posted), but I think it's misleading.
Weekly's page describes the protocol between client and server. It says nothing at all about how Napster *implements* the protocol, yet the headline suggests either the client or the server source code was posted. That would be like saying that knowing the HTTP protocol is the same as
having the source code to IIS or Netscape Enterprise.
Why is this important? Because reverse engineering is legal (in general), while publishing someone's source code is not.
There's also this interesting quote:
"Kessler said an important difference between Weekly's actions and those of the Macster programmers is that they did not publish their source code."
Well, Weekly didn't publish *any* source code, right?
Thanks for your time.
-Matt Jensen
Seattle
Good question, but its a separate cookie. There's a security design issue (bug) in the browsers where they'll allow a cookie in the headers sent with an image. When your browser retrieves the URL for the ad image, it's in that request-response that the doubleclick cookie gets sent.
Frankly, I'm disappointed at the weak bill "Ms." McGrath has offered. It's just leftist tripe that panders to the special-interest student lobby. Here's what goes unsaid in her bill:
* Libraries
Libraries are precious, taxpayer-funded resources. Yet any day of the week you'll find people taking off the shelf any book that strikes their fancy, whether assigned or related to a class or not. They'll sit their smug, I-love-to-read butts down in one of the limited chairs available -- a chair which should be reserved for students performing actual classwork -- and read just as long as they want, at the state's expense!
* Unsanctioned Discussions
Students go to college to learn their coursework. In that light, friendly discussions about assigned work can be educational (as long as said discussions do not degenerate into cricitisms of the faculty or administration). But there are still students who spend some of their time discussing concepts NOT RELATED to their assigned courses!
Not only is this a misuse of public resources (time, opportunity cost, available seating, heat, oxygen), but such students often take advantage of more innocent students who don't know, on their own, what is worth discussing. That's why we have courses and assigned work. If the people of Arizona wanted their money to be spent so that students could talk about Archaeology (non-Greek) or Urban Planning, then arizona.edu would have departments for them. It doesn't, which means those know-it-alls should stick to their program or keep their mouths shut. Of course, they always have two other options as well: transfer to another school, or go back to Russia!
What if a student hears about some new molecule, such as fullerene or cubane, and is interested? In such a case, the student should trust that the appropriate department (Chemistry) will examine the issue in due time, and if the subject matter warrants creation of a class, said student will be free to take such class (providing student is still enrolled at the time, and is a Chemistry major with required minimum GPA). Meanwhile, it is in the Chemistry Department's scope to examine the topic, NOT the student's.
* No Punishments?
Suppose "Ms." McGrath's bill passes and yet some student still uses the Internet without a specific educational purpose, what then? While some people might want to give a warning first, I say the law is the warning, and you need a zero-tolerance policy. That student is stealing taxpayer resources. First, the student must be fired; any pension or 401K contributions for that semester must be forfeited, as well. Then, the state's District Attorney should be notified of the theft. Anything less is just coddling young brutes who have no understanding of civilized behavior.
I'm looking at the Dec. 6, 1999 issue of PCWeek, page 58. Big ad from Microsoft, which says:
"Surprisingly (to some), Microsoft has not gone the way of the brontosaurus. The proof? Microsoft(R) Windows(R) DNA, our comprehensive platform for easily building distributed Web apps today. More proof? There are more Web sites (including Ask Jeeves, drugstore.com, Dell.com, and Nasdaq(R)) running on our platform than any other, including Sun Solaris *.
*Netcraft Survey (September 1999).
What the hell are they talking about? Anyone can see Apache ran on twice the number of host names as Microsoft in September (and today). Maybe Microsoft likes to think of "platform" as being an operating system plus web server etc. Well, not only is the operating system not provided by Netcraft, but on the page where Netcraft summarizes "platform groupings", the groupings are NT, Apache, Roxen, and Macintosh. So Netcraft certainly considers Apache a platform.
I cannot think of any reasonable explanation for Microsoft's claim. IANAL, but I think the ad is highly misleading. And at the very least, they should be made to remove the footnote to Netcraft. Thoughts?
Well, what you need is a search engine for news. One that is constantly crawling news sites so you can search on "Clinton" or "fire" and get current or recent results.
Shameless plug: My own site, NewsBlip.com, is just coming out of beta now. Fast searching now, more features coming. Built on Open Source (Apache, PHP, etc.). End of shameless plug.
First of all, what the current belief WAS, up until the last year, was that adults could not create new *neurons* (brain cells), but everyone agrees that adults continue to create new dendrites (branches off of neurons) and synapses (junctions between dendrites and parts of other neurons), although at a slower rate than young children.
. htm , this October...
...
I once found a videotape showing, side by side, time lapse footage through a microscope of an 8-year-old brain and a 40-year-old brain, and man, that 8 year old's dendrites were running circles around the 40 year old's. I showed it to a kid I was tutoring, to try to convince him he had to make the best use of his peak brain-growing years.
But over the last two years, neuroscience has been turned upside down with discoveries that animals, including mammals, DO continue to create new neurons throughout adulthood. The old view was largely an old wive's tale, handed down for several generations. Much like the unquantifiable and meaningless malarkey that we only use 10% of our brain.
from http://www.princeton.edu/pr/news/99/q4/1014-brain
"...Princeton scientists have shown that new neurons are continually added to the cerebral cortex of adult monkeys. The discovery reverses a dogma nearly a century old
'This is an absolutely novel result,' says William T. Greenough, director of the neuroscience program at the University of Illinois' Beckman Institute. 'These data scream for a reanalysis of human brain development.' "
I have two perspectives on this conference and the protests, one as a journalist for NewsBlip.com, and another as a resident of a besieged neighborhood.
(You can say it was besieged by a loud mob, or besieged by riot police, or just besieged with the conflict, etc., based on what you saw or heard.)
Here are some of my experiences, from mildest to wildest:
1. Overheard from protesters after the action of Tuesday night: "Dude, you want to go drinking or something?" "Nah, I've got to go home and write a term paper for my International Business class. But I don't know what to write about." Hello?
2. In press conferences, I asked Undersecretary Larson and Ms. Barchefsky's panel what specific process reforms they'd like to see to make the WTO more open and responsive. The proposed working group on core labor standards was the only on-point response (which is issue-based, not process-based).
3. Became immobilized by tear gas (due to a change in wind). Stings, but blurring of vision is more disabling.
4. Worried whether bad eggs in that crowd 2 blocks from my home were going to cause me trouble. Or whether police would prevent me from getting home. In the end I was fine, but it was a little worrying.
5. In an alley between a police vs. protester standoff, saw some kids start to push a dumpster toward the police, downhill. They gave up shortly and left, but if they got it going, the police would have had to either risk injury by trying to stop it, or risk the it going off the Pine St. bridge, falling onto the highway below.
I haven't reached many firm conclusions yet, as I keep reading about new stories from different angles. There are certainly some people who behaved in ways that I can not excuse.
By the way, when I checked in to get my press credentials, I was given a nice set of gifts, paid for by Boeing, Microsoft, and other sponsors of the [Seattle] Host Organization. These corporations have a lot at stake with the WTO (Boeing: ability to move work overseas. Microsoft: wants to extend ban on e-commerce taxes.) I'm not sure what the delegates themselves received.
I've put the gifts up for auction on ebay, with all of the proceeds going to the Fund for Investigative Journalism (http://fij.org).
I agree with most of this. With the exception of some recent folk who are only in it for the money, people go into the computer field because it's easy (to them) and has these benefits:
* Good working conditions (no grease).
* Opportunity for creativity (does a mechanic get to invent a new alternator very often?).
* Network effects (too many to list here, but as more people and services go online, there are more opportunities and rewards for creating additional services).
* The most significant limits are under your control, because it's rational ("Can I figure out this bug?" versus "Can I persuade Congress to pass this bill?").
Regarding the jokes about "if GM built computers"...
I think the network effects we're just starting to see will speed things up even more, at least in the short term. But don't forget that the principle reason we can buy a 400 MHz machine for $400, while a 70 mph Geo is still $9,000, is the economics of physical production. You still need roughly the same amount of steel (or plastic now) to build a car as you did 50 years ago, but small improvements in lithography lead to disproportionately huge improvements in chip specs (i.e., Moore's Law).
It is kass-kades, after the mountain range that separates western Washington and Oregon (the lush green parts) from eastern Washington and Oregon (the dry, wheat and apple-growing parts). The mountains trap the moisture coming in from the Pacific, which is why the Pacific Northwest can grow trees hundreds of feet tall.
The mountains can be pretty rugged, and it's likely they were named the Cascades because streams cascade down them. (That's a guess, though.)
In Washington, the Cascades used to be isolated until recently (check out North Cascades National Park). But with rapid growth in the Seattle metro area, particularly the many new housing developments in the vicinity of Redmond and beyond, people are building homes closer and closer to the foothills of the Cascades. Eventually, the Cascades will be... assimilated.
The NYTimes had a similar story on Tuesday, which probably prompted this Post story. Interesting point: it says several studies show Metro DC has more engineers and programmers than Silicon Valley or Route 128.
Read it, with free signup, here
Here is the MS press release from March, at http://www.microsoft.com/PressPass/press/1999/Mar9 9/SQLEntpr.htm ...
"As part of the first Web cast, Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard Co. will unveil an innovative solution to the same business problem posed by Oracle Corp. in its million-dollar "Challenge," matching Oracle's performance - for less than one-sixteenth the cost. "
The "same *business* problem" phrase is careful Microsoftese for "pretty much, but not necessarily, the same thing." If they had met the challenge requirements, with the actual benchmark, they darn well would have trumpeted that fact. There would probably be a quote from the irrepressible Ballmer to the effect of "when can I pick up the check, Larry?" Ask Wall Street if Ballmer can be kept quiet.
Microsoft does not claim in this release to have met the specific requirements of the challenge. If anyone has found quotes from a Microsoft officer that claims they have indeed met the requirements, then MS shareholders should force MS to demand payment from Oracle, or issue a retraction of the comments. The beauty of the release is its ambiguity; you just *think* Microsoft has claimed victory, and Larry is a nitpicking baby for not paying up. Not true. Microsoft press releases are the highest form of flack art, no?
- Stalin was a priest.
Hrm. Can you offer documentation of this?
Well, it wasn't my post, but I can document it. Joseph Stalin went to a seminary. He was "originally trained for the priesthood" before joining an underground Georgian revolutionary movement in 1900. This is from Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1985, Micropaedia vol. 11, p.205.
Likewise, encyclopedia.com (based on Concise Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia) says "he joined the Social-Democratic party while a seminarian and soon became a professional revolutionary."
Note that in that place and time the church was often the best or only place a poor person without many connections could acquire a profession (that is, not just get a job but move into the "professional" class). So it's specious to conclude that he was a serious Christian because he was a seminary student. You'd need to start with a detailed biography to find an answer to that question. IMHO.
I've read a couple of comments like this, and it really floors me. Although they might not remember or might not want to admit it (why not?), each of those posters has been encouraged in their past ("Bill's our resident computer whiz!").
Their arguments claim that: 1) encouragement isn't effective at guiding ambitions, and 2) if you go into computers because you were encouraged, you won't have any drive for it. Both are wrong.
Let's take drive first. This argument assumes a scenario like this: "Well Julie, you say you've got no idea which school to go to, and you couldn't care less what you study. Notre Dame is closer, but CMU sent you a really nice letter and a discount at the campus computer store. Might as well go there, eh?"
Well duh, of course that person's not going to be the next Alan Cox. But that's not the person CMU's trying to reach. They're trying to reach smart girls with an interest in computers who would like a reassurance that CMU's not going to be like a rehash of high school, with the taunting and the catty remarks (from boys, girls, teachers, and maybe their family).
Forget about male/female for a minute. Imagine you grew up in the 'hood. Where so many of your peers have an attitude against anyone who shows ambition ("he's acting white!"), how do you think you would have fared if you were not only ambitious but a computer nerd? And imagine you first tried computers say 4 years ago, before there was the slightest chance your peers might think the Internet was cool. You'd probably give it up. Can you face that reality? You'd probably give it up if no other kid in your school thought computers were an acceptable thing to be doing.
In many, many schools, that's how it is with girls who used to like math, science, and technology. Most had that desire squashed in junior high by friends and enemies. Many by teachers. My sister was told, flat out, by her teacher, that physics is not for girls. Out of 15 kids in the class, she was the only girl. True, she stuck it out til the end to spite the teacher, but it took a lot of energy. She ended up majoring in English, where teachers gave her a lot of positive feedback (coincidence?). Female friends have told me that happened to them, too.
Now let's talk about whether encouragement actually... encourages. Whether it gives them courage to get into computers without being self-conscious about it, because that's when they'll thrive.
Heck, even without encouragement, the absence of negative pressure would be a huge boost. If my sister's physics teacher had instead said "Good job!", can you really doubt she would have been more interested, more confident? If she thought at the time she wanted to be a physicist (or a doctor, engineer, programmer, or anything on the "same side of the brain"), can you really doubt that she would have been more likely to choose such a major with the encouragement than with the discouragement?
I spent some time tutoring young kids, ages 5-8. Unlike older kids, they don't hide their emotions very deeply. When they discover they've learned something and are proud of themselves, it shows. When they see that you're proud of them and approve of their work, their pride in that shows, too. That's how I know I reached these kids.
When a kid finally understands fractions, which everyone else in his/her class seems to know already, the kid feels empowered. They're not going to stay back another year. They're going to do just as good at math as they do at reading! Then you teach the kid something fun, like how to estimate the number of bricks in the school building. They've never thought about anything like that. "Hey, math could be my secret weapon, the thing that makes me special, the thing that lets me do what other kids can't do, maybe do things adults haven't thought of yet!"
Encouragement works. Now, after the putdowns of junior high and high school (far more than the geek boys endured), some of these girls could benefit from a little more encouragement. CMU's doing it, and that's a good thing.