...but damn, I wish I had moderator points, and could blow them all modding up your comment.
Oh, and hadn't already posted a comment to this very thread...
Of course, I'd have already blown them all modding down Anne Marie's comment, so some sort of ability to foretell the future would be nice too, if anyone's handing out wishes...:-)
That's assuming that all the packets take the same route to the target, of course.
The best way to DoS a server, imho, would be to use a distributed attack, from a number of different subnets.
That way, not only does the server get hit with more packets (there's no guarantee that one machine will be able to take down the server), but they take different routes to the target, which helps to ensure that more of them get through (as you don't risk taking down any of the intervening nodes).
Besides which, the "worst" that can happen is that you overload a router or two on the way there; you are not going to be able to ping-flood an airport's or university hospital's critical systems in that way, unless they are also acting as a router (or you're really dumb, and fire at the wrong IP address, and the firewall lets the packets through...)
If you do decide to fight it, then you have a very difficult question to answer: What right do we have to express our opinons?
Sure, I think probably most people here would agree that Nazi beliefs are morally repugnant. So, do we fight against them?
Well, therein lies the problem - I seem to remember a while back, lots of people here getting very righteously indignant that the RIAA was seeking injunctions against people and sites who posted the DeCSS code. More recently, people were pretty annoyed that the Co$ threatened/. over a comment posted.
I can't rationalise protesting against the latter censorships, whilst participating in the former, myself.
Why would China care if US citizens couldn't access Chinese web sites?
I can't imagine that a Chinese version of Amazon would do much overseas trade, for example.
I can see the point in blocking eg the American subnet from being accessed by the rest of the world, as that would have some considerable economic impact. However, for countries that don't even use the same alphabet, I honestly can't see it having a particularly great effect.
Because, especially in this situation, there is very little to compare between the two.
When you bomb a nazi organisation's HQ, you damage and destroy property (not just the HQ, but buildings around it), and kill people (again, not just the nazis, although as long as they're not killing people, they have just as much right to live as the next person).
When you ping-flood a website, you bring down a website. No-one gets hurt, nothing gets damaged (expcet maybe the pride of a sysadmin or two).
It would be different if it was computers controlling, say, air traffic or power generation that were targeted, but when a website gets taken down like that, no-one gets hurt.
Sure, it would almost certainly damage diplomatic relations between the two countries, but anyone who would even threaten to go to war over such a thing should not be in a position of power.
I acknowledge that such a break-down in relations could, eventually, lead to war, but it should certainly not be anyone's first reaction.
I understand your sentiments, but don't forget that the laser was sat around in research labs for a decade or so before anyone thought of a use for it.
Now, I personally own two (one in my CD-ROM drive, one in my audio CD player).
As DeadInSpace said, don't knock it just because it doesn't appear to be useful now. You never know what we might think to do with it in the future.
Not only that, but you need to be able to split the tasks between that many people sensibly. Also, as the number of people working on a project increases, so does the overhead of managing it and making sure that people are communicating effectively, that everything gets done and nothing gets done twice, etc
After a point, throwing more people at a project at best has no effect, and at worst slows it down.
I forget the exact details, but some bloke demonstrated a trojaned compiler that would recognise that it was compiling the source to login, and insert a back door.
It would also recognise when it was compiling its own source, and insert the code to insert the backdoor in login...
Read the source all you like - the ultra-paranoid cannot even trust that:-)
Er, you do realise that firewalls can block outgoing ports too, don't you?
Not to mention that some clients require the server to make a connection back to them on another port - ftp springs to mind; I've had lots of fun with misconfigured firewalls letting the command connection through, but not the data one...:-)
I don't think MS will use this for anything objectionable, but it certainly puts them in a position where they could do so, if they wished, and it wouldn't be the first time...
Conversely, you are also saving whoever pays for the bandwidth you use money, be it your employer, college, or yourself. Not only that, but you're helping to reduce the overall amount of net traffic, increasing the QoS for all net users (admittedly by a tiny fraction, but imagine if there were *no* ads, at all)
I don't begrudge site owners/maintainers the ability to make money from their effort, but I don't think that ads are the best way to do it. Unfortunately, once people are accustomed to getting something for free, it's very hard indeed to convince them to pay...
What if, however, in 10 or 20 years time, a government comes to power and introduces a law that means that you are a criminal?
Maybe not being a member of the Church of England is a crime punishable by execution. Maybe having political or philosophical beliefs other than those of the ruling party is a crime punishable by lengthy terms of imprisonment. Maybe being homosexual is also punishable by imprisonment.
These are all things that have been illegal (or frowned upon by those in power) at some time or another in the UK.
You speak of "freedom from" - how about the freedom from persecution?
The increased ubiquity of covert and overt surveilance techniques puts in place an infrastructure that has great potential for misuse, should it ever fall into the wrong hands.
Wow. Sorry, I didn't realise that your ink cartridges are so fscked up.
I thought you were arguing that things running out are no big deal, and just didn't understand the difference:-)
Still, the ink is a limited resource, it would run out eventually anyway (and you're not going to be getting much more ink than you need to print out 50 pages anyway); the music would never run out. Of course, the 'puce' means that you can't buy just the ink and refill it, thus recycling the cartridge and saving money and resources... and all in the name of a guaranteed revenue stream.
Companies make me sick sometimes.
I can almost understand people convincing themselves that it's okay to do it to information, but to natural resources? Surely people waste enough of them on their own without being forced into it...
True; at the time of replying, I hadn't thought of the ability to try out music (something that I'd quite often love to do).
However, I'm just cynical enough to expect that if this was ever widely adopted, you'd end up having to pay a sizeable proportion of the cost of a CD now for something that's only going to be usable for a year.
Businesses exist to maximise profits; often, although not always, this translates to charging more, or paying their workforce less. Either way, someone loses out.
The ink in the cartridge is a limited resource - it runs out, and there's nothing you can do about it. Once it does, and it's physically not there any more, you have to buy more.
The data on the disk (or in the flash RAM, or wherever) is unlimited - no matter how many times I read it, it'll still be there (barring the physical destruction of the medium in/on which it resides). The only way for it to "run out" is for the manufacturer to make it run out; that's an artificial restriction.
Slashdot Mirror
Tesco are the UK's biggest supermarket, you know... :-)
Cheers,
Tim
...but damn, I wish I had moderator points, and could blow them all modding up your comment.
:-)
Oh, and hadn't already posted a comment to this very thread...
Of course, I'd have already blown them all modding down Anne Marie's comment, so some sort of ability to foretell the future would be nice too, if anyone's handing out wishes...
Cheers,
Tim
committing rape is, by definition, committing adultry
Even if neither you nor the woman is married?
Cheers,
Tim
That's assuming that all the packets take the same route to the target, of course.
The best way to DoS a server, imho, would be to use a distributed attack, from a number of different subnets.
That way, not only does the server get hit with more packets (there's no guarantee that one machine will be able to take down the server), but they take different routes to the target, which helps to ensure that more of them get through (as you don't risk taking down any of the intervening nodes).
Besides which, the "worst" that can happen is that you overload a router or two on the way there; you are not going to be able to ping-flood an airport's or university hospital's critical systems in that way, unless they are also acting as a router (or you're really dumb, and fire at the wrong IP address, and the firewall lets the packets through...)
Cheers,
Tim
If you do decide to fight it, then you have a very difficult question to answer: What right do we have to express our opinons?
/. over a comment posted.
Sure, I think probably most people here would agree that Nazi beliefs are morally repugnant. So, do we fight against them?
Well, therein lies the problem - I seem to remember a while back, lots of people here getting very righteously indignant that the RIAA was seeking injunctions against people and sites who posted the DeCSS code. More recently, people were pretty annoyed that the Co$ threatened
I can't rationalise protesting against the latter censorships, whilst participating in the former, myself.
Cheers,
Tim
Why would China care if US citizens couldn't access Chinese web sites?
I can't imagine that a Chinese version of Amazon would do much overseas trade, for example.
I can see the point in blocking eg the American subnet from being accessed by the rest of the world, as that would have some considerable economic impact. However, for countries that don't even use the same alphabet, I honestly can't see it having a particularly great effect.
Cheers,
Tim
Because, especially in this situation, there is very little to compare between the two.
When you bomb a nazi organisation's HQ, you damage and destroy property (not just the HQ, but buildings around it), and kill people (again, not just the nazis, although as long as they're not killing people, they have just as much right to live as the next person).
When you ping-flood a website, you bring down a website. No-one gets hurt, nothing gets damaged (expcet maybe the pride of a sysadmin or two).
It would be different if it was computers controlling, say, air traffic or power generation that were targeted, but when a website gets taken down like that, no-one gets hurt.
Sure, it would almost certainly damage diplomatic relations between the two countries, but anyone who would even threaten to go to war over such a thing should not be in a position of power.
I acknowledge that such a break-down in relations could, eventually, lead to war, but it should certainly not be anyone's first reaction.
Cheers,
Tim
I understand your sentiments, but don't forget that the laser was sat around in research labs for a decade or so before anyone thought of a use for it.
Now, I personally own two (one in my CD-ROM drive, one in my audio CD player).
As DeadInSpace said, don't knock it just because it doesn't appear to be useful now. You never know what we might think to do with it in the future.
Cheers,
Tim
Not only that, but you need to be able to split the tasks between that many people sensibly. Also, as the number of people working on a project increases, so does the overhead of managing it and making sure that people are communicating effectively, that everything gets done and nothing gets done twice, etc
After a point, throwing more people at a project at best has no effect, and at worst slows it down.
Cheers,
Tim
Hey, I meant no disrespect - it was merely that my lack-of-sleep addled brain couldn't remember his name :-)
Cheers,
Tim
I forget the exact details, but some bloke demonstrated a trojaned compiler that would recognise that it was compiling the source to login, and insert a back door.
:-)
It would also recognise when it was compiling its own source, and insert the code to insert the backdoor in login...
Read the source all you like - the ultra-paranoid cannot even trust that
Cheers,
Tim
Dummies are not supposed to run servers.
:-)
Er, you do realise that firewalls can block outgoing ports too, don't you?
Not to mention that some clients require the server to make a connection back to them on another port - ftp springs to mind; I've had lots of fun with misconfigured firewalls letting the command connection through, but not the data one...
I don't think MS will use this for anything objectionable, but it certainly puts them in a position where they could do so, if they wished, and it wouldn't be the first time...
Cheers,
Tim
...it won't be ahead of its time anymore :-)
Cheers,
Tim
Oh yeah - just like Q3 sucked on my TNT2 machine under Linux with NVidia's drivers.
It was at least as fast as under Windows, qualitatively at least.
Cheers,
Tim
Conversely, you are also saving whoever pays for the bandwidth you use money, be it your employer, college, or yourself. Not only that, but you're helping to reduce the overall amount of net traffic, increasing the QoS for all net users (admittedly by a tiny fraction, but imagine if there were *no* ads, at all)
I don't begrudge site owners/maintainers the ability to make money from their effort, but I don't think that ads are the best way to do it. Unfortunately, once people are accustomed to getting something for free, it's very hard indeed to convince them to pay...
Cheers,
Tim
Not to mention that the questions mentioned can be answered using client-side javascript, at least in modern browsers.
(Okay, so you can only test capability and not preference...)
Cheers,
Tim
I don't care if I've got a P4 1.4 GHz machine or a 486DX 66 sitting on my desk
:-)
You will, when it's 10pm on the day before the deadline and you're waiting for something to compile...
Cheers,
Tim
Okay, you're not breaking the law now.
What if, however, in 10 or 20 years time, a government comes to power and introduces a law that means that you are a criminal?
Maybe not being a member of the Church of England is a crime punishable by execution. Maybe having political or philosophical beliefs other than those of the ruling party is a crime punishable by lengthy terms of imprisonment. Maybe being homosexual is also punishable by imprisonment.
These are all things that have been illegal (or frowned upon by those in power) at some time or another in the UK.
You speak of "freedom from" - how about the freedom from persecution?
The increased ubiquity of covert and overt surveilance techniques puts in place an infrastructure that has great potential for misuse, should it ever fall into the wrong hands.
Cheers,
Tim
We Britons find it offensive
No offence, but please, don't presume to speak for the whole of the population of Britain.
Some of us really aren't that keen on the idea of having cameras everywhere.
Cheers,
Tim
Rereading my reply, I see that I could have worded it somewhat better!
:-)
I meant, of course, that I don't use IE (as you so helpfully suggested) because I don't run Windows
Cheers,
Tim
wondering why people still don't simply use the right tool for the task at hand...
:-)
Because I run Linux
Cheers,
Tim
Wow. Sorry, I didn't realise that your ink cartridges are so fscked up.
:-)
I thought you were arguing that things running out are no big deal, and just didn't understand the difference
Still, the ink is a limited resource, it would run out eventually anyway (and you're not going to be getting much more ink than you need to print out 50 pages anyway); the music would never run out. Of course, the 'puce' means that you can't buy just the ink and refill it, thus recycling the cartridge and saving money and resources... and all in the name of a guaranteed revenue stream.
Companies make me sick sometimes.
I can almost understand people convincing themselves that it's okay to do it to information, but to natural resources? Surely people waste enough of them on their own without being forced into it...
Cheers,
Tim
Hollywood put a happy ending on Brazil ?!
And I thought I'd heard it all...
Thank [insert focus of believe system here] I have a copy of the original.
Cheers,
Tim
True; at the time of replying, I hadn't thought of the ability to try out music (something that I'd quite often love to do).
However, I'm just cynical enough to expect that if this was ever widely adopted, you'd end up having to pay a sizeable proportion of the cost of a CD now for something that's only going to be usable for a year.
Businesses exist to maximise profits; often, although not always, this translates to charging more, or paying their workforce less. Either way, someone loses out.
Cheers,
Tim
...and you know it :-)
:-)
The ink in the cartridge is a limited resource - it runs out, and there's nothing you can do about it. Once it does, and it's physically not there any more, you have to buy more.
The data on the disk (or in the flash RAM, or wherever) is unlimited - no matter how many times I read it, it'll still be there (barring the physical destruction of the medium in/on which it resides). The only way for it to "run out" is for the manufacturer to make it run out; that's an artificial restriction.
Stop trying to play devil's advocate
Cheers,
Tim