I don't get this story. No company thinks as much of person with a record as one without one, may it be related to what they do or not. A really good security guy with a economic crime, fraud, theft, child abuse, drunk driving, offensive behaviour or [crime of choice] in their history, would have a hard time getting a job as well. It's not having a hacking record that's not profitable, it's have any record.
why is it that people can't read what has already been said before they post? 90%, or perhaps even more, of the reply's to this article say the same thing ("it's intentional spreading that counts", in case you didn't read any of them).
If I'm not mistaken, it says very clearly in the/. rules that you should read what others have said before you post, in order to avoid this sort of thing.
I understand that a number of people will object that people might reply the very same thing you're about reply, while you're writing (in fact, that might happen to this reply as well), but this is anyhow obviously not the case with this article, since almost all posts are no more that 10 words long.
You may moderate me to hell for not being on topic, or flamebating or whatever, but I still find this highly irritating, and if I have to post it somewhere why not in reply to such an excellent example like this one?
It thinks it's sad that even geeks have such a tremendous need to feed their ego's.
As someone already quite cleverly pointed out, this is not really comparable to what is today regarded as interesting cryptography, as modern cryptographers have to take into account that whoever they wanted to hide the message from already know the algorithm.
Moreover, if the message is not something like "this is the message aeroigb ekrgjlk jpojp jpojerjgkrj rjpgorjij...", the encryption method is even more useless, since it in some way must be related to the message been send, as obviously takes more things into account than what characters/symbols are included in the message.
This is by no means the kind of crypto the/. audience is interested in, and I doubt this $25-to-solve-a-close-to-impossible-crypto-contest belongs anywhere at all but on some kind of puzzel-page.
That said, I should make clear that I understand that the author did not intend to make this the new RSA, and that some/.ers may find this kind of stuff interesting.
But then again, wednesday just happens to be my whining day of the week.
Doing just that will provide you with more material than you can read in your lifetime.
Personally I would recommend Stephensons Diamond age, Bill Joy's Why the future doesn't need us and Eric Drexlers Engines of creation, all very interesting reads.
That said (I know I'm going to get flamed for this), IMHO this a rather abundant Ask/. question. We've had plenty of discussions on nanotech here, and I can't see why this one would provide anything new (since it's a question, and not an article about something nanotech advance). And it's not like it's difficult to find resources on nanotech on the net (or even on/.) either.
However, that's just the thoughts that most recently penetrated my mind, and I may very well be wrong. Comments anyone?
I think that what he, more or less, is trying to say is that we need to look out for the evolving of too many watchdogs to keep track of, instead of the all-powerful all-seeing enemy that will some time soon, due to the possibilities of limiting privacy these days (echelon-type systems, surveillance cameras etc. ad infinitum), emerge out of nowhere (or, for that matter, an already existing one (e.g. NSA)).
In that I think he is indeed right. The biggest threat to privacy may today not be everybody's favorite No Such Agency, the Illuminati or whatever, but the enormous amount of small organizations all looking out for their little corner of the world, may it be just a supermarket, that together ensure that noone is ever unseen by everybody. Then there is no need for a big org. watching everything, since everything is already watched. You by then do only have to know who to talk to and pull some strings to find out whatever you want to know about whoever you want to know something about.
Although the projects of the NSA and all the other spook orgs give me the creeps as well, this is a more acute fear, that, moreover, is by all means justified.
.. or maybe it was just too long ago I saw an x-files episode.
the/. community will love her (even?) more after this article - If someone uncomfortable in interacting with other human beings can get to hold such a post as the one she holds in the first place, that means any guy with "huge intellectual capacity" who nevertheless does lack some social competence can as well.
In other words: Yes, Joe Random Geek, you too can become a politician / talk show host / #prefered high status job involving every now and then having to talk to another person#
Oh come on! Like it wasn't already painfully obvious that AOL is a moral monster.
For some reason, it seems more rule than exception that small computer and internet related basement-companies that start to expand at exponential rate sooner or later get megalomaniac (= want to either take over the world by monopolizing, put an end to all privacy or both).
when you say that we already live in a post-m$ world, are you referring to the/. community or to humanity as a whole?
If the latter, I hate to disappoint you, but my grandma still don't know what Linux is, and she probably wouldn't care should someone explain to her either. And then, the same goes for about 10 zillion other grandmas, big stupid companies, tiny stupid companies and practically all other computer illiterates.
Conclusion: what you're talking about is far far away, as always.
has it ever occured to you that I might be interested in some of the linux-articles? If it hasn't, please do read my post again, preferably the sentence: "linux is good, but it's not everything", which was sort of the point of posting this post in the first place.
That was at least what I was trying to say, although whiners about whiners always tend to skip the parts of a "whining" post that make sense, and, hence, just don't get it at all.
A very unattractive scenario could be painted, if one really wanted to, I will be the first to admit that. However, byrocratic processes are slow, and the internet is a roaming beast out of the cage and out of control since a long time. There is no way it could be controlled. Almost all of these lawsuits are withdrawn, and the person responsible for whatever bad thing he had done gets employment offers from tens of computer related companies (16 year old DVD-Jon now works for some norwegian company developing applications for WAP, for example) instead of facing prosecution and punishments.
There is a storm right now, but it will probably blow over without the internet even noticing.
Heard at some form of learning institution in the US:
Hypocrite 1: I'm planning on making my history exams a little more information highway internet society technology IT futurish by letting people have access to the net while taking the test. What do you think?
Hypocrite 2: Well, the idea sucks, and nobody will ever learn anything that way since it will only test how well, not to mention fast, people can spell altavista, but heck, maybe we'd get some more funds and get mentioned on/. for being on the right track, so why noy?
Hypocrite 1: Yeah, that was the plan. Of course, it's a shame noone will ever learn jack shit in any class of any kind ever again if this sort of things get accepted, but that's just something we'll have to take. After all, how could a good education possibly be more valuable than that new coffea machine we could buy with more funds?
Hypocrite 2: Well spoken. Of course, I would prefer a couple of good pornos, but we can skip that discussion for now.
Hypocrite 1: Urhm.. ok. Well, anyway, see you next break, I think I just heard the bell. It's time to go make these little suckers pay for being born in this ridiculously messed up hypocratic age of information hysteria.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't get this story. No company thinks as much of person with a record as one without one, may it be related to what they do or not. A really good security guy with a economic crime, fraud, theft, child abuse, drunk driving, offensive behaviour or [crime of choice] in their history, would have a hard time getting a job as well. It's not having a hacking record that's not profitable, it's have any record.
If I'm not mistaken, it says very clearly in the /. rules that you should read what others have said before you post, in order to avoid this sort of thing.
I understand that a number of people will object that people might reply the very same thing you're about reply, while you're writing (in fact, that might happen to this reply as well), but this is anyhow obviously not the case with this article, since almost all posts are no more that 10 words long.
You may moderate me to hell for not being on topic, or flamebating or whatever, but I still find this highly irritating, and if I have to post it somewhere why not in reply to such an excellent example like this one?
It thinks it's sad that even geeks have such a tremendous need to feed their ego's.
people don't watch 1984 movies. If anything, they read the book.
Moreover, if the message is not something like "this is the message aeroigb ekrgjlk jpojp jpojerjgkrj rjpgorjij ...", the encryption method is even more useless, since it in some way must be related to the message been send, as obviously takes more things into account than what characters/symbols are included in the message.
This is by no means the kind of crypto the /. audience is interested in, and I doubt this $25-to-solve-a-close-to-impossible-crypto-contest belongs anywhere at all but on some kind of puzzel-page.
That said, I should make clear that I understand that the author did not intend to make this the new RSA, and that some /.ers may find this kind of stuff interesting.
But then again, wednesday just happens to be my whining day of the week.
Do a search on altavista for nanotech.
Do a search on /. for nanotech.
Do a search on amazon for nanotech.
Doing just that will provide you with more material than you can read in your lifetime.
Personally I would recommend Stephensons Diamond age, Bill Joy's Why the future doesn't need us and Eric Drexlers Engines of creation, all very interesting reads.
That said (I know I'm going to get flamed for this), IMHO this a rather abundant Ask /. question. We've had plenty of discussions on nanotech here, and I can't see why this one would provide anything new (since it's a question, and not an article about something nanotech advance). And it's not like it's difficult to find resources on nanotech on the net (or even on /.) either.
However, that's just the thoughts that most recently penetrated my mind, and I may very well be wrong. Comments anyone?
Possible Intepretation:
Space Cruiser Argo = geek force one
advanced technology = Linux
the deadly contamination = take a wild wild guess
Geeze, was this guy ahead of his time or what?
In that I think he is indeed right. The biggest threat to privacy may today not be everybody's favorite No Such Agency, the Illuminati or whatever, but the enormous amount of small organizations all looking out for their little corner of the world, may it be just a supermarket, that together ensure that noone is ever unseen by everybody. Then there is no need for a big org. watching everything, since everything is already watched. You by then do only have to know who to talk to and pull some strings to find out whatever you want to know about whoever you want to know something about.
Although the projects of the NSA and all the other spook orgs give me the creeps as well, this is a more acute fear, that, moreover, is by all means justified.
In other words: Yes, Joe Random Geek, you too can become a politician / talk show host / #prefered high status job involving every now and then having to talk to another person#
For some reason, it seems more rule than exception that small computer and internet related basement-companies that start to expand at exponential rate sooner or later get megalomaniac (= want to either take over the world by monopolizing, put an end to all privacy or both).
If the latter, I hate to disappoint you, but my grandma still don't know what Linux is, and she probably wouldn't care should someone explain to her either. And then, the same goes for about 10 zillion other grandmas, big stupid companies, tiny stupid companies and practically all other computer illiterates.
Conclusion: what you're talking about is far far away, as always.
That was at least what I was trying to say, although whiners about whiners always tend to skip the parts of a "whining" post that make sense, and, hence, just don't get it at all.
There is a storm right now, but it will probably blow over without the internet even noticing.
doesn't matter what happens in what industry - Atari will always be the killer in this business
for submitting a story noone is able to make a sane comment on
A close-to-improvable conjecture
A bunch of mathematicians not willing to waste their time on a close-to-improvable conjecture
Some loser issuing a contest
It then clearly follows that NOTHING HAPPENS
I can assure you all that this is as close to a proof of anything that will follow as a consequence of this pathetic contest
Hypocrite 1: I'm planning on making my history exams a little more information highway internet society technology IT futurish by letting people have access to the net while taking the test. What do you think?
Hypocrite 2: Well, the idea sucks, and nobody will ever learn anything that way since it will only test how well, not to mention fast, people can spell altavista, but heck, maybe we'd get some more funds and get mentioned on /. for being on the right track, so why noy?
Hypocrite 1: Yeah, that was the plan. Of course, it's a shame noone will ever learn jack shit in any class of any kind ever again if this sort of things get accepted, but that's just something we'll have to take. After all, how could a good education possibly be more valuable than that new coffea machine we could buy with more funds?
Hypocrite 2: Well spoken. Of course, I would prefer a couple of good pornos, but we can skip that discussion for now.
Hypocrite 1: Urhm.. ok. Well, anyway, see you next break, I think I just heard the bell. It's time to go make these little suckers pay for being born in this ridiculously messed up hypocratic age of information hysteria.