I can see this falling on a lot of deaf or even contemptuous ears in the gray hat community. If information on a security hole is released and someone's just too damn lazy or stupid to plug it or get someone else to, that's their problem.
Absolutely! He starts out by conceding that possession of physical objects is valid. He uses shoes as an example. But how did I pay for the shoes I'm wearing? I'm a web developer and programmer. None of what I do would be possible without the prior work of others. Does that mean that my shoes belong in part to Brian Kernigan and Dennis Ritchie? By his arguments it does. But I don't think they'd want them.
A friend of mine, totally a non-techie, once gave me an idea for a program by something she said. She wasn't talking about programming or even computers. It just clicked as she was talking. Do my shoes belong in part to her?
Let's take a look at physical products. A blacksmith, for example. He (or she:) produces some horseshoes. According to Martin, the smith's ownership of these shoes is unquestionable. But how did he learn to make the shoes? Did he ever get shoe-making ideas in talking to another smith? Uh-oh!
What the smith is compensated for is his value added, both to the raw materials used to make the shoes, and to the ideas of those that preceded him in the making of horse shoes. Because the smith learned how to make horse shoes, I don't have to when I want horse shoes. That's knowledge. What I am compensated for is the value added to the work of those I learned from and those they learned from, etc. Because I leared to do that, the smith doesn't have to if he wants a web site.
Yes, there have been and are abuses of intellectual propery rights, some quite blatant and some quite grievous. But let's not throw the baby out with the bath water.
I think Pizza Hut is the *perfect* company to take the initiative on this. I mean, if we're going to have all those orbital and lunar colonies, which of course geeks will be called upon to maintain, we're gonna need pizza! I think Mountain Dew should follow their lead.
I liked this part: "The 200-foot tall proton rocket was launched at 12:56 a.m./EDT from Kazakhstan and is headed for the International Space Station carrying a critical component, the Service Module...." Sure: and how many pizzas?
On a serious note, I've seen a number of people here moaning about "billboards in space". The key point to keep in mind here is that somebody took the initiative to get this module into space. If it's Pizza Hut that made it possible, why shouldn't they get some benefit in return?
The book "Applied Cryptography" looks at cracking a 256 bit key:
It starts by stating that to change a single bit in a processor, you would (according to the laws of thermodynamics) need an amount of energy no less than kT where T is the absolute temperature of the system, and k is the Boltzman constant. If you run a computer at 3.2 degrees Kelvin, and with k being 1.38*10^-16 ergs/K, you would need 4.4*10^-16 ergs to set or clear a bit.
The sun releases about 1.12*10^41 ergs in a year, so if you could collect all the energy from it for 32 years (of course, Earth would soon become very cold and dead then), you could have a your computer count up to 2^192, but you wouldn't have any energy left to do anything with the counter (such as cracking a key). A typical supernova releases about 10^51 ergs. If you collect all that energy, you could count up to 2^219.
The conclusion is that unless computers are built from something other than matter, and occupy something other than space, a brute force attack against a 256 bit key is not possible.
While I'm just as concerned over privacy issues as the next person, I just want to address one point here. In the article, Mark Rasch, a former federal computer-crimes prosecutor says "It's the electronic equivalent of listening to everybody's phone calls to see if it's the phone call you should be monitoring."
I disagree -- I think it's more like opening a telephone junction box to see which line you should be tapping. With that box open you have the potential of tapping all those lines, but you just tap the one. The computer may be monitoring all the traffic, but obviously it has no understanding of what it's processing; if the system is used properly (and granted, that may be a big IF), it's only recording suspect traffic.
The first computer I ever worked on was a DEC PDP 11/70, in 1975. Then our school sprung for a state-of-the-art TRS-80. The first computer I owned myself was a 286 clone from American Semiconductor.
I've transferred all of my own domains from NSI, and most (soon to be all) of my clients'. I've had no problems with them -- it went quite smoothly.
My best experience has been with a friend of mine who's signed up as an OpenSRS reseller. They'll credit you with time remaining at your previous registrar.
I have no problem with a grace period, but one domain I've been watching has been expired for almost six months. It's a particulary juicy domain name, and I really suspect NSI is squatting on it.
Uhh. ..perhaps you've heard of this new thing called hyperlinks? It's this great thing you put in text that readers can click on and go to whatever you're talking about. Kind of like this: www.time-domain.com
The sad thing is, clueless users will go for it, just like they go for Snotmail and LookOut!, just because it's Microsoft and their evening news program told them that's good.
Well, never is a long time. Certainly with the current state of the Internet, ASPs are not widely practical. But it's an idea that occurred to me well before the term ASP started floating around (too bad I didn't patent it:). I think eventually we will get to a model where most data and applications are centralized, with more generic terminals/clients. Think Star Trek PADDs, for example.
You can't copyright individual words or even phrases (though you can trademark them sometimes -- that's a different issue). The copyright on a dictionary applies to the whole compilation and presentation, not to the words in it or even the definitions.
I think something we need to keep in mind is that this whole thing isn't over yet. The issue of such absurdly broad patents as Bezos' and Walker's, while they have been tested somewhat in the courts, still have a long way to go.
Seth Shulman at Technology Review gives a good, fairly even overview of the situation. He quotes a patent lawyer who, I think, makes a particularly interesting point, "when there has been enough perceived inequity in the patent system, industry has revolted and other mechanisms have kicked in." In the case of e-commerce patents, he predicts "the courts will probably step in. Congress may have to step in. But you have to remember that all these forces, including broad societal forces, come together in a confluence that creates the law."
I think the reaction and outcry to this issue have been, at the same time, excessive and necessary. Excessive in the sense that I think it will ultimately be resolved: I think it will ultimately be seen that this sort of patent defeats the purpose of the patent system. Necessary in the sense that, in situations like this, excessive reaction is necessary in order to drive the needed changes.
Slashdot Mirror
Why did Constantinople get the works?
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I can see this falling on a lot of deaf or even contemptuous ears in the gray hat community. If information on a security hole is released and someone's just too damn lazy or stupid to plug it or get someone else to, that's their problem.
--
Absolutely! He starts out by conceding that possession of physical objects is valid. He uses shoes as an example. But how did I pay for the shoes I'm wearing? I'm a web developer and programmer. None of what I do would be possible without the prior work of others. Does that mean that my shoes belong in part to Brian Kernigan and Dennis Ritchie? By his arguments it does. But I don't think they'd want them.
:) produces some horseshoes. According to Martin, the smith's ownership of these shoes is unquestionable. But how did he learn to make the shoes? Did he ever get shoe-making ideas in talking to another smith? Uh-oh!
A friend of mine, totally a non-techie, once gave me an idea for a program by something she said. She wasn't talking about programming or even computers. It just clicked as she was talking. Do my shoes belong in part to her?
Let's take a look at physical products. A blacksmith, for example. He (or she
What the smith is compensated for is his value added, both to the raw materials used to make the shoes, and to the ideas of those that preceded him in the making of horse shoes. Because the smith learned how to make horse shoes, I don't have to when I want horse shoes. That's knowledge. What I am compensated for is the value added to the work of those I learned from and those they learned from, etc. Because I leared to do that, the smith doesn't have to if he wants a web site.
Yes, there have been and are abuses of intellectual propery rights, some quite blatant and some quite grievous. But let's not throw the baby out with the bath water.
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> A service agreement from a little
> company called Network Solutions,
> whose rep chairs COPA's meetings;
But that one's correct: NSI is obscene and not suitable for children.
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I think Pizza Hut is the *perfect* company to take the initiative on this. I mean, if we're going to have all those orbital and lunar colonies, which of course geeks will be called upon to maintain, we're gonna need pizza! I think Mountain Dew should follow their lead.
I liked this part: "The 200-foot tall proton rocket was launched at 12:56 a.m./EDT from Kazakhstan and is headed for the International Space Station carrying a critical component, the Service Module...." Sure: and how many pizzas?
On a serious note, I've seen a number of people here moaning about "billboards in space". The key point to keep in mind here is that somebody took the initiative to get this module into space. If it's Pizza Hut that made it possible, why shouldn't they get some benefit in return?
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...the Slashdot Effect, already known to dissipate the strength of powerful servers.
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> The freedom to take without getting caught.
> Thats Open Source.
> The freedom to get rich at others expense.
> Thats Open Source.
Right! Freedom is for criminals only! Freedom is slavery! Hail Big Brother!!
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The book "Applied Cryptography" looks at cracking a 256 bit key:
It starts by stating that to change a single bit in a processor, you would (according to the laws of thermodynamics) need an amount of energy no less than kT where T is the absolute temperature of the system, and k is the Boltzman constant. If you run a computer at 3.2 degrees Kelvin, and with k being 1.38*10^-16 ergs/K, you would need 4.4*10^-16 ergs to set or clear a bit.
The sun releases about 1.12*10^41 ergs in a year, so if you could collect all the energy from it for 32 years (of course, Earth would soon become very cold and dead then), you could have a your computer count up to 2^192, but you wouldn't have any energy left to do anything with the counter (such as cracking a key). A typical supernova releases about 10^51 ergs. If you collect all that energy, you could count up to 2^219.
The conclusion is that unless computers are built from something other than matter, and occupy something other than space, a brute force attack against a 256 bit key is not possible.
--
While I'm just as concerned over privacy issues as the next person, I just want to address one point here. In the article, Mark Rasch, a former federal computer-crimes prosecutor says "It's the electronic equivalent of listening to everybody's phone calls to see if it's the phone call you should be monitoring."
I disagree -- I think it's more like opening a telephone junction box to see which line you should be tapping. With that box open you have the potential of tapping all those lines, but you just tap the one. The computer may be monitoring all the traffic, but obviously it has no understanding of what it's processing; if the system is used properly (and granted, that may be a big IF), it's only recording suspect traffic.
--
The first computer I ever worked on was a DEC PDP 11/70, in 1975. Then our school sprung for a state-of-the-art TRS-80. The first computer I owned myself was a 286 clone from American Semiconductor.
--
I've transferred all of my own domains from NSI, and most (soon to be all) of my clients'. I've had no problems with them -- it went quite smoothly.
My best experience has been with a friend of mine who's signed up as an OpenSRS reseller. They'll credit you with time remaining at your previous registrar.
--
I have no problem with a grace period, but one domain I've been watching has been expired for almost six months. It's a particulary juicy domain name, and I really suspect NSI is squatting on it.
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I'm all for kicking the crap out of NSI, but I'm not going to tell anyone the domain names I'm watching. Especially not NSI!
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Let me see: you're pushing drugs, so you're either a psychiatrist or a DEA agent. Right?
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Uh, more likely computer game following previously more obscure science. I seriously doubt the game designers at MS dreamed this up themselves.
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> I'd like to see the first guy who gets the
.you realize, of course, that would require a space shuttle crashing first. And you'd like to see this?
> death-sentence for cracking because he
> somehow manages to make a space shuttle
> crash.
Uh. .
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Better yet, install a cookie monitor utility such as Cookie Pal. I've been using it for almost a year, and I love it.
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Uhh. . .perhaps you've heard of this new thing called hyperlinks? It's this great thing you put in text that readers can click on and go to whatever you're talking about. Kind of like this: www.time-domain.com
--
The sad thing is, clueless users will go for it, just like they go for Snotmail and LookOut!, just because it's Microsoft and their evening news program told them that's good.
When will people learn?
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> ASP's are never going to take off in a big way,
:). I think eventually we will get to a model where most data and applications are centralized, with more generic terminals/clients. Think Star Trek PADDs, for example.
Well, never is a long time. Certainly with the current state of the Internet, ASPs are not widely practical. But it's an idea that occurred to me well before the term ASP started floating around (too bad I didn't patent it
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Criminal negligence, perhaps?
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You can't copyright individual words or even phrases (though you can trademark them sometimes -- that's a different issue). The copyright on a dictionary applies to the whole compilation and presentation, not to the words in it or even the definitions.
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Moore Action Collectibles got the year wrong. They say Fry is thawed out in 2099. I guess Fry isn't the only one who can't do math.
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One star? How about minus stars? Their arrogance and stupidity (which so often seem to go together) is utterly beyond belief.
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I think something we need to keep in mind is that this whole thing isn't over yet. The issue of such absurdly broad patents as Bezos' and Walker's, while they have been tested somewhat in the courts, still have a long way to go.
Seth Shulman at Technology Review gives a good, fairly even overview of the situation. He quotes a patent lawyer who, I think, makes a particularly interesting point, "when there has been enough perceived inequity in the patent system, industry has revolted and other mechanisms have kicked in." In the case of e-commerce patents, he predicts "the courts will probably step in. Congress may have to step in. But you have to remember that all these forces, including broad societal forces, come together in a confluence that creates the law."
I think the reaction and outcry to this issue have been, at the same time, excessive and necessary. Excessive in the sense that I think it will ultimately be resolved: I think it will ultimately be seen that this sort of patent defeats the purpose of the patent system. Necessary in the sense that, in situations like this, excessive reaction is necessary in order to drive the needed changes.
--