I'm surprised some Boston Market exec didn't walk in and start bitching about the smell. After all, they're not likely to spend enough time on the 'factory floor' to get acclimated.
Six months ago thousands of people died because security failed
Exactly what part of security failed on 9/11? That these guys were allowed on the plane in the first place? No way could airport security have known that they shouldn't. That they brought box cutters? I don't recall them being required to stop anyone carrying anything with a sharp edge on it into a plane, so they didn't fail in that regard. They could have just as easily used a straight razor or utility knife. Or a sharp piece of glass or ceramic.
There is no reasonable amount of searching that can keep someone from bringing a potential weapon onto a plane. The problem here is that they were able to hijack the plane in the first place using nothing but a 2-inch blade. If anything failed that day, it wasn't the groundside security.
So you're standing there at the checkpoint, with a man in front of you whom you have many reasons to believe might be wearing a bomb, and you have only his word that it's a computer.
So if in doubt, brutalize? Hold the man for 3 days? Trash his equipment? Ignore everything he says and any documentsation he has? Gee, that's just swell..
How small could an explosive powerful enough to destroy an airplane be made? There are a number of ways to hide it in a human body if it's fairly small. Swallowing it or jamming it up your ass come to mind.
No amount of inconvenience will give you the security you desire.
Hear, hear. I'd say the (attempted) takeover of Flight 93, even though it crashed anyway, will do more for preventing hijackings than any security. There's always the crazies who just want to blow it up, but for that they'll need explosives. And for those we have sniffers, both mechanical and canine, which work far better than a $10/hr rent a cop.
Most of all I am rather appalled at the apparent total lack of Sneakers-style red team exercises conducted against the new and not very improved security. What kind of fool implements a whole new batch of security procedures and then doesn't hire someone to test them to the limits?
I was thinking about that. The Abiocor came to mind. It's powered by an external pack. I can just imagine a recipient trying to walk through and security ripping the thing away and killing him.
Of course, one could conceivably acquire those parts, pack them with explosives, and board the plane pretending to have an artificial heart.
The smart card is used to protect TV signals. Breaking it is akin to writing DeCSS.
Though the DMCA wouldn't really apply because they didn't create a copy-prevention circumvention. They simply published the specs of the cards that many people already owned. Someone else designed the actual hacks. But when did little things like reason and logic ever affect politicians?
No, it just cannot be hampered by government intervention. Valenti and Rosen can try and DRM or CD-key everything in sight but under no circumstances are they to have the power of law on their side. If I can beat it, I am legally allowed to do so.
I thought of that. Basically you'd need two window panes. The inner one plays the sound and the outer one does the noise nullification they mentioned in the article.
I think he meant that if you stick a flat panel tv on the wall and then turn the wall behind it into a speaker you get a significant reduction in used floorspace.
As long as the thumper, which is what I'm gonna call this gadget since it basically thumps the attached surface and makes sound, is far enough away from the screen, there's little or no EM interference. The only thing you need to worry about then is vibrations screwing it up. I imagine placing some kind of vibration damper between the screen and the surface would take care of it.
But if he did mean turning the monitor itself into the speaker, then I agree with you.
Re:[OT?] Opera 6.01 on NT4 crashes on that Salon l
on
Chained Melodies
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· Score: 2
Holy crap, that never even occured to me. No sarcasm. At the rate we're going it'll be lethal to rip a CD you own but a slap on the wrist to steal one you don't.
So are there any Congresscritters that actually have experience working with the computers they make all these laws about?
Nope, because Tim has a thermometer built in so that the whole assembly melts to slag if not kept within an approved temperature zone.
It's quite possible to totally protect the hardware on a computer, but aside from the NSA or CIA or the military or whatever, nobody is going to. The bulkiness, frustration, and sheer cost of doing so would be completely prohibitive for the PC market.
As long as untrusted software can be written and untrusted hardware used, then bits will be copyable. Only if both hardware and software are out of the reach of our grubby little fingers will copy-prevention be successful.
Unfortunately, people will be keeping their computers in their own homes and (gasp) writing their own code on them. Essentially out of the reach of the DMCA and SSSCA. The hardware and software will start off quite protected, but since nobody can keep tabs on what I do with my own system in the basement, the copy-prevention will quickly become a thing of the past.
The only way to make the modern computer truly protectable is to do what you suggested. Isolate the hardware (keep it out of the reach of the person actually using it, either in a remote location or in a totally sealed case that self destructs when breached) and do not allow any new software whatsoever to be run on it. Not even new 'trusted' software could be installed since nasty hackers could forge the authentication signature and install some evil hacking utility like gcc. What little software that is installed is specially chosen so as not to include things like hex editors and compilers or anything that could be used as such.
You can guess how likely it is that anyone, even Joe Sixpack, would buy such a machine.
That is why the whole circumvention part of the DMCA is so stupid. Supposedly it only applies to effective copy-prevention mechanisms. But if it can be bypassed, then it's not very effective and violations shouldn't be applicable under the DMCA, no? It's like a auto theft insurance policy that only protects effectively protected belongings, but treats a post-it note on the front door that says "Do not steal this" as effective.
I don't have a problem with them trying to keep me from copying. It's stupid and childish and they'd eventually see it won't work, but if theat's what they want to do, so be it. I have a problem with them running to Congress and whining "Make them stop copying!"
That is, I would still have the right to copy, and they would still have the right to try and stop me from copying. But with the SSSCA and DMCA I would not have the right to stop them from stopping me from copying.
It's not a question of finding a place where there are no dangers. It's about being in enough places so that the possibility of all of them being affected to a lethal degree all at once is essentialy nil. If something really bad happened to Earth, it'd be nice if there were colonies near or at self-sufficiency scattered around the solar system (and beyond?) that could build anew.
A line from "A Deepness in the Sky" by Vernor Vinge that stays with me is the one about Earth having been resettled from scratch three or four times since mankind achieved starflight. Each previous incarnation of civilization having been destroyed for one reason or another.
Same reason we keep buying new computers even though we know it'll be outdated by the time we get it home. We have to do something or we'll forever be sitting at home saying, "Just one more doubling of processor speed and I'll upgrade". A bird in the hand is worth 2 next year, as it were.
The thrust required to correct a well-planned interplanetary orbit could be accomplished by having an astronaut piss out the ship away from the direction they need to go.
Really, any halfway decent orbit would barely be affected by solar wind and dust particles. The overlapping gravity effects are terribly hard to figure out, but they can be done well in advance on any computer and accounted for fairly well. Note that most comets have very safe and regular orbits despite never correcting theirs.
Just because we can do something is no argument for in fact doing it
Yes, good point. Let's all sit here on this one little godforsaken planet and hope that nothing comes along and does a number on it. There's really nothing to worry about. Aside from the natural possiblities like solar flares, asteroid impacts, ice ages, global warming induced flooding, and freak tectonic action, there's just the pesky manmade problems of nuclear wars, virulent diseases, and shoe manufacturing run amok. All of these could quite possibly wipe out our species, almost certainly our civilization, but there's really no need to hedge our bets by establishing Earth's progeny on other planets.
I realize that the odds of anything we can't handle coming along in the next few years is pretty slim to say the least, but I for one am not willing to bet the human race on it. Particularly when the potential rewards for moving out into space are so great.
You might enjoy this. The official news agency for the DPRK.
I thumb through it every now and then. Most of it is utter bosh, but occasionally there's some real gems in it. My favorite was the reference to the Korean War which was started by the United States and from which North Korea emerged victorious.
What worries me is that eventually the powers that be in North Korea might start believing their own superiority bullshit and do something rash.
In the long run, space exploration is the only way to increase the long term chance of survival for mankind. It is stupid to be dependant on any one planet if we don't have to.
Slashdot Mirror
Better than the nanites in your nervous system being hacked to show roach motel commercials. In Hindi. All the time. Even when your eyes are closed.
I'm surprised some Boston Market exec didn't walk in and start bitching about the smell. After all, they're not likely to spend enough time on the 'factory floor' to get acclimated.
I'd say it's a hardware problem caused by his Canadaware.
Exactly what part of security failed on 9/11? That these guys were allowed on the plane in the first place? No way could airport security have known that they shouldn't. That they brought box cutters? I don't recall them being required to stop anyone carrying anything with a sharp edge on it into a plane, so they didn't fail in that regard. They could have just as easily used a straight razor or utility knife. Or a sharp piece of glass or ceramic.
There is no reasonable amount of searching that can keep someone from bringing a potential weapon onto a plane. The problem here is that they were able to hijack the plane in the first place using nothing but a 2-inch blade. If anything failed that day, it wasn't the groundside security.
So you're standing there at the checkpoint, with a man in front of you whom you have many reasons to believe might be wearing a bomb, and you have only his word that it's a computer.
So if in doubt, brutalize? Hold the man for 3 days? Trash his equipment? Ignore everything he says and any documentsation he has? Gee, that's just swell..
How small could an explosive powerful enough to destroy an airplane be made? There are a number of ways to hide it in a human body if it's fairly small. Swallowing it or jamming it up your ass come to mind.
Hear, hear. I'd say the (attempted) takeover of Flight 93, even though it crashed anyway, will do more for preventing hijackings than any security. There's always the crazies who just want to blow it up, but for that they'll need explosives. And for those we have sniffers, both mechanical and canine, which work far better than a $10/hr rent a cop.
Most of all I am rather appalled at the apparent total lack of Sneakers-style red team exercises conducted against the new and not very improved security. What kind of fool implements a whole new batch of security procedures and then doesn't hire someone to test them to the limits?
Of course, one could conceivably acquire those parts, pack them with explosives, and board the plane pretending to have an artificial heart.
Though the DMCA wouldn't really apply because they didn't create a copy-prevention circumvention. They simply published the specs of the cards that many people already owned. Someone else designed the actual hacks. But when did little things like reason and logic ever affect politicians?
AND publish my method for doing so...
Yeah, that too. Thanks.
No, it just cannot be hampered by government intervention. Valenti and Rosen can try and DRM or CD-key everything in sight but under no circumstances are they to have the power of law on their side. If I can beat it, I am legally allowed to do so.
I thought of that. Basically you'd need two window panes. The inner one plays the sound and the outer one does the noise nullification they mentioned in the article.
As long as the thumper, which is what I'm gonna call this gadget since it basically thumps the attached surface and makes sound, is far enough away from the screen, there's little or no EM interference. The only thing you need to worry about then is vibrations screwing it up. I imagine placing some kind of vibration damper between the screen and the surface would take care of it.
But if he did mean turning the monitor itself into the speaker, then I agree with you.
Well, Opera 6.01 on Win2k doesn't.
Require amputations of all limbs at birth and extraction of teeth as they show up? Sounds about right...
So are there any Congresscritters that actually have experience working with the computers they make all these laws about?
It's quite possible to totally protect the hardware on a computer, but aside from the NSA or CIA or the military or whatever, nobody is going to. The bulkiness, frustration, and sheer cost of doing so would be completely prohibitive for the PC market.
Unfortunately, people will be keeping their computers in their own homes and (gasp) writing their own code on them. Essentially out of the reach of the DMCA and SSSCA. The hardware and software will start off quite protected, but since nobody can keep tabs on what I do with my own system in the basement, the copy-prevention will quickly become a thing of the past.
The only way to make the modern computer truly protectable is to do what you suggested. Isolate the hardware (keep it out of the reach of the person actually using it, either in a remote location or in a totally sealed case that self destructs when breached) and do not allow any new software whatsoever to be run on it. Not even new 'trusted' software could be installed since nasty hackers could forge the authentication signature and install some evil hacking utility like gcc. What little software that is installed is specially chosen so as not to include things like hex editors and compilers or anything that could be used as such.
You can guess how likely it is that anyone, even Joe Sixpack, would buy such a machine.
That is why the whole circumvention part of the DMCA is so stupid. Supposedly it only applies to effective copy-prevention mechanisms. But if it can be bypassed, then it's not very effective and violations shouldn't be applicable under the DMCA, no? It's like a auto theft insurance policy that only protects effectively protected belongings, but treats a post-it note on the front door that says "Do not steal this" as effective.
That is, I would still have the right to copy, and they would still have the right to try and stop me from copying. But with the SSSCA and DMCA I would not have the right to stop them from stopping me from copying.
A line from "A Deepness in the Sky" by Vernor Vinge that stays with me is the one about Earth having been resettled from scratch three or four times since mankind achieved starflight. Each previous incarnation of civilization having been destroyed for one reason or another.
Same reason we keep buying new computers even though we know it'll be outdated by the time we get it home. We have to do something or we'll forever be sitting at home saying, "Just one more doubling of processor speed and I'll upgrade". A bird in the hand is worth 2 next year, as it were.
Really, any halfway decent orbit would barely be affected by solar wind and dust particles. The overlapping gravity effects are terribly hard to figure out, but they can be done well in advance on any computer and accounted for fairly well. Note that most comets have very safe and regular orbits despite never correcting theirs.
Yes, good point. Let's all sit here on this one little godforsaken planet and hope that nothing comes along and does a number on it. There's really nothing to worry about. Aside from the natural possiblities like solar flares, asteroid impacts, ice ages, global warming induced flooding, and freak tectonic action, there's just the pesky manmade problems of nuclear wars, virulent diseases, and shoe manufacturing run amok. All of these could quite possibly wipe out our species, almost certainly our civilization, but there's really no need to hedge our bets by establishing Earth's progeny on other planets.
I realize that the odds of anything we can't handle coming along in the next few years is pretty slim to say the least, but I for one am not willing to bet the human race on it. Particularly when the potential rewards for moving out into space are so great.
I thumb through it every now and then. Most of it is utter bosh, but occasionally there's some real gems in it. My favorite was the reference to the Korean War which was started by the United States and from which North Korea emerged victorious.
What worries me is that eventually the powers that be in North Korea might start believing their own superiority bullshit and do something rash.
In this, we are in perfect and total agreement.