The Simpsons make a shopping excursion to ShÃp, the place to go for modern Swedish furniture and accessories. A green end table catches Marge's eye, and she's impressed that those crazy Swedish furniture designers could invent such a far-out concept. Homer tests a bean-bag chair -- and it immediately swallows him up. He joins Captain McAllister, who fell victim to the same chair.
Luckily, Homer rejoins his family in time to look at assemble-it-yourself wall units. A costumed character that looks like an Allen wrench with arms and legs walks up.
Allen: You put it together yourself. All you need is me -- Allen
Wrench. Homer: [giggles] He's named after what he is. Bart: [knocking on the wrench] Cool costume. Allen: [turns away from the rest of the family to face Bart, and
begins talking in a robotic tone]
It's not a costume. They found me inside a meteor. Marge: Excuse me, where are your hamper lids? Allen: [friendly] Hamper lids? Uh, third floor.
[turns to Bart again]
[robotic] Help, I need tungsten to live. [raises arms]
Tungsten!
[Bart flees] -- "Eight Misbehavin'"
Right. There's an episode of House that is also very similar. Interestingly, the Goiânia accident has also provided information for several papers modeling how X (where X is bad) will be transported / dispersed / etc. through a community. Check out a Google search of 'Goiânia accident' to see some of the research.
I used to read the Times Editorial page once, twice, sometimes three times a week. Until Times Select. Then it was, "Krugman? Friedman? Who?" Putting the content behind that wall made the Times' columnists practically irrelevant. For better or worse, the Times has some of the most talked-about columnists in the country, and their importance evaporated almost instantly when the unwashed masses (me) could no longer read them. I, for one, am more than happy to look at a picture of a car or a book or whatever a few times a week if it means (in some small way) invigorating the national conversation.
An EU official said that the EU wanted to give away less data, while the US wanted more.
That doesn't sound right at all!
More seriously, here's some of the data they're talking about (from the article)
Passenger profile
The Passenger Name Record (PNR) data that has been transferred up to now, falls into 34 overlapping fields, some of which contain very little information, for example the passenger's name, while others contain a lot, including the passenger's name (again), date of birth, sex, citizenship and so on.
Some of this information is collected when the ticket is booked, some of it at check-in, and some is information about the passenger's travelling history, which can be gleaned from the reservation database. Not all the fields will necessarily be filled in.
The data can be broken down into the following categories
* Information about the passenger: name; address; date of birth; passport number; citizenship; sex; country of residence; US visa number (plus date and place issued); address while in the US; telephone numbers; e-mail address; frequent flyer miles flown; address on frequent flyer account; the passenger's history of not showing up for flights
* Information about the booking of the ticket: date of reservation; date of intended travel; date ticket was issued; travel agency; travel agent; billing address; how the ticket was paid for (including credit card number); the ticket number; which organisation issued the ticket; whether the passenger bought the ticket at the airport just before the flight; whether the passenger has a definite booking or is on a waiting list; pricing information; a locator number on the computer reservation system; history of changes to the booking
* Information about the flight itself: seat number; seat information (eg aisle or window); bag tag numbers; one-way or return flight; special requests, such as requests for special meals, for a wheelchair, or help for an unaccompanied minor
* Information about the passenger's itinerary: other flights ticketed separately, or data on accommodation, car rental, rail reservations or tours.
* Information about other people: the group the passenger is travelling with; the person who booked the ticket
The CBP system has been built in such a way that some "sensitive" information is filtered out.
Protected data
According to the undertakings on data protection provided by the US, this includes "personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, and data concerning the health or sex life of the individual".
This means that Halal or Kosher meal preferences will not show up, while requests for a vegetarian meal will.
I also found this passage interesting:
Airlines have been threatened with fines of $6,000 per passenger or withdrawal of landing rights if they fly to the US without supplying the data, which American officials use to try to identify potential terrorists.
But the airlines could face prosecution under national data protection laws in EU member states if they do hand over the information.
I'm not exactly a friend of the airlines, but it seems like they're screwed either way.
The Ars article's title was: Federal judge doesn't buy state secrets argument in NSA wiretap case, which I think is a little misleading. Read this passage from State Your Secrets (an article by Louis Fisher appearing in the June, 2006 edition of Legal Times, reprinted courtesy of Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists)
The responsibility for deciding questions of privilege and access to evidence is central to the role of a judge in conducting a trial.
This authority is well established. In his well-known 1940 treatise on evidence, John Wigmore recognized the existence of "state secrets" but also concluded that the scope of the privilege had to be decided by a judge, not executive officials. He agreed that there "must be a privilege for secrets of State, i.e. matters whose disclosure would endager [sic] the Nation's governmental requirements or its relations of friendship and profit with other nations." Yet he cautioned that this privilege "has been so often improperly invoked and so loosely misapplied that a strict definition of its legitimate limits must be made."
Wigmore considered the claim of "state secrets" so abstract and useless that he divided it into eight categories, including exemptions from giving testimony, attending court, providing evidence by deposition, and disclosing communications by informers to government prosecutors. But on the duty to give evidence, he was unambiguous: "Let it be understood, then, that there is no exemption, for officials as such, or for the Executive as such, from the universal testimonial duty to give evidence in judicial investigations." An exemption from attendance in court "does not involve any concession either of an exemption from the Executive's general testimonial duty to furnish evidence or of a judicial inability to enforce the performance of that duty."
Wigmore came down clearly on which branch should determine the necessity for secrecy. It was the judiciary: "Shall every subordinate in the department have access to the secret, and not the presiding officer of justice? Cannot the constitutionally coördinate body of government share the confidence? The truth cannot be escaped that a Court which abdicates its inherent function of determining the facts upon which the admissibility of evidence depends will furnish to bureaucratic officials too ample opportunities for abusing the privilege . . . Both principle and policy demand that the determination of the privilege shall be for the Court."
Basically, he's saying that, yes, there are state secrets, but the judiciary -- not the executive -- is responsible for determining how trials involving state secrets proceed. This idea of someone crying 'State Secrets!!!1!!1!one!11!!!' and automatically getting a case tossed out is relatively new, and, as most of us here believe, contrary to the basic premise of the court system.
There was a Slate article on hard labor recently. The context was military punishment, but maybe it's relevant? Maybe not. Either way, I think I'll go double check my grant proposals...
More generally, I think people are going to have to face someday that brain genetics are not somehow special. Just like certain races are shorter, taller, darker, lighter, faster, stronger, etc, certain races (and sexes...) are going to have bell curves that are different shapes. Of course, this doesn't preclude any individual from falling anywhere on the bell curve.
I bet that there were strings attached when Bono played Xbox with that guy:
Bono: It'd be pretty cool if you could play this with me, right? Kapellen: Yeah. Bono: Alright, then we'll play -- but you have to promise to cure AIDS as soon as we're done. Kapellen: (mulls it over for a minute) Yeah, okay.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is a socially constructive application of the power of celebrity. I bet that Kapellen guy is half way to a bachelor's degree in Biology by now.
Reminds me of an anecdote from An Evening with Kevin Smith where he talks about dealing with one of Prince's handlers while he (Kevin Smith) was making a documentary for Prince:
She's like, "Prince doesn't comprehend things the way you and I do."
I was like, "What do you mean?"
She was like, "Well... Prince has been living in Prince World for quite some time now." She's like, "So Prince will come to us periodically and say things like: 'It's 3 in the morning in Minnesota. I really need a camel. Go get it.'
And then we try to explain to Prince, like: 'Prince, it's 3:00 in the morning in Minnesota, it's January... and you want a camel. That is not physically or psychologically possible.'
And Prince says, 'Why?"'
I'm like, "Is he an asshole?"
She's like, "He's not malicious when he does it. He just doesn't understand why he can't get what he wants. He doesn't understand why someone can't process a request... like a camel at 3 in the morning in Minnesota."
I was like, "That's not my problem. I can't do what he wants. I don't know what to do."
She said, "You'd be doing me a huge favor if you tell him that."
I was like, "All right, I'll tell him."
I'm not sure I'd want to be doing tech support for this guy.
I think that these robots would be much better fund-raising machines than killing machines. Think about these robots on Battle Bots. I think this could get the show back on the air. Then, the DoD could use the winnings to reduce the tax burden of defense spending.
I'm probably being stupid, but if Lycos already knows who the bad hosts are, why is it necessary to (not) DDOS them, instead of just blocking mail from those hosts?
It seems to me that any problem with blacklisting certain hosts would translate to a similar problem with the (not) DDOS approach (for instance, spammers changing hosts or compromising more machines).
Not to mention, this creates yet more traffic for the internet to handle. I'm sure it's up to the task, but it seems like there's no need to create new traffic and work when less traffic and work is one of the goals of the project.
Besides, this is sort of a murky, ethically gray area for a corporation. My initial thought was "neat!" immediately followed by, "well... but... hmm... I'm not so sure that's a good idea..."
I also got this notice from the police station today that says I have won a speed boat! All I have to do is go down to the station to sign the title and get the keys! I hope it won't be a problem that I have like 11ty billion unpaid parking tickets!
black iPod that comes preloaded with the band's new album as well as portions of the band's 25-year back catalo
Sure, it's cool that the iPod is black (although, I can't seem to find any pictures of said iPod. I'd love to see what it looks like), but I think the real question is how much of the band's catalog is preloaded onto it? If you are a U2 fan, and the device contains, say, even 50% of the catalog, that's pretty significant value added. Of course, if you're a U2 fan, you probably own those albums anyway, so maybe not.
Still, I guess it's a nice marketing gimmick by Apple. Exclusive rights to seel the music (online, and for a little while at least), some ads out of a pretty popular group, and a million trillion news outlets covering the story and producing even more press. Kudos, Apple.
The sensors, which are estimated to be less than an inch (2.5 centimetres) wide, were apparently installed in a circuit board in the wrong orientation - rotated 180 from the correct direction. But the problem stemmed not from the installation but the design, by Lockheed Martin, based in Bethesda, Maryland.
I caught that too. What I don't understand is what was wrong with the design. Is the crash investigation team saying, "Yeah, the sensors were designed wrong, but, huh, check it out, they were installed backwards too, but that doesn't matter" or what? It seems like them (the sensors) being in backwards would be a big deal, but the article seems to imply that the design flaw was the only relevant mistake.
Anybody have any idea what the flaw was or why the sensors would still work when installed backwards?
When I was in college (I'm a second-year grad student now) was right about when Apple starting producing the G4s and I thought, Wow, those machines rock. They look nice and they are super powerful. It's too bad I don't like the MacOS. When I got to grad school, I bought a Powerbook laptop and it was the best computer-buying decision I ever made. Once I actually sat down and spent some time with OS X, I realized that I liked it much better than any flavor of Windows. So, no, I wouldn't switch, and I'm glad I spend the time to learn OS X instead.
Hopefully, the Olympics will bring some positive changes to China. One of the conditions of winning the Olympic bid was to make the Olympics 'green.' I'm not exactly sure what that's supposed to mean, but there have been fairly incredible improvements in the various levels of pollution in and around Beijing.
So, for now at least, China is the polluted nightmare of the world, but it looks like they're trying to make some efforts to get pollution under control.//
Good point. I haven't tried this specifically, but it seems like it should work. It's just a little frustrating that there was never one marketed (and that they are only half-ass marketing it now).
Similarly, the community for Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon figured out a Mac installation process that used PC disks to install expansions for the Mac. It worked, but it was dissapointing that there was never an "official" Mac version.
That's good to hear. It's amazing that Bioware just got around to releasing the expansions for NWN1 for Mac. It's also amazing that they did such a poor job publicizing the release. I found out from my friends who only found out because Amazon recommended the expansions to them out of the blue one day.
Hopefully, it won't take as long for expansions to NWN2 to come to the mac.
Slashdot Mirror
From http://www.snpp.com/episodes/BABF03
-----
The Simpsons make a shopping excursion to ShÃp, the place to go for modern Swedish furniture and accessories. A green end table catches Marge's eye, and she's impressed that those crazy Swedish furniture designers could invent such a far-out concept. Homer tests a bean-bag chair -- and it immediately swallows him up. He joins Captain McAllister, who fell victim to the same chair.
Luckily, Homer rejoins his family in time to look at assemble-it-yourself wall units. A costumed character that looks like an Allen wrench with arms and legs walks up.
Allen: You put it together yourself. All you need is me -- Allen
Wrench.
Homer: [giggles] He's named after what he is.
Bart: [knocking on the wrench] Cool costume.
Allen: [turns away from the rest of the family to face Bart, and
begins talking in a robotic tone]
It's not a costume. They found me inside a meteor.
Marge: Excuse me, where are your hamper lids?
Allen: [friendly] Hamper lids? Uh, third floor.
[turns to Bart again]
[robotic] Help, I need tungsten to live. [raises arms]
Tungsten!
[Bart flees]
-- "Eight Misbehavin'"
Right. There's an episode of House that is also very similar. Interestingly, the Goiânia accident has also provided information for several papers modeling how X (where X is bad) will be transported / dispersed / etc. through a community. Check out a Google search of 'Goiânia accident' to see some of the research.
They're going to want to be on the lookout for androids carrying suspiciously labeled bags.
I used to read the Times Editorial page once, twice, sometimes three times a week. Until Times Select. Then it was, "Krugman? Friedman? Who?" Putting the content behind that wall made the Times' columnists practically irrelevant. For better or worse, the Times has some of the most talked-about columnists in the country, and their importance evaporated almost instantly when the unwashed masses (me) could no longer read them. I, for one, am more than happy to look at a picture of a car or a book or whatever a few times a week if it means (in some small way) invigorating the national conversation.
An old favorite: 640K cores ought to be enough for anybody.
That's why Professor Frink's motorcycle flies through the air -- no cars to hit.
-----
Frink tests his new flying motorcycle.
Frink: Hello, son. You want to try the flying motorcycle I just invented?
Bart: No time.
Frink: Okay.
Later, Bart loses his skateboard in the wet cement.
Bart: I could sure use that flying motorcycle now.
Frink flies by.
Frink: You had your chance. Whoa-hai.
-----
That doesn't sound right at all!
More seriously, here's some of the data they're talking about (from the article)
I also found this passage interesting:
I'm not exactly a friend of the airlines, but it seems like they're screwed either way.
Basically, he's saying that, yes, there are state secrets, but the judiciary -- not the executive -- is responsible for determining how trials involving state secrets proceed. This idea of someone crying 'State Secrets!!!1!!1!one!11!!!' and automatically getting a case tossed out is relatively new, and, as most of us here believe, contrary to the basic premise of the court system.
There was a Slate article on hard labor recently. The context was military punishment, but maybe it's relevant? Maybe not. Either way, I think I'll go double check my grant proposals ...
More generally, I think people are going to have to face someday that brain genetics are not somehow special. Just like certain races are shorter, taller, darker, lighter, faster, stronger, etc, certain races (and sexes...) are going to have bell curves that are different shapes. Of course, this doesn't preclude any individual from falling anywhere on the bell curve.
... you have the brainpan of a stagecoach tilter!
As per usual, The Simpsons provides guidance. From episode 3F06, 'Mother Simpson':
In Burns' office, Joe Friday and Bill Gannon [FBI agents searching for Homer's mother] interview Burns about the incident.
Friday: Are you sure this is the woman you saw in the post office?
Burns: Absolutely! Who could forget such a monstrous visage? She has the sloping brow and cranial bumpage of the career criminal.
Smithers: Uh, Sir? Phrenology was dismissed as quackery 160 years ago.
Burns: Of course you'd say that
I think we all know, specifically, who actually found the compound.
I bet that there were strings attached when Bono played Xbox with that guy:
Bono: It'd be pretty cool if you could play this with me, right?
Kapellen: Yeah.
Bono: Alright, then we'll play -- but you have to promise to cure AIDS as soon as we're done.
Kapellen: (mulls it over for a minute) Yeah, okay.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is a socially constructive application of the power of celebrity. I bet that Kapellen guy is half way to a bachelor's degree in Biology by now.
I'm not sure I'd want to be doing tech support for this guy.
I hear they're bundling Duke Nukem Forever with Knuth's ACP vol. 4. Might just be a rumor, though ...
I think that these robots would be much better fund-raising machines than killing machines. Think about these robots on Battle Bots. I think this could get the show back on the air. Then, the DoD could use the winnings to reduce the tax burden of defense spending.
Maybe not.
I'm probably being stupid, but if Lycos already knows who the bad hosts are, why is it necessary to (not) DDOS them, instead of just blocking mail from those hosts?
... but ... hmm ... I'm not so sure that's a good idea ..."
It seems to me that any problem with blacklisting certain hosts would translate to a similar problem with the (not) DDOS approach (for instance, spammers changing hosts or compromising more machines).
Not to mention, this creates yet more traffic for the internet to handle. I'm sure it's up to the task, but it seems like there's no need to create new traffic and work when less traffic and work is one of the goals of the project.
Besides, this is sort of a murky, ethically gray area for a corporation. My initial thought was "neat!" immediately followed by, "well
I also got this notice from the police station today that says I have won a speed boat! All I have to do is go down to the station to sign the title and get the keys! I hope it won't be a problem that I have like 11ty billion unpaid parking tickets!
So, does that mean that if I run my car in reverse, the state will start sending me checks? Hmm, no ... that doesn't sound right ...
Petreley concludes that Microsoft's efforts to dispel Linux "myths" are based largely on faulty reasoning and overly narrow statistical analysis.
Microsoft, official platform of the 2004 presidential campaign.
black iPod that comes preloaded with the band's new album as well as portions of the band's 25-year back catalo
Sure, it's cool that the iPod is black (although, I can't seem to find any pictures of said iPod. I'd love to see what it looks like), but I think the real question is how much of the band's catalog is preloaded onto it? If you are a U2 fan, and the device contains, say, even 50% of the catalog, that's pretty significant value added. Of course, if you're a U2 fan, you probably own those albums anyway, so maybe not.
Still, I guess it's a nice marketing gimmick by Apple. Exclusive rights to seel the music (online, and for a little while at least), some ads out of a pretty popular group, and a million trillion news outlets covering the story and producing even more press. Kudos, Apple.
The sensors, which are estimated to be less than an inch (2.5 centimetres) wide, were apparently installed in a circuit board in the wrong orientation - rotated 180 from the correct direction. But the problem stemmed not from the installation but the design, by Lockheed Martin, based in Bethesda, Maryland.
I caught that too. What I don't understand is what was wrong with the design. Is the crash investigation team saying, "Yeah, the sensors were designed wrong, but, huh, check it out, they were installed backwards too, but that doesn't matter" or what? It seems like them (the sensors) being in backwards would be a big deal, but the article seems to imply that the design flaw was the only relevant mistake.
Anybody have any idea what the flaw was or why the sensors would still work when installed backwards?
When I was in college (I'm a second-year grad student now) was right about when Apple starting producing the G4s and I thought, Wow, those machines rock. They look nice and they are super powerful. It's too bad I don't like the MacOS. When I got to grad school, I bought a Powerbook laptop and it was the best computer-buying decision I ever made. Once I actually sat down and spent some time with OS X, I realized that I liked it much better than any flavor of Windows. So, no, I wouldn't switch, and I'm glad I spend the time to learn OS X instead.
Hopefully, the Olympics will bring some positive changes to China. One of the conditions of winning the Olympic bid was to make the Olympics 'green.' I'm not exactly sure what that's supposed to mean, but there have been fairly incredible improvements in the various levels of pollution in and around Beijing.
//
Also, China has undertaken construction of a 400 Megawatt wind plant that will be completed in time for the games. Apparantly, (according to Wired, at least) it will be the world's largest wind project.
So, for now at least, China is the polluted nightmare of the world, but it looks like they're trying to make some efforts to get pollution under control.
Good point. I haven't tried this specifically, but it seems like it should work. It's just a little frustrating that there was never one marketed (and that they are only half-ass marketing it now).
Similarly, the community for Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon figured out a Mac installation process that used PC disks to install expansions for the Mac. It worked, but it was dissapointing that there was never an "official" Mac version.
That's good to hear. It's amazing that Bioware just got around to releasing the expansions for NWN1 for Mac. It's also amazing that they did such a poor job publicizing the release. I found out from my friends who only found out because Amazon recommended the expansions to them out of the blue one day.
Hopefully, it won't take as long for expansions to NWN2 to come to the mac.