Referring to a single person of unknown gender as "they" is common slang but is not correct english. "They" is always plural when used correctly.
Many people argue that anything used widely enough becomes correct. This is true but I don't like it (although I don't have time to learn Latin...:-)
From a practical standpoint, using "they" as singular makes a correctly singular noun sound incorrect, e.g. "Everyone was blowing their nose" vs. "Everyone was blowing their noses" - borrowed from the alt.english.usage FAQ. "Everyone" is singular, requiring the singular "nose", but "their nose" sounds strange...
Well, assuming they could find two equally knowledgable sysadmins (each relative to his/her platform - yes, this is difficult) and assuming each was allowed to choose the server, scripts, etc. to be used on that platform it's a worthwhile test. It doesn't have to be the same software to be valid.
If you had a flawless operating system but the only applications available for it were crap you would have a bad server platform. In other words, there's a difference between testing an OS and testing a platform.
(Note: I'm not arguing that the case I described is the case with the linux box in the contest - linux is not flawless and apache is not crap. I know it was a bad script and this reflects badly on almost nothing else. I'm just making a point about the hypothetical validity of this kind of testing)
Why on earth (no pun intended) would tourists want to spend a vacation without gravity? Sure, we geeks would enjoy it, and most people would probably enjoy the novelty of it very briefly, but do they really think ridiculously wealthy travelers are going to want to suck their dinner through a straw and sleep in a harness?
If they're serious about this they're going to have to provide artificial gravity. The kind of people who could afford to do this are the kind of people who can't stand to stay in less than a 5-star hotel - they're not interested in being uncomfortable.
I should clarify before I get flamed that I'm referring to Corel's own code and code containing their modifications, not code that is entirely written by others. Clearly it's a mistake to stamp "for internal use only" on something that's been entirely released previously under GPL.
However, protecting their own code from premature public distribution is quite reasonable. They just should have been more careful about what they applied their license to.
They call it a beta but they're not treating it the way we expect a beta to be treated... It's really a not-ready-for-public-eyes testing release (I'd call it an alpha, but to each his own)
Corel is a company with a reputation to think about. They have legitimate reasons for not making this a public release. Granted, this practice is more common in the world of proprietary code, but I don't think it's at all unreasonable.
It's already happening in San Jose
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CNN On IPv6
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San Jose is overlaying a new area code (669) over 408 and is making 10 digit dialing mandatory for both area codes starting October 2nd of this year. We've had area code splits here in the Bay Area but as far as I know this is the first overlay.
There's a quick explanation over at Pac Bell. There are even commercials on television to make people aware that they have to start dialing 10 digits.
I too foresee LOTS of problems with the shortage of numbers in the near future.
I seem to be missing your point... This isn't about a theoretical Sony product. It's about a Fullway product, and it's available for purchase now. What does Sony's hypothetical dislike for MP3 have to do with it? They don't have to support the format - they just have to keep selling Playstations.
BTW, I think the only reason MD hasn't taken off in the states is lack of marketing effort. Sony has never really gotten behind it here - I don't really know why.
If you had the Pine portable MP3 CD player mentioned here on Slashdot last week, you'd be burning CDs like this anyway.
Also, in my apartment (I know, I'm not a good geek) the TV, PSX and real stereo are in the living room and the computer is not. I suspect I'm not the only one with this configuration.
The kind of technical review they're referring to already happens during a license request under the current rules. If it didn't we could all be exporting strong crypto and lying to the government about its strength.
There's no reason to believe they'd be any more likely to coerce companies into including backdoors than they are now. The real news is that they're proposing to allow companies to go through the process less frequently. This means the companies waste less money and aren't as late in getting their products to market.
These aren't meant to be global status reports... They're "consular information summaries", i.e. reports for the information of Americans abroad, like those in the Foreign Service. Which is why they don't mention domestic problems.
Yet another data point to fuel my theory: anyone who asks that their comment be moderated down is ALWAYS moderated up.
A note to moderators: Try not to be swayed by this. True, many of the people who make this request have interesting and different points, but sometimes (case in point above) they seem to be moderated up for no good reason...
I've worked on a CSP. When you send it to Microsoft you don't have to send the source! You fill out a form describing algorithms used, etc (so they can evaluate the export requirements) but you provide your CSP in binary form (after all, they have to sign the binary). You don't ever have to let them see your source, and they don't check your implementation (for the reasons I stated before).
So if you want to make a bogus CSP you lie about the contents. Of course your customers can hold you responsible for lying about what you're giving them, but you may or may not care.
Oh, I'm not claiming that there are no stupid legislators. But the fact that they tend to blindly follow party leaders doesn't disprove my point. There are always people who actually make decisions, and you can bet that these people, high up on the party ladders, have seen and understand the results of their export policy.
Disclaimer: I work for a company which makes smart cards NOT based on Java.:-)
...if they use a Java Card based smart card, they'll be able to roll out new features in the future.
I must defend other cards here... LOTS of non Java Card smart cards are capable of being loaded with new applications after distribution. Any card with a reasonable processor and a reasonably flexible OS should be capable of supporting future feature additions.
You're assuming that anyone with the 16 digits can use the account. With smart cards this isn't necessarily true. Read some of the other comments - even with something as simple as a shared block of secret data, you can perform a challenge/response which can be used over an insecure channel and yet can't be exploited by a malicious eavesdropper.
Public key crypto is even easier to use - write out the transaction information and sign it. It doesn't matter who sees the information. They can't duplicate the signature so they can't make their own transactions.
We shouldn't just be educating people about how to use credit cards. We should be replacing them with more secure tokens which are harder for an ignorant user to compromise.
Why does everyone assume legislators can't understand this?
They DO understand what export restrictions do to American companies. (Sorry to say the same thing over and over, but these "boy are those lawmakers dumb" messages just won't stop coming)
The laws are intended to keep American companies from effectively promoting the use of crypto in the states. No widespread use => no real need to regulate => no publicity nightmare.
The legislature is fully aware of the effect of their policy. They don't WANT American crypto companies to be competitive. Strong American crypto companies lead to more Americans using crypto.
As long as Americans don't bother using crypto the legislature doesn't have to take unpopular steps to control it. So they stifle the companies who make and promote crypto products and the issue comes to the public's attention as little as possible.
There's at least one thing Microsoft and Schneier are not kidding about - the MS CAPI verification keys DO NOT PROVIDE SECURITY, nor do they intend to. They enforce export restrictions.
If you send Microsoft a CSP which encrypts data by XOR'ing with a stream of zeroes they'll sign it as long as you have the appropriate license. They don't care, nor should they.
Think about it. If Microsoft were actually certifying that any signed CSP provided a good strong crypto implementation, then any customer who discovered a flaw in a signed CSP could sue. And would. Microsoft wouldn't even consider putting themselves in that position.
Therefore if I work for the NSA and I want to install a crippled CSP on your system, I ask Microsoft to sign it. And they will, no security questions asked. The only thing having my own key would buy me is not having to wait for them to get through the process.
Isn't that a little low for a keyboard?
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The Ottoman PC
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It's a cool idea, but honestly, do you really want to use a keyboard that's a foot off the ground? I think I'd have to pick the thing up and put it in my lap to use it.
I don't understand your comment at all. Why do you think this is "...an effort to make it clear... that they are merely _one_ of the distributions of Linux...?" They're not trying to validate alternative Linux distros, they're trying to prevent people from selling brown paper bag Red Hat Linux CDs and cashing in on Red Hat's advertising expenditures. It's as simple as that.
As far as the "linux == redhat" debate goes, why do you think taking the Red Hat name off of repackages will help people understand that there are other distros? If anything I would think that associating all Red Hat copies with the company would be easier to understand - one company must have competition. Maybe now they'll think their alternatives are "Official Red Hat" and "Unofficial Red Hat".
I like Red Hat. I'm using Red Hat 6.0 now. But I don't see why you feel the need to defend this practice. It's just common business (assuming, of course, that Red Hat is actually doing ANYTHING here, of which we have little proof...)
GT did not provide the only access to this product in Germany. Sure, they probably made it more visible, and some people who bought it from them wouldn't have bought it otherwise because they never would have heard of it. But anyone in Germany who really wanted the game could have bought it without GT's help from Starplay's website.
(Yeah, the order form is Amero-centric, but surely they won't refuse to ship to a customer who lives in Europe...)
But I agree with the fundamental issue here. A company selling software for $10,000 a pop can NOT legitimately claim $10,000 loss for every pirated copy. Some people pirate things they would NEVER dream of purchasing (e.g. Photoshop, FrameMaker, etc)
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Common usage is far from correct usage... Try watching daytime talk shows.
ahem.
That's "MORE information than you ever wanted..."
Referring to a single person of unknown gender as "they" is common slang but is not correct english. "They" is always plural when used correctly.
:-)
Many people argue that anything used widely enough becomes correct. This is true but I don't like it (although I don't have time to learn Latin...
From a practical standpoint, using "they" as singular makes a correctly singular noun sound incorrect, e.g. "Everyone was blowing their nose" vs. "Everyone was blowing their noses" - borrowed from the alt.english.usage FAQ. "Everyone" is singular, requiring the singular "nose", but "their nose" sounds strange...
For information than you ever wanted on the topic of gender-neutral pronouns, see The Gender Neutral Pronoun FAQ.
Well, assuming they could find two equally knowledgable sysadmins (each relative to his/her platform - yes, this is difficult) and assuming each was allowed to choose the server, scripts, etc. to be used on that platform it's a worthwhile test. It doesn't have to be the same software to be valid.
If you had a flawless operating system but the only applications available for it were crap you would have a bad server platform. In other words, there's a difference between testing an OS and testing a platform.
(Note: I'm not arguing that the case I described is the case with the linux box in the contest - linux is not flawless and apache is not crap. I know it was a bad script and this reflects badly on almost nothing else. I'm just making a point about the hypothetical validity of this kind of testing)
Why on earth (no pun intended) would tourists want to spend a vacation without gravity? Sure, we geeks would enjoy it, and most people would probably enjoy the novelty of it very briefly, but do they really think ridiculously wealthy travelers are going to want to suck their dinner through a straw and sleep in a harness?
If they're serious about this they're going to have to provide artificial gravity. The kind of people who could afford to do this are the kind of people who can't stand to stay in less than a 5-star hotel - they're not interested in being uncomfortable.
I should clarify before I get flamed that I'm referring to Corel's own code and code containing their modifications, not code that is entirely written by others. Clearly it's a mistake to stamp "for internal use only" on something that's been entirely released previously under GPL.
However, protecting their own code from premature public distribution is quite reasonable. They just should have been more careful about what they applied their license to.
They call it a beta but they're not treating it the way we expect a beta to be treated... It's really a not-ready-for-public-eyes testing release (I'd call it an alpha, but to each his own)
Corel is a company with a reputation to think about. They have legitimate reasons for not making this a public release. Granted, this practice is more common in the world of proprietary code, but I don't think it's at all unreasonable.
San Jose is overlaying a new area code (669) over 408 and is making 10 digit dialing mandatory for both area codes starting October 2nd of this year. We've had area code splits here in the Bay Area but as far as I know this is the first overlay.
There's a quick explanation over at Pac Bell. There are even commercials on television to make people aware that they have to start dialing 10 digits.
I too foresee LOTS of problems with the shortage of numbers in the near future.
I seem to be missing your point... This isn't about a theoretical Sony product. It's about a Fullway product, and it's available for purchase now. What does Sony's hypothetical dislike for MP3 have to do with it? They don't have to support the format - they just have to keep selling Playstations.
BTW, I think the only reason MD hasn't taken off in the states is lack of marketing effort. Sony has never really gotten behind it here - I don't really know why.
If you had the Pine portable MP3 CD player mentioned here on Slashdot last week, you'd be burning CDs like this anyway.
Also, in my apartment (I know, I'm not a good geek) the TV, PSX and real stereo are in the living room and the computer is not. I suspect I'm not the only one with this configuration.
The kind of technical review they're referring to already happens during a license request under the current rules. If it didn't we could all be exporting strong crypto and lying to the government about its strength.
There's no reason to believe they'd be any more likely to coerce companies into including backdoors than they are now. The real news is that they're proposing to allow companies to go through the process less frequently. This means the companies waste less money and aren't as late in getting their products to market.
These aren't meant to be global status reports... They're "consular information summaries", i.e. reports for the information of Americans abroad, like those in the Foreign Service. Which is why they don't mention domestic problems.
Heh... We were typing the same thing at the same time...
I've seen this many times before. It seems to be a very effective ploy to gain attention.
Yet another data point to fuel my theory: anyone who asks that their comment be moderated down is ALWAYS moderated up.
A note to moderators: Try not to be swayed by this. True, many of the people who make this request have interesting and different points, but sometimes (case in point above) they seem to be moderated up for no good reason...
I've worked on a CSP. When you send it to Microsoft you don't have to send the source! You fill out a form describing algorithms used, etc (so they can evaluate the export requirements) but you provide your CSP in binary form (after all, they have to sign the binary). You don't ever have to let them see your source, and they don't check your implementation (for the reasons I stated before).
So if you want to make a bogus CSP you lie about the contents. Of course your customers can hold you responsible for lying about what you're giving them, but you may or may not care.
I agree. And that's why we're beginning to see the anti-crypto legislation. Because the obscurity period is gradually coming to an end.
Oh, I'm not claiming that there are no stupid legislators. But the fact that they tend to blindly follow party leaders doesn't disprove my point. There are always people who actually make decisions, and you can bet that these people, high up on the party ladders, have seen and understand the results of their export policy.
Disclaimer: I work for a company which makes smart cards NOT based on Java. :-)
...if they use a Java Card based smart card, they'll be able to roll out new features in the future.
I must defend other cards here... LOTS of non Java Card smart cards are capable of being loaded with new applications after distribution. Any card with a reasonable processor and a reasonably flexible OS should be capable of supporting future feature additions.
You're assuming that anyone with the 16 digits can use the account. With smart cards this isn't necessarily true. Read some of the other comments - even with something as simple as a shared block of secret data, you can perform a challenge/response which can be used over an insecure channel and yet can't be exploited by a malicious eavesdropper.
Public key crypto is even easier to use - write out the transaction information and sign it. It doesn't matter who sees the information. They can't duplicate the signature so they can't make their own transactions.
We shouldn't just be educating people about how to use credit cards. We should be replacing them with more secure tokens which are harder for an ignorant user to compromise.
Why does everyone assume legislators can't understand this?
They DO understand what export restrictions do to American companies. (Sorry to say the same thing over and over, but these "boy are those lawmakers dumb" messages just won't stop coming)
The laws are intended to keep American companies from effectively promoting the use of crypto in the states. No widespread use => no real need to regulate => no publicity nightmare.
The legislature is fully aware of the effect of their policy. They don't WANT American crypto companies to be competitive. Strong American crypto companies lead to more Americans using crypto.
As long as Americans don't bother using crypto the legislature doesn't have to take unpopular steps to control it. So they stifle the companies who make and promote crypto products and the issue comes to the public's attention as little as possible.
There's at least one thing Microsoft and Schneier are not kidding about - the MS CAPI verification keys DO NOT PROVIDE SECURITY, nor do they intend to. They enforce export restrictions.
If you send Microsoft a CSP which encrypts data by XOR'ing with a stream of zeroes they'll sign it as long as you have the appropriate license. They don't care, nor should they.
Think about it. If Microsoft were actually certifying that any signed CSP provided a good strong crypto implementation, then any customer who discovered a flaw in a signed CSP could sue. And would. Microsoft wouldn't even consider putting themselves in that position.
Therefore if I work for the NSA and I want to install a crippled CSP on your system, I ask Microsoft to sign it. And they will, no security questions asked. The only thing having my own key would buy me is not having to wait for them to get through the process.
It's a cool idea, but honestly, do you really want to use a keyboard that's a foot off the ground? I think I'd have to pick the thing up and put it in my lap to use it.
I don't understand your comment at all. Why do you think this is "...an effort to make it clear... that they are merely _one_ of the distributions of Linux...?" They're not trying to validate alternative Linux distros, they're trying to prevent people from selling brown paper bag Red Hat Linux CDs and cashing in on Red Hat's advertising expenditures. It's as simple as that.
As far as the "linux == redhat" debate goes, why do you think taking the Red Hat name off of repackages will help people understand that there are other distros? If anything I would think that associating all Red Hat copies with the company would be easier to understand - one company must have competition. Maybe now they'll think their alternatives are "Official Red Hat" and "Unofficial Red Hat".
I like Red Hat. I'm using Red Hat 6.0 now. But I don't see why you feel the need to defend this practice. It's just common business (assuming, of course, that Red Hat is actually doing ANYTHING here, of which we have little proof...)
GT did not provide the only access to this product in Germany. Sure, they probably made it more visible, and some people who bought it from them wouldn't have bought it otherwise because they never would have heard of it. But anyone in Germany who really wanted the game could have bought it without GT's help from Starplay's website.
(Yeah, the order form is Amero-centric, but surely they won't refuse to ship to a customer who lives in Europe...)
But I agree with the fundamental issue here. A company selling software for $10,000 a pop can NOT legitimately claim $10,000 loss for every pirated copy. Some people pirate things they would NEVER dream of purchasing (e.g. Photoshop, FrameMaker, etc)