You would think that Hugo winners would be more involved with the web than they are. Maybe they are so involved with the future that they don't realize we have some pretty good stuff in the present.
I find it hard to believe your linux box only beats your windows box by a couple of hours. They must be really fast ( i.e. your linux box finishes in 3 hours and your windows in 5). I have 4 linux boxes and 3 windows boxes. I don't even run the client on the windows boxes because it took so damn long it was driving my average score up waaaay too high. My Windows boxes (550, 450 and 233 mhz) sometimes took as long as 48 hours to complete a work unit. My linux boxes are usually at least twice as fast. I guess it's true what they say, YMMV:)
Pretty soon all the whacked-out parents are going to try to genetically engineer their child. This is going to cause HUGE controversy, how is it all going to come out? Are we going to be able to clone ourselves? How about a headless clone, so I can put my 80 year old head on a 20 year old body. Can you genetically engineer your own clone? Can I give myself bigger muscles, blue eyes, etc.? We are delving deeply into the things that make us human, are we going to transform ourselves into something that is not?
This is what happens when you get people excited over the prospect of some "new technology" that will "revolutionize the Internet". It is happening all over the place, and the Venture Capitalists are pouring money into things they don't, won't and can't understand. The stock market finally shook itself up, I expect the VC market to do the same, as investors become increasingly wary on where their money is going and what is is doing while it is there.
I don't think this will have a very big effect on initiatives (at least in the short term) other than it will be easier for groups who don't have lots of money to get initiatives on the ballot. I welcome the law that allows technology to level the playing field. As it stands right now, only well-funded groups who hire signature gatherers get their ideas on the ballots.
Keep in mind that initiatives don't pass laws, they just allow the people to vote on new ideas for laws. This allows the common man to effect change, when the elected representative is not doing his duty to his constituents. It is much closer to true democracy than the representative democracy currently practiced in the US.
I envision a future where everyone votes on new laws, and all the representatives do is introduce new ideas for bills. With this development and the advent of internet voting, I think we are getting closer to my ideal.
I really enjoyed reading about this. However, #20-high performance materials. Don't you think they could have been a little more specific? And highways? C'mon, there have been roads since pre-historic times. How is putting 4 lanes on a road any huge advance?
I like the looks of this computer. However, there seem to be some limitations. There is only 4 MB of flash, you wouldn't be able to run very many applications. The 16mhz processor will need some lean apps anyway. I think that this could be an improvement on the current wearables, but it doesn't really have the power or expandability (other than USB) to really compete with the high-end wearable market. It will be good for very small embedded applications (POS data tracking, addresses, etc.) but don't count on getting one to do any real computing (although a USB wireless NIC and a remote shell would be possible).
Enigma
Chess has already been conquered. Humans lose!
on
Solving Chess?
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· Score: 4
I think the most interesting chess match in the future will be between 2 computers. Now that computers are better at the game, we humans are just going to stand back and watch as the computers advance the game. I think that 2 computers playing each other would get closer to the "perfect" game than we humans ever will.
Now we need the computers to do it. Anybody care to hack together some code for a distributed network of chess computers? Once there is a good following we can issue a challenge to Deep Blue, see if the distributed project can take the chess title!
There is no constitutional issue here because Mitnick agreed to the terms of the plea bargain. If he didn't like it, he was free to go to trial and stand up for himself. Who knows, he might have gotten better terms. But the point remains he entered into a contract that he would confine himself to non-computer related activites for the duration of his probation. If you drive a car, you enter into a contract that you agree to provide blood, urine or breath to test for the presence of alcohol. If you sign a NDA for your company, you are agreeing not to talk about proprietary information with the company's competitors. Mitnick entered into a contract with the government where he agreed to the terms of his probation. He was not required to accept the agreement. Here is one of the requrements of his agreement that would prohibit his current activity:
B. The defendant shall not be employed in or perform services for any entity angaged in the computer, computer software, or telecommunications business and shall not be employed in any capacity wherein he has access to computers or computer related equipment or software; And this one is even more explicit:
D. The defendant shall not acts as a consultant or advisor to individuals or groups engaged in any computer related activity; Mitnick agreed to these terms and that is why he is out of jail. He wasn't even a good hacker, the good ones aren't the ones that get caught. Just look at mafiaboy, who was responsible for at least some of the DOS attacks, he got caught because he bragged about it on IRC. Mitnick got caught because he took stupid risks and thought he was better than the people tracing him. He was wrong. He agreed to these conditions and he should abide by them. Enigma
Slashdot Mirror
You would think that Hugo winners would be more involved with the web than they are. Maybe they are so involved with the future that they don't realize we have some pretty good stuff in the present.
I find it hard to believe your linux box only beats your windows box by a couple of hours. They must be really fast ( i.e. your linux box finishes in 3 hours and your windows in 5). I have 4 linux boxes and 3 windows boxes. I don't even run the client on the windows boxes because it took so damn long it was driving my average score up waaaay too high. My Windows boxes (550, 450 and 233 mhz) sometimes took as long as 48 hours to complete a work unit. My linux boxes are usually at least twice as fast. I guess it's true what they say, YMMV :)
Pretty soon all the whacked-out parents are going to try to genetically engineer their child. This is going to cause HUGE controversy, how is it all going to come out? Are we going to be able to clone ourselves? How about a headless clone, so I can put my 80 year old head on a 20 year old body. Can you genetically engineer your own clone? Can I give myself bigger muscles, blue eyes, etc.? We are delving deeply into the things that make us human, are we going to transform ourselves into something that is not?
Enigma
This is what happens when you get people excited over the prospect of some "new technology" that will "revolutionize the Internet". It is happening all over the place, and the Venture Capitalists are pouring money into things they don't, won't and can't understand. The stock market finally shook itself up, I expect the VC market to do the same, as investors become increasingly wary on where their money is going and what is is doing while it is there.
Enigma
I don't think this will have a very big effect on initiatives (at least in the short term) other than it will be easier for groups who don't have lots of money to get initiatives on the ballot. I welcome the law that allows technology to level the playing field. As it stands right now, only well-funded groups who hire signature gatherers get their ideas on the ballots.
Keep in mind that initiatives don't pass laws, they just allow the people to vote on new ideas for laws. This allows the common man to effect change, when the elected representative is not doing his duty to his constituents. It is much closer to true democracy than the representative democracy currently practiced in the US.
I envision a future where everyone votes on new laws, and all the representatives do is introduce new ideas for bills. With this development and the advent of internet voting, I think we are getting closer to my ideal.
Enigma
I really enjoyed reading about this. However, #20-high performance materials. Don't you think they could have been a little more specific? And highways? C'mon, there have been roads since pre-historic times. How is putting 4 lanes on a road any huge advance?
Enigma
I like the looks of this computer. However, there seem to be some limitations. There is only 4 MB of flash, you wouldn't be able to run very many applications. The 16mhz processor will need some lean apps anyway. I think that this could be an improvement on the current wearables, but it doesn't really have the power or expandability (other than USB) to really compete with the high-end wearable market. It will be good for very small embedded applications (POS data tracking, addresses, etc.) but don't count on getting one to do any real computing (although a USB wireless NIC and a remote shell would be possible).
Enigma
Now we need the computers to do it. Anybody care to hack together some code for a distributed network of chess computers? Once there is a good following we can issue a challenge to Deep Blue, see if the distributed project can take the chess title!
B. The defendant shall not be employed in or perform services for any entity angaged in the computer, computer software, or telecommunications business and shall not be employed in any capacity wherein he has access to computers or computer related equipment or software;
And this one is even more explicit:
D. The defendant shall not acts as a consultant or advisor to individuals or groups engaged in any computer related activity;
Mitnick agreed to these terms and that is why he is out of jail. He wasn't even a good hacker, the good ones aren't the ones that get caught. Just look at mafiaboy, who was responsible for at least some of the DOS attacks, he got caught because he bragged about it on IRC. Mitnick got caught because he took stupid risks and thought he was better than the people tracing him. He was wrong. He agreed to these conditions and he should abide by them. Enigma