Boy this is so incorrect it is scary. To say every person who voted for Perot would have chosen to vote for Bush is wrong. I voted for Perot and would have voted for Clinton over Bush.
Now, this does not dismiss you very valid point though. I believe the primary system strips us of the better candidates. Instead, I believe we should have a National Primary in March of the election year with the top four candidates (regardless of party) being the official candidates who will then have a 100% public financed campaign. Then we have run-off elections until a clear absolute 50.1+% of the electorate vote for one candidate.
This isn't fully fleshed out as it has been an idea I just came up with last week after feeling like I got ripped off because I never had a chance to vote for either McCain or Bradley. 3% of the nation selected Bush and Gore (this is an unproven percentage and should not be taken as a literal factual number...it is meant to emphasize the fact that a low number of the electorate actually choose the two front runners).
This is a particularly good idea. It would serve two very useful purposes. 1 - Allow webmasters to avoid the slugs and sleazemeisters and 2 - Show webmasters the width of competition.
How long do you think sleaze tactics would be around if there was a third party site vetting out the losers?
"A switch, mechanical (mechanical being defined as being created via physical parts) or virtual (virtual being defined as being created via a computer program/script software or firmware) in nature than when properly used will cause a device or function to work in a predetermined manner and when used again will cause a device to cease its functioning. As part of the operation of this switch, an attached mechanical or virtual sensory indicator (audio, visual, tactile, nasal, or taste) will be activated to provide notice of whether or not the switch has properly caused the predetermined function to begin or caused it to stop.
I've read a lot of messages responding to this article stating police authorities wouldn't ignore evidence of a crime that was 6 months plus a day old. The judge on the other had was essentially stating he believed when you deleted something, it should be destroyed completely. He was also intelligent enough to know that immediate deletion was a bad thing, that there should be some durability to it. But after 6 months, the file should be completely gone, scrambled via one of many technological means.
Instead of a trash bin it would be a shredder and you can set the time of when the files would be atomized completely. Thus there wouldn't be any evidence for authorities to find in the first place.
Now, is this something we really want? I don't know. But I do suspect tech criminals already scramble their files.
While a fascinating idea, the only way to truly guarantee your children are not looking at things you don't want them to look at is to sit next to them.
Anyone who relies upon technology or the good intentions of other people to protect their children from unwanted material is asking for trouble.
One of the key problems I see with a.kids TLD is who would administer it? I fear the control would soon fall into the hands of Toys 'R' Us and KBKids and.kids would become a massive marketing playground in which children become indoctrinated in the ways of the commericial world.
I don't have a kid, so I can't speak with much authority, but the voice of my father comes to me in regards to these situations: 'Go outside and play, let the wind blow the stink off of ya.' Idle hands are the devils playground. I do believe a child who is trying to do homework, is doing homework. Its only when he is unsupervised for a long period of time does the idea of 'seeking out' naughty stuff comes to mind.
Of course, is this any different than my sneaking into my brother's secret stash of adult magazines? No. Everything is a learning opportunity and it would behoove a parent to teach the child about acceptable behavior regarding pornography the moment the child become interested in pornography. We all know that once that interest is sparked, there is no going back. It is called puberty.
This reminds me of one of the first web development jobs I applied for. It was in 96 and they wanted someone with at least 3 years experience. "Oh," I said, "they want one of the original CERN physicists to put up their business card on the web."
Is it possible these lawsuit all stem from having too many lawyers on retainer and trying to justify the cost of a legal department?
Somewhere there is a happy middleground, or maybe not so much as happy but mutually dissatisfying. I like the idea of patents and IP in general, but I think, like so many others, that this has gotten too far out of hand. Perhaps a new level of bureaucracy within the Patent Office that needs to be contacted in cases of suspected patent violations. This would add months to the process of making a claim against someone, add tons of paperwork, and would then become enough of an obstacle that only something that a person considers a major infringement would be pursued.
A zero-tolerance society is not a good society at all. God forbid we have a zero-tolerance speed limit of a zero-tolerance litter law.
Of course this always boils down to the same issue: the US patent office accepts too many stupid patents. The question is how do we, average citizens, affect some change in that government agency?
Hey, I like this idea. I'm going to start mailing dollar bills to people and on my official website claim I am making $1 loans at 10%, then after a year, I'll send out threatening letters claiming they owe me $3. That would be cool.
But since I would be completely and utterly laughed at, so should DC.
Apple itself is known to try to have some screwy patents. Now it is trying to legitimize the whole absurd patent movement by acknowledging Amazon's screwy patent.
Maybe only companies who file screwy patents will acknowledge the screwy patents of others. They will create a whole little community and live in their altered reality.
When I read this story on Wired this morning, I was first very excited. I was thinking this had to be the groundbreaking p2p app. But when I saw it was based on the Gnutella structure, I recalled a previous discussion on Slashdot where it was said Gnutella had maxed.
I am assuming when they say based on Gnutella, they have 'fixed' some of the problems. Or, maybe it really isn't searching the entire network, but key segments of the network. And maybe it just ignores 56k connections altogether.
In your honest opinions, what is the viability of gPulp? Is this a bandwagon that deserves support or should we (okay, you real programmers) continue to develop a more robust and 'intuitive' P2P system. I do believe a well-built, user friendly P2P app will take the internet by storm. We've only scratched the surface. What I am afraid of is instead of looking down the road and seeing what the requirements and capacity of the P2P app will be, the development community will continue to add and tweak the current flawed or underpowered systems.
I'd like to see more artists jump on that bandwagon. If MP3.com was hurting the artists, then the artists deserve some of that money. I hope Love presses this hard and isn't just getting a brief moment in the spotlight.
This all goes to the point that I think musicians need a trade organization that is representative of the musician's desires. Since many musicians have come down on both sides of the whole MP3 issue, I honestly believe a trade group representing the artists would approach the whole thing with a much more balanced point-of-view.
Will the TV have IR sensors to make sure fewer than 15 people are watching, etc.??
And what if you a really fat guy who gives off the body heat of 16 people? Will you be prevented from watching tv, your sole source of enjoyment in life, because you are so huge? What an outrage!
Contrary to popular belief, I am not speaking personally, really...its a friend of mine, really!
Good stuff. There are a few bills like this being proposed. This threatens public funding of the technology if it isn't enacted.
Let's address these issues realistically. I, too, don't want to walk into my local library and realize it is filled with porn seeking technonauts, but I also don't want to walk into my local library and realize my community's distinction of what is right and wrong is being dictated from the Bible Belt of the USA.
No, I don't call this current round of lawsuits anything of the sort. But letting them believe that SMDI is uncrackable and the day it is released, the code for cracking it is posted on the Usenet would make them look quite foolish.
Especially since they are pushing this as 'the' soluton.
10K is a large amount, but how much money would the RIAA have to pay real programmers and security technicians come in and take apart SDMI? I assure you, it would cost a lot more than 10K. What is going on here is an attempt to gain publicity (see, the hacker community can't break it, it is good) or if it is broken they reap the benefits that would have cost them a lot.
It is far better to take SDMI, not find the holes, let them institute it, and then flood the market with the methodology to crack it, forcing them to scrap the entire project and walk away with egg on thier faces.
The collective manhours spent breaking down the security of SDMI and the information gained by these attempts, including any flaws that come up, is essentially what Open Source Projects are about. But seeing this isn't an Open Source project, it looks like the industry is looking for a) free consulting that would normally cost them a significant chunk of dough or b) cheap publicity.
Salon's article on this clearly implies this is a big ol' PR stunt.
And what did SDMI think of [Don Marti's] response? Salon's calls to SDMI's press office went unreturned. But Marti says that he also e-mailed his open letter to the webmaster of HackSDMI.org -- and guess what? It bounced.
What the cracking community needs to do is to be very vocal on it's non-participation in this 'event' instead of silently ignoring it. Anyone up for DoNotHackSDMI.org?
none of the machines in the building
which are on our internal classified network are connected in any way to the outside world
This is how I assumed most of the government systems were. That was why Wargames seemed so trite was it was based on the idea of a system linked to the system capable of launching nukes being accessed from an outside telephone. The best digital security is simply allow no outside access. A stand alone comp can't be hacked remotely...of course it tends to be less useful than a networked one.
I would think the DoD would have a clear concept of compartmentalization as a security method.
Seeing that the State Department, Department of Energy, and Capital Hill all were lambasted for poor physical security, is it any surprise that the government has poor digital security?
I'll bet you dimes to doughnuts that the NSA, FBI, and CIA all have pretty tight security with nothing that even has a remote chance of being classified coming near the internet. DoD is slightly surprising, but hints at their arrogance - they believe they are superior and no one would be able to crack them.
As originally said though, and especially in light of the Western Union attack, this is probably the general state of all computer security.
All your points are well laid out and clearly delineate a problem with Pipeline. My initial take of this subject was it was a voluntary service that allowed for a cookie cutter infrastructure. But if all faculty and student mail are routed through it, not giving you a choice one way or another, that is a *significant* problem.
Colleges and Universities need to be seen as an open marketplace of ideas, meaning giving as much choice as possible. Okay, sometimes they can't. They can't have multiple infrastructure companies available for the students to pick from. But they can make sure that within that choice, students can completely avoid the system if it offends them (i.e. forwarding the mail to another account).
The fact that it was so easy to send all the faculty an email makes me wonder about the security of the system. I understand the ease of usergroups, but at least break it down by department. I would love to get that alias so I can spam it with my offers to decrease mortgage costs, or my new Britney Speares Nude website.
You are absolutely right, I didn't even consider that aspect of it. But a simple licensing agreement saying, you get access to our herd if and only if you display our ads. That would be a difficult plum to turn down for a business that is trying to legitimately serve the internet community as a whole.
Here's to hoping AIM dies a horrible heat death and AOL users never realize there is a world beyond the AOL servers.
Slashdot Mirror
Boy this is so incorrect it is scary. To say every person who voted for Perot would have chosen to vote for Bush is wrong. I voted for Perot and would have voted for Clinton over Bush. Now, this does not dismiss you very valid point though. I believe the primary system strips us of the better candidates. Instead, I believe we should have a National Primary in March of the election year with the top four candidates (regardless of party) being the official candidates who will then have a 100% public financed campaign. Then we have run-off elections until a clear absolute 50.1+% of the electorate vote for one candidate. This isn't fully fleshed out as it has been an idea I just came up with last week after feeling like I got ripped off because I never had a chance to vote for either McCain or Bradley. 3% of the nation selected Bush and Gore (this is an unproven percentage and should not be taken as a literal factual number...it is meant to emphasize the fact that a low number of the electorate actually choose the two front runners).
I don't think Slashdot, as a weblog, semi-news worthy source, has to worry about objectivity. Objectivity really isn't what Slashdot is about.
This is a particularly good idea. It would serve two very useful purposes. 1 - Allow webmasters to avoid the slugs and sleazemeisters and 2 - Show webmasters the width of competition. How long do you think sleaze tactics would be around if there was a third party site vetting out the losers?
"A switch, mechanical (mechanical being defined as being created via physical parts) or virtual (virtual being defined as being created via a computer program/script software or firmware) in nature than when properly used will cause a device or function to work in a predetermined manner and when used again will cause a device to cease its functioning. As part of the operation of this switch, an attached mechanical or virtual sensory indicator (audio, visual, tactile, nasal, or taste) will be activated to provide notice of whether or not the switch has properly caused the predetermined function to begin or caused it to stop.
This is clever. Will Blink(tm) Inc. also offer supplemental moistener in case the biological moistener cannot overcome excessive dryness?
This would make for an interesting stratification of the web. Only the rich can afford streaming video and audio.
Instead of a trash bin it would be a shredder and you can set the time of when the files would be atomized completely. Thus there wouldn't be any evidence for authorities to find in the first place.
Now, is this something we really want? I don't know. But I do suspect tech criminals already scramble their files.
Now that would be a key lesson to learn about the Force come Ep.3
Anyone who relies upon technology or the good intentions of other people to protect their children from unwanted material is asking for trouble.
One of the key problems I see with a .kids TLD is who would administer it? I fear the control would soon fall into the hands of Toys 'R' Us and KBKids and .kids would become a massive marketing playground in which children become indoctrinated in the ways of the commericial world.
I don't have a kid, so I can't speak with much authority, but the voice of my father comes to me in regards to these situations: 'Go outside and play, let the wind blow the stink off of ya.' Idle hands are the devils playground. I do believe a child who is trying to do homework, is doing homework. Its only when he is unsupervised for a long period of time does the idea of 'seeking out' naughty stuff comes to mind.
Of course, is this any different than my sneaking into my brother's secret stash of adult magazines? No. Everything is a learning opportunity and it would behoove a parent to teach the child about acceptable behavior regarding pornography the moment the child become interested in pornography. We all know that once that interest is sparked, there is no going back. It is called puberty.
This reminds me of one of the first web development jobs I applied for. It was in 96 and they wanted someone with at least 3 years experience. "Oh," I said, "they want one of the original CERN physicists to put up their business card on the web."
Somewhere there is a happy middleground, or maybe not so much as happy but mutually dissatisfying. I like the idea of patents and IP in general, but I think, like so many others, that this has gotten too far out of hand. Perhaps a new level of bureaucracy within the Patent Office that needs to be contacted in cases of suspected patent violations. This would add months to the process of making a claim against someone, add tons of paperwork, and would then become enough of an obstacle that only something that a person considers a major infringement would be pursued.
A zero-tolerance society is not a good society at all. God forbid we have a zero-tolerance speed limit of a zero-tolerance litter law.
Of course this always boils down to the same issue: the US patent office accepts too many stupid patents. The question is how do we, average citizens, affect some change in that government agency?
But since I would be completely and utterly laughed at, so should DC.
Maybe only companies who file screwy patents will acknowledge the screwy patents of others. They will create a whole little community and live in their altered reality.
I am assuming when they say based on Gnutella, they have 'fixed' some of the problems. Or, maybe it really isn't searching the entire network, but key segments of the network. And maybe it just ignores 56k connections altogether.
In your honest opinions, what is the viability of gPulp? Is this a bandwagon that deserves support or should we (okay, you real programmers) continue to develop a more robust and 'intuitive' P2P system. I do believe a well-built, user friendly P2P app will take the internet by storm. We've only scratched the surface. What I am afraid of is instead of looking down the road and seeing what the requirements and capacity of the P2P app will be, the development community will continue to add and tweak the current flawed or underpowered systems.
This all goes to the point that I think musicians need a trade organization that is representative of the musician's desires. Since many musicians have come down on both sides of the whole MP3 issue, I honestly believe a trade group representing the artists would approach the whole thing with a much more balanced point-of-view.
And what if you a really fat guy who gives off the body heat of 16 people? Will you be prevented from watching tv, your sole source of enjoyment in life, because you are so huge? What an outrage!
Contrary to popular belief, I am not speaking personally, really...its a friend of mine, really!
Let's address these issues realistically. I, too, don't want to walk into my local library and realize it is filled with porn seeking technonauts, but I also don't want to walk into my local library and realize my community's distinction of what is right and wrong is being dictated from the Bible Belt of the USA.
Especially since they are pushing this as 'the' soluton.
It is far better to take SDMI, not find the holes, let them institute it, and then flood the market with the methodology to crack it, forcing them to scrap the entire project and walk away with egg on thier faces.
Salon's article on this clearly implies this is a big ol' PR stunt.
What the cracking community needs to do is to be very vocal on it's non-participation in this 'event' instead of silently ignoring it. Anyone up for DoNotHackSDMI.org?
Sorry, couldn't resist the opportunity. I'm not a Katz-basher, I swear, I'm not.
This is how I assumed most of the government systems were. That was why Wargames seemed so trite was it was based on the idea of a system linked to the system capable of launching nukes being accessed from an outside telephone. The best digital security is simply allow no outside access. A stand alone comp can't be hacked remotely...of course it tends to be less useful than a networked one.
I would think the DoD would have a clear concept of compartmentalization as a security method.
I'll bet you dimes to doughnuts that the NSA, FBI, and CIA all have pretty tight security with nothing that even has a remote chance of being classified coming near the internet. DoD is slightly surprising, but hints at their arrogance - they believe they are superior and no one would be able to crack them.
As originally said though, and especially in light of the Western Union attack, this is probably the general state of all computer security.
Colleges and Universities need to be seen as an open marketplace of ideas, meaning giving as much choice as possible. Okay, sometimes they can't. They can't have multiple infrastructure companies available for the students to pick from. But they can make sure that within that choice, students can completely avoid the system if it offends them (i.e. forwarding the mail to another account).
The fact that it was so easy to send all the faculty an email makes me wonder about the security of the system. I understand the ease of usergroups, but at least break it down by department. I would love to get that alias so I can spam it with my offers to decrease mortgage costs, or my new Britney Speares Nude website.
Here's to hoping AIM dies a horrible heat death and AOL users never realize there is a world beyond the AOL servers.