The huge military-economic powerhouse the USA currently is, there hardly is any country in the world that can afford to say "No!" to the USA. And those few who can (Russia and China to name a few), are easily bribed to go along.
For instance, many countries were strong-armed by the US State Department to sign the Wassenaar-agreement which restricts the developement and marketing of strong encryption throughout the World.
The sad thing is that any country in such a dominant position would do the same.
As long as AMD (or someone else) won't produce an SMP chipset, there's a definite need for Intel processors. I'd rather have two or four slower processors than one blindingly fast.
Why would you do something like that? You won't get any more analysed blocks that way. Once the processors are fully loaded (=2 seti processes), you can only lose by adding processes; yoyu're making the scheduler work harder.
Why does it always have to be either all-out capitalism or all-out communism?
If you'd take a look at most European economies, you'd see how a mostly free economy, regulated only to prevent the corporations running rampant and to run (fund) good public services, can exist without being oppressive, "Russian" or communist.
And the existence of public services does not mean that private entrepreneurism has been eliminated. For instance, in many countries public healthcare, or in one of your dirty words "socialized healthcare", exists but that hasn't prevented private hospitals and clinics from prosepering. On the contrary.
I'd say a system where you can start up your own business and at the same time remain relatively free of fears of "losing your shirt" if you fail, encourages more entrepreneurism than a cut-throat, do-or-die capitalism. Knowing that you can apply for state help in paying your debts, getting housing and healthcare encourages people.
Ok, that's a good cultural tidbit to know, although the fact that drinking would not be approved during a job interview wasn't really that surprising. On the other hand, the "danger" of being suspected of alcoholism for having a beer was surprising. Amazing. I actually learnt something useful by reading Slashdot.
I personally don't mind having a beer or a glass of wine with my lunch (I weigh about 80 kg, so a small Danish beer in midst of all the food doesn't really hit me that hard), but I wouldn't drink during a formal, job related lunch either. Just to have an absolutely clear head.
Having an informal lunch with your buddies in the middle of your work day is another thing, though, as I learnt during the few years I spent working in Ireland.;)
Certianly don't order a beer if they take you out for lunch you really don't want them to think that you're that much of a raging alcoholic.
Are you serious?
Have you met people who really think that if you have a beer with your lunch, it's a sign that you're an alcoholic. When are you supposed to drink beer then? At home and alone after work?
I can understand your point of view, but saying there is no acceptable loss of life if it could have been prevented by surveillance doesn't make sense to me.
By the same logic, everyone should be kept under constant surveillance to prevent murders. Or, better yet, develop and install in everybody's brain an implant that will stun you if you even think of killing someone. I'm sure that would cut down the murder rates, but would it make us any happier? No.
A zero loss policy can only be implemented by an establishing a police state with no civil rights at all.
Sure, dozens of people died but at least nobody's privacy was violated, right.
It's a question of what is an acceptable loss in return for civil rights.
Zero loss? If so, ban everything and go for a totalitarian police state. Any loss? Probably not a good solution either, but if a mistake is to made, it's better that the laws are too liberal than too strict.
thousands upon thousands of people with a biological bomb.
What do you think will happen to civil rights if a major city gets a-bombed? Do you think those rights would be restored?
And yet some little schmoe from Asshole, Indiana thinks that he is so important
This point needs to be re-iterated from time to time: it doesn't matter how important you are; what matters is how easy it is to conduct surveillance on people. If you need special equipment and lots of people to monitor a single person, the resources will obviously be concentrated on only the most important targets. However, if you can do it practically automatically with minimal hardware and manpower, then even your "little schmoe from Asshole, Indiana" becomes a potential target.
First of all, he's important to people currently in the government. That's because he's a member of the electorate and the government wants desperately to get re-elected. Knowing Joe Schmoes' party affiliations, special interests and voting histories helps targeting the campaign.
A more sinister use of the e-mail snooping would be gathering dirt on your political or business competitors. History knows several examples (Nixon and allegedly Clinton admins, for instance) of this kind of abuse. This application would probably not affect your average Joe Schmoe, though, because he doesn't wield direct power or pose a direct threat.
Knowing Joe Schmoe's habits is also important to businesses. Why do you think they'd like you to tell them your name, e-mail address and sometimes even income and hobbies before they let you use their web services? Profiling people is a serious business today.
So, don't take comfort in thinking that you're not important enough...
I seriously doubt FOIA really works. Ok, by the law the agencies have to give out information, but there is no way of ascertaining how reliable the information is.
What's stopping FBI just writing a source code for a simple, bogus search engine and releasing that as Carnivore?
as soon as management finds out they have someone competent, they'll move them
It's the same everywhere. Show too much initiative and competence, you will be moved up to management and you get to manage a group of morons. Now, instead of you doing what you do best, you end up pushing paper while your squad of morons "help" the clients by telling them to re-install Windows.
It goes both ways. In the society there are nice people and nasty people and the politicians come from this mix. The problem is, you can't tell the nice and nasty people apart just by their looks. Because of this, I'm not going to let a stranger enter my house or strike up conversation in the street with people I don't know. Why should I trust politicians any more?
social systems worked in the old days in small towns, where the vandal's mother generally knew about the vandalism before the perp got home.
Ah, yes. The good old days. Don't like your neighbour? Don't worry. Just start spreading a rumour that she's a promiscuous little wench or whatever the narrow-minded small town mentality deems immoral at the time. The social system will take care of the problem for you. Quite nice, actually, until it's your head on the block for saying something less flattering about the local patriarch's nose in the pub.
RUSTY He wanted me to understand. He communicated with me. They're like locusts. They travel from site to site, their whole civilization. After they've consumed every system resource they move on. And we're next.
Isn't the reason for the communication blackout during a spacecraft's re-entry due to the ionization of the atmosphere around it? Is the re-entry vehicle also invisible to radar?
Slashdot Mirror
Believe me, we will.
The huge military-economic powerhouse the USA currently is, there hardly is any country in the world that can afford to say "No!" to the USA. And those few who can (Russia and China to name a few), are easily bribed to go along.
For instance, many countries were strong-armed by the US State Department to sign the Wassenaar-agreement which restricts the developement and marketing of strong encryption throughout the World.
The sad thing is that any country in such a dominant position would do the same.
As long as AMD (or someone else) won't produce an SMP chipset, there's a definite need for Intel processors. I'd rather have two or four slower processors than one blindingly fast.
Why would you do something like that? You won't get any more analysed blocks that way. Once the processors are fully loaded (=2 seti processes), you can only lose by adding processes; yoyu're making the scheduler work harder.
If you'd take a look at most European economies, you'd see how a mostly free economy, regulated only to prevent the corporations running rampant and to run (fund) good public services, can exist without being oppressive, "Russian" or communist.
And the existence of public services does not mean that private entrepreneurism has been eliminated. For instance, in many countries public healthcare, or in one of your dirty words "socialized healthcare", exists but that hasn't prevented private hospitals and clinics from prosepering. On the contrary.
I'd say a system where you can start up your own business and at the same time remain relatively free of fears of "losing your shirt" if you fail, encourages more entrepreneurism than a cut-throat, do-or-die capitalism. Knowing that you can apply for state help in paying your debts, getting housing and healthcare encourages people.
No problem. We can get cheap nukes from the Russia, too. Now how can we help you with these?
Yeah, right, blame the scientists and engineers. Blame the ones who find the information and build the stuff that can be abused.
Politicians and marketdroids are innocent.
Donating money to EFF is an obvious way, but anything else?
Sounds like you should get your intestinal gas problem treated.
Ok, that's a good cultural tidbit to know, although the fact that drinking would not be approved during a job interview wasn't really that surprising. On the other hand, the "danger" of being suspected of alcoholism for having a beer was surprising. Amazing. I actually learnt something useful by reading Slashdot.
I personally don't mind having a beer or a glass of wine with my lunch (I weigh about 80 kg, so a small Danish beer in midst of all the food doesn't really hit me that hard), but I wouldn't drink during a formal, job related lunch either. Just to have an absolutely clear head.
Having an informal lunch with your buddies in the middle of your work day is another thing, though, as I learnt during the few years I spent working in Ireland. ;)
Are you serious?
Have you met people who really think that if you have a beer with your lunch, it's a sign that you're an alcoholic. When are you supposed to drink beer then? At home and alone after work?
By the same logic, everyone should be kept under constant surveillance to prevent murders. Or, better yet, develop and install in everybody's brain an implant that will stun you if you even think of killing someone. I'm sure that would cut down the murder rates, but would it make us any happier? No.
A zero loss policy can only be implemented by an establishing a police state with no civil rights at all.
It's a question of what is an acceptable loss in return for civil rights.
Zero loss? If so, ban everything and go for a totalitarian police state.
Any loss? Probably not a good solution either, but if a mistake is to made, it's better that the laws are too liberal than too strict.
thousands upon thousands of people with a biological bomb.
What do you think will happen to civil rights if a major city gets a-bombed? Do you think those rights would be restored?
This point needs to be re-iterated from time to time: it doesn't matter how important you are; what matters is how easy it is to conduct surveillance on people. If you need special equipment and lots of people to monitor a single person, the resources will obviously be concentrated on only the most important targets. However, if you can do it practically automatically with minimal hardware and manpower, then even your "little schmoe from Asshole, Indiana" becomes a potential target.
First of all, he's important to people currently in the government. That's because he's a member of the electorate and the government wants desperately to get re-elected. Knowing Joe Schmoes' party affiliations, special interests and voting histories helps targeting the campaign.
A more sinister use of the e-mail snooping would be gathering dirt on your political or business competitors. History knows several examples (Nixon and allegedly Clinton admins, for instance) of this kind of abuse. This application would probably not affect your average Joe Schmoe, though, because he doesn't wield direct power or pose a direct threat.
Knowing Joe Schmoe's habits is also important to businesses. Why do you think they'd like you to tell them your name, e-mail address and sometimes even income and hobbies before they let you use their web services? Profiling people is a serious business today.
So, don't take comfort in thinking that you're not important enough...
What's stopping FBI just writing a source code for a simple, bogus search engine and releasing that as Carnivore?
Isn't this where Microsoft is heading was well with their .NET?
If you're lucky to have a holiday that lasts several years, that is.
It's the same everywhere. Show too much initiative and competence, you will be moved up to management and you get to manage a group of morons. Now, instead of you doing what you do best, you end up pushing paper while your squad of morons "help" the clients by telling them to re-install Windows.
Request that each company certifies their product on when in use with the remaining two.
Put them on probation and hold them on as tight restrictions as Kevin is being held. If they make a mistake, lock'em up!
It goes both ways. In the society there are nice people and nasty people and the politicians come from this mix. The problem is, you can't tell the nice and nasty people apart just by their looks. Because of this, I'm not going to let a stranger enter my house or strike up conversation in the street with people I don't know. Why should I trust politicians any more?
Ah, yes. The good old days. Don't like your neighbour? Don't worry. Just start spreading a rumour that she's a promiscuous little wench or whatever the narrow-minded small town mentality deems immoral at the time. The social system will take care of the problem for you. Quite nice, actually, until it's your head on the block for saying something less flattering about the local patriarch's nose in the pub.
RUSTY
He wanted me to understand.
He communicated with me.
They're like locusts. They travel
from site to site, their whole
civilization. After they've
consumed every system resource
they move on. And we're next.
Isn't the reason for the communication blackout during a spacecraft's re-entry due to the ionization of the atmosphere around it? Is the re-entry vehicle also invisible to radar?
Mosquito trap.
Yeah, it's bloody expensive and isn't really logical, but has stopped the military before?