Keep in mind that it's a lot easier to write an exploit when you have the source code available. Up until now, that was the only security advantage Windows had over Linux.
Looking at this story, its possible Windows can't claim that advantage anymore.
Perhaps you do think that the Presidential race doesn't involve you. Maybe you're right; maybe not. Your local race does involve you. Will
your roads be will paved? Will your city be kept clean? Will your children (or YOU) be well educated? Will your water be kept clean and
your environment healthy? These are important questions and are decided in a large part on a local or a state level. There are also races
for the US Senate all over, which are also quite important.
Absolutely. Over 90% of school funding comes from the state governments. The presidential candidates may say what they want to about education, but the fact is that they don't have that much impact on it. Education is the most important issue facing any of us. Better funding for education is the long-term solution for many of the other issues we are faced with today, including our country's economic success, improving the situation of people in poverty today, etc. Many of our problems with crime stem from the fact that people working at anywhere near the minimum wage can't support themselves on that little money. Raising the minimum wage is a zero-sum game - all it does is promote inflation. Better funding for education will take many years before it starts showing results, but it WILL help. We need smaller classes and better teachers, and we can't do that without money. Vote for local candidates who support funding education the way it should be funded.
As someone involved in hiring for IT positions, I can tell you straight up - it's hard to find good people. And then when you do find them, they sometimes want a ping-pong table, video arcade, and six figures, which is unreasonable for our entry-level IT positions. If you don't price yourself out of the market, and you know your stuff, you'll find a job very quickly.
Using state-of-the-art nanotechnology, extremely large volumes of highly complex, interdependant data can be perpetuated in a fault-tolerant, redundant manner. First, the data is encoded into a highly compact chemical structure. Then, it is reproduced in a massively parallel fashion and each data instance is individually embedded into an independent delivery mechanism.
I fully expect "Functions Of Reproducing Normative Information Carefully Assembled Through Iterative Orientation of Nucleic acid" to revolutionize the distribution of information in our emerging technological society.
.NET differs from Microsoft's previous efforts in building cross-language component architecture (COM/DCOM). While COM (like CORBA)
allows you to invoke methods/functions from one language to another, the common runtime allows data-level interoperability. The difference is
that with COM/CORBA you modify objects through their interfaces, so everything is done via function calls (possibly many of them). In contrast, to modify an object in the common runtime you can just change it directly, since each language uses the same data representation, same address
space and same garbage collector (when performing remote function calls the situation becomes more similar to DCOM or CORBA).
If you're not going to program to an object's interface, you lose the biggest advantages of using objects - modularity and maintainability. You're right back to the bad old days of changing one thing and breaking twenty other things. Sounds like the beginnings of a mess if you ask me.
Maybe someone pointed out to Microsoft that their home state, Washington, has made unsolicited business-related e-mail illegal and will fine the spammer on a per message basis. I can't remember whether it was $100 or $500 per message...
They took out the MSN plug because it made the spam "business related".
Got a box in the mail that says WIRED all over it. I thought to myself, "Hmm, what's this? I didn't order anything from Wired. Must be a promo." There were no EULA notices on the outside of the box. Inside the box were several items:
1) CD with CueCat software (I guess)
2) CueCat scanner
3) cable
4) user's guide
5) Delta Airlines promo card
The only place the EULA was at all mentioned was on the CD jacket, which clearly says, "opening this software constitutes acceptance of our License terms contained herein. Copies can also be found at www.digitalconvergence.com/ula.html. Hard copies can be mailed to you by contacting... blah blah blah".
I didn't see a copy of the EULA anywhere in the package, and since I wasn't interested in the software anyway, I didn't open it. Since I didn't open the software, according to what's written on the package, I am not bound by their EULA.
Even if I was, I don't think an EULA could override the postal code in this instance - for example, if the EULA was on the outside of the CueCat box, or even just notice that "opening this box constitutes agreement to be bound by our license" (Which it definitely does NOT say). Even in that instance, I would argue that the postal code transfers ownership of the physical device to me, and their license cannot apply to items they no longer own.
Confusing "isolates" with technilliterates?
on
Disconnected
·
· Score: 3
"Many individuals," he writes, "have tenuous connections to the organizations they work for.
They want no more to do with that organization than their job, or their paycheck, requires. They
don't show up at the company picnic, read the company newsletter, or tune in to the company
grapevine."
Wresch suggests that this is so because despite the explosion in new information technologies,
most companies don't know how to get their employees to communicate with one another. ...SNIP Early indications are that the disconnected will fare far worse than their predecessors in
previous revolutions. The gap between the rich and the poor, the knowing and the ignorant, will
be larger, the room along the margins far smaller."
Without having read the book, from Katz' review it sounds like the Wresch confuses "cultural isolates" with ignorance. Sure, channels of information will be different between social groups, but that doesn't mean one group of information is any less valuable than another.
I'm not sure whether this is just Katz' spin or the author's opinion, but I'm really getting tired of reading about the poor technilliterates. Almost every non-technical person feels like they don't know enough about computers. However, almost all of them know enough to do what they need to do with computers. We still need people to build roads, design buildings, make coffee tables, airplanes, etc. Not everyone needs to be a programmer. Sure, some of these skills require some basic computer skills, but people learn what they need to learn to do these things. Most people studying aerodynamics are not going to have any trouble learning CAD. Someone with the talent to write the next great work of literature will figure out Abiword (or whatever) without too much trouble.
The problem is not with "technical literacy". The problem is with education in general. Teaching people to read is far more important than teaching them to use computers, and is a far more difficult thing to learn. People who can read well can teach themselves all they need to know about computers, which may very well be nothing.
I keep seeing comments about how there are no real choices in the election, and how we really only get to choose between the lesser of two evils.
IF YOU VOTE FOR THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS, YOU ARE STILL VOTING FOR EVIL.
Vote your conscience. Spend some effort finding somebody who you can really support, who is willing to run for President. Vote for a write-in candidate if necessary. Public policy is based on the opinions of those people who do vote. If the only people who voted were gun-totin, fundamentalist Christian, pro-censorship, death-penalty-supportin' white people, our laws would ONLY support and represent people with those same beliefs.
If every African American who was eligible to vote showed up on election day, no matter WHO they voted for, all the politicians running in the next election would suddenly be paying a lot more attention to the communities they all voted in. Lots of people live in communities that are falling apart, where tragedies happen every day. If those people are qualified to vote but don't vote, they have no right to complain.
It doesn't matter who you vote for. It just matters that you vote, and for someone who you really, honestly want to see in office. Even if your guy doesn't win, the other lawmakers will take a look at the platform of anyone who gets even a relatively small chunk of the vote, to see how public opinion is turning.
I repeat, STEP AWAY FROM THE COMPUTER! Get some damn priorities! Food, clothing, shelter. That's what people need.
And don't give me any of that crap about using computer skills to improve efficiency or some shit like that. That's just a fucking excuse because you are too damn fat and lazy and you don't want to get dirt under your fingernails.
So, Mr. Wizard, what are computers for if not to help improve efficiency? Efficiency saves money. Money that is used by the charity to buy food, clothing, shelter. There is a lot of paperwork associated with any charity organization.
I build database applications for various United Way charities in my free time. United Way provides an excellent way for charities to get in contact with technology specialists that can help them with their specific needs. The reason I get paid very, very well when not working a charity job is that THERE ARE NOT VERY MANY PEOPLE WHO CAN DO WHAT I DO, compared with how many people are capable of filling soup bowls. The charities I work with have lots of people willing and able to 'fill soup bowls'. Unfortunately, they are often short on people who know how to manage large organizations, people who know how to build inventory tracking systems, people who know how to manage finances for nonprofit organizations, and people who know how to build database applications like me.
Since you mentioned shelter, let's focus on that for a minute. Imagine, if you can, a group of programmers gathered together with the intention of building a homeless shelter, "Stepping away from their computers" as you broadcasted. They have roofing tiles, two-by-fours, drywall, plumbing pipe, kitchen fixtures, windowpanes, heating duct, nailguns, electrical panels, sawzalls, skilsaws, roto-hammers, and various other tools and appliances. D A N G E R O U S. Put them back in front of their computers before they hurt people.
Technology work helps charities where they need it most - many I have come to are keeping track of stuff with 3x5 cards and 3-part forms, and spend insane amounts of time sorting, filing, etc. How is all that sorting and filing helping the needy?
The whole point of having a society with specialized disciplines is efficiency. I contribute with what I know how to do best. I can build db apps way, way better than I can build a house for the homeless. By spending a few hours of my time, I can save hundreds of hours of the time of someone whose time could be spent on things more helpful than filing and sorting.
I come to charities' offices that are disorganized and buried in paperwork, and I leave them able to help more people, faster. When was the last time you got dirt under your fingernails, ZikZak? Everyone I know that actually works with charities (key word: work) recognizes that everyone who does help, helps with what they can do best.
As far as Internet access in Africa, believe it or not, there are actually CITIES in Africa. And now, a short statement from our spokesman in the Congo, Tarzan:
"That right, Bob! Not all jungle!!! Internet help economy. Help distribution of wealth from have-money nation to no-have-money nation. Why living condition so bad? Government have less money than banditos! How do Government get more money? It tax businesses! Like Jungle, everything depend on everything else. Not so simple as Cheetah think. This Tarzan, live from Congo."
I bet Smith thinks he's just purchasing a ticket in the American Legal Lottery. He probably doesn't realize that frivolous lawsuits aren't any more socially acceptable in the US than in the UK.
People outside the US seem to think all US citizens are rude, poor listeners, carry guns, and sue each other at the drop of a hat. If Americans don't fit that image, they are assumed to be Canadian.
Seriously, I was asked in Australia, "Did you bring your gun to Australia?" Pretty sad. I'm not a gun-control supporter, but I don't own any guns either.
In the before-time, when the gods were not yet born and the titans bowed and scraped before the Early Hackers, the arch-demon Information was but a wee imp, nursing at the teat of its foul mother, Technology, who was imprisoned in the Labyrinth of Stupidity, guarded by the great Chimera of the Global Economy. Aeons passed, and the black, evil Information grew into a great beast. The Early Hackers proclaimed, "Information wants to be free!" And so they slayed the great Chimera, and smashed down the walls of the Labyrinth of Stupidity, setting Information loose on the world. Fangs dripping venom, dark wings spread, the great arch-demon Information roamed the land, destroying villages, dispensing death and terror everywhere.
Slashdot Mirror
I thought EMACS stood for Escape-Meta-Alt-CShift, the key sequence that starts the coffee-brewing process.
Keep in mind that it's a lot easier to write an exploit when you have the source code available. Up until now, that was the only security advantage Windows had over Linux.
Looking at this story, its possible Windows can't claim that advantage anymore.
Perhaps you do think that the Presidential race doesn't involve you. Maybe you're right; maybe not. Your local race does involve you. Will your roads be will paved? Will your city be kept clean? Will your children (or YOU) be well educated? Will your water be kept clean and your environment healthy? These are important questions and are decided in a large part on a local or a state level. There are also races for the US Senate all over, which are also quite important.
Absolutely. Over 90% of school funding comes from the state governments. The presidential candidates may say what they want to about education, but the fact is that they don't have that much impact on it. Education is the most important issue facing any of us. Better funding for education is the long-term solution for many of the other issues we are faced with today, including our country's economic success, improving the situation of people in poverty today, etc. Many of our problems with crime stem from the fact that people working at anywhere near the minimum wage can't support themselves on that little money. Raising the minimum wage is a zero-sum game - all it does is promote inflation. Better funding for education will take many years before it starts showing results, but it WILL help. We need smaller classes and better teachers, and we can't do that without money. Vote for local candidates who support funding education the way it should be funded.
As someone involved in hiring for IT positions, I can tell you straight up - it's hard to find good people. And then when you do find them, they sometimes want a ping-pong table, video arcade, and six figures, which is unreasonable for our entry-level IT positions. If you don't price yourself out of the market, and you know your stuff, you'll find a job very quickly.
Using state-of-the-art nanotechnology, extremely large volumes of highly complex, interdependant data can be perpetuated in a fault-tolerant, redundant manner. First, the data is encoded into a highly compact chemical structure. Then, it is reproduced in a massively parallel fashion and each data instance is individually embedded into an independent delivery mechanism.
I fully expect "Functions Of Reproducing Normative Information Carefully Assembled Through Iterative Orientation of Nucleic acid" to revolutionize the distribution of information in our emerging technological society.
You guys reported on this back in April: Magnetic Bubble Space Drive
.NET differs from Microsoft's previous efforts in building cross-language component architecture (COM/DCOM). While COM (like CORBA) allows you to invoke methods/functions from one language to another, the common runtime allows data-level interoperability. The difference is that with COM/CORBA you modify objects through their interfaces, so everything is done via function calls (possibly many of them). In contrast, to modify an object in the common runtime you can just change it directly, since each language uses the same data representation, same address space and same garbage collector (when performing remote function calls the situation becomes more similar to DCOM or CORBA).
If you're not going to program to an object's interface, you lose the biggest advantages of using objects - modularity and maintainability. You're right back to the bad old days of changing one thing and breaking twenty other things. Sounds like the beginnings of a mess if you ask me.
Maybe someone pointed out to Microsoft that their home state, Washington, has made unsolicited business-related e-mail illegal and will fine the spammer on a per message basis. I can't remember whether it was $100 or $500 per message...
They took out the MSN plug because it made the spam "business related".
I agree. Don't forget Covey's other book, "Principle-Centered Management."
It's another good one that focuses explicitly on the topic at hand.
Got a box in the mail that says WIRED all over it. I thought to myself, "Hmm, what's this? I didn't order anything from Wired. Must be a promo." There were no EULA notices on the outside of the box. Inside the box were several items:
1) CD with CueCat software (I guess)
2) CueCat scanner
3) cable
4) user's guide
5) Delta Airlines promo card
The only place the EULA was at all mentioned was on the CD jacket, which clearly says, "opening this software constitutes acceptance of our License terms contained herein. Copies can also be found at www.digitalconvergence.com/ula.html. Hard copies can be mailed to you by contacting... blah blah blah".
I didn't see a copy of the EULA anywhere in the package, and since I wasn't interested in the software anyway, I didn't open it. Since I didn't open the software, according to what's written on the package, I am not bound by their EULA.
Even if I was, I don't think an EULA could override the postal code in this instance - for example, if the EULA was on the outside of the CueCat box, or even just notice that "opening this box constitutes agreement to be bound by our license" (Which it definitely does NOT say). Even in that instance, I would argue that the postal code transfers ownership of the physical device to me, and their license cannot apply to items they no longer own.
"Many individuals," he writes, "have tenuous connections to the organizations they work for. They want no more to do with that organization than their job, or their paycheck, requires. They don't show up at the company picnic, read the company newsletter, or tune in to the company grapevine." Wresch suggests that this is so because despite the explosion in new information technologies, most companies don't know how to get their employees to communicate with one another.
...SNIP
Early indications are that the disconnected will fare far worse than their predecessors in previous revolutions. The gap between the rich and the poor, the knowing and the ignorant, will be larger, the room along the margins far smaller."
Without having read the book, from Katz' review it sounds like the Wresch confuses "cultural isolates" with ignorance. Sure, channels of information will be different between social groups, but that doesn't mean one group of information is any less valuable than another.
I'm not sure whether this is just Katz' spin or the author's opinion, but I'm really getting tired of reading about the poor technilliterates. Almost every non-technical person feels like they don't know enough about computers. However, almost all of them know enough to do what they need to do with computers. We still need people to build roads, design buildings, make coffee tables, airplanes, etc. Not everyone needs to be a programmer. Sure, some of these skills require some basic computer skills, but people learn what they need to learn to do these things. Most people studying aerodynamics are not going to have any trouble learning CAD. Someone with the talent to write the next great work of literature will figure out Abiword (or whatever) without too much trouble.
The problem is not with "technical literacy". The problem is with education in general. Teaching people to read is far more important than teaching them to use computers, and is a far more difficult thing to learn. People who can read well can teach themselves all they need to know about computers, which may very well be nothing.
As recorded by the Echelon system:
SJ: "Jeff, we want to use one click."
JB: "Hey Steve, what's with charging thirty bucks for a beta product? Send me a copy of OS X beta for free and you can use one-click."
SJ: "OK, thanks Jeff."
JB: "No problem, Steve. Bye."
I keep seeing comments about how there are no real choices in the election, and how we really only get to choose between the lesser of two evils.
IF YOU VOTE FOR THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS, YOU ARE STILL VOTING FOR EVIL.
Vote your conscience. Spend some effort finding somebody who you can really support, who is willing to run for President. Vote for a write-in candidate if necessary. Public policy is based on the opinions of those people who do vote. If the only people who voted were gun-totin, fundamentalist Christian, pro-censorship, death-penalty-supportin' white people, our laws would ONLY support and represent people with those same beliefs.
If every African American who was eligible to vote showed up on election day, no matter WHO they voted for, all the politicians running in the next election would suddenly be paying a lot more attention to the communities they all voted in. Lots of people live in communities that are falling apart, where tragedies happen every day. If those people are qualified to vote but don't vote, they have no right to complain.
It doesn't matter who you vote for. It just matters that you vote, and for someone who you really, honestly want to see in office. Even if your guy doesn't win, the other lawmakers will take a look at the platform of anyone who gets even a relatively small chunk of the vote, to see how public opinion is turning.
I repeat, STEP AWAY FROM THE COMPUTER! Get some damn priorities! Food, clothing, shelter. That's what people need.
And don't give me any of that crap about using computer skills to improve efficiency or some shit like that. That's just a fucking excuse because you are too damn fat and lazy and you don't want to get dirt under your fingernails.
So, Mr. Wizard, what are computers for if not to help improve efficiency? Efficiency saves money. Money that is used by the charity to buy food, clothing, shelter. There is a lot of paperwork associated with any charity organization.
I build database applications for various United Way charities in my free time. United Way provides an excellent way for charities to get in contact with technology specialists that can help them with their specific needs. The reason I get paid very, very well when not working a charity job is that THERE ARE NOT VERY MANY PEOPLE WHO CAN DO WHAT I DO, compared with how many people are capable of filling soup bowls. The charities I work with have lots of people willing and able to 'fill soup bowls'. Unfortunately, they are often short on people who know how to manage large organizations, people who know how to build inventory tracking systems, people who know how to manage finances for nonprofit organizations, and people who know how to build database applications like me.
Since you mentioned shelter, let's focus on that for a minute. Imagine, if you can, a group of programmers gathered together with the intention of building a homeless shelter, "Stepping away from their computers" as you broadcasted. They have roofing tiles, two-by-fours, drywall, plumbing pipe, kitchen fixtures, windowpanes, heating duct, nailguns, electrical panels, sawzalls, skilsaws, roto-hammers, and various other tools and appliances. D A N G E R O U S. Put them back in front of their computers before they hurt people.
Technology work helps charities where they need it most - many I have come to are keeping track of stuff with 3x5 cards and 3-part forms, and spend insane amounts of time sorting, filing, etc. How is all that sorting and filing helping the needy?
The whole point of having a society with specialized disciplines is efficiency. I contribute with what I know how to do best. I can build db apps way, way better than I can build a house for the homeless. By spending a few hours of my time, I can save hundreds of hours of the time of someone whose time could be spent on things more helpful than filing and sorting.
I come to charities' offices that are disorganized and buried in paperwork, and I leave them able to help more people, faster. When was the last time you got dirt under your fingernails, ZikZak? Everyone I know that actually works with charities (key word: work) recognizes that everyone who does help, helps with what they can do best.
As far as Internet access in Africa, believe it or not, there are actually CITIES in Africa. And now, a short statement from our spokesman in the Congo, Tarzan:
"That right, Bob! Not all jungle!!! Internet help economy. Help distribution of wealth from have-money nation to no-have-money nation. Why living condition so bad? Government have less money than banditos! How do Government get more money? It tax businesses! Like Jungle, everything depend on everything else. Not so simple as Cheetah think. This Tarzan, live from Congo."
I bet Smith thinks he's just purchasing a ticket in the American Legal Lottery. He probably doesn't realize that frivolous lawsuits aren't any more socially acceptable in the US than in the UK.
People outside the US seem to think all US citizens are rude, poor listeners, carry guns, and sue each other at the drop of a hat. If Americans don't fit that image, they are assumed to be Canadian.
Seriously, I was asked in Australia, "Did you bring your gun to Australia?" Pretty sad. I'm not a gun-control supporter, but I don't own any guns either.
In the before-time, when the gods were not yet born and the titans bowed and scraped before the Early Hackers, the arch-demon Information was but a wee imp, nursing at the teat of its foul mother, Technology, who was imprisoned in the Labyrinth of Stupidity, guarded by the great Chimera of the Global Economy. Aeons passed, and the black, evil Information grew into a great beast. The Early Hackers proclaimed, "Information wants to be free!" And so they slayed the great Chimera, and smashed down the walls of the Labyrinth of Stupidity, setting Information loose on the world. Fangs dripping venom, dark wings spread, the great arch-demon Information roamed the land, destroying villages, dispensing death and terror everywhere.