ower seems to be cheap, a few pence/cents/whatever to keep lights running, run a computer, etc does not concern most (enough) people.
Here in the state of California, we're rapidly getting away from this attitude, as our power rates have almost quadrupled since 'deregulation'. If this holds (there's immense political pressure coming to bear, as the politicians begin to realize that the largesse they've enjoyed due to a booming economy is completely dependent on business continuing to generate profits. What a radical concept. But I digress.), then the incentives to shave every kilowatthour are going to be very high. I can see low-power servers being of interest especially to the 'server-farm' businesses that have hundreds or thousands of computers in a single building. The lower the power requirements, the less expense, not only to power the servers themselves, but also for the air-conditioning, which can be just as costly.
so far, these robots don't even have the intelligence of a small animal. I predict that maybe after 500 to 2000 years we will have robots that may have the intellect of a small animal.
I don't think we'll create these robots in the sense that we humans pre-program them. Rather, we'll create the basic framework and capability, and it will educate itself. The difference will be that once it does, it can be copied exactly, so the education process will be a one-time thing. We're already seeing this done in a basic way with neural networks.
With the cost of GPS chips dropping so rapidly, maybe it would be cheaper for manufacturers to equip each drive with a GPS receiver that disables the burner if the user is within German national boundaries. (No, I'm not serious. But some of the weirdest things seem to come true, so don't discount this completely.)
(try, or rather don't, the fascist paen Starship Troopers or the right-wing gun-nut's wet dream The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress)
This reminds me of the controversy over the Rolling Stone's "Back Street Girl," in that it attributes the story-line of the work to the author's attitudes. I've read every Heinlein novel, and I don't see his story lines as necessarily revelatory of his personal beliefs. If they were, how do you reconcile his 'fascist paen' of "Starship Troopers" with the neo-hippie attitudes on display in "Job: A Comedy of Justice"?
Good idea, but there might be an even easier tactic. When listing the files you're sharing, the client reports the checksum to the server. This appears to be the checksum that the Napster server reports to a client doing a search. I don't see why you couldn't just make a client that reported the checksum as any old number for listing purposes. You could give the real one when actually transferring the MP3 itself, but it would force your opponent to do a transfer to get the genuine one. It would at least serve the purpose of slowing them up, and you could potentially also make your client reject requests from certain IPs if the word gets out on what ones are being used by the watchers. The advantage to all this would be that you wouldn't have to have the client make changes to the MP3 itself.
Ok, so if Thailand decide it's ok to sell child pornography (videos or whatever) over the internet, you think that Americans should still be able to see the pictures? And view the items?
But of course, almighty America would not let Thailand do that and would put economic pressure on them... But then I guess it helps to be the "police of the world" and have the implicit right to decide what is right to show and what is not.
As repellent as I think child porn is, I'm not in favor of laws trying to ban the viewing of it. I am in favor of prosecuting those creating it, if they abused actual children in creating it. The problem nowadays is that it's possible to take a child's picture from an innocent context and turn it into a pornographic image using an image editor. Laws have been passed that have attempted to get around this by banning images that even apprear to be that of a child in a pornographic context. That would mean it would be a felony to possess or distribute certain types of anime, for example. I don't think we ought to be going to those lengths, as then we're prosecuting thought crimes.
Why are you picking on Thailand? Do you think Thais are particularly likely to create child porn? That seems like a bigoted attitude.
Sadly, most/.ers have absolutely no concept of what "prior art" means, legally. Whenever I see a patent story on/., I'm reminded of a room full of parrots, all squawking "Prior art, prior art" with absolutely no concept of what prior art actually is.
Apparently you're in possession of an enlightened view of this subject that would benefit the SlashDot community. Unfortunately, you don't tell us what it is. Would you care to share with the squwakers your vision of 'prior art', or are you just here to shake your head, go "tsk tsk" and move on to criticize the next topic? If you're not going to follow through, why'd you even waste time posting this?
Just so that I'm not equally guilty of adding to the bitch quotient without adding to the info quotient, here's the Black's Law Dictionary of prior art:
... anything in tangible form that may properly be relied on by patent office in patent cases in support of rejection on matter of substance, not form, of claim in pending appiication for patent.
Does the EU have the concept of "prior art" as embodied in U.S. law? Many of the so-called 'patents' in the list would be invalidated under this test. Does the EU not recognize this, or is it just that the examiners don't realize that many of these concepts have actually been implemented and have been in use for years?
"Freedom of shopping" might be *a* right, but it's by no means a *basic* right. And even "Freedom of speech" can
and is limited by our government. (Slander? Libel? Shouting fire in a crowded theater?)
This isn't just "Freedom of Shopping." The judge has said that even allowing people in France to view these items is forbidden. Under that ruling, it's perfectly ok for a totalitarian regime to bar access of its citizens to basic political information, foreign newspapers, etc. This gives legitimacy to suppression of fundamental freedoms and I think sets a dangerous precedent.
My brother is a professional alarm installer, so my viewpoint is based on what I've learned from him. Unless you want to do this as a hobby just for your own interest, I suggest getting a professionally-installed system. Doing this yourself is going to require quite a bit of time and effort, and if you end up controlling and recording the result on your own linux hardware, the thieves may simply remove all of the evidence. Professionals will be able to do a neat and effective job of installion. From personal experience, I know that cats can be a problem with certain types of sensors, and a professional will know how to work around your particlar requirements. They have access to and knowledge of sensors and equipment that will be difficult for you to obtain on your own. For example, there are wireless battery-powered sensors for locations to which you can't run wires. The central alarm panel periodically queries the sensors and can detect tripped or malfunctioning ones. Finding and installing good ones properly would be a challenge to someone who doesn't do alarm work all the time.
One thing you don't want is to end up with a system that gives a lot of false alarms. The cops hate that and, even if you don't draw a fine, they'll soon start to ignore you. The objective of a security system isn't to help capture the thieves after the fact, it's to make it difficult and undesireable for them to attempt to steal in the first place. Not knowing your exact circumstances (neighbors, whether your area is patrolled by police, etc.) precludes me making a definitive suggestion, however, the usual system where I live uses an outdoor horn and a dial-in to a central company who will alert police. My own home has one interior door with a sensor, and an infrared beam down a central hallway which would be unavoidable by a thief. The beam is set quite high, with a one-second delay and with no furniture near it, because of the cats. It also has fire sensors. If an alarm goes off, the central office calls and if it gets no answer or someone who doesn't know the password, they call the police or fire department. It's a good system, and the only false alarms I've had were before we perfected the cat-proof infrared beam, and because of a failed fire sensor.
I know that you're justifiably upset and the natural instinct is revenge in the circumstances (cameras would be great to catch these scum), but take a deep breath and think about the problem logically. Take appropriate steps to secure your dwelling with a reliable and effective system, and don't rush to implement something that ends up being a less-than-effective solution. That said, you could probably get a decent professional alarm system and supplement it with cameras or whatever else might be of interest. I would, however, leave the job of actually tripping the alarm to the professional portion of the system.
This has rambled a bit, but it's my best advice. Good luck.
As I see it, the main problem is that balloting is controlled by each individual county. Lacking a common standard to which to conform, counties are free to invest as little as they can get away with. For many, this means that they end up using decades-old machines employing a century-old technology. For others, it means hand-marked paper ballots. Another factor is bureaucratic inertia ("we've always done it this way and it works fine"). I don't favor a national law forcing a uniform method (it would probably not be constitutional anyway), but it would be a great start to have each state come up with a modern standard, and have each county conform. It would cost money, but the present mess makes it clear that it would be money well spent.
I'd ask, "If I produce a product on my own time, will the University attempt to assert ownership rights?" I've done work for companies in the past who had employment contracts that basically said, "anything you develop belongs to us, regardless of whose time it was on or whether it bears any resemblance to what you work on in your job." I'm wondering if universities have the same sort of thing. I don't know if these provisions are ultimately enforceable, but it could cost a boatload of money to fight it in court.
One of my favorite sites was the Internation Lyrics Server. It contained song lyrics submitted by its visitors, so essentially they were the opinions of what the songs said (who can really tell what Iron Butterfly is singing in "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" anyway?). Nevertheless, the music industry sued, so the site shut down. It's sort-of back, but much of the database has been expunged. I'd love it if someone could get their hands on the original database and mirror it.
You missed the point. The 'benefits and prosperity' you speak of were neither created, nor can they be sustained, by a populace only interested in indulging themselves. If the mass media are providing information solely for the self-indulgent, how will the rest be informed of issues that count?
If you want to be in the business of telling people what 'counts' then you need to get yourself a job as a news editor. They're the ones burying the stories you think ought to be on the front page. The general populace is not going to care unless their lives are perturbed in some way (as soon as the middle class kids weren't being drafted any more, the anti-war protests lost a lot of their verve). You can try and grab them by the lapels and say "You've got to care about this, man!," but most of them aren't going to agree with you. Meanwhile those of us who actually do care will handle the job for them. And I think that the U.S. will survive just fine. I'll make one concession, though: our education system is not equipping people with the tools to be involved and knowledgeable citizens should they desire to be. The ignorance of our basic laws, history, culture, and economics is just appalling. I used to think that it was mainly a U.S. phenomenon, but I recently read that only a small fraction of British students could identify Winston Churchill! It seems that ignorance is becoming universal.
It's your unwarranted assumption that I don't pay attention. In point of fact, I pay very very close attention, and I also write letters to let my representatives know that I'm paying attention. What I object to is some zealot thinking that it would be a good idea to force-feed 'important' news to people, as though that will somehow motivate them. Those who are interested enough will find the information that they want and act on it. The rest won't. I'm happy to be the watchdog for my fellow citizens who don't want to bother, and I'll do a far better job of it than somebody who doesn't really care.
"Oh my, Meg Ryan is breaking up with her husband. Oh my, how important!" he mocked. "It's CNN, USA Today, Time deliberately not reporting the stories that affect our lives."
What a dreary world people like Jello would have us inhabit. One of the benefits of prosperity and reward for hard work is the freedom to indulge ourselves in whatever makes us happy. If it's reading tabloid tales of the rich and famous, so what? If CNN and USA Today could make a buck printing the sort of stuff he finds important, they'd do it in a heartbeat. His unspoken criticism is that people aren't interested. Tough luck there, Jello.
If you want to maintain privacy in this world, sometimes you have to go to great lengths. Recommended reading: How to be Invisible, by J. J. Luna. It isn't perfect, and some of its suggestions are probably more trouble than you want to go to, but it's an interesting read. Did you know that there's a national registry of new hires to which all employers have to submit the names of people they've just given jobs? I sure didn't.
If you read the decision, you'll notice that the domain owner never filed a response to Guinness. This is the legal equivalent of rolling over and playing dead.
Exactly. In the U.S. legal system, this is known as "sitting on your rights," and it's a quick way to lose your case.
The way WIPO is behaving in these decisions is a good example of why the U.S. ought to avoid surrendering authority to international bodies in the future. I can only imagine what we'd see if the Kyoto or Outer Space Treaties ever got signed.
BTW, Heinlein's book "Take Back Your Government" is still in print, and surprisingly useful 50 years after he wrote it.
Wow. RAH had a major effect on my worldview as I read him growing up. I thought I had read everything he'd ever written, but somehow missed this. Thanks for mentioning it.
You may not care about politics, but it cares about you. Ignoring government doesn't mean it goes away, it just means you have no chance to influence what it's doing. If you don't want to wake up one day to discover that your 'leaders' have upped your taxes, trampled on your rights, or generally made your life miserable by some new action of the nanny state (we don't think you really need that SUV, citizen), then you ought to be following politics closely. And not just as a passive observer; politics isn't a football game. Write letters to your representatives. They actually do read them and will modify their behavior on a surprisingly small number of letters or calls. They know that for every one they get, there are thousands of people who feel the same way, so you can have tremendous leverage. If you really want to see a politician take notice, get a dozen or two people together and all of you write or call on the same topic.
I haven't read the bylaws of the ICANN, but presumably there's a procedure for the membership to recall a board member before his/her term is up. My suggestion is that members do just that to all of these people (or at least the ones who voted for the term extension). Otherwise, before you know it this bunch is going to start voting themselves pensions.
Interestingly, some may choose to remain blind
on
End To Blindness?
·
· Score: 2
My father used to be part-owner of a company that manufactured telecommunications devices for the deaf (TDD), so I got a first-hand look at the dynamics of the 'deaf community'. Lessons that I believe would carry over into the 'blind community'. Many of the people who suffer a profound disability define their very identity by this fact. I was astounded to find that, when one company announced a device that may have allowed many if not most deaf people some degree of hearing, some in the community began to say that it would be a mistake to use it! They were concerned that the community would be eroded if large numbers of the afflicted were to be able to hear sound again. I was absolutely flabbergasted that anyone would want to perpetuate their deafness, yet there it was.
I think this carries a larger message: large-scale change - even for the better - is terrifying to people and to those who wield authority or power under the old regime. Even though it seems farfetched, I would not be at all surprised to find out that the blind will be exhorted to remain so by some of their leaders and self-appointed advocates. All in the name of group identity.
This would have been more impressive if each image were done on an individual Palm and hung on the wall. Like the mural someone once made out of etch-a-sketches.
Slashdot Mirror
Here in the state of California, we're rapidly getting away from this attitude, as our power rates have almost quadrupled since 'deregulation'. If this holds (there's immense political pressure coming to bear, as the politicians begin to realize that the largesse they've enjoyed due to a booming economy is completely dependent on business continuing to generate profits. What a radical concept. But I digress.), then the incentives to shave every kilowatthour are going to be very high. I can see low-power servers being of interest especially to the 'server-farm' businesses that have hundreds or thousands of computers in a single building. The lower the power requirements, the less expense, not only to power the servers themselves, but also for the air-conditioning, which can be just as costly.
I don't think we'll create these robots in the sense that we humans pre-program them. Rather, we'll create the basic framework and capability, and it will educate itself. The difference will be that once it does, it can be copied exactly, so the education process will be a one-time thing. We're already seeing this done in a basic way with neural networks.
With the cost of GPS chips dropping so rapidly, maybe it would be cheaper for manufacturers to equip each drive with a GPS receiver that disables the burner if the user is within German national boundaries. (No, I'm not serious. But some of the weirdest things seem to come true, so don't discount this completely.)
This reminds me of the controversy over the Rolling Stone's "Back Street Girl," in that it attributes the story-line of the work to the author's attitudes. I've read every Heinlein novel, and I don't see his story lines as necessarily revelatory of his personal beliefs. If they were, how do you reconcile his 'fascist paen' of "Starship Troopers" with the neo-hippie attitudes on display in "Job: A Comedy of Justice"?
Good idea, but there might be an even easier tactic. When listing the files you're sharing, the client reports the checksum to the server. This appears to be the checksum that the Napster server reports to a client doing a search. I don't see why you couldn't just make a client that reported the checksum as any old number for listing purposes. You could give the real one when actually transferring the MP3 itself, but it would force your opponent to do a transfer to get the genuine one. It would at least serve the purpose of slowing them up, and you could potentially also make your client reject requests from certain IPs if the word gets out on what ones are being used by the watchers. The advantage to all this would be that you wouldn't have to have the client make changes to the MP3 itself.
But of course, almighty America would not let Thailand do that and would put economic pressure on them... But then I guess it helps to be the "police of the world" and have the implicit right to decide what is right to show and what is not.
As repellent as I think child porn is, I'm not in favor of laws trying to ban the viewing of it. I am in favor of prosecuting those creating it, if they abused actual children in creating it. The problem nowadays is that it's possible to take a child's picture from an innocent context and turn it into a pornographic image using an image editor. Laws have been passed that have attempted to get around this by banning images that even apprear to be that of a child in a pornographic context. That would mean it would be a felony to possess or distribute certain types of anime, for example. I don't think we ought to be going to those lengths, as then we're prosecuting thought crimes.
Why are you picking on Thailand? Do you think Thais are particularly likely to create child porn? That seems like a bigoted attitude.
Apparently you're in possession of an enlightened view of this subject that would benefit the SlashDot community. Unfortunately, you don't tell us what it is. Would you care to share with the squwakers your vision of 'prior art', or are you just here to shake your head, go "tsk tsk" and move on to criticize the next topic? If you're not going to follow through, why'd you even waste time posting this?
Just so that I'm not equally guilty of adding to the bitch quotient without adding to the info quotient, here's the Black's Law Dictionary of prior art:
Does the EU have the concept of "prior art" as embodied in U.S. law? Many of the so-called 'patents' in the list would be invalidated under this test. Does the EU not recognize this, or is it just that the examiners don't realize that many of these concepts have actually been implemented and have been in use for years?
and is limited by our government. (Slander? Libel? Shouting fire in a crowded theater?)
This isn't just "Freedom of Shopping." The judge has said that even allowing people in France to view these items is forbidden. Under that ruling, it's perfectly ok for a totalitarian regime to bar access of its citizens to basic political information, foreign newspapers, etc. This gives legitimacy to suppression of fundamental freedoms and I think sets a dangerous precedent.
One thing you don't want is to end up with a system that gives a lot of false alarms. The cops hate that and, even if you don't draw a fine, they'll soon start to ignore you. The objective of a security system isn't to help capture the thieves after the fact, it's to make it difficult and undesireable for them to attempt to steal in the first place. Not knowing your exact circumstances (neighbors, whether your area is patrolled by police, etc.) precludes me making a definitive suggestion, however, the usual system where I live uses an outdoor horn and a dial-in to a central company who will alert police. My own home has one interior door with a sensor, and an infrared beam down a central hallway which would be unavoidable by a thief. The beam is set quite high, with a one-second delay and with no furniture near it, because of the cats. It also has fire sensors. If an alarm goes off, the central office calls and if it gets no answer or someone who doesn't know the password, they call the police or fire department. It's a good system, and the only false alarms I've had were before we perfected the cat-proof infrared beam, and because of a failed fire sensor.
I know that you're justifiably upset and the natural instinct is revenge in the circumstances (cameras would be great to catch these scum), but take a deep breath and think about the problem logically. Take appropriate steps to secure your dwelling with a reliable and effective system, and don't rush to implement something that ends up being a less-than-effective solution. That said, you could probably get a decent professional alarm system and supplement it with cameras or whatever else might be of interest. I would, however, leave the job of actually tripping the alarm to the professional portion of the system.
This has rambled a bit, but it's my best advice. Good luck.
As I see it, the main problem is that balloting is controlled by each individual county. Lacking a common standard to which to conform, counties are free to invest as little as they can get away with. For many, this means that they end up using decades-old machines employing a century-old technology. For others, it means hand-marked paper ballots. Another factor is bureaucratic inertia ("we've always done it this way and it works fine"). I don't favor a national law forcing a uniform method (it would probably not be constitutional anyway), but it would be a great start to have each state come up with a modern standard, and have each county conform. It would cost money, but the present mess makes it clear that it would be money well spent.
I'd ask, "If I produce a product on my own time, will the University attempt to assert ownership rights?" I've done work for companies in the past who had employment contracts that basically said, "anything you develop belongs to us, regardless of whose time it was on or whether it bears any resemblance to what you work on in your job." I'm wondering if universities have the same sort of thing. I don't know if these provisions are ultimately enforceable, but it could cost a boatload of money to fight it in court.
One of my favorite sites was the Internation Lyrics Server. It contained song lyrics submitted by its visitors, so essentially they were the opinions of what the songs said (who can really tell what Iron Butterfly is singing in "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" anyway?). Nevertheless, the music industry sued, so the site shut down. It's sort-of back, but much of the database has been expunged. I'd love it if someone could get their hands on the original database and mirror it.
If you want to be in the business of telling people what 'counts' then you need to get yourself a job as a news editor. They're the ones burying the stories you think ought to be on the front page. The general populace is not going to care unless their lives are perturbed in some way (as soon as the middle class kids weren't being drafted any more, the anti-war protests lost a lot of their verve). You can try and grab them by the lapels and say "You've got to care about this, man!," but most of them aren't going to agree with you. Meanwhile those of us who actually do care will handle the job for them. And I think that the U.S. will survive just fine. I'll make one concession, though: our education system is not equipping people with the tools to be involved and knowledgeable citizens should they desire to be. The ignorance of our basic laws, history, culture, and economics is just appalling. I used to think that it was mainly a U.S. phenomenon, but I recently read that only a small fraction of British students could identify Winston Churchill! It seems that ignorance is becoming universal.
It's your unwarranted assumption that I don't pay attention. In point of fact, I pay very very close attention, and I also write letters to let my representatives know that I'm paying attention. What I object to is some zealot thinking that it would be a good idea to force-feed 'important' news to people, as though that will somehow motivate them. Those who are interested enough will find the information that they want and act on it. The rest won't. I'm happy to be the watchdog for my fellow citizens who don't want to bother, and I'll do a far better job of it than somebody who doesn't really care.
What a dreary world people like Jello would have us inhabit. One of the benefits of prosperity and reward for hard work is the freedom to indulge ourselves in whatever makes us happy. If it's reading tabloid tales of the rich and famous, so what? If CNN and USA Today could make a buck printing the sort of stuff he finds important, they'd do it in a heartbeat. His unspoken criticism is that people aren't interested. Tough luck there, Jello.
If you want to maintain privacy in this world, sometimes you have to go to great lengths. Recommended reading: How to be Invisible, by J. J. Luna. It isn't perfect, and some of its suggestions are probably more trouble than you want to go to, but it's an interesting read. Did you know that there's a national registry of new hires to which all employers have to submit the names of people they've just given jobs? I sure didn't.
Exactly. In the U.S. legal system, this is known as "sitting on your rights," and it's a quick way to lose your case.
The way WIPO is behaving in these decisions is a good example of why the U.S. ought to avoid surrendering authority to international bodies in the future. I can only imagine what we'd see if the Kyoto or Outer Space Treaties ever got signed.
Wow. RAH had a major effect on my worldview as I read him growing up. I thought I had read everything he'd ever written, but somehow missed this. Thanks for mentioning it.
You may not care about politics, but it cares about you. Ignoring government doesn't mean it goes away, it just means you have no chance to influence what it's doing. If you don't want to wake up one day to discover that your 'leaders' have upped your taxes, trampled on your rights, or generally made your life miserable by some new action of the nanny state (we don't think you really need that SUV, citizen), then you ought to be following politics closely. And not just as a passive observer; politics isn't a football game. Write letters to your representatives. They actually do read them and will modify their behavior on a surprisingly small number of letters or calls. They know that for every one they get, there are thousands of people who feel the same way, so you can have tremendous leverage. If you really want to see a politician take notice, get a dozen or two people together and all of you write or call on the same topic.
Opennap. Get yourself an Opennap client and start using one of the opennap servers.
I haven't read the bylaws of the ICANN, but presumably there's a procedure for the membership to recall a board member before his/her term is up. My suggestion is that members do just that to all of these people (or at least the ones who voted for the term extension). Otherwise, before you know it this bunch is going to start voting themselves pensions.
I think this carries a larger message: large-scale change - even for the better - is terrifying to people and to those who wield authority or power under the old regime. Even though it seems farfetched, I would not be at all surprised to find out that the blind will be exhorted to remain so by some of their leaders and self-appointed advocates. All in the name of group identity.
This would have been more impressive if each image were done on an individual Palm and hung on the wall. Like the mural someone once made out of etch-a-sketches.