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User: HongPong

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  1. reverse: impending graceful failures of government on US No-Fly List Uses 'Predictive Judgement' Instead of Hard Evidence · · Score: 1

    I think it would be great if people could just shut down federal agencies because they can be predictively judged to continue being shady balls of fail in the future. Sorry FBI and DEA, we the people predict you will gracefully fail to notice any banksters laundering drug money again in 2016 and 2017 so your appropriations have been pulled. Later!

  2. Alternative tech: Greensock and WebRTC on The Agonizingly Slow Decline of Adobe's Flash Player · · Score: 1

    WebRTC is maturing quickly with good vendor support for creating direct audio, video and data connections among browsers with many peer-to-peer possibilities including for example a sort of BitTorrent client: https://github.com/feross/webt... . Already WebRTC is the data conveyor for the Facebook Messenger app for example. I have been lucky to attend a couple talks in recent months about this. Be sure to check out Red5 if you are interested in video superpowers: https://github.com/Red5

    For flash-like HTML5/Javascript controls I have been impressed with Greensock - see http://greensock.com/get-start... - it even has a lot of 3D capabilities. Greensock started as a Flash toolkit and moved into HTML5 later, as I understand it.

    We are getting to the point where even Unreal Engine can roughly compile for the browser so I think most of the unique capabilities of Flash are finally becoming supplanted in better and more open ways.

  3. Very good fiber in Minneapolis on The Fastest-Growing Tech State Is... Minnesota · · Score: 2

    Don't forget you can get very good fiber access in a large part of Minneapolis http://fiber.usinternet.com/

    Would you like reasonably priced 10Gbps? No problemo! Ping times below 4ms? Done! yay!

  4. Samsung Terminators need a Skynet on Samsung Researchers Propose 4,600 Micro-Satellite Space Network · · Score: 0

    Samsung is a world leader in the insane killer robot business ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AKZC-5dFWQ ) and now has robotic Howitzer, ammo and fire control platforms ( http://www.samsungtechwin.com/... ) ... having a network of satellites too. Now all you need is a malicious AI to troll up a war with North Korea and it's game over... or something like that.

  5. Proof stop & frisk is concentrated on George Lucas Building Low-Income Housing Next Door To Millionaires · · Score: 1

    This shows with 4.2 million records loaded into MapBox to create contour map that stop and frisk was not spread evenly across NYC and shows clear patterns of bias: https://www.mapbox.com/blog/co...

  6. dump standardized testing on Report: Chinese Government Plans To Put 3D Printers In All Elementary Schools · · Score: 1

    This type of tech - maybe not just in one wave, but things of this nature - should replace standardized testing. To hell with filling in little dots, let the kids actually *create* things and then they are more likely to succeed. Tons of nasty leech organizations grab the kind of money needed for these sorts of initiatives. Swat them away and get creative - and yes 3D printers are manufactured in the US.

  7. A matter for free software on Coding For Cars: The Next Generation of Mobile Apps · · Score: 1

    One hopes that GPL compatible software can be installed. As Stallman pointed out in his Libreplanet keynote a couple weeks ago, the separate computers are not really designed correctly to defend the other parts from runaway music player components or whatever. Having a Michael Hastings style crash is only a few malfunctions away...

  8. a lot of hostility to prisoners here on Prison Program Aims To Turn Criminals Into Coders · · Score: 1

    I think it shows a lot of insecurity about tech jobs that so many people here attack prisoners and fear job market competition from them after some basic tech training.

    It is great that people could learn a trade which would let them prosper and be rewarded for their efforts. This could be much worse - they could be trained to become lawyers!

  9. Re:FCC CREATES Internet monopolies on As Big As Net Neutrality? FCC Kills State-Imposed Internet Monopolies · · Score: 1

    In your hypothetical, you really think that the city could use the muni network contract without a bidding process? That's not usually how it works but maybe you're in a more corrupt section of the USA.

  10. Chris Mitchell on As Big As Net Neutrality? FCC Kills State-Imposed Internet Monopolies · · Score: 1

    I would just like to add that Chris Mitchell who is quoted in this story has been working to protect local internet access and community ownership for many many years and a hat tip to him!

  11. Can any Greek speakers help translate GPL software on Will Greek Finance Minister Varoufakis Support Cryptocurrency In Greece? · · Score: 1

    I helped cleanup & docs on a GPL project called Integral Community Exchange System (ICES) just approved as full drupal.org project module suite https://www.drupal.org/project... . It is already used by Ecoxarxes (econetworks) around Spain specifically Catalonia to provide timebanking/time credit and needs/offers listings. It feature-replaces closed source CES software used in places like South Africa and Australia.

    I think that getting basic needs connected and covered for people and enhancing trust among a web of people, without need for deflated (or low velocity /liquidity fiat currencies like Euro in depressed Spain or Greece), with either timebanking or basic services listed, already helping a lot of people. Exchanges: https://www.integralces.net/ce... developer docs https://docs.integralces.net/ Thanks for considering something practical. No fancy blockchains, but an OAuth / OpenTransaction implementation to exchange crossovers is working in dev. If anyone would like to plugin or translate please check it out...

  12. So is SystemD or the old ways moar secure then?? on Removing Libsystemd0 From a Live-running Debian System · · Score: 1

    Is SystemD and these related libraries going to actually be more secure? It seems like init scripts were not a source of disaster earlier. The kludgy if-then scripts, while somewhat embarassing, seem predictable enough in their effects. I wonder if the converting of this idiosyncratic system into one big spaghetti monster will create more vulnerabilities.

    Is the logging too verbose like a firehose to follow what's important? And would this help them charge money for DevOps? Where has the center of this conversation been? Without digging around Slashdot seems to be the only venue this gets any attention. Is it a result of centralization in the open source world, wherein relatively few people decide the fate of upstream distros?

    Even if it works fine and solves some major problems, still: what can be done to decentralize the open source world? Can maybe SystemD get a kind of POSIX like clearly defined set of functions, and truly be made hot swappable for something less bulky and possibly devious? What would it take to unplug or supplant SystemD's role in GNOME?

  13. USI Fiber is a cheap business to operate, solid on US Internet Offers 10Gbps Fiber In Minneapolis · · Score: 1

    I was lucky enough to have access to a home hookup on a lower USI tier for a while. It was of course far and away the best Internets around locally (altho now it's prompted CenturyLink to roll out). Coverage maps here http://fiber.usinternet.com/

    Another thing I loved was Comcast was forced to slash its rates in the covered zip codes dramatically, finally resembling a reasonable price. The solid upstream is very good for getting videos online, altho its true that the chokepoint winds up being the Youtube server, not the pipe. The entire time, except when someone doing laundry unplugged the basement router, it never really bogged down & you could tell the peering points were not saturated like is always the Comcast experience.

    I happened to run into a bunch of the USI staff at an event & they explained to me that while they didn't have much capital, the little bit they were riding on could suffice to slowly build out the network. It took awhile to develop a process w the city to get easements on the boulevards but now proceeds smoothly. Conveniently everything is reliable (who knew buried optical cables are more reliable than coax on poles?) and the whole city network gets like 4-5 service calls a day. They were actually happy to not have to bother providing TV service w its finicky boxes, because they don't cover the whole city.

    The ping times to the U of Minn timeserver at 128.101.101.101 were around 2-4ms if you don't go thru a router.

    Obviously they were a bit proud they'd been able to hang in the biz over those years, and considered themselves the "last man standing" against the big monopolies.

  14. Re:Lies, damn lies, and on Will Ripple Eclipse Bitcoin? · · Score: 1

    but we are still talking about something where a large block of them were set aside and hence have risen dramatically in value even tho they are not circulating yet, true?

  15. TNR setup to promote interventionism on Facebook Founder Presents Vision For The New Republic, Many Resign In Protest · · Score: 1

    It seems no one on the thread's mentioned how TNR was setup in the World War I era to propagandize Americans into interventionism, because they were too "isolationist" and not enough support existed for empire building. They went on to promote other wars and forms of supremacy. Most recently promoting the war in Iraq. There were a sprinkling of interesting pieces here and there but it was mostly the Robert Kagan style liberal neocon guide to Empire for fanciful 21st century Lawrence of Arabia wannabees. Good riddance and I hope it somehow turns into a radically anticolonialist clickbait site.

  16. Slashdot wins, dammit! on Microsoft Introduces .NET Core · · Score: 1

    Maybe it isn't everything you could hope for, but it is a huge concession to the idea that the Slashdot crowd set out in favor of so long ago. Proprietary software steadily lost ground on the merits and now MS has to release code for many aspects of their whole ecosystem. You can all tip a wine glass and scrub your monocles, it is Progress.

  17. such branches on Linux Foundation Launches Open Source Dronecode Project · · Score: 1

    I'm looking forward to the branch of development that can take out other drones such as Amazon Monopolizers and assorted police / military drones. Possible features include pointing lasers to 'paint' them for arduino controlled ground based rapidfire paintball targeting, spraying crazy glue or webbing into their rotors, and of course flipping the damn things over. Set up a hawk's perch with some solar panels & magnetic inductance charger, fella could have a good time in Vegas w a few of these.

  18. Nuclear is dangerous - Fukushima overlooked on Its Nuclear Plant Closed, Maine Town Is Full of Regret · · Score: 1

    It seems most commenters on this thread overlook the severity of Fukushima. It's an uncomfortable reality for techies that tech like nuclear is not really run in a responsible - more expensive - way. In Minnesota the Monticello nuclear plant is the same GE Mk II as Fukushima with the terrible spent fuel chamber design. Fortunately MN has low disaster risks compared to say the uber-dangerous Cal Edison San Onofre plant - but look how even one nuclear accident proves impossible to contain or bring to a close?!
    See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Onofre_Nuclear_Generating_Station - imagine if a tsunami had hit this rickety place - it took tons of local pressure to shut it down finally. Nuclear plants sometimes degrade unpredictably like San Onofre did. Meanwhile in Japan, a country world renowned for its robot expertise, has been utterly unable to mobilize a Soviet style Chernobyl like response. Chernobyl popped once and then had a moderate fire, but Fukushima remains in slow meltdown, and if another typhoon or tsunami happens to hit the area just right, the remaining fuel rods could finally go off and metropolitan Tokyo could have to be evacuated. In this country the EPA has radically raised the 'acceptable' levels for radiation, and who knows how many nuclear incidents in the US go unreported??

    I agree coal and oil based plants trigger major environmental consequences and natural gas plants drawn from fracking now cause geological & chemical damage. We need to focus on driving down aggregate demand for electricity and patching together intermittent sources (a new water-based heat cylinder idea for example could help w storage and peak, vertical windmills are safer for birds, clever plastic lenses cheapen solar etc), while phasing out catastrophe-prone technologies. In the new SimCity nuclear plants are safe if the workers are educated, if only real life were so easy :P

  19. 700MHz Radio Spectrum battle continues on Post-9/11 DOJ Tech Project Dying After 10 Years? · · Score: 1

    I heard last year that first responders are trying to hang onto a chunk of radio spectrum that the telecoms want. I don't think it was really about encryption so much as making sure that it could do trunking correctly - units could bring in radios across the country and have working interoperability. Encryption is its own ball of crazy. I for one would rather have the fire fighters have better radios, the fuzz can generally get good radios if they want them.

    This is apparently the "D Block" which is next to existing 700MHz public safety frequencies.
    http://gcn.com/articles/2011/03/31/first-responders-public-safety-d-block-spectrum.aspx
    later: http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dc/2011/06/911-first-responder-radio-bill-clears-committee

  20. This code should be open-sourced? on Man Charged With Stealing Code From Federal Reserve Bank · · Score: 0

    There should be a git repository for all the code used for such core functions as the US Treasury ledger. Of course that would cause reporting to improve -- imagine if each budget operation got spit out in tweets or API-compatible calls. That would really mess up the routine at the Federal Reserve for laundering drug money & creating credit lines for foreign criminal banker arch weasels, so it's going to be closed source as far as they can take it.

  21. SAIC builds out tracking systems roads-panopticon on DoD Paper Proposes National Security Through a Culture of Restraint (and Stigma) · · Score: 1

    I recently obtained info about SAIC participating in building a new tracking pilot system called IntelliDrive. Basically they are there to profit (cost plus) from approving the system. It's a huge industry to install military industrial tracking systems at every level of society. Story here:
    http://tc.indymedia.org/2011/may/tcimc-exclusive-contracts-intellidrive-mndot-military-industrialu-m-plan-gps-track-all-cars

  22. Consult zerohedge for cyber/market spam nexus on Subtle Cyber Attacks Could Tilt Global Economies · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The majority of stock activity is exactly this electronic noise, it's the rule, not the exception. The whole equities market (and other ones) is a turbo-hyperactive instant messaging system of bid/ask channels and they are all basically crapflooded now at about 60-70% of daily trading volume. The "Carbon Market" is another huge scam handy for passthru moneylaundering & fraud operations. Unknown binaries have been lodged in key NASDAQ systems. The messaging "order flow" is arbitrarily frontrun (i.e. man in the middle message intercept).

    The real question is what miserable slice of the activity actually represents rationally allocated capital, rather than this message crapflooding. My fave site for this topic http://zerohedge.com/ consistently nails so many anomalies, flash crashes, order stacking rule loopholes (which bids are bumped off to 'dark pools' under less than optimal logic) etc.

    It would be better if there was a 5ms 'quanta' for market prices, at least that would set a minimum time-to-live for price quotes. It becomes less 'rational' as the time horizon asymptotically approaches zero.

  23. fluoride and thorium G! on China Starts Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Project · · Score: 1

    Gentlemen, the Russian Ambassador has told us the Communists have the Thorium G Bomb -- and it's powered with **fluoride** yet another communist conspiracy!

    Seriously, Dr Strangelove was right. And the melamine for our precious

  24. Open BSD an acronym for on BSD Coder Denies Adding FBI Backdoor · · Score: 1

    Open Bothersome Side Door .

  25. Aha now we learn what BSD stands for on FBI Alleged To Have Backdoored OpenBSD's IPSEC Stack · · Score: 1

    OpenBSD:
    Open Bothersome Side Door!! :-D