I understand some of the privacy pundits bitching all around about how this is an "invasion of privacy." However, the 5 seconds leading up to a crash can provide important data for the manufacturers and accident investagators...particularly if the driver of the car is killed in the crash.
It's interesting that it has the top speed recorded, which is kinda the death blow in this case. In most speed-related auto collisions, law enforcement goes by road conditions and skid marks to determine the speed of the vehicle at impact. Imagine the mess if that were a child running after a ball...
Personally, I'm glad this guy is going to prison. There is no excuse for excessive speed in a residential neighborhood...especially when that exceeded by a factor of four. That's what they built highways for!;)
This is great...but seriously out of reach of most subscribers to even be cost-effective to implement.
Then there are the people like me who live in fiber-fed areas. It doesn't matter how close I am to the CO, but because my copper terminates in a SLIC hut and not on a CO's MDF, I'm SOL.
People in my shoes traditionally have had to use either IDSL-based services (DSL over ISDN carrier for 144k), or get a T1.
...burn those hideous microcassette jobs and get an MD recorder. I've had mine for the last few years and it is by far the best thing I've ever used for lectures.
MP3 recorders are NOT good for this kind of application because:
1.) Lectures don't take up a lot of bandwidth and ALL mp3 at 96k or below sounds like junk...even on something as simple as a lecture. 2.) MD discs are nice and cheap on eBay. 3.) Standard MD recorders will get you about 2 1/2 hours of record time in mono mode at near CD quality. 4.) MD discs are a piece of cake to reuse. 5.) A few sets of rechargable batteries and you can record as long as you want! 6.) Profit! (If you're devious enough to sell copies of the lectures you attended...but don't get caught or the professor may expressly forbid all forms of recording)
I used to keep the discs around for the lectures I attended, but since I listen to them anyways while studying, I record them onto my PC and transcode them into a 38k vorbis file which has acceptable loss for archiving of a lecture.
First of all, triangulation is a hell of a lot more difficult than you think...hence the reason for the FCC mandate that GPS be implemented in all phones. Consider how your favorite radio station gets stronger at some points than others...and then consider the higher frequency that cell phones operate on. At best, you can guess where the phone may be by looking at the signal strengths from various towers, but that's not something that some cube monkey can just feel like pulling up in a browser...you would need actual radio foxhunting skills to pinpoint the location of the phone.
I have an old-ass StarTac without any of these fancy GPS features, and I intend on keeping it that way. Having used 911 a small number of times on this phone has required me to give a very detailed description of where I was...no GPS baby!
Of course, if you want more anonymous location without the monthly bills...get yourself a ham radio license and go that route...and you'll get to use up to 1500 watts PEP on most bands.;)
Well, I switched because of it's better quality, particularly in the low bitrate arena for lectures...and for all my CDs. Yes...I re-ripped everything I owned once I got a taste for the format.
Using a Winamp vorbis encoder plugin, I was able to achieve significant crunches on classroom lectures, that were close enough to the original to be useful. Bear in mind too, that this was before Speex became part of the project.
MP3 on the otherhand was totally useless at anything less than 64k. The loss drove me nuts.
Let's not consider only that Vorbis is free...but it's also further extensible. Last I knew, none of the "new" audio formats being touted could support up to 255 discreet audio channels...which could be a very big hit with multispeaker surround systems well into the future. Bitrate peeling promises to be very exciting...once the details of that are all worked out. The Ogg multimedia foundation will be a true thing of beauty.
And it's free not just from the licensing and patents...but also from that DRM BS that all of us hate so much. Probably another reason Apple decided to go with ACC was to get the DRM support from the record labels.
Funny how over the last 2 years my department went to a third of its size...from nearly 40 at the height of the boom to only 12...and now it's going to take 7 years to double current numbers? Looks like a lot of techies are gonna be out of jobs for awhile to come!
My company is moving locations and intends on laying off everyone who doesn't want to relocate...let me tell ha how excited I am!
I was a fool for thinking that an ISP job was a stable gig...
Even in some places, IDSL service doesn't have anything to do with fixing the phone lines.
In my case, the part of the city where I live is in a fiber-fed neighborhood. Since DSL signals travel above the analog frequency band, they can't be multiplexed, sent to the CO, and then wired over to the ISPs cage. The only two ways around this are: 1.) Use a telco-standard data carrier from the residence to the CO, or 2.) Install a DSLAM in every fiber SLIC hut where the subscribers are.
This presents a problem for most people because a DSL provider isn't going to install a DSLAM everywhere a subscriber wants to be provisioned if there isn't a good chance that the DSLAM is going to be fairly heavily utilized. Assuming the RBOC would even let the ISP install a DSLAM in their SLIC, the ISP then has to get a backhauled circuit to the CO which they will pay transit for...so this is a risky gamble in smaller towns and cities where subscriber pools are limited at best. (Cable usually gets a lot of those subscribers 'cos it's a lot cheaper).
Unfortunately, this leaves people like me to get a circuit that requires an easily supportable and MUXable telco carrier, either an ISDN carrier (2B+D for 144k over 3 DS0s), or a full T1. I know someone is going to think of things like Frac Ts and stuff like that, but I know that at least Verizon likes to use LiteSpan SLIC equipment, which AFAIK only supports voice DS0, ISDN, and Full T1.
(Definitions:
DSLAM - DSL Access Multiplexer, where all the DSL signals for the subscribers are aggregated and then connected to the ISP's backbone for network transit.
SLIC - Subscriber Line Interface Cabinet, where all the subscriber lines in a given distribution area come in over copper or fiber links and are aggregated and fed to the CO over another or larger fiber link. Can be an ouside hut, underground bunker, or a fiber feed to a business.)
The number of sites on that list is actually less than 423. At least for the ISP I work for, they have to supply the URL and the IP address...and we block by IP.
The unfortunate side effect is that blocking by IP permeates over the whole backbone, effectively shutting everyone out from our network and anyone else who uses us for transit...regardless if they live in PA or not.
Also, once each request is made, that's it...we don't keep tabs on it...especially since they don't pay us for that kind of service. In short, it's their responsiblity to provide us the information for continued enforcement.
Amazing...a public official with clue...the end of the earth is upon us!
That's fine...you can take the censorship. I, however, prefer to think for myself.
However, your conclusion is wrong in that once people have the illusion that their leaders are clueful, then they're easier to contain and control...and censorship is part of that.
Re:so it can transfer a lot of data quickly....
on
Net Speed Record Smashed
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Add in that the speed of light is measured through a vacuum. Put in through something like fiber and the maximum speed is cut to 2/3 max.
The first Baby Bell breakup had everything to do with deregulating long distance, and that did wonders for the American consumer.
However, with the modern approaches to communication, the Baby Bells need to be broken up in another way I have not yet seen mentioned:
Separate the dial provider from the infrastructure provider.
Check this out: You RBOCs would be split into two separate entities, your dialtone providers, and your cable-line providers.
Unfortunately, the infrastructure generally lends itself to a natural monopoly, similar to electrical service...but in most places, we can choose our energy provider...but still need to pay the distributor.
This could work well with phone service. Once company would own and maintain the infrastructure, and provide the physical path for anyone who make service available on it. Then the costs of the line would have to be paid by the service providers you choose, be it Covad, Verizon, or AT&T.
It would be nice then, because any companies could provide competing service if they all have to cover essentially the same wireline costs to reach the consumer. However, if the bells get to keep the whole ball of wax, then there'll never be any good service.
I've got my Covad IDSL line because I have no restrictions on what I can do with it...and I have a block of IPs. Compare that to the "business-class" Verizon DSL and cable modem service, and I get one IP...no routable netblock...and a ton of service restrictions (i.e. no servers).
In short, unless the physical plant is made into a separate operating company, we will never truly have competition for telephone service.
In short, Jason Scott is making a film about the BBS and the important aspects it played in the world. It's an ambitious project, and I had a lot of fun doing my interview, and anyone who has something to say about the BBS experience is encouraged to help him out.
Jason is one heck of a cool dude...can't wait to see how this turns out.
Reverse lookups go by sending a PTR request containing an IP address to a DNS server, versus a A request with a name as a snippet from this TCPdump shows a request from one my boxen to my DNS server:
What effect do you suppose that would have, half a million geeks, each owing as much as a quarter million dollars (typical house, or a really nice car and lots of toys), all defaulting on their debts?
Woohoo! Lots of cheap stuff on eBay!!
Sickening as it sounds, that's what I'll be looking at doing if I get into a rut...
This format will also bite the dust, kinda like that stupid DataPlay disc format...which was at one point touted to be the format to replace all other removable formats.
Yeah...right.
Re:How about upping the signal strength for free?
on
802.11 RF Amp
·
· Score: 2
Only works for the WAP11 v1.x. Won't work on the WAP11 v2.x or any of the combo router units. I've got a WAP11 v2.2, and I'd be delighted to use my wireless connection in my living room...even 50' away, the connection is sunk.
I suspect the amplifier isn't limited to LinkSys products either, although its design is meant to fit with them.
And if 1/10th of a cent is no problem for consumers, what's the government to say "hey, why not make this 1/2 a cent...surely they'll be willing to pay 5 cents of taxes per day."
As soon as you let something be taxed, there will be no end to it. Governments are greedy like that.
...you're walking down the hall with a 3 foot stack of drives and you trip over an ethernet cable...and all the drives take a sailing course through the air and land on the concrete floor.
I'm not a betting man, but I bet if that were a stack of DLT tape, you might still be able to read them after that hypothetical incident.
Tell that to the poor tech in Georgia who was getting sued by his employer for doing the exact same thing:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/23477.htm l
It hurts nothing until it's your ass getting kicked.
HSRP can be a pain in the ass.
on
VRRP
·
· Score: 2
It's just as well that HSRP wasn't accepted as the standard. It uses a totally proprietary scheme which can be broken if the switch connecting all the routers in a standby group doesn't like it.
For example, the Nortel Passport 8000 will clobber your HSRP group if in the unfortunate instance two HSRP routers send hello packets at the same time. As far as the switch goes, it sees a packet from the same source address in two different ports at the same time...then it shuts off the ports for a short bit, and when it all comes back, both routers think they're active because a two-way dialoge can't happen due to switch blocking. The only known remedy that I've heard of is to reset the switch and that disrupts everyone else's communications.
I got the whole scoop on this problem dealing with a major east coast University this weekend. According to Nortel, this is not a bug, so VRRP is on the docket to be implemented.
HSRP is great...but unless you're running an all-Cisco shop, it can be a pain in the ass. This is why a standards-based protocol was needed.
Slashdot Mirror
I understand some of the privacy pundits bitching all around about how this is an "invasion of privacy." However, the 5 seconds leading up to a crash can provide important data for the manufacturers and accident investagators...particularly if the driver of the car is killed in the crash.
;)
It's interesting that it has the top speed recorded, which is kinda the death blow in this case. In most speed-related auto collisions, law enforcement goes by road conditions and skid marks to determine the speed of the vehicle at impact. Imagine the mess if that were a child running after a ball...
Personally, I'm glad this guy is going to prison. There is no excuse for excessive speed in a residential neighborhood...especially when that exceeded by a factor of four. That's what they built highways for!
This is great...but seriously out of reach of most subscribers to even be cost-effective to implement.
Then there are the people like me who live in fiber-fed areas. It doesn't matter how close I am to the CO, but because my copper terminates in a SLIC hut and not on a CO's MDF, I'm SOL.
People in my shoes traditionally have had to use either IDSL-based services (DSL over ISDN carrier for 144k), or get a T1.
I wish I had the coin for a T1, though.
...except the setting of the Sun definitely won't envelope the industry in darkness.
Mmmm...no more slowlaris.
But the more important question is... ...who really gives a shit?
...burn those hideous microcassette jobs and get an MD recorder. I've had mine for the last few years and it is by far the best thing I've ever used for lectures.
MP3 recorders are NOT good for this kind of application because:
1.) Lectures don't take up a lot of bandwidth and ALL mp3 at 96k or below sounds like junk...even on something as simple as a lecture.
2.) MD discs are nice and cheap on eBay.
3.) Standard MD recorders will get you about 2 1/2 hours of record time in mono mode at near CD quality.
4.) MD discs are a piece of cake to reuse.
5.) A few sets of rechargable batteries and you can record as long as you want!
6.) Profit! (If you're devious enough to sell copies of the lectures you attended...but don't get caught or the professor may expressly forbid all forms of recording)
I used to keep the discs around for the lectures I attended, but since I listen to them anyways while studying, I record them onto my PC and transcode them into a 38k vorbis file which has acceptable loss for archiving of a lecture.
First of all, triangulation is a hell of a lot more difficult than you think...hence the reason for the FCC mandate that GPS be implemented in all phones. Consider how your favorite radio station gets stronger at some points than others...and then consider the higher frequency that cell phones operate on. At best, you can guess where the phone may be by looking at the signal strengths from various towers, but that's not something that some cube monkey can just feel like pulling up in a browser...you would need actual radio foxhunting skills to pinpoint the location of the phone.
;)
I have an old-ass StarTac without any of these fancy GPS features, and I intend on keeping it that way. Having used 911 a small number of times on this phone has required me to give a very detailed description of where I was...no GPS baby!
Of course, if you want more anonymous location without the monthly bills...get yourself a ham radio license and go that route...and you'll get to use up to 1500 watts PEP on most bands.
Well, I switched because of it's better quality, particularly in the low bitrate arena for lectures...and for all my CDs. Yes...I re-ripped everything I owned once I got a taste for the format.
Using a Winamp vorbis encoder plugin, I was able to achieve significant crunches on classroom lectures, that were close enough to the original to be useful. Bear in mind too, that this was before Speex became part of the project.
MP3 on the otherhand was totally useless at anything less than 64k. The loss drove me nuts.
Let's not consider only that Vorbis is free...but it's also further extensible. Last I knew, none of the "new" audio formats being touted could support up to 255 discreet audio channels...which could be a very big hit with multispeaker surround systems well into the future. Bitrate peeling promises to be very exciting...once the details of that are all worked out. The Ogg multimedia foundation will be a true thing of beauty.
And it's free not just from the licensing and patents...but also from that DRM BS that all of us hate so much. Probably another reason Apple decided to go with ACC was to get the DRM support from the record labels.
Funny how over the last 2 years my department went to a third of its size...from nearly 40 at the height of the boom to only 12...and now it's going to take 7 years to double current numbers? Looks like a lot of techies are gonna be out of jobs for awhile to come!
My company is moving locations and intends on laying off everyone who doesn't want to relocate...let me tell ha how excited I am!
I was a fool for thinking that an ISP job was a stable gig...
Even in some places, IDSL service doesn't have anything to do with fixing the phone lines.
In my case, the part of the city where I live is in a fiber-fed neighborhood. Since DSL signals travel above the analog frequency band, they can't be multiplexed, sent to the CO, and then wired over to the ISPs cage. The only two ways around this are: 1.) Use a telco-standard data carrier from the residence to the CO, or 2.) Install a DSLAM in every fiber SLIC hut where the subscribers are.
This presents a problem for most people because a DSL provider isn't going to install a DSLAM everywhere a subscriber wants to be provisioned if there isn't a good chance that the DSLAM is going to be fairly heavily utilized. Assuming the RBOC would even let the ISP install a DSLAM in their SLIC, the ISP then has to get a backhauled circuit to the CO which they will pay transit for...so this is a risky gamble in smaller towns and cities where subscriber pools are limited at best. (Cable usually gets a lot of those subscribers 'cos it's a lot cheaper).
Unfortunately, this leaves people like me to get a circuit that requires an easily supportable and MUXable telco carrier, either an ISDN carrier (2B+D for 144k over 3 DS0s), or a full T1. I know someone is going to think of things like Frac Ts and stuff like that, but I know that at least Verizon likes to use LiteSpan SLIC equipment, which AFAIK only supports voice DS0, ISDN, and Full T1.
(Definitions:
DSLAM - DSL Access Multiplexer, where all the DSL signals for the subscribers are aggregated and then connected to the ISP's backbone for network transit.
SLIC - Subscriber Line Interface Cabinet, where all the subscriber lines in a given distribution area come in over copper or fiber links and are aggregated and fed to the CO over another or larger fiber link. Can be an ouside hut, underground bunker, or a fiber feed to a business.)
The number of sites on that list is actually less than 423. At least for the ISP I work for, they have to supply the URL and the IP address...and we block by IP.
The unfortunate side effect is that blocking by IP permeates over the whole backbone, effectively shutting everyone out from our network and anyone else who uses us for transit...regardless if they live in PA or not.
Also, once each request is made, that's it...we don't keep tabs on it...especially since they don't pay us for that kind of service. In short, it's their responsiblity to provide us the information for continued enforcement.
Amazing...a public official with clue...the end of the earth is upon us!
That's fine...you can take the censorship. I, however, prefer to think for myself.
However, your conclusion is wrong in that once people have the illusion that their leaders are clueful, then they're easier to contain and control...and censorship is part of that.
Add in that the speed of light is measured through a vacuum. Put in through something like fiber and the maximum speed is cut to 2/3 max.
.667) =
10,978 km / (300,000 km/sec *
10,978 kn / (200,100 km/sec) = 54.86 ms.
The first Baby Bell breakup had everything to do with deregulating long distance, and that did wonders for the American consumer.
However, with the modern approaches to communication, the Baby Bells need to be broken up in another way I have not yet seen mentioned:
Separate the dial provider from the infrastructure provider.
Check this out: You RBOCs would be split into two separate entities, your dialtone providers, and your cable-line providers.
Unfortunately, the infrastructure generally lends itself to a natural monopoly, similar to electrical service...but in most places, we can choose our energy provider...but still need to pay the distributor.
This could work well with phone service. Once company would own and maintain the infrastructure, and provide the physical path for anyone who make service available on it. Then the costs of the line would have to be paid by the service providers you choose, be it Covad, Verizon, or AT&T.
It would be nice then, because any companies could provide competing service if they all have to cover essentially the same wireline costs to reach the consumer. However, if the bells get to keep the whole ball of wax, then there'll never be any good service.
I've got my Covad IDSL line because I have no restrictions on what I can do with it...and I have a block of IPs. Compare that to the "business-class" Verizon DSL and cable modem service, and I get one IP...no routable netblock...and a ton of service restrictions (i.e. no servers).
In short, unless the physical plant is made into a separate operating company, we will never truly have competition for telephone service.
Check here:
http://www.bbsdocumentary.com
In short, Jason Scott is making a film about the BBS and the important aspects it played in the world. It's an ambitious project, and I had a lot of fun doing my interview, and anyone who has something to say about the BBS experience is encouraged to help him out.
Jason is one heck of a cool dude...can't wait to see how this turns out.
At least it's linux, so adding codecs should be relatively simple.
After all, isn't making a backup somewhat illegal under the DMCA??
Man...I can't wait for another round of forced upgrades...or replacements in this case!
Woohoo! I'm glad to be a consumer!!
Reverse lookups go by sending a PTR request containing an IP address to a DNS server, versus a A request with a name as a snippet from this TCPdump shows a request from one my boxen to my DNS server:
Reverse:
12:59:31.814847 defender.licensedaemon > gimpy.domain: 20091+ PTR? 1.65.0.199.in-addr.arpa. (41)
12:59:31.816003 defender.1029 > arrowroot.arin.net.domain: 19500 [b2&3=0x10] [1au] PTR? 1.65.0.199.in-addr.arpa. (52)
Forward (complete request cycle from defender to gimpy):
13:11:54.760484 defender.globe > gimpy.domain: 47604+ A? www.gtei.net. (30)
13:11:54.761597 gimpy.1029 > dnsauth1.sys.gtei.net.domain: 51438 A? www.gtei.net. (30)
13:11:54.977584 dnsauth1.sys.gtei.net.domain > gimpy.1029: 51438*- 1/3/3 A 128.11.42.31 (167) (DF)
13:11:54.978626 gimpy.domain > defender.globe: 47604 1/3/0 A 128.11.42.31 (119)
DNS & BIND is the first book to use for more info, though.
What effect do you suppose that would have, half a million geeks, each owing as much as a quarter million dollars (typical house, or a really nice car and lots of toys), all defaulting on their debts?
Woohoo! Lots of cheap stuff on eBay!!
Sickening as it sounds, that's what I'll be looking at doing if I get into a rut...
This format will also bite the dust, kinda like that stupid DataPlay disc format...which was at one point touted to be the format to replace all other removable formats.
Yeah...right.
Only works for the WAP11 v1.x. Won't work on the WAP11 v2.x or any of the combo router units. I've got a WAP11 v2.2, and I'd be delighted to use my wireless connection in my living room...even 50' away, the connection is sunk.
I suspect the amplifier isn't limited to LinkSys products either, although its design is meant to fit with them.
And if 1/10th of a cent is no problem for consumers, what's the government to say "hey, why not make this 1/2 a cent...surely they'll be willing to pay 5 cents of taxes per day."
As soon as you let something be taxed, there will be no end to it. Governments are greedy like that.
...30 more years and my Apple //e will have been running for 50 years! Woohoo!
...you're walking down the hall with a 3 foot stack of drives and you trip over an ethernet cable...and all the drives take a sailing course through the air and land on the concrete floor.
I'm not a betting man, but I bet if that were a stack of DLT tape, you might still be able to read them after that hypothetical incident.
Tell that to the poor tech in Georgia who was getting sued by his employer for doing the exact same thing:
m l
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/23477.ht
It hurts nothing until it's your ass getting kicked.
It's just as well that HSRP wasn't accepted as the standard. It uses a totally proprietary scheme which can be broken if the switch connecting all the routers in a standby group doesn't like it.
For example, the Nortel Passport 8000 will clobber your HSRP group if in the unfortunate instance two HSRP routers send hello packets at the same time. As far as the switch goes, it sees a packet from the same source address in two different ports at the same time...then it shuts off the ports for a short bit, and when it all comes back, both routers think they're active because a two-way dialoge can't happen due to switch blocking. The only known remedy that I've heard of is to reset the switch and that disrupts everyone else's communications.
I got the whole scoop on this problem dealing with a major east coast University this weekend. According to Nortel, this is not a bug, so VRRP is on the docket to be implemented.
HSRP is great...but unless you're running an all-Cisco shop, it can be a pain in the ass. This is why a standards-based protocol was needed.