And of course, that shop didn't have their staff wasting 3-5 hours a day playing Solitaire, Minesweeper, or more complex games that they brought from home and loaded on their workstations. I've worked in shops where exactly that happened. How many people at your PoE turn their screens where they can be seen by someone walking in the door, eh? I suspect this factor in the Windows TCO absolutely dwarfs all the other factors together. In the VAX shop I mentioned, this problem was completely absent.
Tell it, brother! Nothing like having a clerk who should be working ask "Why is my machine so slow?" and seeing IE pointing to some not even remotely work-related site, Solitaire running, Webshots, AOL IM, Realplayer, ICQ, and Bob knows whatall of non-work related crap sitting in the system tray. First thing I do is start killing tasks. Amazing how much faster Word runs once that's done:).
Not trying to be self-righteous--Bob knows I read my share of/. at work, but heck, if people are going to complain that their machines aren't fast enough, I wish they'd at least have the courtesy and common sense to not have them blatantly loaded with cruft before asking for help!
Good point--wonder how many of these legislatures have actually studied how much a mail order business homed in their state would generate in gasoline/diesel taxes, goods and services used, etc. And this effect is not limited to the place from where the goods originate--FedEx has to pay taxes on what it buys, and has to operate in every state. Maybe they'd be better off trying to tax the packages coming in--oh, wait--the Constitution doesn't allow the states to do that:).
This is one reason the states fight so hard to be able to tax mail order transactions--they feel like merchants in their state (that would be feeding that state's coffers with sales taxes) are being undercut by catalog merchants.
I have a pretty hard and fast rule that I will pay either shipping/handling or sales tax, but never both.
While there is risk for an attack on AMEX's database, I'd bet on the data security practices at American Express over those at J. Random E-commerce site. There is risk in everything we do, but these risks can be mitigated with innovative solutions and their intelligent application.
He did acknowledge that Aaron Lutes was disciplined last year for using a school computer to call up inappropriate Web sites.
And Mom and Dad probably have a good FERPA case against the school district for mentioning that little fact to the media, regardless of the outcome of this case. If a school districted tried that with my kid, I'd pony up for counsel and own their sorry butts.
Trying to hide points of view one opposes is not the most intelligent way to combat them. If indeed Google is practicing censorship (and it is nothing less, if they're tampering with search results to suppress information), they are only helping to increase the value to seekers of the very ideas they're trying to hide.
Anybody here remember reading J.D. Salinger, D.H. Lawrence, or Mark Twain primarily because TPTB didn't want us to?
Anway, our ability to think, not some search engine's idea of what is appropriate, is what should be guiding us to critically read all versions of history and decide for ourselves what is true.
Exactly. This is what we're taught, and what we (collectively speaking) never do. People who sign every message (to provide repudiation for those they didn't send, they have to sign all the ones they did send as standard procedure) are called out as paranoid. Our (collectively again) associates and friends have a hard time understanding encryption, and when they learn to operate the tools, it's inconvenient to do so, so they only use them for, you guessed it, the "good stuff."
I agree completely that we need to make privacy, security, and anonymity standard practices--to do otherwise draws attention to those of us who do use these tools consistently.
I also relish the thought of some three letter agency expending millions of CPU hours on my correspondence, only to find picayune (love that word--thanks) stuff:).
And lots of publicity and mirrors for the "defamatory" website. Then the whole world can know what an asshole the "defamed" guy was, not just the people who happened upon the website before the suit.
Then the original suit gets dismissed, and everything's fine.
If Silencers for guns were available to the public
Building a silencer is not rocket science. By your logic, since it's so easy, we'd all be murdering each other with silencer equipped pistols. Maybe you would be wantonly killing if you could figure out how to do it without getting caught, but it's incorrect extrapolate your own desires to mean those of every member of society.
The point is, the greatest opponents of anonymity are opponents of anonymity for others--they want to keep getting away with the illegal things they are doing. They "know" (because they are in that situation) that those who want anonymity have something to hide.
Running an anonymiser is a great way to conduct man in the middle attacks, particularly since you know anyone using an anonymiser is doing something they don't want people to find out about.
You hit it right on the head.
Sometimes, the best practical anonymity comes from not making a big deal about encryption, etc., but from just doing things the way everyone else does so that ones traffic in the clear isn't particularly noticeable, anyway, and thus not logged or read. It's the difference between mailing a postcard and mailing a red envelope with a wax seal stamped TOP SECRET on the outside. One will arouse people's curiosity more than the other.
Unless using anonymous protcols is standard, it becomes like using encryption--waving a big red flag saying "investigate me." This puts the most ardent supporters of anonymity and encryption in the ironic position of having to be squeaky clean, because the gubmint will be looking for any reason to string them up as the battle for personal privacy against corporations and governments turns overtly nasty in the next few years.
P.S., I've always suspected that perhaps TPTB either have a mole in or are at least closely monitoring (i.e. capturing and logging all traffic to and from) anonymizer.com and similar services. The only thing saving people committing petty crimes (e.g. piracy, questionable porn, harassment) is that the government wouldn't tip its hand for something that small in open court.
So, what exactly thinks that your proof of concept won't illuminate the fact that anyone can make such a trap, for any content, not just underage porn (which, according to the media, and maybe yourself (". . . it will become the focus of the network"), apparently constitutes the bulk of the Internet)?
Don't you think the FBI/FSB/RIAA/MPAA/SS/GRU/ATF/Islamic Jihad/GCHQ will be doing exactly the same thing? Setting up "munged" Freenet servers and watching who connects, then breaking down their doors? First, stuff we can get the public behind easily (underage porn), then drug information, then abortion information, then "the wrong" politics--I think we both know the slippery slope here.
If it's not sufficiently anonymous that what you want to do is impossible, there's really no point in Freenet--this no better, network-wise, than Napster or Gnutella if any one server with contraband content can identify clients trying to get its content.
If I'm wrong, feel free to enlighten me, please.
(Also, if you're basing the information on your "wall of shame" on incriminating filenames, I imagine you might find that people who deal in this stuff probably don't use names that shout out "I'm kiddie porn!!!" any more than people storing warez and mp3s on free web space name them as such. The other problem is that what you're doing would be considered entrapment in court (NAL), so you might be responsbile for letting one of these scum go free some day.)
. . . the Brainbench exams don't seem bad, but there's no test environment control and I wouldn't expect anyone for a minute to believe they meant anything. I think they're useful for self-assessment, though, and don't do any harm, so long as they aren't mentioned on a resume:).
acceleriter, Certified Master Windows 98 Administrator:)
If you use transparent caching or proxying and don't tell the user, you're committing fraud, IMHO.
However, if you disclose it, that's fine. Of course, if there's another ISP that doesn't force me through a transparent proxy . . . unless you're charging me less . . . or your performance is a lot better . . . you get the idea. I think as long as you're honest with the users, that stuff's OK. It's when ISP's try things like that (e.g. upstream capping, transparent proxies, blocked ports) and don't tell the users up front that's bogus.
Unfortunately, I bet that the courts will eventually take a more pragmatic view since filtering is useful for security
Precisely--and by attempting to do this, they may well have created liability for themselves when they fail. The possiblity that someone will sue their ISP when their box gets "h@x0r3d" (because the ISP filtered in the name of "security," and didn't do a good enough job) is our best hope for avoiding this kind of limitation on the use of the connections we've paid for.
That's pretty darned ironic, considering VNC was created at AT&T laboratories. I can't wait until the first time one of these cable companies gets smacked down for not filtering something, since they've taken it upon themselves to do that. You would think AT&T would know what "common carrier" means and the protections it provides.
You may want to consider recompiling the source for VNC and running it on a higher numbered port, such as would be seen in passive ftp--this would be easier than setting up a VPN. All bets are off if they're actually doing packet inspection, which I doubt.
Actually, it's cool to know another language or two passably enough to search for warez and roms in countries that aren't so anal about intellectual "property"--Spanish is a good one. (Also, the piracy fascists like the SPA/BSA/IDSA/RIAA/MPAA can't have as many people looking for non-English speaking web pages of this type!) I bet if I knew how to speak the Mandarin, Cantonese, Czech, I'd be in like Flynn!
Uh, yeah, whatever. Selling a product as all-you-can-eat and then crying "abuse! abuse!" when someone actually does is not an honest business practice.
Slashdot Mirror
Tell it, brother! Nothing like having a clerk who should be working ask "Why is my machine so slow?" and seeing IE pointing to some not even remotely work-related site, Solitaire running, Webshots, AOL IM, Realplayer, ICQ, and Bob knows whatall of non-work related crap sitting in the system tray. First thing I do is start killing tasks. Amazing how much faster Word runs once that's done :).
Not trying to be self-righteous--Bob knows I read my share of /. at work, but heck, if people are going to complain that their machines aren't fast enough, I wish they'd at least have the courtesy and common sense to not have them blatantly loaded with cruft before asking for help!
Good point--wonder how many of these legislatures have actually studied how much a mail order business homed in their state would generate in gasoline/diesel taxes, goods and services used, etc. And this effect is not limited to the place from where the goods originate--FedEx has to pay taxes on what it buys, and has to operate in every state. Maybe they'd be better off trying to tax the packages coming in--oh, wait--the Constitution doesn't allow the states to do that :).
If you think sales taxes are rough, wait until you look at the import duties from those little offshore havens!
I have a pretty hard and fast rule that I will pay either shipping/handling or sales tax, but never both.
While there is risk for an attack on AMEX's database, I'd bet on the data security practices at American Express over those at J. Random E-commerce site. There is risk in everything we do, but these risks can be mitigated with innovative solutions and their intelligent application.
And Mom and Dad probably have a good FERPA case against the school district for mentioning that little fact to the media, regardless of the outcome of this case. If a school districted tried that with my kid, I'd pony up for counsel and own their sorry butts.
Thanks for the thought :)!
Anybody here remember reading J.D. Salinger, D.H. Lawrence, or Mark Twain primarily because TPTB didn't want us to?
Anway, our ability to think, not some search engine's idea of what is appropriate, is what should be guiding us to critically read all versions of history and decide for ourselves what is true.
~~~
I agree completely that we need to make privacy, security, and anonymity standard practices--to do otherwise draws attention to those of us who do use these tools consistently.
I also relish the thought of some three letter agency expending millions of CPU hours on my correspondence, only to find picayune (love that word--thanks) stuff :).
Then the original suit gets dismissed, and everything's fine.
IANAL, yada yada yada.
Building a silencer is not rocket science. By your logic, since it's so easy, we'd all be murdering each other with silencer equipped pistols. Maybe you would be wantonly killing if you could figure out how to do it without getting caught, but it's incorrect extrapolate your own desires to mean those of every member of society.
The point is, the greatest opponents of anonymity are opponents of anonymity for others--they want to keep getting away with the illegal things they are doing. They "know" (because they are in that situation) that those who want anonymity have something to hide.
You hit it right on the head.
Sometimes, the best practical anonymity comes from not making a big deal about encryption, etc., but from just doing things the way everyone else does so that ones traffic in the clear isn't particularly noticeable, anyway, and thus not logged or read. It's the difference between mailing a postcard and mailing a red envelope with a wax seal stamped TOP SECRET on the outside. One will arouse people's curiosity more than the other.
Unless using anonymous protcols is standard, it becomes like using encryption--waving a big red flag saying "investigate me." This puts the most ardent supporters of anonymity and encryption in the ironic position of having to be squeaky clean, because the gubmint will be looking for any reason to string them up as the battle for personal privacy against corporations and governments turns overtly nasty in the next few years.
P.S., I've always suspected that perhaps TPTB either have a mole in or are at least closely monitoring (i.e. capturing and logging all traffic to and from) anonymizer.com and similar services. The only thing saving people committing petty crimes (e.g. piracy, questionable porn, harassment) is that the government wouldn't tip its hand for something that small in open court.
Good. Two sellouts locked in a court battle that drains both. (improved! now posted as a reply to the right parent!)
Easy. Centaur.
Don't you think the FBI/FSB/RIAA/MPAA/SS/GRU/ATF/Islamic Jihad/GCHQ will be doing exactly the same thing? Setting up "munged" Freenet servers and watching who connects, then breaking down their doors? First, stuff we can get the public behind easily (underage porn), then drug information, then abortion information, then "the wrong" politics--I think we both know the slippery slope here.
If it's not sufficiently anonymous that what you want to do is impossible, there's really no point in Freenet--this no better, network-wise, than Napster or Gnutella if any one server with contraband content can identify clients trying to get its content.
If I'm wrong, feel free to enlighten me, please.
(Also, if you're basing the information on your "wall of shame" on incriminating filenames, I imagine you might find that people who deal in this stuff probably don't use names that shout out "I'm kiddie porn!!!" any more than people storing warez and mp3s on free web space name them as such. The other problem is that what you're doing would be considered entrapment in court (NAL), so you might be responsbile for letting one of these scum go free some day.)
Good. Two sellouts locked in a court battle that drains both.
acceleriter, Certified Master Windows 98 Administrator :)
If you use transparent caching or proxying and don't tell the user, you're committing fraud, IMHO.
However, if you disclose it, that's fine. Of course, if there's another ISP that doesn't force me through a transparent proxy . . . unless you're charging me less . . . or your performance is a lot better . . . you get the idea. I think as long as you're honest with the users, that stuff's OK. It's when ISP's try things like that (e.g. upstream capping, transparent proxies, blocked ports) and don't tell the users up front that's bogus.
Precisely--and by attempting to do this, they may well have created liability for themselves when they fail. The possiblity that someone will sue their ISP when their box gets "h@x0r3d" (because the ISP filtered in the name of "security," and didn't do a good enough job) is our best hope for avoiding this kind of limitation on the use of the connections we've paid for.
You may want to consider recompiling the source for VNC and running it on a higher numbered port, such as would be seen in passive ftp--this would be easier than setting up a VPN. All bets are off if they're actually doing packet inspection, which I doubt.
A gentleman remembers to use someone else's title. A gentleman also overlooks it when someone else forgets to use theirs.
Actually, it's cool to know another language or two passably enough to search for warez and roms in countries that aren't so anal about intellectual "property"--Spanish is a good one. (Also, the piracy fascists like the SPA/BSA/IDSA/RIAA/MPAA can't have as many people looking for non-English speaking web pages of this type!) I bet if I knew how to speak the Mandarin, Cantonese, Czech, I'd be in like Flynn!
Dude, just picking off Pterodactyls doesn't count :).
Uh, yeah, whatever. Selling a product as all-you-can-eat and then crying "abuse! abuse!" when someone actually does is not an honest business practice.