All I am saying is that you do indeed have control over the Windows Update feature -- if you want it. Not all users do. That doesn't mean that I'm saying you use it for every fucking goddamn update to every fucking clocked von neumann device in your enterprise. You use your head!
Example: Windows 2000 SP2. Is this something that practically every machine in my enterprise should have? Yes! OK, it's a candidate for my own, personally-controlled Windows Update Server. But I'm not stupid enough to use it just because Martha in HR wants the Salary Database application! Jesus get some perspective.
And who will be the first to take a cheap shot because I mentioned SP2 in the paragraph above?
OK, not exactly a data center story, but funny and true story nonetheless:
Back in '86 I had a top-of-the-line Corona IBM-PC clone (cost me nearly $5,000 then). It had those big full-height floppy drives (two!) and was a very well-built, sturdy unit.
I was working as a computer hardware technician at the time, and I had recently bought a bunch of 256k memory chips. I brought my computer to work to show it off to the guys, and also install the memory where I had a nice anti-static station.
So there I was with all my buddies, showing off my toy. I open the case of my computer, ready to wow them, and at least a pound of dog kibbles spills out of the case. Dog kibbles are strewn all over the computer motherboard. We all kind of stood there for a moment, dumbfounded.
Eventually, I discovered the cause. My house was infested with mice, this I had known. But what I didn't know was that, in the middle of the night, mice will steal dog kibbles from the dog dish, and hide them in little places they can get to later. Apparently, they had been climbing in through the full-height floppy drives and storing the kibbles.
Interestingly, it never seemed to affect the computer!
Exactly. This sub-thread has all the elements of a 17th century witch hunt. Most "slanderdot" readers don't work with Microsoft technology, and so they fear it as EVIL EVIL EVIL.
Is nobody else capable to talk about the ability to point the EVIL "Windows Update" feature to YOUR OWN Windows Update server?? This short-circuits the "EVIL EMPIRE" from touching your computer, while instead giving you FULL CONTROL of what is deployed. And it does it in a very network-friendly "dribble" approach, rather than full-on 100 megabit draw from thousands of clients. It's effective and it works.
I disagree, but you're on the right track. If professional journalists were really into making money that much, they would no longer be journalists.
What journalists really care about is swaying public opinion. Forget objective reporting; forget "fair and balanced"; If you were in a journalist position, getting paid like you're a monkey at a typewriter, you're going to try to get your viewpoint as a slave to "the man" in there somehow. Do you think that, given their situation, those articles are going to reflect anything but left-wing democratic views? Hardly.
In early December, Gallup updated a question about the media that it began asking in 1985. Sixty-five percent said news organizations' stories and reports are often inaccurate, while 32 percent said they get their facts straight. Republicans were more likely than Democrats (74 to 54 percent) to say they are often inaccurate. Most polls show that majorities or pluralities believe the media are not biased toward one party or the other. But of those who see bias, more see a Democratic than a Republican slant.
Notice how the slashdot claim that they take money is encapsulated into quotes? It's a clever trick often used by reporters that are either lazy or want to slant the news.
The scheme goes something like this: find someone stupid enough to be quoted saying something that otherwise might land you in front of a judge. Then, you simply state, "But your honor, I was simply reporting what the dumbass said and he did, in fact, say that."
Of course you get the message across to the readership and can avoid doing any heavy lifting or going on uncomfortable fact-finding missions...
Top notch editors NEVER publish such quotes without getting the facts straight, even the ones that don't create liability situations. Moreover, these editors have a responsibility to follow up because of the chance that there's a juicier story in exactly such details.
Hint: if you disagree with me and reply, your message will be deleted. Don't waste your time, son.
Spoken like a true anti-Microsoft, anti-Corporate, anti-establishment Slashdot bigot. So while you're out there making Slashdot readers an easy target, please tell us about how Microsoft is responsible for UnitedLinux, crying babies, flat tires and the Ebola virus.
Not exactly. A software company can assign the BSA to act as their legal agent in whatever capacity they'd like. Just because the software company itself isn't suing doesn't mean anything if the company has such an agreement with the BSA.
Interesting article. I think it effectively shows that Brilliant Digital -- along with just about 95% of our industry -- needs to learn that they can't just shove software down people's throats. Most interesting to these companies should be the legal liability questions raised.
I'd expect these companies to start adding stuff into their installation legalese with something to the effect of, "You agree not to reverse-engineer anything we might be doing with your computer. You agree to sit back and relax while we adjust the horizontal and vertical"..
I'd like to tell you all the story of my grandfather (yeah, I know, images of the old vacation slides coming out). My grandfather was a successful businessman into his 40s. He was an executive with a firearms company (business was good at that time) and always into doing something productive.. not much different than most of us, I think.
But when he turned 40 he lost his sight. As a computer professional, I can only imagine what this is like.. but anyway.. to make a long story short he retired and became a ham radio operator.
Now you might ask yourself.. why in the world would a former executive who lost his sight become a ham radio operator? To join the ranks of the fat and bald?? Well, he did it first, because nobody would know he was blind. And second, because he found out he could help people!
Every day in his retirement, like a job, he would check into the international radio networks. On these networks, you find serious people doing serious business with Ham Radio. Every so often he would come across someone in the world in dire medical need. In one case, it was a missionary station in Venezula who explained that they had a little boy who urgently needed medicine. In another, it was a fisherman in Honduras who had the benz and the local doctor needed medical advice. Yet another case -- one that touched my grandfathers heart -- was one where a little girl became blind after drinking antifreeze and no doctor was in the village. In each of these cases, my grandfather would patch in American doctors.. and in some cases arrange for the necessary medicine flown in by plane (often the local Miami doctors would supply the medicine free of charge).
These are all real cases of how Amateur radio actually helped people.
Yes, it's a hobby of lots of fat bald men, but it's also a key means of communication to areas of the world that don't yet have cell phones and wireless Internet.
P.S. If you think everyone in Ham Radio is fat and Bald... here's a picture of my grandfather... god I miss him.. (he passed away about 10 years ago, god bless him).
http://pw1.netcom.com/~jmulvey/wb4elx.jpg
Sure, GW's characterization of the Internet as the cause of the Columbine disaster was inaccurate. I think the real cause of Columbine was that there was no supervision of these kids at ANY LEVEL. While the bullys beat up these kids, where were the teachers?? Did they think this was going to be good for them or something? And where were the parents while they were preparing for armageddon?? These kids were in their own little "
But I also disagree with Slashdot's statement: "If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.
Do you really believe there is some kind of Human Violence Quotient that all humans must maintain? I hope not.
I think the real problem is that the entertainment industry is taking advantage of this lack of supervision to groom super-impulse-consumers.
Ask any parent if they think they're at war with the entertainment industry for the minds of their children -- they'll say YES!! The entertainment industry preys specifically upon people (and especially children) with low self-esteem and brainwashes them into becoming lifelong impulse shoppers.
The more low-self-esteem people out there, the better! One of the most common advertising messages out there is, "You didn't buy a Widget? Now everyone thinks you're weird!!" Unfortunately, many low-self-esteem people find violence and violent video games as a way to feel in control.
There is a part of me that finds this story exciting and sparks my imagination.. and another part that want to shrug and ask.. "so what?"
I am troubled by how I address the "so what" question.. It seems to me that the surrogate birth of another species is something that current technology views as species-centric.
Is science trying to find (or develop) a universal "DNA mother", into which can spawn offspring of any species? Can such a being or "thing" exist? And what kind of a world is opened up when we can create entire new species that are totally different than the surrogate cows and elephants we crudely use today?
Such a world would constrast starkly from the wonderful "spin" bringing back an extinct animal promises.
I personally can't imagine this technology will really be put to commercial use simply to bring back Bambi.
Do you really believe that producers of Intellectual Property must maintain such a level of gratitute to the public for not "petitioning congress" in such a way??
Do you really believe that the just renumeration of that gratitude must be unfettered use/access/reproduction of that Intellectual Property?
That would be a scary precent indeed if it applied to material property.
Better rethink hard on your suggestion, for it would shake the foundations of not just IP, but commerce in general. The Judicial branch would NEVER let Congress put such an unconstitutional idea into law!
Oh come on... Do you really want to record Digital TV to record the daily news for historical archives?
If you believe that, then you also believe Napster was created for the express purpose of allowing anyone in the world to publish MP3 files by "consenting" bands.
Hogwash.
You want to record digital TV so you can get good movies at DVD quality for free!
I'm all for upsetting the applecart if it needs to be upset, but let's make sure everyone involved understands what the leaders of this "copyright revolution" are trying to accomplish.. otherwise the "copyright revolution" is just as bad by using ideological deception to justify thievery.
Slashdot Mirror
All I am saying is that you do indeed have control over the Windows Update feature -- if you want it. Not all users do. That doesn't mean that I'm saying you use it for every fucking goddamn update to every fucking clocked von neumann device in your enterprise. You use your head!
Example: Windows 2000 SP2. Is this something that practically every machine in my enterprise should have? Yes! OK, it's a candidate for my own, personally-controlled Windows Update Server. But I'm not stupid enough to use it just because Martha in HR wants the Salary Database application! Jesus get some perspective.
And who will be the first to take a cheap shot because I mentioned SP2 in the paragraph above?
Back in '86 I had a top-of-the-line Corona IBM-PC clone (cost me nearly $5,000 then). It had those big full-height floppy drives (two!) and was a very well-built, sturdy unit.
I was working as a computer hardware technician at the time, and I had recently bought a bunch of 256k memory chips. I brought my computer to work to show it off to the guys, and also install the memory where I had a nice anti-static station.
So there I was with all my buddies, showing off my toy. I open the case of my computer, ready to wow them, and at least a pound of dog kibbles spills out of the case. Dog kibbles are strewn all over the computer motherboard. We all kind of stood there for a moment, dumbfounded.
Eventually, I discovered the cause. My house was infested with mice, this I had known. But what I didn't know was that, in the middle of the night, mice will steal dog kibbles from the dog dish, and hide them in little places they can get to later. Apparently, they had been climbing in through the full-height floppy drives and storing the kibbles.
Interestingly, it never seemed to affect the computer!
Is nobody else capable to talk about the ability to point the EVIL "Windows Update" feature to YOUR OWN Windows Update server?? This short-circuits the "EVIL EMPIRE" from touching your computer, while instead giving you FULL CONTROL of what is deployed. And it does it in a very network-friendly "dribble" approach, rather than full-on 100 megabit draw from thousands of clients. It's effective and it works.
I disagree, but you're on the right track. If professional journalists were really into making money that much, they would no longer be journalists.
What journalists really care about is swaying public opinion. Forget objective reporting; forget "fair and balanced"; If you were in a journalist position, getting paid like you're a monkey at a typewriter, you're going to try to get your viewpoint as a slave to "the man" in there somehow. Do you think that, given their situation, those articles are going to reflect anything but left-wing democratic views? Hardly.
In early December, Gallup updated a question about the media that it began asking in 1985. Sixty-five percent said news organizations' stories and reports are often inaccurate, while 32 percent said they get their facts straight. Republicans were more likely than Democrats (74 to 54 percent) to say they are often inaccurate. Most polls show that majorities or pluralities believe the media are not biased toward one party or the other. But of those who see bias, more see a Democratic than a Republican slant.
Notice how the slashdot claim that they take money is encapsulated into quotes? It's a clever trick often used by reporters that are either lazy or want to slant the news.
The scheme goes something like this: find someone stupid enough to be quoted saying something that otherwise might land you in front of a judge. Then, you simply state, "But your honor, I was simply reporting what the dumbass said and he did, in fact, say that."
Of course you get the message across to the readership and can avoid doing any heavy lifting or going on uncomfortable fact-finding missions...
Top notch editors NEVER publish such quotes without getting the facts straight, even the ones that don't create liability situations. Moreover, these editors have a responsibility to follow up because of the chance that there's a juicier story in exactly such details.
Moral: Be wary of these tactics.
Spoken like a true anti-Microsoft, anti-Corporate, anti-establishment Slashdot bigot. So while you're out there making Slashdot readers an easy target, please tell us about how Microsoft is responsible for UnitedLinux, crying babies, flat tires and the Ebola virus.
You know you believe it.
Not exactly. A software company can assign the BSA to act as their legal agent in whatever capacity they'd like. Just because the software company itself isn't suing doesn't mean anything if the company has such an agreement with the BSA.
Think of the BSA as a collection agency.
Interesting article. I think it effectively shows that Brilliant Digital -- along with just about 95% of our industry -- needs to learn that they can't just shove software down people's throats. Most interesting to these companies should be the legal liability questions raised.
I'd expect these companies to start adding stuff into their installation legalese with something to the effect of, "You agree not to reverse-engineer anything we might be doing with your computer. You agree to sit back and relax while we adjust the horizontal and vertical"..
I'd like to tell you all the story of my grandfather (yeah, I know, images of the old vacation slides coming out). My grandfather was a successful businessman into his 40s. He was an executive with a firearms company (business was good at that time) and always into doing something productive.. not much different than most of us, I think. But when he turned 40 he lost his sight. As a computer professional, I can only imagine what this is like.. but anyway.. to make a long story short he retired and became a ham radio operator. Now you might ask yourself.. why in the world would a former executive who lost his sight become a ham radio operator? To join the ranks of the fat and bald?? Well, he did it first, because nobody would know he was blind. And second, because he found out he could help people! Every day in his retirement, like a job, he would check into the international radio networks. On these networks, you find serious people doing serious business with Ham Radio. Every so often he would come across someone in the world in dire medical need. In one case, it was a missionary station in Venezula who explained that they had a little boy who urgently needed medicine. In another, it was a fisherman in Honduras who had the benz and the local doctor needed medical advice. Yet another case -- one that touched my grandfathers heart -- was one where a little girl became blind after drinking antifreeze and no doctor was in the village. In each of these cases, my grandfather would patch in American doctors.. and in some cases arrange for the necessary medicine flown in by plane (often the local Miami doctors would supply the medicine free of charge). These are all real cases of how Amateur radio actually helped people. Yes, it's a hobby of lots of fat bald men, but it's also a key means of communication to areas of the world that don't yet have cell phones and wireless Internet. P.S. If you think everyone in Ham Radio is fat and Bald... here's a picture of my grandfather... god I miss him.. (he passed away about 10 years ago, god bless him). http://pw1.netcom.com/~jmulvey/wb4elx.jpg
But I also disagree with Slashdot's statement: "If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.
Do you really believe there is some kind of Human Violence Quotient that all humans must maintain? I hope not.
I think the real problem is that the entertainment industry is taking advantage of this lack of supervision to groom super-impulse-consumers.
Ask any parent if they think they're at war with the entertainment industry for the minds of their children -- they'll say YES!! The entertainment industry preys specifically upon people (and especially children) with low self-esteem and brainwashes them into becoming lifelong impulse shoppers.
The more low-self-esteem people out there, the better! One of the most common advertising messages out there is, "You didn't buy a Widget? Now everyone thinks you're weird!!" Unfortunately, many low-self-esteem people find violence and violent video games as a way to feel in control.
I am troubled by how I address the "so what" question.. It seems to me that the surrogate birth of another species is something that current technology views as species-centric.
Is science trying to find (or develop) a universal "DNA mother", into which can spawn offspring of any species? Can such a being or "thing" exist? And what kind of a world is opened up when we can create entire new species that are totally different than the surrogate cows and elephants we crudely use today?
Such a world would constrast starkly from the wonderful "spin" bringing back an extinct animal promises.
I personally can't imagine this technology will really be put to commercial use simply to bring back Bambi.
Do you really believe that producers of Intellectual Property must maintain such a level of gratitute to the public for not "petitioning congress" in such a way?? Do you really believe that the just renumeration of that gratitude must be unfettered use/access/reproduction of that Intellectual Property? That would be a scary precent indeed if it applied to material property. Better rethink hard on your suggestion, for it would shake the foundations of not just IP, but commerce in general. The Judicial branch would NEVER let Congress put such an unconstitutional idea into law!
Oh come on... Do you really want to record Digital TV to record the daily news for historical archives? If you believe that, then you also believe Napster was created for the express purpose of allowing anyone in the world to publish MP3 files by "consenting" bands. Hogwash. You want to record digital TV so you can get good movies at DVD quality for free! I'm all for upsetting the applecart if it needs to be upset, but let's make sure everyone involved understands what the leaders of this "copyright revolution" are trying to accomplish.. otherwise the "copyright revolution" is just as bad by using ideological deception to justify thievery.