By coincidence I was reading about how applications work on Android earlier this week and was quite impressed with the security model.
Application packages have to declare the permissions that they need and those permissions are then granted or denied at install time. So presumably an application should have to declare that it wants to be able to control roaming and the phone user can deny it the ability to do so.
I would want to know if Android supports defaults for permissions, so that permission for turning on roaming can be set to always denied.
Also, do the global phone settings always override requests from apps to change them ? For instance, at some time the user might want a app to manage roaming for them, but at another they might want to firmly turn roaming off.
The CO2 output does not make a net contribution to atmospheric CO2 because it was originally pulled from the atmosphere by the plants used to make the brewing ingredients.
I've long thought that patent reform should introduce a "use it or lose it" principle.
If a patent holder lets other companies establish use of the patented technology or intellectual property without contest the patent should be invalidated.
Similarly, if the patent holder does not create products that use the patent or license the patent to others, it should be invalidated also.
Why do it ? What benefit does it bring humanity - apart from furthering lunar geological science ?
As I understand it, funds have been taken away from NASA's earth observation projects and diverted to manned space flight, which means we will have less knowledge about the state of the earth and its climate and be in a worse position to combat climate change.
Financial security comes from auditing. Auditing requires records of who did what. Voting systems require anonymity, so auditing can't be done.
Bruce Schneier has an excellent short piece on this.
"Some have argued in favor of touch-screen voting systems, citing the millions of dollars that are handled every day by ATMs and other computerized financial systems. That argument ignores another vital characteristic of voting systems: anonymity. Computerized financial systems get most of their security from audit. If a problem is suspected, auditors can go back through the records of the system and figure out what happened. And if the problem turns out to be real, the transaction can be unwound and fixed. Because elections are anonymous, that kind of security just isn't possible."
"Boxes of automated voting cards that are required to work the electronic machines were mistakenly left behind in a Rockville warehouse in the run-up to Election Day, elections officials said."
That's a HUMAN error, not a machine or computer error. It could have been "Boxes of ballot papers were mistakenly left behind in a Rockville warehouse..."
I'm not sure there is a reliable way to differentiate between the patents on the ridiculously obvious and the truly novel and useful - it's kind of like obscenity, you know it when you see it but you can't define it.
I say lets make some changes that will allow Darwinian forces to operate on patents.
1) It should be easier to get a patent revoked on the grounds of prior art or not being novel or innovative. Third parties should be able to do this, by say, petitioning the Patent Office with evidence of prior art.
If patents are much more easily revoked - organization will not patent thing that are easily attacked.
2) A patent holder MUST either create a product or service that uses the patent OR license it to another organization or organizations to do the same within a short time, say a 6 months to a year. If they don't, they lose the patent. Furthermore, the patent would expire if the organization stopped producing the product or offering the service - with some allowances for times when the product of service is off the market while being redeveloped or licenses are being offered.
I.e., use it, or lose it.
That would get rid of companies that patent any old thing then wait for an infringer to come along for them to sue.
It should also get rid of worthless patents through market forces - if a company can't make a viable business out of it, not get anyone to take up a license - it was not worth patenting - or lets another organization that is better or smarter have a crack at it.
By co-incidence Bob Cringely taked about this idea last week in his column at the PBS site. He explains the differences between email and paper mail spam and why this idea would work.
Good point. Also, it seems to me that the lemon law is intended to provide protection for consumers when a product does not function in a way that the manufacturer says it does. With Open Source, the product can be fully described - by the source itself. The consumer has a way of seeing exactly what thay are getting.
Would the Washington Post get annoyed if I told a bunch of folks to look at an article at (for instance) column 1, page 3 section B, in the 4/19/2002 edition ?
Would an author sue me for making a reference to a particlar chapter or page of their book ?
A complete lack of EM shielding - yikes ! I wonder what that does to the disk error rate.
Shielding could have been easily added by lining the toolbox with aluminium foil and connecting it to the PS ground. Easy to do and adds only a small amount of extra weight.
Slashdot Mirror
By coincidence I was reading about how applications work on Android earlier this week and was quite impressed with the security model.
Application packages have to declare the permissions that they need and those permissions are then granted or denied at install time. So presumably an application should have to declare that it wants to be able to control roaming and the phone user can deny it the ability to do so.
I would want to know if Android supports defaults for permissions, so that permission for turning on roaming can be set to always denied.
Also, do the global phone settings always override requests from apps to change them ? For instance, at some time the user might want a app to manage roaming for them, but at another they might want to firmly turn roaming off.
The CO2 output does not make a net contribution to atmospheric CO2 because it was originally pulled from the atmosphere by the plants used to make the brewing ingredients.
I've long thought that patent reform should introduce a "use it or lose it" principle.
If a patent holder lets other companies establish use of the patented technology or intellectual property without contest the patent should be invalidated.
Similarly, if the patent holder does not create products that use the patent or license the patent to others, it should be invalidated also.
Why do it ? What benefit does it bring humanity - apart from furthering lunar geological science ?
As I understand it, funds have been taken away from NASA's earth observation projects and diverted to manned space flight, which means we will have less knowledge about the state of the earth and its climate and be in a worse position to combat climate change.
Indeed, What is the definition of a social networking site ?
Would Flickr be one ?
Would a Wiki set up as a hub for an online community count ?
Seems fair, I've been rejecting Wal-Mart for a long time now.
Financial security comes from auditing. Auditing requires records of who did what. Voting systems require anonymity, so auditing can't be done.
_ problem_wit.html
Bruce Schneier has an excellent short piece on this.
"Some have argued in favor of touch-screen voting systems, citing the millions of dollars that are handled every day by ATMs and other computerized financial systems. That argument ignores another vital characteristic of voting systems: anonymity. Computerized financial systems get most of their security from audit. If a problem is suspected, auditors can go back through the records of the system and figure out what happened. And if the problem turns out to be real, the transaction can be unwound and fixed. Because elections are anonymous, that kind of security just isn't possible."
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2004/11/the
"Boxes of automated voting cards that are required to work the electronic machines were mistakenly left behind in a Rockville warehouse in the run-up to Election Day, elections officials said."
That's a HUMAN error, not a machine or computer error. It could have been "Boxes of ballot papers were mistakenly left behind in a Rockville warehouse..."
I'm not sure there is a reliable way to differentiate between the patents on the ridiculously obvious and the truly novel and useful - it's kind of like obscenity, you know it when you see it but you can't define it.
I say lets make some changes that will allow Darwinian forces to operate on patents.
1) It should be easier to get a patent revoked on the grounds of prior art or not being novel or innovative. Third parties should be able to do this, by say, petitioning the Patent Office with evidence of prior art.
If patents are much more easily revoked - organization will not patent thing that are easily attacked.
2) A patent holder MUST either create a product or service that uses the patent OR license it to another organization or organizations to do the same within a short time, say a 6 months to a year. If they don't, they lose the patent. Furthermore, the patent would expire if the organization stopped producing the product or offering the service - with some allowances for times when the product of service is off the market while being redeveloped or licenses are being offered.
I.e., use it, or lose it.
That would get rid of companies that patent any old thing then wait for an infringer to come along for them to sue.
It should also get rid of worthless patents through market forces - if a company can't make a viable business out of it, not get anyone to take up a license - it was not worth patenting - or lets another organization that is better or smarter have a crack at it.
By co-incidence Bob Cringely taked about this idea last week in his column at the PBS site. He explains the differences between email and paper mail spam and why this idea would work.
Good point.
Also, it seems to me that the lemon law is intended to provide protection for consumers when a product does not function in a way that the manufacturer says it does. With Open Source, the product can be fully described - by the source itself. The consumer has a way of seeing exactly what thay are getting.
If us geeks are being forced to pay for NASA, we should get first rights to any alien technology they find !
Would the Washington Post get annoyed if I told a bunch of folks to look at an article at (for instance) column 1, page 3 section B, in the 4/19/2002 edition ?
Would an author sue me for making a reference to a particlar chapter or page of their book ?
I don't think so.
A complete lack of EM shielding - yikes ! I wonder what that does to the disk error rate.
Shielding could have been easily added by lining the toolbox with aluminium foil and connecting it to the PS ground. Easy to do and adds only a small amount of extra weight.