There are a lot of posts above that deride the fellow for poor workmanship or whatever. Personally, I love how it looks in the context of his studio. Alongside a turntable, a reel-to-reel, and various sundry radios of days gone past, the less than perfect laptop connotes the good old days of computing when a guy could order a box of kit parts and put his own computing rig together transistor by transistor. It looks like the laptop has gone around the same block as the rest of his gear. I applaud his mise-en-scene.
Plus, he listens to Zappa. Can't fault the man for that.
I think his point is that it is better to implement no security policy than to come to depend on one that is fundementally flawed and discourages further investigation.
Most of the commentary I've read from him sounds pretty sane. He makes a point of pointing out misdirected security efforts that fail to secure real issues. Recognizing a mistake is a step toward finding a solution.
I can't complain about that; security is actually *really tough* to pull off.
It seems like there is a whole lot of potential for messing with VOIP spammers' minds, moreso than over a telephone or through email.
Push the incoming stream quietly into the background while you go on computing, no problem. Tie the spammer up as long as they'll let themselves get tied up. No skin off your nose.
For example, the VOIP software could have a set of control plugins that could be used to redirect the spammer's voice back at them (WILL YOU STOP REPEATING ME?), or direct your outgoing voice stream to a looping message about how you don't accept spam. If you get two spam calls at the same time, hook them to each other and let *them* figure it out. Do it a la JACK -- if you want a new plugin to hassle would-be telemarketers (put reverb on their voice as you pump it back, or cange the pitch maybe?), just write one up and plug it into your existing sound architecture.
I imagine doing this at a desktop, so maybe that why it seems so controllable to me. Especially with the Libre OS of Your Choice at the helm. Mobile VOIP devices might be tougher... or maybe not.
I did this with my 6GB Archos Recorder, like, two years ago. More capacity, cheaper, and it recorded.
Ha! Ha! Oh, Apple, you know I kid because I love you.
But seriously, I did. One ancient laptop, a floppy, a busted CD-ROM drive, and an image of a Gentoo liveCD loaded onto my Archos. I used a Red Hat recovery floppy for the USB drivers, then mounted the image as a loopback device from the MP3 player and chrooted to it. I felt like a badass pulling that one off.
I doubt mine was the first ref call on slashdot either, but there appears to be an emerging protocol for this kind of thing. Shall we start putting together a rulebook to reference?
And yet, I can't bring myself to believe that if the broadcast flag were to become a mandated reality, then studios would suddenly unleash the full potential of their creative entertainment genuis on us at last. "Now at last that piracy has been defeated, we can afford to put quality television on the air once more!" -- I doubt it.
It's in their best interests to present a facade of barely treading water all the time. That means that even if they get their way with the broadcast flag, some new evil will appear that they have to be seen to chase down.
I teach a class on literature with apocalyptic themes, so this is close to my heart...
CNN ran a story on magnatars a few weeks ago. Following the trend that you cite of having to endanger the Earth with the unknown at every possible journalistic opportunity, CNN conjectured the devistating consequences of a magnatar passing through our solar system.
The quoted result? "The exotic object would destroy the data on every credit card on the planet."
My current TV is also my first TV: a great, hulking monster in a solid oak case from 1979. My parents bought it when cable was the hot new thing, they gave it to me when I moved out in the mid '90s, and I expect to give it to my kids. It's like the cast iron pan heirloom of the electronics world.
It weighs a TON, too. I'd like to see some thief crack his back open trying to lift *my* television while we're on vacation...
Spot on question. I remember the first time I went to google after spending so much time on yahoo and altavista. I was BOGGLED. There were no flashy graphics, no blinkies, no columns, no nothing. I thought to myself that these guys couldn't be serious. It looked like it was handcoded in about 2 minutes from notepad.
Then, after using it, the wisdom of the Google overlords was revealed: simplicity. Build a search engine that finds what you want and doesn't bog the searcher down with irrelevant crap - not in the results, and not in the interface. It's clean.
The Google interface comes down to an easy exchange that goes like this: "Give me worthwhile links about this," rapidly followed by "Okay, here you go."
All the regurgitation about MSN's revamped look skirts the issue. Will it find what I'm looking for?
Slashdot Mirror
I see you're trying to pick up the white phone! Would you like to:
* Talk to somebody on the white phone?
* Listen to somebody on the white phone?
* Call somebody on the white phone?
There are a lot of posts above that deride the fellow for poor workmanship or whatever. Personally, I love how it looks in the context of his studio. Alongside a turntable, a reel-to-reel, and various sundry radios of days gone past, the less than perfect laptop connotes the good old days of computing when a guy could order a box of kit parts and put his own computing rig together transistor by transistor. It looks like the laptop has gone around the same block as the rest of his gear. I applaud his mise-en-scene.
Plus, he listens to Zappa. Can't fault the man for that.
I think his point is that it is better to implement no security policy than to come to depend on one that is fundementally flawed and discourages further investigation.
Most of the commentary I've read from him sounds pretty sane. He makes a point of pointing out misdirected security efforts that fail to secure real issues. Recognizing a mistake is a step toward finding a solution.
I can't complain about that; security is actually *really tough* to pull off.
A well-designed protocol with flexible user-defined safeguards will trump legislation any day in my book.
Lord knows that last thing I want is another bipartisan effort to ream me up one end and down the other. Because CAN-SPAM was so, you know, USEFUL.
It seems like there is a whole lot of potential for messing with VOIP spammers' minds, moreso than over a telephone or through email.
Push the incoming stream quietly into the background while you go on computing, no problem. Tie the spammer up as long as they'll let themselves get tied up. No skin off your nose.
For example, the VOIP software could have a set of control plugins that could be used to redirect the spammer's voice back at them (WILL YOU STOP REPEATING ME?), or direct your outgoing voice stream to a looping message about how you don't accept spam. If you get two spam calls at the same time, hook them to each other and let *them* figure it out. Do it a la JACK -- if you want a new plugin to hassle would-be telemarketers (put reverb on their voice as you pump it back, or cange the pitch maybe?), just write one up and plug it into your existing sound architecture.
I imagine doing this at a desktop, so maybe that why it seems so controllable to me. Especially with the Libre OS of Your Choice at the helm. Mobile VOIP devices might be tougher... or maybe not.
Don't forget that there's *Windows Media* of the event on the blogsite...
I did this with my 6GB Archos Recorder, like, two years ago. More capacity, cheaper, and it recorded.
Ha! Ha! Oh, Apple, you know I kid because I love you.
But seriously, I did. One ancient laptop, a floppy, a busted CD-ROM drive, and an image of a Gentoo liveCD loaded onto my Archos. I used a Red Hat recovery floppy for the USB drivers, then mounted the image as a loopback device from the MP3 player and chrooted to it. I felt like a badass pulling that one off.
Well... not unless you're SCO.
Stage #5: Realize that your adversary quotes this claptrap right into the ground too (boss level in warp zone)
Stage #6: MASS CONFUSION!
The best thing about Linux is that you have four or five unified clipboards to choose from!
(Written completely tongue-in-cheek)
When free stuff is banned, then only criminals will have free stuff.
IT STANDS TO REASON!
Now there will be an agency who can take up the awesome reposinibility of communicating to us the dangers of tsunamis from the moon!
Moon tsunami, I fear you no longer!
But on the other hand, I'm kind of getting sick of cover versions...
Like so?
I doubt mine was the first ref call on slashdot either, but there appears to be an emerging protocol for this kind of thing. Shall we start putting together a rulebook to reference?
And yet, I can't bring myself to believe that if the broadcast flag were to become a mandated reality, then studios would suddenly unleash the full potential of their creative entertainment genuis on us at last. "Now at last that piracy has been defeated, we can afford to put quality television on the air once more!" -- I doubt it.
It's in their best interests to present a facade of barely treading water all the time. That means that even if they get their way with the broadcast flag, some new evil will appear that they have to be seen to chase down.
The BF is a DODGE, guys.
I teach a class on literature with apocalyptic themes, so this is close to my heart...
CNN ran a story on magnatars a few weeks ago. Following the trend that you cite of having to endanger the Earth with the unknown at every possible journalistic opportunity, CNN conjectured the devistating consequences of a magnatar passing through our solar system.
The quoted result? "The exotic object would destroy the data on every credit card on the planet."
Tin foil: it's not just for heads any more.
My current TV is also my first TV: a great, hulking monster in a solid oak case from 1979. My parents bought it when cable was the hot new thing, they gave it to me when I moved out in the mid '90s, and I expect to give it to my kids. It's like the cast iron pan heirloom of the electronics world.
It weighs a TON, too. I'd like to see some thief crack his back open trying to lift *my* television while we're on vacation...
Will the inevitable re-post in the next three days tide you over?
What about the re-post with three new sentences, and Greedo shoots first this time?
Spot on question. I remember the first time I went to google after spending so much time on yahoo and altavista. I was BOGGLED. There were no flashy graphics, no blinkies, no columns, no nothing. I thought to myself that these guys couldn't be serious. It looked like it was handcoded in about 2 minutes from notepad.
Then, after using it, the wisdom of the Google overlords was revealed: simplicity. Build a search engine that finds what you want and doesn't bog the searcher down with irrelevant crap - not in the results, and not in the interface. It's clean.
The Google interface comes down to an easy exchange that goes like this: "Give me worthwhile links about this," rapidly followed by "Okay, here you go."
All the regurgitation about MSN's revamped look skirts the issue. Will it find what I'm looking for?
Destroy the Sontarans at every opportunity?
Ugh. I can't believe I just outed myself like that.
All it takes is a moment to fill out the Freedom of Information Act forms.
*rimshot*
It's already (probably) running DKN. You just can't observe it doing so.
And the ref rules:
"Failure to observe parent's 'Obligatory' header. Overreactive sensy-pants. Minus one karma, first post."
Or: Calm down, man. I think grandparent's tone was reasonable, but yours sure ain't.
Proving once again that it's not innovate gameplay we want; it's the pretty pictures.
Geez.
Actually, I'm quite happy to use XFCE without desktop icons; when I'm in a position to use Gnome, I go in and turn the icons off.
The only major thing I miss from fluxbox is its built-in tabbing of like windows. If XFCE had window tabbing, I would be in a singular WM nirvana.