Stop with the kludges and force the developers along. 32 bit came with the 386 era and lasted a good while - a very good run indeed. 64 bit would last beyond our lifetimes anyway, I doubt we will even come close to the limits of addressable memory there (hopefully this isn't the new 640k comment) -- so there is no point in stalling it indefinitely.
They did. There have been 64-bit versions of Windows XP (with much less driver support than 32-bit XP) and 64-bit versions of Vista (with the same hardware support as 32-bit Vista, since MS won't logo certify anything for Vista that won't work on both versions). Problem solved, you just need to get people to use it.
If you're choosing between 32-bit and 64-bit Vista, the only reason I can see for NOT choosing 64-bit is if you need to run legacy 16-bit applications. On 32-bit Windows they use WOW (Windows on Windows, not World of Warcraft) to support 16-bit legacy code. On 64-bit Windows they use WOW to support 32-bit legacy code. Consequently there is no 16-bit support on 64-bit Windows. This did cause some problems when 64-bit XP first came out as some 32-bit applications were still using old 16-bit installers, and consequently wouldn't install.
It's now official, new machines have more RAM than my first computers had hard drive. I'm not sure how to use such power, though you can bet it will be with an open source OS.
Uh...I don't know when you started, but my first computer didn't have a hard drive. Or floppy drive. It had a cassette tape drive. Talk about slow...it had to search the entire tape sequentially to find a file that you wanted, there was no allocation table. And physical media failures were a real and constant worry.
I didn't have a hard disk until I got my 4th computer, and that one only had a 130MB drive. At the time I remember thinking, "There's no way I'll ever fill that up, and even if I do it's IDE so I can just add another drive!"
Depends on what you use. If you encrypt every file separately, yes. But encrypted containers, via on-the-fly-encryption (OTFE) like Truecrypt, Drivecrypt, PGPdisk, etc, are not at all a hassle. You create a container once, and mount it when you want to use it. There is no excuse for not using encryption. How many horribly injured people once thought that seatbelts were too much of a hassle?
There's a false logic there. Your chances of being in an auto accident are far greater than the chances that someone's going access unencrypted data on your hard disk in a way that hurts you, or at least the perception is that it is. Secondly, in the event of an auto accident you have a high liklihood of being seriously injured or killed if you're not wearing a seatbelt. If your confidential data is compromised then it is unlikely to result in your injury or death. It will undoubtedly result in inconvenience while you try to put your finances/legal defense in order, but those are abstract damages compared to dying in an auto accident. Finally, most people (and certainly anyone who rides in a car) knows about seatbelts, and seatbelts are ridiculously easy to use. Most computer users don't know about encryption, don't know how easy it can be to use, and even for those solutions that can be easy to use that you mentioned, it's still too complicated for the average computer user to understand and use.
You're right, you are just guessing there. Then taking that guess and jumping through some hoops, making some crazy-ass assumptions, and then trying to use all of that linguistic gymnastics to prove a point.
Your biggest assumption was that if he was getting the CP from the Internet then he would have a) known about encryption and b) used encryption. Even if "a" were true, that doesn't mean that "b" is true. One thing about encryption is that it can be a hassle. If you believe that your life or freedom depends on using encryption then you would definitely use it. But if you though it very unlikely that you would be caught (or just didn't think about the consequences because you were too busy getting your CP fix) then you might not bother with encryption, even if you knew about it. Of course, that's assuming that you even know about it and how to properly use it. Most criminals aren't all that bright. I could see some major distributors using encryption to try to hide, but average consumers of CP, probably not.
To the second point, if he had been making it himself or molesting neighborhood kids or whatever, you can bet that would have been mentioned in the article. The case has already been heard and appealed, so it would have been old news by now.
Finally, you're assuming that he's the one who put the porn there. It could have been a roommate, house guest, or even the previous owner of the computer (if there was one). It's entirely possible that his computer was compromised as part of a botnet and that someone else was using it to store illegal material (because if I'm dealing in something that could put me away for life, I'm going to stash it on someone's hacked computer where I can get to it) rather than on my own computer. Of course, I would assume that this would have been brought up in the defense argument, but lawyers aren't particularly technical and most people tend to shut their brains off when they hear the words "kiddie porn" or "protect the children," so who knows.
At any rate, as I said on another site about this case, the search was legal, the case should be heard in court, and the tech who was searching the hard disk should be fired for unethical behavior.
Once there are more drivers the 64 bit Vista may be a good option but the 32 bit version is a step backwards for Microsoft in my opinion. My opinion is coloured by having to deal with Vista installed on hardware that is completely inadequate - laptops with slow drives, low memory and sharing memory with graphics hardware that is not capable of handling the effects that got turned on by whoever does the installs.
There is no issue with Vista 64 bit drivers. In order for a product to be allowed to be advertised as Vista compatible (i.e., it gets that little Vista logo on the box) it has to have drivers for both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the OS. There is no such requirement for an XP-compatible device to have 64-bit drivers, and since 64-bit XP was released relatively late in the game as an OEM-only product there aren't a whole lot of 64-bit XP drivers from hardware vendors, with the exception of the top tier (ATI, nVidia, etc) or those who tend to sell into the workstation market.
For consumers, the legislation will mean that over the next dozen years auto companies will likely build more diesel-powered SUVs and gas-electric hybrid cars as well as vehicles that can run on 85 percent ethanol.
Since E85 actually gets worse mileage than regular gasoline, I doubt that this is true. E85's benefit is that it is made of primarily of renewable resources so it is more sustainable that gasoline.
First off, this isn't something that's coming in the future, it's something that McKesson has already done and has been doing for years. So I think it hardly counts as news.
Secondly, speaking as someone who has worked many years in hospital IT with a number of software vendors, INCLUDING McKesson, I can tell you that this has done very little to save money for hospitals. While it's true that running RedHat on commodity hardware is going to be less expensive than running AIX on an IBM P-Series, the single biggest expense is still the vendor's software, in this case McKesson. I know, I know, the article says:
Red Hat estimated that health care facilities that have switched have been able to save as much as 60% on IT costs compared with what they were spending before.
I'm pretty sure that they were talking about saving 60% on OS licensing and hardware purchasing costs, not overall savings.
We all make mistakes, but surgeons today should have enough skill to ensure that objects are not left in the body in the first place.
I agree that they should but mistakes do happen, even among the most highly skilled in any profession. It's one thing if the surgeon does nothing but knee replacements all day long. Those are relatively short (approx 1 hour) surgeries. Plus there's not really a body cavity to "lose" things in. But some cases can run 8-12 hours. At that point you have to worry about fatigue setting in for the surgeon and OR staff, and remembering how many of each item you used and where you used it can be a little more difficult.
I'm not saying it's OK for doctors to leave materials inside someone, but it sometimes happens. Most of the surgeons I've met have always been pretty diligent about getting the counts right. After all, it's their ass on the line if they forget one and you get infected.
Somehow I can't totally believe that. True, it will obviously remind them and stop them from leaving them accidentally, but what if the doctor just leaves? Does it lock the door?
In a lot of cases the surgeon doesn't even close. He has a resident do it for him. But yes, in theory you're not allowed to start a case without taking a timeout and verifying that you have the correct patient, correct procedure, and correct body part to operate on. Likewise, in theory you can't finish the case until all of the materials have been accounted for. In the old days people would simply count. Where I used to work we had an OR application that was used to track all of the relevant times. It kept track of when the patient was brought in the room, when the surgeon came into the room, when the first incision was made, close time, etc. It also handled billing for materials, so every time a sponge or some other material was used one of the OR techs would click to increment counter. When the case was done they could see how many of each item they needed to pull out of the patient, and the application would feed the data into the billing system and supplies ordering system too.
Radiohead also already benefited from the existing recording establishment... They were backed by a music distributor who made sure they got on the radio and MTV, that the right professionals were managing their tours, etc. Would people care about Radiohead's new album (in such a large quantity) if they weren't already established as a AAA band? I don't see people dumping millions on the quality bands I see locally who offer their stuff online.
True. But there are a number of other artists who got their first exposure solely from being available online. Gnarls Barkley is one that immediately springs to mind. And while it's true that your quality local band isn't making millions off of their music being available online, they also aren't making millions from the recording industry either. So there's a sense of appropriateness missing from that comparison. The biggest and best-known bands will make millions. The unknown bands may or may not make money, hopefully based on the quality of their music. If they make appealing music that becomes popular then the Internet has the potential to be a very low-cost distribution method that can get them national recognition without having to sell their souls to a record label.
I think the traditional companies can still provide a benefit in the internet age, but they're going to have to adapt (they could theoretically separate the wheat from the chaff and narrow down that huge selection to the 5,000 good ones for you) and they aren't going to have the margins they used to take anymore (so they'd better make sure they're getting you the wheat).
Wait...are you claiming that the recording industry is able to separate the good artists from the crap for us? Have you seen the crap that they release and call music? What the music industry releases and puts money behind promoting isn't the best music, it's the music that has been focus grouped, marketing-friendly and demographic tested to the point where they know that they can count on X amount of sales. If you want more Britney Spears and boy-band-a-likes then let the recording industry pick your artists for you. But I sure don't...
Gmail's spam detection rate is phenomenal. That being said, I haven't seen any decrease in spam to my Gmail accounts. I still only get one or two messages a month that make it through into my inbox, but if I check the "Spam" folder in Gmail (which I do empty regularly), I'm not seeing any decrease.
So, put yourself in the shoes of a CIO faced with replacing hundreds, or even thousends of PCs because they need to be upgraded to run Vista, and the difficulty of going to the board once again with a request for huge amounts of cash for very little gain, and then maybe Linux starts to look a little better.
That's ridiculous. CIOs don't go to the board to ask for money to upgrade an OS. If your company is big enough to have a board of directors and a CIO, then odds are you deploy new operating systems only with new hardware. Why? Because you'll be replacing the hardware on a regular cycle anyway, and throwing in an OS upgrade is even more disruptive. Not to mention that the new OS usually has higher system requirements, etc. Oh yes, and it's a hell of a lot cheaper.
For most large companies if they buy a PC that comes pre-installed with XP, that's what that machine will run for the rest of it's corporate life. When they are ready to switch to Vista, they'll start buying machines with Vista licenses.
That's funny. It's a fairly well-established fact that Gene Simmons has an amazing aversion to gambling. His rationale is that when it comes to business and money, he always wants to be on the winning team. With gambling, there's a chance you'll lose. Even "his" well-publicized $100,000 bet at the Kentucky Derby wasn't placed by him, it was allegedly done behind his back by his wife. But it's also entirely possible that it was done as a publicity stunt to stir up interest in him and his various projects (Family Jewels, the IRL, etc).
At any rate, it's fairly obvious that he doesn't know what he's talking about. And it is odd that someone who has made the overwhelming majority of his "music-industry" money from things other than album sales would take such a vehement stance against the newly emerging models for the music industry. But it's clear from the example he gave that he doesn't understand the market. He equates what Radiohead did with "Opening a store and saying 'Come on in and pay whatever you want,'" but his example is comparing brick and mortar stores (expensive to open and mainatain) with a web-based distribution service (much cheaper, much less overhead). The two business models (the one he expressed and the one that Radiohead tried) are completely different.
What might be more interesting would be his response upon finding out that Radiohead made at least as much money from their With Rainbows experiment than they have from traditional album releases, and that there's still a "special edition" CD to be released and sold yet. My guess (based on Gene's past behavior) is that he wouldn't care. He's very focused on making money at every opportunity, and I suspect that the notion of an unpaid download offends his sensibilities, even if the system is still generating more revenue for him than the traditional model.
Don't even get me started about his stupid comments like "Every little college kid, every freshly-scrubbed little kid's face should have been sued off the face of the earth." Nothing like trying to sue your customers out of existance. After all, it worked for SCO.
Profile Data: Move locations of all user folders and data to another location.
I don't know who vets/validates these lists, but the user profile location has been changing with almost every release of Windows since profiles were originally introduced. Why? First they were in "C:\winnt\documents and settings", then they were in "c:\documents and settings", now with Vista they're in "c:\users." Why is there a need to change this? What makes one location any better or sensible than the other? Why the fuck do they keep changing this?
This has been one of my biggest gripes about Windows for the past few iterations. Not about the user profiles specifically, but that in general Microsoft tends to shuffle around the user interface and other items just enough so that configuration options and resources are not managed from the same place in the UI that they had been in the previous version. It doesn't even make any sense why they keep rearranging it, they just do it. Sometimes I think that they do it so that they can list it as "one more difference/improvement" over the previous OS, because 99 times out of 100 there's no reason for it.
I love VMWare, but can't stand their parent corp (EMC) and can't wait for the Compaqification of the SAN market with the part of IBM played by EMC. Any company that forces their customers to buy $100 SATA drives for $900 deserves to die at the hands of commoditization.
If you think that EqualLogic's biggest advantage over EMC was in the hardware prices, you're only getting half the story. The FAR more interesting thing to me was that when you bought the iSCSI array it came with all of the software for snaps, replication, etc included in the purchase price, and it's as easy to install as a server. With EMC, you buy a similar capacity SAN for 1.5x-2x the price and then after that they hit you with $1800 in professional services for installation, then charge you $3000-$5000 for each additional piece of software functionality that you need.
Look at it from the cop's point of view, if this person is not cooperating then they have something to hide.
Except that obviously wasn't the case here. Asserting your legally protected rights is NEVER an admission of guilt. Unfortunately, uneducated toerags like yourself and the police officer in this case don't believe that's the case.
Surely Intel must have a bin full of quad core CPUs where one core failed QC. Whats to stop them selling those too?
Nope. Because Intel CPUs are true quad core, they're two dual core chips glued together in the same module. Since AMD's cores are all connected by a crossbar switch, all AMD has to do is cut off connects to the fourth core and there's no issue. But on Intel's side they would have to figure out how to mate a single core CPU with a dual core CPU in a single module and still have all of the cores treated equally. It's a lot harder to do that way.
akkarin noted a story about a new Service patch for XP. Dubbed SP2c, the new service patch contains no bug fixes or features. Instead, this exciting patch exists only to add new valid active product registration keys. Oops.
...when it comes to Windows. Seriously, I think that the editors (and most of the readers) here see something that sounds ridiculous and say, "Oh, it's for Windows. It must be true, no matter how silly it seems."
This is not a new service pack. This is not a patch. It is a new OEM release of Windows XP that includes a different activation keyspace because they were running out of activation keys. Current Windows users don't need to do or install anything. Future Windows users won't need to do or install anything. The only case where you might have to do something differently is if you have multiple copies lying around and try to use an old media kit with a new activation key, or vice versa. But assuming that you have a legal copy of Windows, you should have keys and media that match.
What is immoral about using a resource that is already installed? Especially if it means more income to the edu community. I understand that the original agreement said no commercial use, but suspect that might have been a demand of the big telcos.
In my mind, it's a case of them trying to compete with big telcos without having to make any investment in the infrastructure. But worse than that, they are using networks that we, the taxpayers, built for research organizations. If the money that was made from the opening of the networks went back to the state, or the research organizations who will now have to share the network, or even the taxpayers then I wouldn't have an issue with it. But that money is going into the pockets of private companies.
Care to cite some sources? It sounds kind of like you are describing OARnet, but they have not been 'strictly edu' for quite some time.
No, it's not OARnet, that's been around for ages. It's Ohio's "Third Frontier Network" that they're opening access to.
The group that has done the lobbying and is working on reselling it is called Whiteboard or Whiteboard Broadband. They are affiliated with a major law firm in Central Ohio which I believe has done a lot of the lobbying. They're not only talking about reselling it to businesses, but they are also pushing it to towns and small cities to encourage them to form their own ISPs and implement municipal wifi (anyone see the "Monorail" episode of the Simpsons?). Oh yes, and of course they provide all of the consulting and engineering that you would need for those services too.
What it really comes down to is they are taking a state resource that the taxpayers built expressly and specifically for the development of research organizations in the state, and then reselling access to it. So think of it like going from being Joe Scmhoe with no data network to having one of the largest and fastest high-speed data networks in the state without having to do any buildout at all, and then trying to use that network to compete with AT&T. Also while taking away resources from the research institutions that it was built for.
It's actually a corporate interests doing a land-grab on state owned resources.
Quite some time ago, the state of Ohio began building a new, high speed internetwork that was paid for by taxpayers. This network was supposed to be available only to research and nonprofit institutions like universities, non-profit hospitals, and so forth. This network had strict access standards, and getting your organization connected (unless you were someplace like Ohio State University) wasn't easy to do. Even companies like OCLC were not permitted to connect to the network. Commercial use of the network was strictly prohibited by charter. It was a good thing for encouraging research and collaboration between research institutions in the state of Ohio.
Not too long ago a few entrepreneurial types decided that if they could just tap into that high-speed network, they could circumvent the telcos and resell access to that network as a broadband data network. Except that doing so would be against the charter, and basically equate to corporate welfare. But they weren't discouraged, because the current governor was on his way out of office, and they spent lots of money on lobbyists who wound up taking roles as technology advisors to the campaigns for both of the major candidates for governor.
I know this because the for-profit hospital that I was employed by at the time was actually approached by this new company about buying access to this high-speed network. At the time we asked them how they planned to pull it off, because we knew that they couldn't legally resell this network access, even if they could get it. Their response was "the next governor will be receptive to our business ideas and change the rules." Since the election hadn't happened yet, we asked them if they knew something about the voting machines that we didn't, and their response was that they had basically convinced both of the two major candidates to see things their way. We were not impressed, not just because we thought that the whole deal was morally questionable but also because the people who approached our company about it came across as extremely sleazy. After meeting with us once about it (which got a very tepid response), they began using our hospital's name in marketing materials for the community that we were located in as if we had already signed on to the project (presumably to convince other businesses that it was a good idea).
So now it's finally happened. We have a new governor, and he's OK'd these new companies to take the high-speed research network away from the institutions that we, the taxpayers, built it for and handed it to businesses that just want to make a fast buck off of it. On one hand, I'm appalled that a state funded, maintained, and sponsored resource could be co-opted by corporate interests and taken from it's intended purpose. On the other hand, I know that our AT&T sales rep was very concerned about this effort, and usually anything that pisses in AT&T's coffee is a good thing. So do I oppose it because it's morally wrong, or do I support it because it could hurt AT&T?
I've been using the Logitech Trackman Marble ever since the first one came out. I tried it on a whim and found it much, much, much easier to use than a mouse. Precision-wise, it's as good as any mouse I've ever used. But as pointed out, you don't have to worry about wires getting in the way of movements, nor the surface that you're using. Yes, even optical and laser mice can behave poorly if they are used on certain surfaces. Plus the whole space issue...mine sites on my keyboard drawer next to the keyboard. There's no way a mouse could fit in there.
But most importantly, it's easy to set the trackball in a position that causes no stress/strain to the wrist or arm and maintain that position for hours. With a mouse you have to constantly move it, which causes the angles of flex in your wrist, elbow, and shoulder to change frequently. Eventually that can cause some strain, especially in the wrist.
I just read the entire article from The Australian, and it was only slightly less amusingly inaccurate than the WoW quote from Kevin Zuccato. Unfortunately the "amusingly inaccurate" has quickly turned into frightening. Doesn't it scare you that someone who is in a position of political power and responsibility in "the war on terror" is willing to put their name next to such a laughably inaccurate statement? Is he truly that stupid, or is he just too lazy to bother checking facts? For that matter, what about his staffers? Or the reporter who took the quote, or the editor who gave it the OK for publishing? I mean, we're only talking about the most popular online game in the world here, I'm sure that there must have been an intern somewhere who's played it.
Unfortunately, the lack of critical thinking didn't stop at the thought of sword-wielding orcs on gryphons attacking government buildings, the bits on Second Life weren't much better.
The arguments basically come down to two things:
1. They can launder money through Second Life.
2. They can create elaborate simulations of locations in Second Life with which to practice operations.
The problems with #2 are mostly obvious, i.e., you can't just whip up an accurate model of a government installation (or even a public location) without detailed information about that facility. That means lots of reconaissance, collation of data, etc. If you have all of the info needed to create a realistic simulation in Second Life, then you have all of the info needed to create a realistic simulation in any other environment/medium as well. The issue isn't Second Life, it's the recon data that the terrorists presumably would have. But the reality is that such data is hard to come by, at least in quantities sufficient to be truly useful. So we can just whip out the magical Internet box to fill in the blanks, and suddenly Second Life has gone from being a stupid waste of time to being a Terrorist Training Simulator (TM).
Argument #1 actually does hold some water. It would certainly be possible to use Second Life to transfer funds from individuals in one location to another, or to even launder funds. But anything of the sort would have to happen in a very limited fashion on a very limited scale. Transferring $20,000 via Second Life is bound to attract a lot of attention. Transferring smaller amounts of money would probably be more successful, but also a lot less useful. And frankly, I'm not seeing Second Life as being any easier or more likely to be used for money laundering/xfers than other services like PayPal. But you know, it's that magical Internet box again so critical thinking has to go out the window.
As to "three jihadi terrorists registered and two elite jihadist terrorist groups in Second Life", one has to wonder a little. What makes them elite jihadist groups as opposed to regular jihadist groups? Do they hog all the dungeon raids or something, or does it just make things sound scarier? And how to they know that there are three jihadi terrorists registered? Are they really jihadi terrorists who are trying to recruit for real-world damage? Or are they pimple-faced 14-year olds who just want to smash up bits of peoples' online virtual worlds and are role-playing terrorists as part of "the game"? After all, I doubt that the people playing as prostitutes in Second Life are actually really prostitutes. For that matter, I am confident that most of the "women" in Second Life are actually men, but I doubt that any significant portion of them are transvestites or transexuals.
If you need an "appreciation day" for whatever your job is, chances are very good your job really isn't that special. You don't see a "Surgeon Appreciation" day, do you?
That's right, you don't. But only because they get an entire week.
I don't know about the rest of the world, but here in the US there are all sorts of official days and weeks for various professions. Until recently I worked as a "sysadmin" at a small hospital. They celebrated just about every "professionals holiday" you can imagine. National doctor's week, nurse's week, pharmacy week, lab tech week, secretary's day (administrative professionals day if you want to be PC), and so on. On the respective days/weeks they would hang a big banner in the cafeteria, they'd send around trays of fresh-baked cookies to all of the departments, and usually they would have a little cake and ice cream party to celebrate it. I lobbied HR and hospital administration for three years to have them institute a recognition of International System's Administrator's day as an opportunity to "thank" their IT staff, but we never got it. Not even so much as a "thank you" email or a tray of cookies to our department.
Now that I re-read that, it probably sounds kind of bitter. I've got to say that I wouldn't have made a stink about it at all if they nobody else had their "holidays" celebrated. I mean, when it comes down to it I think it's a bit silly to celebrate a special day for a particular profession. But my previous employer was willing to go all out to celebrate just about any profession except those in IT, and it's hard to take that as anything other than a slap in the face. I could see them not knowing about it the first year, but after three years of asking about it they still wouldn't budge.
Slashdot Mirror
Stop with the kludges and force the developers along. 32 bit came with the 386 era and lasted a good while - a very good run indeed. 64 bit would last beyond our lifetimes anyway, I doubt we will even come close to the limits of addressable memory there (hopefully this isn't the new 640k comment) -- so there is no point in stalling it indefinitely.
They did. There have been 64-bit versions of Windows XP (with much less driver support than 32-bit XP) and 64-bit versions of Vista (with the same hardware support as 32-bit Vista, since MS won't logo certify anything for Vista that won't work on both versions). Problem solved, you just need to get people to use it.
If you're choosing between 32-bit and 64-bit Vista, the only reason I can see for NOT choosing 64-bit is if you need to run legacy 16-bit applications. On 32-bit Windows they use WOW (Windows on Windows, not World of Warcraft) to support 16-bit legacy code. On 64-bit Windows they use WOW to support 32-bit legacy code. Consequently there is no 16-bit support on 64-bit Windows. This did cause some problems when 64-bit XP first came out as some 32-bit applications were still using old 16-bit installers, and consequently wouldn't install.
It's now official, new machines have more RAM than my first computers had hard drive. I'm not sure how to use such power, though you can bet it will be with an open source OS.
Uh...I don't know when you started, but my first computer didn't have a hard drive. Or floppy drive. It had a cassette tape drive. Talk about slow...it had to search the entire tape sequentially to find a file that you wanted, there was no allocation table. And physical media failures were a real and constant worry.
I didn't have a hard disk until I got my 4th computer, and that one only had a 130MB drive. At the time I remember thinking, "There's no way I'll ever fill that up, and even if I do it's IDE so I can just add another drive!"
Depends on what you use. If you encrypt every file separately, yes. But encrypted containers, via on-the-fly-encryption (OTFE) like Truecrypt, Drivecrypt, PGPdisk, etc, are not at all a hassle. You create a container once, and mount it when you want to use it. There is no excuse for not using encryption. How many horribly injured people once thought that seatbelts were too much of a hassle?
There's a false logic there. Your chances of being in an auto accident are far greater than the chances that someone's going access unencrypted data on your hard disk in a way that hurts you, or at least the perception is that it is. Secondly, in the event of an auto accident you have a high liklihood of being seriously injured or killed if you're not wearing a seatbelt. If your confidential data is compromised then it is unlikely to result in your injury or death. It will undoubtedly result in inconvenience while you try to put your finances/legal defense in order, but those are abstract damages compared to dying in an auto accident. Finally, most people (and certainly anyone who rides in a car) knows about seatbelts, and seatbelts are ridiculously easy to use. Most computer users don't know about encryption, don't know how easy it can be to use, and even for those solutions that can be easy to use that you mentioned, it's still too complicated for the average computer user to understand and use.
You're right, you are just guessing there. Then taking that guess and jumping through some hoops, making some crazy-ass assumptions, and then trying to use all of that linguistic gymnastics to prove a point.
Your biggest assumption was that if he was getting the CP from the Internet then he would have a) known about encryption and b) used encryption. Even if "a" were true, that doesn't mean that "b" is true. One thing about encryption is that it can be a hassle. If you believe that your life or freedom depends on using encryption then you would definitely use it. But if you though it very unlikely that you would be caught (or just didn't think about the consequences because you were too busy getting your CP fix) then you might not bother with encryption, even if you knew about it. Of course, that's assuming that you even know about it and how to properly use it. Most criminals aren't all that bright. I could see some major distributors using encryption to try to hide, but average consumers of CP, probably not.
To the second point, if he had been making it himself or molesting neighborhood kids or whatever, you can bet that would have been mentioned in the article. The case has already been heard and appealed, so it would have been old news by now.
Finally, you're assuming that he's the one who put the porn there. It could have been a roommate, house guest, or even the previous owner of the computer (if there was one). It's entirely possible that his computer was compromised as part of a botnet and that someone else was using it to store illegal material (because if I'm dealing in something that could put me away for life, I'm going to stash it on someone's hacked computer where I can get to it) rather than on my own computer. Of course, I would assume that this would have been brought up in the defense argument, but lawyers aren't particularly technical and most people tend to shut their brains off when they hear the words "kiddie porn" or "protect the children," so who knows.
At any rate, as I said on another site about this case, the search was legal, the case should be heard in court, and the tech who was searching the hard disk should be fired for unethical behavior.
Once there are more drivers the 64 bit Vista may be a good option but the 32 bit version is a step backwards for Microsoft in my opinion. My opinion is coloured by having to deal with Vista installed on hardware that is completely inadequate - laptops with slow drives, low memory and sharing memory with graphics hardware that is not capable of handling the effects that got turned on by whoever does the installs.
There is no issue with Vista 64 bit drivers. In order for a product to be allowed to be advertised as Vista compatible (i.e., it gets that little Vista logo on the box) it has to have drivers for both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the OS. There is no such requirement for an XP-compatible device to have 64-bit drivers, and since 64-bit XP was released relatively late in the game as an OEM-only product there aren't a whole lot of 64-bit XP drivers from hardware vendors, with the exception of the top tier (ATI, nVidia, etc) or those who tend to sell into the workstation market.
For consumers, the legislation will mean that over the next dozen years auto companies will likely build more diesel-powered SUVs and gas-electric hybrid cars as well as vehicles that can run on 85 percent ethanol.
Since E85 actually gets worse mileage than regular gasoline, I doubt that this is true. E85's benefit is that it is made of primarily of renewable resources so it is more sustainable that gasoline.
First off, this isn't something that's coming in the future, it's something that McKesson has already done and has been doing for years. So I think it hardly counts as news.
Secondly, speaking as someone who has worked many years in hospital IT with a number of software vendors, INCLUDING McKesson, I can tell you that this has done very little to save money for hospitals. While it's true that running RedHat on commodity hardware is going to be less expensive than running AIX on an IBM P-Series, the single biggest expense is still the vendor's software, in this case McKesson. I know, I know, the article says:
Red Hat estimated that health care facilities that have switched have been able to save as much as 60% on IT costs compared with what they were spending before.
I'm pretty sure that they were talking about saving 60% on OS licensing and hardware purchasing costs, not overall savings.
It's not true! It's just that God has been intelligently re-designing us at a higher rate.
We all make mistakes, but surgeons today should have enough skill to ensure that objects are not left in the body in the first place.
I agree that they should but mistakes do happen, even among the most highly skilled in any profession. It's one thing if the surgeon does nothing but knee replacements all day long. Those are relatively short (approx 1 hour) surgeries. Plus there's not really a body cavity to "lose" things in. But some cases can run 8-12 hours. At that point you have to worry about fatigue setting in for the surgeon and OR staff, and remembering how many of each item you used and where you used it can be a little more difficult.
I'm not saying it's OK for doctors to leave materials inside someone, but it sometimes happens. Most of the surgeons I've met have always been pretty diligent about getting the counts right. After all, it's their ass on the line if they forget one and you get infected.
Somehow I can't totally believe that. True, it will obviously remind them and stop them from leaving them accidentally, but what if the doctor just leaves? Does it lock the door?
In a lot of cases the surgeon doesn't even close. He has a resident do it for him. But yes, in theory you're not allowed to start a case without taking a timeout and verifying that you have the correct patient, correct procedure, and correct body part to operate on. Likewise, in theory you can't finish the case until all of the materials have been accounted for. In the old days people would simply count. Where I used to work we had an OR application that was used to track all of the relevant times. It kept track of when the patient was brought in the room, when the surgeon came into the room, when the first incision was made, close time, etc. It also handled billing for materials, so every time a sponge or some other material was used one of the OR techs would click to increment counter. When the case was done they could see how many of each item they needed to pull out of the patient, and the application would feed the data into the billing system and supplies ordering system too.
Radiohead also already benefited from the existing recording establishment... They were backed by a music distributor who made sure they got on the radio and MTV, that the right professionals were managing their tours, etc. Would people care about Radiohead's new album (in such a large quantity) if they weren't already established as a AAA band? I don't see people dumping millions on the quality bands I see locally who offer their stuff online.
True. But there are a number of other artists who got their first exposure solely from being available online. Gnarls Barkley is one that immediately springs to mind. And while it's true that your quality local band isn't making millions off of their music being available online, they also aren't making millions from the recording industry either. So there's a sense of appropriateness missing from that comparison. The biggest and best-known bands will make millions. The unknown bands may or may not make money, hopefully based on the quality of their music. If they make appealing music that becomes popular then the Internet has the potential to be a very low-cost distribution method that can get them national recognition without having to sell their souls to a record label.
I think the traditional companies can still provide a benefit in the internet age, but they're going to have to adapt (they could theoretically separate the wheat from the chaff and narrow down that huge selection to the 5,000 good ones for you) and they aren't going to have the margins they used to take anymore (so they'd better make sure they're getting you the wheat).
Wait...are you claiming that the recording industry is able to separate the good artists from the crap for us? Have you seen the crap that they release and call music? What the music industry releases and puts money behind promoting isn't the best music, it's the music that has been focus grouped, marketing-friendly and demographic tested to the point where they know that they can count on X amount of sales. If you want more Britney Spears and boy-band-a-likes then let the recording industry pick your artists for you. But I sure don't...
Gmail's spam detection rate is phenomenal. That being said, I haven't seen any decrease in spam to my Gmail accounts. I still only get one or two messages a month that make it through into my inbox, but if I check the "Spam" folder in Gmail (which I do empty regularly), I'm not seeing any decrease.
So, put yourself in the shoes of a CIO faced with replacing hundreds, or even thousends of PCs because they need to be upgraded to run Vista, and the difficulty of going to the board once again with a request for huge amounts of cash for very little gain, and then maybe Linux starts to look a little better.
That's ridiculous. CIOs don't go to the board to ask for money to upgrade an OS. If your company is big enough to have a board of directors and a CIO, then odds are you deploy new operating systems only with new hardware. Why? Because you'll be replacing the hardware on a regular cycle anyway, and throwing in an OS upgrade is even more disruptive. Not to mention that the new OS usually has higher system requirements, etc. Oh yes, and it's a hell of a lot cheaper.
For most large companies if they buy a PC that comes pre-installed with XP, that's what that machine will run for the rest of it's corporate life. When they are ready to switch to Vista, they'll start buying machines with Vista licenses.
That's funny. It's a fairly well-established fact that Gene Simmons has an amazing aversion to gambling. His rationale is that when it comes to business and money, he always wants to be on the winning team. With gambling, there's a chance you'll lose. Even "his" well-publicized $100,000 bet at the Kentucky Derby wasn't placed by him, it was allegedly done behind his back by his wife. But it's also entirely possible that it was done as a publicity stunt to stir up interest in him and his various projects (Family Jewels, the IRL, etc).
At any rate, it's fairly obvious that he doesn't know what he's talking about. And it is odd that someone who has made the overwhelming majority of his "music-industry" money from things other than album sales would take such a vehement stance against the newly emerging models for the music industry. But it's clear from the example he gave that he doesn't understand the market. He equates what Radiohead did with "Opening a store and saying 'Come on in and pay whatever you want,'" but his example is comparing brick and mortar stores (expensive to open and mainatain) with a web-based distribution service (much cheaper, much less overhead). The two business models (the one he expressed and the one that Radiohead tried) are completely different.
What might be more interesting would be his response upon finding out that Radiohead made at least as much money from their With Rainbows experiment than they have from traditional album releases, and that there's still a "special edition" CD to be released and sold yet. My guess (based on Gene's past behavior) is that he wouldn't care. He's very focused on making money at every opportunity, and I suspect that the notion of an unpaid download offends his sensibilities, even if the system is still generating more revenue for him than the traditional model.
Don't even get me started about his stupid comments like "Every little college kid, every freshly-scrubbed little kid's face should have been sued off the face of the earth." Nothing like trying to sue your customers out of existance. After all, it worked for SCO.
Here's one that irks me:
Profile Data: Move locations of all user folders and data to another location.
I don't know who vets/validates these lists, but the user profile location has been changing with almost every release of Windows since profiles were originally introduced. Why? First they were in "C:\winnt\documents and settings", then they were in "c:\documents and settings", now with Vista they're in "c:\users." Why is there a need to change this? What makes one location any better or sensible than the other? Why the fuck do they keep changing this?
This has been one of my biggest gripes about Windows for the past few iterations. Not about the user profiles specifically, but that in general Microsoft tends to shuffle around the user interface and other items just enough so that configuration options and resources are not managed from the same place in the UI that they had been in the previous version. It doesn't even make any sense why they keep rearranging it, they just do it. Sometimes I think that they do it so that they can list it as "one more difference/improvement" over the previous OS, because 99 times out of 100 there's no reason for it.
I love VMWare, but can't stand their parent corp (EMC) and can't wait for the Compaqification of the SAN market with the part of IBM played by EMC. Any company that forces their customers to buy $100 SATA drives for $900 deserves to die at the hands of commoditization.
If you think that EqualLogic's biggest advantage over EMC was in the hardware prices, you're only getting half the story. The FAR more interesting thing to me was that when you bought the iSCSI array it came with all of the software for snaps, replication, etc included in the purchase price, and it's as easy to install as a server. With EMC, you buy a similar capacity SAN for 1.5x-2x the price and then after that they hit you with $1800 in professional services for installation, then charge you $3000-$5000 for each additional piece of software functionality that you need.
Look at it from the cop's point of view, if this person is not cooperating then they have something to hide.
Except that obviously wasn't the case here. Asserting your legally protected rights is NEVER an admission of guilt. Unfortunately, uneducated toerags like yourself and the police officer in this case don't believe that's the case.
Surely Intel must have a bin full of quad core CPUs where one core failed QC. Whats to stop them selling those too?
Nope. Because Intel CPUs are true quad core, they're two dual core chips glued together in the same module. Since AMD's cores are all connected by a crossbar switch, all AMD has to do is cut off connects to the fourth core and there's no issue. But on Intel's side they would have to figure out how to mate a single core CPU with a dual core CPU in a single module and still have all of the cores treated equally. It's a lot harder to do that way.
akkarin noted a story about a new Service patch for XP. Dubbed SP2c, the new service patch contains no bug fixes or features. Instead, this exciting patch exists only to add new valid active product registration keys. Oops.
...when it comes to Windows. Seriously, I think that the editors (and most of the readers) here see something that sounds ridiculous and say, "Oh, it's for Windows. It must be true, no matter how silly it seems."
This is not a new service pack. This is not a patch. It is a new OEM release of Windows XP that includes a different activation keyspace because they were running out of activation keys. Current Windows users don't need to do or install anything. Future Windows users won't need to do or install anything. The only case where you might have to do something differently is if you have multiple copies lying around and try to use an old media kit with a new activation key, or vice versa. But assuming that you have a legal copy of Windows, you should have keys and media that match.
What is immoral about using a resource that is already installed? Especially if it means more income to the edu community. I understand that the original agreement said no commercial use, but suspect that might have been a demand of the big telcos.
In my mind, it's a case of them trying to compete with big telcos without having to make any investment in the infrastructure. But worse than that, they are using networks that we, the taxpayers, built for research organizations. If the money that was made from the opening of the networks went back to the state, or the research organizations who will now have to share the network, or even the taxpayers then I wouldn't have an issue with it. But that money is going into the pockets of private companies.
Care to cite some sources? It sounds kind of like you are describing OARnet, but they have not been 'strictly edu' for quite some time.
No, it's not OARnet, that's been around for ages. It's Ohio's "Third Frontier Network" that they're opening access to.
The group that has done the lobbying and is working on reselling it is called Whiteboard or Whiteboard Broadband. They are affiliated with a major law firm in Central Ohio which I believe has done a lot of the lobbying. They're not only talking about reselling it to businesses, but they are also pushing it to towns and small cities to encourage them to form their own ISPs and implement municipal wifi (anyone see the "Monorail" episode of the Simpsons?). Oh yes, and of course they provide all of the consulting and engineering that you would need for those services too.
What it really comes down to is they are taking a state resource that the taxpayers built expressly and specifically for the development of research organizations in the state, and then reselling access to it. So think of it like going from being Joe Scmhoe with no data network to having one of the largest and fastest high-speed data networks in the state without having to do any buildout at all, and then trying to use that network to compete with AT&T. Also while taking away resources from the research institutions that it was built for.
It's actually a corporate interests doing a land-grab on state owned resources.
Quite some time ago, the state of Ohio began building a new, high speed internetwork that was paid for by taxpayers. This network was supposed to be available only to research and nonprofit institutions like universities, non-profit hospitals, and so forth. This network had strict access standards, and getting your organization connected (unless you were someplace like Ohio State University) wasn't easy to do. Even companies like OCLC were not permitted to connect to the network. Commercial use of the network was strictly prohibited by charter. It was a good thing for encouraging research and collaboration between research institutions in the state of Ohio.
Not too long ago a few entrepreneurial types decided that if they could just tap into that high-speed network, they could circumvent the telcos and resell access to that network as a broadband data network. Except that doing so would be against the charter, and basically equate to corporate welfare. But they weren't discouraged, because the current governor was on his way out of office, and they spent lots of money on lobbyists who wound up taking roles as technology advisors to the campaigns for both of the major candidates for governor.
I know this because the for-profit hospital that I was employed by at the time was actually approached by this new company about buying access to this high-speed network. At the time we asked them how they planned to pull it off, because we knew that they couldn't legally resell this network access, even if they could get it. Their response was "the next governor will be receptive to our business ideas and change the rules." Since the election hadn't happened yet, we asked them if they knew something about the voting machines that we didn't, and their response was that they had basically convinced both of the two major candidates to see things their way. We were not impressed, not just because we thought that the whole deal was morally questionable but also because the people who approached our company about it came across as extremely sleazy. After meeting with us once about it (which got a very tepid response), they began using our hospital's name in marketing materials for the community that we were located in as if we had already signed on to the project (presumably to convince other businesses that it was a good idea).
So now it's finally happened. We have a new governor, and he's OK'd these new companies to take the high-speed research network away from the institutions that we, the taxpayers, built it for and handed it to businesses that just want to make a fast buck off of it. On one hand, I'm appalled that a state funded, maintained, and sponsored resource could be co-opted by corporate interests and taken from it's intended purpose. On the other hand, I know that our AT&T sales rep was very concerned about this effort, and usually anything that pisses in AT&T's coffee is a good thing. So do I oppose it because it's morally wrong, or do I support it because it could hurt AT&T?
Me too, except for the pretard part.
I've been using the Logitech Trackman Marble ever since the first one came out. I tried it on a whim and found it much, much, much easier to use than a mouse. Precision-wise, it's as good as any mouse I've ever used. But as pointed out, you don't have to worry about wires getting in the way of movements, nor the surface that you're using. Yes, even optical and laser mice can behave poorly if they are used on certain surfaces. Plus the whole space issue...mine sites on my keyboard drawer next to the keyboard. There's no way a mouse could fit in there.
But most importantly, it's easy to set the trackball in a position that causes no stress/strain to the wrist or arm and maintain that position for hours. With a mouse you have to constantly move it, which causes the angles of flex in your wrist, elbow, and shoulder to change frequently. Eventually that can cause some strain, especially in the wrist.
I just read the entire article from The Australian, and it was only slightly less amusingly inaccurate than the WoW quote from Kevin Zuccato. Unfortunately the "amusingly inaccurate" has quickly turned into frightening. Doesn't it scare you that someone who is in a position of political power and responsibility in "the war on terror" is willing to put their name next to such a laughably inaccurate statement? Is he truly that stupid, or is he just too lazy to bother checking facts? For that matter, what about his staffers? Or the reporter who took the quote, or the editor who gave it the OK for publishing? I mean, we're only talking about the most popular online game in the world here, I'm sure that there must have been an intern somewhere who's played it.
Unfortunately, the lack of critical thinking didn't stop at the thought of sword-wielding orcs on gryphons attacking government buildings, the bits on Second Life weren't much better.
The arguments basically come down to two things:
1. They can launder money through Second Life.
2. They can create elaborate simulations of locations in Second Life with which to practice operations.
The problems with #2 are mostly obvious, i.e., you can't just whip up an accurate model of a government installation (or even a public location) without detailed information about that facility. That means lots of reconaissance, collation of data, etc. If you have all of the info needed to create a realistic simulation in Second Life, then you have all of the info needed to create a realistic simulation in any other environment/medium as well. The issue isn't Second Life, it's the recon data that the terrorists presumably would have. But the reality is that such data is hard to come by, at least in quantities sufficient to be truly useful. So we can just whip out the magical Internet box to fill in the blanks, and suddenly Second Life has gone from being a stupid waste of time to being a Terrorist Training Simulator (TM).
Argument #1 actually does hold some water. It would certainly be possible to use Second Life to transfer funds from individuals in one location to another, or to even launder funds. But anything of the sort would have to happen in a very limited fashion on a very limited scale. Transferring $20,000 via Second Life is bound to attract a lot of attention. Transferring smaller amounts of money would probably be more successful, but also a lot less useful. And frankly, I'm not seeing Second Life as being any easier or more likely to be used for money laundering/xfers than other services like PayPal. But you know, it's that magical Internet box again so critical thinking has to go out the window.
As to "three jihadi terrorists registered and two elite jihadist terrorist groups in Second Life", one has to wonder a little. What makes them elite jihadist groups as opposed to regular jihadist groups? Do they hog all the dungeon raids or something, or does it just make things sound scarier? And how to they know that there are three jihadi terrorists registered? Are they really jihadi terrorists who are trying to recruit for real-world damage? Or are they pimple-faced 14-year olds who just want to smash up bits of peoples' online virtual worlds and are role-playing terrorists as part of "the game"? After all, I doubt that the people playing as prostitutes in Second Life are actually really prostitutes. For that matter, I am confident that most of the "women" in Second Life are actually men, but I doubt that any significant portion of them are transvestites or transexuals.
If you need an "appreciation day" for whatever your job is, chances are very good your job really isn't that special. You don't see a "Surgeon Appreciation" day, do you?
That's right, you don't. But only because they get an entire week.
I don't know about the rest of the world, but here in the US there are all sorts of official days and weeks for various professions. Until recently I worked as a "sysadmin" at a small hospital. They celebrated just about every "professionals holiday" you can imagine. National doctor's week, nurse's week, pharmacy week, lab tech week, secretary's day (administrative professionals day if you want to be PC), and so on. On the respective days/weeks they would hang a big banner in the cafeteria, they'd send around trays of fresh-baked cookies to all of the departments, and usually they would have a little cake and ice cream party to celebrate it. I lobbied HR and hospital administration for three years to have them institute a recognition of International System's Administrator's day as an opportunity to "thank" their IT staff, but we never got it. Not even so much as a "thank you" email or a tray of cookies to our department.
Now that I re-read that, it probably sounds kind of bitter. I've got to say that I wouldn't have made a stink about it at all if they nobody else had their "holidays" celebrated. I mean, when it comes down to it I think it's a bit silly to celebrate a special day for a particular profession. But my previous employer was willing to go all out to celebrate just about any profession except those in IT, and it's hard to take that as anything other than a slap in the face. I could see them not knowing about it the first year, but after three years of asking about it they still wouldn't budge.
So yeah, now I celebrate it every year.