The inverse-square law isn't necessarily relevant for all cell phones. At large distances, sure, it'll behave as a point source. When you're using your phone, however, and you've got the antenna extended, it's more like a line-source up close to your head (in an arm-waving way, if you're closer to the antenna than the antenna is long, you'll probably feel line-like effects). And, as all good geeks know, line-source effects decrease *linearly*.
If you're an optics geek, you could crunch the numbers and give yourself a better idea of the nature of the source at close distances... Of course the "real" answer is going to be something between squared and linear.
Baloney. We've had nothing but good things from
VA-Linux. My company has purchased 30 Full-On
servers in the last year. We've had great
support, great service, and great results from
some solid machines. They've been as reliable as
our Sun machines, at a fraction of the cost.
That's why they get my business -- when I buy a
product, I want it to perform. That's it. This is business, not a popularity contest.
In addition, the -vast- majority of the world does not live as we do.
To a first-order approximation, nobody on earth has ever: seen the internet, been vaccinated, visited a doctor, etc. Sure, we slap glasses on those with bad eyes (like me) but if you're born in rural India or Africa, you'll never see them, let alone get some yourself.
Strict biological evolution won't be driven by us, it will be driven by them. The Africans are facing a gigantic AIDS crisis -- guess where the seeds of adaptation to AIDS are being sown? In addition, true evoltion isn't always as simple as Darwinian natural selection. A lot of it has to do with pure random chance. Sure, mammals took over from dinosaurs, but what if the earth hadn't been hit by a big bloody rock?
I find a few things are important in choosing an algorithm. From a math point of view, the optimal solution is NOT to go with the latest-and-greatest algorithm. Serpent, Twofish, and other new algorithms might be all fancy and wonderful, but they simply do not have the history behind them. They don't have years of continual battering that others do. 3DES, for example, has been around for ages. It has been beaten to death by cryptanalysts the world over, and it's still holding up very well. THIS is what makes someone confident in their selection of crypto algorithm. Sure, 3DES may not have a bazillion bits, but there are most likely no bone-headed mistakes in it. Serpent and Twofish probably don't have any either, but there just isn't the history there to say for sure. Encryption algorithms are like wine... Over time, some sour, and some develop into mature, robust, beautiful works of art. In this light, Blowfish becomes attractive. Its advantage over Twofish et al. is age. Its advantage over 3DES is its freedom. This is part of the reason why Blowfish is ubiquitous in the real world.
So, if I understand correctly, the flap is about the GPL seemingly allowing someone to grab the source code for something, making their own version, and keeping all their work secret just so long as they don't try to distribute it publicly.
So what? Am I the only person who thinks that there isn't anything wrong with this? Heck, even RMS thinks its legit, if unethical. (http://lists.tunes.org/list/cybernethics/0001/msg 00002.html)
It can never be used to subvert a program, since if you don't distribute it, then it's contained internally. They can't sell it, heck they can't even give it away unless they provide code. But why should they be banned from using changes internally that they've made without telling anyone about them? And how would anyone know about it anyways?
This, to me, would be absolutely absurd. Where does it end? Ok, say you're working on a new addition to the linux kernel. Do you have to provide constant 24hr public ftp access to your personal source directories so people can see the new, improved source code as-it-happens? Do you have to allow people to see your changes the second they're made? Or does it suffice to upload the changes to a public CVS once a day? Once a week? Once a month? Once a year? Once you've done your own testing? Once you've done alpha testing? Once you've done beta testing? (remember the Corel beta-testers snafu?) Where does it end?!
I say the only realistic way is to enforce *public* distributions to be full disclosure, with source etc. To force full disclosure of internal, non-public things is an invasion of privacy by definition. If some legal precedant says that this is the way the GPL should be interpreted, you can bet I'm going to drop the GPL as fast as humanly possible (including re-releasing all my originally-GPL'd software under a non-GPL license).
No, it's not arrogance, it's the truth. Nobody's constitutional rights *were* stomped on. That does not, however, imply that all is happy and good in the world of the web. This is not a happy story, but, unfortunately, the constitution will not help this person in this case.
And I happen to think that finding a medium that you can control *is* good advice. You seem to think there's a way to "take back the web". I'm suggesting that it may be very difficult to "control" the web. Can you "control" television? No. How about radio? No. Can you ever take them back? Maybe, with megabucks, you could. So how about print? Yes, I'd say so, because the cost of entry is practically nil. Scrawl with crayons on old newspapers if you must, but there's a medium you can control. I say we've lost the web as a medium we can control. The idea that any average Joe can immediately publish on the web is false one -- Joe relies on the cooperation of the ISPs/Universities/companies that give him his bandwidth. Joe does *not* have a right to bandwidth, unfortunately.
This means that Joe cannot control the internet, or even a part of it. Joe cannot truly have free speech on line -- not yet, anyhow. Joe won't until he has guaranteed bandwidth that cannot be taken away.
You'll notice I said "ask nicely". I said that for a reason...
Harassment? No, that wouldn't be legal. Of course, there's a fine line between "discussion" and "harassment". Also, don't forget that we're only reading from one source -- and this source is definitely not going to be impartial. They're obviously going to portray the FBI in the most sinister, evil tones possible. Otherwise there wouldn't be much of a story, would there? And besides, what are the ISPs going to tell the public? Of -course- they're going to say that the FBI forced them to do it. How else could they save face? "Oh, we just figgered it wasn't, um, like nice and stuff." Yeah, the public would love that. They said what they had to, and the article played it to the hilt, as expected.
In reality, nobody knows what really happened except those that directly participated. And, in reality, this kind of thing can happen every single day, and there isn't a thing we can do about it. *this* was the point of my post: As long as you're relying on someone else, as long as you're paying -them- for a service, then you are subject to their whims, and play the "free speech" game on their terms.
Yes, this is a terrifying thing, and I don't know how to fix it. In any case, this isn't exactly a constitutional offence, however. It's a symptom of a very serious danger to our way of life all the same.
One must remember something extremely important: free speech is protected.... HOWEVER.... Nothing says that anyone else must support your message with their resources. For example, you have the right to publish and distribute your own magazine, but you do NOT have the right to demand that an arbitrary magazine publishes your essays.
Similarly, the FBI (or anyone else) does not have to get any sort of legal document to tell an ISP to wipe out your web site. All they have to do is ask nicely, and get the ISP to agree that they shouldn't be supporting this. Then, subject to the agreement that you have with your ISP (which almost ALWAYS protect the ISP, and practically never gives you any say in anything at all), your pages get trashed. End of story. Nobody's constitutional rights were stomped on at all.
So what's the moral of the story? Find yourself a medium that you control, don't depend on renting space from other companies. How you do that is up to you.
So you called them up, faxed the stuff in, and they didn't have any problem with it? Yowza. That's super-good news. Can anyone else corroborate this tidbit?
Er... wait... what time is it in Germany right now?:) Maybe I'll give them a call. Shoot, and I would have missed your post if I hadn't read the Score:0 posts on a whim...:)
Are Canadians shut out? I got "the letter" but it seems that, being a Canadian citizen, I'll be ineligible. That sucks.:) Please tell me I've missed something obvious...
On the possibly-hopeful side, I'll have a working visa (H-1b or something like that?) by early January, and I'll be in San Francisco at my new job. Does this mean anything? I'd love to get in on this, but I'm afraid I may not be able to. *sigh*
To heck with asking them to distribute a reminder... HR comes to me and says "Scan everything in email for porn." I say, "sure thing, it'll take me a couple of days to get things set up, and then I'll send the results to you". They'll be happy with that reply.
Then the first thing I'd do is email the entire company and tell each and every person the corporate policy on email/porn/etc. I'd also mention offhandedly that "At the request of HR, Computing Services will be conducting a thorough search of all email for porn and other forbidden materials commencing in two days. Any comments or questions may be directed to [insert HR moron's name here]"
After seeing this, all porn will be deleted, and nobody will be surprised by this action. HR might be a little pissed off, but there's nothing they can do about it (I followed orders). If they get mad at me, they end up looking like witchhunters, trying to ambush people. I'd call this the least of the evils.
Slashdot Mirror
If you're an optics geek, you could crunch the numbers and give yourself a better idea of the nature of the source at close distances... Of course the "real" answer is going to be something between squared and linear.
VA-Linux. My company has purchased 30 Full-On
servers in the last year. We've had great
support, great service, and great results from
some solid machines. They've been as reliable as
our Sun machines, at a fraction of the cost.
That's why they get my business -- when I buy a
product, I want it to perform. That's it. This is business, not a popularity contest.
In addition, the -vast- majority of the world does not live as we do.
To a first-order approximation, nobody on earth has ever: seen the internet, been vaccinated, visited a doctor, etc. Sure, we slap glasses on those with bad eyes (like me) but if you're born in rural India or Africa, you'll never see them, let alone get some yourself.
Strict biological evolution won't be driven by us, it will be driven by them. The Africans are facing a gigantic AIDS crisis -- guess where the seeds of adaptation to AIDS are being sown? In addition, true evoltion isn't always as simple as Darwinian natural selection. A lot of it has to do with pure random chance. Sure, mammals took over from dinosaurs, but what if the earth hadn't been hit by a big bloody rock?
I find a few things are important in choosing an algorithm. From a math point of view, the optimal solution is NOT to go with the latest-and-greatest algorithm. Serpent, Twofish, and other new algorithms might be all fancy and wonderful, but they simply do not have the history behind them. They don't have years of continual battering that others do. 3DES, for example, has been around for ages. It has been beaten to death by cryptanalysts the world over, and it's still holding up very well. THIS is what makes someone confident in their selection of crypto algorithm. Sure, 3DES may not have a bazillion bits, but there are most likely no bone-headed mistakes in it. Serpent and Twofish probably don't have any either, but there just isn't the history there to say for sure. Encryption algorithms are like wine... Over time, some sour, and some develop into mature, robust, beautiful works of art. In this light, Blowfish becomes attractive. Its advantage over Twofish et al. is age. Its advantage over 3DES is its freedom. This is part of the reason why Blowfish is ubiquitous in the real world.
So, if I understand correctly, the flap is about the GPL seemingly allowing someone to grab the source code for something, making their own version, and keeping all their work secret just so long as they don't try to distribute it publicly.
g 00002.html)
So what? Am I the only person who thinks that there isn't anything wrong with this? Heck, even RMS thinks its legit, if unethical. (http://lists.tunes.org/list/cybernethics/0001/ms
It can never be used to subvert a program, since if you don't distribute it, then it's contained internally. They can't sell it, heck they can't even give it away unless they provide code. But why should they be banned from using changes internally that they've made without telling anyone about them? And how would anyone know about it anyways?
This, to me, would be absolutely absurd. Where does it end? Ok, say you're working on a new addition to the linux kernel. Do you have to provide constant 24hr public ftp access to your personal source directories so people can see the new, improved source code as-it-happens? Do you have to allow people to see your changes the second they're made? Or does it suffice to upload the changes to a public CVS once a day? Once a week? Once a month? Once a year? Once you've done your own testing? Once you've done alpha testing? Once you've done beta testing? (remember the Corel beta-testers snafu?) Where does it end?!
I say the only realistic way is to enforce *public* distributions to be full disclosure, with source etc. To force full disclosure of internal, non-public things is an invasion of privacy by definition. If some legal precedant says that this is the way the GPL should be interpreted, you can bet I'm going to drop the GPL as fast as humanly possible (including re-releasing all my originally-GPL'd software under a non-GPL license).
No, it's not arrogance, it's the truth. Nobody's constitutional rights *were* stomped on. That does not, however, imply that all is happy and good in the world of the web. This is not a happy story, but, unfortunately, the constitution will not help this person in this case.
And I happen to think that finding a medium that you can control *is* good advice. You seem to think there's a way to "take back the web". I'm suggesting that it may be very difficult to "control" the web. Can you "control" television? No. How about radio? No. Can you ever take them back? Maybe, with megabucks, you could. So how about print? Yes, I'd say so, because the cost of entry is practically nil. Scrawl with crayons on old newspapers if you must, but there's a medium you can control. I say we've lost the web as a medium we can control. The idea that any average Joe can immediately publish on the web is false one -- Joe relies on the cooperation of the ISPs/Universities/companies that give him his bandwidth. Joe does *not* have a right to bandwidth, unfortunately.
This means that Joe cannot control the internet, or even a part of it. Joe cannot truly have free speech on line -- not yet, anyhow. Joe won't until he has guaranteed bandwidth that cannot be taken away.
You'll notice I said "ask nicely". I said that for a reason...
Harassment? No, that wouldn't be legal. Of course, there's a fine line between "discussion" and "harassment". Also, don't forget that we're only reading from one source -- and this source is definitely not going to be impartial. They're obviously going to portray the FBI in the most sinister, evil tones possible. Otherwise there wouldn't be much of a story, would there? And besides, what are the ISPs going to tell the public? Of -course- they're going to say that the FBI forced them to do it. How else could they save face? "Oh, we just figgered it wasn't, um, like nice and stuff." Yeah, the public would love that. They said what they had to, and the article played it to the hilt, as expected.
In reality, nobody knows what really happened except those that directly participated. And, in reality, this kind of thing can happen every single day, and there isn't a thing we can do about it. *this* was the point of my post: As long as you're relying on someone else, as long as you're paying -them- for a service, then you are subject to their whims, and play the "free speech" game on their terms.
Yes, this is a terrifying thing, and I don't know how to fix it. In any case, this isn't exactly a constitutional offence, however. It's a symptom of a very serious danger to our way of life all the same.
Similarly, the FBI (or anyone else) does not have to get any sort of legal document to tell an ISP to wipe out your web site. All they have to do is ask nicely, and get the ISP to agree that they shouldn't be supporting this. Then, subject to the agreement that you have with your ISP (which almost ALWAYS protect the ISP, and practically never gives you any say in anything at all), your pages get trashed. End of story. Nobody's constitutional rights were stomped on at all.
So what's the moral of the story? Find yourself a medium that you control, don't depend on renting space from other companies. How you do that is up to you.
So you called them up, faxed the stuff in, and they didn't have any problem with it? Yowza. That's super-good news. Can anyone else corroborate this tidbit?
:) Maybe I'll give them a call. Shoot, and I would have missed your post if I hadn't read the Score:0 posts on a whim... :)
Er... wait... what time is it in Germany right now?
Are Canadians shut out? I got "the letter" but it seems that, being a Canadian citizen, I'll be ineligible. That sucks. :) Please tell me I've missed something obvious...
On the possibly-hopeful side, I'll have a working visa (H-1b or something like that?) by early January, and I'll be in San Francisco at my new job. Does this mean anything? I'd love to get in on this, but I'm afraid I may not be able to. *sigh*
To heck with asking them to distribute a reminder... HR comes to me and says "Scan everything in email for porn." I say, "sure thing, it'll take me a couple of days to get things set up, and then I'll send the results to you". They'll be happy with that reply.
Then the first thing I'd do is email the entire company and tell each and every person the corporate policy on email/porn/etc. I'd also mention offhandedly that "At the request of HR, Computing Services will be conducting a thorough search of all email for porn and other forbidden materials commencing in two days. Any comments or questions may be directed to [insert HR moron's name here]"
After seeing this, all porn will be deleted, and nobody will be surprised by this action. HR might be a little pissed off, but there's nothing they can do about it (I followed orders). If they get mad at me, they end up looking like witchhunters, trying to ambush people. I'd call this the least of the evils.