Well, if you're in the U.S., and you're concerned about these events (it's looking more and more like an anti-privacy group), might I suggest contacting the privacy office or going directly to the dept. of homeland security to let them know how you feel as a taxpayer about the appointment of individuals with a less than stellar record when it comes to privacy concerns?
Heh, I'm a verizon customer, and there's a dead spot on the Powhite Pkwy. on my way home.
I must admit that verizon does have the best coverage. But they have the crappiest phones, they nickel and dime to death with text messaging, sending pictures, games, ringtones, etc., and their customer service is mediocre.
First they don't tell anybody about it. Then they stop people from talking about it.
Stuff like this is just sleazy, and calls into question the character of the devs and site admins. Either that, or it's just a really stupid, really immature move.
I wonder if they've realized they've just upset a lot of users, who are now wondering if they can trust the devs and the software they produce anymore. I wonder if they even care.
Well, it really depends. You might have the copyright on your movie, but have you carefully checked all your audio to make sure you're not using anything copyrighted, or can even hear anything copyrighted? Made sure any buildings or artwork that appear aren't copyrighted? Better not have used a coke can or a t-shirt with a cool design - all those are probably copyrighted. Got releases from every identifiable person in your flick?
This has even made me a little scared when it comes to just sharing family home movies online! You can get sued for just about anything these days.
I think maybe one of the problems is that Vonage requires you to read. So many people are either very poor at reading, are unable to comprehend things above about a 3rd grade level, or just ignore the warnings and information as more legal mumbo-jumbo that they never bother with it.
I don't think this makes Vonage at fault. Perhaps they could have some kind of warning message anytime the phone is used without 911 being activated, and an easy way in your voicemail menu to check the 911 settings (and if it's not, connect you to customer service who will change it for you maybe)?
Vonage 911 works for me. I've had Vonage for about a year and a half now, in fact I waited to sign up until they had some kind of 911 support.
When I did, I read carefully the documentation about the 911 service. I moved about 6 months ago, and before I had my broadband and vonage up and running I used the website to update my 911 info so that it would have the correct address before the vonage box ever got plugged in.
After about 3 months there, our then 10 month old had his first accident with stairs. (It was scary, but he was fine) My wife called 911 with our Vonage line, and had no problems whatsoever. Rescue squad and police were on the scene very quickly.
A friend of mine used to drive a truck for Coke (delivered sodas and refilled vending machines). He could have been fired for drinking Pepsi products or eating, watching a movie, doing any kind of business that served pepsi (and not coke).
It seems news media usually get away with photographs of identifiable people in states with publicity laws under a fair use exemption for newsworthy reporting. In some states the publicity laws only apply to celebrities, but in others they apply to everyone (details).
Some HTTP/1.1 web servers, like Apache, support KeepAlive, which creates a persistant connection, until a certain amount of time has passed. Right now that information is not available in the browser, and I've seen no way to exploit it to create applications (and a good persistant connection would also perhaps allow thing like push, not just pull). It seems to exist solely for performance reasons, not as a way to eliminate or reduce using cookies.
Not quite the same. It's more like they put a nice big honkin' v8, but use software to only let you run off of 4 cylinders. For an extra $.25 per cylinder per mile, you can enable make use of them.
However the moonroof (OBEX), which is there, is locked out completely. It's just too dangerous for you to use (asteroids might fall in!).
I stupidly signed up with Verizon. When my contract expires, I'm gone.
That's 15 million to the UN for aid, and that's for "starters". Forget that we contribute over 20% of the UN's budget, and in the past few years have actually paid in the billions.
With the oil for food fiasco, the UN is not the logical place to put all the money for this, unless you want it horribly mismanaged.
Personally, I think groups like the Red Cross/Red Crescent would be able to make better use of the funds. Links: American International/Red Crescent
That's great for you. But where I live (rural VA) 1500/256k DSL runs $70/month from the telco. 3000/384 is $90 (almost twice what you're paying). If I was in Verizon territory it would be less expensive, but I'm in Sprint land (the land of notoriously high latency).
All the local/regional ISP's DSL service is actually the telco's DSL lines, but with their support/email/web servers. You'd think they get the lines at cost and so could be a little bit cheaper than the telco maybe... not so. The all want anywhere from 10%-150% more $$.
I wish I could afford to bring in a T1 or two and start my own wireless operation. (The town is 2 sq. miles, about 2,500 people). Anyone know of any grants for seed money for doing something like this?;)
I'm a fairly new father myself (I have a 7 month old little boy at home). We used an audio monitor for the first few weeks at home, but found due to the rather small size of the townhouse we were in that we could hear our son just fine.
We just moved into a much larger house (bought our own), and have found that we can barely hear him cry on the other side of the house (did I say much larger? I meant a crapload larger!), so we'll be setting up the monitor again as a repeater.
Once you get past the 3 month stage, unless your child has known respitory problems, the chance of SIDS falls dramatically.
I would have loved to have setup a webcam to watch him, but found that it really wasn't practical for us, in terms of time, money, etc. It's amazing when you have kids how those things are no longer yours, but theirs.;)
Although if you have the funds (make sure you have plenty, our son was 2 months early, and let me tell ya, extra-calorie preemie formula and such ain't cheap!) or if you already have the equipment, maybe a sony digital camcorder with night-shot (for very low light conditions) connected to a pc via firewire and some steaming or webcam software and a pc might work well.
You'd not only have a good low-light capable webcam, but you'd also have a good digital video camera for all those home movies. (We chose buying our own home over getting the camera, although I wish I had one... maybe for Christmas... before he's walking.)
You probably don't need to worry about noise from a computer in the nursery. We've found the hum of an air filter, a pc, a clock, stuff like that as long as it's not too loud, provides some much needed white noise that helps keep the baby asleep through other sounds (creaking floors, closing drawers, people talking, etc.). Although it can add a very annoying hiss to the audio monitor.
The BSD license allows for the same free rides, and it's been around a long, long time. I'm sure there are plenty of other open source licenses that do the same.
Sorry it took so long, but have your tried bean-e-doo? It's a soy based carpet/linoleum adhesive remover with no fumes and that leaves no residue. I don't know if it's available where you live, or how well it works, but I've been told their soy based paint stripper is amazing (non-toxic, bio-degradeable, safe to touch, no fumes, binds lead, works fast and well).
As far as the ethical dillema, I don't really see one. I don't know about your country or locality, but in my state licensed asbestos contractors and workers must take many hours of classes and pass certification tests in order to acheive their state license and be legally allowed to remove the asbestos. Any homeowner or business that knowingly hires someone without a license to remove asbestos faces very stiff penalties, as does anyone who forges or otherwise lies about not having a license. They should have the training and tools to be able to handle the material safely. I have no qualms about paying a properly insured and licensed professional to do a job.
I'm in the process of buying an old house (built in 1905!), so I've done quite a bit of research recently on Asbestos (and lead paint).
The epa has a pretty good section devoted to it. I also found The Asbestos Tragedy to be enlightening and more than a bit disturbing.
Asbestos, the state rock of California, is a mineral fiber. It's a rock that can be woven into fabric. It's very strong, chemically resistant, and fireproof. Being a natural substance, it's around us all the time and is part of the environment - as the rocks erode, the dust containing asbestos fibers are picked up by wind. (When an asbestos containing product is releasing fibers, it's termed friable).
It was used in a wide variety of household materials for decades. Things like heating system insulaton, vinyl/asphalt/rubber tiles, vinyl floor backing and adhesives, joint compounds, texturized paint, stove-top pads, oven mits, etc.. It was even used as stage curtains in theaters because of it's resistance to flame.
If it's in good condition (non-friable), meaning not cracking, crumbling, on an impact surface or otherwise releasing dust, then it's usually harmless if left alone. If it's friable though there are two methods for taking care of it - encapsulation (which is a temporary solution and must be maintained) and removal. Most states specify that only a licensed contractor or homeowner (friends and relatives can help, but cannot be paid, and all regulations must be followed) can deal with it.
When exposed to asbestos it will usually be caught by the mucus in the lining of your nose, mouth, and throat. This eventually gets swallowed (or hacked up I suppose). What's swallowed passes through you and winds up passing through and out of your digestive tract.
All it takes however is a single asbestos fiber to get past that defense system and get trapped in your lungs to potentially cause cancer. But like most cancers it's hit or miss who will be affected.
Oh, remember that part about it being a naturally occuring substance? It is quite possible that you could be exposed just by breathing fresh clean air.
The worst part is that it takes 20-40 years for any signs to show up, there's no way to test for it besides using x-rays to see if there's visibly damaged lung tissue, and there's no treatment. Our house inspector has had 3 friends die in the past 5 years or so due to asbestos.
Which brings me back to the house I'm buying - we found obvious asbestos insulation on the old radiator heating system under the house. The seller is going to have professionally removed (licensed asbestos contractor).
But there may still be asbestos lurking in other places. The texturized ceilings in a few rooms will have to have tested (the current owners have had the place ~10 years, and don't know exactly when it was painted) for both asbestos and lead before we do anything with them. Testing runs about $25-50 per sample.
Lead paint is much much easier to deal with. Blood levels can be monitored, encapsulation products are easy to apply (special paint,kinda pricey but much cheaper than abatement), and for wood surfaces the newer soy gel paint strippers make it much safer for do-it-yourselfers.
Basically we're going to have to be very careful and meticulus about any work we decide to do or have done to make sure our home is safe.
Some folks consider allowing yourself to die when there's an alternative to be the same as suicide, and therefore a mortal sin. Which results in some folks believing they'll have the choice to either live forever or burn in hell forever.
(I just saw a documentary about cannibals on HBO, which made me think about it this way. The rugby team who got stranded in the andes for ~2 months and survived on their dead teammates corpses were strong Catholics, and decided that desicrating the corpses of their comrades was better than the mortal sin of suicide by starving.)
I wonder though, for these folks, is it any less a suicide to not pursue a possible life extending treatment? To not find the treatment, if it's possible, wouldn't that be the same as suicide by following that line of reasoning?
Ok. It's illegal for them to call if you have to pay for the inbound call. But I don't think there's a price limit. So could someone like Vonage step up to the plate and charge.0000000000000000001 cents per incoming call (effectively nothing, but legally something? Would we then be allowed to sue? $500/violation sounds nice to me.
Slashdot Mirror
Or maybe it's cause the weather's getting nicer and they want to work on their yards? heh.
Well, if you're in the U.S., and you're concerned about these events (it's looking more and more like an anti-privacy group), might I suggest contacting the privacy office or going directly to the dept. of homeland security to let them know how you feel as a taxpayer about the appointment of individuals with a less than stellar record when it comes to privacy concerns?
Might be a good idea to contact your senators and representatives too.
Heh, I'm a verizon customer, and there's a dead spot on the Powhite Pkwy. on my way home.
I must admit that verizon does have the best coverage. But they have the crappiest phones, they nickel and dime to death with text messaging, sending pictures, games, ringtones, etc., and their customer service is mediocre.
First they don't tell anybody about it. Then they stop people from talking about it.
Stuff like this is just sleazy, and calls into question the character of the devs and site admins. Either that, or it's just a really stupid, really immature move.
I wonder if they've realized they've just upset a lot of users, who are now wondering if they can trust the devs and the software they produce anymore. I wonder if they even care.
Well, it really depends. You might have the copyright on your movie, but have you carefully checked all your audio to make sure you're not using anything copyrighted, or can even hear anything copyrighted? Made sure any buildings or artwork that appear aren't copyrighted? Better not have used a coke can or a t-shirt with a cool design - all those are probably copyrighted. Got releases from every identifiable person in your flick?
This has even made me a little scared when it comes to just sharing family home movies online! You can get sued for just about anything these days.
I think maybe one of the problems is that Vonage requires you to read. So many people are either very poor at reading, are unable to comprehend things above about a 3rd grade level, or just ignore the warnings and information as more legal mumbo-jumbo that they never bother with it.
I don't think this makes Vonage at fault. Perhaps they could have some kind of warning message anytime the phone is used without 911 being activated, and an easy way in your voicemail menu to check the 911 settings (and if it's not, connect you to customer service who will change it for you maybe)?
Vonage 911 works for me. I've had Vonage for about a year and a half now, in fact I waited to sign up until they had some kind of 911 support.
When I did, I read carefully the documentation about the 911 service. I moved about 6 months ago, and before I had my broadband and vonage up and running I used the website to update my 911 info so that it would have the correct address before the vonage box ever got plugged in.
After about 3 months there, our then 10 month old had his first accident with stairs. (It was scary, but he was fine) My wife called 911 with our Vonage line, and had no problems whatsoever. Rescue squad and police were on the scene very quickly.
And it's pretty hard to be worse than Mansquito...
A friend of mine used to drive a truck for Coke (delivered sodas and refilled vending machines). He could have been fired for drinking Pepsi products or eating, watching a movie, doing any kind of business that served pepsi (and not coke).
The law varies from state to state. There are privacy laws (which would not be violated here), and publicity laws (which may be being violated).
There's a whole host of rules and regulations about when you need to get permission and when you don't for photographs of people, places, and things.
A good article is here.
It seems news media usually get away with photographs of identifiable people in states with publicity laws under a fair use exemption for newsworthy reporting. In some states the publicity laws only apply to celebrities, but in others they apply to everyone (details).
>> Option to initiate persistant connection
>
> HTTP/1.1 already supports that.
Some HTTP/1.1 web servers, like Apache, support KeepAlive, which creates a persistant connection, until a certain amount of time has passed. Right now that information is not available in the browser, and I've seen no way to exploit it to create applications (and a good persistant connection would also perhaps allow thing like push, not just pull). It seems to exist solely for performance reasons, not as a way to eliminate or reduce using cookies.
Not quite the same. It's more like they put a nice big honkin' v8, but use software to only let you run off of 4 cylinders. For an extra $.25 per cylinder per mile, you can enable make use of them.
However the moonroof (OBEX), which is there, is locked out completely. It's just too dangerous for you to use (asteroids might fall in!).
I stupidly signed up with Verizon. When my contract expires, I'm gone.
That's 15 million to the UN for aid, and that's for "starters". Forget that we contribute over 20% of the UN's budget, and in the past few years have actually paid in the billions.
With the oil for food fiasco, the UN is not the logical place to put all the money for this, unless you want it horribly mismanaged.
Personally, I think groups like the Red Cross/Red Crescent would be able to make better use of the funds.
Links:
American
International/Red Crescent
I've got a PHP version, which is a bit different. Code's public domain, do with it what you will.
Try it:
http://webmages.com/misc/passkey.php
Grab the source:
http://webmages.com/misc/passkey.phps
That's great for you. But where I live (rural VA) 1500/256k DSL runs $70/month from the telco. 3000/384 is $90 (almost twice what you're paying). If I was in Verizon territory it would be less expensive, but I'm in Sprint land (the land of notoriously high latency).
;)
All the local/regional ISP's DSL service is actually the telco's DSL lines, but with their support/email/web servers. You'd think they get the lines at cost and so could be a little bit cheaper than the telco maybe... not so. The all want anywhere from 10%-150% more $$.
I wish I could afford to bring in a T1 or two and start my own wireless operation. (The town is 2 sq. miles, about 2,500 people). Anyone know of any grants for seed money for doing something like this?
Congrats!
;)
I'm a fairly new father myself (I have a 7 month old little boy at home). We used an audio monitor for the first few weeks at home, but found due to the rather small size of the townhouse we were in that we could hear our son just fine.
We just moved into a much larger house (bought our own), and have found that we can barely hear him cry on the other side of the house (did I say much larger? I meant a crapload larger!), so we'll be setting up the monitor again as a repeater.
Once you get past the 3 month stage, unless your child has known respitory problems, the chance of SIDS falls dramatically.
I would have loved to have setup a webcam to watch him, but found that it really wasn't practical for us, in terms of time, money, etc. It's amazing when you have kids how those things are no longer yours, but theirs.
Although if you have the funds (make sure you have plenty, our son was 2 months early, and let me tell ya, extra-calorie preemie formula and such ain't cheap!) or if you already have the equipment, maybe a sony digital camcorder with night-shot (for very low light conditions) connected to a pc via firewire and some steaming or webcam software and a pc might work well.
You'd not only have a good low-light capable webcam, but you'd also have a good digital video camera for all those home movies. (We chose buying our own home over getting the camera, although I wish I had one... maybe for Christmas... before he's walking.)
You probably don't need to worry about noise from a computer in the nursery. We've found the hum of an air filter, a pc, a clock, stuff like that as long as it's not too loud, provides some much needed white noise that helps keep the baby asleep through other sounds (creaking floors, closing drawers, people talking, etc.). Although it can add a very annoying hiss to the audio monitor.
The BSD license allows for the same free rides, and it's been around a long, long time. I'm sure there are plenty of other open source licenses that do the same.
It's more like:
:) Ahh, modern manhood.
Husband: Honey, I'm home!
Wife: Great, what are you cooking for dinner? And when are you going to get to the laundry?
There's a product called Kali for Windows that tunnels IPX over TCP/IP, worked pretty good years ago, and apparently still has a following.
Once upon a time I even got WarCraft II running in dosemu using Kali's DOS IPXTCP/IP stack.
Sorry it took so long, but have your tried bean-e-doo? It's a soy based carpet/linoleum adhesive remover with no fumes and that leaves no residue. I don't know if it's available where you live, or how well it works, but I've been told their soy based paint stripper is amazing (non-toxic, bio-degradeable, safe to touch, no fumes, binds lead, works fast and well).
As far as the ethical dillema, I don't really see one. I don't know about your country or locality, but in my state licensed asbestos contractors and workers must take many hours of classes and pass certification tests in order to acheive their state license and be legally allowed to remove the asbestos. Any homeowner or business that knowingly hires someone without a license to remove asbestos faces very stiff penalties, as does anyone who forges or otherwise lies about not having a license. They should have the training and tools to be able to handle the material safely. I have no qualms about paying a properly insured and licensed professional to do a job.
I'm in the process of buying an old house (built in 1905!), so I've done quite a bit of research recently on Asbestos (and lead paint).
The epa has a pretty good section devoted to it. I also found The Asbestos Tragedy to be enlightening and more than a bit disturbing.
Asbestos, the state rock of California, is a mineral fiber. It's a rock that can be woven into fabric. It's very strong, chemically resistant, and fireproof. Being a natural substance, it's around us all the time and is part of the environment - as the rocks erode, the dust containing asbestos fibers are picked up by wind. (When an asbestos containing product is releasing fibers, it's termed friable).
It was used in a wide variety of household materials for decades. Things like heating system insulaton, vinyl/asphalt/rubber tiles, vinyl floor backing and adhesives, joint compounds, texturized paint, stove-top pads, oven mits, etc.. It was even used as stage curtains in theaters because of it's resistance to flame.
If it's in good condition (non-friable), meaning not cracking, crumbling, on an impact surface or otherwise releasing dust, then it's usually harmless if left alone. If it's friable though there are two methods for taking care of it - encapsulation (which is a temporary solution and must be maintained) and removal. Most states specify that only a licensed contractor or homeowner (friends and relatives can help, but cannot be paid, and all regulations must be followed) can deal with it.
When exposed to asbestos it will usually be caught by the mucus in the lining of your nose, mouth, and throat. This eventually gets swallowed (or hacked up I suppose). What's swallowed passes through you and winds up passing through and out of your digestive tract.
All it takes however is a single asbestos fiber to get past that defense system and get trapped in your lungs to potentially cause cancer. But like most cancers it's hit or miss who will be affected.
Oh, remember that part about it being a naturally occuring substance? It is quite possible that you could be exposed just by breathing fresh clean air.
The worst part is that it takes 20-40 years for any signs to show up, there's no way to test for it besides using x-rays to see if there's visibly damaged lung tissue, and there's no treatment. Our house inspector has had 3 friends die in the past 5 years or so due to asbestos.
Which brings me back to the house I'm buying - we found obvious asbestos insulation on the old radiator heating system under the house. The seller is going to have professionally removed (licensed asbestos contractor).
But there may still be asbestos lurking in other places. The texturized ceilings in a few rooms will have to have tested (the current owners have had the place ~10 years, and don't know exactly when it was painted) for both asbestos and lead before we do anything with them. Testing runs about $25-50 per sample.
Lead paint is much much easier to deal with. Blood levels can be monitored, encapsulation products are easy to apply (special paint,kinda pricey but much cheaper than abatement), and for wood surfaces the newer soy gel paint strippers make it much safer for do-it-yourselfers.
Basically we're going to have to be very careful and meticulus about any work we decide to do or have done to make sure our home is safe.
Maybe he suffered from some kind of memory loss from being in a buffer for 75 years.
It's rather ironic that it almost has a basis in fact - the actor who played Scotty, James Doohan, has Alzheimers. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5380169
The largest archive of pr0n and dair cow pictures you mean?
Some folks consider allowing yourself to die when there's an alternative to be the same as suicide, and therefore a mortal sin. Which results in some folks believing they'll have the choice to either live forever or burn in hell forever.
(I just saw a documentary about cannibals on HBO, which made me think about it this way. The rugby team who got stranded in the andes for ~2 months and survived on their dead teammates corpses were strong Catholics, and decided that desicrating the corpses of their comrades was better than the mortal sin of suicide by starving.)
I wonder though, for these folks, is it any less a suicide to not pursue a possible life extending treatment? To not find the treatment, if it's possible, wouldn't that be the same as suicide by following that line of reasoning?
Ok. It's illegal for them to call if you have to pay for the inbound call. But I don't think there's a price limit. So could someone like Vonage step up to the plate and charge .0000000000000000001 cents per incoming call (effectively nothing, but legally something? Would we then be allowed to sue? $500/violation sounds nice to me.