So, I believe he's accused of distributing a device for circumventing technological means for protecting copywritten works, which (rightly or wrongly) is illegal under the DMCA. Car mod chips don't do that.
If the allegation is true -- that he used isonews to sell mod chips, then he's a moron. ISONEWS, it seems to me, has always stayed just on the legal side of the line. It was possible, for example, to go to ISONEWS and find out what new pirated works were being distributed, but any information about keys/serial number or where to find the works was omitted. It was actually a pretty good way for the legit software industry to track when their software was being distributed illegal.
He should have been aware that the site was being monitored, either by the Feds or by copyright owners who wanted it shut down. Selling mod-chips on it was just asking to be caught.
Now, IANAL, but I'm reasonably certain that you're allowed to own a mod-chip. You're just not allowed to use it to play games you've copied from somebody else -- that would be copyright infringement. In fact, even possessing the copies would probably be infrigement.
In answer to your question, it may be expanding the market for the consoles themselves, because it allows people who otherwise wouldn't have bought the console due to the restrictions to buy it and mod the restrictions away. But, the copyright owners would argue that if joe 15-year-old kid has a mod chip and is downloading all his games from the 'net instead of buying them, then the people who wrote the game originally are being deprived of the money from that sale.
Mind you, I'm no big fan of the DMCA -- it's overreaching and unbalanced. But, I'm also not a big fan of copyright infrigement -- if somebody spends a lot of time creating something, they deserve the profits from that work, at least for a little while.
One of the problems that you run into in any sort of language decision is that all sorts of people have religion -- you have the OO/C++ types who think everything should be written in C++, others that think Perl is the perfect language for everything, some who don't think that anything should be scripted in csh, java-bigots and so on.
I've discovered that I need to have a variety of tools in my toolbox. To use the old analogy, if the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
There are certainly projects that should naturally be written in C++, some in Tcl and some in assembler. If you have experience in all of them, then you have the standing to pick the best approach for a given project with the confidence that you know what you're doing and aren't just being 'religious' about it.
I should note that this idea is true for more than just programming languages -- I've used it with networking technologies, programming environments, editors and documentation systems. You don't need to be an expert in everything -- you just need to know enough.
The purpose of the monitoring is to provide additional knowledge about people who are travelling to the US. This information (including the credit card number) could be used to corrolate with other data.
For example, let's say that somebody buys an airplane ticket with a credit card, travels to the US and then the next day uses the same credit card to rent a truck and buy a bunch of diesel fuel and fertilizer. Any of these by itself isn't suspicious, but it's a rare person who flies to the US, moves a bunch of furniture and takes up large-scale farming the next day.
Or, some of the information could be used to track when a bunch of people who used to live together bought one-way flights to the US with cash within a few weeks of each other.
In order to commit a terrorist act against targets on US soil, the terrorists need to get here somehow and airplanes are currently the fastest and easiest way. Sure -- it's not perfect... A determined terrorist could still fly into Panama and drive to the US. But, it sure makes it harder for them.
I don't think the problem would be theft -- the main value of these two services is in their completeness and searchability. Sure, somebody could copy the Lexis notes from an individual case, but that doesn't have a whole lot of value -- I can't imagine somebody posting each decision in Westlaw on Kaaza. Ick.
I suspect that the real reason they don't want to sell a license to a public library is that if they do so, then a bunch of lawyers who are each paying big bucks for their subscriptions will cancel and start to use the library's subscription.
So, probably bad form replying twice on the same thread.... oh well...
The issue is *NOT* Patents. It's all about copyright and licensing. Unix dates back to 1969 (see http://www.levenez.com/unix ), and software patents only go back to 1981.
So, the question is whether any software written by SCO (or really, anything that SCO now owns the rights to, since it was mostly written by Ma Bell) is ending up in software that somebody else sells. If the answer to that is 'yes', and that somebody else didn't pay SCO for the right to use that software *AND* their use isn't considered 'fair use,' then SCO probably has a cause of action.
I think this will eventually amount to not much. They're not going to go after redhat or Linus or Stallman or.... They may go after somebody who grabbed SCO source code, recompiled it for Windows and is running their app there without paying SCO for the right to copy the code. Or somebody who did the same thing for Linux.
I don't think it's patents, per se. Software patents just didn't exist in the days that most of what we now consider to be 'Unix' was written.
It's likely just plain-old-ordinary copyright and licensing issues. It seems that the argument would go that some people are using SCO software outside of the bounds of the license agreement that they originally agreed to.
I've heard some people assert that this means that SCO is asserting that they own 'ls', for example, and that nobody can use 'ls' without a license from SCO. That's only partially correct -- nobody can use *their version* without permission. But, that doesn't prevent the GNU people from writing 'ls' by themselves in a manner that behaves exactly like the SCO S/W.
I suspect that what they're really trying to target is people who use certain SCO software outside of SCO unix and aren't paying for the right to use it.
That being said, though, you gotta worry if a big chunk of SCO's revenue comes from lawsuits and not from new technology. It's 2003, for crying out loud -- how long can you milk 30-year-old technology?
Well, so mp3.com got into trouble for allowing people to download mp3 versions of songs that they owned.
What you can and can't do under fair use is not entirely clear and is open to case law. I believe that the current interpetation of fair use is that you're allowed to make a backup copy in case the original gets destroyed somehow. But, then the question of whether you're allowed to make a copy for work and a copy for home comes up. Can you have an original CD in one car and duplicates in each of your other 10 cars? If you're a library, can you make a backup copy and lend the original out, just in case a borrower accidentally destroys the original?
The RIAA can assert that the law says whatever they want. It's the Congress and the Judge who determine what the law actually says.
So, being rude to telemarketers is actually in their best interest -- the "Click" sound is really the best thing they can hear, because that means that they've finished with one non-responsive call and are making their next call which may yield better results. One of the things that makes telemarketing cost-effective is that they tend to spend very little time on each dead lead. It's a similar idea as spam -- if you call 100 people an hour and get 1 positive result, you're doing pretty well.
My solution? Keep them on the phone for as long as I possibly can -- ask them lots of questions, pretend like it's hard to hear them, etc.... Engage them in as much idle chit-chat as possible, and then just when they think they're going to close the deal, switch subjects and say "So... What are you wearing?" Make them pay for calling and annoying you.
What are the ports on the back? They appear to be RJ11 and RJ45 connections, which would imply phone and/or ethernet. Could this actually be the world's smallest laptop?
Dumb.... maybe... undisciplined... probably
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Professors vs. WiFi
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· Score: 2
After being out of school for 13 years, I've been considering going to law school. So, I visited a class at Duke to see what it was like and sat in the back of the class. I was astounded to see that maybe 1/4 of the students were doing something totally unrelated to their classwork -- some were IM'ing, some were reading espn.com, etc....
The thing that bugged me is that the class was really interesting -- the professor did a great job and (according to the student next to me) was considered one of the best professors in the school.
The first thing that crossed my mind was "these students are paying $30,000 a year to be here" and then I did the division and came up with around $100 per class. But, that's a bit deceiving because the value of school is not just in the lectures.
The problem, though, I think is that many of those students probably are not very keenly aware of why they're in class. Instead of trying to suck the marrow out of their education, they've grown sloppy and have really lost track of what they're doing there in the first place.
Now, that assessment certainly doesn't apply universally -- I've sat through classes where reading slashdot would have been a better use of time than paying attention to the professor. The point, though, is that there're two sides to the story: Sure, the professors have to do a good job of actually teaching in such a way as to make the subject interesting. But, at the same time, students need to pay attention and do their part.
Porbably the worst movie I've ever seen
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Solaris: Another View
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· Score: 1, Redundant
I suspect that the only reason it got any hype at all was because of George Clooney's butt. And, BTW, you've seen one guy's butt, you've seen them all.
There was no action at all. Not 'action' like in an action movie, but action as in 'movement'. Long shots of this glowing planet for no apparent purpose. Tedious dialog. Lines that don't make sense (something about the planet "increasing in mass at an exponential rate". Doesn't E=mc^2 mean that would take fantastic amounts of energy?) Zero character development. There is no explaining of how the situation in the movie came about or any resolution of any 'why' question. It was sort of like the first star trek movie (star trek: the motionless picture), only without the interesting stuff.
I understand that this Sodenheimer guy is supposed to be a great director. Great directors must really be overrated, because he really made an awful film here.
As we left the theater, we (not just me, but just about everybody who had just seen the film) warned the people buying tickets not to see it.
A movie consisting entirely of static would be a better choice. At least you know it's not supposed to make sense.
I've sent my ticket stub to 20th Century Fox, asking for a refund. I'll follow up if I get it.
So, exactly how many kids do you have that you're now an expert in child-rearing?
Children are not just little adults who are capable of making their own decisions and who understand not only what's good and what's bad, but why. Teaching them the difference is a long process, not an instantaneous event. People always raise gullible children -- the hope is that they won't be gullible adults. 6-year-olds are easy to fool, not because their parents did a lousy job of raising them, but because they're only 6 and aren't done learning. The job of raising them isn't complete.
I have a 3-year old who occasinally sits in my lap and we go to disney.com, nickjr.com, pbskids.com, etc.... I directly monitor what he sees -- is it censorship to only allow him to access the sites that I want him to? When he says "Daddy, click here," and that's not someplace I think he needs to go, should I let him go there just to let him see "oh yeah, there's bad stuff out there"?
In a couple of years, probably by the time he's 5, he's going to want to do the computer himself. Now, 5 years old is too young to be exposed to things like pornography, pictures of dead people or serious violence. When that point comes, you can be darned sure that I'm going to limit the sites that he can go to. Sure, it won't be perfect -- it may be that I accidentally ban him from Scoobydoo.com or something. The point is not to exactly mirror my preferences for what he can and can't see, but to let him learn how to use the computer by going to some websites that are fun and age-appropriate.
If the.kids.us domain is managed and yes *censored* well, at some point my kids may be allowed to visit any.kids.us site without my being in the room. That would be an improvement both for them and for me, and that's what makes the idea good.
So, Jesse Helms has not held onto his Senate seat for as long as he has by not taking care of his constituents. However, he's retiring this year, which means that he's not going to be able to do this for much longer. It's unclear whether either of the folks running for his seat (Elizabeth Dole and Erskine Bowles) will take the same position.
The real question is... Why are Rep. Howard Coble (Also North Carolina - R) and Sen. Ernest Hollings (South Carolina - D) not doing the same thing?
My view of what's happening is that SearchKing is in the business of artificially inflating the ranks of their customers on google.com. Google has noticed this and has taken steps to un-inflate those ranks. SearchKing sues of the basis of Tortious Interference (ie they claim that google.com is interfering with a business relationship.)
The claim is pretty bogus because it's sort of like saying "Our company advertises your company by writing grafitti on subway walls. We're suing the subway owners who keep cleaning up the grafitti."
(Massively) parallel supercomputing
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Ask Donald Becker
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· Score: 3, Interesting
In general, the architecture provided by Beowulf works well on specific classes of problems -- those that can be divided among a large number of processors for simultaneous processing. Figuring out how to do the division of a large problem, however, is decidedly non-trivial. What tools do the commercial supercomputer outfits have to solve the problem that could be adapted to a Beowulf environment?
It sounds like you just got somebody with a bee in their bonnet. (And, if you want another cliche,) My experience has been that such people's bark is worse than their bite.
So, if the CEO wants to sue you, first he has to find a lawyer willing to take on the case. In this case, that means that the lawyer would believe that A) there's a reasonable chance of winning in court and B) that if they did sue you, you have enough money to make it worth their while. Now, B is not as critical -- if the CEO in question is a real jerk, he may sue out of spite. But, A... If there isn't a reasonable chance that you'd win and a judge agrees, not only do you win, but the CEO and his attorney could be in trouble for filing a frivolous lawsuit.
The FBI, luckily is more than smart enough to understand forged headers and also knows more about computer viruses than this CEO evidently does. There may be some record in some computer somewhere, but it won't really mean anything.
The real questions are:
1) Is this CEO is the head of the place that *you* work? and 2) Is he slandering you among other people?
If he is the CEO of your company and he decides to have you fired or something, then you may have a wrongful termination case. If he's going around telling other people about how you wrote this virus and sent it to him, then that's slander (assuming you didn't actually do it...), which is grounds under which you could sue him. In either case, consulting a lawyer may be a good idea.
Probably the best thing is to take the high road and ignore it.
Finally, something I know about! This is what I do for a living.
The fact of the matter is that most of the large emerging packet telephony networks are not being deployed in enterprises, but in the carrier networks -- telephone companies around the world are replacing their old circuit-switched back-haul networks for packet-switched networks, either ATM or IP. These are private networks which are not open to the general public, and so do not have the same risks as, say running VoIP on the internet would. Sure, the telcos still need to watch out for attackers... it's just that you've raised the bar far enough that 'script kiddies' would have a tough time.
The article also has an over-simplified view of the effort needed to tap an IP phone call. Even if the user were able to mirror any port on the network onto his computer, he still has the extremely hard task of figuring out which port(s) he needs to monitor -- they typically change on a per-call basis, and the user would actually have to mirror two ports (one for each direction of speech) in order to get the entire call. Now, it can be done, but it's difficult. And, it's made even harder because the signalling path (the communication link that handles setting up calls) is usually encrypted, so it becomes impossible to distinguish among calls.
1) Pawn shop. You would be amazed at how many Diamonds are there. See the pawn shop FAQs for information on how to shop there.
2) Non-mall reputable dealer. There are a few of these around usually in some hole-in-the-wall shop. I bought my wife's diamond from one 6 years ago -- they had a 1-year money back warranty that they honored for a friend of mine without a problem, and were much less expensive than mall stores.
Whatever you do, buy a certified stone -- it's the only way to get an objective measure of the 4 C's which you can use to compare prices among jewelers.
Whatever you do, stay away fromt he stores in the mall. Their overhead is higher, due to rent and glitz, their return policies generally stink, and they often employ people who don't know what they're talking about.
To counteract some of the (apparently uninformed) negative comments I've seen, check out this
article on the same subject from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
What authority does Microsoft or the BSA (or any private enterprise, for that matter) have to come in and 'audit' some business, government entity or charity? I can understand it if they have probable cause and go in under a warrent, accompanying law enforcement. But, just choosing a school district and saying "I'm going to audit you"? Why doesn't the district just say "Go to hell"? It seems to me that Microsoft has as much right to do that as Madonna does to come into my house and 'audit' my music collection for illegal copies of her music.
Sure, piracy is a big problem for the software industry, but there still needs to be some reasonable evidence of wrongdoing before you can inflict a search on somebody.
Now is absolutely not a good time for a recent grad to be looking for a job. This is especially true since every company that normally hires new-grads has likely already filled their positions. It is the end of May, after all.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
There are some things that you can do to help get a CS job -- you're on the right track, more/less with the idea of getting some more education. I don't think that the actual certification is worth much more than a statement of "I have some initiative," though. I certainly don't pay much attention to it when I interview candidates.
As previously pointed out, it's a buyers market, and so those companies that do have jobs are going to have their choice of people. Frankly, the fact that you don't have a job now is a strike against getting one soon -- there's a hidden bias that says "Well, nobody's wanted him yet. Should I take a chance?"
Things to do? Find a small handful of companies who have hired your friends, and who are either hiring now, or will be soon. Learn as much as you possibly can about the company and their products. That way, when you do get an interview, you'll be able to talk intelligently -- that, by itself, can wow them.
Don't stay unemployed -- find something else to do related to your field. Write open-source software to create a name for yourself (and learn something in the process); go back to grad school and wait the job market out; Travel -- at least when they ask 'why is he still unemployed,' the answer can be 'he was backpacking across Europe', and not 'he was being turned down by 30 other companies.'
So, we've done this with off-shore contractors. The tips I have are...
1. Hand over independent projects. The more interaction their part has with everybody else, the greater the chance of problems. The communications differences are going to cause issues if there's a lot of interaction with the rest of the project.
2. Be very explicit on requirements. Nail down the exact behavior of what you want their software to do. Be explicit about the development environment and the target environment.
3. Avoid giving them tasks that you'll need to modify heavily for the next release, because they likely won't design with the next release in mind (the next release's requirements are likely not explicit yet. See #2 above.)
4. As much as you can, try to interview the people who you'll be dealing with. With remote development, it's all the more important that you get smart people.
5. frequent milestones -- since you're not there, you have no real way to tell where they are on your schedule, unless you have a set of milestones that they need to meet. Build meeting the milestones into the compensation plan.
So, the point is to segregate their development from the US development as much as possible. Work to minimize communications problems. Take strong measures to measure progress.
It's quite possible to get good work out of off-shore development. But, it'll take a lot of work on your end as well.
I hope you're not talking about re-writing existing code to use STL instead of the equivilent C++ libraries. That sounds like a great way to introduce insideous bugs in your code. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
In our development team, we have people who prefer RW, others who prefer the STL and others who are agnostic. In general, we've had a very good experience getting them to work together. Sure, it tends to lead to larger executables, but that's not a particularly big issue for us.
One thing that I haven't seen others talk about is that the two do not necessarily perform equivilent functions. The STL provides a bunch of templates, and RogueWave provides a bunch of useful classes, some of which are templates. RWTime, for example, has no equivilent in the STL.
Also, if you want to use other RW libraries (such as their threading stuff), then you're going to need to use some of the base RW stuff anyway.
Actually, the SIP protocol (Developed by the IETF) is a very decentralized method for initiating VoIP sessions without going through any specific centralized resource. You just say "I want to establish a phone link with the person 'my_friend@someisp.net', and Voila! In fact, that person doesn't even need to be logged on via his home account -- he can be at work or on vacation somewhere.
So, this is my field of expertise... To answer some questions/comments...
1. Why? -- Cost and features. It costs the same amount for the phone company to run 4 or 8 lines to your house as it does 1. Features like 3WC, call waiting, etc... don't require special equipment.
-- You don't have to have seperate phone and data networks (more important in businesses, where they actually own/lease phone equipment.)
2. Latency
Latency on a phone call is generally noticable above 120ms or so (1/8th of a second). VoIP calls typically split audio into 10ms (or smaller) packets, which have maybe a 30ms buffer. Add some propagation delay and you're still well under 120ms.
3. Gateways
Yes! Equipment providers have gateways to translate between packet and traditional TDM networks. All different sizes, including home gateways that have a packet interface on one end and plug into your home phone network on the other.
4. PPP over VoIP
Ick. It *can* be done, but generally isn't a good idea. Wastes bandwidth. (You could then run VoIP over PPP over VoIP again...) For 99% of the cases, you're just going to data over the base IP network.
5. traditional Telcos response
Most major telcos have slowed their growth in TDM equipment in favor of VoIP/VoATM equipment. (Sprint just announced a > $1B deal for this equipment recently.) Fact is that telephone switches are expensive and naturally low bandwidth. Growth is in high bandwidth services, so moving to a data network makes a lot more sense.
6 Why no 911?
That's just a problem with this particular implementation, not of VoIP in general. For even more arcane reasons, 911 uses a specific type of digital trunk and requires a special gateway to talk to that trunk. There are ways around it.
7 What about spotty cable modem service?
That's a problem. Broadband needs to be something that you don't think about before you'd hook your phone line up to it. It's coming, but isn't there yet for a lot of people.
Slashdot Mirror
So, I believe he's accused of distributing a device for circumventing technological means for protecting copywritten works, which (rightly or wrongly) is illegal under the DMCA. Car mod chips don't do that.
If the allegation is true -- that he used isonews to sell mod chips, then he's a moron. ISONEWS, it seems to me, has always stayed just on the legal side of the line. It was possible, for example, to go to ISONEWS and find out what new pirated works were being distributed, but any information about keys/serial number or where to find the works was omitted. It was actually a pretty good way for the legit software industry to track when their software was being distributed illegal.
He should have been aware that the site was being monitored, either by the Feds or by copyright owners who wanted it shut down. Selling mod-chips on it was just asking to be caught.
Now, IANAL, but I'm reasonably certain that you're allowed to own a mod-chip. You're just not allowed to use it to play games you've copied from somebody else -- that would be copyright infringement. In fact, even possessing the copies would probably be infrigement.
In answer to your question, it may be expanding the market for the consoles themselves, because it allows people who otherwise wouldn't have bought the console due to the restrictions to buy it and mod the restrictions away. But, the copyright owners would argue that if joe 15-year-old kid has a mod chip and is downloading all his games from the 'net instead of buying them, then the people who wrote the game originally are being deprived of the money from that sale.
Mind you, I'm no big fan of the DMCA -- it's overreaching and unbalanced. But, I'm also not a big fan of copyright infrigement -- if somebody spends a lot of time creating something, they deserve the profits from that work, at least for a little while.
One of the problems that you run into in any sort of language decision is that all sorts of people have religion -- you have the OO/C++ types who think everything should be written in C++, others that think Perl is the perfect language for everything, some who don't think that anything should be scripted in csh, java-bigots and so on.
I've discovered that I need to have a variety of tools in my toolbox. To use the old analogy, if the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
There are certainly projects that should naturally be written in C++, some in Tcl and some in assembler. If you have experience in all of them, then you have the standing to pick the best approach for a given project with the confidence that you know what you're doing and aren't just being 'religious' about it.
I should note that this idea is true for more than just programming languages -- I've used it with networking technologies, programming environments, editors and documentation systems. You don't need to be an expert in everything -- you just need to know enough.
I don't really understand the complaint.
The purpose of the monitoring is to provide additional knowledge about people who are travelling to the US. This information (including the credit card number) could be used to corrolate with other data.
For example, let's say that somebody buys an airplane ticket with a credit card, travels to the US and then the next day uses the same credit card to rent a truck and buy a bunch of diesel fuel and fertilizer. Any of these by itself isn't suspicious, but it's a rare person who flies to the US, moves a bunch of furniture and takes up large-scale farming the next day.
Or, some of the information could be used to track when a bunch of people who used to live together bought one-way flights to the US with cash within a few weeks of each other.
In order to commit a terrorist act against targets on US soil, the terrorists need to get here somehow and airplanes are currently the fastest and easiest way. Sure -- it's not perfect... A determined terrorist could still fly into Panama and drive to the US. But, it sure makes it harder for them.
I don't think the problem would be theft -- the main value of these two services is in their completeness and searchability. Sure, somebody could copy the Lexis notes from an individual case, but that doesn't have a whole lot of value -- I can't imagine somebody posting each decision in Westlaw on Kaaza. Ick.
I suspect that the real reason they don't want to sell a license to a public library is that if they do so, then a bunch of lawyers who are each paying big bucks for their subscriptions will cancel and start to use the library's subscription.
So, probably bad form replying twice on the same thread.... oh well...
The issue is *NOT* Patents. It's all about copyright and licensing. Unix dates back to 1969 (see http://www.levenez.com/unix ), and software patents only go back to 1981.
So, the question is whether any software written by SCO (or really, anything that SCO now owns the rights to, since it was mostly written by Ma Bell) is ending up in software that somebody else sells. If the answer to that is 'yes', and that somebody else didn't pay SCO for the right to use that software *AND* their use isn't considered 'fair use,' then SCO probably has a cause of action.
I think this will eventually amount to not much. They're not going to go after redhat or Linus or Stallman or.... They may go after somebody who grabbed SCO source code, recompiled it for Windows and is running their app there without paying SCO for the right to copy the code. Or somebody who did the same thing for Linux.
IANAL (yet)
I don't think it's patents, per se. Software patents just didn't exist in the days that most of what we now consider to be 'Unix' was written.
It's likely just plain-old-ordinary copyright and licensing issues. It seems that the argument would go that some people are using SCO software outside of the bounds of the license agreement that they originally agreed to.
I've heard some people assert that this means that SCO is asserting that they own 'ls', for example, and that nobody can use 'ls' without a license from SCO. That's only partially correct -- nobody can use *their version* without permission. But, that doesn't prevent the GNU people from writing 'ls' by themselves in a manner that behaves exactly like the SCO S/W.
I suspect that what they're really trying to target is people who use certain SCO software outside of SCO unix and aren't paying for the right to use it.
That being said, though, you gotta worry if a big chunk of SCO's revenue comes from lawsuits and not from new technology. It's 2003, for crying out loud -- how long can you milk 30-year-old technology?
Well, so mp3.com got into trouble for allowing people to download mp3 versions of songs that they owned.
What you can and can't do under fair use is not entirely clear and is open to case law. I believe that the current interpetation of fair use is that you're allowed to make a backup copy in case the original gets destroyed somehow. But, then the question of whether you're allowed to make a copy for work and a copy for home comes up. Can you have an original CD in one car and duplicates in each of your other 10 cars? If you're a library, can you make a backup copy and lend the original out, just in case a borrower accidentally destroys the original?
The RIAA can assert that the law says whatever they want. It's the Congress and the Judge who determine what the law actually says.
So, being rude to telemarketers is actually in their best interest -- the "Click" sound is really the best thing they can hear, because that means that they've finished with one non-responsive call and are making their next call which may yield better results. One of the things that makes telemarketing cost-effective is that they tend to spend very little time on each dead lead. It's a similar idea as spam -- if you call 100 people an hour and get 1 positive result, you're doing pretty well.
My solution? Keep them on the phone for as long as I possibly can -- ask them lots of questions, pretend like it's hard to hear them, etc.... Engage them in as much idle chit-chat as possible, and then just when they think they're going to close the deal, switch subjects and say "So... What are you wearing?" Make them pay for calling and annoying you.
What are the ports on the back? They appear to be RJ11 and RJ45 connections, which would imply phone and/or ethernet. Could this actually be the world's smallest laptop?
After being out of school for 13 years, I've been considering going to law school. So, I visited a class at Duke to see what it was like and sat in the back of the class. I was astounded to see that maybe 1/4 of the students were doing something totally unrelated to their classwork -- some were IM'ing, some were reading espn.com, etc....
The thing that bugged me is that the class was really interesting -- the professor did a great job and (according to the student next to me) was considered one of the best professors in the school.
The first thing that crossed my mind was "these students are paying $30,000 a year to be here" and then I did the division and came up with around $100 per class. But, that's a bit deceiving because the value of school is not just in the lectures.
The problem, though, I think is that many of those students probably are not very keenly aware of why they're in class. Instead of trying to suck the marrow out of their education, they've grown sloppy and have really lost track of what they're doing there in the first place.
Now, that assessment certainly doesn't apply universally -- I've sat through classes where reading slashdot would have been a better use of time than paying attention to the professor. The point, though, is that there're two sides to the story: Sure, the professors have to do a good job of actually teaching in such a way as to make the subject interesting. But, at the same time, students need to pay attention and do their part.
I suspect that the only reason it got any hype at all was because of George Clooney's butt. And, BTW, you've seen one guy's butt, you've seen them all.
There was no action at all. Not 'action' like in an action movie, but action as in 'movement'. Long shots of this glowing planet for no apparent purpose. Tedious dialog. Lines that don't make sense (something about the planet "increasing in mass at an exponential rate". Doesn't E=mc^2 mean that would take fantastic amounts of energy?) Zero character development. There is no explaining of how the situation in the movie came about or any resolution of any 'why' question. It was sort of like the first star trek movie (star trek: the motionless picture), only without the interesting stuff.
I understand that this Sodenheimer guy is supposed to be a great director. Great directors must really be overrated, because he really made an awful film here.
As we left the theater, we (not just me, but just about everybody who had just seen the film) warned the people buying tickets not to see it.
A movie consisting entirely of static would be a better choice. At least you know it's not supposed to make sense.
I've sent my ticket stub to 20th Century Fox, asking for a refund. I'll follow up if I get it.
So, exactly how many kids do you have that you're now an expert in child-rearing?
.kids.us domain is managed and yes *censored* well, at some point my kids may be allowed to visit any .kids.us site without my being in the room. That would be an improvement both for them and for me, and that's what makes the idea good.
Children are not just little adults who are capable of making their own decisions and who understand not only what's good and what's bad, but why. Teaching them the difference is a long process, not an instantaneous event. People always raise gullible children -- the hope is that they won't be gullible adults. 6-year-olds are easy to fool, not because their parents did a lousy job of raising them, but because they're only 6 and aren't done learning. The job of raising them isn't complete.
I have a 3-year old who occasinally sits in my lap and we go to disney.com, nickjr.com, pbskids.com, etc.... I directly monitor what he sees -- is it censorship to only allow him to access the sites that I want him to? When he says "Daddy, click here," and that's not someplace I think he needs to go, should I let him go there just to let him see "oh yeah, there's bad stuff out there"?
In a couple of years, probably by the time he's 5, he's going to want to do the computer himself. Now, 5 years old is too young to be exposed to things like pornography, pictures of dead people or serious violence. When that point comes, you can be darned sure that I'm going to limit the sites that he can go to. Sure, it won't be perfect -- it may be that I accidentally ban him from Scoobydoo.com or something. The point is not to exactly mirror my preferences for what he can and can't see, but to let him learn how to use the computer by going to some websites that are fun and age-appropriate.
If the
So, Jesse Helms has not held onto his Senate seat for as long as he has by not taking care of his constituents. However, he's retiring this year, which means that he's not going to be able to do this for much longer. It's unclear whether either of the folks running for his seat (Elizabeth Dole and Erskine Bowles) will take the same position.
The real question is... Why are Rep. Howard Coble (Also North Carolina - R) and Sen. Ernest Hollings (South Carolina - D) not doing the same thing?
My view of what's happening is that SearchKing is in the business of artificially inflating the ranks of their customers on google.com. Google has noticed this and has taken steps to un-inflate those ranks. SearchKing sues of the basis of Tortious Interference (ie they claim that google.com is interfering with a business relationship.)
The claim is pretty bogus because it's sort of like saying "Our company advertises your company by writing grafitti on subway walls. We're suing the subway owners who keep cleaning up the grafitti."
In general, the architecture provided by Beowulf works well on specific classes of problems -- those that can be divided among a large number of processors for simultaneous processing. Figuring out how to do the division of a large problem, however, is decidedly non-trivial. What tools do the commercial supercomputer outfits have to solve the problem that could be adapted to a Beowulf environment?
IANAL...
It sounds like you just got somebody with a bee in their bonnet. (And, if you want another cliche,) My experience has been that such people's bark is worse than their bite.
So, if the CEO wants to sue you, first he has to find a lawyer willing to take on the case. In this case, that means that the lawyer would believe that A) there's a reasonable chance of winning in court and B) that if they did sue you, you have enough money to make it worth their while. Now, B is not as critical -- if the CEO in question is a real jerk, he may sue out of spite. But, A... If there isn't a reasonable chance that you'd win and a judge agrees, not only do you win, but the CEO and his attorney could be in trouble for filing a frivolous lawsuit.
The FBI, luckily is more than smart enough to understand forged headers and also knows more about computer viruses than this CEO evidently does. There may be some record in some computer somewhere, but it won't really mean anything.
The real questions are:
1) Is this CEO is the head of the place that *you* work?
and
2) Is he slandering you among other people?
If he is the CEO of your company and he decides to have you fired or something, then you may have a wrongful termination case. If he's going around telling other people about how you wrote this virus and sent it to him, then that's slander (assuming you didn't actually do it...), which is grounds under which you could sue him. In either case, consulting a lawyer may be a good idea.
Probably the best thing is to take the high road and ignore it.
Finally, something I know about! This is what I do for a living.
The fact of the matter is that most of the large emerging packet telephony networks are not being deployed in enterprises, but in the carrier networks -- telephone companies around the world are replacing their old circuit-switched back-haul networks for packet-switched networks, either ATM or IP. These are private networks which are not open to the general public, and so do not have the same risks as, say running VoIP on the internet would. Sure, the telcos still need to watch out for attackers... it's just that you've raised the bar far enough that 'script kiddies' would have a tough time.
The article also has an over-simplified view of the effort needed to tap an IP phone call. Even if the user were able to mirror any port on the network onto his computer, he still has the extremely hard task of figuring out which port(s) he needs to monitor -- they typically change on a per-call basis, and the user would actually have to mirror two ports (one for each direction of speech) in order to get the entire call. Now, it can be done, but it's difficult. And, it's made even harder because the signalling path (the communication link that handles setting up calls) is usually encrypted, so it becomes impossible to distinguish among calls.
1) Pawn shop. You would be amazed at how many Diamonds are there. See the pawn shop FAQs for information on how to shop there.
2) Non-mall reputable dealer. There are a few of these around usually in some hole-in-the-wall shop. I bought my wife's diamond from one 6 years ago -- they had a 1-year money back warranty that they honored for a friend of mine without a problem, and were much less expensive than mall stores.
Whatever you do, buy a certified stone -- it's the only way to get an objective measure of the 4 C's which you can use to compare prices among jewelers.
Whatever you do, stay away fromt he stores in the mall. Their overhead is higher, due to rent and glitz, their return policies generally stink, and they often employ people who don't know what they're talking about.
To counteract some of the (apparently uninformed) negative comments I've seen, check out this article on the same subject from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
So, I may be missing something, but...
What authority does Microsoft or the BSA (or any private enterprise, for that matter) have to come in and 'audit' some business, government entity or charity? I can understand it if they have probable cause and go in under a warrent, accompanying law enforcement. But, just choosing a school district and saying "I'm going to audit you"? Why doesn't the district just say "Go to hell"? It seems to me that Microsoft has as much right to do that as Madonna does to come into my house and 'audit' my music collection for illegal copies of her music.
Sure, piracy is a big problem for the software industry, but there still needs to be some reasonable evidence of wrongdoing before you can inflict a search on somebody.
Now is absolutely not a good time for a recent grad to be looking for a job. This is especially true since every company that normally hires new-grads has likely already filled their positions. It is the end of May, after all.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
There are some things that you can do to help get a CS job -- you're on the right track, more/less with the idea of getting some more education. I don't think that the actual certification is worth much more than a statement of "I have some initiative," though. I certainly don't pay much attention to it when I interview candidates.
As previously pointed out, it's a buyers market, and so those companies that do have jobs are going to have their choice of people. Frankly, the fact that you don't have a job now is a strike against getting one soon -- there's a hidden bias that says "Well, nobody's wanted him yet. Should I take a chance?"
Things to do? Find a small handful of companies who have hired your friends, and who are either hiring now, or will be soon. Learn as much as you possibly can about the company and their products. That way, when you do get an interview, you'll be able to talk intelligently -- that, by itself, can wow them.
Don't stay unemployed -- find something else to do related to your field. Write open-source software to create a name for yourself (and learn something in the process); go back to grad school and wait the job market out; Travel -- at least when they ask 'why is he still unemployed,' the answer can be 'he was backpacking across Europe', and not 'he was being turned down by 30 other companies.'
So, we've done this with off-shore contractors. The tips I have are...
1. Hand over independent projects. The more interaction their part has with everybody else, the greater the chance of problems. The communications differences are going to cause issues if there's a lot of interaction with the rest of the project.
2. Be very explicit on requirements. Nail down the exact behavior of what you want their software to do. Be explicit about the development environment and the target environment.
3. Avoid giving them tasks that you'll need to modify heavily for the next release, because they likely won't design with the next release in mind (the next release's requirements are likely not explicit yet. See #2 above.)
4. As much as you can, try to interview the people who you'll be dealing with. With remote development, it's all the more important that you get smart people.
5. frequent milestones -- since you're not there, you have no real way to tell where they are on your schedule, unless you have a set of milestones that they need to meet. Build meeting the milestones into the compensation plan.
So, the point is to segregate their development from the US development as much as possible. Work to minimize communications problems. Take strong measures to measure progress.
It's quite possible to get good work out of off-shore development. But, it'll take a lot of work on your end as well.
I hope you're not talking about re-writing existing code to use STL instead of the equivilent C++ libraries. That sounds like a great way to introduce insideous bugs in your code. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
In our development team, we have people who prefer RW, others who prefer the STL and others who are agnostic. In general, we've had a very good experience getting them to work together. Sure, it tends to lead to larger executables, but that's not a particularly big issue for us.
One thing that I haven't seen others talk about is that the two do not necessarily perform equivilent functions. The STL provides a bunch of templates, and RogueWave provides a bunch of useful classes, some of which are templates. RWTime, for example, has no equivilent in the STL.
Also, if you want to use other RW libraries (such as their threading stuff), then you're going to need to use some of the base RW stuff anyway.
Actually, the SIP protocol (Developed by the IETF) is a very decentralized method for initiating VoIP sessions without going through any specific centralized resource. You just say "I want to establish a phone link with the person 'my_friend@someisp.net', and Voila! In fact, that person doesn't even need to be logged on via his home account -- he can be at work or on vacation somewhere.
So, this is my field of expertise... To answer some questions/comments...
1. Why?
-- Cost and features. It costs the same amount for the phone company to run 4 or 8 lines to your house as it does 1. Features like 3WC, call waiting, etc... don't require special equipment.
-- You don't have to have seperate phone and data networks (more important in businesses, where they actually own/lease phone equipment.)
2. Latency
Latency on a phone call is generally noticable above 120ms or so (1/8th of a second). VoIP calls typically split audio into 10ms (or smaller) packets, which have maybe a 30ms buffer. Add some propagation delay and you're still well under 120ms.
3. Gateways
Yes! Equipment providers have gateways to translate between packet and traditional TDM networks. All different sizes, including home gateways that have a packet interface on one end and plug into your home phone network on the other.
4. PPP over VoIP
Ick. It *can* be done, but generally isn't a good idea. Wastes bandwidth. (You could then run VoIP over PPP over VoIP again...) For 99% of the cases, you're just going to data over the base IP network.
5. traditional Telcos response
Most major telcos have slowed their growth in TDM equipment in favor of VoIP/VoATM equipment. (Sprint just announced a > $1B deal for this equipment recently.) Fact is that telephone switches are expensive and naturally low bandwidth. Growth is in high bandwidth services, so moving to a data network makes a lot more sense.
6 Why no 911?
That's just a problem with this particular implementation, not of VoIP in general. For even more arcane reasons, 911 uses a specific type of digital trunk and requires a special gateway to talk to that trunk. There are ways around it.
7 What about spotty cable modem service?
That's a problem. Broadband needs to be something that you don't think about before you'd hook your phone line up to it. It's coming, but isn't there yet for a lot of people.