The progressive sites I read have been making a big point that these were ALLEGED terrorist videos. A few clearly were, were also violations of the guidelines, and were removed.
The rest? Not so clear, and google did the right thing in punting.
The alternative is to reduce the internet to the equivalence of the "no fly list". You want to post something? Sorry, but someone in the government says that it violates some rules. Can't tell you what those rules are -- you would just work around them. Can't give you a way to appeal the decision. Can't even let you bitch about the decision -- that in itself would be supporting terrorism. Donchaknow. But don't worry, we can trust the government.
The lunar missions were actually pretty straightforward. You had to have a solid knowledge of physics and/or engineering to understand the math, but Newtonian mechanics has been understood for a LONG time and by the lunar missions it was mostly a question of getting accurate values for the constants.
They still got it wrong, btw. The control system on the lunar lander was unstable on the first few missions, but fortunately nobody tripped it. I think I read that it would have been non-survivable.
On the other issue... you're right that there are a lot of people who never develop the mental skills needed to stand alone. On the other hand, a lot of people never developed them before either. They didn't use their tools available to them either. They often didn't see problems even when you pointed it out to them.
And... when you get down to it, they were still (mostly) good enough for their jobs. 99% of the tasks are boring drudge work (relatively speaking) and you don't need the full set of tools you need to do the most critical work. More power to them, as long as they know when they're over their head.
That's why I'm a big fan of static analysis etc. It won't weaken skills that much, overall, and should dramatically improve the quality of the code when used appropriately.
Unless you're looking for a job that requires explicit CS skills (e.g., writing compilers), probably 0.1% of them, then the fact that you have "CS skills" is pretty much beside the point.
What I care about when interviewing people, and most of the companies I have worked for(*), is whether you can think. Can you easily see the effects of your decisions? Can you get the bigger picture easily? Can you effectively communicate your thoughts?
That's why the best developers (in my experience) have usually had non-CS degrees. English majors, pre-law, math or engineering, etc. It's easier for these people to pick up languages and technology than for somebody focused purely on technical subjects to pick up the other skills.
But... the devil is in the details. A good school will force you to develop these skills regardless of your major. Some fun jobs do require you to have the CS theory down cold. But maybe you'll want to go into a different direction after a few years in the workplace, or even after just a few years of ugrad school.
(*) On the other hand some companies are buzz-word driven, especially with people of relatively little experience. I think they get second-tier employees, but that's just my opinion. Of course small teams will always need people with strong matching skills, but that's a different situation.
I thought WIMPs (weakly-interacting massive particles) and MACHOs (whatever) had been essentially ruled out by exclusion in various experiments. That leaves a new form of non-baronic matter that doesn't interact with itself, baronic matter or light except through gravity.
You might not trigger the action, but at some point these sites are going to host something that will bring down full military action and that will be the end of them. It's just not worth the bad PR at the moment, but I heard it was close after 9/11. Few people would have cried for them if it turned out that their hosted systems had detailed information on a nearly-launched successor.
On the other hand, by the same logic they might have already been compromised by one or more governments under the threat of such military force. It's not like you can sue them if they lied to you about not cooperating -- where is the jurisdiction if part of your argument is that you believed them to be sovereign entities?
What I am doing is studying for CAPM (certified associate of program management), the experience-less version of the PMP certification that's increasingly required of project managers. You'll still need formal training in project management, but a few reputable online courses can satisfy that requirement. (e.g., check out http://ed2go.com/ for online courses affiliated with community college professional development programs.)
This means three things:
First, I'm learning a lot more about the business side of things. Correction, about how the business side of things -should- be done. It's not always what I expected.
Second, I'm learning skills that I can apply to my own technical work. We all get into ruts of 'knowing what works' and not feeling like we have the time or opportunity to check out alternatives. This is forcing me to take a fresh look at things.
Finally, it shows you're serious. It's one thing to say you would like to be an IT manager, it's a very different way to show you've taken SMART steps towards it. SMART is a business acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant (or Realistic) and Time-bound -- five critical questions in management. If you can't manage your own attempt at a promotion, why should anyone give you a chance to manage anything else?
IANAL, but I've seen this argument before, based on case law involving things like safe combinations and lock keys. In a nutshell the courts threw it out since the safe combination, key, etc., are not intrinsically incriminating. The contents of the safe might incriminate you, but they aren't -you- and fall under the Fourth, not Fifth, Amendment. That means they have to be turned over given a legal search warrant. This is the same logic that allows cops to seize money "suspected" of being involved in a crime (e.g., as potential payment for drugs) and putting the burden on you to prove its "innocence". (I strongly disagree with that interpretation of the law, btw, even though I can see merit in the argument that safe combinations are not intrinsically incriminating.)
I don't know if anyone has ever tried dipping a lock key in the victim's blood and claiming that that protected it from seizure. It probably wouldn't work, again, since it's something that is not the person himself. I suspect the same logic would apply to a passphrase like "I murdered Bob at 12:47 on Tuesday".
As for "forgetting" your encryption keys, again the courts have had to deal with people who "forgot" safe combinations, "lost" lock keys, etc. for generations. Are you ready to spend months in jail on contempt charges? Or face prosecution for obstruction of justice?
You seem to be confusing true debit cards (where you must enter a PIN, can get cash back, etc.) with the credit cards with immediate automatic payment. They're the same piece of plastic and appear to have the same behavior, but are actually very different things.
In fact, that's why you'll often find modest fees associated with 'pin use'. If you use it as a credit card, normal credit card processing fees apply and (iirc) the bank gets a small cut as issuer. If you use it as a debit card, the bank has to take a small hit. That's why you're usually out some cash if you use your ATM card at a 'foreign' bank. (Nicked a buck or two by your bank -and- by the ATM's bank.) The banks want to encourage credit card use over debit card use, so they'll add a small charge to the latter. Merchants want to encourage debit card use (since they'll get the full amount, iirc) so you might get a small promotion to use it as a debit card.
Remember that this could have been any of us. Database entries can (and are) be wrong due to the offender lying, the clerk misentering the data, people moving in houses where offenders previously lived, etc.
Look at the father's behavior, not the sordid details of his victim. How would you feel if he had killed a law-abiding firefighter? Teacher of the year? Doctor? Why does/should this matter -- our laws don't make people 'fair game' just because they have a criminal past or work at a minimum wage job at McDonalds.
The bottom line is that he committed premeditated murder in cold blood. We have to remember that it could have been any of us... and that "understanding" his actions will encourage other vigilantes since we say it's a defensible act.
[Sorry if this is a dup of my earlier comments -- my first post didn't show up]
The 30 minute recommendations were actually a compromise with the reality of how people would react to being told to exercise for 60 minutes/day. It might keep you from gaining weight, but you wouldn't lose any.
Some cutting-edge research says you flat-out need strength training to lose weight, that cardio won't cut it, long-term.
I still don't get why people think exercise makes them hungry, though. I (and everyone I know) lose my appetite, and in fact a total loss of appetite is a good indicator of overtraining.
It was an interview with the author of Mindless Eating. It's a very interesting book and really nails how it's so easy to overeat unless you have strong cues that you're 'done'. Small plates and 'sandwich' baggies are your friend.
The problem isn't remembering to change the 'sa' account password, or using an encrypted connection. It's the possibility of exploits that don't require account access at all. Hidden backdoors, DOS attacks by flooding the port with connection requests, even deliberately sending bad packets that take down the server. That's why you want the minimum necessary exposure for servers even if you have strong access controls within the application.
That said, I agree with everyone who says that you should also set up good security on the database server. E.g., the accounts with remote access may be limited to read-only views with stored procedures to create/modify records. This limits the damage even if somebody manages to get remote access since they can't just truncate tables or do blanket updates -- they have to trigger the correct stored procedures.
You are wrong. This isn't a question of whether people are seen in public, it's whether their image (and statements) are being used for commercial purposes. Advertising is, by definition, a commercial purpose. With very few exceptions (e.g., legitimate news coverage) you have to get written permission before you can use anyone's likeness or words for commercial purposes.
For an analogy, go to a stock photo site that accepts pictures from the public, e.g., iStockPhoto. They really drive home the fact that you have to get written permission from everyone in the photo, and provide a copy for every single picture. (You don't need it from people who are unrecognizable.) You also have to be careful about infringing on other IP, including such subtle things as the fonts used in signs. Every so often you'll hear of companies having to yank campaigns or products because they didn't have the necessary permissions (or documentation for same). There was even a recent case where the photographer did get signed releases from the subject, but it turned out that they were minors (17) and the father objected to their commercial use and the product had to be yanked. It's a real issue that can cost real money if you skimp on it.
On the other handle, Google created a stink with their cityscape photos, but in that case it was noncommercial use.
The facebook EULA -might- CTA, but I wouldn't count on it until it's been before a few courts. There's just a very different feel to the commercial use. For instance, would that EULA permit advertisers to make up quotes (which you definitely do with stock photos in advertising campaigns)? Would it permit them to hold up users for ridicule, e.g., as somebody in desperate need of zit medicine or grooming advice? As others have pointed out, would it cover image manipulation like putting somebody's head on a model's nude body? (Which may not be a good thing if it's a model for a weight loss product, 'before' shot.)
It's also an issue if you're tall or short. Weight goes up as the cube of your size, but the BMI only goes up by the square. So somebody who's 10% taller than average (say a bit under 6" for a guy) should naturally have a BMI range about 10% larger as well. Shoehorning him into BMI 25 is roughly akin to demanding the average guy get under BMI 22.5.
(This is all approximate, of course, but so's the BMI in general. The bottom line is that a single BMI for all heights is the cleanest public health message, but it should be tempered when you're talking about individuals.)
Shorter people have the opposite problem. They might think they're well within the recommended range at BMI 25, but in fact they should be staying under BMI 22.5. This gives them a false sense of security.
BTW, I've seen a similiar message come into vogue recently. Men should have a waist under 40" (by some experts), or under 35" (by the guys who wrote "You on a Diet".) I understand and accept the general premise, but the guy at 5'7" is going to still be a little chubby while I (at 6'2") would be showing some serious ribs.
Unacceptably low-end for modern software? Huh? I do some development at home, but other than that nearly all of my time is spent either reading email or surfing the web. Neither is particularly heavy.
And I'm happy with my bottom-end MicroCenter PCs that cost under $300, even with the development work. I did double the memory to 1GB, but that was the only change for two years. (Last week I decided to add a low-end NVIDIA card.)
I'll grant you that it's not a great choice for playing movies, and would undoubtably suck as a game platform, but for a lot of people that system would easily satisfy their needs and is far more affordable than the crap I've seen pushed at the same market -- get a 'name brand' pc for only $19.99/week for a year!
So is it for everyone? No. Is it a good choice for a lot of people? Yes.
The 'press' is specifically listed in the First Amendment (which is itself 'first' for a reason) because the framers of the Constitution knew that democracy was meaningless without an informed electorate. Sure, you may have the right to go down to the courthouse to go through stacks of files, but do you have the time? The ability to find experts who can help you interpret the results?
Still don't think it's that important? Look at its peers: freedom of speech (and more importantly, the freedom to openly dissent from the government's stand), freedom of assembly (to organize for peaceful political purposes, and at least as importantly to exclude unwanted representatives of the government), freedom of religion (after coming from a system where the monarch ruled by divine right and you had to be a member of that church to serve in public office, attend university, start a business, etc.), and freedom to seek redress from the government (for when you believe it has done you harm).
So yeah, the "press" as in CNN or Faux News, isn't enshrined in the constitution. But the Constitution clearly protects the idea of the citizenry having the right to investigate the acts of the government and report those findings to others.
P.S., this doesn't mean that reporters can break the law casually. But courts need to give serious consideration to constitutional issues. It is not uncommon for acts to be unlawful (breaking the letter of the law) but legal (satisfying the greater needs of the law). As an example you might encounter today, nobody but an idiot would argue that you should not run a red light (law) if you can do it safely and, by doing so, open up space for an emergency vehicle to pass. That one drove my father, a firefighter, up the wall since so many people refused to bulge.
Check out Daily Kos (http://dailykos.com) yesterday. Some idiot 'with a press card' was basically making the same point, and specifically named Markos ('kos') as an example.
Oops. As Markos points out, the critic didn't even bother to click the 'About' button where he would learn that he has an undergraduate degree in journalism, has actually worked as a paid journalist, and oh yeah also has a law degree. He isn't some guy ranting from his mother's basement.
I've seen this pattern countless times. Someone says a "blogger" isn't qualified, yet even a casual examination shows that the blogger is not only highly qualified, they're often more qualified than their would-be critic.
Does this mean that this is true of all bloggers? Of course not. But at this point I think we've clearly crossed the "better to let 20 murderers walk than hang one innocent man" threshold and bloggers should be treated with respect and as bona fide journalists unless they demonstrate otherwise.
Unrelated note: you do realize, don't you, that Fox News has successfully argued in court that it should not be held accountable for factual errors in its reports because it presents 'opinion and commentary', not 'news', programming? Why are they entitled to 'journalist' protection while people with appropriate experience and/or advanced degrees are held up for ridicule?
One small nit -- they're only GUARANTEED to 100k. In practice I believe they've always covered accounts fully. That makes sense, if your goal is to promote public confidence, while leaving yourself an exit if a major bank fails.
Don't forget that there are multiple aspects to security. You don't want the sleazy competitor sniffing your network, but you don't want them blasting your network out of existence two days before the RFQ is due either. The bad actor could be hard to track down if they're using a highly directional antenna and an illegal amplifier.
I'm pretty sure the OP is thinking about body fat percentage, not BMI. The numbers for women are also fairly low, I thought the recommendation for women of child-bearing age was around 25.
BTW 30% body fat on a guy is not "obscenely high". The person will definitely have a spare tire, but they sadly won't stand out on the streets of most American cities.
BTW the BMI is subtly skewed against tall people. Ditto the "waist under 40 inches" rule.
The reason is simple -- the square-cube law. Your weight goes up by the cube of your height (so someone 10% taller is probably 30% heavier), while your cross-section only goes up by the square of your height. Waist size goes up linearly. This rule doesn't apply on large changes (you'll need changes in bone structures and musculature, etc.), but it's good enough for the variability you see in adult humans.
If you work out the numbers, you come up with the BMI being 'off' by about the person's height. That means that a 30 BMI for a guy at 5'8" (average height for calculations?) should correspond to approx 33 BMI for somebody who's 6'3" (one in twenty guys under 40?). Likewise for him to get under 30 BMI will be like his shorter peer getting under 27 BMI. Same thing applies on the 40" waist 'rule' -- a 40" waist on somebody 5'8" will be about 44" on somebody 6'3".
So flat fees are going to hit tall guys unreasonably hard... but our short peers still have a far worse deal. They get a false sense of security since their numbers appear to be good.
(The other benefit is that waist isn't the only thing that scales up!)
A book was published about a year ago, "Mindless Eating". It discussed the various factors that cause us to overeat and undereat. (The latter is a serious problem in combat situations in the military. It's one thing for a civilian to lose 20 pounds of fat, it's another thing for a fighting soldier to lose 20 pounds of muscle.)
It's easy to say "eat less/eat healthier", but that requires far more attention than you realize. Marketers are NOT trying to get you to eat poorly, they just want you to buy from them instead of the competitor. If everyone wanted broccoli, there would be broccoli stands on every corner.
Most people want something fast, cheap and filling. Chains have tried introducing healthier fare periodically (e.g., Taco Bell had 'lite' choices for awhile), but they weren't popular enough to be economically viable. But offer a larger standard drink or more fries and your sales climb, so you get a downward spiral that results in a pound of french fries and people drinking 64 ounces of soda.
Worse, this "renormalizes" what people expect. Did you know that coke bottles were originally 8 fl oz? Then pepsi introduced a standard 10 fl oz bottle as a marketing gimmick. Vending machines stabilized things at 12 oz for a while (since you had to stay at the standard size to be sold in the machine), but fast food restaurants competed with each other with larger and larger cups, free refills, etc. You could always buy a smaller size but that's psychologically hard when you get half as much drink but pay nearly the same price.
Ditto coffee. It used to be a cup or two in the morning, perhaps with a bit of cream. Then Starbucks came into the market and the sizes have not only increased, the amount of fat and sugar has exploded. People who would never consider drinking a milk shake every day (or even twice a day!) do this without thinking twice when it's a fancy Starbucks drink. If you want a cup (8 oz) of black coffee... good luck!
I think the most telling story was some guy at a yard sale(?) who asked if the seller had any more dinner plates in a set from the 40s. He was holding a serving platter. Historically dinner plates were around 8", but now they're usually 12" (iirc), or over twice as much area. People tend to fill their plates so we're eating a lot more food without thinking about it. Now look at sit-down restaurant chains (Chili's, Olive Garden, etc.) They're selling presentation so they use larger plates than you have at home, and they fill those plates. It's not an exaggeration to say that they serve 3 or 4 solid servings, nutritionally speaking.
This is gradual enough that most people aren't aware that it's happening, but we are eating a lot more food and finding it harder to eat the correct portions. How often have you seen a 6'+ adult order from the child's menu?
Does this excuse people from TRYING? No, of course not. But arrogant "people should know better" tirades don't help since changes requires us to be aware of the subtle changes that have lead us to the current selections and portion sizes.
Stored procedures are bits of code (previously database-specific, but there's often support for java, perl and python now) that are stored in the database and can be executed by the server. There are at least three times when they're a Really Good Idea:
1. when you want to make sure something is always done despite lazy or even hostile users. You attach the SP to standard operations. E.g., it's common to set a 'last modified date' on every insert and update to a table. Depending on the DB you could even do fancy stuff like sending an alarm when certain actions are performed. You can even support things like updateable views this way.
2. when you want to really lock down your database. You can revoke 'insert' and 'update' rights from everyone and force them to go through a stored procedure to insert/update data. No risk of SQL injection, you can do arbitrarily complex input validation, etc.
3. when you want to perform complex aggregation operations. I had a problem where I needed to create a table that contained the rolling average of the 30 most recent values for each date. It was much faster (orders of magnitude faster) to do this in a SP than programmatically on a client.
Many DB also allow you to create 'user-defined functions' and 'user-defined types', albeit at a far higher integration cost. The first allows you to add C functions to the database server itself. This would allow you to perform fairly complex operations, but the need for it has dropped significantly with direct support for perl/java/etc., but you can still use them when you don't want to make it easy for somebody to alter your procedures.
The latter (with appropriate user-defined functions) allow you to create new first-order objects in your database. E.g., I've written a user-defined type that can hold digital certificates and wrapped encryption keys. Standard databases can always store them as blobs, but with the UDT I can provide an extremely powerful set of tools to the stored procedures and sql queries.
There's an argument that this is actually PRO-consumer since it makes it possible for businesses to compete on the basis of quality and service instead of being forced to compete on price alone. Price-only competition is surprisingly corrosive since there really is no middle ground on many things -- even if you're willing to pay a 50% markup for quality (and it really is cheaper to pay 50% more if the product lasts twice as long) there's not enough other people to make it economically viable in most cases. Look at t-shirts. You have really cheap junk at Walmart, shirts from other stores that can't charge much more than Walmart so their quality has also suffered, and the $100 designer shirts. No middle ground with good fabric but no handstitching.
I'm not sure I buy this argument, no pun intended, but the race to the bottom has got to stop. I know it's in Walmart's interest that I need to buy a new tv every two years, but it's not in mine.
(Sidenote: I've never entered Walmart/Sam's Club due to this policy and the way they mistreat their employees. Costco, baby, Costco!)
Slashdot Mirror
The progressive sites I read have been making a big point that these were ALLEGED terrorist videos. A few clearly were, were also violations of the guidelines, and were removed.
The rest? Not so clear, and google did the right thing in punting.
The alternative is to reduce the internet to the equivalence of the "no fly list". You want to post something? Sorry, but someone in the government says that it violates some rules. Can't tell you what those rules are -- you would just work around them. Can't give you a way to appeal the decision. Can't even let you bitch about the decision -- that in itself would be supporting terrorism. Donchaknow. But don't worry, we can trust the government.
The lunar missions were actually pretty straightforward. You had to have a solid knowledge of physics and/or engineering to understand the math, but Newtonian mechanics has been understood for a LONG time and by the lunar missions it was mostly a question of getting accurate values for the constants.
They still got it wrong, btw. The control system on the lunar lander was unstable on the first few missions, but fortunately nobody tripped it. I think I read that it would have been non-survivable.
On the other issue... you're right that there are a lot of people who never develop the mental skills needed to stand alone. On the other hand, a lot of people never developed them before either. They didn't use their tools available to them either. They often didn't see problems even when you pointed it out to them.
And... when you get down to it, they were still (mostly) good enough for their jobs. 99% of the tasks are boring drudge work (relatively speaking) and you don't need the full set of tools you need to do the most critical work. More power to them, as long as they know when they're over their head.
That's why I'm a big fan of static analysis etc. It won't weaken skills that much, overall, and should dramatically improve the quality of the code when used appropriately.
Unless you're looking for a job that requires explicit CS skills (e.g., writing compilers), probably 0.1% of them, then the fact that you have "CS skills" is pretty much beside the point.
What I care about when interviewing people, and most of the companies I have worked for(*), is whether you can think. Can you easily see the effects of your decisions? Can you get the bigger picture easily? Can you effectively communicate your thoughts?
That's why the best developers (in my experience) have usually had non-CS degrees. English majors, pre-law, math or engineering, etc. It's easier for these people to pick up languages and technology than for somebody focused purely on technical subjects to pick up the other skills.
But... the devil is in the details. A good school will force you to develop these skills regardless of your major. Some fun jobs do require you to have the CS theory down cold. But maybe you'll want to go into a different direction after a few years in the workplace, or even after just a few years of ugrad school.
(*) On the other hand some companies are buzz-word driven, especially with people of relatively little experience. I think they get second-tier employees, but that's just my opinion. Of course small teams will always need people with strong matching skills, but that's a different situation.
I thought WIMPs (weakly-interacting massive particles) and MACHOs (whatever) had been essentially ruled out by exclusion in various experiments. That leaves a new form of non-baronic matter that doesn't interact with itself, baronic matter or light except through gravity.
You might not trigger the action, but at some point these sites are going to host something that will bring down full military action and that will be the end of them. It's just not worth the bad PR at the moment, but I heard it was close after 9/11. Few people would have cried for them if it turned out that their hosted systems had detailed information on a nearly-launched successor.
On the other hand, by the same logic they might have already been compromised by one or more governments under the threat of such military force. It's not like you can sue them if they lied to you about not cooperating -- where is the jurisdiction if part of your argument is that you believed them to be sovereign entities?
What I am doing is studying for CAPM (certified associate of program management), the experience-less version of the PMP certification that's increasingly required of project managers. You'll still need formal training in project management, but a few reputable online courses can satisfy that requirement. (e.g., check out http://ed2go.com/ for online courses affiliated with community college professional development programs.)
This means three things:
First, I'm learning a lot more about the business side of things. Correction, about how the business side of things -should- be done. It's not always what I expected.
Second, I'm learning skills that I can apply to my own technical work. We all get into ruts of 'knowing what works' and not feeling like we have the time or opportunity to check out alternatives. This is forcing me to take a fresh look at things.
Finally, it shows you're serious. It's one thing to say you would like to be an IT manager, it's a very different way to show you've taken SMART steps towards it. SMART is a business acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant (or Realistic) and Time-bound -- five critical questions in management. If you can't manage your own attempt at a promotion, why should anyone give you a chance to manage anything else?
IANAL, but I've seen this argument before, based on case law involving things like safe combinations and lock keys. In a nutshell the courts threw it out since the safe combination, key, etc., are not intrinsically incriminating. The contents of the safe might incriminate you, but they aren't -you- and fall under the Fourth, not Fifth, Amendment. That means they have to be turned over given a legal search warrant. This is the same logic that allows cops to seize money "suspected" of being involved in a crime (e.g., as potential payment for drugs) and putting the burden on you to prove its "innocence". (I strongly disagree with that interpretation of the law, btw, even though I can see merit in the argument that safe combinations are not intrinsically incriminating.)
I don't know if anyone has ever tried dipping a lock key in the victim's blood and claiming that that protected it from seizure. It probably wouldn't work, again, since it's something that is not the person himself. I suspect the same logic would apply to a passphrase like "I murdered Bob at 12:47 on Tuesday".
As for "forgetting" your encryption keys, again the courts have had to deal with people who "forgot" safe combinations, "lost" lock keys, etc. for generations. Are you ready to spend months in jail on contempt charges? Or face prosecution for obstruction of justice?
You seem to be confusing true debit cards (where you must enter a PIN, can get cash back, etc.) with the credit cards with immediate automatic payment. They're the same piece of plastic and appear to have the same behavior, but are actually very different things.
In fact, that's why you'll often find modest fees associated with 'pin use'. If you use it as a credit card, normal credit card processing fees apply and (iirc) the bank gets a small cut as issuer. If you use it as a debit card, the bank has to take a small hit. That's why you're usually out some cash if you use your ATM card at a 'foreign' bank. (Nicked a buck or two by your bank -and- by the ATM's bank.) The banks want to encourage credit card use over debit card use, so they'll add a small charge to the latter. Merchants want to encourage debit card use (since they'll get the full amount, iirc) so you might get a small promotion to use it as a debit card.
Remember that this could have been any of us. Database entries can (and are) be wrong due to the offender lying, the clerk misentering the data, people moving in houses where offenders previously lived, etc.
Look at the father's behavior, not the sordid details of his victim. How would you feel if he had killed a law-abiding firefighter? Teacher of the year? Doctor? Why does/should this matter -- our laws don't make people 'fair game' just because they have a criminal past or work at a minimum wage job at McDonalds.
The bottom line is that he committed premeditated murder in cold blood. We have to remember that it could have been any of us... and that "understanding" his actions will encourage other vigilantes since we say it's a defensible act.
[Sorry if this is a dup of my earlier comments -- my first post didn't show up]
The 30 minute recommendations were actually a compromise with the reality of how people would react to being told to exercise for 60 minutes/day. It might keep you from gaining weight, but you wouldn't lose any.
Some cutting-edge research says you flat-out need strength training to lose weight, that cardio won't cut it, long-term.
I still don't get why people think exercise makes them hungry, though. I (and everyone I know) lose my appetite, and in fact a total loss of appetite is a good indicator of overtraining.
It was an interview with the author of Mindless Eating. It's a very interesting book and really nails how it's so easy to overeat unless you have strong cues that you're 'done'. Small plates and 'sandwich' baggies are your friend.
The problem isn't remembering to change the 'sa' account password, or using an encrypted connection. It's the possibility of exploits that don't require account access at all. Hidden backdoors, DOS attacks by flooding the port with connection requests, even deliberately sending bad packets that take down the server. That's why you want the minimum necessary exposure for servers even if you have strong access controls within the application.
That said, I agree with everyone who says that you should also set up good security on the database server. E.g., the accounts with remote access may be limited to read-only views with stored procedures to create/modify records. This limits the damage even if somebody manages to get remote access since they can't just truncate tables or do blanket updates -- they have to trigger the correct stored procedures.
Some databases support encrypted connections. I believe postgresql does.
You are wrong. This isn't a question of whether people are seen in public, it's whether their image (and statements) are being used for commercial purposes. Advertising is, by definition, a commercial purpose. With very few exceptions (e.g., legitimate news coverage) you have to get written permission before you can use anyone's likeness or words for commercial purposes.
For an analogy, go to a stock photo site that accepts pictures from the public, e.g., iStockPhoto. They really drive home the fact that you have to get written permission from everyone in the photo, and provide a copy for every single picture. (You don't need it from people who are unrecognizable.) You also have to be careful about infringing on other IP, including such subtle things as the fonts used in signs. Every so often you'll hear of companies having to yank campaigns or products because they didn't have the necessary permissions (or documentation for same). There was even a recent case where the photographer did get signed releases from the subject, but it turned out that they were minors (17) and the father objected to their commercial use and the product had to be yanked. It's a real issue that can cost real money if you skimp on it.
On the other handle, Google created a stink with their cityscape photos, but in that case it was noncommercial use.
The facebook EULA -might- CTA, but I wouldn't count on it until it's been before a few courts. There's just a very different feel to the commercial use. For instance, would that EULA permit advertisers to make up quotes (which you definitely do with stock photos in advertising campaigns)? Would it permit them to hold up users for ridicule, e.g., as somebody in desperate need of zit medicine or grooming advice? As others have pointed out, would it cover image manipulation like putting somebody's head on a model's nude body? (Which may not be a good thing if it's a model for a weight loss product, 'before' shot.)
It's also an issue if you're tall or short. Weight goes up as the cube of your size, but the BMI only goes up by the square. So somebody who's 10% taller than average (say a bit under 6" for a guy) should naturally have a BMI range about 10% larger as well. Shoehorning him into BMI 25 is roughly akin to demanding the average guy get under BMI 22.5.
(This is all approximate, of course, but so's the BMI in general. The bottom line is that a single BMI for all heights is the cleanest public health message, but it should be tempered when you're talking about individuals.)
Shorter people have the opposite problem. They might think they're well within the recommended range at BMI 25, but in fact they should be staying under BMI 22.5. This gives them a false sense of security.
BTW, I've seen a similiar message come into vogue recently. Men should have a waist under 40" (by some experts), or under 35" (by the guys who wrote "You on a Diet".) I understand and accept the general premise, but the guy at 5'7" is going to still be a little chubby while I (at 6'2") would be showing some serious ribs.
Unacceptably low-end for modern software? Huh? I do some development at home, but other than that nearly all of my time is spent either reading email or surfing the web. Neither is particularly heavy.
And I'm happy with my bottom-end MicroCenter PCs that cost under $300, even with the development work. I did double the memory to 1GB, but that was the only change for two years. (Last week I decided to add a low-end NVIDIA card.)
I'll grant you that it's not a great choice for playing movies, and would undoubtably suck as a game platform, but for a lot of people that system would easily satisfy their needs and is far more affordable than the crap I've seen pushed at the same market -- get a 'name brand' pc for only $19.99/week for a year!
So is it for everyone? No. Is it a good choice for a lot of people? Yes.
The 'press' is specifically listed in the First Amendment (which is itself 'first' for a reason) because the framers of the Constitution knew that democracy was meaningless without an informed electorate. Sure, you may have the right to go down to the courthouse to go through stacks of files, but do you have the time? The ability to find experts who can help you interpret the results?
Still don't think it's that important? Look at its peers: freedom of speech (and more importantly, the freedom to openly dissent from the government's stand), freedom of assembly (to organize for peaceful political purposes, and at least as importantly to exclude unwanted representatives of the government), freedom of religion (after coming from a system where the monarch ruled by divine right and you had to be a member of that church to serve in public office, attend university, start a business, etc.), and freedom to seek redress from the government (for when you believe it has done you harm).
So yeah, the "press" as in CNN or Faux News, isn't enshrined in the constitution. But the Constitution clearly protects the idea of the citizenry having the right to investigate the acts of the government and report those findings to others.
P.S., this doesn't mean that reporters can break the law casually. But courts need to give serious consideration to constitutional issues. It is not uncommon for acts to be unlawful (breaking the letter of the law) but legal (satisfying the greater needs of the law). As an example you might encounter today, nobody but an idiot would argue that you should not run a red light (law) if you can do it safely and, by doing so, open up space for an emergency vehicle to pass. That one drove my father, a firefighter, up the wall since so many people refused to bulge.
Check out Daily Kos (http://dailykos.com) yesterday. Some idiot 'with a press card' was basically making the same point, and specifically named Markos ('kos') as an example.
Oops. As Markos points out, the critic didn't even bother to click the 'About' button where he would learn that he has an undergraduate degree in journalism, has actually worked as a paid journalist, and oh yeah also has a law degree. He isn't some guy ranting from his mother's basement.
I've seen this pattern countless times. Someone says a "blogger" isn't qualified, yet even a casual examination shows that the blogger is not only highly qualified, they're often more qualified than their would-be critic.
Does this mean that this is true of all bloggers? Of course not. But at this point I think we've clearly crossed the "better to let 20 murderers walk than hang one innocent man" threshold and bloggers should be treated with respect and as bona fide journalists unless they demonstrate otherwise.
Unrelated note: you do realize, don't you, that Fox News has successfully argued in court that it should not be held accountable for factual errors in its reports because it presents 'opinion and commentary', not 'news', programming? Why are they entitled to 'journalist' protection while people with appropriate experience and/or advanced degrees are held up for ridicule?
One small nit -- they're only GUARANTEED to 100k. In practice I believe they've always covered accounts fully. That makes sense, if your goal is to promote public confidence, while leaving yourself an exit if a major bank fails.
Don't forget that there are multiple aspects to security. You don't want the sleazy competitor sniffing your network, but you don't want them blasting your network out of existence two days before the RFQ is due either. The bad actor could be hard to track down if they're using a highly directional antenna and an illegal amplifier.
I'm pretty sure the OP is thinking about body fat percentage, not BMI. The numbers for women are also fairly low, I thought the recommendation for women of child-bearing age was around 25.
BTW 30% body fat on a guy is not "obscenely high". The person will definitely have a spare tire, but they sadly won't stand out on the streets of most American cities.
BTW the BMI is subtly skewed against tall people. Ditto the "waist under 40 inches" rule.
The reason is simple -- the square-cube law. Your weight goes up by the cube of your height (so someone 10% taller is probably 30% heavier), while your cross-section only goes up by the square of your height. Waist size goes up linearly. This rule doesn't apply on large changes (you'll need changes in bone structures and musculature, etc.), but it's good enough for the variability you see in adult humans.
If you work out the numbers, you come up with the BMI being 'off' by about the person's height. That means that a 30 BMI for a guy at 5'8" (average height for calculations?) should correspond to approx 33 BMI for somebody who's 6'3" (one in twenty guys under 40?). Likewise for him to get under 30 BMI will be like his shorter peer getting under 27 BMI. Same thing applies on the 40" waist 'rule' -- a 40" waist on somebody 5'8" will be about 44" on somebody 6'3".
So flat fees are going to hit tall guys unreasonably hard... but our short peers still have a far worse deal. They get a false sense of security since their numbers appear to be good.
(The other benefit is that waist isn't the only thing that scales up!)
Somewhat related to a number of the comments....
A book was published about a year ago, "Mindless Eating". It discussed the various factors that cause us to overeat and undereat. (The latter is a serious problem in combat situations in the military. It's one thing for a civilian to lose 20 pounds of fat, it's another thing for a fighting soldier to lose 20 pounds of muscle.)
It's easy to say "eat less/eat healthier", but that requires far more attention than you realize. Marketers are NOT trying to get you to eat poorly, they just want you to buy from them instead of the competitor. If everyone wanted broccoli, there would be broccoli stands on every corner.
Most people want something fast, cheap and filling. Chains have tried introducing healthier fare periodically (e.g., Taco Bell had 'lite' choices for awhile), but they weren't popular enough to be economically viable. But offer a larger standard drink or more fries and your sales climb, so you get a downward spiral that results in a pound of french fries and people drinking 64 ounces of soda.
Worse, this "renormalizes" what people expect. Did you know that coke bottles were originally 8 fl oz? Then pepsi introduced a standard 10 fl oz bottle as a marketing gimmick. Vending machines stabilized things at 12 oz for a while (since you had to stay at the standard size to be sold in the machine), but fast food restaurants competed with each other with larger and larger cups, free refills, etc. You could always buy a smaller size but that's psychologically hard when you get half as much drink but pay nearly the same price.
Ditto coffee. It used to be a cup or two in the morning, perhaps with a bit of cream. Then Starbucks came into the market and the sizes have not only increased, the amount of fat and sugar has exploded. People who would never consider drinking a milk shake every day (or even twice a day!) do this without thinking twice when it's a fancy Starbucks drink. If you want a cup (8 oz) of black coffee... good luck!
I think the most telling story was some guy at a yard sale(?) who asked if the seller had any more dinner plates in a set from the 40s. He was holding a serving platter. Historically dinner plates were around 8", but now they're usually 12" (iirc), or over twice as much area. People tend to fill their plates so we're eating a lot more food without thinking about it. Now look at sit-down restaurant chains (Chili's, Olive Garden, etc.) They're selling presentation so they use larger plates than you have at home, and they fill those plates. It's not an exaggeration to say that they serve 3 or 4 solid servings, nutritionally speaking.
This is gradual enough that most people aren't aware that it's happening, but we are eating a lot more food and finding it harder to eat the correct portions. How often have you seen a 6'+ adult order from the child's menu?
Does this excuse people from TRYING? No, of course not. But arrogant "people should know better" tirades don't help since changes requires us to be aware of the subtle changes that have lead us to the current selections and portion sizes.
Stored procedures are bits of code (previously database-specific, but there's often support for java, perl and python now) that are stored in the database and can be executed by the server. There are at least three times when they're a Really Good Idea:
1. when you want to make sure something is always done despite lazy or even hostile users. You attach the SP to standard operations. E.g., it's common to set a 'last modified date' on every insert and update to a table. Depending on the DB you could even do fancy stuff like sending an alarm when certain actions are performed. You can even support things like updateable views this way.
2. when you want to really lock down your database. You can revoke 'insert' and 'update' rights from everyone and force them to go through a stored procedure to insert/update data. No risk of SQL injection, you can do arbitrarily complex input validation, etc.
3. when you want to perform complex aggregation operations. I had a problem where I needed to create a table that contained the rolling average of the 30 most recent values for each date. It was much faster (orders of magnitude faster) to do this in a SP than programmatically on a client.
Many DB also allow you to create 'user-defined functions' and 'user-defined types', albeit at a far higher integration cost. The first allows you to add C functions to the database server itself. This would allow you to perform fairly complex operations, but the need for it has dropped significantly with direct support for perl/java/etc., but you can still use them when you don't want to make it easy for somebody to alter your procedures.
The latter (with appropriate user-defined functions) allow you to create new first-order objects in your database. E.g., I've written a user-defined type that can hold digital certificates and wrapped encryption keys. Standard databases can always store them as blobs, but with the UDT I can provide an extremely powerful set of tools to the stored procedures and sql queries.
There's an argument that this is actually PRO-consumer since it makes it possible for businesses to compete on the basis of quality and service instead of being forced to compete on price alone. Price-only competition is surprisingly corrosive since there really is no middle ground on many things -- even if you're willing to pay a 50% markup for quality (and it really is cheaper to pay 50% more if the product lasts twice as long) there's not enough other people to make it economically viable in most cases. Look at t-shirts. You have really cheap junk at Walmart, shirts from other stores that can't charge much more than Walmart so their quality has also suffered, and the $100 designer shirts. No middle ground with good fabric but no handstitching.
I'm not sure I buy this argument, no pun intended, but the race to the bottom has got to stop. I know it's in Walmart's interest that I need to buy a new tv every two years, but it's not in mine.
(Sidenote: I've never entered Walmart/Sam's Club due to this policy and the way they mistreat their employees. Costco, baby, Costco!)