I am very critical of Terry Childs actions and think, that those can at least be interpreted as criminal act. But 4 years for such a bagatelle case? What do you do with a real criminal? There was a lot of incompetence on the city side walking around which enabled such a situation. I think he was afraid of loosing his job and overstepped his legal options. But what do you do who does this to steal money or with the intent to cause damage? Shoot him?
People who drive under the influence of alcohol and kill someone get away with less.
I still remember the first version on the C64. And winning on the hardest difficulty settings is one of my fondest computer gaming memories (along with resurfacing once with real a Amulet of Yendor).
Are live failover/load balanced systems covered by the honor code?
It seems to be like this: at a power failure the systems will be turned off. Once the power is restored, they turn the systems one by one. Once everything works, all systems that are still powered off are considered "as spare".
Yes, it is expensive, and yes, it's a pain to have to store and keep track of the spares inventory (which always seems to 'go walkies'), but if you have a demanding SLA, it's the only way to go.
Expensive is not the problem, getting the walkies is... According to customer, they experience a strange "honor code" in third world countries... Operative systems seem to be quite safe, but any spare equipment is fair game (Africa is the biggest problem in this regard). Trying to fool the people by faking spare systems to be operative was also not successful.
Or just blow the budget and have a spare set of equipment at each location. When something dies, take out the replacement that is already there, then worry about shipping a new replacement.
According to the customer, this has been tried and failed... Unused spare equipment has a tendency to vanish.
I don't envy someone with a job like that. It is already very difficult to serve locations less remote. E.g. to offer a SLA for a network which spans over 30 locations in the world, we have to make sure that spare parts arrive around the world within a well defined time frame. We don't want anything fancy: a week would be finde by us. But i haven't found any transportation company that guarantees delivery on site in 3rd world countries (big cities) within that time frame. All make exceptions like "customs", which doesn't help me.
To an external observer it seems, Hollywood has declared cheating the universal principle: actors cheat their wives, wives cheat gravity with upper body parts, businesspartners cheat each other and everyone cheats with his/her taxes....
I only noticed, nobody managed to cheat death yet, but think they will some day:-).
I think this depends how you measure it. During my last vacations i have read about 20 books all stored in my ebook reader. If i would have taken the time to buy/fetch new books every time from a bookstore, i would have read (on average) much slower. Having an automated bookmark for every book also saved a lot of time. So, it depends on the way of measuring:-).... as usual.
As i read it: He was locked out, ignored it mostly for about 2.9 years and got it fixed within a few days. IMHO someone more determined would have been able to resolve the issue in very short time.
Unluckily cross-checking facts about foreign countries is not a high priority on Slashdot. They hope the comments will correct any mistake (as one does here).
CU, Martin
P.S. There is a lot more to this news than it appears. The media moguls are complaining about a new stranglehold threatening their stranglehold on the public opinion. What an irony....
A simple "that's not cool, please take that down" would have resulted in the content being gone from the internet forever, and an employee a bit better educated about what the city is comfortable with. Also, it would have sidestepped this lawsuit. Destroying a career for it, though, is extreme. The only other alternative is to strive as hard as you can to keep any personally identifiable information or photographs off of the internet (how long before ip reverse lookup tables are trivial?), and down that road lies madness.
It seems there has been a list of incidents prior to this incident. If it was justified, i cannot judge, but at least the operator has been suspended twice before. I agree with you, that if nothing else has happened before, a verbal reprimand would be the solution i would approach (and have approached in the past).
Nonwithstanding that, i only argued that it was stupid to make such a joke in such a way on the internet. I still stand by that argument. This happens about 100 times a day. This isn't a newsworthy story.
If i make the joke among friends at my home, that's OK. But making such jokes in public is stupid. It is nearly as stupid as asking "Do you see the bomb?" when passing through the airport security. You don't go on the streets and shout "I am taking drugs". But that comes close to what she has done.
This doesn't disprove that her superiors are fools, nor does it prove it. Usually such events have a backlog that is too complicated to fit in a short post and is therefor omitted. All i can say is: She did something stupid. What amount of punishment is adequate is subject to discussion. It may be unjust, because a lot of people do a lot of stupid things a lot of times and walk away without consequences. But doing stupid things unpunished isn't a right. And that the stupity involved the internet doesn't make the story newsworthy.
While i seriously doubt the adequacy of the punishment, the baseline is the same as in dozens of cases before: "Someone did something terribly stupid in public and now it has consequences for him/her". Facebook, Twitter,/.-posts are not in private space. Accept that and act accordingly.
Tell me you're trying to pull a joke on your non-american readers.... The country that mocks us about cease & decist letters for an open WLAN router is actually using the police to stop you from swearing? I sincerely hope you're just kidding.
Slashdot Mirror
I call it malicious prosecution and unlawful imprisonment.
I do not. I think punishment for Terry Childs is in order, but 4 years are far too much.
CU, Martin
I am very critical of Terry Childs actions and think, that those can at least be interpreted as criminal act. But 4 years for such a bagatelle case? What do you do with a real criminal? There was a lot of incompetence on the city side walking around which enabled such a situation. I think he was afraid of loosing his job and overstepped his legal options. But what do you do who does this to steal money or with the intent to cause damage? Shoot him?
People who drive under the influence of alcohol and kill someone get away with less.
I think the punishment is out of proportion.
CU, Martin
You're correct.... In my mind both machines have merged. I was so sure it was the C64 i didn't bother to check. Now i did...
I still remember the first version on the C64. And winning on the hardest difficulty settings is one of my fondest computer gaming memories (along with resurfacing once with real a Amulet of Yendor).
CU, Martin
Stop this, you're making me do it myself...
Je n'ai jamais entendu les françaises .
During the early area of the internet (around 1990) i held courses and taught new users, how to use the "blank" correctly. Rules were:
People who didn't followed the rule were convicted for excessive blanking.... at least here in germany.
CU, Martin
Just add "Management Incompetence" to the list or add it at least as natural constant.
I don't think there is an airline that doesn't have that one on their list...
Dunno what you're talking about *** Humming United Breaks Guitars ****
Just add "Management Incompetence" to the list or add it at least as natural constant.
Has been tried, only increased the amount of damage done.... The idea to ship it was not done lightly, it's last resort...
Are live failover/load balanced systems covered by the honor code?
It seems to be like this: at a power failure the systems will be turned off. Once the power is restored, they turn the systems one by one. Once everything works, all systems that are still powered off are considered "as spare".
CU, Martin
Yes, it is expensive, and yes, it's a pain to have to store and keep track of the spares inventory (which always seems to 'go walkies'), but if you have a demanding SLA, it's the only way to go.
Expensive is not the problem, getting the walkies is... According to customer, they experience a strange "honor code" in third world countries... Operative systems seem to be quite safe, but any spare equipment is fair game (Africa is the biggest problem in this regard). Trying to fool the people by faking spare systems to be operative was also not successful.
CU, Martin
Or just blow the budget and have a spare set of equipment at each location. When something dies, take out the replacement that is already there, then worry about shipping a new replacement.
According to the customer, this has been tried and failed... Unused spare equipment has a tendency to vanish.
CU, Martin
I don't envy someone with a job like that. It is already very difficult to serve locations less remote. E.g. to offer a SLA for a network which spans over 30 locations in the world, we have to make sure that spare parts arrive around the world within a well defined time frame. We don't want anything fancy: a week would be finde by us. But i haven't found any transportation company that guarantees delivery on site in 3rd world countries (big cities) within that time frame. All make exceptions like "customs", which doesn't help me.
CU, Martin
To an external observer it seems, Hollywood has declared cheating the universal principle: actors cheat their wives, wives cheat gravity with upper body parts, businesspartners cheat each other and everyone cheats with his/her taxes....
I only noticed, nobody managed to cheat death yet, but think they will some day :-).
CU, Martin
I think this depends how you measure it. During my last vacations i have read about 20 books all stored in my ebook reader. If i would have taken the time to buy/fetch new books every time from a bookstore, i would have read (on average) much slower. Having an automated bookmark for every book also saved a lot of time. So, it depends on the way of measuring :-).... as usual.
CU, Martin
Let's See What Happens When Corporations Become Publishers
Aren't most publishers corporations?
Maybe i was lucky. But i am also pretty insistent. Part of my job is escalation of support cases. That gives me a lot of training :-).
CU, Martin
In fact, i have been in contact with Google support twice and all issues have been resolved within days.
As i read it: He was locked out, ignored it mostly for about 2.9 years and got it fixed within a few days. IMHO someone more determined would have been able to resolve the issue in very short time.
CU, Martin
Mod parent up please...
Unluckily cross-checking facts about foreign countries is not a high priority on Slashdot. They hope the comments will correct any mistake (as one does here).
CU, Martin
P.S. There is a lot more to this news than it appears. The media moguls are complaining about a new stranglehold threatening their stranglehold on the public opinion. What an irony ....
A simple "that's not cool, please take that down" would have resulted in the content being gone from the internet forever, and an employee a bit better educated about what the city is comfortable with. Also, it would have sidestepped this lawsuit. Destroying a career for it, though, is extreme. The only other alternative is to strive as hard as you can to keep any personally identifiable information or photographs off of the internet (how long before ip reverse lookup tables are trivial?), and down that road lies madness.
It seems there has been a list of incidents prior to this incident. If it was justified, i cannot judge, but at least the operator has been suspended twice before. I agree with you, that if nothing else has happened before, a verbal reprimand would be the solution i would approach (and have approached in the past).
Nonwithstanding that, i only argued that it was stupid to make such a joke in such a way on the internet. I still stand by that argument. This happens about 100 times a day. This isn't a newsworthy story.
CU, Martin
If i make the joke among friends at my home, that's OK. But making such jokes in public is stupid. It is nearly as stupid as asking "Do you see the bomb?" when passing through the airport security. You don't go on the streets and shout "I am taking drugs". But that comes close to what she has done.
This doesn't disprove that her superiors are fools, nor does it prove it. Usually such events have a backlog that is too complicated to fit in a short post and is therefor omitted. All i can say is: She did something stupid. What amount of punishment is adequate is subject to discussion. It may be unjust, because a lot of people do a lot of stupid things a lot of times and walk away without consequences. But doing stupid things unpunished isn't a right. And that the stupity involved the internet doesn't make the story newsworthy.
CU, Martin
While i seriously doubt the adequacy of the punishment, the baseline is the same as in dozens of cases before: "Someone did something terribly stupid in public and now it has consequences for him/her". Facebook, Twitter, /.-posts are not in private space. Accept that and act accordingly.
Tell me you're trying to pull a joke on your non-american readers.... The country that mocks us about cease & decist letters for an open WLAN router is actually using the police to stop you from swearing? I sincerely hope you're just kidding.