well, presumably that's what the default "ask me what to do" option, with the program listed at the top, is supposed to effect.
but the option to set your own icon + description then makes it too easy to mislead people, currently.
=====
by the by... the CERT recommendation - http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/techalerts/TA09-020A.html - now notes that MS have an update available for manual install (XP etc.) and/or coming up on windows update (vista, server 2003) that -does- fully close the other vectors that CERT mentions.
"by taking advantage of Windows' Autorun and Autoplay features" well no, not really.
Granted, they take advantage of the fact that... 1. there is an autorun feature. Is that so horrible? Probably not. 2. that the autorun feature pops up a display letting the user choose what to do (i.e. run the program, browse the drive, view pictures if it finds them, etc.). Again, not so bad. 3. that the autorun feature lets you customize the icon. Okay, things get a little hairy here - it's nice when the icon fits the program, but this malware uses the icon of... a folder. Just like the 'browse the disc/device' icon. 4. that the autorun feature does not have a -clear- distinction between what are autorun directives (run the program), and what are windows' built-in features (browse the drive).
The fourth is nearly inexcusable and if handled well, it would alleviate the third as well - just put a big red border around the darn thing (is one option, anyway).
In the end, though, it doesn't exploit 'autorun' directly - it exploits the fact that many users will think that the option with the folder icon with (misleading) description is the regular 'browse drive' option and click it carelessly.
no, but you do waste time prosecuting, say, teachers who receive such pornographic pictures from students themselves and subsequently get reported by that/another student. The student may have been consenting (having taken and sent the picture themselves), but it's still 'statutory child pornography possession' as far as the teacher goes under what you seem to propose.
The entire problem in the article hinges on the fact that these kids took and sent these pictures themselves, apparently* out of free will without coercion of any kind. * I do say 'apparently' - perhaps they felt 'peer pressure' or something - as from the article it seems likely these girls just thought it'd be fun to send their boyfriends kinky pictures. If they hadn't taken them themselves and/or hadn't sent them themselves, then the laws would be far more cut and wouldn't be much of a news topic except in local outlets.
I'm sorry, how exactly are they discriminating against those who quote have faith unquote?
Given the context, I can only presume that you are referring to a having a religious faith belief in which marriage is reserved for a man and a woman and no other combination. That's all fine and well, but how is Google discriminating against those who have that belief? Are they blocking visitors who have that belief? Are they not hiring people who have that belief? Are they firing those who have that belief?
There is no discrimination going on there. You are certainly more than free to withdraw yourself as one of their customers, but please don't delude yourself that this is about their decision to accept gay marriage - this is about *you* not being able to accept, or at least tolerate, that decision.
Just for the record and because I don't feel like making another post on this...
I don't believe in marriage between gay couples either. Marriage has become, in my opinion, a Christian religious institute, and as long as that particular religion says no to gay marriages, I think that's something we all must either accept - and work to change within that particular religion if one feels strongly enough to do so. ( I figure if 'your' religion says gay marriage is a no-no and you believe otherwise, then maybe you don't quite align with that particular religion.)
However, I do strongly believe in legal partnerships between gay people with any and *all* rights (and responsibilities) that a marriage would give. That includes tax provisions, insurance provisions, benefits, adoption rights, and so forth and so on. All too often a legal partnership does not even come close to having the same rights (or responsibilities) that a marriage does, and that is truly a travesty that delineates once more the lack of separation of state and church (in many nations that claim to have or support such separation).
but, see, you can already download beef jerky from the internet - just that you have to pay the $7.99 or whatever that number was for the privilege of downloading it. Just like you had to pay $2.49 for a song (nowadays $0.99 or whatever?) to do so legally. Just because you can now illegally download jerky for free doesn't quite make it 'right'.
( and yes, I know, downloading music is actually legal in some nations - I'm in one of them - but then distributing often still isn't )
Although I absolutely agree with you on the ludicrous claim of $1M for 7 songs, I do think I should point this out...
'The Slashdot Crowd' is always quick to point out that copyright infringement is -not- stealing. So I don't know why you're comparing stealing a beef jerky from a 7-11 to copyright infringement.
I don't think this case is about distributing, just downloading, but in the typical cases it is about distributing.. so your analogy would have to be akin to going into a 7-11 store, copying their beef jerky, then distributing that for zilch to anybody who asks you for another copy of the 7-11 beef jerky. 7-11 still have their copy of the beef jerky to sell, so there's no harm done to them directly. Just because nobody's actually buying it anymore because they can get it from you for free doesn't magically make it stealing.
Of course.. you can't copy a beef jerky.. the only way for you to be handing out beef jerky is to acquire it yourself - and I very highly doubt you'd be able to give it away for free with no money exhanged somewhere somehow.
So 7x$2.49 or whatever those songs went for back in the day (this is a Napster case, right?) plus a monetary slap on the wrist, and call it a day. Though if I googled it right, it seems that Tenenbaum tried exactly that ($500) and the RIAA didn't take? *shrug*
"There is nothing special about secure sites. HTTPS doesn't mean "this site is super special and you should do special things with it". This same attack can be applied to non-secure sites, too." - RockMFR (1022315)
Well that's the thing - why not? They are superspecial to my browser already.. doing its certificate check and throwing a big fat "passport check" image at me (FireFox 3) if it think something's not quite up to snuff. I don't see why a page on anything other than https://www.mybank.com/ shouldn't be told to piss off.
"Quite a few sites are actually structured around the idea of cross-site linking. (e.g. The HTML may be www.mainsite.com while the images come from the web server media.mainsite.com.)" - AKAImBatman (238306)
That I understand - as per my post, for inlining things etc.
However, I think that in the specific case you mentioned - e.g. media.. presumably images - those images *should* either come from the same domain as the secure site *or* come directly from an insecure site. Yes, a browser will pop up a warning that there's mixed content.. it does that for a reason, I would think. But the way around that is not to stick your images on a completely different-but-still-secure domain (I've not actually seen this, so for all I know that throws up an error as well anyway), but by keeping things on the same domain. Any sysadmin worth their pay can easily offload resources to a different media server if there's some manner of capacity issue at play that would have them put the media on a different domain otherwise.
Maybe making things more strict would indeed break a few sites, but other than webmasters/sysadmins realizing they need to be more careful, I don't see the harm in that other than short-term mumbling and cursing from the aforementioned groups.
crossdomain directives sound like another security problem just waiting to happen, in my humble opinion, but I'm certainly not an expert on that topic.
so wait.. as you explain it, I guess the idea is that once the user logs into the secure site, the malware script can magically access the lock.gif because the site and browser tell them that.. yup.. the user is logged in and thus should have access.
however.. presumably, the script is not from a page that's actually -on- https://www.mybank.com/.. if it was, you and the bank probably have bigger problems.
So let's say that instead it's on http://www.malware.lol/ - why would a script on a page from malware.lol be allowed access to a resource - in this case 'pinging' the 'lock.gif' - *on* https://www.mybank.com/ ?
Is there any valid purpose for allowing something like that? I can understand it for non-secure sites.. from inlining content that's hosted on another domain to allowing local applications to grab data off of e.g. websites that do not provide a nice API. But for secure sites? I'm baffled.
just to answer the "don't know if you can grab them with wifi" - absolutely. All but the most ancient of WM devices that have WiFi or a cellular chip will have an internet browser - typically IE, but newer models come with Opera. Just browse to the website that hosts the.CAB or.EXE (the former is the more common - the latter you have to make sure it's not a windows installer but e.g. a pocketpc installer.. yes, that's a bit of a hassle, yes, the App(le) Store prevents such hassles), save the file, and launch it.. whether you're doing so over a virtual network (via a USB cable, for example), wifi, cellular chip, bluetooth or heck - IRda modem.. it doesn't care.. once the file's on the machine (by any means), you can run it.
In the case of #2, those who are looking to escape a "you were drunk, you retard" ruling/fine/thing will just find some other excuse.
For example.. who is to say that the source code they show was, in fact, the (compiled into firmware) source code on the machine at the time of use? Presumably it has some manner of having that updated - in case of law changes and the like.
Okay, so say that's behind a seal.. who is to say they didn't simply re-seal it?
Okay, so there's only 1 company that issues the seals, and any tampering to try to re-seal with the old seal would be obvious.. who is to say an employee didn't steal some seal and is selling them to bad cops on the blue market?
And so forth, and so on. At some point there will -have- to be legislation that says "the device was last calibrated and verified by an independent agency within 2 weeks of your reading, that's good enough for the law and it will have to be good enough for you to accept this verdict". But then people will just pop up saying how that's a bad law:)
Don't get me wrong..
I fully understand the need for things to be verifiable and if somebody has their drivers' license taken away for a few weeks because they were a smidgen over the limit and that smidgen turns out to be within some measurement error revealed via a detailed analysis of the workings of the machine's software -and- hardware, then absolutely they should have any decisions reverted.. even if it still means they were just a smidgen on the 'OK' side of intoxication.
However I'm not seeing a single solution from those who so very strongly believe in this concept to address the obvious problem this introduces: how do you stop those who -are- simply driving drunk from taking advantage of it in order to essentially walk away without penalty?
Perhaps it's time to go back to just letting a cop and his or her partner(s) decide whether or not you're okay to drive. You smell of booze - tough luck, you get a nice stay at the police dept hotel. No 'hard' data to verify your drunken state also means no data to refute it.
This is true for just about any nation that requires a visa (or has a visa waiver-like program). If, at the border, they decide you are denied entry - tough luck. You don't have the right to an answer to the question of -why- you are denied entry, just grab your bags and follow the nice man to the next flight/train/boat back to where you came from. It doesn't typically hurt to ask - just don't always expect an answer.
If "Cutting it fine" means "Cutting it close" - no. You're asking to apply -at least- 72 hours before your actual travel as it may take up to 72 hours for them to give you a result. They highly *recommend* that you apply as soon as possible. The application, if approved, stays valid for 2 years as long as you don't make any travel changes. Ergo, if you are *now* planning to go on a trip to the USA in Summer - say August - then you can apply now. You can check 72 hours later and if something's awry, you've still got several months to figure out what the deal is, re-apply, etc.
Are you saying you would tell if you were required to fill out the paper forms?
Also, for what it's worth, if there's any change to any of the data you fill in - you, technically, have to re-apply as well.
So if you go to, say, Phoenix AZ this year and that's what your application is for - and you go to Las Vegas NV the next year, don't expect them not to raise an eyebrow at your Las Vegas travel plans when your existing application (valid for 2 years) tells them you're on your way to Phoenix.
Gone are the days of "*ring*ring* Hello? [It's a BOY!!!!!!!!!] Congratulations, dude!".. nowadays you have to subscribe to the twit's twits or be left behind... worse yet, if you did not subscribe, *clearly* you didn't care about his newborn at all so be prepared for a "F U."
MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, etc. are all called part of the 'social networking' arena, but I'm starting to side with the psychologists of 5 years ago... these things are just making us -less- social and far more superficial.
I love that the tools exist, I hate what they tend to do to people.
That sounds eerily familiar to the talk I got... the problem is that the very next thing these profs do (and I'm not blaming the profs, the university dictates they do this) is give you an assignment that, when it comes down to it, consists of "create novel solution to problem X". Novel -> possibly patentable. These are universities, they're not elementary schools where they're asking you for the solution to 1+1, they're giving you serious problems that require serious solutions - and more often than not, the solutions aren't readily available; if they were, they assignment is hardly challenging, now is it?
So although you can still keep quiet about any other ideas you have, or perhaps an even better solution than the one you'll be submitting, chances are that they will get what they want from you anyway.
I'm not entirely unhappy with that situation, mind you, given all the resources universities throw at it (researching whether it is patentable, for a simple but very time-consuming tedious example) but I do feel strongly that the student should have a broad license to any patents stemming directly from the student's work.
But although I understand that Slashdot posts stories in order to get many comments = many page impression = (hopefully, to them) some ad clicks as well, etc. and not so much due to any actual news value, this particular story - like many before it - suffer from "a bot could have posted this"-syndrome.
The pseudo-code for the bot goes like this:
if (news comes out about a leak) then (
submitToSlashdot(story about how leak was deliberate for theUsualDeliberateLeakReasons) )
That's not news of any sort - it's natural paranoid delusional thought - and as far as I'm concerned, it may just as well have been in idle.
Not sure about the USA, but in NL you pay all sorts of taxes on gas (one of the highest in the world) + a road use tax. Both go toward, among other, road maintenance as well.
As cars get more efficient in terms of gas use, the gov't wallet slims down.. but given the same car in terms of e.g. weight, footprint (literal - i.e. tires-on-road), it doesn't matter whether you're super-efficient or the worst gas guzzler in the world... you're still putting the same wear-and-tear on that road. Ergo, they have to.. A. increase gas prices more B. increase road use taxes more C. create a new (context-dependent) per-mile (kilometer) tax D. go with a bit of A, drop B and implement C -and- add an entirely new tax that -everybody- pays.. whether you actually drive a car or not, as dropping B does not get compensated enough by A and C.
Of course they spin this as a positive thing, as those who drive a lot will now pay more, while those who drive say 20,000km/year will be off much cheaper... thanks in part to those driving 0km/year helping pay. ho hum. ( not that I'm fervently opposed to it - my goods are delivered by road, so even if I don't travel on it.. transport companies do - but I was under the impression I already paid for transportation cost by paying for the product. hmpf. )
As others have stated - so they can charge you different taxes based on where you are/went. In the case of the USA, that might be state-wise. In the case of NL (where they intend to launch this starting 2012), it's so they can charge you more if you drive during rush hour, more if you take the busy roads, more if you're down town (when you could have parked at the edge and taken a shuttle bus instead), etc. Plus.. they get to track your vehicle. We see that as privacy invasions, 'they' see that as a great means to see where a car that was involved in a crime might have gone, for example. (presuming the perp didn't disconnect the unit, blabla)
Both of those are foreseeable possibilities based on conditions.
It's the conditions you can't foresee that I'd worry about.
He has just as long to brake as I have, actually, if he's paying attention.
Minus, of course, any response time and not taking into account braking characteristics of the two cars and so forth and so on.
I wouldn't have cut in front so close if I thought there was a possibility I'd have to slow down
Here's the thing - you should always think that there is that possibility. I thought they taught as much in driving school (mom&dad-taught kids notwithstanding - I'd sure hope they get told the same thing).
Suffice to say that I think your "I was poor" argument is, well, fairly poor.. especially nowadays with a plethora of free (beer / speech / etc.) games available, but even in the end of the 80's; I remember buying BBC Micro magazine and typing in listings of games from the magazine - for free (yes, that's source code right there) - such as Clogger. The magazines were cheap, even with them having to be imported out of the UK, easily afforded by not spending allowance money on, say, candy... beer... cigarettes and a ton of other things other kids my age were spending -their- money on.
However, your remaining arguments are very, very valid. Demos are supposed to be representative, but often they are not (Breed, Half-Life (yes, Half-Life was awesome, but I dare say the demo level was a notch above the rest of the game). Granted, reading around for reviews helps a bit in overcoming the shock of a full game not living up to the demo as the reviewer is likely to point this out - but reading another's review does not give -you- a full evaluation of the product.
Of course there's very few products where you can get a full evaluation before paying; short of the situation of eating at a restaurant, you most usually pay up front and then get to 'evaluate' the product afterwards.. if you don't like it, you can usually return it, but sometimes not. I know that games make 'returning the item' difficult if not impossible, so let me get off this tangent right quick and get back to the prior paragraph..
So given that the only way to fully evaluate a game is to essentially fully play the game, I agree that a pirated copy works wonders for it. Won't work with online games - and those are becoming the norm - but for single player games or games that you can still play on your own servers, it's a perfect solution (for you, not for the developer/distributor).
But the question is.. now that you have this available to you, and you evaluate a game, and presumably you enjoyed the game (if you don't, I fully suspect that you'd delete it without another thought)... then what happens? Do you go out and buy the game at full price? Do you decide that it isn't quite worth the full $40, and wait for a few weeks for it to be discounted to $20? Do you wait even longer and wait for it to be in the $5 bargain bin? Or do you simply say to yourself "well I'm already playing the game for free - what's in it for me if I go and spend anything on it at all? Warm fuzzy feeling inside? ha."
My warm fuzzy feeling inside makes me hope it's one of the first few options.. the reality around me is that by far the majority of those who would pirate games go with the last option.
...obviously they ruled that out as that just wouldn't be very newsworthy at all, now would it?
"Behind Ecofont
[...] We tried lots of possible ink-saving-options. From extra thin letters to letters with outlines only.[/quote]
I agree that there's better ways to save ink, especially ways that apply to any font (put those halftone patterns to good use, for example), but it's a fun font to add to the collection if nothing else; if nothing else, we should applaud the fact that it's free (as in etc. - quite unlike the fonts you linked to, I might add)
"Nope, the XBox isn't any more prone to scratching discs than your average non-car-CD player. Most people just know better than to move their CD players around while they're playing, and I suppose don't make the same connection with a game console." - portable CD players - portable DVD players - laptops / notebooks All playback hardware that aren't in cars which may reasonably be in motion while a disc is being played, and none of which should scratch a disc.
Now I agree that a game console is not something you take with you on a treadmill, or into a train, but it does mean that it -can- be made in such a fashion that the disc does not get damaged -and- it can be done so cheaply enough that portable CD players for under $20 exist.
Your reply is exactly why Thyamine is 'getting old'.
Rewind to the 80's, if you will. There were no DVD players - you'd be lucky to have a CD player - and certainly no computers that would be playing back high quality video (exceptions aside, I know the Archimedes did some pretty nice things, but I wouldn't quite call it 'high quality'.).
So if you had 2 TVs in the house - say, 1 in the living room and 1 in the bedroom - and 1 VCR (let's not ponder where). So you buy a VHS (or beta or Video2000.. 'tis the 80's, after all), get home, and then curse the heavens that The Corporate Man is keeping you down by not allowing you to magically play back that same video on both TVs, just for the pathetic excuse they bring forth that you would need a 2nd VCR?.. probably not. You'd just eventually get another VCR.
If you purchased a CD, would you kick up a shitstorm about not being able to play that back on your walkman?.. probably not. You'd just get your tapedeck and record the CD straight to tape.
Fast forward to 'now'.. instead of you saying "well, I guess I'll just get a blu-ray drive for that machine as well" or "I guess I'll just have to record the video with a capture card / my computer's video-out"... you realize it's well past the 90's, everything is digital, and by jove that means you have the right to duplicate and format shift the media's content as you damn well please, and screw the corporations for making this difficult for you.
I'm not saying that that is a wrong stance on things... but the change to digital has changed how we all view these things as well. The old ways (getting a second drive, or recording to a different media - yes, you may get quality loss) still work, but now we resist due to the changed mindset that came with going digital.
... honestly, Slashdot - and others - have covered this time and time again. Nothing has changed. There still isn't a cheap digital storage medium that we know for sure -will- retain your data -and- be readable (in terms of media -and- the hardware to read that media) down to the very last bit for your grandchildren.
IF and when there's a breakthrough, I'm sure Slashdot is one of the first places you'll hear about it.. but it won't be in an answer to an Ask Slashdot.
Yes, I realize that you stated "I'm not looking to start my own national archive; I have less than 500GBs and only save things important to me". However, it doesn't really matter whether you're archiving hollywood movies, NASA records or just your own random crap. If it is important to you - important enough that you want it to be "lasting for decades if possible" - then your concerns are the same as NASA's... and they're struggling with the exact same question.
You mentioned 'cheap', as otherwise all the answers saying "duuuuude, ditch the digital - go analog!" might have some validity.. take a wild guess as to what it would cost to have thousands of photos transferred to negatives/prints, or video transferred to tape/film, etc. Plus you mentioned documents.. some of those may not transfer to e.g. paper (easily) at all depending on the 'documents' in question; e.g. CAD files.
"Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for emergencies (like this one)" How can that be misinterpreted to read that he meant the iPhone was a satellite phone?
Simple substitution: "Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for emergencies (like the iPhone)" Ahhh, so the iPhone is an emergency! Err, wait.
If he wanted things to read like the iPhone was a satellite phone, he'd write: "Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone (like the iPhone) for emergencies"
However, if you unsubstitute that: "Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone (like this one) for emergencies"
Then you'd have to scan around for what "like this one" would be referring to.. his post doesn't refer to any specific phone at all.. if this wasn't slashdot with its auto-domain-appendage bits, I would move my mouse over the "like this one" expecting to find it linking to a satellite phone.. I would not assume he meant the iPhone.
Going back to the original line, however, "like this one" easily finds context in "your car broke down and you're in the middle of the desert."
That's not to say the original phrasing can't be improved... "But let's imagine your car broke down and you're in the middle of the desert. Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for such emergencies."
But to think he meant the iPhone was an example of a satellite phone? hm.
Slashdot Mirror
well, presumably that's what the default "ask me what to do" option, with the program listed at the top, is supposed to effect.
but the option to set your own icon + description then makes it too easy to mislead people, currently.
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by the by... the CERT recommendation - http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/techalerts/TA09-020A.html - now notes that MS have an update available for manual install (XP etc.) and/or coming up on windows update (vista, server 2003) that -does- fully close the other vectors that CERT mentions.
"by taking advantage of Windows' Autorun and Autoplay features"
well no, not really.
Granted, they take advantage of the fact that...
1. there is an autorun feature. Is that so horrible? Probably not.
2. that the autorun feature pops up a display letting the user choose what to do (i.e. run the program, browse the drive, view pictures if it finds them, etc.). Again, not so bad.
3. that the autorun feature lets you customize the icon. Okay, things get a little hairy here - it's nice when the icon fits the program, but this malware uses the icon of... a folder. Just like the 'browse the disc/device' icon.
4. that the autorun feature does not have a -clear- distinction between what are autorun directives (run the program), and what are windows' built-in features (browse the drive).
The fourth is nearly inexcusable and if handled well, it would alleviate the third as well - just put a big red border around the darn thing (is one option, anyway).
In the end, though, it doesn't exploit 'autorun' directly - it exploits the fact that many users will think that the option with the folder icon with (misleading) description is the regular 'browse drive' option and click it carelessly.
no, but you do waste time prosecuting, say, teachers who receive such pornographic pictures from students themselves and subsequently get reported by that/another student. The student may have been consenting (having taken and sent the picture themselves), but it's still 'statutory child pornography possession' as far as the teacher goes under what you seem to propose.
The entire problem in the article hinges on the fact that these kids took and sent these pictures themselves, apparently* out of free will without coercion of any kind. * I do say 'apparently' - perhaps they felt 'peer pressure' or something - as from the article it seems likely these girls just thought it'd be fun to send their boyfriends kinky pictures.
If they hadn't taken them themselves and/or hadn't sent them themselves, then the laws would be far more cut and wouldn't be much of a news topic except in local outlets.
wow. just wow.
I'm sorry, how exactly are they discriminating against those who quote have faith unquote?
Given the context, I can only presume that you are referring to a having a religious faith belief in which marriage is reserved for a man and a woman and no other combination.
That's all fine and well, but how is Google discriminating against those who have that belief? Are they blocking visitors who have that belief? Are they not hiring people who have that belief? Are they firing those who have that belief?
There is no discrimination going on there. You are certainly more than free to withdraw yourself as one of their customers, but please don't delude yourself that this is about their decision to accept gay marriage - this is about *you* not being able to accept, or at least tolerate, that decision.
Just for the record and because I don't feel like making another post on this...
I don't believe in marriage between gay couples either. Marriage has become, in my opinion, a Christian religious institute, and as long as that particular religion says no to gay marriages, I think that's something we all must either accept - and work to change within that particular religion if one feels strongly enough to do so. ( I figure if 'your' religion says gay marriage is a no-no and you believe otherwise, then maybe you don't quite align with that particular religion.)
However, I do strongly believe in legal partnerships between gay people with any and *all* rights (and responsibilities) that a marriage would give. That includes tax provisions, insurance provisions, benefits, adoption rights, and so forth and so on. All too often a legal partnership does not even come close to having the same rights (or responsibilities) that a marriage does, and that is truly a travesty that delineates once more the lack of separation of state and church (in many nations that claim to have or support such separation).
Just my 2cts.
screw that, I'd keep it and eat it myself! :D
but, see, you can already download beef jerky from the internet - just that you have to pay the $7.99 or whatever that number was for the privilege of downloading it. Just like you had to pay $2.49 for a song (nowadays $0.99 or whatever?) to do so legally. Just because you can now illegally download jerky for free doesn't quite make it 'right'.
( and yes, I know, downloading music is actually legal in some nations - I'm in one of them - but then distributing often still isn't )
Although I absolutely agree with you on the ludicrous claim of $1M for 7 songs, I do think I should point this out...
'The Slashdot Crowd' is always quick to point out that copyright infringement is -not- stealing. So I don't know why you're comparing stealing a beef jerky from a 7-11 to copyright infringement.
I don't think this case is about distributing, just downloading, but in the typical cases it is about distributing.. so your analogy would have to be akin to going into a 7-11 store, copying their beef jerky, then distributing that for zilch to anybody who asks you for another copy of the 7-11 beef jerky. 7-11 still have their copy of the beef jerky to sell, so there's no harm done to them directly. Just because nobody's actually buying it anymore because they can get it from you for free doesn't magically make it stealing.
Of course.. you can't copy a beef jerky.. the only way for you to be handing out beef jerky is to acquire it yourself - and I very highly doubt you'd be able to give it away for free with no money exhanged somewhere somehow.
So 7x$2.49 or whatever those songs went for back in the day (this is a Napster case, right?) plus a monetary slap on the wrist, and call it a day. Though if I googled it right, it seems that Tenenbaum tried exactly that ($500) and the RIAA didn't take? *shrug*
Well that's the thing - why not? They are superspecial to my browser already.. doing its certificate check and throwing a big fat "passport check" image at me (FireFox 3) if it think something's not quite up to snuff. I don't see why a page on anything other than https://www.mybank.com/ shouldn't be told to piss off.
"Quite a few sites are actually structured around the idea of cross-site linking. (e.g. The HTML may be www.mainsite.com while the images come from the web server media.mainsite.com.)" - AKAImBatman (238306)
That I understand - as per my post, for inlining things etc.
However, I think that in the specific case you mentioned - e.g. media.. presumably images - those images *should* either come from the same domain as the secure site *or* come directly from an insecure site. Yes, a browser will pop up a warning that there's mixed content.. it does that for a reason, I would think. But the way around that is not to stick your images on a completely different-but-still-secure domain (I've not actually seen this, so for all I know that throws up an error as well anyway), but by keeping things on the same domain. Any sysadmin worth their pay can easily offload resources to a different media server if there's some manner of capacity issue at play that would have them put the media on a different domain otherwise.
Maybe making things more strict would indeed break a few sites, but other than webmasters/sysadmins realizing they need to be more careful, I don't see the harm in that other than short-term mumbling and cursing from the aforementioned groups.
crossdomain directives sound like another security problem just waiting to happen, in my humble opinion, but I'm certainly not an expert on that topic.
so wait..
as you explain it, I guess the idea is that once the user logs into the secure site, the malware script can magically access the lock.gif because the site and browser tell them that.. yup.. the user is logged in and thus should have access.
however.. presumably, the script is not from a page that's actually -on- https://www.mybank.com/.. if it was, you and the bank probably have bigger problems.
So let's say that instead it's on http://www.malware.lol/ - why would a script on a page from malware.lol be allowed access to a resource - in this case 'pinging' the 'lock.gif' - *on* https://www.mybank.com/ ?
Is there any valid purpose for allowing something like that? I can understand it for non-secure sites.. from inlining content that's hosted on another domain to allowing local applications to grab data off of e.g. websites that do not provide a nice API. But for secure sites? I'm baffled.
just to answer the "don't know if you can grab them with wifi" - absolutely. All but the most ancient of WM devices that have WiFi or a cellular chip will have an internet browser - typically IE, but newer models come with Opera. Just browse to the website that hosts the .CAB or .EXE (the former is the more common - the latter you have to make sure it's not a windows installer but e.g. a pocketpc installer.. yes, that's a bit of a hassle, yes, the App(le) Store prevents such hassles), save the file, and launch it.. whether you're doing so over a virtual network (via a USB cable, for example), wifi, cellular chip, bluetooth or heck - IRda modem.. it doesn't care.. once the file's on the machine (by any means), you can run it.
In the case of #2, those who are looking to escape a "you were drunk, you retard" ruling/fine/thing will just find some other excuse.
For example.. who is to say that the source code they show was, in fact, the (compiled into firmware) source code on the machine at the time of use? Presumably it has some manner of having that updated - in case of law changes and the like.
Okay, so say that's behind a seal.. who is to say they didn't simply re-seal it?
Okay, so there's only 1 company that issues the seals, and any tampering to try to re-seal with the old seal would be obvious.. who is to say an employee didn't steal some seal and is selling them to bad cops on the blue market?
And so forth, and so on. At some point there will -have- to be legislation that says "the device was last calibrated and verified by an independent agency within 2 weeks of your reading, that's good enough for the law and it will have to be good enough for you to accept this verdict". But then people will just pop up saying how that's a bad law :)
Don't get me wrong..
I fully understand the need for things to be verifiable and if somebody has their drivers' license taken away for a few weeks because they were a smidgen over the limit and that smidgen turns out to be within some measurement error revealed via a detailed analysis of the workings of the machine's software -and- hardware, then absolutely they should have any decisions reverted.. even if it still means they were just a smidgen on the 'OK' side of intoxication.
However I'm not seeing a single solution from those who so very strongly believe in this concept to address the obvious problem this introduces: how do you stop those who -are- simply driving drunk from taking advantage of it in order to essentially walk away without penalty?
Perhaps it's time to go back to just letting a cop and his or her partner(s) decide whether or not you're okay to drive. You smell of booze - tough luck, you get a nice stay at the police dept hotel. No 'hard' data to verify your drunken state also means no data to refute it.
This is true for just about any nation that requires a visa (or has a visa waiver-like program). If, at the border, they decide you are denied entry - tough luck. You don't have the right to an answer to the question of -why- you are denied entry, just grab your bags and follow the nice man to the next flight/train/boat back to where you came from. It doesn't typically hurt to ask - just don't always expect an answer.
If "Cutting it fine" means "Cutting it close" - no. You're asking to apply -at least- 72 hours before your actual travel as it may take up to 72 hours for them to give you a result. They highly *recommend* that you apply as soon as possible. The application, if approved, stays valid for 2 years as long as you don't make any travel changes. Ergo, if you are *now* planning to go on a trip to the USA in Summer - say August - then you can apply now. You can check 72 hours later and if something's awry, you've still got several months to figure out what the deal is, re-apply, etc.
Are you saying you would tell if you were required to fill out the paper forms?
Also, for what it's worth, if there's any change to any of the data you fill in - you, technically, have to re-apply as well.
So if you go to, say, Phoenix AZ this year and that's what your application is for - and you go to Las Vegas NV the next year, don't expect them not to raise an eyebrow at your Las Vegas travel plans when your existing application (valid for 2 years) tells them you're on your way to Phoenix.
Gone are the days of "*ring*ring* Hello? [It's a BOY!!!!!!!!!] Congratulations, dude!".. nowadays you have to subscribe to the twit's twits or be left behind... worse yet, if you did not subscribe, *clearly* you didn't care about his newborn at all so be prepared for a "F U."
MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, etc. are all called part of the 'social networking' arena, but I'm starting to side with the psychologists of 5 years ago... these things are just making us -less- social and far more superficial.
I love that the tools exist, I hate what they tend to do to people.
That sounds eerily familiar to the talk I got... the problem is that the very next thing these profs do (and I'm not blaming the profs, the university dictates they do this) is give you an assignment that, when it comes down to it, consists of "create novel solution to problem X". Novel -> possibly patentable. These are universities, they're not elementary schools where they're asking you for the solution to 1+1, they're giving you serious problems that require serious solutions - and more often than not, the solutions aren't readily available; if they were, they assignment is hardly challenging, now is it?
So although you can still keep quiet about any other ideas you have, or perhaps an even better solution than the one you'll be submitting, chances are that they will get what they want from you anyway.
I'm not entirely unhappy with that situation, mind you, given all the resources universities throw at it (researching whether it is patentable, for a simple but very time-consuming tedious example) but I do feel strongly that the student should have a broad license to any patents stemming directly from the student's work.
But although I understand that Slashdot posts stories in order to get many comments = many page impression = (hopefully, to them) some ad clicks as well, etc. and not so much due to any actual news value, this particular story - like many before it - suffer from "a bot could have posted this"-syndrome.
The pseudo-code for the bot goes like this:
That's not news of any sort - it's natural paranoid delusional thought - and as far as I'm concerned, it may just as well have been in idle.
Well that's the point, isn't it... well, maybe.
Not sure about the USA, but in NL you pay all sorts of taxes on gas (one of the highest in the world) + a road use tax. Both go toward, among other, road maintenance as well.
As cars get more efficient in terms of gas use, the gov't wallet slims down.. but given the same car in terms of e.g. weight, footprint (literal - i.e. tires-on-road), it doesn't matter whether you're super-efficient or the worst gas guzzler in the world... you're still putting the same wear-and-tear on that road. Ergo, they have to..
A. increase gas prices more
B. increase road use taxes more
C. create a new (context-dependent) per-mile (kilometer) tax
D. go with a bit of A, drop B and implement C -and- add an entirely new tax that -everybody- pays.. whether you actually drive a car or not, as dropping B does not get compensated enough by A and C.
Of course they spin this as a positive thing, as those who drive a lot will now pay more, while those who drive say 20,000km/year will be off much cheaper... thanks in part to those driving 0km/year helping pay. ho hum.
( not that I'm fervently opposed to it - my goods are delivered by road, so even if I don't travel on it.. transport companies do - but I was under the impression I already paid for transportation cost by paying for the product. hmpf. )
As others have stated - so they can charge you different taxes based on where you are/went. In the case of the USA, that might be state-wise. In the case of NL (where they intend to launch this starting 2012), it's so they can charge you more if you drive during rush hour, more if you take the busy roads, more if you're down town (when you could have parked at the edge and taken a shuttle bus instead), etc.
Plus.. they get to track your vehicle. We see that as privacy invasions, 'they' see that as a great means to see where a car that was involved in a crime might have gone, for example. (presuming the perp didn't disconnect the unit, blabla)
Both of those are foreseeable possibilities based on conditions.
It's the conditions you can't foresee that I'd worry about.
He has just as long to brake as I have, actually, if he's paying attention.
Minus, of course, any response time and not taking into account braking characteristics of the two cars and so forth and so on.
I wouldn't have cut in front so close if I thought there was a possibility I'd have to slow down
Here's the thing - you should always think that there is that possibility. I thought they taught as much in driving school (mom&dad-taught kids notwithstanding - I'd sure hope they get told the same thing).
Suffice to say that I think your "I was poor" argument is, well, fairly poor.. especially nowadays with a plethora of free (beer / speech / etc.) games available, but even in the end of the 80's; I remember buying BBC Micro magazine and typing in listings of games from the magazine - for free (yes, that's source code right there) - such as Clogger. The magazines were cheap, even with them having to be imported out of the UK, easily afforded by not spending allowance money on, say, candy... beer... cigarettes and a ton of other things other kids my age were spending -their- money on.
However, your remaining arguments are very, very valid. Demos are supposed to be representative, but often they are not (Breed, Half-Life (yes, Half-Life was awesome, but I dare say the demo level was a notch above the rest of the game). Granted, reading around for reviews helps a bit in overcoming the shock of a full game not living up to the demo as the reviewer is likely to point this out - but reading another's review does not give -you- a full evaluation of the product.
Of course there's very few products where you can get a full evaluation before paying; short of the situation of eating at a restaurant, you most usually pay up front and then get to 'evaluate' the product afterwards.. if you don't like it, you can usually return it, but sometimes not. I know that games make 'returning the item' difficult if not impossible, so let me get off this tangent right quick and get back to the prior paragraph..
So given that the only way to fully evaluate a game is to essentially fully play the game, I agree that a pirated copy works wonders for it. Won't work with online games - and those are becoming the norm - but for single player games or games that you can still play on your own servers, it's a perfect solution (for you, not for the developer/distributor).
But the question is.. now that you have this available to you, and you evaluate a game, and presumably you enjoyed the game (if you don't, I fully suspect that you'd delete it without another thought)... then what happens? Do you go out and buy the game at full price? Do you decide that it isn't quite worth the full $40, and wait for a few weeks for it to be discounted to $20? Do you wait even longer and wait for it to be in the $5 bargain bin? Or do you simply say to yourself "well I'm already playing the game for free - what's in it for me if I go and spend anything on it at all? Warm fuzzy feeling inside? ha."
My warm fuzzy feeling inside makes me hope it's one of the first few options.. the reality around me is that by far the majority of those who would pirate games go with the last option.
...obviously they ruled that out as that just wouldn't be very newsworthy at all, now would it?
"Behind Ecofont
[...] We tried lots of possible ink-saving-options. From extra thin letters to letters with outlines only.[/quote]
I agree that there's better ways to save ink, especially ways that apply to any font (put those halftone patterns to good use, for example), but it's a fun font to add to the collection if nothing else; if nothing else, we should applaud the fact that it's free (as in etc. - quite unlike the fonts you linked to, I might add)
"Nope, the XBox isn't any more prone to scratching discs than your average non-car-CD player. Most people just know better than to move their CD players around while they're playing, and I suppose don't make the same connection with a game console."
- portable CD players
- portable DVD players
- laptops / notebooks
All playback hardware that aren't in cars which may reasonably be in motion while a disc is being played, and none of which should scratch a disc.
Now I agree that a game console is not something you take with you on a treadmill, or into a train, but it does mean that it -can- be made in such a fashion that the disc does not get damaged -and- it can be done so cheaply enough that portable CD players for under $20 exist.
Your reply is exactly why Thyamine is 'getting old'.
Rewind to the 80's, if you will. There were no DVD players - you'd be lucky to have a CD player - and certainly no computers that would be playing back high quality video (exceptions aside, I know the Archimedes did some pretty nice things, but I wouldn't quite call it 'high quality'.).
So if you had 2 TVs in the house - say, 1 in the living room and 1 in the bedroom - and 1 VCR (let's not ponder where). So you buy a VHS (or beta or Video2000.. 'tis the 80's, after all), get home, and then curse the heavens that The Corporate Man is keeping you down by not allowing you to magically play back that same video on both TVs, just for the pathetic excuse they bring forth that you would need a 2nd VCR? .. probably not. You'd just eventually get another VCR.
If you purchased a CD, would you kick up a shitstorm about not being able to play that back on your walkman? .. probably not. You'd just get your tapedeck and record the CD straight to tape.
Fast forward to 'now'.. instead of you saying "well, I guess I'll just get a blu-ray drive for that machine as well" or "I guess I'll just have to record the video with a capture card / my computer's video-out"... you realize it's well past the 90's, everything is digital, and by jove that means you have the right to duplicate and format shift the media's content as you damn well please, and screw the corporations for making this difficult for you.
I'm not saying that that is a wrong stance on things... but the change to digital has changed how we all view these things as well. The old ways (getting a second drive, or recording to a different media - yes, you may get quality loss) still work, but now we resist due to the changed mindset that came with going digital.
... honestly, Slashdot - and others - have covered this time and time again. Nothing has changed. There still isn't a cheap digital storage medium that we know for sure -will- retain your data -and- be readable (in terms of media -and- the hardware to read that media) down to the very last bit for your grandchildren.
IF and when there's a breakthrough, I'm sure Slashdot is one of the first places you'll hear about it.. but it won't be in an answer to an Ask Slashdot.
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/21/1257249 - Digital Media Archiving Challenges Hollywood .. and so forth and so on.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/20/2036247 - Archiving Digital Data an Unsolved Problem
http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/06/12/11/1714232.shtml - How To Choose Archival CD/DVD Media
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/26/218250&from=rss - Archiving Digital History at the NARA
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/03/31/2141204 - How To Properly Archive Data On Disc Media
Yes, I realize that you stated "I'm not looking to start my own national archive; I have less than 500GBs and only save things important to me". However, it doesn't really matter whether you're archiving hollywood movies, NASA records or just your own random crap. If it is important to you - important enough that you want it to be "lasting for decades if possible" - then your concerns are the same as NASA's... and they're struggling with the exact same question.
The 'best' answer so far is one you will find in each and every single discussion on this - including this thread, so I'll just point you there:
http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1061489&cid=26102825
You mentioned 'cheap', as otherwise all the answers saying "duuuuude, ditch the digital - go analog!" might have some validity.. take a wild guess as to what it would cost to have thousands of photos transferred to negatives/prints, or video transferred to tape/film, etc. Plus you mentioned documents.. some of those may not transfer to e.g. paper (easily) at all depending on the 'documents' in question; e.g. CAD files.
Preamble: English is not my native language
"Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for emergencies (like this one)"
How can that be misinterpreted to read that he meant the iPhone was a satellite phone?
Simple substitution:
"Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for emergencies (like the iPhone)"
Ahhh, so the iPhone is an emergency! Err, wait.
If he wanted things to read like the iPhone was a satellite phone, he'd write:
"Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone (like the iPhone) for emergencies"
However, if you unsubstitute that:
"Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone (like this one) for emergencies"
Then you'd have to scan around for what "like this one" would be referring to.. his post doesn't refer to any specific phone at all.. if this wasn't slashdot with its auto-domain-appendage bits, I would move my mouse over the "like this one" expecting to find it linking to a satellite phone.. I would not assume he meant the iPhone.
Going back to the original line, however, "like this one" easily finds context in "your car broke down and you're in the middle of the desert."
That's not to say the original phrasing can't be improved...
"But let's imagine your car broke down and you're in the middle of the desert. Let's also assume you were smart enough to bring along a sat phone for such emergencies."
But to think he meant the iPhone was an example of a satellite phone? hm.