There is a VERY amusing short story, titled "Man of Steel, Woman of Tissue Paper" that examines at some length (as it were) the whole subject of Superman's puberty and sexual life...and some of the unforeseen consequences and frustrations of it. Well worth tracking down and reading.
Greetings and salutations....
This "supplemental" tax picture you have is right on the money. here in Tennessee, for example, we have an "Entertainment tax" of about 15% that is levied on movie theaters, restaurants, bars, etc. It is not listed ANYWHERE in the bill, but it is there in the total. Since a big chunk of income for the state comes from tourists, it was another way for the cash addicts in the government to feed their habit off folks that had no power and were not likely to complain.
Cash to a politician is like crack to an addict.
Oh yea...Tn is not alone in these cute tricks....EVERY state that has a large tourist income does the same thing. regards dave mundt
What!!!!! YOU had a pringles can to use as a whistle>????? You kids have it EASY now! In MY day, we had nothing but teeth and pursed lips....and now, alas, nothing but pursed lips..
Greetings and Salutations.
However, I, for one, GREATLY appreciate the no smoking rule for restaurants here in Tennessee. I, for one, like to smell and taste the food I am eating, and, not the acrid and annoying smell of stale tobacco smoke. Smoking and non-smoking areas for restaurants were a joke, as, unless the two areas were in separate buildings, or floors of a building, with isolated A/C systems, the smoke WOULD permiate everything.
As a matter of fact, there are a number of restaurants here that I refused to eat at, because of the smoking environment...and a lot of them have gone under in the past decade or so, because a lot of people apparently agreed with my stance.
Actually...sales taxes collected on Internet Sales are a record keeping nightmare, and would, at least, cause a huge jump in costs of online goods.
Apparently you are unaware of the fact that Sales taxes are Not uniform through the state. As a matter of fact, they vary on a county and even CITY basis. Enacting requirements for companies to collect and forward sales taxes to the appropriate authorities for interstate sales could require a company to send out thousands of checks and two or more pages of paperwork PER CHECK every month.
Another factor is that this will not only affect internet sales. It will, in fact, hit EVERY mail-order seller...and every one of them will pass those costs along to you, the consumer.
regards
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations... A good point. My usual mantra for this is "money to a politician is like crack to an addict". There is never enough, they can never GET enough and they will sell their daughters into BDSM prostitution to get more of it. pleasant dreams dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
Actually, the writers of the American Constitution thought of this. The fact of the matter is that the Constitution is a document which defines what powers the citizens of the USA are willing to allow the government to have. Anything that is NOT mentioned is, explicitly, reserved for the Citizenry. So...as regards the Constitution, yea...if it is not specifically addressed, then it is allowed to the CITIZENS..not the government.
As for the rest of the tens of thousands of laws that we Americans have allowed ourselves to become burdened with...the same principle applies there too. Unless there is a law that specifically prohibits an act, then, that act is ALLOWED. For example, the original formulations for Coca Cola included a fairly goodly shot of cocaine. At the time, this was not addressed in law, so was perfectly legal. It gave Coke that refreshing zap! Now, as time progressed, certain drugs were prohibited by law...and vanished from Coke.
However, one worrisome evolution in America is the concept of "freedom zones", where protestors against a politician or event are corralled. It is usually fairly far away from the person or event in question, and, often means that the protestors are "out of sight and out of mind". There are no statutes covering this, and, I suspect any such laws would be overturned by the courts in short order. Now..my question here is this: Although this appears to fall into the area covered by your statement...is this a "good" thing, and is this where American should be going? I think not, and, I hope that others agree. It is this sort of attitude that ends up with a Citizenry cowering in fear under the thumb of a repressive government, and, is the rot that will destroy America in the long run, if it is allowed to continue and grow. regards dave mundt
is the Buckaroo Banzi films. WITH the original cast....
Still waiting hopefully... THird best line in the movie: The answer Lithgow gave the general..."It's not my G-D planet, Monkey Boy!".
Followed closely by "Where are we going to go?
Home (says the Greek chorus...) When are we going to leave?
Real soon now...."
and the big winner:
"Wherever you go, there you are!"
Greetings and Salutations...
Thanks for the insightful, critical review of my website.
As a matter of fact it IS about 1996, as I have not touched it in a number of years. Updating it and improving it is on the list of things to do, but, alas, other priorities have gotten it pushed down the ladder. Maybe NEXT year (*smile*).
regards
dave mundt
P.S. Since I am somewhat old and feeble-minded, perhaps you could enlighten me as to how my website design relates to the topic at hand? dcm
When a phrase becomes part of the common vernacular, it no longer needs explanation or definition. For example, "Use the Force", or "Live Long and Prosper".
Also, it has been my observation that in the case of cross-platform malware (say, something that uses a Java vulnerablity), any references to it tend to mention that it can affect multiple platforms.
In any case, the focus of the paper was on the MALWARE - what its capabilities were, and how it could be used. I found that very interesting, actually, as it seems to be quite the multi-tasker, and, if one was into that sort of thing, quite a useful tool.
There may be omissions and weaknesses in the paper - there always are. However, it is less useful to wonder in a general manner if these exist, and far more useful to think about it, then, post specific questions about perceived problems.
Greetings and Salutations...
I have to say that the level of misunderstanding exhibited by MOST of the folks posting to this thread boggles the mind. Considering the alleged level of IT sophistication of the readers of/., it is even more amazing.
I read the researcher's report, and, I have to say that I found it a well-reasoned and interesting analysis of a terrible problem on the Internet. However, without following their methodology, I do not believe they could have been able to do any where close to this level of analysis. These researchers not only produced a fairly scholarly analysis of a nasty and persistent problem, but, apparently went out of their way to work with the governmental authorities charged with controlling these sorts of crimes. So...why all the calls for them to be drawn and quartered in the public square? Have none of you ever heard of the concept of studying your enemy on a deep level, so to find its weaknesses, and make it easier to destroy? And as a part of that how do you propose to GATHER that information, short of following procedures that these researchers used?
There are only a few, small quibbles I have with the paper. While they do say that they took a number of steps to secure the private information that they gathered while researching this virus, I would feel much better about reality if there was some assurance that this data set had been destroyed at the end of the study. I realise that arguments can be made that information, once gathered, tends to exist forever (after all, can we be sure that no copies were made?). However, with sufficient audit trails of what happened to the data, and who accessed it, this is a minimal problem. Of course, if the folks whose data had been intercepted were, indeed, contacted and made aware of the breach of their privacy, the usefulness of this data would erode away quickly, as CC numbers/banking information/passwords/etc were changed.
Also, it was unclear to me exactly how they attempted to contact the people whose information had been compromised. Mainly this is curiosity on my part, because most of the methods that spring to mind (Email, IM, etc), are exactly the sorts of communications that I tend to filter out and delete with out any further attention. I suppose that a phone call from a complete stranger would certainly be a wake-up call, though.
As for their activities being "illegal", while perhaps technically true, It is more a problem with the way the laws are written, rather than with their activities. Most folks do not understand that applying the law to a bad situation is akin to using a 20 lb sledgehammer to swat a mosquito. it is not a precision instrument. That is one of the many reasons that the justice system in America has avenues for appealing a case through several levels of juries and judges. The hope is that with enough people looking at it, a sane interpretation of the law will take root. Most of the current laws dealing with computer access and IT these days DO make security research difficult and problimatical, as their wording exposes even legitimate researchers to criminal charges. That is a legislative problem, though, and, not a sign that serious researchers who are trying to understand a complex and interesting problem on the net are "Doing Evil".
In short...if you like eating sausage, you should NEVER watch it being made.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
Library skills are important, even today. Go to dictionary.com, and look up "censor". This is the first definition you will find:
1. an official who examines books, plays, news reports, motion pictures, radio and television programs, letters, cablegrams, etc., for the purpose of suppressing parts deemed objectionable on moral, political, military, or other grounds.
Note that the world "official" does not imply a member of the government, although historically, that has been where the power to enforce the suppression of unpleasant information has lived.
So...should Google be REQUIRED to publish everything? Probably not, as not all libraries are REQUIRED to have a copy of every book ever printed. However, if they are going to play the "library game", they need to be willing to make available not only the books that they like, but, any book that a user requests.
The libraries of America have fought this war for decades, so far have remained winners, and, deserve a big "thumbs up" and support for this stance. Google needs to play the game by ALL the rules, not just the ones that they LIKE.
regards
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
I find this puzzling, as the only time I have had to re-install the entire Linux system is when a hardware failure hosed the hard drive. yea...the programmers out there do continually produce updates to the software, both for security and bug fixes and enhancements to function. However, I cannot think of a time when it required more than simply running an online update to get the patches. I am running OpenSUSE, but, it seems to be the same for other distros.
For that matter, how does that differ from Windows? As a sysadmin, I am continually having to install patches and updates to the software and OS on the windows boxes I watch over. At least once or twice, installing those updates has caused the system to become unbootable...requiring a bit of work to revive it. That has never happened to the Linux boxes.
In any case, I suspect that the lack of lockups, flakiness and general speed increase that Linux users get will more than outweigh any worries over updating their software.
Regards
Dave Mundt
Your employees need support to use a word processor and spreadsheet? I think your money would be better spent hiring competent people over support contracts.
There...fixed that for you.
Unless you DID mean component...in which case I would suggest you buy better quality components.
regards
dave Mundt
bright moonlit night outside, but I'm stuffed in a windowless basement
Perhaps my neck elevation angle is insufficient, but if I was in a windowless basement how would I know what the lunar illumination situation was?
Greetings and Salutations...
The same way all geeks find out about the Big Room with the Blue Ceiling....
http://www.weather.com/
http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/
G.D.R.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
As Adam Corolla used to say on Love Line - "perfectly natural, perfectly normal"...
http://furry.wikia.com/wiki/Furry
regards dave
By the by...the government SHOULD fear "anonymous" more than anything, because that is tht group of people who are MOST likely to expose its failures, evil-doing, and, general incompetence. However, to include that group in a list of terrorists and enemies of the state is another step on the slippery slope to totalitarianism.
Greetings and Salutations...
I disagree with several points here, and, so, thought I would address them.
1) your assumption about lethal doses of drugs. Do a google search for "ibuprofen lethal dose", and, read a couple of the articles. To summerize, it appears that to get a lethal dose of the drug, your typical high school student would have to be carrying around a five gallon bucket of the pills...and be willing to get them all down. If the young lady who was caught with the Ibuprofen had been carrying a 5 gallon bucket of them, I suspect that it might have been mentioned in the newspaper article, even with today's painfully low journalistic standards.
2) America is a Republic, built on the concept of Laws that all are subject to. Therefore, there is always time to "fuck around for a judge to issue a warrant". Since you are, admittedly, NOT American, you are probably a bit clueless about how easy it is to get a warrant here. School officials are NOT law enforcement, so they do not have the same rights of search and siezure, although, alas they have taken that power it seems.
3) IF I were to walk into a situation, and find ANYONE comatose, with pills scattered around, I would be calling for an ambulance, and Emergency Medical Technicians. That would be common sense. However, it appears that if any of the pills were actually taken, it was not enough of a quantity to be worth reporting.
4) Before you minimize the trauma of being seen in your underware, consider how YOU would feel if you were pulled out of your Schoolroom/cubical at work, escorted into a room and required to disrobe to the same extent, and treated like a criminal in the process, all because of a random, UNTRUE accusation made by someone else that, at one time, had been your friend. You may feel that it is trivial, but, try it some time. Your attitudes may change.
5) Your point #1, about students suing over nothing, is specious at best. Her family has pushed this through the court system because they, quite rightly, feel that the level of authority that schools have taken has exceeded the bounds of sanity. In short, a student in the elementary and high schools is considered to have NO civil rights. At this point, they have no freedom, no defense against unreasonable search and siezure, and, as the quote from the administration so bluntly puts it...they are considered guilty until proven innocent. Up to a few years ago, the ONLY people in America that had that same set of conditions on them were prisoners in high security facilities. Every one of these points flies in the face of our Constitution, and, in the way that we, citizens SHOULD be treated. In addition, this is likely to involve the whole concept of "zero tolerance" rules, and, with luck, it will start to chip them away so we can get back to some level of common sense in dealing with the kids. It is far too easy to find report upon report of good kids who have fallen afoul of the "zero tolerance" policies of a school, and, ended up receiving excessive punishment for it.
6) Your point #2 is, for the most part, factually incorrect. A vast majority of the teachers in America's schools care deeply about the kids in their custody, and, are trying as hard as they can to provide these kids with a good, rounded education. Arrayed against them are parents who are not supporting this educational push by being indifferent, or, are actively fighting against their kids learning anything that might cause them to question the parent's belief systems. Also, there are the school boards, who are supposed to be finding ways to provide an excellent education for our children, but, far too often end up being nothing but political bedsheets, flapping to whatever breeze is blowing the hardest. Then, there is the Teacher's Union, which, while in theory, is there to support the teachers, in far too many cases ends up fighting change, fighting to keep incompetent teachers in their positions, and, deserting the teachers t
Greetings and Salutations.. Hum...this looks like an excellent proof of the observation that inability to detect sarcasm is an early sign of dimentia.
G,D, R
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
The last time I severed ties with a company, I actually fired them (as mentioned before). In this case, it was in the 80s, and, the owner of the smallish company had, basically, doubled my work load, with no increase in pay. This, after the usual promises upon hiring that "while we know this is a bit below what you should be making, we will bring you up to industry standards quickly".
I wrote a short, one page letter of resignation that stated the reasons I was leaving the company including compensation issues (did not name numbers on the salary promised, of course, as that would have just irritated and annoyed the hardware guys, who I did like); lack of overtime pay combined with the assumption that everyone would work 60+ hours a week (the owner called everyone a "salaried" employee, to not have to pay overtime - and did not appreciate it when I quoted the state labor board in a staff meeting showing that he DID have to pay overtime); the impossible task of getting programming done when I would walk in and find terminals/computers used in MY production robbed to get a customer back up (they were MAINLY a hardware support firm), and, getting dinged for missing deadlines, as well as other issues. I was polite and civil but REALLY CLEAR about it.. I printed out a copy for each person in the office, and, starting with the receptionist, handed them out on a Friday morning. I worked my way up the ladder of seniority, until I reached the office manager. After assuring him I really meant it, I hit the door and did not come back.
Now...I did this because when the last guy quit, a Sr. Tech who had hit his frustration level with some of the unethical dealings and underhandedness of the owner, the owner had come in an walked around the office all day saying things like "D....had no balls, his WIFE made him quit", and, "He was so incompetent that I was going to fire him anyway..." and a whole raft of other things like that. When the Manager asked why I had handed the letters out, I explained very clearly that I had no desire to be slandered after I left, like D.... had been.
It was, as it turned out, an excellent decision. Although they hired a person to replace me, they were new out of Tech school, and were totally lost in the fairly sophisticated programming environment we had set up there. So...within three months I was doing the software support for every one of their customers. "Luckily", I had refused to sign the non-compete contract that the owner had come up with a few months before I left...so there was nothing that the owner could do about it.
Greetings and Salutations,... Just on the off chance you are ever in the position of being at the wrong end of a gun...DON'T stick your finger in the end of the barrel and have any confidence in the weapon not firing if the trigger is pulled. The fact of the matter is that if the firing pin hits the primer on a cartridoge, the bullet WILL make an excellent attempt to come out the end of the barrel. It will NOT care if flesh and bone are there, and, probably won't slow down a significant amount for them.
Guesses like this are what get folks killed, and, are the strongest argument I have for manditory gun safety classes in school.
Regards
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
Well, while the patent app may show penguins, I remember being really impressed by the World's Chat environment. I spent WAY too much time wandering around there, and created some pretty spiffy 3d avatars. I thought it was quite a shame when they decided to pull the plug on the free version, and go to a full subscription model. As I suspected, a vast majority of folks simply bailed out from it and went away.
However, in terms of the environment, it was quite flexible, and, had a bunch of interesting rooms, mazes, and generally slick toys. One of the better bits was that one could find the cracks in the station walls, and actually escape to the outside to look around. Could not get to the planet below, but, could fly around the station, etc.
Another innovative thing that made it more impressive was that it was designed to minimize data traffic between the server and the clients, only downloading changed data in small bits during pauses, etc. The main program for displaying the environment ran on the local client. This meant that even over a fairly slow (9800 baud or so) dialup, the connection was usable, and, at 56k it was down-right speedy.
They seemed to be trying to move into what they thought was a tele-presence field, marketed to companies. Apparently that did not work that well. I can see, though, that, depending on where they are at now, it could work well for a gaming environment. It would work better, I suspect, if there were data gloves and an affordable VR helmet that would provide more of an immersive experience. But, then, that would be true of MOST first person, 3d shooters these days, wouldn't it?
Regards
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
I ran a D&D campaign for WAY to many years, and, while there was a lot of violence at times, anyone that participated in it understood that there was a real difference between the fantasy violence and violence in reality. However, I have seen folks that are unable to keep those separate. I do not, though, think that the games are responsible for violent behavior in real life. I do agree with the other poster that dings the parents for not giving their kids a solid set of positive values.
But then, I also think that the biggest problem with the VT shooting was that there were too FEW guns on campus. After all, if an armed student, or staff/faculty member had the ability to defend against this rampage, it would have cut the body count down by QUITE a bit.
Gun control is not keeping weapons out of the hands of citizens. It is being able to put half a dozen bullets into a 1" circle at 20 yards or more.
Thanks for the opportunity to dump out some fuel for a flamewar.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
THe cost of diesel is always a challenging thing to track down. Since it is (essentially) the sludge left over after lighter components are cracked out, one DOES think it should be cheapler. I believe that much of the cost stems from political issues - including the fact that MOST of the diesel vehicles in America are in the $40K area, and I am sure that the refiners figure that anyone that can afford a $40K+ vehicle will not whine about a few pennies more pre gallon for fuel.
I should point out that the cost of fuel MAY be one of the factors that destroys the American economy. It is a hidden expense for ALL consumer goods, and one that hurts all of us equally. After all, the folks that drive all those veggies across country are not absorbing the costs of fuel...they are passing them along to their customers...and those customers not only pay but crank it up a bit more each time, until it gets to us, the consumers, as quite an inflated amount.
Pleasant dreams.
Dave Mundt
Slashdot Mirror
There is a VERY amusing short story, titled "Man of Steel, Woman of Tissue Paper" that examines at some length (as it were) the whole subject of Superman's puberty and sexual life...and some of the unforeseen consequences and frustrations of it. Well worth tracking down and reading.
Greetings and salutations....
This "supplemental" tax picture you have is right on the money. here in Tennessee, for example, we have an "Entertainment tax" of about 15% that is levied on movie theaters, restaurants, bars, etc. It is not listed ANYWHERE in the bill, but it is there in the total. Since a big chunk of income for the state comes from tourists, it was another way for the cash addicts in the government to feed their habit off folks that had no power and were not likely to complain.
Cash to a politician is like crack to an addict.
Oh yea...Tn is not alone in these cute tricks....EVERY state that has a large tourist income does the same thing.
regards
dave mundt
What!!!!! YOU had a pringles can to use as a whistle>????? You kids have it EASY now! In MY day, we had nothing but teeth and pursed lips....and now, alas, nothing but pursed lips..
Now....GET OFF MY LAWN
G,D, R
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
However, I, for one, GREATLY appreciate the no smoking rule for restaurants here in Tennessee. I, for one, like to smell and taste the food I am eating, and, not the acrid and annoying smell of stale tobacco smoke. Smoking and non-smoking areas for restaurants were a joke, as, unless the two areas were in separate buildings, or floors of a building, with isolated A/C systems, the smoke WOULD permiate everything.
As a matter of fact, there are a number of restaurants here that I refused to eat at, because of the smoking environment...and a lot of them have gone under in the past decade or so, because a lot of people apparently agreed with my stance.
Actually...sales taxes collected on Internet Sales are a record keeping nightmare, and would, at least, cause a huge jump in costs of online goods.
Apparently you are unaware of the fact that Sales taxes are Not uniform through the state. As a matter of fact, they vary on a county and even CITY basis. Enacting requirements for companies to collect and forward sales taxes to the appropriate authorities for interstate sales could require a company to send out thousands of checks and two or more pages of paperwork PER CHECK every month.
Another factor is that this will not only affect internet sales. It will, in fact, hit EVERY mail-order seller...and every one of them will pass those costs along to you, the consumer.
regards
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
A good point. My usual mantra for this is "money to a politician is like crack to an addict". There is never enough, they can never GET enough and they will sell their daughters into BDSM prostitution to get more of it.
pleasant dreams
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
Actually, the writers of the American Constitution thought of this. The fact of the matter is that the Constitution is a document which defines what powers the citizens of the USA are willing to allow the government to have. Anything that is NOT mentioned is, explicitly, reserved for the Citizenry. So...as regards the Constitution, yea...if it is not specifically addressed, then it is allowed to the CITIZENS..not the government.
As for the rest of the tens of thousands of laws that we Americans have allowed ourselves to become burdened with...the same principle applies there too. Unless there is a law that specifically prohibits an act, then, that act is ALLOWED. For example, the original formulations for Coca Cola included a fairly goodly shot of cocaine. At the time, this was not addressed in law, so was perfectly legal. It gave Coke that refreshing zap! Now, as time progressed, certain drugs were prohibited by law...and vanished from Coke.
However, one worrisome evolution in America is the concept of "freedom zones", where protestors against a politician or event are corralled. It is usually fairly far away from the person or event in question, and, often means that the protestors are "out of sight and out of mind". There are no statutes covering this, and, I suspect any such laws would be overturned by the courts in short order. Now..my question here is this: Although this appears to fall into the area covered by your statement...is this a "good" thing, and is this where American should be going? I think not, and, I hope that others agree. It is this sort of attitude that ends up with a Citizenry cowering in fear under the thumb of a repressive government, and, is the rot that will destroy America in the long run, if it is allowed to continue and grow.
regards
dave mundt
is the Buckaroo Banzi films. WITH the original cast....
Still waiting hopefully...
THird best line in the movie: The answer Lithgow gave the general..."It's not my G-D planet, Monkey Boy!".
Followed closely by
"Where are we going to go?
Home (says the Greek chorus...)
When are we going to leave?
Real soon now...."
and the big winner:
"Wherever you go, there you are!"
regards & Cheerfully Off topic...
dave mundt
are you really sure that is it?
(g,d,r)
Greetings and Salutations...
Thanks for the insightful, critical review of my website.
As a matter of fact it IS about 1996, as I have not touched it in a number of years.
Updating it and improving it is on the list of things to do, but, alas, other priorities have gotten it pushed down the ladder.
Maybe NEXT year (*smile*).
regards
dave mundt
P.S. Since I am somewhat old and feeble-minded,
perhaps you could enlighten me as to how my website design relates to the topic at hand?
dcm
Greetings and Salutations...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torpig
When a phrase becomes part of the common vernacular, it no longer needs explanation or definition. For example, "Use the Force", or "Live Long and Prosper".
Also, it has been my observation that in the case of cross-platform malware (say, something that uses a Java vulnerablity), any references to it tend to mention that it can affect multiple platforms.
In any case, the focus of the paper was on the MALWARE - what its capabilities were, and how it could be used. I found that very interesting, actually, as it seems to be quite the multi-tasker, and, if one was into that sort of thing, quite a useful tool.
There may be omissions and weaknesses in the paper - there always are. However, it is less useful to wonder in a general manner if these exist, and far more useful to think about it, then, post specific questions about perceived problems.
Regards
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations... /., it is even more amazing.
I have to say that the level of misunderstanding exhibited by MOST of the folks posting to this thread boggles the mind. Considering the alleged level of IT sophistication of the readers of
I read the researcher's report, and, I have to say that I found it a well-reasoned and interesting analysis of a terrible problem on the Internet. However, without following their methodology, I do not believe they could have been able to do any where close to this level of analysis. These researchers not only produced a fairly scholarly analysis of a nasty and persistent problem, but, apparently went out of their way to work with the governmental authorities charged with controlling these sorts of crimes. So...why all the calls for them to be drawn and quartered in the public square? Have none of you ever heard of the concept of studying your enemy on a deep level, so to find its weaknesses, and make it easier to destroy? And as a part of that how do you propose to GATHER that information, short of following procedures that these researchers used?
There are only a few, small quibbles I have with the paper. While they do say that they took a number of steps to secure the private information that they gathered while researching this virus, I would feel much better about reality if there was some assurance that this data set had been destroyed at the end of the study. I realise that arguments can be made that information, once gathered, tends to exist forever (after all, can we be sure that no copies were made?). However, with sufficient audit trails of what happened to the data, and who accessed it, this is a minimal problem. Of course, if the folks whose data had been intercepted were, indeed, contacted and made aware of the breach of their privacy, the usefulness of this data would erode away quickly, as CC numbers/banking information/passwords/etc were changed.
Also, it was unclear to me exactly how they attempted to contact the people whose information had been compromised. Mainly this is curiosity on my part, because most of the methods that spring to mind (Email, IM, etc), are exactly the sorts of communications that I tend to filter out and delete with out any further attention. I suppose that a phone call from a complete stranger would certainly be a wake-up call, though.
As for their activities being "illegal", while perhaps technically true, It is more a problem with the way the laws are written, rather than with their activities. Most folks do not understand that applying the law to a bad situation is akin to using a 20 lb sledgehammer to swat a mosquito. it is not a precision instrument. That is one of the many reasons that the justice system in America has avenues for appealing a case through several levels of juries and judges. The hope is that with enough people looking at it, a sane interpretation of the law will take root. Most of the current laws dealing with computer access and IT these days DO make security research difficult and problimatical, as their wording exposes even legitimate researchers to criminal charges. That is a legislative problem, though, and, not a sign that serious researchers who are trying to understand a complex and interesting problem on the net are "Doing Evil".
In short...if you like eating sausage, you should NEVER watch it being made.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
Library skills are important, even today.
Go to dictionary.com, and look up "censor". This is the first definition you will find:
1. an official who examines books, plays, news reports, motion pictures, radio and television programs, letters, cablegrams, etc., for the purpose of suppressing parts deemed objectionable on moral, political, military, or other grounds.
Note that the world "official" does not imply a member of the government, although historically, that has been where the power to enforce the suppression of unpleasant information has lived.
So...should Google be REQUIRED to publish everything? Probably not, as not all libraries are REQUIRED to have a copy of every book ever printed. However, if they are going to play the "library game", they need to be willing to make available not only the books that they like, but, any book that a user requests.
The libraries of America have fought this war for decades, so far have remained winners, and, deserve a big "thumbs up" and support for this stance. Google needs to play the game by ALL the rules, not just the ones that they LIKE.
regards
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
I find this puzzling, as the only time I have had to re-install the entire Linux system is when a hardware failure hosed the hard drive. yea...the programmers out there do continually produce updates to the software, both for security and bug fixes and enhancements to function. However, I cannot think of a time when it required more than simply running an online update to get the patches. I am running OpenSUSE, but, it seems to be the same for other distros.
For that matter, how does that differ from Windows? As a sysadmin, I am continually having to install patches and updates to the software and OS on the windows boxes I watch over. At least once or twice, installing those updates has caused the system to become unbootable...requiring a bit of work to revive it. That has never happened to the Linux boxes.
In any case, I suspect that the lack of lockups, flakiness and general speed increase that Linux users get will more than outweigh any worries over updating their software.
Regards
Dave Mundt
Your employees need support to use a word processor and spreadsheet? I think your money would be better spent hiring competent people over support contracts.
There...fixed that for you.
Unless you DID mean component...in which case I would suggest you buy better quality components.
regards
dave Mundt
Perhaps my neck elevation angle is insufficient, but if I was in a windowless basement how would I know what the lunar illumination situation was?
Greetings and Salutations...
The same way all geeks find out about the Big Room with the Blue Ceiling....
http://www.weather.com/
http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/
G.D.R.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
As Adam Corolla used to say on Love Line - "perfectly natural, perfectly normal"...
http://furry.wikia.com/wiki/Furry
regards
dave
By the by...the government SHOULD fear "anonymous" more than anything, because that is tht group of people who are MOST likely to expose its failures, evil-doing, and, general incompetence. However, to include that group in a list of terrorists and enemies of the state is another step on the slippery slope to totalitarianism.
Greetings and Salutations... I disagree with several points here, and, so, thought I would address them.
1) your assumption about lethal doses of drugs. Do a google search for "ibuprofen lethal dose", and, read a couple of the articles. To summerize, it appears that to get a lethal dose of the drug, your typical high school student would have to be carrying around a five gallon bucket of the pills...and be willing to get them all down. If the young lady who was caught with the Ibuprofen had been carrying a 5 gallon bucket of them, I suspect that it might have been mentioned in the newspaper article, even with today's painfully low journalistic standards.
2) America is a Republic, built on the concept of Laws that all are subject to. Therefore, there is always time to "fuck around for a judge to issue a warrant". Since you are, admittedly, NOT American, you are probably a bit clueless about how easy it is to get a warrant here. School officials are NOT law enforcement, so they do not have the same rights of search and siezure, although, alas they have taken that power it seems.
3) IF I were to walk into a situation, and find ANYONE comatose, with pills scattered around, I would be calling for an ambulance, and Emergency Medical Technicians. That would be common sense. However, it appears that if any of the pills were actually taken, it was not enough of a quantity to be worth reporting.
4) Before you minimize the trauma of being seen in your underware, consider how YOU would feel if you were pulled out of your Schoolroom/cubical at work, escorted into a room and required to disrobe to the same extent, and treated like a criminal in the process, all because of a random, UNTRUE accusation made by someone else that, at one time, had been your friend. You may feel that it is trivial, but, try it some time. Your attitudes may change.
5) Your point #1, about students suing over nothing, is specious at best. Her family has pushed this through the court system because they, quite rightly, feel that the level of authority that schools have taken has exceeded the bounds of sanity. In short, a student in the elementary and high schools is considered to have NO civil rights. At this point, they have no freedom, no defense against unreasonable search and siezure, and, as the quote from the administration so bluntly puts it...they are considered guilty until proven innocent. Up to a few years ago, the ONLY people in America that had that same set of conditions on them were prisoners in high security facilities. Every one of these points flies in the face of our Constitution, and, in the way that we, citizens SHOULD be treated. In addition, this is likely to involve the whole concept of "zero tolerance" rules, and, with luck, it will start to chip them away so we can get back to some level of common sense in dealing with the kids. It is far too easy to find report upon report of good kids who have fallen afoul of the "zero tolerance" policies of a school, and, ended up receiving excessive punishment for it.
6) Your point #2 is, for the most part, factually incorrect. A vast majority of the teachers in America's schools care deeply about the kids in their custody, and, are trying as hard as they can to provide these kids with a good, rounded education. Arrayed against them are parents who are not supporting this educational push by being indifferent, or, are actively fighting against their kids learning anything that might cause them to question the parent's belief systems. Also, there are the school boards, who are supposed to be finding ways to provide an excellent education for our children, but, far too often end up being nothing but political bedsheets, flapping to whatever breeze is blowing the hardest. Then, there is the Teacher's Union, which, while in theory, is there to support the teachers, in far too many cases ends up fighting change, fighting to keep incompetent teachers in their positions, and, deserting the teachers t
Greetings and Salutations..
Hum...this looks like an excellent proof of the observation that inability to detect sarcasm is an early sign of dimentia.
G,D, R
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations...
The last time I severed ties with a company, I actually fired them (as mentioned before). In this case, it was in the 80s, and, the owner of the smallish company had, basically, doubled my work load, with no increase in pay. This, after the usual promises upon hiring that "while we know this is a bit below what you should be making, we will bring you up to industry standards quickly".
I wrote a short, one page letter of resignation that stated the reasons I was leaving the company including compensation issues (did not name numbers on the salary promised, of course, as that would have just irritated and annoyed the hardware guys, who I did like); lack of overtime pay combined with the assumption that everyone would work 60+ hours a week (the owner called everyone a "salaried" employee, to not have to pay overtime - and did not appreciate it when I quoted the state labor board in a staff meeting showing that he DID have to pay overtime); the impossible task of getting programming done when I would walk in and find terminals/computers used in MY production robbed to get a customer back up (they were MAINLY a hardware support firm), and, getting dinged for missing deadlines, as well as other issues. I was polite and civil but REALLY CLEAR about it.. I printed out a copy for each person in the office, and, starting with the receptionist, handed them out on a Friday morning. I worked my way up the ladder of seniority, until I reached the office manager. After assuring him I really meant it, I hit the door and did not come back.
Now...I did this because when the last guy quit, a Sr. Tech who had hit his frustration level with some of the unethical dealings and underhandedness of the owner, the owner had come in an walked around the office all day saying things like "D....had no balls, his WIFE made him quit", and, "He was so incompetent that I was going to fire him anyway..." and a whole raft of other things like that. When the Manager asked why I had handed the letters out, I explained very clearly that I had no desire to be slandered after I left, like D.... had been.
It was, as it turned out, an excellent decision. Although they hired a person to replace me, they were new out of Tech school, and were totally lost in the fairly sophisticated programming environment we had set up there. So...within three months I was doing the software support for every one of their customers. "Luckily", I had refused to sign the non-compete contract that the owner had come up with a few months before I left...so there was nothing that the owner could do about it.
Regards
dave mundt
Greetings and Salutations,...
Just on the off chance you are ever in the position of being at the wrong end of a gun...DON'T stick your finger in the end of the barrel and have any confidence in the weapon not firing if the trigger is pulled. The fact of the matter is that if the firing pin hits the primer on a cartridoge, the bullet WILL make an excellent attempt to come out the end of the barrel. It will NOT care if flesh and bone are there, and, probably won't slow down a significant amount for them.
Guesses like this are what get folks killed, and, are the strongest argument I have for manditory gun safety classes in school.
Regards
Dave Mundt
So, there I am buying us some Dark Matter for a little snack, and the Milky Way looks at me, and asks "does this telescope make me look fat???"
Trust me...the right answer is NEVER "no, it's the fact that you weigh about half again as much as you did last year!"!!!
regards
the Ex-Dweller In the Citystate of the Vincible Overlord.
Greetings and Salutations...
Well, while the patent app may show penguins, I remember being really impressed by the World's Chat environment. I spent WAY too much time wandering around there, and created some pretty spiffy 3d avatars. I thought it was quite a shame when they decided to pull the plug on the free version, and go to a full subscription model. As I suspected, a vast majority of folks simply bailed out from it and went away.
However, in terms of the environment, it was quite flexible, and, had a bunch of interesting rooms, mazes, and generally slick toys. One of the better bits was that one could find the cracks in the station walls, and actually escape to the outside to look around. Could not get to the planet below, but, could fly around the station, etc.
Another innovative thing that made it more impressive was that it was designed to minimize data traffic between the server and the clients, only downloading changed data in small bits during pauses, etc. The main program for displaying the environment ran on the local client. This meant that even over a fairly slow (9800 baud or so) dialup, the connection was usable, and, at 56k it was down-right speedy.
They seemed to be trying to move into what they thought was a tele-presence field, marketed to companies. Apparently that did not work that well. I can see, though, that, depending on where they are at now, it could work well for a gaming environment. It would work better, I suspect, if there were data gloves and an affordable VR helmet that would provide more of an immersive experience. But, then, that would be true of MOST first person, 3d shooters these days, wouldn't it?
Regards
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
I ran a D&D campaign for WAY to many years, and, while there was a lot of violence at times, anyone that participated in it understood that there was a real difference between the fantasy violence and violence in reality. However, I have seen folks that are unable to keep those separate. I do not, though, think that the games are responsible for violent behavior in real life. I do agree with the other poster that dings the parents for not giving their kids a solid set of positive values.
But then, I also think that the biggest problem with the VT shooting was that there were too FEW guns on campus. After all, if an armed student, or staff/faculty member had the ability to defend against this rampage, it would have cut the body count down by QUITE a bit.
Gun control is not keeping weapons out of the hands of citizens. It is being able to put half a dozen bullets into a 1" circle at 20 yards or more.
Thanks for the opportunity to dump out some fuel for a flamewar.
Dave Mundt
Greetings and Salutations.
THe cost of diesel is always a challenging thing to track down. Since it is (essentially) the sludge left over after lighter components are cracked out, one DOES think it should be cheapler. I believe that much of the cost stems from political issues - including the fact that MOST of the diesel vehicles in America are in the $40K area, and I am sure that the refiners figure that anyone that can afford a $40K+ vehicle will not whine about a few pennies more pre gallon for fuel.
I should point out that the cost of fuel MAY be one of the factors that destroys the American economy. It is a hidden expense for ALL consumer goods, and one that hurts all of us equally. After all, the folks that drive all those veggies across country are not absorbing the costs of fuel...they are passing them along to their customers...and those customers not only pay but crank it up a bit more each time, until it gets to us, the consumers, as quite an inflated amount.
Pleasant dreams.
Dave Mundt