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User: alecto

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  1. Lots of folks are going to be laying out an extra place setting with a spork today. RIP, Rob.

  2. Haven't seen anything yet . . . on Think Tank's Website Rejects Browser Do-Not-Track Requests · · Score: 2

    . . . from a site that goes out of its way to block adblocking users that I couldn't live without. It seems to me that those running sites who do this sort of thing vastly overestimate the value of their "content."

  3. Re:Patents, open licences and cyberspace laws on How IT Pros Can Avoid Legal Trouble · · Score: 1

    Isn't nepotism a word with French roots? How fitting.

    Latin--but close enough! nepos, -otis, m.: nephew

  4. Re:Legally questionable scenarios? on How IT Pros Can Avoid Legal Trouble · · Score: 1

    They fired me three days after reporting this flaw, calling me a security risk.

    This is a lesson I learned early on--fortunately not at the cost of a job: don't make the people responsible for security look incompetent or they will label you a "hacker" (in the pejorative sense) and do everything in their power to harm your career. If security is not one of your job responsibilities, keep things like that to yourself.

  5. Re:Not much left! on R In a Nutshell · · Score: 1

    That's where Big-O notation came from.

  6. Re:drug testing? on Feds To Help Train 50,000 Health IT Workers · · Score: 1

    I don't use illegal drugs, but would have to have emptied my last can of beans before accepting a job that required a drug test that didn't involve a TS codeword security clearance or was truly a physical safety critical position (e.g. commercial pilot). This is on principle, not because I don't want my employer to know about a weekend crack habit.

  7. Re:Not this again... on The Hurt Locker Producers Sue First 5,000 File-Sharers · · Score: 0, Redundant

    +1

  8. Re:Bought one this morning... on Proposed Law Would Require ID To Buy Prepaid Phones · · Score: 1

    If you're carrying it with your regular cell phone, "they" already know who you are. Unless they think it's your siamese twin.

  9. Re:Total bullshit. on Proposed Law Would Require ID To Buy Prepaid Phones · · Score: 1

    They'll require ID to activate and thus be worthless on eBay--or anywhere else, once something like this goes into effect.

  10. Re:This will probably be bad on TSA Nominee's Snooping Raises Privacy Concerns · · Score: 2, Funny

    P.S.: because he doesn't know you exist.

    Ominous voice: " . . . yet."

  11. Re:This will probably be bad on TSA Nominee's Snooping Raises Privacy Concerns · · Score: -1, Flamebait

    Nor does he you. What's your point?

  12. Re:This will probably be bad on TSA Nominee's Snooping Raises Privacy Concerns · · Score: 1

    It's an argument that he shouldn't have the job he has now, much less be promoted into a job with access to even more sensitive information about us.

  13. Re:This will probably be bad on TSA Nominee's Snooping Raises Privacy Concerns · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Because he had a good personal reason to abuse his access and did so thinking he would never have been caught makes him the perfect man for the job? I disagree--he demonstrated a willingness to misuse a public trust for personal gain that I doubt the passage of time has magically cured so much as made him better at covering his tracks.

  14. Who doesn't do this? on TSA Nominee's Snooping Raises Privacy Concerns · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I suspect folks with that kind of access who misuse it at least on occasion are far more common than those who don't. What surprises me here, actually, is that there were any checks that resulted in him having been caught in the first place.

  15. Re:Invite only? on Google Nexus Rumored To Cost $530 Or $180 w/Plan · · Score: 1

    I do remember, but they're common as dirt now, so the example is just fine--you are erring comparing the future to the past. And they were never really all that scarce for people that had more than one or two friends who were in the circle of enthusiasts.

  16. The apology's nice and all . . . on TSA Withdraws Subpoenas Against Bloggers · · Score: 4, Interesting

    . . . but someone should have to fall on his or her sword over this. If those field agents acted on their own, it would be they; if not, then whoever they worked for that authorized the tactics should be holding a sign saying "WILL WAND YOUR CROTCH FOR FOOD."

  17. Re:Invite only? on Google Nexus Rumored To Cost $530 Or $180 w/Plan · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Just a marketing gimmick to make people feel elite. Invites will be about as scarce as Gmail invites.

  18. Subsidy lock? on Google Nexus Rumored To Cost $530 Or $180 w/Plan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If someone buys the phone with the subsidy then subsequently leaves T-mo and pays the ETF, will T-mo unlock the phone? Also, is the ETF prorated? In any case, it seems that the combination of a cheap phone for voice and a netbook/laptop + WiFi or if ubiquitous access is necessary a data stick are a better deal for the money.

  19. Re:Censorship depends on the country. on UN Officials Remove Poster Mentioning Chinese Firewall · · Score: 0, Troll

    Precisely. Calling barbarians barbarians is racist now. Rights are human rights, not subject to "cultural norms," and we are perfectly justified imposing those rights on the ignorant--by force, if necessary.

  20. Re:So what if you own one of these machines? on Psystar Crushed In Court · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Not that much I imagine, but Franklin sold a whole lot more Aces than Psystar sold commodity machines running Mac OS X.

  21. Moron tries to sue information off the Internet. on German Killers Sue Wikipedia To Remove Their Names · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I think we know how this one's going to turn out for our convicted murderers, [redacted] and [redacted].

  22. Re:Liar beats other liars? on FreeCreditReport.com Wins 1,017 Domains By UDRP · · Score: 3, Informative

    The FTC didn't set it up. The big three set it up to comply with the FACT Act (Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act). Although I agree that a .gov would have been much more apropos.

  23. Moral of the story: on Bernie Madoff's Programmers Arrested · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you destroy evidence, make sure you destroy the backups, too.

  24. Re:Verizon is doubling the phone-subsidy to $350.. on Verizon Doubles Early Termination Fee and More · · Score: 5, Informative

    Tracfone has a brand, Straight Talk (I have no affiliation and that's not a referral link), with phones available at WalMart with unlimited voice and text plus 30 MB data for $45/30 days. Prepaid being only for low-usage folks is a bygone idea.

  25. Re:Geneva Conventions on MPAA Shuts Down Town's Municipal WiFi Over 1 Download · · Score: 1

    Why wouldn't they? The people using it that way have probably been hearing that we are "at war" on something since they were children: the "War on Poverty," the "War on (some) Drugs," the "War on Terror."