Well, they already tried that. Now it's no longer "erotic" services, but "adult" services.:)
The difference is the lost commerce that the various industries believe they have suffered. There is no industry suffering because of escorts. Well, I'm sure someone can make a case for some industry suffering, but there's always someone to bitch about something. It's not like prostitution is legal and licensed in most places. If it were, sure there would be hell to pay for the craigslist "adult" ads, since there would now be a financial impact on someone.
If you have an address of a drug dealer, and you are not party in any sort of way, it could be innocent. For example, if you suspected a neighbor was a drug dealer, and you told the police.
A completely different example, which is more appropriate, would be if you acted as a centralized clearinghouse for information on drug dealers. You provided information on what they had on hand, where to go to get it, and if they were currently available. Most likely, even though neither money nor drugs passed through your hands, you would be found to be an accomplice to their criminal activities.
This happens in other circles, such as TER. They provide a facility for people to post information on intimate adult experiences. That's not the only example. There are quite a few national and regional facilities like this.
I personally wouldn't demonize TPB. While this kind of sharing isn't the nicest thing, if the companies who are being effected had been decent about their cost structure people wouldn't have resorted to this in the first place.
It does sound like a great scam. Give us your money, and we'll give it back to you with interest when you get undead.
Since they haven't exactly frozen and resurrected an abundance of people, the whole cryogenics thing is still a big scam. I'd feel just as comfortable with letting a company keep a DNA sample of me to clone me with at some future date. Oh, that won't really happen either.:)
Maybe I should get in on this scam. I'll start an "insurance" company who keeps 10% of the interest as a fee, so I have working capital for years to come. Well, until I take all of the money and retire to a tropical island nation (which I'd own) with their money.
I agree totally. He's an idiot. Most people who have read his stuff know that though.
There's way too much space to cover. I talked with some friends in the past about the same idea, but we realized it wouldn't work, without putting ourselves in front of the world to look like idiots.:)
I don't think putting water up would help much either. It may encourage some of the very low debris to deorbit sooner, but not the majority of the junk that's up there. The really low stuff is on it's way down already anyways.
Exactly where are you getting thrust from the solar power? Solar panels are great for making electricity, but it's not like you can spin a propeller in space.
That's assuming all (or even the majority) of the debris is ferrous. Titanium, aluminum, ceramic, propulsion slag, and leaked coolant are at least some of the debris that's up there, and it would happily float past a giant magnet like it wasn't even there. Lets not forget rock debris that's been floating around up there since before we (humanity) had a space program.
Don't forget, attraction and repulsion work both ways too. So the satellite pulls the object out of orbit a little. The object in turn would be pulling the satellite too. It's an absolutely huge 3 dimensional space, so even at 18k mph, clearing one plain would take a long time. Clearing all the plains would take an eternity. We're not talking about a few miles. According to NASA, there's debris from 300km to over 10,000km. That'd take one mighty big EM field, that I don't believe we have the ability to produce any time in the near future.
Even the net, sheet, or garbage collecting satellite would spend an awful lot of time (and fuel) to try to collect them. The expended fuel would cause new debris too. Since we're talking about some huge orbital velocities, the impacts would make a bigger mess than they'd cure. Even something only 1kg at 18k mph at a glancing impact would likely leave fresh debris.
I do wonder what will happen over time. From what I know about astrophysics (which isn't all that much), I would have to assume that they would eventually drift into a equatorial orbit. Ahhh, the man made rings of Earth.:)
If you watched the Drew Carey show, you'd know more about it. Ya, it was suppose to taste terrible, but you'd get drunk and be wide awake. It was totally fictional though.
I don't think I could bring myself to drink it, if it had existed. If I want caffeinated alcohol, I'll stick with rum & coke, since every bar in the world knows how to make it. Well, sometimes you have to order Bacardi and cola, but that depends on the part of the world that you're in. I'm still not a Redbull & vodka fan. It may be an acquired taste, but Redbull still tastes like ass.
I still help some people who are distant. Echogent's EchoVNC is a wonderful tool. I schedule people's virus scans to run at boot time, reboot, and then tell them to call me if there are any problems. Usually I don't get the call back. Usually the reboot will fix their problem, but in case it was a virus, that'll be fixed too by the time it comes back up. Come on, what other problems can a Windows user possibly have?:)
I try that a lot. I tell people "I'm a Linux guy. I don't understand their pesky Windows problems. Try pointing and clicking on something." I end up fixing their problems anyways, because they can't figure out how to point and click.
If more people were fucking outside, there would be less demand for watching PPV porn. Just wander around until you see some hot chick, sit back, and relax.;)
Ahhhh.. FO porn. Is there anything better? Like, would you be inside watching reruns of Doogie Howser, or watching the hot chick next door gettin' some lesbian action on in the front yard.
Well, we do have the Internet, and Rule 34. And just in case, Rule 35.:)
I'm still looking for an official site that says it, but I found this....
"Most insurance companies do not allow insured vessels to carry arms and many countries will not allow armed vessels to enter their ports. But this needs to change."
I forgot about the insurance aspect. I do remember that being said on the news when the piracy problem started.
If machine guns are legal in your country, and you came to the US with a locked box containing said machine guns, would you think you wouldn't end up in jail and/or have to forfeit those weapons? I'd wish you the best of luck at your trial.
I knew someone who went to Amsterdam, where marijuana is legal. She was given an empty box which had contained marijuana cigarettes (actually, those funny cone things, but....). She flew into New York, they searched her bags because she had just come back from Amsterdam, and was carted off to jail. No marijuana. Just the box, and it smelled of it's old contents. She got off pretty easily. She had to forfeit the box and spend a year on probation. That was after she hired lawyers to defend her.
Especially since 9/11, having a civilian ship of any origin sitting at a major port with weapons on it, locked or not, wouldn't go over so well. There are authorities on the subject you can ask, but I'm not making that phone call.:)
Hmmm, people moving around on a flat surface, shooting AK-47's and RPG's? Nope doesn't sound at all like jungle combat in Vietnam. Oh. Iraq. Ya, much closer.
Wow, with that logic, the war in Iraq is already over, huh? There's no way that a lesser armed force would ever attempt actions on a better armed force. I guess the US just hasn't sent the big guns over yet, huh?
As for overcoming with a sufficiently sized craft, lets think about that for a moment. I mentioned the Zu-23's, since those were actually in the hands of the Somalian pirates. They weigh 2,094 lbs each. A 43' yacht isn't the most expensive thing out there, and most marinas have quite a few. They can hold over 20 passengers for a party, although it may be a little cramped. That is more than enough weight capacity to hold one Zu-23, and be able to operate normally. So, you have a boat, with an AA gun, on the water that can travel in excess of 20 knots, and blast some pretty nasty holes in whatever they need, should they resist.
I could imagine the navy wouldn't appreciate it much either, if one snuck up on them. In the dark or the fog, how would they identify a friendly boat out for a cruise, versus a not so friendly stolen yacht with an AA gun on the stern?
Yup, you can as a matter of fact, run a gorilla war at sea.
I won't say chaining them in irons would help. That was done before too, without complete success. Consider the US legal system. We put people in prison for years for a whole variety of things. Yet, crimes are still committed.
I don't disagree that it does need to be managed. Until then, I'm still trying to figure out where to pick up a small boat, crew, and AK-47's so I can start my own pirate fleet.:)
You won't do very well on the dark side, will you?
If you can raid a ship, you take take a ship. Now we don't have a problem with replacing ships.
A gun is a gun is a gun. So getting a US Navy deck gun may not be a reasonable idea, but I'm pretty sure there are some eastern europe who would be more than happy to sell you some old soviet tanks and ammo.
Oh wait, what am I saying... What about the ship that was taken last year. RPG's, Zu-23 anti-aircraft guns, ammunition and... 30 Soviet T-72 tanks.
So tell me how ships and weapons are hard to replace?
As for their size and speed, sure a cruse ship or freighter is slow. A nice size yacht is smaller, faster, and many could hold a couple Zu-23's pretty easily.
They don't have to go that far right now, because the unarmed crews of these merchant ships may put up a little fight, but will surrender to guys with AK-47's. It only gets nasty when there's an escellation of force.
I'd seen a couple news stories on that. For the most part, the sailors are sailors. They didn't sign up for, nor do they want, to take part in any combat. I have heard that some ships are hiring private security companies (like Xe/Blackwater) to manage their protection in hostile areas. I believe they're using all handheld weapons.
They may also have problems coming into foreign ports, if weapons are not allowed. Just think of the trouble a common merchant ship would have, if it came into a US port with a 5" deck gun, and a couple 50 cal machine guns mounted up on it.
The other consideration is, it would be fine and dandy if they saw the pirates and stopped them from raiding the ship. It wouldn't be quite so good if the pirates boarded it and took the ship and/or guns. You have to consider the cost of escellation of force.
The pirates have AK-47's and RPG's. The merchants have their fists.
The merchants get AR-15's and 50 cal's. The pirates get 50 cal's and RPMs.
The merchants get deck guns. The pirates steal deck guns.
Eventually, you'll get to the point where a merchant fleet will be escorted by a carrier group. It may be better to lose the occasional ship to pirates, than to be fighting an all-out war. Hopefully that's a lesson learned from the golden age of piracy and privateering.
Well, I don't let them into mine, but I pick pockets as a hobby. I made $300 yesterday, and scored 4 bank passwords.
Wait a minute. u38cg? That was written on a slip of paper in one of the wallets. Oops, sorry. Do you want your wallet and $6 back? I saw your BoA account wasn't all that good either. You need the $6 more than I do.:)
The reason they were stored like that was, it wasn't my work. I didn't write that part of the code. I maintained the machines, and did some other programming, like the actual on-server authentication. My urges towards doing the right thing were ignored.
I had a cron that would export the account credentials from the database, crypt() them (with random salts), and then put them into the stream to be replicated to the production environment.
As someone else noted, the HTTP Basic Auth is not exactly the most secure thing out there. I had to work within the confines of what the company wanted, as far as things like that went. My major part there was making sure servers worked properly.
I did have to code the part which watched for abused accounts, and initiated a password change. They weren't always weak passwords though. The passwordz sites/forums would sometimes buy accounts with stolen cards and publish those. I had a happy medium where a person who logged on from two places in a short amount of time wouldn't get a forced password change, but a posted password would get changed almost immediately. That was always fun, since I could watch the logs, and see where the active passwordz sites were.:) I had a report sent to me nightly, so I could review them when I felt like it. I could also tell you every IP that was attempting brute force attacks, how many requests they got in before the firewall blocked them (less than 5 minutes), and any accounts which they managed to compromise. Ya, the compromised accounts were automatically changed too, so sometimes we'd have it changed before the folks running the brute force attacks could post them.
Now, I do very little in that arena (none adult) but I do encrypt an awful lot more stuff.
That's why I used the example of a password for a bank that made sense. Each password should be unique for all. Myself, I have a few common passwords that I use on places that I may not ever use again, and are not critical to anything. Primary email, banks, insurance, etc, all get unique passwords, because they could be compromised to my disadvantage.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, they already tried that. Now it's no longer "erotic" services, but "adult" services. :)
The difference is the lost commerce that the various industries believe they have suffered. There is no industry suffering because of escorts. Well, I'm sure someone can make a case for some industry suffering, but there's always someone to bitch about something. It's not like prostitution is legal and licensed in most places. If it were, sure there would be hell to pay for the craigslist "adult" ads, since there would now be a financial impact on someone.
I was just replying to the parent. :) Ya, it in no way relates to drug smuggling. People don't get killed either by their peers or LEO.
I prefer the escort comparison myself. Everyone walks away with a smile on their faces. :)
There's a fine line here.
If you have an address of a drug dealer, and you are not party in any sort of way, it could be innocent. For example, if you suspected a neighbor was a drug dealer, and you told the police.
A completely different example, which is more appropriate, would be if you acted as a centralized clearinghouse for information on drug dealers. You provided information on what they had on hand, where to go to get it, and if they were currently available. Most likely, even though neither money nor drugs passed through your hands, you would be found to be an accomplice to their criminal activities.
This happens in other circles, such as TER. They provide a facility for people to post information on intimate adult experiences. That's not the only example. There are quite a few national and regional facilities like this.
I personally wouldn't demonize TPB. While this kind of sharing isn't the nicest thing, if the companies who are being effected had been decent about their cost structure people wouldn't have resorted to this in the first place.
It does sound like a great scam. Give us your money, and we'll give it back to you with interest when you get undead.
Since they haven't exactly frozen and resurrected an abundance of people, the whole cryogenics thing is still a big scam. I'd feel just as comfortable with letting a company keep a DNA sample of me to clone me with at some future date. Oh, that won't really happen either. :)
Maybe I should get in on this scam. I'll start an "insurance" company who keeps 10% of the interest as a fee, so I have working capital for years to come. Well, until I take all of the money and retire to a tropical island nation (which I'd own) with their money.
I agree totally. He's an idiot. Most people who have read his stuff know that though.
There's way too much space to cover. I talked with some friends in the past about the same idea, but we realized it wouldn't work, without putting ourselves in front of the world to look like idiots. :)
I don't think putting water up would help much either. It may encourage some of the very low debris to deorbit sooner, but not the majority of the junk that's up there. The really low stuff is on it's way down already anyways.
Exactly where are you getting thrust from the solar power? Solar panels are great for making electricity, but it's not like you can spin a propeller in space.
That's assuming all (or even the majority) of the debris is ferrous. Titanium, aluminum, ceramic, propulsion slag, and leaked coolant are at least some of the debris that's up there, and it would happily float past a giant magnet like it wasn't even there. Lets not forget rock debris that's been floating around up there since before we (humanity) had a space program.
Don't forget, attraction and repulsion work both ways too. So the satellite pulls the object out of orbit a little. The object in turn would be pulling the satellite too. It's an absolutely huge 3 dimensional space, so even at 18k mph, clearing one plain would take a long time. Clearing all the plains would take an eternity. We're not talking about a few miles. According to NASA, there's debris from 300km to over 10,000km. That'd take one mighty big EM field, that I don't believe we have the ability to produce any time in the near future.
Even the net, sheet, or garbage collecting satellite would spend an awful lot of time (and fuel) to try to collect them. The expended fuel would cause new debris too. Since we're talking about some huge orbital velocities, the impacts would make a bigger mess than they'd cure. Even something only 1kg at 18k mph at a glancing impact would likely leave fresh debris.
I do wonder what will happen over time. From what I know about astrophysics (which isn't all that much), I would have to assume that they would eventually drift into a equatorial orbit. Ahhh, the man made rings of Earth. :)
If you watched the Drew Carey show, you'd know more about it. Ya, it was suppose to taste terrible, but you'd get drunk and be wide awake. It was totally fictional though.
I don't think I could bring myself to drink it, if it had existed. If I want caffeinated alcohol, I'll stick with rum & coke, since every bar in the world knows how to make it. Well, sometimes you have to order Bacardi and cola, but that depends on the part of the world that you're in. I'm still not a Redbull & vodka fan. It may be an acquired taste, but Redbull still tastes like ass.
Damn, you beat me to it.
Long live Buzz Beer! :)
USS Drum (SS-228)
Gato-class submarine
1940-1967
Battleship Memorial Park
2703 Battleship Parkway
Mobile, Alabama, 36602
Google Maps satellite view
This park also has a lot of other nice things to look at, such as the USS Alabama (BB-60), and A-12 (similar to the SR-71) #06938.
A good part of the Drum and Alabama are open for you to explore.
I was there to see the A-12, but spent hours exploring the Alabama, and probably 1/2 hour in the Drum.
I still help some people who are distant. Echogent's EchoVNC is a wonderful tool. I schedule people's virus scans to run at boot time, reboot, and then tell them to call me if there are any problems. Usually I don't get the call back. Usually the reboot will fix their problem, but in case it was a virus, that'll be fixed too by the time it comes back up. Come on, what other problems can a Windows user possibly have? :)
I don't know that point and click thing. If I can't do it in 'vi', it's not worth doing. :)
Well, except surfing porn and Slashdot. We gotta have our browser for that. :)
I try that a lot. I tell people "I'm a Linux guy. I don't understand their pesky Windows problems. Try pointing and clicking on something." I end up fixing their problems anyways, because they can't figure out how to point and click.
If more people were fucking outside, there would be less demand for watching PPV porn. Just wander around until you see some hot chick, sit back, and relax. ;)
Ahhhh.. FO porn. Is there anything better? Like, would you be inside watching reruns of Doogie Howser, or watching the hot chick next door gettin' some lesbian action on in the front yard.
Well, we do have the Internet, and Rule 34. And just in case, Rule 35. :)
I'm still looking for an official site that says it, but I found this....
"Most insurance companies do not allow insured vessels to carry arms and many countries will not allow armed vessels to enter their ports. But this needs to change."
I forgot about the insurance aspect. I do remember that being said on the news when the piracy problem started.
If machine guns are legal in your country, and you came to the US with a locked box containing said machine guns, would you think you wouldn't end up in jail and/or have to forfeit those weapons? I'd wish you the best of luck at your trial.
I knew someone who went to Amsterdam, where marijuana is legal. She was given an empty box which had contained marijuana cigarettes (actually, those funny cone things, but....). She flew into New York, they searched her bags because she had just come back from Amsterdam, and was carted off to jail. No marijuana. Just the box, and it smelled of it's old contents. She got off pretty easily. She had to forfeit the box and spend a year on probation. That was after she hired lawyers to defend her.
Especially since 9/11, having a civilian ship of any origin sitting at a major port with weapons on it, locked or not, wouldn't go over so well. There are authorities on the subject you can ask, but I'm not making that phone call. :)
Hmmm, people moving around on a flat surface, shooting AK-47's and RPG's? Nope doesn't sound at all like jungle combat in Vietnam. Oh. Iraq. Ya, much closer.
Wow, with that logic, the war in Iraq is already over, huh? There's no way that a lesser armed force would ever attempt actions on a better armed force. I guess the US just hasn't sent the big guns over yet, huh?
As for overcoming with a sufficiently sized craft, lets think about that for a moment. I mentioned the Zu-23's, since those were actually in the hands of the Somalian pirates. They weigh 2,094 lbs each. A 43' yacht isn't the most expensive thing out there, and most marinas have quite a few. They can hold over 20 passengers for a party, although it may be a little cramped. That is more than enough weight capacity to hold one Zu-23, and be able to operate normally. So, you have a boat, with an AA gun, on the water that can travel in excess of 20 knots, and blast some pretty nasty holes in whatever they need, should they resist.
I could imagine the navy wouldn't appreciate it much either, if one snuck up on them. In the dark or the fog, how would they identify a friendly boat out for a cruise, versus a not so friendly stolen yacht with an AA gun on the stern?
Yup, you can as a matter of fact, run a gorilla war at sea.
I won't say chaining them in irons would help. That was done before too, without complete success. Consider the US legal system. We put people in prison for years for a whole variety of things. Yet, crimes are still committed.
I don't disagree that it does need to be managed. Until then, I'm still trying to figure out where to pick up a small boat, crew, and AK-47's so I can start my own pirate fleet. :)
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, right? :)
You won't do very well on the dark side, will you?
If you can raid a ship, you take take a ship. Now we don't have a problem with replacing ships.
A gun is a gun is a gun. So getting a US Navy deck gun may not be a reasonable idea, but I'm pretty sure there are some eastern europe who would be more than happy to sell you some old soviet tanks and ammo.
Oh wait, what am I saying... What about the ship that was taken last year. RPG's, Zu-23 anti-aircraft guns, ammunition and ... 30 Soviet T-72 tanks.
So tell me how ships and weapons are hard to replace?
As for their size and speed, sure a cruse ship or freighter is slow. A nice size yacht is smaller, faster, and many could hold a couple Zu-23's pretty easily.
They don't have to go that far right now, because the unarmed crews of these merchant ships may put up a little fight, but will surrender to guys with AK-47's. It only gets nasty when there's an escellation of force.
I'd seen a couple news stories on that. For the most part, the sailors are sailors. They didn't sign up for, nor do they want, to take part in any combat. I have heard that some ships are hiring private security companies (like Xe/Blackwater) to manage their protection in hostile areas. I believe they're using all handheld weapons.
They may also have problems coming into foreign ports, if weapons are not allowed. Just think of the trouble a common merchant ship would have, if it came into a US port with a 5" deck gun, and a couple 50 cal machine guns mounted up on it.
The other consideration is, it would be fine and dandy if they saw the pirates and stopped them from raiding the ship. It wouldn't be quite so good if the pirates boarded it and took the ship and/or guns. You have to consider the cost of escellation of force.
The pirates have AK-47's and RPG's. The merchants have their fists.
The merchants get AR-15's and 50 cal's. The pirates get 50 cal's and RPMs.
The merchants get deck guns. The pirates steal deck guns.
Eventually, you'll get to the point where a merchant fleet will be escorted by a carrier group. It may be better to lose the occasional ship to pirates, than to be fighting an all-out war. Hopefully that's a lesson learned from the golden age of piracy and privateering.
Checking the magazines. Making it street ready.
Nope, I still have mine. Bring on the terrorists or CEO's. :)
Well, I don't let them into mine, but I pick pockets as a hobby. I made $300 yesterday, and scored 4 bank passwords.
Wait a minute. u38cg? That was written on a slip of paper in one of the wallets. Oops, sorry. Do you want your wallet and $6 back? I saw your BoA account wasn't all that good either. You need the $6 more than I do. :)
Hehe. Ya, I read over the whole thread again.
The reason they were stored like that was, it wasn't my work. I didn't write that part of the code. I maintained the machines, and did some other programming, like the actual on-server authentication. My urges towards doing the right thing were ignored.
I had a cron that would export the account credentials from the database, crypt() them (with random salts), and then put them into the stream to be replicated to the production environment.
As someone else noted, the HTTP Basic Auth is not exactly the most secure thing out there. I had to work within the confines of what the company wanted, as far as things like that went. My major part there was making sure servers worked properly.
I did have to code the part which watched for abused accounts, and initiated a password change. They weren't always weak passwords though. The passwordz sites/forums would sometimes buy accounts with stolen cards and publish those. I had a happy medium where a person who logged on from two places in a short amount of time wouldn't get a forced password change, but a posted password would get changed almost immediately. That was always fun, since I could watch the logs, and see where the active passwordz sites were. :) I had a report sent to me nightly, so I could review them when I felt like it. I could also tell you every IP that was attempting brute force attacks, how many requests they got in before the firewall blocked them (less than 5 minutes), and any accounts which they managed to compromise. Ya, the compromised accounts were automatically changed too, so sometimes we'd have it changed before the folks running the brute force attacks could post them.
Now, I do very little in that arena (none adult) but I do encrypt an awful lot more stuff.
That's why I used the example of a password for a bank that made sense. Each password should be unique for all. Myself, I have a few common passwords that I use on places that I may not ever use again, and are not critical to anything. Primary email, banks, insurance, etc, all get unique passwords, because they could be compromised to my disadvantage.