If we're talking about EU member states, the solution is easy: Make it a requirement - in order to remain a member - to get the Internet out to everyone. Doesn't matter if it's a question of cabling, access costs or people too stupid to use it or get it - just get it fixed, whatever it takes. If they don't just kick them out.
It is a completely relevant question. If a quarter of the population never have used the web, but half of the population has Internet access, it follows that either half those with Internet access have never used it, or that the sentence is formulated so poorly that misunderstandings are bound to ensue.
IANAL but why is it so hard to hold the registered vehicle owner responsible for all violations committed using the vehicle, with the exception of stolen or duplicated plates? - If someone else was using the car, sue that person for transfer of punishment (demerits, points etc.) on the license and whatever fines were involved. Done and done.
Additionally, someone using stolen plates get triple the punishment that the registered owner would have gotten, plus a conviction for theft. Someone using duplicated plates gets five times the punishment plus a trip to the big house for fraud and attempted transfer of guilt through impersonation using official documents.
Now plaster the cities and countryside with cameras and people will start driving a lot more in accordance with the law. The authorities have to prove of course that you knew you were violating the law, i.e. that you violated clearly posted restrictions. This means that speed limit sign that's overgrown or vandalized doesn't apply, and neither do 'self-evident' rules like "general speed limit in an urban area" because that requires that it is clearly posted that you are in an "urban area".
In some countries - like Denmark - the absence of signs signify the "default" limit for the environment, which takes away your attention from the traffic. You have to check the surroundings and notice the absence of speed limit signs, then you need to judge if you're in an urban area (limit: 50 km/h) or outside one (limit: 80 km/h). If you judge incorrectly (driving 50 km/h in a 80 km/h zone) you're likely to get hit hard from behind, and if you're driving slightly above 80 km/h in a 50 km/h zone and you're caught, you're likely to lose your license in addition to a hefty fine as you're going 30 km/h too fast in a 50 km/h zone, which is 60% or more too fast which will cost you your license. Suspended though, pending a new theoretical and practical driving test (fail one and you lose your license for at least 6 months).
So my opinion is: There should be clear signs everywhere and then there's no excuse for not obeying the rules. Slam violators hard and then they'll either learn or pay dearly for their arrogance.
restraining orders usually cover things like physical distance and direct communication. writing about her doesn't seem like a problem unless it was specified in the restraining order. he should be in the clear if he isn't slandering.
From TFA:
On December 22, Arlotta consented to entry of a six-month HRO that prohibited him from (1) committing any acts “intended to adversely affect [Johnson's] safety, security, or privacy,” [emph mine]
He started the blog the day after.
it wouldn't shock me if this judge was some neo-feminist windbag. a lot of them are.
It wouldn't shock me if you were a fucking idiot. A lot of anons are.
A lot of non-anons here are idiots too. Just saying...
Anyway, this verdict must be appealed all the way to the Human Rights Court. Not only is the time frame obscenely ridiculous, it takes away Arlottas freedom of speech and makes it impossible for him to argue his case. You can ban him from direct contact but that's it.
But here's an idea. How about a group of people get together and create a blog where they can post anonymously. located on a server outside the USA where US law doesn't apply. Then Arlotta can email them what he wants to have posted and someone posts it. Arlotta isn't banned from talking about the case privately, and the anonymous blog author isn't banned from relaying it, not from posting it. And good luck getting a restraining order against someone anonymous. Logging should be turned off naturally to prevent attempts at naming the anonymous posters.
I'm not saying that Arlotta is right, nor that what he writes isn't hurtful or downright false. I am however saying that Arlotta has the freedom of speech and if stupid judges abuse their power to prevent him from using this right, their verdict must be circumvented to make it null and void. Sure, prosecute him for libel and slander if applicable but don't take away his freedom of speech in general.
The freedom of speech should be inviolate not matter what. You can ban public speaking that violates laws on the same level, i.e. anti-discrimination laws etc. but banning someone from expressing his opinion about an ex-girlfriend is wrong on every level.
A restraining order should be limited to "contact of any form directly between parties", i.e. physical contact, phone calls, emails, instant messages and so on. But writing about someone on a blog should not be covered. It is covered by anti-discrimination laws and anti-defamation laws so if you make allegations you better be able to document what you claim. But writing about your experiences (subjective facts) and your conclusions based on that ("she must be insane" etc.) is pure freedom of speech.
A secondary restraining order banning this guy from emailing related third parties (parents, work colleagues etc.) might be necessary and that works just like the first one, i.e. banning him from contacting these people directly, physically or electronically.
That should be it. Freedom of speech preserved and the victim should be free of the communications. Any public libel is handled through normal channels.
The issue is not that this option was added as I'm sure there's a reasonable amount of users that don't mind old-school ads (static, text etc.), but rather that it is enable by default and that you need to change a setting in about:config to disable. It should be an option in the primary context menu and it should be disabled by default, as the arguments for having it enabled are pure bullshit.
Also, using the always obnoxious first run page to inform about this is wrong because too many addon writers use it for blatant begging, propaganda or worse, and many don't include settings to turn them off (Giorgio Maone, author of NoScript, I'm looking at you in particular) so they're closed rapid-fire style without looking at them.
Something this fundamental requires a modal popup, nothing less.
Yes, it's my opinion that people don't need revenue from ads in order to run a simple website. Basically there are two types of websites: One complements a physical business and the other is virtual only. Now, if you can afford a brick-and-mortar place, or to print a rain forest worth of paper publications, you can afford a webserver. Most webservers come with with a reasonable bandwidth included and additional can be acquired fairly inexpensively, and most smaller businesses don't need much and might even do just fine with a simple LAMP webhotel/webshop that can be had for almost nothing (a few bucks a month). If you need ads to finance that, you're in so much trouble I wouldn't bother. Same thing for virtual only solutions. You have replaced the brick-and-mortar cost with hosting. Should come out even or maybe with some savings. Ads are not needed here either.
Now, someone might argue that non-profit organizations have different requirements. But how did they work before the Internet? - They relied on contributions and donations. Why can't they still do that and divert some of the funds from paper and brick-and-mortar to hosting?
I run a small hosted server myself. I pay around €50/month for it and this includes (reasonable) free traffic. I use it as mailserver and a webserver for myself and some friends, who run celebrity fansites, community websites, blogs and a podcast homepage. All the podcasts are stored on the server and the entire back catalogue is available as well. But I still don't exceed any bandwidth limits. I charge nothing from my friends, I have zero ads and I pay the hosting fee out of my pretty average salary. So a business should easily be able to afford this as well.
Don't waste resources protecting people from "offending content". If people seek out stuff that offends them, they asked for it. If they get offended by regular newsfeeds, go complain to the provider, not the government. And stop reading newsfeeds that contain what they consider offending content.
Under no circumstances does it make any sense that the government should impose censorship to protect the populace from "offending content". They might protect against subversive content but that doesn't seem to be the case here. It seems to be a case of plain censorship, nothing more, nothing less.
On what do you base this assumption? History is littered with sucky technologies that became standard because someone important was pushing it.
You are so right. Most 'standards' are not the best possible solution to the matter at hand. The reasons for the bad choices are many but they certainly don't get any better from becoming defacto 'standards'.
Do I need to mention examples?
If yes, just think consumer electronics and similar technology for the general public. Why VHS when betamax was far better? Why MP3 when Ogg Vorbis is both better and completely free? Why internal combustion engines and not steam when steam was both cheaper, safer and more efficient? Why 110-120 volt when 220-240 volt can deliver the same effect with half the amps, requiring much thinner wires and lower waste heat? etc. etc.
Yes, I know the answer to most of these... competitors have always battled for market domination and as a contrast to nature it rarely is survival of the fittest which my above examples should illustrate.
If the person cared about others they wouldn't be working at the DMV.
Kinda sad, isn't it?
It should be a service institution helping people to get a license, but has turned into place too evil for Hell; the staff is rude, obnoxious, uncooperative and thrives on making people miserable through long queues, horrible service and a bureaucracy second to none. Why do we accept this?
The problem with Muslims is that they're violent, uneducated and incredibly stupid... according to the media. But one thing would be if biased media invented this, but they don't have to - the world and especially the Middle East is full of Muslims behaving like morons and all the biased media have to do is turn on the cameras.
If the Muslim world wants respect they need to start acting like they're civilized, from stopping the violence (terrorism in particular) and homicidal rhetoric to stopping the overly theatrical manifestations in the streets. And they need to stop confirming the stereotypes on a daily basis - no more child marriages, no more male supremacy, no more female mutilations, no more 'honor' violence and murder. Finally they need to become more assimilated into society, especially when it comes to appearance. The scarves and other female discriminatory clothing must go - they're not part of the Qur'an probably because they were custom at the time of writing and thus self-evident, but they have been perverted over time into extremes like the burka and enforced by self-serving clerics who have made it into something religiously required which it never was - or is.
Actually there's nothing random given the multiverse theory. Every time there's what we perceive as a random quantum event it is simply the branching of the multiverse. As we cannot predict which branch we'll perceive as following, we see it as random. In reality our consciousness branches as well, and each part sees a different outcome.
The Earth is an impressive thing, but even more impressive is the complete universe, especially if it is indefinitely branched into a multiverse infinity. Why can't religious people see this as a much, much greater feat of creation, resulting in God being infinitely more omnipotent?
There should be three paths, one for trusted, verified passengers (green), one for people that's 'probably' trusted (orange) and one for everybody else (red).
The green path requires only a simple ID check and a standard metal scanner (portal type). If it beeps a manual scan is conducted with a wand, just like in the pre-9/11 days. Most ordinary civilized people qualify for this.
The orange path has the above plus an enhanced ID check (like green but slower). People with certain backgrounds fits here.
The red path has everything - metal scanners, xray-scanners, body scanners, grope search, plus a very thorough ID check. Any non-professional contact with any form of extremists voids your access upfront. If you are turned away here, you will be removed from the airport right away.
Oh, and these checks are just after check-in, not at the gate or similar.
Yes, this means that certain people cannot travel by air under any circumstances. That is as it should be.
Today, most major trackers (bittorrent) support SSL connections, TOR was always encrypted, most filehosters (megaupload, hotfile, rapidshare, fileserve, filesonic, wupload etc.) also support SSL and then there's VPN...
There's simply no way filtering would hamper serious file sharers, not the common leecher if portals and tracker links silently used SSL. It's only effect would be higher bills (due to investments in computing power to perform the filtering) and slower traffic. It would not do anything worthwhile in the area of file sharing.
We've had much success using something as simple and widely supported as a remote syslog server (with a twist - more later), you know the @ notation from/etc/syslog.conf.
Using this you'll get a complete history of what the hacker does up until the time where syslog is stopped. The hacker can't mess with stuff on a different server so just let him delete/modify logs to his hearts content on the compromised server.
Now, someone might argue that the hacker just grabs the logging server name from/etc/syslog.conf and attacks that was well. Well, good luck with that. We stream to a server that doesn't exist except as a honey pot, and let another server sniff the traffic and save it the usual way. But this might be overkill - we've had a dozen successful attacks and all deleted logs but none went after the remote server, nor bothered to kill off the syslog daemon.
Because of this, I suspect this article is just another consumer-paranoia attempt to blame smart meters for anything they can think of.
Just curious... Why would consumers be paranoid about this technology?
Isn't a smart meter just a device that can:
- Measure use just like the old ones - Automatically report the use so they don't have to visit the house to do the accounting - Control certain appliances based on greenness and/or cost of the power
The only incidents that count are the ones where this sequence occurs:
1) An electronic malfunction is detected. 2) The cabin crew searches and locates someone using on of these 'electronic devices'. 3) The device is turned off 4) The malfunction goes away.
Only then is it likely that there was a connection between the electronic device and the malfunction.
It is highly unlikely that any device left on will cause any malfunction. After all, avionics are heavily shielded and are designed to work through both the higher (ionizing) radiation levels at high altitude and direct lightning strikes.
The final 'trick' to such a computer would be some sort of acceleration sensor that would wipe the drive if the computer was moved, or some mechanical device that fries it to the same effect- for example, unloading the feet of the case closes a circuit, powering up a neon sign transformer that lights up a pile of iron and aluminum dust- aka thermite- on top of the hard drive.
The acceleration sensor is a safer bet, because the cops will probably be offended if the computer they're carrying starts spewing molten metal.
Perhaps, but just label it with a warning! - Make it clear that any tampering may result in the physical destruction of the hardware. They can't move the thing, they can't switch power (a phase shift might trigger the destruction), they can't touch the keyboard or open the case. They can't access the raw data (clone the drive etc.) and letting you 'defuse' the system... Good luck with that. There's no copies and they can be sure that 'an accident' might happen if they make you disable the device, destroying any and all evidence.
Actually USB drives is the key to plausible deniability here. Assuming you have turned off all the stuff that leaves plaintext copies all over your regular disks, all that remains are clues that a disk might have been attached. Just claim that it was a USB drive that you must have forgotten on the plane. That would be both plausible and reasonable, plus it's likely that airplane cleaning staff (overworked, underpaid) steal easily concealable items like this. As the plane most likely already have departed with new passengers etc. it's pretty unlikely that a real forgotten USB drive would have found by someone honest enough to turn it in.
Its funny, that this morning I had applied security patches to a debian stable box and thought "hmm, looks like BIND is getting fixed, wonder what thats about" before this even got posted to slashdot.
... but security theater is not a good enough reason for exposing people to ionizing radiation.
Exactly!
Face it: The scanners don't work and neither does the grope search. By working mean "detecting hidden weapons" of course. Neither does the carry-on rules about liquids by the way. It takes less than 200 ml of liquid explosive to blow a fatal hole in a plane, but you're allowed five times that. Add to that that nothing prevents you from combining your stuff if you're more than a lone terrorist. If you're part of a cell and board with a 'staff' of five (like the 9/11 terrorists did), you have a lot to work with.
The only way to stop terrorists is to prevent them from becoming terrorists in the first place, or at least prevent them from obtaining weapons, or just from buying a ticket or entering the airport. If you count on an ever-increasing pile of technological junk to catch them at the last possible moment, you're doing it wrong... very wrong.
But wouldn't a simple comparative analysis between two distinct sources reveal the frames most likely to contain the watermark, which can then be dropped or replaced with a 'morph' between the previous frame and the next frame?
Of course if the watermark is encoded in every frame, this is not an option...
PETA used to be run by sane people, but then the crazies came in and scared the sanity away.
I don't think the sane people ever got to run it... It was pretty much bonkers when it started and then they got worse... To say that they 'drifted' towards extremism is a gross understatement; they ran there and then they pushed the boundaries. Here's a few signs that they're way off the deep end already:
1) The end justifies the means. Getting the point across no matter what. 2) Humans, the law, common sense - everything is expendable if it just 'saves' one animal. 3) It's okay to lie or blatantly abuse anything (nudity and famous people in particular) in order to gather followers. 4) They never make mistakes or correct errors, even if it kills people.
It's trivial to Google for these things. Arson and firebombing is cool. Gross vandalism is a hobby. Go vegan, even if it kills you - or your kids. And remember: "You can't handle the truth!"
I just don't get what the problem is... How can anyone abuse street view and it's images of buildings? - I mean I've been to Germany more times than I can count and I've taken pictures of buildings (I love interesting architecture) a gazillion times with no hassle what so ever. I've even been allowed inside private yards and so on to take pictures from that angle as well, and still no problems. What harm can street view do? - It already blurs persons so it cannot be the risk of 'locating' individuals that's the problem. And the street view don't show who's inside the buildings, not what valuables are in there, so it cannot be the 'shopping catalog for thieves' they're afraid of either.
I'm the kind of person that welcomes cameras and similar. I'm not doing anything even remotely questionable in public so I don't care if someone want to make a note of me doing basically the same thing every day. I go to work the same way at the same time every day and the route is also always the same. I go home usually at the time, again the same route every day, only sometimes I shop for groceries on the way. When I shop for groceries I buy more or less the same things - milk, bread, cereal, sometimes a sixpack, sometimes a lightbulb, sometimes some clothing, shoes and so on. Nothing to hide there. I'm sure most people's lives are equally boring.
What the cameras may reveal are people up to no good.
I cannot accept that people have any right to be left alone while they semi-break the law or whatever other mischief they might be up to. If guy is visiting his mistress and don't want that to be caught on camera, the correct solution is to not do that. You are no more 'safe' when there's no cameras around. Think of the stupid show "cheaters". Yes, spouses do hire investigators to follow the cheaters and gather evidence to be used later to this effect. The only certain way to avoid getting caught is to stop cheating. You don't have the right to cheat in private. If you move around in public, people (possibly with cameras) and cameras might see that. It the nature of being "out in public".
And when it comes to crime, I'm all for the use of cameras to spot, identify and convict the criminals. It's both just and appropriate that people doing rioting in London was caught on camera, identified from those pictures and convicted based on what they were seen to be doing and whatever evidence could be found otherwise (stolen goods from looting for instance). I find it necessary that those committing arson and other form of gross vandalism were convicted to pay for the damages in full. I know they most likely never will be able to settle this debt, but they will have to live with it, just like their victims will have to live with the losses from the arson etc. - it's fair and just.
Actually I'm in favor of ALWAYS convicting criminals to pay restitution for the losses incurred by their victims. And I don't mind if you lock up those unable or unwilling to pay until they do (in special debtors prisons), with the option to work in jail towards settling the debt. Sure, it may take them the rest of their lives, but then they won't do more mischief while they're behind bars, and society will be much better off. After all, about 98% of all crimes are committed by people that have committed crimes before so throwing people in jail for a very long time after just one offense will reduce crime rates immensely. It will also be an effective deterrent.
The 4 words scheme suggested isn't bad, as long the hacker doesn't know that this is what you're doing.
To make it safe in a world where John The Ripper implements many of such schemes in its initial dictionary style attacks, you need to introduce both other symbols than lowercase a-z, and glue characters between those words. If you 'lamerfy' those words and add three glue characters, one between each of the words, you still need to remember only 7 items (four words and three symbols) and you still get a password that isn't readily guessed or constructed by cracking tools and thus ends up with an entropy similar to a string of random characters or the same length. And it's easier to remember than that string of random characters...
Behavioral taxes won't work. They just drive inflation up. A few people might change (mostly due to other reasons) but most will simply adjust budgets to accept the increased cost.
Now to TFA... This is yet another scare tactic in order to make people join the cult (of Global Warming). If people only used their heads...
It is a fact that this planet has seen much more extreme temperature variations that what's on the table here. Extreme cold during the ice ages and 'nuclear winters' from major impacts and volcanic activity. The interglacial periods had global average temperatures almost 20 degress Celcius higher than today and the temperature always returned to something more 'normal' after the extremes. We're talking about minuscule increases today compared to these historical extremes, and thus it's way overkill to put "irreversible" on the table as much greater extremes has repeatedly been reversed completely without assistance from humans.
Slashdot Mirror
If we're talking about EU member states, the solution is easy: Make it a requirement - in order to remain a member - to get the Internet out to everyone. Doesn't matter if it's a question of cabling, access costs or people too stupid to use it or get it - just get it fixed, whatever it takes. If they don't just kick them out.
Trolling much?
It is a completely relevant question. If a quarter of the population never have used the web, but half of the population has Internet access, it follows that either half those with Internet access have never used it, or that the sentence is formulated so poorly that misunderstandings are bound to ensue.
IANAL but why is it so hard to hold the registered vehicle owner responsible for all violations committed using the vehicle, with the exception of stolen or duplicated plates? - If someone else was using the car, sue that person for transfer of punishment (demerits, points etc.) on the license and whatever fines were involved. Done and done.
Additionally, someone using stolen plates get triple the punishment that the registered owner would have gotten, plus a conviction for theft. Someone using duplicated plates gets five times the punishment plus a trip to the big house for fraud and attempted transfer of guilt through impersonation using official documents.
Now plaster the cities and countryside with cameras and people will start driving a lot more in accordance with the law. The authorities have to prove of course that you knew you were violating the law, i.e. that you violated clearly posted restrictions. This means that speed limit sign that's overgrown or vandalized doesn't apply, and neither do 'self-evident' rules like "general speed limit in an urban area" because that requires that it is clearly posted that you are in an "urban area".
In some countries - like Denmark - the absence of signs signify the "default" limit for the environment, which takes away your attention from the traffic. You have to check the surroundings and notice the absence of speed limit signs, then you need to judge if you're in an urban area (limit: 50 km/h) or outside one (limit: 80 km/h). If you judge incorrectly (driving 50 km/h in a 80 km/h zone) you're likely to get hit hard from behind, and if you're driving slightly above 80 km/h in a 50 km/h zone and you're caught, you're likely to lose your license in addition to a hefty fine as you're going 30 km/h too fast in a 50 km/h zone, which is 60% or more too fast which will cost you your license. Suspended though, pending a new theoretical and practical driving test (fail one and you lose your license for at least 6 months).
So my opinion is: There should be clear signs everywhere and then there's no excuse for not obeying the rules. Slam violators hard and then they'll either learn or pay dearly for their arrogance.
restraining orders usually cover things like physical distance and direct communication. writing about her doesn't seem like a problem unless it was specified in the restraining order. he should be in the clear if he isn't slandering.
From TFA:
On December 22, Arlotta consented to entry of a six-month HRO that prohibited him from (1) committing any acts “intended to adversely affect [Johnson's] safety, security, or privacy,” [emph mine]
He started the blog the day after.
it wouldn't shock me if this judge was some neo-feminist windbag. a lot of them are.
It wouldn't shock me if you were a fucking idiot. A lot of anons are.
A lot of non-anons here are idiots too. Just saying...
Anyway, this verdict must be appealed all the way to the Human Rights Court. Not only is the time frame obscenely ridiculous, it takes away Arlottas freedom of speech and makes it impossible for him to argue his case. You can ban him from direct contact but that's it.
But here's an idea. How about a group of people get together and create a blog where they can post anonymously. located on a server outside the USA where US law doesn't apply. Then Arlotta can email them what he wants to have posted and someone posts it. Arlotta isn't banned from talking about the case privately, and the anonymous blog author isn't banned from relaying it, not from posting it. And good luck getting a restraining order against someone anonymous. Logging should be turned off naturally to prevent attempts at naming the anonymous posters.
I'm not saying that Arlotta is right, nor that what he writes isn't hurtful or downright false. I am however saying that Arlotta has the freedom of speech and if stupid judges abuse their power to prevent him from using this right, their verdict must be circumvented to make it null and void. Sure, prosecute him for libel and slander if applicable but don't take away his freedom of speech in general.
The freedom of speech should be inviolate not matter what. You can ban public speaking that violates laws on the same level, i.e. anti-discrimination laws etc. but banning someone from expressing his opinion about an ex-girlfriend is wrong on every level.
A restraining order should be limited to "contact of any form directly between parties", i.e. physical contact, phone calls, emails, instant messages and so on. But writing about someone on a blog should not be covered. It is covered by anti-discrimination laws and anti-defamation laws so if you make allegations you better be able to document what you claim. But writing about your experiences (subjective facts) and your conclusions based on that ("she must be insane" etc.) is pure freedom of speech.
A secondary restraining order banning this guy from emailing related third parties (parents, work colleagues etc.) might be necessary and that works just like the first one, i.e. banning him from contacting these people directly, physically or electronically.
That should be it. Freedom of speech preserved and the victim should be free of the communications. Any public libel is handled through normal channels.
The issue is not that this option was added as I'm sure there's a reasonable amount of users that don't mind old-school ads (static, text etc.), but rather that it is enable by default and that you need to change a setting in about:config to disable. It should be an option in the primary context menu and it should be disabled by default, as the arguments for having it enabled are pure bullshit.
Also, using the always obnoxious first run page to inform about this is wrong because too many addon writers use it for blatant begging, propaganda or worse, and many don't include settings to turn them off (Giorgio Maone, author of NoScript, I'm looking at you in particular) so they're closed rapid-fire style without looking at them.
Something this fundamental requires a modal popup, nothing less.
Yes, it's my opinion that people don't need revenue from ads in order to run a simple website. Basically there are two types of websites: One complements a physical business and the other is virtual only. Now, if you can afford a brick-and-mortar place, or to print a rain forest worth of paper publications, you can afford a webserver. Most webservers come with with a reasonable bandwidth included and additional can be acquired fairly inexpensively, and most smaller businesses don't need much and might even do just fine with a simple LAMP webhotel/webshop that can be had for almost nothing (a few bucks a month). If you need ads to finance that, you're in so much trouble I wouldn't bother. Same thing for virtual only solutions. You have replaced the brick-and-mortar cost with hosting. Should come out even or maybe with some savings. Ads are not needed here either.
Now, someone might argue that non-profit organizations have different requirements. But how did they work before the Internet? - They relied on contributions and donations. Why can't they still do that and divert some of the funds from paper and brick-and-mortar to hosting?
I run a small hosted server myself. I pay around €50/month for it and this includes (reasonable) free traffic. I use it as mailserver and a webserver for myself and some friends, who run celebrity fansites, community websites, blogs and a podcast homepage. All the podcasts are stored on the server and the entire back catalogue is available as well. But I still don't exceed any bandwidth limits. I charge nothing from my friends, I have zero ads and I pay the hosting fee out of my pretty average salary. So a business should easily be able to afford this as well.
Don't waste resources protecting people from "offending content". If people seek out stuff that offends them, they asked for it. If they get offended by regular newsfeeds, go complain to the provider, not the government. And stop reading newsfeeds that contain what they consider offending content.
Under no circumstances does it make any sense that the government should impose censorship to protect the populace from "offending content". They might protect against subversive content but that doesn't seem to be the case here. It seems to be a case of plain censorship, nothing more, nothing less.
If it sucks, it will die.
On what do you base this assumption? History is littered with sucky technologies that became standard because someone important was pushing it.
You are so right. Most 'standards' are not the best possible solution to the matter at hand. The reasons for the bad choices are many but they certainly don't get any better from becoming defacto 'standards'.
Do I need to mention examples?
If yes, just think consumer electronics and similar technology for the general public. Why VHS when betamax was far better? Why MP3 when Ogg Vorbis is both better and completely free? Why internal combustion engines and not steam when steam was both cheaper, safer and more efficient? Why 110-120 volt when 220-240 volt can deliver the same effect with half the amps, requiring much thinner wires and lower waste heat? etc. etc.
Yes, I know the answer to most of these... competitors have always battled for market domination and as a contrast to nature it rarely is survival of the fittest which my above examples should illustrate.
If the person cared about others they wouldn't be working at the DMV.
Kinda sad, isn't it?
It should be a service institution helping people to get a license, but has turned into place too evil for Hell; the staff is rude, obnoxious, uncooperative and thrives on making people miserable through long queues, horrible service and a bureaucracy second to none. Why do we accept this?
The problem with Muslims is that they're violent, uneducated and incredibly stupid... according to the media. But one thing would be if biased media invented this, but they don't have to - the world and especially the Middle East is full of Muslims behaving like morons and all the biased media have to do is turn on the cameras.
If the Muslim world wants respect they need to start acting like they're civilized, from stopping the violence (terrorism in particular) and homicidal rhetoric to stopping the overly theatrical manifestations in the streets. And they need to stop confirming the stereotypes on a daily basis - no more child marriages, no more male supremacy, no more female mutilations, no more 'honor' violence and murder. Finally they need to become more assimilated into society, especially when it comes to appearance. The scarves and other female discriminatory clothing must go - they're not part of the Qur'an probably because they were custom at the time of writing and thus self-evident, but they have been perverted over time into extremes like the burka and enforced by self-serving clerics who have made it into something religiously required which it never was - or is.
Actually there's nothing random given the multiverse theory. Every time there's what we perceive as a random quantum event it is simply the branching of the multiverse. As we cannot predict which branch we'll perceive as following, we see it as random. In reality our consciousness branches as well, and each part sees a different outcome.
The Earth is an impressive thing, but even more impressive is the complete universe, especially if it is indefinitely branched into a multiverse infinity. Why can't religious people see this as a much, much greater feat of creation, resulting in God being infinitely more omnipotent?
There should be three paths, one for trusted, verified passengers (green), one for people that's 'probably' trusted (orange) and one for everybody else (red).
The green path requires only a simple ID check and a standard metal scanner (portal type). If it beeps a manual scan is conducted with a wand, just like in the pre-9/11 days. Most ordinary civilized people qualify for this.
The orange path has the above plus an enhanced ID check (like green but slower). People with certain backgrounds fits here.
The red path has everything - metal scanners, xray-scanners, body scanners, grope search, plus a very thorough ID check. Any non-professional contact with any form of extremists voids your access upfront. If you are turned away here, you will be removed from the airport right away.
Oh, and these checks are just after check-in, not at the gate or similar.
Yes, this means that certain people cannot travel by air under any circumstances. That is as it should be.
Today, most major trackers (bittorrent) support SSL connections, TOR was always encrypted, most filehosters (megaupload, hotfile, rapidshare, fileserve, filesonic, wupload etc.) also support SSL and then there's VPN...
There's simply no way filtering would hamper serious file sharers, not the common leecher if portals and tracker links silently used SSL. It's only effect would be higher bills (due to investments in computing power to perform the filtering) and slower traffic. It would not do anything worthwhile in the area of file sharing.
We've had much success using something as simple and widely supported as a remote syslog server (with a twist - more later), you know the @ notation from /etc/syslog.conf.
Using this you'll get a complete history of what the hacker does up until the time where syslog is stopped. The hacker can't mess with stuff on a different server so just let him delete/modify logs to his hearts content on the compromised server.
Now, someone might argue that the hacker just grabs the logging server name from /etc/syslog.conf and attacks that was well. Well, good luck with that. We stream to a server that doesn't exist except as a honey pot, and let another server sniff the traffic and save it the usual way. But this might be overkill - we've had a dozen successful attacks and all deleted logs but none went after the remote server, nor bothered to kill off the syslog daemon.
Because of this, I suspect this article is just another consumer-paranoia attempt to blame smart meters for anything they can think of.
Just curious... Why would consumers be paranoid about this technology?
Isn't a smart meter just a device that can:
- Measure use just like the old ones
- Automatically report the use so they don't have to visit the house to do the accounting
- Control certain appliances based on greenness and/or cost of the power
What else can it do? Thought Control? Read minds?
The only incidents that count are the ones where this sequence occurs:
1) An electronic malfunction is detected.
2) The cabin crew searches and locates someone using on of these 'electronic devices'.
3) The device is turned off
4) The malfunction goes away.
Only then is it likely that there was a connection between the electronic device and the malfunction.
It is highly unlikely that any device left on will cause any malfunction. After all, avionics are heavily shielded and are designed to work through both the higher (ionizing) radiation levels at high altitude and direct lightning strikes.
The final 'trick' to such a computer would be some sort of acceleration sensor that would wipe the drive if the computer was moved, or some mechanical device that fries it to the same effect- for example, unloading the feet of the case closes a circuit, powering up a neon sign transformer that lights up a pile of iron and aluminum dust- aka thermite- on top of the hard drive.
The acceleration sensor is a safer bet, because the cops will probably be offended if the computer they're carrying starts spewing molten metal.
Perhaps, but just label it with a warning! - Make it clear that any tampering may result in the physical destruction of the hardware. They can't move the thing, they can't switch power (a phase shift might trigger the destruction), they can't touch the keyboard or open the case. They can't access the raw data (clone the drive etc.) and letting you 'defuse' the system... Good luck with that. There's no copies and they can be sure that 'an accident' might happen if they make you disable the device, destroying any and all evidence.
Actually USB drives is the key to plausible deniability here. Assuming you have turned off all the stuff that leaves plaintext copies all over your regular disks, all that remains are clues that a disk might have been attached. Just claim that it was a USB drive that you must have forgotten on the plane. That would be both plausible and reasonable, plus it's likely that airplane cleaning staff (overworked, underpaid) steal easily concealable items like this. As the plane most likely already have departed with new passengers etc. it's pretty unlikely that a real forgotten USB drive would have found by someone honest enough to turn it in.
Its funny, that this morning I had applied security patches to a debian stable box and thought "hmm, looks like BIND is getting fixed, wonder what thats about" before this even got posted to slashdot.
Same here. Debian rules! :)
... but security theater is not a good enough reason for exposing people to ionizing radiation.
Exactly!
Face it: The scanners don't work and neither does the grope search. By working mean "detecting hidden weapons" of course. Neither does the carry-on rules about liquids by the way. It takes less than 200 ml of liquid explosive to blow a fatal hole in a plane, but you're allowed five times that. Add to that that nothing prevents you from combining your stuff if you're more than a lone terrorist. If you're part of a cell and board with a 'staff' of five (like the 9/11 terrorists did), you have a lot to work with.
The only way to stop terrorists is to prevent them from becoming terrorists in the first place, or at least prevent them from obtaining weapons, or just from buying a ticket or entering the airport. If you count on an ever-increasing pile of technological junk to catch them at the last possible moment, you're doing it wrong... very wrong.
But wouldn't a simple comparative analysis between two distinct sources reveal the frames most likely to contain the watermark, which can then be dropped or replaced with a 'morph' between the previous frame and the next frame?
Of course if the watermark is encoded in every frame, this is not an option...
PETA used to be run by sane people, but then the crazies came in and scared the sanity away.
I don't think the sane people ever got to run it... It was pretty much bonkers when it started and then they got worse... To say that they 'drifted' towards extremism is a gross understatement; they ran there and then they pushed the boundaries. Here's a few signs that they're way off the deep end already:
1) The end justifies the means. Getting the point across no matter what.
2) Humans, the law, common sense - everything is expendable if it just 'saves' one animal.
3) It's okay to lie or blatantly abuse anything (nudity and famous people in particular) in order to gather followers.
4) They never make mistakes or correct errors, even if it kills people.
It's trivial to Google for these things. Arson and firebombing is cool. Gross vandalism is a hobby. Go vegan, even if it kills you - or your kids. And remember: "You can't handle the truth!"
I just don't get what the problem is... How can anyone abuse street view and it's images of buildings? - I mean I've been to Germany more times than I can count and I've taken pictures of buildings (I love interesting architecture) a gazillion times with no hassle what so ever. I've even been allowed inside private yards and so on to take pictures from that angle as well, and still no problems. What harm can street view do? - It already blurs persons so it cannot be the risk of 'locating' individuals that's the problem. And the street view don't show who's inside the buildings, not what valuables are in there, so it cannot be the 'shopping catalog for thieves' they're afraid of either.
I'm the kind of person that welcomes cameras and similar. I'm not doing anything even remotely questionable in public so I don't care if someone want to make a note of me doing basically the same thing every day. I go to work the same way at the same time every day and the route is also always the same. I go home usually at the time, again the same route every day, only sometimes I shop for groceries on the way. When I shop for groceries I buy more or less the same things - milk, bread, cereal, sometimes a sixpack, sometimes a lightbulb, sometimes some clothing, shoes and so on. Nothing to hide there. I'm sure most people's lives are equally boring.
What the cameras may reveal are people up to no good.
I cannot accept that people have any right to be left alone while they semi-break the law or whatever other mischief they might be up to. If guy is visiting his mistress and don't want that to be caught on camera, the correct solution is to not do that. You are no more 'safe' when there's no cameras around. Think of the stupid show "cheaters". Yes, spouses do hire investigators to follow the cheaters and gather evidence to be used later to this effect. The only certain way to avoid getting caught is to stop cheating. You don't have the right to cheat in private. If you move around in public, people (possibly with cameras) and cameras might see that. It the nature of being "out in public".
And when it comes to crime, I'm all for the use of cameras to spot, identify and convict the criminals. It's both just and appropriate that people doing rioting in London was caught on camera, identified from those pictures and convicted based on what they were seen to be doing and whatever evidence could be found otherwise (stolen goods from looting for instance). I find it necessary that those committing arson and other form of gross vandalism were convicted to pay for the damages in full. I know they most likely never will be able to settle this debt, but they will have to live with it, just like their victims will have to live with the losses from the arson etc. - it's fair and just.
Actually I'm in favor of ALWAYS convicting criminals to pay restitution for the losses incurred by their victims. And I don't mind if you lock up those unable or unwilling to pay until they do (in special debtors prisons), with the option to work in jail towards settling the debt. Sure, it may take them the rest of their lives, but then they won't do more mischief while they're behind bars, and society will be much better off. After all, about 98% of all crimes are committed by people that have committed crimes before so throwing people in jail for a very long time after just one offense will reduce crime rates immensely. It will also be an effective deterrent.
The 4 words scheme suggested isn't bad, as long the hacker doesn't know that this is what you're doing.
To make it safe in a world where John The Ripper implements many of such schemes in its initial dictionary style attacks, you need to introduce both other symbols than lowercase a-z, and glue characters between those words. If you 'lamerfy' those words and add three glue characters, one between each of the words, you still need to remember only 7 items (four words and three symbols) and you still get a password that isn't readily guessed or constructed by cracking tools and thus ends up with an entropy similar to a string of random characters or the same length. And it's easier to remember than that string of random characters...
Behavioral taxes won't work. They just drive inflation up. A few people might change (mostly due to other reasons) but most will simply adjust budgets to accept the increased cost.
Now to TFA... This is yet another scare tactic in order to make people join the cult (of Global Warming). If people only used their heads...
It is a fact that this planet has seen much more extreme temperature variations that what's on the table here. Extreme cold during the ice ages and 'nuclear winters' from major impacts and volcanic activity. The interglacial periods had global average temperatures almost 20 degress Celcius higher than today and the temperature always returned to something more 'normal' after the extremes. We're talking about minuscule increases today compared to these historical extremes, and thus it's way overkill to put "irreversible" on the table as much greater extremes has repeatedly been reversed completely without assistance from humans.