The usual suspects (Seattle, San Francisco) show up on the list, but some might surprise you.
I looked at the list, and in fact it was mostly the usual suspects. I mean everyone knows there is a big tech presence in Raleigh/Durham and Austin. About the only really surprising inclusion is Orlando, and it was the most poorly justified of all of them. Substitute Portland, OR for Orlando on their list and you have basically the conventional wisdom on what the major tech centers in the US are.
What this study found is that students from countries with higher average math scores have lower average enjoyment of and confidence in math than those from countries with lower scores. This does not actually imply that people who are more proficient in math enjoy it less than those who do not, in general, much less that they are less happy overall. What it does suggest is that educational systems that produce students who are more capable may be less enjoyable or result in less confidence, which actually makes a good deal of sense considering how math is taught in many countries that tend to perform well in these international comparisons.
Although the blurb explicitly claims that this new bootloader is "more powerful" than NTLDR/boot.ini, in fact it sounds like this new loader is doing the same thing (starting grup/lilo/etc. from the windows boot loader) that people have been doing for ages with NTLDR. Here is an ancient HOWTO on how to do it.
as of the new xorg there is no need for video drivers to be in the kernel.
Most of the NVIDIA and ATI drivers, like most of any of the open-source drivers, ARE user-space. In fact, since X11 itself is and has always been a user-space application, it is impossible for there not to be some fairly large user-space component.
Moreover, the open-source drivers included with Xorg that have support for hardware 3d acceleration DO require a kernel driver for some low-level interfacing with the hardware, just like NVIDIA and ATI use: that is what those DRI modules are for.
The only controversial difference in approaches stems from NVIDIA (I don't know what ATI does) not using the standard DRI interface between its kernel and X11 drivers. NVIDIA claims DRI has some performance drawbacks. But even if they did use DRI, they would still need a kernel driver, and it would have the same license issues (non-issues actually, IMHO) that their current driver has.
Perhaps, but the binary module is compiled by linking against the kernel headers, and it includes shim code which may (or may not) be derived from the kernel.
That is not "linking" in the sense that is covered by the GPL. The kernel headers contain declarations for kernel functions, structures, and macros. They don't actually produce any object code that is linked in the binary. The binary driver is produced from two object files, one distributed binary-only by NVIDIA and one compiled from NVIDIA's shim source, which is explicitly allowed to be linked with the binary, and not under the GPL. So no mixture of proprietary and GPL code occurs until runtime, when you actually use the driver, and while that is technically a GPL violation since the kernel runs in a single address space (hence the "tainted kernel" messages) neither NVIDIA nor any distributor is liable for it.
Why do you think that nvidia doesn't precompile their shim code too, when they distribute their kernel module.
They do, actually, or at least they used to (for the default kernels of specific distributions). Its just that the Linux kernel doesn't have a stable binary ABI for drivers, so it is necessary to recompile it for every single different kernel version. If it was up to them they likely wouldn't distribute any code at all, just a binary module, but because of the way Linux is that isn't practical. Other distributions, including even Debian, have also distributed linked binaries of the NVIDIA kernel drivers without trouble.
Education (or lack there) is *NOT* a protected characteristic. They are perfectly free to say that people who have below a certain level of education need not apply.
Actually, using IQ and education level in hiring is considered in violation of civil rights laws in some circumstances, if the requirements are not "reasonably related" to the job in question.
1. Notebook, kind of crummy 4-year old Toshiba P3 that still miraculously works. 2. AC adapter 3. CAT5 cable 4. Phone cable for modem (never used) 5. Bag of replacement tips for notebook's trackpoint-type pointing device (nice thought on their part, but never needed) 6. WiFi card 7. USB sound pod, which I need because I gouged out the built-in headphone jack so the internal speakers don't cut out when headphones are plugged in (why do I have this if I'm not carrying any headphones or speakers?) 8. DOS and Linux floppy boot disks (why do I have these if I don't have a floppy drive?) 9. Legal pad 10. Pen 11. Mechanical pencil 12. Pile of handouts from old meetings 13. Pile of scratch paper to write on (why do I have this if I also have the legal pad?) 14. Book from library. Some translated fragments and poetry by Novalis. 15. A couple of Coke bottle caps I can redeem for free Coca-Cola products some time (and hey! they aren't even expired) 16. An empty envelope. I don't have any idea where it came from.
If the system works correctly (ie, it is really capable of learning language syntax), it will learn the "bad grammar" presented to it. Can you really expect an algorithm to automatically figure out the social conventions that mark one system of communication as "good" and one as "bad", and reject or correct "bad" ones?
Actually it would be quite remarkable if this was possible, given that the reasons some dialects become privileged and others don't have nothing to do with the formal properties of those dialects, and everything to do with history and geography.
It sounds like Perens is attacking this proposal for not doing something which it never claimed to do. If Microsoft or some other anti-OSS software company wants to use their patent portfolio against open source projects, there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it except perhaps get the patent invalidated, if there is a case for doing so. What it sounds like this was intended to do, and seemingly does do, is present patented technologies that open source projects unambiguously CAN use without fear of retribution.
So what does Perens want? The only way to securely eliminate the threat of Microsoft, etc. using patents agressively against open source would be to eliminate patents altogether, at least on software and anything related to software. That might be a reasonable position that deserves consideration, but if that is what he is advocating he should say so openly so that it can be reasonably debated, rather than making insinuations like this.
How did anyone expect to make money on providing free internet service with no ads?
I don't know, but these guys seem to have managed to stay afloat for many years doing just that. They do offer tech support and other services for an optional monthly fee, but the base service is totally free and has no ads.
This is an interesting idea. I know that for a while people have been using custom kernels built from the free Darwin source to get OS X to run on older pre-G3 PowerMacs, for instance. So at least now it seems to be possible.
They have probably considered the possibility and taken steps to ensure that using a non-approved kernel image isn't possible.
Kernel performance
on
Why FreeBSD
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
If you want to seriously compare two open-source Unix-like systems, the only instrinsic difference is the kernel. Arguing that one system is better because of the default configuration of network services, the package system, the organization of the rc scripts, and so on, is a red herring, because there is no reason you can't take all of the userspace from one system and run it on top of the kernel from the other -- and there are projects which do this.
In that light, these benchmarks are the most enlightening comparison I have seen to date. Some BSD users have attacked the methodology, but none of them has gone on to do alternative tests of their own, and the author has been very conscientious about addressing some of the criticism. The bottom line is that FreeBSD is, whichever version you choose, at best equal to Linux in low-level kernel performance, and usually slower.
When you also take into account the greater ease of use of most common Linux distributions, broader hardware support, greater availability of commercial software (yes, you may be able to run it under FreeBSD's Linux emulation layer, but the vendor is unlikely to officially support that, which matters to large corporations), and better scalability, it really isn't suprising that most people considering a free Unix-like operating system choose some distribution of Linux.
Undoubtedly for a long time, perhaps until the 2.4 kernel came out, FreeBSD probably was superior, and had a well-deserved reputation as a better choice for serious usage. For some purposes (there are some routing benchmarks that FreeBSD people always bring up, which I can't find right now) it may still be. But through some combination of the AT&T lawsuit, media coverage, and pure chance (licensing may also have played a part), the commercial support and developer mindshare swung decisively to the Linux kernel, and today it is clearly the best choice for most uses. We can wonder what would have happened if FreeBSD had won out instead -- the resulting kernel might very well be better than either Linux or FreeBSD is today -- but that doesn't change the facts about which is the better choice today.
I really think you have to consider the position of the department and the University before you whine too much about not getting accepted. The competitive department admissions system is not fundamentally different from any other UW department where there is more supply than demand; all engineering departments, business, etc., all work the same way. Supposedly the average GPA of incoming bioengineering students is even higher than for CSE. The UW is a public school and must accept a large number of students to fulfill its public mission, but the funding isn't there for everyone to study what they want to, without substantially degrading the quality of education (and even as things are, I think the number of undergraduate CSE students has at least doubled over the past ten years).
As a current undergraduate student (a few quarters away from graduation) in the department, I wish there was a little more humility in the department also, and that they did more to engage students, and I don't think a competitive admissions systems helps things (yes, I knew someone who got rejected with a 3.75 GPA around 2001). It is discouraging to see people with good grades and no real passion for the field, some of whom plan to go to professional school in unrelated fields, have the upper hand over people who really care about CS and computing but have (relatively) lower grades. But things would be much, much worse if they let everyone who applied in and there were 2000 students in the department, especially with no commensurate improvement in state funding. I may not like the effect of the admissions policy on the overall environment and student culture but I feel like it has succeeded in upholding the quality of education.
Its quite admirable that Western is able to do what they do to support incoming CS students, but being smaller and somewhat less underfunded it is certainly easier for them.
I think most people treat online communication more like speech than writing. I know that very little of the formal process of written composition (outlining, proofreading, etc.) goes into most things I write online. And many of the things pointed out in the parent post do not correspond to errors in spoken language at all. For instance, "should of" is a perfectly fine lexicalization of how most native English speakers actually pronounce "should have". In the case of "definitely" versus "definately", the problem phoneme is usually spoken as an "uh" sound that under many circumstances can be realized by almost any written vowel in English, so someone sounding words out without a dictionary could easily make the wrong choice without noticing it (especially since the misspelling is so common).
In the intended context of online communication, it is debatable whether mistakes like these, along with typing errors ("teh", etc.), abbreviations, and other deviations from formal written English, are really errors at all, since they don't prevent understanding of the message by others who are also familiar with the discourse norms on the Internet. Much as I tend to be a pedant for such things myself, I have concluded that there is little to be gained from behaving toward online English in a perscriptive and belittling fashion; it is as much a valid form of language as any other, with its own distinct rules and norms, and is worthy of respect as such.
so why not identify yourself as Opera? Why not take a chunk out of IE's numbers and not Firefoxes?
Because some sites, especially in the past, would not allow some content to be displayed on non-IE browsers, or worse would default to a page using nonstandard Netscape 4-targeted code that would be handled much worse than the IE version by Opera. You can set Mozilla/Firefox to identify as IE also, and some people used to do this, but it isn't the default.
As far as I can see the Firefox trademark policy isn't fundamentally different from Debian's own trademark policy.
It might very well be the case that if Debian were to be included recursively in itself, perhaps with some minor modifications and updates, there would be a similar conflict. They sidestep this issue since they don't have to make the whole distribution available on the same terms that included software is, at least as far as trademarks are concerned.
I guess it is only natural that a very successful person should advise others to do exactly what they did. I am thinking not just of this speech but, for instance, of several essays of Paul Graham that received much attention here. They always ignore the fact that a lot of their success depends on external factors and sheer chance, and their experience is hardly typical of everyone who made the same decisions they did at the same point in life.
Maybe dropping out of college and having cancer were transformative experiences for Steve Jobs. That doesn't mean that everyone who does those things is going to receive the same benefits he does. In fact it is beyond doubt that statistically, people who drop out of college make less money and have fewer career options than those who don't, and many people who contract cancer die of it.
I am a few credits away from finishing my undergraduate degree right now. If I dropped out now I would lose almost all of the equity I have invested in that education, and I can think of nothing that I would gain in its place. The crushing of the will, destruction of my creative spirit, that is done already, it would not matter if I dropped out two years ago or followed things through to the end. What value an action like dropping out has depends entirely on one's particular circumstances. I hope that if I am ever a billionaire, I will still have the critical sense to tell anyone who asks me, as I would now, to do things completely differently than I did.
Having waded through all 9 pages of the article I agree that it was quite fine, like most of what Lessig writes.
I think there is something going on, which he barely hints at, that will come to be important. The World Social Forum is not an event mainly focused around copyright law or free software. It is an event organized for a myriad of global popular movements of a generally leftist character -- for economic justice, environmental preservation, indigenous rights, gender and racial equality, and so on. It is one of the focal points of what is sometimes called (I would say erroneously) the "anti-globalization" movement.
What we are seeing here is a convergence between those movements and free software. From the standpoint of leftists, it is quite natural: If you are interested in alternative forms of social organization (to unrestricted free-market capitalism) both the way open-source communities function and the nature of the software itself as a public resource are a prime example of how such an organization could work.
On the other hand I imagine parts of the open-source community would be very wary of the association: After all, many community leaders go to great lengths to be as apolitical as possible, or even are outspoken conservatives or libertarians, and have spent years trying to persuade major corporations that supporting open-source does not mean destroying capitalism. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
And make sure you leave it on a post-it note stuck to your monitor, or in a desk drawer, your laptop bag, or somewhere else where absolutely no one would possibly think of looking for it.
Voluntarily giving passwords away (ie through phishing or other kinds of trojan horses), having them intercepted (by packet sniffers, keystroke loggers, etc.), or brute-force search are much bigger threats to password integrity than guessing. In none of those cases does a complicated password that would need to be written down fare any worse than a "stupid, easy to guess" password. Password guessing seems a comparably minor threat, and would only seem to apply to really dumb passwords (birth dates, '123456', etc.).
Slashdot Mirror
I'll just go pick up a retail copy of Max OS X at Best Buy and install it on my Dell, I'm sure there's nothing against that in the license.
The usual suspects (Seattle, San Francisco) show up on the list, but some might surprise you.
I looked at the list, and in fact it was mostly the usual suspects. I mean everyone knows there is a big tech presence in Raleigh/Durham and Austin. About the only really surprising inclusion is Orlando, and it was the most poorly justified of all of them. Substitute Portland, OR for Orlando on their list and you have basically the conventional wisdom on what the major tech centers in the US are.
What this study found is that students from countries with higher average math scores have lower average enjoyment of and confidence in math than those from countries with lower scores. This does not actually imply that people who are more proficient in math enjoy it less than those who do not, in general, much less that they are less happy overall. What it does suggest is that educational systems that produce students who are more capable may be less enjoyable or result in less confidence, which actually makes a good deal of sense considering how math is taught in many countries that tend to perform well in these international comparisons.
Okay, so that link was the opposite of what I claimed, but this one describes the right process.
Although the blurb explicitly claims that this new bootloader is "more powerful" than NTLDR/boot.ini, in fact it sounds like this new loader is doing the same thing (starting grup/lilo/etc. from the windows boot loader) that people have been doing for ages with NTLDR. Here is an ancient HOWTO on how to do it.
as of the new xorg there is no need for video drivers to be in the kernel.
Most of the NVIDIA and ATI drivers, like most of any of the open-source drivers, ARE user-space. In fact, since X11 itself is and has always been a user-space application, it is impossible for there not to be some fairly large user-space component.
Moreover, the open-source drivers included with Xorg that have support for hardware 3d acceleration DO require a kernel driver for some low-level interfacing with the hardware, just like NVIDIA and ATI use: that is what those DRI modules are for.
The only controversial difference in approaches stems from NVIDIA (I don't know what ATI does) not using the standard DRI interface between its kernel and X11 drivers. NVIDIA claims DRI has some performance drawbacks. But even if they did use DRI, they would still need a kernel driver, and it would have the same license issues (non-issues actually, IMHO) that their current driver has.
Perhaps, but the binary module is compiled by linking against the kernel headers, and it includes shim code which may (or may not) be derived from the kernel.
That is not "linking" in the sense that is covered by the GPL. The kernel headers contain declarations for kernel functions, structures, and macros. They don't actually produce any object code that is linked in the binary. The binary driver is produced from two object files, one distributed binary-only by NVIDIA and one compiled from NVIDIA's shim source, which is explicitly allowed to be linked with the binary, and not under the GPL. So no mixture of proprietary and GPL code occurs until runtime, when you actually use the driver, and while that is technically a GPL violation since the kernel runs in a single address space (hence the "tainted kernel" messages) neither NVIDIA nor any distributor is liable for it.
Why do you think that nvidia doesn't precompile their shim code too, when they distribute their kernel module.
They do, actually, or at least they used to (for the default kernels of specific distributions). Its just that the Linux kernel doesn't have a stable binary ABI for drivers, so it is necessary to recompile it for every single different kernel version. If it was up to them they likely wouldn't distribute any code at all, just a binary module, but because of the way Linux is that isn't practical. Other distributions, including even Debian, have also distributed linked binaries of the NVIDIA kernel drivers without trouble.
Education (or lack there) is *NOT* a protected characteristic. They are perfectly free to say that people who have below a certain level of education need not apply.
Actually, using IQ and education level in hiring is considered in violation of civil rights laws in some circumstances, if the requirements are not "reasonably related" to the job in question.
John Backus won the award in 1977 though, so it is quite legitimate to ask, as the original poster did, why they didn't recognize Naur sooner.
I switched for the games. I can play tetravex for hours (and I do).
This is kind of amusing, since Tetravex was actually developed by Microsoft originally.
Hmm...what do have in there...
1. Notebook, kind of crummy 4-year old Toshiba P3 that still miraculously works.
2. AC adapter
3. CAT5 cable
4. Phone cable for modem (never used)
5. Bag of replacement tips for notebook's trackpoint-type pointing device (nice thought on their part, but never needed)
6. WiFi card
7. USB sound pod, which I need because I gouged out the built-in headphone jack so the internal speakers don't cut out when headphones are plugged in (why do I have this if I'm not carrying any headphones or speakers?)
8. DOS and Linux floppy boot disks (why do I have these if I don't have a floppy drive?)
9. Legal pad
10. Pen
11. Mechanical pencil
12. Pile of handouts from old meetings
13. Pile of scratch paper to write on (why do I have this if I also have the legal pad?)
14. Book from library. Some translated fragments and poetry by Novalis.
15. A couple of Coke bottle caps I can redeem for free Coca-Cola products some time (and hey! they aren't even expired)
16. An empty envelope. I don't have any idea where it came from.
If the system works correctly (ie, it is really capable of learning language syntax), it will learn the "bad grammar" presented to it. Can you really expect an algorithm to automatically figure out the social conventions that mark one system of communication as "good" and one as "bad", and reject or correct "bad" ones?
Actually it would be quite remarkable if this was possible, given that the reasons some dialects become privileged and others don't have nothing to do with the formal properties of those dialects, and everything to do with history and geography.
It sounds like Perens is attacking this proposal for not doing something which it never claimed to do. If Microsoft or some other anti-OSS software company wants to use their patent portfolio against open source projects, there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it except perhaps get the patent invalidated, if there is a case for doing so. What it sounds like this was intended to do, and seemingly does do, is present patented technologies that open source projects unambiguously CAN use without fear of retribution.
So what does Perens want? The only way to securely eliminate the threat of Microsoft, etc. using patents agressively against open source would be to eliminate patents altogether, at least on software and anything related to software. That might be a reasonable position that deserves consideration, but if that is what he is advocating he should say so openly so that it can be reasonably debated, rather than making insinuations like this.
Yes, there might not be any benefits to you or most people, which is probably why it is marketed the way it is, but it is not identical to an iPod.
How did anyone expect to make money on providing free internet service with no ads?
I don't know, but these guys seem to have managed to stay afloat for many years doing just that. They do offer tech support and other services for an optional monthly fee, but the base service is totally free and has no ads.
This is an interesting idea. I know that for a while people have been using custom kernels built from the free Darwin source to get OS X to run on older pre-G3 PowerMacs, for instance. So at least now it seems to be possible.
They have probably considered the possibility and taken steps to ensure that using a non-approved kernel image isn't possible.
If you want to seriously compare two open-source Unix-like systems, the only instrinsic difference is the kernel. Arguing that one system is better because of the default configuration of network services, the package system, the organization of the rc scripts, and so on, is a red herring, because there is no reason you can't take all of the userspace from one system and run it on top of the kernel from the other -- and there are projects which do this.
In that light, these benchmarks are the most enlightening comparison I have seen to date. Some BSD users have attacked the methodology, but none of them has gone on to do alternative tests of their own, and the author has been very conscientious about addressing some of the criticism. The bottom line is that FreeBSD is, whichever version you choose, at best equal to Linux in low-level kernel performance, and usually slower.
When you also take into account the greater ease of use of most common Linux distributions, broader hardware support, greater availability of commercial software (yes, you may be able to run it under FreeBSD's Linux emulation layer, but the vendor is unlikely to officially support that, which matters to large corporations), and better scalability, it really isn't suprising that most people considering a free Unix-like operating system choose some distribution of Linux.
Undoubtedly for a long time, perhaps until the 2.4 kernel came out, FreeBSD probably was superior, and had a well-deserved reputation as a better choice for serious usage. For some purposes (there are some routing benchmarks that FreeBSD people always bring up, which I can't find right now) it may still be. But through some combination of the AT&T lawsuit, media coverage, and pure chance (licensing may also have played a part), the commercial support and developer mindshare swung decisively to the Linux kernel, and today it is clearly the best choice for most uses. We can wonder what would have happened if FreeBSD had won out instead -- the resulting kernel might very well be better than either Linux or FreeBSD is today -- but that doesn't change the facts about which is the better choice today.
I really think you have to consider the position of the department and the University before you whine too much about not getting accepted. The competitive department admissions system is not fundamentally different from any other UW department where there is more supply than demand; all engineering departments, business, etc., all work the same way. Supposedly the average GPA of incoming bioengineering students is even higher than for CSE. The UW is a public school and must accept a large number of students to fulfill its public mission, but the funding isn't there for everyone to study what they want to, without substantially degrading the quality of education (and even as things are, I think the number of undergraduate CSE students has at least doubled over the past ten years).
As a current undergraduate student (a few quarters away from graduation) in the department, I wish there was a little more humility in the department also, and that they did more to engage students, and I don't think a competitive admissions systems helps things (yes, I knew someone who got rejected with a 3.75 GPA around 2001). It is discouraging to see people with good grades and no real passion for the field, some of whom plan to go to professional school in unrelated fields, have the upper hand over people who really care about CS and computing but have (relatively) lower grades. But things would be much, much worse if they let everyone who applied in and there were 2000 students in the department, especially with no commensurate improvement in state funding. I may not like the effect of the admissions policy on the overall environment and student culture but I feel like it has succeeded in upholding the quality of education.
Its quite admirable that Western is able to do what they do to support incoming CS students, but being smaller and somewhat less underfunded it is certainly easier for them.
I think most people treat online communication more like speech than writing. I know that very little of the formal process of written composition (outlining, proofreading, etc.) goes into most things I write online. And many of the things pointed out in the parent post do not correspond to errors in spoken language at all. For instance, "should of" is a perfectly fine lexicalization of how most native English speakers actually pronounce "should have". In the case of "definitely" versus "definately", the problem phoneme is usually spoken as an "uh" sound that under many circumstances can be realized by almost any written vowel in English, so someone sounding words out without a dictionary could easily make the wrong choice without noticing it (especially since the misspelling is so common).
In the intended context of online communication, it is debatable whether mistakes like these, along with typing errors ("teh", etc.), abbreviations, and other deviations from formal written English, are really errors at all, since they don't prevent understanding of the message by others who are also familiar with the discourse norms on the Internet. Much as I tend to be a pedant for such things myself, I have concluded that there is little to be gained from behaving toward online English in a perscriptive and belittling fashion; it is as much a valid form of language as any other, with its own distinct rules and norms, and is worthy of respect as such.
so why not identify yourself as Opera? Why not take a chunk out of IE's numbers and not Firefoxes?
Because some sites, especially in the past, would not allow some content to be displayed on non-IE browsers, or worse would default to a page using nonstandard Netscape 4-targeted code that would be handled much worse than the IE version by Opera. You can set Mozilla/Firefox to identify as IE also, and some people used to do this, but it isn't the default.
As far as I can see the Firefox trademark policy isn't fundamentally different from Debian's own trademark policy.
It might very well be the case that if Debian were to be included recursively in itself, perhaps with some minor modifications and updates, there would be a similar conflict. They sidestep this issue since they don't have to make the whole distribution available on the same terms that included software is, at least as far as trademarks are concerned.
I guess it is only natural that a very successful person should advise others to do exactly what they did. I am thinking not just of this speech but, for instance, of several essays of Paul Graham that received much attention here. They always ignore the fact that a lot of their success depends on external factors and sheer chance, and their experience is hardly typical of everyone who made the same decisions they did at the same point in life.
Maybe dropping out of college and having cancer were transformative experiences for Steve Jobs. That doesn't mean that everyone who does those things is going to receive the same benefits he does. In fact it is beyond doubt that statistically, people who drop out of college make less money and have fewer career options than those who don't, and many people who contract cancer die of it.
I am a few credits away from finishing my undergraduate degree right now. If I dropped out now I would lose almost all of the equity I have invested in that education, and I can think of nothing that I would gain in its place. The crushing of the will, destruction of my creative spirit, that is done already, it would not matter if I dropped out two years ago or followed things through to the end. What value an action like dropping out has depends entirely on one's particular circumstances. I hope that if I am ever a billionaire, I will still have the critical sense to tell anyone who asks me, as I would now, to do things completely differently than I did.
Having waded through all 9 pages of the article I agree that it was quite fine, like most of what Lessig writes.
I think there is something going on, which he barely hints at, that will come to be important. The World Social Forum is not an event mainly focused around copyright law or free software. It is an event organized for a myriad of global popular movements of a generally leftist character -- for economic justice, environmental preservation, indigenous rights, gender and racial equality, and so on. It is one of the focal points of what is sometimes called (I would say erroneously) the "anti-globalization" movement.
What we are seeing here is a convergence between those movements and free software. From the standpoint of leftists, it is quite natural: If you are interested in alternative forms of social organization (to unrestricted free-market capitalism) both the way open-source communities function and the nature of the software itself as a public resource are a prime example of how such an organization could work.
On the other hand I imagine parts of the open-source community would be very wary of the association: After all, many community leaders go to great lengths to be as apolitical as possible, or even are outspoken conservatives or libertarians, and have spent years trying to persuade major corporations that supporting open-source does not mean destroying capitalism. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
haven't been following the news, eh?
Well this thing doesn't have Apple-signed DRM firmware so it is never going to run Mac OS, Intel processor or no.
And make sure you leave it on a post-it note stuck to your monitor, or in a desk drawer, your laptop bag, or somewhere else where absolutely no one would possibly think of looking for it.
Voluntarily giving passwords away (ie through phishing or other kinds of trojan horses), having them intercepted (by packet sniffers, keystroke loggers, etc.), or brute-force search are much bigger threats to password integrity than guessing. In none of those cases does a complicated password that would need to be written down fare any worse than a "stupid, easy to guess" password. Password guessing seems a comparably minor threat, and would only seem to apply to really dumb passwords (birth dates, '123456', etc.).