>>>Twitter can determine when, where, and from what IP address an account is created.
I expect./ crowd to at least understand that IP is not a reliable identifier. Twitter can only reliably determine when, everything else they know only if bot creator did not bother to spoof it.
True, but it's not so much to identify a single user but if batches of new users are created and then use that to follow their behavior. You really don't care about id'ing a unique individual but rather seeing if enough cues are available to identify fake users.
Side note: The reactors at Fukushima are GE design, not Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, as some readers might conclude from the author's attempt to tie the two together.
Not only that but the Fuku reactors are an early BWR design that is no way like the current designs from GE, Westinghouse, CE et. al.
Twitter can determine when, where, and from what IP address an account is created. they can also follow its activity patterns, likes, etc. to build a profile of the account. In addition to using that data to generate revenue it could look t typical behavioral patterns of real users and establish a set o rules that indicate the account belongs to an actual person. It could then flag accounts that appear to be fake and not count them as followers. This is straightforward behavioral analysis and pattern recognition. Of course, since growth in accounts are the driving force behind Twitter's value, while they have a need for people to trust that Twitter's user base is real there is the competing demand of having a growing user base. the risk to Twitter is if us of fake accounts becomes widespread companies will discount the value of the number of followers accordingly and Twitter's revenue stream and value will take a hit.
It also looks like this has become a minor right-wing cause. Jack-booted thugs coming to take away your wood-burning stoves, and all that.
The right wing tends to be against regulation that erodes personal freedoms. This particular rule may or may not be a good idea, but the healthy thing for society is to look at all new regulation with a healthy dose of skepticism and suspicion.
More like they are against any law they perceive as preventing them from doing what they want to do but in favor of government intervention to prevent someone else form doing something they (the right wingers) don't like or think people should not do.As long as regulations and government imposes *their* view of right and wrong they are OK with it; it's just when it does the same thing to them they are against it. Make no mistake, it's about power and control and not "personal freedom."
That said, I do think it is good to be skeptical of government's attempts at regulation since they often produce unintended consequences.
I remember seeing about 10 years ago a demo of a laser sinter 3D printer used to build parts at remote or deployed locations. If they didn't have a design it is done by HQ or other engineering assists and emailed to the printer. Interestingly enough they said the sintered part was often more robust and better than the OEM. It required machining but it can be easily done.
All they have done is taken the old security question idea and replaced questions with images. While that makes it harder to circumvent using personal information,such as mother's maiden name or where were you born, it's really not that much better than if you simply give nonsense answers that you can still remember. After all, it would be just as hard for a bot or person to find out I was born on Moon Base Piper or lived on German Shepard Lane as match answer to blot. Depending on the number of tries allowed, brute forcing by recognizing the blot and going through possible answers would yield a match. The one advantage I see is you can give nonsense answers that are more easily recalled since the blot can trigger the memory while a bot would need to guess. If the use 3 inserts and 3 blots the bot has a 1 in 3 chance of getting it right the first time.
Perhaps there is more to it than simple match the picture with a phrase?
Why should web marketers feel entitled to additional data just because of the media change. When I read a newspaper, marketers can't even tell I read an ad much less who I am or what I did before or after reading the ad. They have the ability to tell the browser requested the ad, that should be all info they get about anyone.
The simple answer is "MONEY." The more they know, the more they can charge.
I would love to see an organization like wikipedia take over a browser. Let them do their once a year fundraiser. They could block whatever they like out of the box.
I can see a Wikizilla browser now:
Don't agree with a feature, edit it. then watch it get reverted by a later edit
Features get renamed by some drive by joker who thinks it's , to be Frank, err Francis,funny
Click on a feature and get the popular "This feature is a stub and needs more coding to work. Can you help?"
Opening up history and getting "cite needed" since ether all are single sources of information
Should they have been slightly less self-righteous when "blasting the US" last time? Sure.
Does this even remotely compare to the practices of NSA regarding foreign (allied) heads of state? Nu-uh.
The main difference is that this is happening on Brazilian soil.
Got it. It's not what you do but where. So as long as the NSA ensures its collection activities occur on US soil it's OK.
Except when this story was originally reported, the city COULD use the network. They chose not to, claiming that they thought he might have compromised the system in other ways. As well as it being originally reported that Terry Childs continually offered to divulge the password to the individual and in the way that the cities security policy dictated. The city refused to follow their own procedure, and insisted that he violate the city's security policies by divulging the passwords to an unauthorized individual over the phone, which was also unauthorized.
Unless new facts have come to light that contradicted what was reported when it happened, Terry Childs has been sent to jail as an innocent man because he didn't realize that the law is a joke and works at the whim of those in power.
No, he went to jail because he deliberately setup the system so he was the only one that knew the passwords; and then refused to divulge them. He didn't simply forget his or refuse to violate procedures; he tried to use what he did as leverage and that is what he went to jail for. What he did is no different then any other type of extortion.
The nice thing about this is that short of invading, there's no way to pressure the Swiss to do anything that they don't want to do. They produce their own energy, they make a crapload of money, and every adult male owns an assault rifle (security of a free state, keep and bear arms, etc. etc.). They can afford to give the NSA the finger.
Actually, there is a way to pressure them. Have foreign banks stop doing business with their banks. It's actually a very effective tool; one that is used on the North Koreans very effectively. It essentially cuts off access to their money which results in their rethinking what they are doing. We'd never do that to Switzerland but it is a little know but effective weapon.
" However, Apple really isn't in the phone business as much as they are in the content delivery business. They'll still put out great iPhones; but they'll be aimed at tying people tighter into the whole eco-system. That is an area that gives them an advantage over their competitors because they don't offer the same end to end experience (yet). The iPhone, iPad, AppleTV and Mac will all be ways to deliver content i this customers that allow happen to text, make phone calls and run programs."
Apple makes much more money in profits and revenues from hardware---and iPhone hardware to be specific---than anything else.
Content revenues are relatively insignificant and will stay insignificant.
Remember that Apple's revenue is about the same as Chevron's and twice IBM's and JPMorgan (biggest mega-bank!), three times ConocoPhillips, and 5 times Goldman Sachs.
It's ***enormous***, only exceeded by Exxon, Walmart and Saudi Aramco.
There's no remote way that content revenue (maybe 1% of that) could possibly substitute to run Apple's business. Apple trying to make money on content instead of hardware leads to a Blackberry death-spiral outcome.
Content network and ecosystem is there to promote the attractiveness of the hardware.
I think we are in general agreement although I may not have been clear what I meant by "content delivery business." What I meant was Apple wants to be the way content is accessed by the user through hardware and use that to to deliver, via software, and sell content as well. They really are building a foundation to replace the traditional cable TV delivery model; which is why cable companies are pushing for bandwidth caps and buying content developers. They don't want to be the dumb pipe that lets others sell content at a premium, and they want to control the content so they can dictate how it is delivered and charge for the bandwidth used as well.
I foresee a day when instead of buying cable packages you can buy shows or channels al la carte from iTunes, and view them on multiple devices so you get your content wherever you are. No more DVR since everything is viewed on demand. Want a lower price? Watch it with ads or pay a premium for ad free TV. Apple could really get a premium for ad time since they can serve tailored ads based on an Apple ID and the info they have on the account owner.
The "control everything" (or in a positive light "integration"), is what Apple is selling and what they are good at. Apple cannot compete head to head with Android, history taught them that - they failed until Jobs came back and started to focus on their niche. After a decade of restructuring, Apple is simply not ready to compete on many fronts, like Samsung is for example.
Apple doesn't have to, nor do they want to, compete on every front. They have focused on what they believe is a profitable market segment and develop products for that segment. By focusing, they can build a product set that is very profitable and not waste time and money on less profitable commodity products.
That is what is amazing with Apple this time. They had the whole smartphone market by the balls, but they let it go to stay focused on a smaller number of products.
The early smartphone market was for high end devices; an area that Apple competes in quite well. As the market expanded and cheaper phones came out, Apple chose not to go into the more price sensitive areas instead focusing on the expanding demand at the high end of the market. As Apple developed a series of iPhones it became viable for them to keep older models at lower price points to bring more people into its eco-system; even then the lower priced iPhone isn't cheap if you buy it off contract. Apple is moving into a broader market by targeting what they see as the most valuable segments and happy to leave the low end to Android.
The real big big difference is that this time there are other players competing in Apple's traditional niche instead of being left alone. If Apple eventually fails, it is this time not because of a strategic problem, just because the competition was good. ( and that's a good thing no ? )
Yes, competition is god and Apple will need to continue to innovate to stay on top. However, Apple really isn't in the phone business as much as they are in the content delivery business. They'll still put out great iPhones; but they'll be aimed at tying people tighter into the whole eco-system. That is an area that gives them an advantage over their competitors because they don't offer the same end to end experience (yet). The iPhone, iPad, AppleTV and Mac will all be ways to deliver content i this customers that allow happen to text, make phone calls and run programs.
I just re-serve the CAPTCHAs on my own popular website. Crowdsourcing for the win.
That's the real problem with captchas. As long as you can hire people real cheap to brute force them how well a computer can do that is really just an interesting computational feat. I can create a test that says "Answer this: 1+3=" with instructions above it that say to answer with the name at the top of the blog; while a machine may be fooled a person who is served the entire web page can just as easily defeat that. If the gain from defeating a captcha is big enough someone will pay to brute force them.
to make a real world analogy, we use shredders to destroy documents. However, if you can throw enough people together in a room over time the can recreate the document in many cases. It's only a question is the effort worth the outcome.
A bike never has the right of way. I say this because of the laws of physics -- if a delivery van blows a stop sign and t-bones you, he can hose down his van and get back to work tomorrow.
Ah yes, what we used to call the Law of Gross Tonnage," or as a CO I served under once put it when a sailboat cut across our path when were outbound in a channel "don't worry. We won't know we hit her until we see the wood scraps in our wake."
They only offer UPGRADES for free? Then nothing changed, really. You'd still need to buy a Mac to use it legally. In fact it's kinda stupid OS updates were paid for in the first place.
Yea, the question really wasn't that insightful since OSX and Linux really don't compete for the same user base; it's really a marketing shot at MS as well as a way to get people onto the new OS so as Apple decides to move in certain directions that can be assured much of their user base is on the latest OS.
Oddly enough, Apple has come full circle from its early Apple ][ days when every OS release was free; it wasn't until MacOS came out did they eventually start charging. I forget what release was the first paid update. Of course, many programs were the same way, HyperStudio for example let any user upgrade to the latest version for free. I wonder if Apple is thinking it is better to tie users into the least versions and to your software by giving it away so that you can make money on devices and services; and they're betting that keeping everyone up to date will bind them even tighter into their closed ecosystem.
If you've spent much time on the site, you'd realize that they operate with a very special kind of stupid around here. And by special kind of stupid, I mean about 1,000x the normal human amount.
Yes, but it is free and open source stupidity; so that if you have some special need you can adapt it to your particular use of stupid. Some folks simply use it as is with a pre-existing build that they can cut and paste in replies, others make minor modifications and some fork it into a whole new type of stupidity because they think they have a better way to be stupid.
It isn't just security either; I see lots of jobs advertised at the moment here in London. It is overwhelmingly what they call "DevOps" and Java development. I have been following the market for a long while, and I can see the same roles coming up again and again, so clearly the companies are having trouble finding people.
It's also possible after gaining experience and the needed clearances they discover they can make more elsewhere.
What I find interesting is that you appear not to have backed up the files elsewhere. While I appreciate the convenience cloud storage offers I also make sure all my files are backed up on some other media so if the cloud goes poof at least I don't lose anything. In your example, you were fortunate it was am administrative error and not box.com simply going out of business overnight. Had that happened, you might never get your files back or even worse someone would have a HD full of you data bought at a bankruptcy auction; which as a second point makes me wonder why you would store such sensitive information as pay checks / tax forms / etc. anywhere nut media you have physical control of to ensure it's security.
On a side note, it is interesting the difference in response you get when you say "I am writing an article..." vs "I need help..."
Another question for someone to answer: What about ozone discharge? My wife and I get headaches from the laser printers so we went back to inkjets in our home office. (She used to print out 100 - 200 pages at a time even with a window open, the office stank for quite a while.) It looks like people like Brother (B&W) lasers and Kyocera lasers are the favorites here. Anyone have anything to say about the ozone pollution these things throw out? Or how to get lasers with minimal ozone discharge?
Are you sure it's ozone and not an allergic reaction to toner?
I'm looking for a multipurpose B&W printer, laser, for home.
My current choice is the Brother MFC-7460DN , also good for SOHO.
It's a multipurpose B&W laser printer, 26ppm print; 35-sheet Auto Document Feeder; Duplex print, Fax, colour scanner.
It looks like people have less problems with this brand/model than some others, so I think I buy it
I have used Brother laser printers for a number of years and am quite happy with them. They are reliable work horses and relatively cheap to buy and operate. My 5 year old one still works fine and I picked up a duplex wireless one for less than $70 on sale. At those prices, it's cheaper to replace the printer than the drum if and when it wears out. They use really cheap toner as well, I use cheap Amazon refills that cost about $15 and have never had an issue with them.
I use a VPN service at $5 a month to keep browsing private as well as ensure access to skype in countries that block it. I wonder how valuable browsing data would be if you just randomly loaded pages form a list of say 10K urls; especially if a significant percentage of users did that 24x7?.
The US-Canada program is NEXUS ($50 for 5 years). It gives you all the privileges of Global Entry (including Pre), as well as access to Nexus lanes on the US-Canada border. It's essentially a superset of Global Entry plus it's cheaper too. The only downside is that most of the interview locations are close to the border, so if you don't live close to one, it can be a pain to get a NEXUS card.
That's a relatively new program. They had a free one about 10 years ago that used a handprint at select crossings.
Slashdot Mirror
>>>Twitter can determine when, where, and from what IP address an account is created. I expect ./ crowd to at least understand that IP is not a reliable identifier. Twitter can only reliably determine when, everything else they know only if bot creator did not bother to spoof it.
True, but it's not so much to identify a single user but if batches of new users are created and then use that to follow their behavior. You really don't care about id'ing a unique individual but rather seeing if enough cues are available to identify fake users.
Side note: The reactors at Fukushima are GE design, not Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, as some readers might conclude from the author's attempt to tie the two together.
Not only that but the Fuku reactors are an early BWR design that is no way like the current designs from GE, Westinghouse, CE et. al.
Twitter can determine when, where, and from what IP address an account is created. they can also follow its activity patterns, likes, etc. to build a profile of the account. In addition to using that data to generate revenue it could look t typical behavioral patterns of real users and establish a set o rules that indicate the account belongs to an actual person. It could then flag accounts that appear to be fake and not count them as followers. This is straightforward behavioral analysis and pattern recognition. Of course, since growth in accounts are the driving force behind Twitter's value, while they have a need for people to trust that Twitter's user base is real there is the competing demand of having a growing user base. the risk to Twitter is if us of fake accounts becomes widespread companies will discount the value of the number of followers accordingly and Twitter's revenue stream and value will take a hit.
It also looks like this has become a minor right-wing cause. Jack-booted thugs coming to take away your wood-burning stoves, and all that.
The right wing tends to be against regulation that erodes personal freedoms. This particular rule may or may not be a good idea, but the healthy thing for society is to look at all new regulation with a healthy dose of skepticism and suspicion.
More like they are against any law they perceive as preventing them from doing what they want to do but in favor of government intervention to prevent someone else form doing something they (the right wingers) don't like or think people should not do.As long as regulations and government imposes *their* view of right and wrong they are OK with it; it's just when it does the same thing to them they are against it. Make no mistake, it's about power and control and not "personal freedom."
That said, I do think it is good to be skeptical of government's attempts at regulation since they often produce unintended consequences.
I remember seeing about 10 years ago a demo of a laser sinter 3D printer used to build parts at remote or deployed locations. If they didn't have a design it is done by HQ or other engineering assists and emailed to the printer. Interestingly enough they said the sintered part was often more robust and better than the OEM. It required machining but it can be easily done.
All they have done is taken the old security question idea and replaced questions with images. While that makes it harder to circumvent using personal information ,such as mother's maiden name or where were you born, it's really not that much better than if you simply give nonsense answers that you can still remember. After all, it would be just as hard for a bot or person to find out I was born on Moon Base Piper or lived on German Shepard Lane as match answer to blot. Depending on the number of tries allowed, brute forcing by recognizing the blot and going through possible answers would yield a match. The one advantage I see is you can give nonsense answers that are more easily recalled since the blot can trigger the memory while a bot would need to guess. If the use 3 inserts and 3 blots the bot has a 1 in 3 chance of getting it right the first time.
Perhaps there is more to it than simple match the picture with a phrase?
Glorious and free
Just be sure to not touch me
Why should web marketers feel entitled to additional data just because of the media change. When I read a newspaper, marketers can't even tell I read an ad much less who I am or what I did before or after reading the ad. They have the ability to tell the browser requested the ad, that should be all info they get about anyone.
The simple answer is "MONEY." The more they know, the more they can charge.
I would love to see an organization like wikipedia take over a browser. Let them do their once a year fundraiser. They could block whatever they like out of the box.
I can see a Wikizilla browser now:
Don't agree with a feature, edit it. then watch it get reverted by a later edit
Features get renamed by some drive by joker who thinks it's , to be Frank, err Francis,funny
Click on a feature and get the popular "This feature is a stub and needs more coding to work. Can you help?"
Opening up history and getting "cite needed" since ether all are single sources of information
Read the article.
Should they have been slightly less self-righteous when "blasting the US" last time? Sure. Does this even remotely compare to the practices of NSA regarding foreign (allied) heads of state? Nu-uh.
The main difference is that this is happening on Brazilian soil.
Got it. It's not what you do but where. So as long as the NSA ensures its collection activities occur on US soil it's OK.
Except when this story was originally reported, the city COULD use the network. They chose not to, claiming that they thought he might have compromised the system in other ways. As well as it being originally reported that Terry Childs continually offered to divulge the password to the individual and in the way that the cities security policy dictated. The city refused to follow their own procedure, and insisted that he violate the city's security policies by divulging the passwords to an unauthorized individual over the phone, which was also unauthorized. Unless new facts have come to light that contradicted what was reported when it happened, Terry Childs has been sent to jail as an innocent man because he didn't realize that the law is a joke and works at the whim of those in power.
No, he went to jail because he deliberately setup the system so he was the only one that knew the passwords; and then refused to divulge them. He didn't simply forget his or refuse to violate procedures; he tried to use what he did as leverage and that is what he went to jail for. What he did is no different then any other type of extortion.
The nice thing about this is that short of invading, there's no way to pressure the Swiss to do anything that they don't want to do. They produce their own energy, they make a crapload of money, and every adult male owns an assault rifle (security of a free state, keep and bear arms, etc. etc.). They can afford to give the NSA the finger.
Actually, there is a way to pressure them. Have foreign banks stop doing business with their banks. It's actually a very effective tool; one that is used on the North Koreans very effectively. It essentially cuts off access to their money which results in their rethinking what they are doing. We'd never do that to Switzerland but it is a little know but effective weapon.
" However, Apple really isn't in the phone business as much as they are in the content delivery business. They'll still put out great iPhones; but they'll be aimed at tying people tighter into the whole eco-system. That is an area that gives them an advantage over their competitors because they don't offer the same end to end experience (yet). The iPhone, iPad, AppleTV and Mac will all be ways to deliver content i this customers that allow happen to text, make phone calls and run programs."
Apple makes much more money in profits and revenues from hardware---and iPhone hardware to be specific---than anything else. Content revenues are relatively insignificant and will stay insignificant. Remember that Apple's revenue is about the same as Chevron's and twice IBM's and JPMorgan (biggest mega-bank!), three times ConocoPhillips, and 5 times Goldman Sachs. It's ***enormous***, only exceeded by Exxon, Walmart and Saudi Aramco. There's no remote way that content revenue (maybe 1% of that) could possibly substitute to run Apple's business. Apple trying to make money on content instead of hardware leads to a Blackberry death-spiral outcome. Content network and ecosystem is there to promote the attractiveness of the hardware.
I think we are in general agreement although I may not have been clear what I meant by "content delivery business." What I meant was Apple wants to be the way content is accessed by the user through hardware and use that to to deliver, via software, and sell content as well. They really are building a foundation to replace the traditional cable TV delivery model; which is why cable companies are pushing for bandwidth caps and buying content developers. They don't want to be the dumb pipe that lets others sell content at a premium, and they want to control the content so they can dictate how it is delivered and charge for the bandwidth used as well.
I foresee a day when instead of buying cable packages you can buy shows or channels al la carte from iTunes, and view them on multiple devices so you get your content wherever you are. No more DVR since everything is viewed on demand. Want a lower price? Watch it with ads or pay a premium for ad free TV. Apple could really get a premium for ad time since they can serve tailored ads based on an Apple ID and the info they have on the account owner.
The "control everything" (or in a positive light "integration"), is what Apple is selling and what they are good at. Apple cannot compete head to head with Android, history taught them that - they failed until Jobs came back and started to focus on their niche. After a decade of restructuring, Apple is simply not ready to compete on many fronts, like Samsung is for example.
Apple doesn't have to, nor do they want to, compete on every front. They have focused on what they believe is a profitable market segment and develop products for that segment. By focusing, they can build a product set that is very profitable and not waste time and money on less profitable commodity products.
That is what is amazing with Apple this time. They had the whole smartphone market by the balls, but they let it go to stay focused on a smaller number of products.
The early smartphone market was for high end devices; an area that Apple competes in quite well. As the market expanded and cheaper phones came out, Apple chose not to go into the more price sensitive areas instead focusing on the expanding demand at the high end of the market. As Apple developed a series of iPhones it became viable for them to keep older models at lower price points to bring more people into its eco-system; even then the lower priced iPhone isn't cheap if you buy it off contract. Apple is moving into a broader market by targeting what they see as the most valuable segments and happy to leave the low end to Android.
The real big big difference is that this time there are other players competing in Apple's traditional niche instead of being left alone. If Apple eventually fails, it is this time not because of a strategic problem, just because the competition was good. ( and that's a good thing no ? )
Yes, competition is god and Apple will need to continue to innovate to stay on top. However, Apple really isn't in the phone business as much as they are in the content delivery business. They'll still put out great iPhones; but they'll be aimed at tying people tighter into the whole eco-system. That is an area that gives them an advantage over their competitors because they don't offer the same end to end experience (yet). The iPhone, iPad, AppleTV and Mac will all be ways to deliver content i this customers that allow happen to text, make phone calls and run programs.
I just re-serve the CAPTCHAs on my own popular website. Crowdsourcing for the win.
That's the real problem with captchas. As long as you can hire people real cheap to brute force them how well a computer can do that is really just an interesting computational feat. I can create a test that says "Answer this: 1+3=" with instructions above it that say to answer with the name at the top of the blog; while a machine may be fooled a person who is served the entire web page can just as easily defeat that. If the gain from defeating a captcha is big enough someone will pay to brute force them.
to make a real world analogy, we use shredders to destroy documents. However, if you can throw enough people together in a room over time the can recreate the document in many cases. It's only a question is the effort worth the outcome.
I don't see us declaring a War on Nuts.
Thank god or else /. Would be high on the target list...
A bike never has the right of way. I say this because of the laws of physics -- if a delivery van blows a stop sign and t-bones you, he can hose down his van and get back to work tomorrow.
Ah yes, what we used to call the Law of Gross Tonnage," or as a CO I served under once put it when a sailboat cut across our path when were outbound in a channel "don't worry. We won't know we hit her until we see the wood scraps in our wake."
They only offer UPGRADES for free? Then nothing changed, really. You'd still need to buy a Mac to use it legally. In fact it's kinda stupid OS updates were paid for in the first place.
Yea, the question really wasn't that insightful since OSX and Linux really don't compete for the same user base; it's really a marketing shot at MS as well as a way to get people onto the new OS so as Apple decides to move in certain directions that can be assured much of their user base is on the latest OS.
Oddly enough, Apple has come full circle from its early Apple ][ days when every OS release was free; it wasn't until MacOS came out did they eventually start charging. I forget what release was the first paid update. Of course, many programs were the same way, HyperStudio for example let any user upgrade to the latest version for free. I wonder if Apple is thinking it is better to tie users into the least versions and to your software by giving it away so that you can make money on devices and services; and they're betting that keeping everyone up to date will bind them even tighter into their closed ecosystem.
If you've spent much time on the site, you'd realize that they operate with a very special kind of stupid around here. And by special kind of stupid, I mean about 1,000x the normal human amount.
Yes, but it is free and open source stupidity; so that if you have some special need you can adapt it to your particular use of stupid. Some folks simply use it as is with a pre-existing build that they can cut and paste in replies, others make minor modifications and some fork it into a whole new type of stupidity because they think they have a better way to be stupid.
It isn't just security either; I see lots of jobs advertised at the moment here in London. It is overwhelmingly what they call "DevOps" and Java development. I have been following the market for a long while, and I can see the same roles coming up again and again, so clearly the companies are having trouble finding people.
It's also possible after gaining experience and the needed clearances they discover they can make more elsewhere.
What I find interesting is that you appear not to have backed up the files elsewhere. While I appreciate the convenience cloud storage offers I also make sure all my files are backed up on some other media so if the cloud goes poof at least I don't lose anything. In your example, you were fortunate it was am administrative error and not box.com simply going out of business overnight. Had that happened, you might never get your files back or even worse someone would have a HD full of you data bought at a bankruptcy auction; which as a second point makes me wonder why you would store such sensitive information as pay checks / tax forms / etc. anywhere nut media you have physical control of to ensure it's security.
On a side note, it is interesting the difference in response you get when you say "I am writing an article..." vs "I need help..."
Another question for someone to answer: What about ozone discharge? My wife and I get headaches from the laser printers so we went back to inkjets in our home office. (She used to print out 100 - 200 pages at a time even with a window open, the office stank for quite a while.) It looks like people like Brother (B&W) lasers and Kyocera lasers are the favorites here. Anyone have anything to say about the ozone pollution these things throw out? Or how to get lasers with minimal ozone discharge?
Are you sure it's ozone and not an allergic reaction to toner?
I'm looking for a multipurpose B&W printer, laser, for home.
My current choice is the Brother MFC-7460DN , also good for SOHO. It's a multipurpose B&W laser printer, 26ppm print; 35-sheet Auto Document Feeder; Duplex print, Fax, colour scanner.
It looks like people have less problems with this brand/model than some others, so I think I buy it
I have used Brother laser printers for a number of years and am quite happy with them. They are reliable work horses and relatively cheap to buy and operate. My 5 year old one still works fine and I picked up a duplex wireless one for less than $70 on sale. At those prices, it's cheaper to replace the printer than the drum if and when it wears out. They use really cheap toner as well, I use cheap Amazon refills that cost about $15 and have never had an issue with them.
I use a VPN service at $5 a month to keep browsing private as well as ensure access to skype in countries that block it. I wonder how valuable browsing data would be if you just randomly loaded pages form a list of say 10K urls; especially if a significant percentage of users did that 24x7?.
The US-Canada program is NEXUS ($50 for 5 years). It gives you all the privileges of Global Entry (including Pre), as well as access to Nexus lanes on the US-Canada border. It's essentially a superset of Global Entry plus it's cheaper too. The only downside is that most of the interview locations are close to the border, so if you don't live close to one, it can be a pain to get a NEXUS card.
That's a relatively new program. They had a free one about 10 years ago that used a handprint at select crossings.