I appreciate the stunning and scary significance of the advanced malware that is able to "realistically" modify medical imagery in a way that coerces doctor into misdiagnosis. However, I do not see any description of the attack vector? I only read the free version of the article, so I could be completely missing it. Sorry, if so!!
I thought the exact same thing. Turns out that we mistakenly confused the owner of Segway with the inventor. The owner of the company that owned the rights to the name Segway fell off a cliff and died.
I was confused, too. Thanks for prompting me to look up this information!
The former does a good job, I thought, of outlining what it means to program in the UNIX style. The latter is perfect for a geek like me who wants to learn all about the ins/outs of semantics of a language that I love!
Thank you for asking this question. It is something that I think about constantly. When the reports about the poor working conditions in Foxconn factories first came out years ago, I decided to boycott Apple and never buy another one of their products.
Now, yes, I do understand that it's hypocritical to continue to hold that boycott because there are so many places that manufacture their goods at Foxconn. I have tried to only buy goods that are not made in those factories, but it's virtually impossible these days if you want to participate in technology at all. As a programmer, I feel that I have no choice but to participate, but I understand that I am in a privileged position to be able to "have to" buy these things.
Yes, I also realize the very good argument that the people moving to these "camps" (er, factories) are making better money than they would be making in their rural villages. They are able to save that money and they are able to send it back home to take care of their families. No, there is no opportunity for them to advance, though -- that's bothersome to me.
I also realize that Foxconn, because of their privileged relationship with Apple, do the best at making sure their workers are treated fairly. I've read the China Labor Watch (Link) reports and they are damning -- of all the factories. It just sticks in my craw that when Foxconn had to decide how to tackle the problem of worker suicides, they decided to build a net to catch jumpers rather than, you know, address their misery.
So, I continue to draw my little, silly line in the sand and boycott Apple products while trying to buy as little as possible from Foxconn.
That said, the overall question is something that bothers me and something that I try to keep in the front of my mind as often as possible.
Jon Masters, one of the people who has been involved in the ongoing Spectre/Meltdown research and mitigation, is from Red Hat and is pushing ARM extensively and doing a great job of advocating for its use beyond low-power mobile devices. He played a huge role in getting Amazon to start offering ARM-based hosts on their cloud platform. If you are looking for interesting presentations about these vulnerabilities, check out some of his talks on YouTube:
Stanford Seminar - Exploiting modern microarchitectures: Meltdown, Spectre, & other hardware attacks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuBw1HFJMsM
Exploiting modern microarchitectures Meltdown, Spectre, and other hardware attacks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kCDPCgjlJ4
And this one with John Hennessy, Keynote from HotChips https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5XzVF0sAZo
(I am just posting this because I don't have moderator points to offer.)
I cannot agree more!! This is an excellent point that I hope people are beginning to realize. If you have to say, "I just tell it like it is.", you're a jerk. People know when you just tell it like it is. You can be frank without being an asshole.
Besides the fact that this is just another Android phone (that doesn't even run a clean version of the OS), I think that it looks pretty nice. Just the design seems to set it apart, somehow. I won't necessarily buy it (I crowdfunded the Purism phone) but I still think it's good to have a phone that is somehow "different" from the pack.
The WSJ has a related story about how sellers attempt to game the system to get their products a higher ranking in searchers.
Some of the tricks include:
1. Taking old listings with high ratings and change the product 2. Posting SPAM-my comments on opponent products to get their rivals listings flagged as abusive 3. Filing bogus safety claims against rivals to get their products delisted pending a safety investigation 4. Paying people to receive empty shipments so that they can post verified buyer reviews
Oh, just that? I thought there was something more nefarious that he was referring to. I thought the original poster was being more subtle. Sorry for offending the slashdot trolls.
Agreed. It's hard to stomach that such an interesting and important technology that really launched so much ancillary research and development will be in the hands of a single person who is known for plagiarizing ideas from another.
I really think that, despite the way that it is unfortunately associated with copyright violations, BT is a very valuable technology.
But speculating that a big automotive competitor is possibly involved sounds nutty even if true. He should have quit when he was ahead and left that out.
Not sure why sabotage is any more unlikely than the corporate espionage that is alleged to have already happened in the self-driving car space.
I wish that I simply had mod points to respond to this. Since I don't, I will post a comment.
This is one of the most thoughtful responses that I've read on/. in a while. Thank you for posting this.
I cannot agree more with your comment. Especially the final part. I think that it is part of human nature to want to be so invaluable that the organization we leave will be stuck without us. And that is true for any type of organization. I know it is definitely true for me. I've left behind several groups and really wanted to be so missed that they constantly had to come ask me about x and y.
I left those organizations on good terms but I wanted my coworkers to think so highly of me that they had no choice but to come ask me about my work after I moved to another position. I am not proud of this. On the contrary, I try very hard to remember that everything continues with or without me.
To bring this full circle, because everything does continue marching, I think that the value of an employee is what he/she contributes to the group overall. That is true whether you play mentor or mentee in any setting. If you are the mentor, then your lasting contribution will be how you improved everyone around you. If you are a mentee, then your last contribution is how much you learned and how you applied in your current position and how you will teach it to someone else at your next organization.
I was in a presentation on the ethics of AI at a very prominent computer science conference. Several experts stood up during the presentation to make this very point. Neural networks, what people call AI these days,/are/ black boxes and we know no more about how they make decisions than we do about how the brain makes decisions based on the network of synapses that have been trained by inputs from the time of our birth.
In this article from the NY Times, people from SGI say that they eventually gave up on the lava lamps and just took pictures of the lens cap which meant that they were essentially using electronic noise!
Fascinating!
I also recall that in the early 2000s Google was using this very technique. You could go online and view images of the lavalamps. Unfortunately I can't find any good references to it. Sorry!
I think that this is fascinating. Like you said, there's definitely a possibility for increased weed "resistance" without the potential for side effects from the herbicide.
I know that this is a sham study and that Soda wants to tell us that our (lack of) movement is what's killing us and not their intensely, artificially sweetened beverages forced upon us by pervasive advertising...
BUT
I thought we all agreed that being sedentary was generally not good for our bodies?
And yes, I am just as guilty as everyone else. I'm a programmer who is loathe to move anything more than my pinky to the ESC to enter control mode in VI(M).
This is absolutely, 100% true, but also slightly different than the forms of attacks to which Linus is referring. I think that the attacks you speak of are incredibly destructive and are self-inflicted. External forces (proprietary vendors or otherwise) do cause great harm to the OS community by attacking its reputation for security. They use examples of attacks perpetrated by blackhats to "prove" that OS cannot/does not work. So, your point is valid and so is Linus'. Thank you!
I am a Firefox beta user who was selected to participate in the trial of the uni-bar and I actually like it. I did not expect to, though. I had always hated that about Chrome (one of the reasons I don't use Chrome), but it works pretty well. I like being able to search my URL history, my search history, etc, all right there from one spot. It puts the "autosuggest" completions from your default search engine in the "right" spot -- not too high and not too low.
Overall, though I am usually a "get off my lawn" person w.r.t Firefox, I am okay with this change!
From what I can see, the data has two easily visible explanations. 1. VCs are sexist and don't like to fund teams with women on them. Or 2. Women are more like to choose (or be placed) in projects that are less likely to receive VC funding
Correlation does not imply causation. Data and evidence has no meaning without interpretation.
I love C. That's first. Second, I haven't read this TechCrunch person's post, but I am generally not inclined to believe anything on TC beyond their analysis of the industry (if I even believe that!).
HOWEVER,
I wanted to share this paper from HotOS 2017 about formalizing type safety in Rust:
I know that Robert X. Cringely is not a favorite around here, but the documentary series was really interesting. Great interviews with key players and lots of contemporaneous accounts of companies that were awesome but now no longer exist (e.g., Excite!).
There are plenty of others that are must see, too, but this is the one that I thought of first!
There are plenty of great books that I wish I had read earlier:
1. Masterminds of Programming 2. Infinite Jest 3. The Sun Also Rises
are just a few examples. However, the one that came to mind first was Mere Christianity by CS Lewis. I really tried to stay away from it because I heard so many people say that it was a great book. I didn't want to read it just out of spite.
When I finally read it, I really enjoyed it and it helped me think through some things differently that I did not expect.
Slashdot Mirror
Just because they may the code available on github, does not mean that it will be licensed in such a way that makes it either Open Source or FOSS.
I appreciate the stunning and scary significance of the advanced malware that is able to "realistically" modify medical imagery in a way that coerces doctor into misdiagnosis. However, I do not see any description of the attack vector? I only read the free version of the article, so I could be completely missing it. Sorry, if so!!
Will
I thought the exact same thing. Turns out that we mistakenly confused the owner of Segway with the inventor. The owner of the company that owned the rights to the name Segway fell off a cliff and died.
I was confused, too. Thanks for prompting me to look up this information!
The Art of UNIX Programming by Eric Raymond
and
Expert Programming: Deep C Secrets
The former does a good job, I thought, of outlining what it means to program in the UNIX style. The latter is perfect for a geek like me who wants to learn all about the ins/outs of semantics of a language that I love!
Here's a compilation of other "must-read" books from well known developers like "Uncle Bob, and Kent Beck, [and] Jeff Atwood and DHH:"
On medium, sorry for the interstitial: https://medium.com/@shvetsovdm/essential-books-that-every-programmer-should-read-a61565095781.
Will
Thank you for asking this question. It is something that I think about constantly. When the reports about the poor working conditions in Foxconn factories first came out years ago, I decided to boycott Apple and never buy another one of their products.
Now, yes, I do understand that it's hypocritical to continue to hold that boycott because there are so many places that manufacture their goods at Foxconn. I have tried to only buy goods that are not made in those factories, but it's virtually impossible these days if you want to participate in technology at all. As a programmer, I feel that I have no choice but to participate, but I understand that I am in a privileged position to be able to "have to" buy these things.
Yes, I also realize the very good argument that the people moving to these "camps" (er, factories) are making better money than they would be making in their rural villages. They are able to save that money and they are able to send it back home to take care of their families. No, there is no opportunity for them to advance, though -- that's bothersome to me.
I also realize that Foxconn, because of their privileged relationship with Apple, do the best at making sure their workers are treated fairly. I've read the China Labor Watch (Link) reports and they are damning -- of all the factories. It just sticks in my craw that when Foxconn had to decide how to tackle the problem of worker suicides, they decided to build a net to catch jumpers rather than, you know, address their misery.
So, I continue to draw my little, silly line in the sand and boycott Apple products while trying to buy as little as possible from Foxconn.
That said, the overall question is something that bothers me and something that I try to keep in the front of my mind as often as possible.
Thanks again for asking the question.
Jon Masters, one of the people who has been involved in the ongoing Spectre/Meltdown research and mitigation, is from Red Hat and is pushing ARM extensively and doing a great job of advocating for its use beyond low-power mobile devices. He played a huge role in getting Amazon to start offering ARM-based hosts on their cloud platform. If you are looking for interesting presentations about these vulnerabilities, check out some of his talks on YouTube:
Stanford Seminar - Exploiting modern microarchitectures: Meltdown, Spectre, & other hardware attacks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuBw1HFJMsM
Exploiting modern microarchitectures Meltdown, Spectre, and other hardware attacks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kCDPCgjlJ4
And this one with John Hennessy,
Keynote from HotChips
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5XzVF0sAZo
(I am just posting this because I don't have moderator points to offer.)
I cannot agree more!! This is an excellent point that I hope people are beginning to realize. If you have to say, "I just tell it like it is.", you're a jerk. People know when you just tell it like it is. You can be frank without being an asshole.
Thank you again for posting this!
Will
I think that you spelled it wrong. It's breaches, not branches.
Besides the fact that this is just another Android phone (that doesn't even run a clean version of the OS), I think that it looks pretty nice. Just the design seems to set it apart, somehow. I won't necessarily buy it (I crowdfunded the Purism phone) but I still think it's good to have a phone that is somehow "different" from the pack.
The WSJ has a related story about how sellers attempt to game the system to get their products a higher ranking in searchers.
Some of the tricks include:
1. Taking old listings with high ratings and change the product
2. Posting SPAM-my comments on opponent products to get their rivals listings flagged as abusive
3. Filing bogus safety claims against rivals to get their products delisted pending a safety investigation
4. Paying people to receive empty shipments so that they can post verified buyer reviews
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-sellers-trick-amazon-to-boost-sales-1532750493?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=4
I thought that the article was interesting. I hope others do too!
Will
Oh, just that? I thought there was something more nefarious that he was referring to. I thought the original poster was being more subtle. Sorry for offending the slashdot trolls.
Agreed. It's hard to stomach that such an interesting and important technology that really launched so much ancillary research and development will be in the hands of a single person who is known for plagiarizing ideas from another.
I really think that, despite the way that it is unfortunately associated with copyright violations, BT is a very valuable technology.
Not sure why sabotage is any more unlikely than the corporate espionage that is alleged to have already happened in the self-driving car space.
Do you have a link to those allegations?
I wish that I simply had mod points to respond to this. Since I don't, I will post a comment.
This is one of the most thoughtful responses that I've read on /. in a while. Thank you for posting this.
I cannot agree more with your comment. Especially the final part. I think that it is part of human nature to want to be so invaluable that the organization we leave will be stuck without us. And that is true for any type of organization. I know it is definitely true for me. I've left behind several groups and really wanted to be so missed that they constantly had to come ask me about x and y.
I left those organizations on good terms but I wanted my coworkers to think so highly of me that they had no choice but to come ask me about my work after I moved to another position. I am not proud of this. On the contrary, I try very hard to remember that everything continues with or without me.
To bring this full circle, because everything does continue marching, I think that the value of an employee is what he/she contributes to the group overall. That is true whether you play mentor or mentee in any setting. If you are the mentor, then your lasting contribution will be how you improved everyone around you. If you are a mentee, then your last contribution is how much you learned and how you applied in your current position and how you will teach it to someone else at your next organization.
Again, thank you fore thoughtful comment.
Will
I was in a presentation on the ethics of AI at a very prominent computer science conference. Several experts stood up during the presentation to make this very point. Neural networks, what people call AI these days, /are/ black boxes and we know no more about how they make decisions than we do about how the brain makes decisions based on the network of synapses that have been trained by inputs from the time of our birth.
Thank you for making this point!
Will
In this article from the NY Times, people from SGI say that they eventually gave up on the lava lamps and just took pictures of the lens cap which meant that they were essentially using electronic noise!
Fascinating!
I also recall that in the early 2000s Google was using this very technique. You could go online and view images of the lavalamps. Unfortunately I can't find any good references to it. Sorry!
Will
There are some companies and farmers that are already doing something very similar: https://www.wsj.com/articles/chip-makers-are-adding-brains-alongside-cameras-eyes-1507114801. Registration required, sorry!
I think that this is fascinating. Like you said, there's definitely a possibility for increased weed "resistance" without the potential for side effects from the herbicide.
Will
I know that this is a sham study and that Soda wants to tell us that our (lack of) movement is what's killing us and not their intensely, artificially sweetened beverages forced upon us by pervasive advertising ...
BUT
I thought we all agreed that being sedentary was generally not good for our bodies?
And yes, I am just as guilty as everyone else. I'm a programmer who is loathe to move anything more than my pinky to the ESC to enter control mode in VI(M).
Will
This is absolutely, 100% true, but also slightly different than the forms of attacks to which Linus is referring. I think that the attacks you speak of are incredibly destructive and are self-inflicted. External forces (proprietary vendors or otherwise) do cause great harm to the OS community by attacking its reputation for security. They use examples of attacks perpetrated by blackhats to "prove" that OS cannot/does not work. So, your point is valid and so is Linus'. Thank you!
I am a Firefox beta user who was selected to participate in the trial of the uni-bar and I actually like it. I did not expect to, though. I had always hated that about Chrome (one of the reasons I don't use Chrome), but it works pretty well. I like being able to search my URL history, my search history, etc, all right there from one spot. It puts the "autosuggest" completions from your default search engine in the "right" spot -- not too high and not too low.
Overall, though I am usually a "get off my lawn" person w.r.t Firefox, I am okay with this change!
Will
From what I can see, the data has two easily visible explanations.
1. VCs are sexist and don't like to fund teams with women on them.
Or
2. Women are more like to choose (or be placed) in projects that are less likely to receive VC funding
Correlation does not imply causation. Data and evidence has no meaning without interpretation.
Data have, not has.
I love C. That's first. Second, I haven't read this TechCrunch person's post, but I am generally not inclined to believe anything on TC beyond their analysis of the industry (if I even believe that!).
HOWEVER,
I wanted to share this paper from HotOS 2017 about formalizing type safety in Rust:
https://www.ics.uci.edu/~aburtsev/doc/crust-hotos17.pdf
I thought it was interesting. In light of this discussion, I thought someone might find it useful!
Will
I always liked Triumph of the Nerds. Wikipedia
I know that Robert X. Cringely is not a favorite around here, but the documentary series was really interesting. Great interviews with key players and lots of contemporaneous accounts of companies that were awesome but now no longer exist (e.g., Excite!).
There are plenty of others that are must see, too, but this is the one that I thought of first!
Will
There are plenty of great books that I wish I had read earlier:
1. Masterminds of Programming
2. Infinite Jest
3. The Sun Also Rises
are just a few examples. However, the one that came to mind first was Mere Christianity by CS Lewis. I really tried to stay away from it because I heard so many people say that it was a great book. I didn't want to read it just out of spite.
When I finally read it, I really enjoyed it and it helped me think through some things differently that I did not expect.