1) snoop on email and phone lines without warrants
2) temper with it
2) profit!
Seriously, this episode shows how sensitive
and precious internal company information is and
how dangerous it can be, when it is tempered with. In this particular case,
snooping was probably not the reason for the damage, but the story illustrates
how spying on citizens could damage enterprises in the future.
they simply have to leave it as an option to every student to
refuse having his or her paper added to the database. There are
reasons, why one wants to do so:
a student is an author or a book or article
or plans to become an author and will in future
have to sign a contract the work has not been
submitted elsewhere.
a student is concerned that some private information
will be stored in a database, which has an uncertain
future: the company could be sold to a data-miner which
finds and targets a population with a certain interest.
the database of turnit in could be hacked and personal
information could be in the wild.
I have seen a demonstration of turnitin, in which a text
was altered in several nonobvious ways and the software did not
find a match if the change was not obvious.
This means that it is quite ineffective for
plagiarism which is not completely obvious.
The software will likely be improved in the future
but since there will also be less and less, which one can say
without being matched with an equivalent sentence, the software
could also become less effective if the database becomes larger.
It also provides a business opportunity: there soon will be
effective programs which take a text and reformulate it
automatically so that it passes the turnitin filter.
Many DRM stricken PDF (especially DRM which prevents printing) can be dealt with convert drmstricken.pdf tmp.ps; convert tmp.ps free.pdf in linux. While this makes the files huge and unsearchable, an additional OCR allows to recover most of the text. As usual, DRM does not prevent access, but makes it a nuisance.
I would already be happier, if there was the option to buy systems without
operating system. Dell could
sell such systems cheaper not only because of the lacking
windows system but also because they would not have to offer
support for OS issues.
I think that these concerns out of proportion. It is an
interesting observation and probably quite a challenge to reverse engineer
the devices, but compare it with the real issues we have today:
We live in a time, when every purchase at a grocery store is recorded
due to "customer cards" when every credit card transaction is monitored,
and cameras watch you almost constantly. Our phones are tapped, dozens of
parameters recorded every time we travel. RFID's will soon be standard
in all items purchased in stores. Passports will have RFIDs.
Cellular phones, wireless computers and even PDA's allow tracking already
now.
An observer does not get a lot of data from this jogging device.
And who would build an entire tracking system with many stations
just listening to Ipods? These stations would need to be
hidden, batteries replaced, monitored etc. And what for? To stalk up
some jogger? How many joggers have these gadgets?
It would be easier to build a network of small cameras which watch
a person. Even easier is shadowing by a single person, who follows
the person.
Finally, the distance in which the devices can be read is 60 feet.
With a bit of shielding, the distance could be reduced to maybe 20 feet
which would make an even tighter network of receivers necessary.
By adding some good error correcting codes and using
the best technology available, it should be possible
to store and retrieve a DVD on paper by printing and
scanning.
Upper bound (there were some computations posted below, which
are flawed): Assuming A4 which is 210x297 mmm = 8.3 x 11.7
and having 600 DPI, we have
8.3*11.7*600*600 34 Mega pixels
Assuming each pixel can store a RGB color from
255*255*255
colors, there are
8.3*11.7*600^2*255^3/10^12 = 579 Gigabites.
If we assume a color printer can print in 600 DPI precisely
and a color scanner can scan 600 DPI reliably and
reconstruct each of the RGB color values up to 1/256 accuracy
then 579 Gigs are possible.
It is upper bound on the information a paper
can carry assuming the DPI and color resolution.
It is not possible to add more information by
additional geometric encoding.
As others have pointed out, printing at a 600 DPI
resolution with a precise color value at each dot is
a main obstacle to make this work. The ink is assumed
not to diffuse and influence the color dots nearby. It
would need a really good printer.
The scanner needs to scan at 600 DPI and get the color
value precicely. This would not work for the junk scanners
I have but this should be technically possible with
professional scanners.
Web 3 is when the rants like this will only
be read by machines and
posted on slashdot
by machines so that enough other machines will
access it and bring the blog down. In other words:
Web 3 is an indication that
the singularity is near.
And you can bet that that the singularity itself will be announced as
Web 4 in the blogosphere!
>Those aren't backslashes \, they are forward slashes/. And they're required because XHTML >is a standards-compliant XML binding, and all valid XML documents must be well-formed. >Well-formedness includes the requirement that all elements be closed. The syntax is just shorthand for
This is what I mean with intellectual arrogance. Languages, even mathematical languages are often not consistent. They have evolved. The advantages of consistency do not always prevail.
Any change of language is risky. They often go bad because
language architects are not the same people than
developers, the writers, the authors or the educators who
actually create stuff with it.
Whether for programming languages, web languages or spoken languages:
developers, authors, educators, readers and users suffer, if things
go too fast.
programming language writers love the process of creating
something so much that they don't care about the consequences. Example:
Pascal. It was a wonderful language. It worked well. It was easy to use
also with low level stuff. Wirth developed Modula, then Oberon.
These were so radical changes that Pascal was killed.
Small changes can be devastating. Example: why does XHTML
backslashes in hr or br tags.
These are completely unnecessary requirements. XHML did not take off
because who would want to wade through thousands of pages
in HTML written during the last decade and make those changes?
Too hasty evolution can be a disaster: Example: I'm convinced that it
was the accelerated evolution of Java which essentially killed it
as a valuable tool for the web. What language architects often
are note aware of are the existing resources, books, libraries.
In the case of Java, applets written only a few years ago
suddenly would no more compile because of depreciated language.
Suppose a educator created a Java applet 8 years ago. She has long moved on
to other projects. The language changes. The tool is lost. We can see
that in many examples, where Java applets work different on different
browsers and operating systems. In the case of Java for the web,
Flash has taken over. Now Adobe might make the same error again,
and evolve it too fast. Sorry: a flash 13 plugin needed.
The German language reform is an other example of
intellectual arrogance. It produced a lot of
controversy.
Language architects have to take into account the huge library
of existing books, textbooks etc, which become obsolete or
awkward after a change of language.
Evolution of languages is nothing bad. But it has to happen so gently
that one can adapt and in such a way that old things are still readable
and that porting of most existing material to the new level can be
realized in time.
What I like about USB is the possibility to have
the devices powered. This is handy for portable HD's
for a laptop for example. I doubt that wireless USB
will be able to power external devices. Having used
wireless mice and keyboards in the past, I got rid of all
them because the battery power always fails in a critical
moment (Murphys law). An other issue with wireless keyboards
and mice is data security. Will these wireless USB devices
have encrypted data streams?
Google has realised that the days of TV as we know
it, are counted. The future is to search for specific
movie content and get it, without having to keep
an eye on dozens of channels, watch stupid adds or
be informed with filtered news or tainted, politically
biased comments or worse, propaganda payed by governments.
It is an other consequence of globalisation. Everybody
can become a content provider. The public finally
can determine what it wants to see and what to toss away.
This is going to explode in the next years.
Consumers are already able to build their own program
and contribute to it. User feedback of millions
of people is automatic and be valuable for content providers.
The web allows to monitor exactly when and what people see
and when to target which group with advertisement.
It will be no problem to milk this new medium. It will also be
fantastic for research of all kind. Companies, political
parties etc which are able to harvest from a large amount
of data and even pay for that. It will be the key for political
power too.
It will a gold mine. 1.65 billion now is nothing. Lawsuits
will be coming but this will come from the losers of the game
and dropping those will not matter anyway. Let them protect their
content so that nobody will watch it any more. Being "in the show"
will be the main goal in this new game. It might even happen
that companies pay for what one calls "copyright infringement" today
They will finally realize that spreading the content is more
important than to disappear in the oblivious.
The trouble with modern programming languages is
that even simple programs need some initialization
at the top. Basic did not need that and one could
right go into programming. Even computer algebra
systems can have a steep learning curve, if they
come with a GUI and if they need libraries for the
most basic things. Still, I think computer algebra
systems can be tool to get started. But on the
command line! (You want to get right into the programming
and not have to learn the quirks and see all the complexity
of the GUI). Here is an example in Mathematica (but Maple,
Octave, Maxima or Matlab would work similarly since they
all allow also to be accessed from the terminal).
Of course, one should avoid higher level commands and consider
even to avoid abbreviations like k++, procedures etc
at first and try to emulate Basic. Even use Print and
(heavens forbid) Goto commands (which Mathematica has
implemented).
Possible ways to start:
1. Write a program which counts from 1 to 100
Do[ Print[k], {k,1,100} ]
2. Write a program which computes 100! = 1 . 2 . 3 ..... 100
k=1; Do[ k=k*j, {j,1,100}]; k ]
3. Write a program which checks whether a number is prime
Would I drive in a car which would drive by itself, guided by
GPS and online maps? Not yet. Would I rely on Skype for making a
911 call? No, I need something which works also if power lines are
down. Would I like to have surgery, done remotely by a doctor
in an other. I don't think so.
From the article:
Apparently photocopier machines were greeted with suspicion... How can you know that the machine has made a perfect copy of your vital
document.
I still check photocopies of multiple page documents, if it is important.
It is not the first time that a page was omitted.
Also, small printed parts or graphics is not always copied correctly.
When dealing with technology, I always try to have a backup plan. Take two
laptops for an important presentation. Have a second computer in sync with the
main production computer, have two printers available, a backup plan if a
slide presentation would not work due to a broken projector bulb etc.
Around the house, the same rules apply as in computing:
minimize complexity. I want to get the job done as easily and fast
as possible. Complexity can be reduced by keeping separate
things separate. If something fails, I can pinpoint
the source. The failure of one item should not influence the other.
A hard drive crash still should allow you to make a
telephone call or get some milk from the fridge
or do the laundry. I don't want the light of the rooms
be controlled by the same machine, which is used to play WOW by
various members of the family. Apropos: why not go one step further
and have your own house controllable from within WOW...
On the other hand, I would not mind, if the computer would just
be used as a reporting tool. The fridge or the laundry machine would have
little web-servers installed, which when connected to the wireless
network, would allow to check about their status
and eventually control them remotely. The machines should still work
by hand. Adding additional control is no problem for me but one should
be able to turn it off and it should still work.
Does somebody have experience with vmware machines and WGA?
Having the operating system "call home"
everytime a vmware workstation boots up, would be disturbing
to me. So, I dont upgrade my windows OS in
my vmware machines.
I personally have had bad experiences with XP reactivation
when upgrading from older vmware workstations to newer ones
because XP complained that the "hardware has changed".
The reactivation would not go through.
I can imagine that WGA could make it more difficult
in future to run virtual machines.
Domestic spying is costly for telecoms
Snooping and tapping activities at
the boundary of legality have made me
worried, but costly legal lawsuits could
be a good medicine. Like chemotherapy against
cancer. Better would be strict laws which
prevent such abuse. Lets see how the law
dragons fight the snooping hydra.
Domestic spying could reveal trading secrets
There is an other issue which could prevent
that we slip into a totalitarian state:
telephone calling records of industry
decision makers are valuable information. The
database can give hints about mergers, stock market
developments (company X has suddenly a lot
of phone-calls with company Y. Do they merge?
Do they launch a new product, lets buy or
sell stocks accordingly). In a government,
for which business is so closely linked to politics,
domestic spying could be seen a free ticket for
obtaining insider information. That could become a
problem, once it is realized that it exists.
Domestic spying accelerates standard encryption
A third remedy about the domestic
spying issue could be technology: not only
standard encryption of telephone calls, but also
standard masquerading about who calls whom. Such
technology will first be used by people who
need protection, not criminals, but CEOs or
engineers working on new technology, which the
competition should not know about.
Of course, the people who are the primary targets
of those stupid spying activities have long
gone to other communication channels.
An other reason for hope is the existence of organizations
like EFF or
ACLU.
"The Eye: that horrible growing sense of a hostile will that strove with
great power to pierce all shadows of cloud, and earth, and flesh, and to
see you: to pin you under its deadly gaze, naked, immovable."
Professor David Nutt, a psychopharmacologist at the
I don't know whether I had been exposed to syntehol myself or whether
I'm still half asleep, but the first thought, which came in
my mind when reading the abstract was: of course, a
"Nutty Professor"!
Any built-in addition features in the hardware, the bios or even the preinstalled operating system would be immediately detected and destroy the entire PC business of Lenovo abroad.
This does not surprise. With less education, there is also less to deteriorate. Its like saying, that people doing professional sports have a faster decay of their muscle power when aging and base this on the time to run one mile. The study measures it in percentages but I guess, it is very difficult to deteriorate basic intellectual skills. It all depends on the scale.
Slashdot Mirror
1) snoop on email and phone lines without warrants
2) temper with it
2) profit!
Seriously, this episode shows how sensitive and precious internal company information is and how dangerous it can be, when it is tempered with. In this particular case, snooping was probably not the reason for the damage, but the story illustrates how spying on citizens could damage enterprises in the future.
cryptome has several mirrors. Here is one:h ut.htm
http://cryptome.quintessenz.org/mirror/cryptome-s
- a student is an author or a book or article
or plans to become an author and will in future
have to sign a contract the work has not been
submitted elsewhere.
- a student is concerned that some private information
will be stored in a database, which has an uncertain
future: the company could be sold to a data-miner which
finds and targets a population with a certain interest.
- the database of turnit in could be hacked and personal
information could be in the wild.
I have seen a demonstration of turnitin, in which a text was altered in several nonobvious ways and the software did not find a match if the change was not obvious. This means that it is quite ineffective for plagiarism which is not completely obvious. The software will likely be improved in the future but since there will also be less and less, which one can say without being matched with an equivalent sentence, the software could also become less effective if the database becomes larger. It also provides a business opportunity: there soon will be effective programs which take a text and reformulate it automatically so that it passes the turnitin filter.This is nasty! My computer just learned how to "double click its mouse".
Many DRM stricken PDF (especially DRM which prevents printing)
can be dealt with
convert drmstricken.pdf tmp.ps; convert tmp.ps free.pdf
in linux. While this makes the files huge and unsearchable, an
additional OCR allows to recover most of the text. As usual,
DRM does not prevent access, but makes it a nuisance.
I would already be happier, if there was the option to buy systems without operating system. Dell could sell such systems cheaper not only because of the lacking windows system but also because they would not have to offer support for OS issues.
I think that these concerns out of proportion. It is an interesting observation and probably quite a challenge to reverse engineer the devices, but compare it with the real issues we have today:
We live in a time, when every purchase at a grocery store is recorded due to "customer cards" when every credit card transaction is monitored, and cameras watch you almost constantly. Our phones are tapped, dozens of parameters recorded every time we travel. RFID's will soon be standard in all items purchased in stores. Passports will have RFIDs. Cellular phones, wireless computers and even PDA's allow tracking already now.
An observer does not get a lot of data from this jogging device. And who would build an entire tracking system with many stations just listening to Ipods? These stations would need to be hidden, batteries replaced, monitored etc. And what for? To stalk up some jogger? How many joggers have these gadgets?
It would be easier to build a network of small cameras which watch a person. Even easier is shadowing by a single person, who follows the person.
Finally, the distance in which the devices can be read is 60 feet. With a bit of shielding, the distance could be reduced to maybe 20 feet which would make an even tighter network of receivers necessary.
P.S. The calculation has to be divided by 8 to get Bytes from Bits.
So, the upper bound is 72.5 Gig not 579 Gig
By adding some good error correcting codes and using the best technology available, it should be possible to store and retrieve a DVD on paper by printing and scanning.
Upper bound (there were some computations posted below, which are flawed): Assuming A4 which is 210x297 mmm = 8.3 x 11.7 and having 600 DPI, we have 8.3*11.7*600*600 34 Mega pixels Assuming each pixel can store a RGB color from 255*255*255 colors, there are 8.3*11.7*600^2*255^3/10^12 = 579 Gigabites.
If we assume a color printer can print in 600 DPI precisely and a color scanner can scan 600 DPI reliably and reconstruct each of the RGB color values up to 1/256 accuracy then 579 Gigs are possible.
It is upper bound on the information a paper can carry assuming the DPI and color resolution. It is not possible to add more information by additional geometric encoding.
As others have pointed out, printing at a 600 DPI resolution with a precise color value at each dot is a main obstacle to make this work. The ink is assumed not to diffuse and influence the color dots nearby. It would need a really good printer. The scanner needs to scan at 600 DPI and get the color value precicely. This would not work for the junk scanners I have but this should be technically possible with professional scanners.
Web 3 is when the rants like this will only be read by machines and posted on slashdot by machines so that enough other machines will access it and bring the blog down. In other words: Web 3 is an indication that the singularity is near. And you can bet that that the singularity itself will be announced as Web 4 in the blogosphere!
>Those aren't backslashes \, they are forward slashes /. And they're required because XHTML
>is a standards-compliant XML binding, and all valid XML documents must be well-formed.
>Well-formedness includes the requirement that all elements be closed. The syntax is just shorthand for
This is what I mean with intellectual arrogance. Languages, even mathematical languages are often
not consistent. They have evolved. The advantages of consistency do not always prevail.
- programming language writers love the process of creating
something so much that they don't care about the consequences. Example:
Pascal. It was a wonderful language. It worked well. It was easy to use
also with low level stuff. Wirth developed Modula, then Oberon.
These were so radical changes that Pascal was killed.
- Small changes can be devastating. Example: why does XHTML
backslashes in hr or br tags.
These are completely unnecessary requirements. XHML did not take off
because who would want to wade through thousands of pages
in HTML written during the last decade and make those changes?
- Too hasty evolution can be a disaster: Example: I'm convinced that it
was the accelerated evolution of Java which essentially killed it
as a valuable tool for the web. What language architects often
are note aware of are the existing resources, books, libraries.
In the case of Java, applets written only a few years ago
suddenly would no more compile because of depreciated language.
Suppose a educator created a Java applet 8 years ago. She has long moved on
to other projects. The language changes. The tool is lost. We can see
that in many examples, where Java applets work different on different
browsers and operating systems. In the case of Java for the web,
Flash has taken over. Now Adobe might make the same error again,
and evolve it too fast. Sorry: a flash 13 plugin needed.
- The German language reform is an other example of
intellectual arrogance. It produced a lot of
controversy.
Language architects have to take into account the huge library
of existing books, textbooks etc, which become obsolete or
awkward after a change of language.
Evolution of languages is nothing bad. But it has to happen so gently that one can adapt and in such a way that old things are still readable and that porting of most existing material to the new level can be realized in time.What I like about USB is the possibility to have the devices powered. This is handy for portable HD's for a laptop for example. I doubt that wireless USB will be able to power external devices. Having used wireless mice and keyboards in the past, I got rid of all them because the battery power always fails in a critical moment (Murphys law). An other issue with wireless keyboards and mice is data security. Will these wireless USB devices have encrypted data streams?
Google has realised that the days of TV as we know it, are counted. The future is to search for specific movie content and get it, without having to keep an eye on dozens of channels, watch stupid adds or be informed with filtered news or tainted, politically biased comments or worse, propaganda payed by governments. It is an other consequence of globalisation. Everybody can become a content provider. The public finally can determine what it wants to see and what to toss away.
This is going to explode in the next years. Consumers are already able to build their own program and contribute to it. User feedback of millions of people is automatic and be valuable for content providers. The web allows to monitor exactly when and what people see and when to target which group with advertisement. It will be no problem to milk this new medium. It will also be fantastic for research of all kind. Companies, political parties etc which are able to harvest from a large amount of data and even pay for that. It will be the key for political power too.
It will a gold mine. 1.65 billion now is nothing. Lawsuits will be coming but this will come from the losers of the game and dropping those will not matter anyway. Let them protect their content so that nobody will watch it any more. Being "in the show" will be the main goal in this new game. It might even happen that companies pay for what one calls "copyright infringement" today They will finally realize that spreading the content is more important than to disappear in the oblivious.
Possible ways to start:
1. Write a program which counts from 1 to 1002. Write a program which computes 100! = 1 . 2 . 3 .
7. Compare your procedure with the built in PrimeQ
From the article:
Apparently photocopier machines were greeted with suspicion ... How can you know that the machine has made a perfect copy of your vital
document.
I still check photocopies of multiple page documents, if it is important. It is not the first time that a page was omitted. Also, small printed parts or graphics is not always copied correctly.When dealing with technology, I always try to have a backup plan. Take two laptops for an important presentation. Have a second computer in sync with the main production computer, have two printers available, a backup plan if a slide presentation would not work due to a broken projector bulb etc.
Around the house, the same rules apply as in computing: minimize complexity. I want to get the job done as easily and fast as possible. Complexity can be reduced by keeping separate things separate. If something fails, I can pinpoint the source. The failure of one item should not influence the other. A hard drive crash still should allow you to make a telephone call or get some milk from the fridge or do the laundry. I don't want the light of the rooms be controlled by the same machine, which is used to play WOW by various members of the family. Apropos: why not go one step further and have your own house controllable from within WOW ...
On the other hand, I would not mind, if the computer would just be used as a reporting tool. The fridge or the laundry machine would have little web-servers installed, which when connected to the wireless network, would allow to check about their status and eventually control them remotely. The machines should still work by hand. Adding additional control is no problem for me but one should be able to turn it off and it should still work.
Does somebody have experience with vmware machines and WGA? Having the operating system "call home" everytime a vmware workstation boots up, would be disturbing to me. So, I dont upgrade my windows OS in my vmware machines. I personally have had bad experiences with XP reactivation when upgrading from older vmware workstations to newer ones because XP complained that the "hardware has changed". The reactivation would not go through. I can imagine that WGA could make it more difficult in future to run virtual machines.
- Domestic spying is costly for telecoms
- Domestic spying could reveal trading secrets
- Domestic spying accelerates standard encryption
An other reason for hope is the existence of organizations like EFF or ACLU.Snooping and tapping activities at the boundary of legality have made me worried, but costly legal lawsuits could be a good medicine. Like chemotherapy against cancer. Better would be strict laws which prevent such abuse. Lets see how the law dragons fight the snooping hydra.
There is an other issue which could prevent that we slip into a totalitarian state: telephone calling records of industry decision makers are valuable information. The database can give hints about mergers, stock market developments (company X has suddenly a lot of phone-calls with company Y. Do they merge? Do they launch a new product, lets buy or sell stocks accordingly). In a government, for which business is so closely linked to politics, domestic spying could be seen a free ticket for obtaining insider information. That could become a problem, once it is realized that it exists.
A third remedy about the domestic spying issue could be technology: not only standard encryption of telephone calls, but also standard masquerading about who calls whom. Such technology will first be used by people who need protection, not criminals, but CEOs or engineers working on new technology, which the competition should not know about. Of course, the people who are the primary targets of those stupid spying activities have long gone to other communication channels.
"The Eye: that horrible growing sense of a hostile will that strove with great power to pierce all shadows of cloud, and earth, and flesh, and to see you: to pin you under its deadly gaze, naked, immovable."
LOR, Chapter 2, The Passage of the Marshes
is this is a reason, why bookstores contain coffee shops?
I noticed several times myself, that after a latte,
I'm more likely to buy a book.
The esata drive is advertised to work on linux too. Did somebody find
a prize for a 1Terabyte version? Comparable to NAS?
Professor David Nutt, a psychopharmacologist at the
I don't know whether I had been exposed to syntehol myself or whether I'm still half asleep, but the first thought, which came in my mind when reading the abstract was: of course, a "Nutty Professor"!
Any built-in addition features in the hardware, the bios or
even the preinstalled operating system would be immediately
detected and destroy the entire PC business of Lenovo abroad.
He doesn't want them to watch this google video on their ipods.
This does not surprise. With less education, there is
also less to deteriorate. Its like saying, that people
doing professional sports have a faster decay of their
muscle power when aging and base this on the time to run
one mile. The study measures it in
percentages but I guess, it is very difficult to
deteriorate basic intellectual skills.
It all depends on the scale.