You're going to saddle them with a $0.20 CD/ROM/sleeve extra cost per unit so they can use 'free software'?
Given the choice between the cost of a $.20 cd and a $1/unit royalty on the respective proprietary software, they'd probably gofor the $.20 CD.
They can also just put the software source on their website, and put a pointer in their user manual. the 1% of people who actually download it will make the distribution costs per unit almost zero.
Microsoft might just hobble Windows ulnder palladium, so that it can't do certain things without RIAA/MPAA aproval.
This would be another win for Linux.
From the second article:
And some U.S. defense experts accuse South Korea of hyping the cyber threat posed by its northern neighbor, which they claim is incapable of seriously disrupting the U.S. military.
Excuse me?? We're talking warships running (or not) on NT.
That's like me trying to convince you that you can't outrun my Hyundai because I've got a turbo-charger in it.
I suspect that North Korea's nuclear weapons are about as real as Iraq's chemical weapons.
Except for the fact that -- unlike Iraq,which did it's best to prove that it didn't have any -- North Korea admits to having them. This is also confirmed (to some extent) by US intelligence.
Consider also: The US is pussey-footing around N. Korea.
While I wouldn't find it surprising for them to own the numbers in that block it's hardly the 'front desk' as the article implies when it's not the number of the front desk.
My guess is that they own a group of numbers in a block and 3140 isn't currently assigned to anybody. As a result it rings through, and ends up getting picked up. by the front desk.
I don't know if humanity will go extinct in a geologically short period of time, but I do believe that it is very possible (likely, even) that our society will colapse under the weight of geometrically increasing resource demands.
Remember that even Windows 95/98 were never designed to be networked operating systems except as a sort or add on. They were single user operating systems in the legacy of MSDOS and the previous Windows addons to DOS. Remember that Bill Gates thought the Internet was just a fad.
95 may not have been designed for the world wide web, but it was definitely designed to handle networking. It was pretty clear by then that networking was
catching on. It had started with 3.1wfw and 95 had networking built in.
It was only the World Wide Web that seemed like it was going to be a fad (having only been about 2-3 years old, by then)
I don't hate Microsoft. Fixing the inevitable results of people running their software has given me a good living. You will forgive me if I don't use their products myself?
Yeah. that's part of my theory about why DOS/Windows caught on instead of Mac. MS required more people to support it per user than the MAC did (by about a factor of 5 according to some surveys). This meant that -- even if the market was 50/50 there'd be about 5 times as many DOS consultants as MAC consultants. As a result, joe blow coming off the street and looking for a consultant (any consultant) to get him/her into the computing world was far more likely to find a DOS/Windows consultant than a MAC consultant.
In other words (if my theory is accurate) Microsoft beat out Apple in part because they had shitty software -- not in spite of it.
If the 3r33t community hated other software/platforms as much as they hated Microsoft I'm sure the level of bugs exposed/viruses would be equally as high.
Intruders and script kiddies like Windows because it's so badly designed and written. Remember when XP was in pre-release and a security expert started screaming about how XP had desin problems that were going to dreate big security holes? MS sent in their big honchos to convince this guy that it was OK, but they didn't even bother arguing that XP was secure. Their argument was that there were so many other security problems, that adding in this design flaw was just a bucked in the ocean. It's that sort of thinking that has made MS software such a fertile ground for script kiddies.
The code is far from modular and well designed. Nobody (or almost nobody) can wrap their heads around it. The constant holes being punched in it are a symptom of years of marketing-driven building... Marketing thinks that some new doodad would look good, so engineering was forced to impliment it... whether or not they thought it was a good idea.
For that reason, you got things like 'login' security where you could just provide a new login (win95), a "journaling filesystem" that needs to be FSCKed after every crash and software that blue-screened when Bill Gates himself is showing it off.
Up to now, MS code releases have rarely been up to what the Open Source community would call 'alpha', nuch less final release quality. From what I can see, MS is driven by the marketing division. Up until now the Marketing group has gotten away with forcing the release of sub-standard products that looked good on the showroom floor and so they've done so. Now MS is getting shown up in terms of software quality and security by an open-source community that they've been bad-mouthing as a bunch of amateurs with no centralized control and it's been back-firing on them. It turns out that, when given a reasonable choice, people prefer stable and secure code and MS does not have a history of supplying that. Unfortunately for microsoft, they're now being bitten on the ass by a corporate culture which considers bugs and security holes the cost of doing business.
I don't dislike MS-Windows just for the fun of it. I dislike MS-Windows because it's bad software, and I don't want bad software as m onlychoice.
puns aside, I presume that in research many apps are written to test a particular algorithm and thrown away.
When you pay $20K-$200K for a piece of hardware, you find as many ways to use it as possible before you throw it away. Just because a new version of the software comes out a year or two later doesn't mean that the lab is going to be able to afford the new version. If a lab can afford a new version of the $100K toy, chances are that they'll had-me-down the older version to the undergrads.
I can understand that a company doesn't want to support more than one or two OSs, but it gets reall annoying if they don't give you the data so that you can roll
your own support.
I take it that there isn't a different company that you can go to to get an equivalent machine??? If there is, then try playing them off against each other. For the more expensive equipment, at least, they should be willing to do some work to get the sale -- if that means releasing the register data, then they'll probably do it.
Snip from the GPL (emphasis changed):
7. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues), conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not excuse you from the conditions of this License.
AFAIK I am not under a non-disclosure agreement with SCO, and SCO has no patent rights that they can use against me. As such, I'm free to distribute any code that I don't know is a violation of someone's copyright. Since SCO will not inform me which code is in violation of their copyright, and don't even seem to be able to prove that they hold any copyright for me to violate, I have no restrictions which contradict the GPL.
If this ever changes, then I would be willing to help rewrite the offending code.
But at $6/share that's still three times what it was trading for in mid-March of this year and ten times its July '02 price.
Well, if their claims to having a solid gripe against Linux don't pan out, and/or people in the Linux community start suing them for Libel and slander, I can see their stock ending up under the $1.00 mark pretty quick.
From what I can see, to prove their case against IBM, they'd not only have to prove that Linux has SYSV code. They'd also have to prove that it's IBM that released the code, and not some third party. If IBM is responsible for a third-party releasing their code, then SCO is on a very slippery slope.
By induction:
If IBM is responsible for third-party release of source code then any company with UNIX source access is responsible for (accidently) re-releasing the source code when they distribute Linux source code
If any company is responsible for third-party release, then SCO (as a distributer of Linux and the UNIX license holder) is similarly responsible.
If SCO is responsible for releasing UNIX source code under Linux, then the company with the right to re-license that code is responsible for (re-)releasing it under the GPL.
If that's the case, then -- under the GPL -- IBM (and the rest of the universe) has the right to do what they've been doing.
That's right. And I also find it interesting that SCO's press release this morning states that copyright and patent protects you from strangers, but contracts are what you USE AGAINST entities you have a relationship with.
In other words, siging a contract with SCO is a bad idea. Maybe SCO and Microsoft will get into the ring now that MS has signed a contract with them...
I finally got thru to their site.. I'm really happy to see that somebody is threatening to sue SCO over their lies innuendo and prevarication. If/when they do sue SCO, hopefully they'll make it a class action lawsuit.
PROVO, Utah -- May 28, 2003 -- Defending
its interests in developing services to operate on the Linux platform,
Novell today issued a dual challenge to The SCO Group over its recent
statements regarding its UNIX ownership and potential intellectual
property rights claims over Linux.
First, Novell
challenged SCO's assertion that it owns the copyrights and patents to
UNIX System V, pointing out that the asset purchase agreement entered
into between Novell and SCO in 1995 did not transfer these rights to
SCO. Second, Novell sought from SCO facts to back up its assertion that
certain UNIX System V code has been copied into Linux. Novell
communicated these concerns to SCO via a letter (text below) from
Novell® Chairman and CEO Jack Messman in response to SCO making these
claims.
"To Novell's knowledge, the 1995 agreement
governing SCO's purchase of UNIX from Novell does not convey to SCO the
associated copyrights," Messman said in the letter. "We believe it
unlikely that SCO can demonstrate that it has any ownership interest
whatsoever in those copyrights. Apparently you share this view, since
over the last few months you have repeatedly asked Novell to transfer
the copyrights to SCO, requests that Novell has rejected."
"SCO
claims it has specific evidence supporting its allegations against the
Linux community," Messman added. "It is time to substantiate that
claim, or recant the sweeping and unsupported allegation made in your
letter. Absent such action, it will be apparent to all that SCO's true
intent is to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt about Linux in order to
extort payments from Linux distributors and users."
"Novell
has answered the call of the open source community," said Bruce Perens,
a leading proponent of open source. "We admire what they are doing.
Based on recent announcements to support Linux with NetWare services
and now this revelation...Novell has just won the hearts and minds of
developers and corporations alike."
Text of the letter from Novell to SCO:
Mr. Darl McBride
President and CEO
The SCO Group
Re: SCO's "Letter to Linux Customers"
Dear Darl:
As
you know, Novell recently announced some important Linux initiatives.
These include an upcoming NetWare version based on the Linux kernel, as
well as collaboration and resource management solutions for Linux.
Put
simply, Novell is an ardent supporter of Linux and the open source
development community. This support will increase over time.
It
was in this context that we recently received your "Letter to Linux
Customers." Many Novell business partners and customers apparently
received the same letter. Your letter compels a response from Novell.
As
we understand the letter, SCO alleges that unnamed entities
incorporated SCO's intellectual property into Linux without its
authorization. You apparently base this allegation on a belief that
these unnamed entities copied some UNIX System V code into Linux.
Beyond this limited understanding, we have been unable to glean any
further information about your allegation because of your letter's
vagueness.
In particular, the letter leaves certain
critical questions unanswered. What specific code was copied from UNIX
System V? Where can we find this code in Linux? Who copied this code?
Why does this alleged copying infringe SCO's intellectual property? By
failing to address these important questions, SCO has failed to put us
on meaningful notice of any allegedly infringing Linux code, and thus
has withheld from us the ability - and removed any corresponding
obligation - to address your allegation.
As best we
can determine, the vagueness about your allegation is intentional. In
+1 to the parent. It's like in the song "battle of New Orleans"
The seargent said we could catch 'em by surprise
If we didn't open fire till we looked 'em in the eyes.
I'm guessing that Novell was PISSED about SCO making excessive
claims about owning UNIX(TM). It probably did take them a couple of days to verify that SCO was pumping more feces out of their mouth than the NY sewage service then it was a case of deciding when to release the info.
This morning would be the best time to do so because SCO is already comitted to a press conference that they cannot cancel or delay.
lock, stock and two smoking barrels.
Oh, man I sooo want to source a class-action libel suit against SCO.
At the University Of Alberta (back in the 70's ~ 80's they charged based on things like VM/CPU integral ( 1Min CPU time * 4 Meg of Virtual memory) and page-months of disk storage.
This sounds like a good bit more complicated, and could lead to rather wierd results like you end up paying more for CPU time because you had to wait longer to get the computation done (it was a high-load period).
The cheapest CPU time on MTS were 'deferred priority' batch jobs. They generally only got ran on weekends and after midnight (when nobody else was using the system). If you were working at those times it was much worth your time to do expensive compiles etc. as deferred batch jobs (if the queue was empty, they'd run pretty quick, and you'd get charged about 1/10 as much as doing it from your terminal).
Re:firewall? we don't need no stinkin' firewall!
on
IT at the CIA
·
· Score: 1
It may be difficult and annoying, but it's still possible. If you don't have internal IDS and protection systems in place on top of the physical
containment, then you're hooped when (not if) someone figures out a way around the physical protections.
I'd rather presume that these groups do have protection beyond what's obvious. But if they don't then they might get hacked up the ying-yang before they realize that someone has made it through.
It would probably run far afoul of anti-competition rules for Microsoft to officially pay SCO to spread FUD about Linux in the form of an IP suit. So if it was true that MS was really paying this money to SCO to make sure that they could afford their libel^H^H^H^H^Hlegal campaign, there is no way on god's green earth that they'd officialy admit it. This Linux Business Week article is about as close to it as we're gonna get (and closer than I thought we'd get) to an official admission.
The thing about innovation is that it's uncommon. The truth of the matter is that innovative ideas really only come out once in a while.
If innovation was the norm.... it wouldn't be innovative.
Sic biscitus disintigrat.
Re:firewall? we don't need no stinkin' firewall!
on
IT at the CIA
·
· Score: 1
Did I mention that the systems run Windows?
Sounds like another case of "military intelligence".
One of the rules of security is to presume that any one layer is going to fail. Even the physical controls can fail. network attachment points halfway up the wall, and watching the MAC addresses of connected nodes still won't protect you from someone connecting a (supposedly) secure laptop with a spare wireless card in it and configured as a gateway.
People will circumvent security -- and they'll (almost) always think that they have a good reason for it.
IDSs and firewalls are still a good idea within a (supposedly) disconnected and private system, because if a cracker ever manages to connect, then you probably REALLY want to know about it.
firewall? we don't need no stinkin' firewall!
on
IT at the CIA
·
· Score: 5, Funny
A friend of mine was talking to an IT type at CSIS (Canadian Security and Intelligence Service -- equivalent to CIA). He asked them what kind of firewall they used for their secure systems.
Also, Americans are notoriously bad at geography if it doesn't involve their own country or select allies.
I was in WaltDisney World, and I ended up talking to a guy from Texas. He asked where I was, and I told him "Alberta... Canada".
"What state is that Next to?" he asked.
"We're right on the border with Montana".
"What?" he replied, incredulously, "I thought Montana was right next to Texas!".
This was around 1979, and he was a bit too old to have been GW Bush.
Yes. VRFY exists, but is now turned off for many default server installs. The alternative would be to try and email the sender and see if the email is accepted (yeuch).
You wouldn't (currently) be able to enforce VRFY or FINGER as being required to accept emails, although it could be used as a way to cut down on false positives in spam-filtering. I.E. If you get something that looks like borderline spam, the last check would be to attempt to VRFY the sender. If it succeeds, then classify it as non-spam. If it fails, then throw it in the spam heap.
If enough people were doing that, it might encourage other systems to turn VRFY back on. It's the old chicken/egg problem. The more inertia that the idea gets the more popular it will be.
Uhm... As a European... isn't the capital or Canada "Ottawa" or am I mistaken somehow?
hey: I'm not trying to claim that there aren't a reasonable number of Europeans that do know the capital of canada (btw: Yes, you're correct). I'm just trying to point out that I deserve to be classified as a moron (as opposed to idiot) for getting the capital of Germany that far off. It's not like I couldn't have known better, or anything.
heh.. well, in this case, I'll just say "close enough".
I couldn't remember which german city was the capital, but Munich seemed like a not-too-bad guess. That's why I put the modifier on it. On the other hand, (last ditch effort at saving face!) what percentage of Europeans can properly name the capital of Canada?
Slashdot Mirror
Given the choice between the cost of a $.20 cd and a $1/unit royalty on the respective proprietary software, they'd probably gofor the $.20 CD.
They can also just put the software source on their website, and put a pointer in their user manual. the 1% of people who actually download it will make the distribution costs per unit almost zero.
Microsoft might just hobble Windows ulnder palladium, so that it can't do certain things without RIAA/MPAA aproval.
This would be another win for Linux.
And some U.S. defense experts accuse South Korea of hyping the cyber threat posed by its northern neighbor, which they claim is incapable of seriously disrupting the U.S. military.
Excuse me?? We're talking warships running (or not) on NT.
That's like me trying to convince you that you can't outrun my Hyundai because I've got a turbo-charger in it.
Except for the fact that -- unlike Iraq,which did it's best to prove that it didn't have any -- North Korea admits to having them. This is also confirmed (to some extent) by US intelligence.
Consider also: The US is pussey-footing around N. Korea.
My guess is that they own a group of numbers in a block and 3140 isn't currently assigned to anybody. As a result it rings through, and ends up getting picked up. by the front desk.
I don't know if humanity will go extinct in a geologically short period of time, but I do believe that it is very possible (likely, even) that our society will colapse under the weight of geometrically increasing resource demands.
95 may not have been designed for the world wide web, but it was definitely designed to handle networking. It was pretty clear by then that networking was catching on. It had started with 3.1wfw and 95 had networking built in.
It was only the World Wide Web that seemed like it was going to be a fad (having only been about 2-3 years old, by then)
I don't hate Microsoft. Fixing the inevitable results of people running their software has given me a good living. You will forgive me if I don't use their products myself?
Yeah. that's part of my theory about why DOS/Windows caught on instead of Mac. MS required more people to support it per user than the MAC did (by about a factor of 5 according to some surveys). This meant that -- even if the market was 50/50 there'd be about 5 times as many DOS consultants as MAC consultants. As a result, joe blow coming off the street and looking for a consultant (any consultant) to get him/her into the computing world was far more likely to find a DOS/Windows consultant than a MAC consultant.
In other words (if my theory is accurate) Microsoft beat out Apple in part because they had shitty software -- not in spite of it.
Intruders and script kiddies like Windows because it's so badly designed and written. Remember when XP was in pre-release and a security expert started screaming about how XP had desin problems that were going to dreate big security holes? MS sent in their big honchos to convince this guy that it was OK, but they didn't even bother arguing that XP was secure. Their argument was that there were so many other security problems, that adding in this design flaw was just a bucked in the ocean. It's that sort of thinking that has made MS software such a fertile ground for script kiddies.
The code is far from modular and well designed. Nobody (or almost nobody) can wrap their heads around it. The constant holes being punched in it are a symptom of years of marketing-driven building... Marketing thinks that some new doodad would look good, so engineering was forced to impliment it... whether or not they thought it was a good idea.
For that reason, you got things like 'login' security where you could just provide a new login (win95), a "journaling filesystem" that needs to be FSCKed after every crash and software that blue-screened when Bill Gates himself is showing it off.
Up to now, MS code releases have rarely been up to what the Open Source community would call 'alpha', nuch less final release quality. From what I can see, MS is driven by the marketing division. Up until now the Marketing group has gotten away with forcing the release of sub-standard products that looked good on the showroom floor and so they've done so. Now MS is getting shown up in terms of software quality and security by an open-source community that they've been bad-mouthing as a bunch of amateurs with no centralized control and it's been back-firing on them. It turns out that, when given a reasonable choice, people prefer stable and secure code and MS does not have a history of supplying that. Unfortunately for microsoft, they're now being bitten on the ass by a corporate culture which considers bugs and security holes the cost of doing business.
I don't dislike MS-Windows just for the fun of it. I dislike MS-Windows because it's bad software, and I don't want bad software as m onlychoice.
When you pay $20K-$200K for a piece of hardware, you find as many ways to use it as possible before you throw it away. Just because a new version of the software comes out a year or two later doesn't mean that the lab is going to be able to afford the new version. If a lab can afford a new version of the $100K toy, chances are that they'll had-me-down the older version to the undergrads.
I can understand that a company doesn't want to support more than one or two OSs, but it gets reall annoying if they don't give you the data so that you can roll your own support.
I take it that there isn't a different company that you can go to to get an equivalent machine??? If there is, then try playing them off against each other. For the more expensive equipment, at least, they should be willing to do some work to get the sale -- if that means releasing the register data, then they'll probably do it.
7. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues), conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not excuse you from the conditions of this License.
AFAIK I am not under a non-disclosure agreement with SCO, and SCO has no patent rights that they can use against me. As such, I'm free to distribute any code that I don't know is a violation of someone's copyright. Since SCO will not inform me which code is in violation of their copyright, and don't even seem to be able to prove that they hold any copyright for me to violate, I have no restrictions which contradict the GPL.
If this ever changes, then I would be willing to help rewrite the offending code.
Well, if their claims to having a solid gripe against Linux don't pan out, and/or people in the Linux community start suing them for Libel and slander, I can see their stock ending up under the $1.00 mark pretty quick.
From what I can see, to prove their case against IBM, they'd not only have to prove that Linux has SYSV code. They'd also have to prove that it's IBM that released the code, and not some third party. If IBM is responsible for a third-party releasing their code, then SCO is on a very slippery slope.
By induction:
- If IBM is responsible for third-party release of source code then any company with UNIX source access is responsible for (accidently) re-releasing the source code when they distribute Linux source code
- If any company is responsible for third-party release, then SCO (as a distributer of Linux and the UNIX license holder) is similarly responsible.
- If SCO is responsible for releasing UNIX source code under Linux, then the company with the right to re-license that code is responsible for (re-)releasing it under the GPL.
- If that's the case, then -- under the GPL -- IBM (and the rest of the universe) has the right to do what they've been doing.
QED.One stone. Two birds.
In other words, siging a contract with SCO is a bad idea. Maybe SCO and Microsoft will get into the ring now that MS has signed a contract with them...
PROVO, Utah -- May 28, 2003 -- Defending its interests in developing services to operate on the Linux platform, Novell today issued a dual challenge to The SCO Group over its recent statements regarding its UNIX ownership and potential intellectual property rights claims over Linux.
First, Novell challenged SCO's assertion that it owns the copyrights and patents to UNIX System V, pointing out that the asset purchase agreement entered into between Novell and SCO in 1995 did not transfer these rights to SCO. Second, Novell sought from SCO facts to back up its assertion that certain UNIX System V code has been copied into Linux. Novell communicated these concerns to SCO via a letter (text below) from Novell® Chairman and CEO Jack Messman in response to SCO making these claims.
"To Novell's knowledge, the 1995 agreement governing SCO's purchase of UNIX from Novell does not convey to SCO the associated copyrights," Messman said in the letter. "We believe it unlikely that SCO can demonstrate that it has any ownership interest whatsoever in those copyrights. Apparently you share this view, since over the last few months you have repeatedly asked Novell to transfer the copyrights to SCO, requests that Novell has rejected."
"SCO claims it has specific evidence supporting its allegations against the Linux community," Messman added. "It is time to substantiate that claim, or recant the sweeping and unsupported allegation made in your letter. Absent such action, it will be apparent to all that SCO's true intent is to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt about Linux in order to extort payments from Linux distributors and users."
"Novell has answered the call of the open source community," said Bruce Perens, a leading proponent of open source. "We admire what they are doing. Based on recent announcements to support Linux with NetWare services and now this revelation...Novell has just won the hearts and minds of developers and corporations alike."
Text of the letter from Novell to SCO:
Mr. Darl McBride
President and CEO
The SCO Group
Re: SCO's "Letter to Linux Customers"
Dear Darl:
As you know, Novell recently announced some important Linux initiatives. These include an upcoming NetWare version based on the Linux kernel, as well as collaboration and resource management solutions for Linux.
Put simply, Novell is an ardent supporter of Linux and the open source development community. This support will increase over time.
It was in this context that we recently received your "Letter to Linux Customers." Many Novell business partners and customers apparently received the same letter. Your letter compels a response from Novell.
As we understand the letter, SCO alleges that unnamed entities incorporated SCO's intellectual property into Linux without its authorization. You apparently base this allegation on a belief that these unnamed entities copied some UNIX System V code into Linux. Beyond this limited understanding, we have been unable to glean any further information about your allegation because of your letter's vagueness.
In particular, the letter leaves certain critical questions unanswered. What specific code was copied from UNIX System V? Where can we find this code in Linux? Who copied this code? Why does this alleged copying infringe SCO's intellectual property? By failing to address these important questions, SCO has failed to put us on meaningful notice of any allegedly infringing Linux code, and thus has withheld from us the ability - and removed any corresponding obligation - to address your allegation.
As best we can determine, the vagueness about your allegation is intentional. In
This morning would be the best time to do so because SCO is already comitted to a press conference that they cannot cancel or delay.
lock, stock and two smoking barrels.
Oh, man I sooo want to source a class-action libel suit against SCO.
This sounds like a good bit more complicated, and could lead to rather wierd results like you end up paying more for CPU time because you had to wait longer to get the computation done (it was a high-load period).
The cheapest CPU time on MTS were 'deferred priority' batch jobs. They generally only got ran on weekends and after midnight (when nobody else was using the system). If you were working at those times it was much worth your time to do expensive compiles etc. as deferred batch jobs (if the queue was empty, they'd run pretty quick, and you'd get charged about 1/10 as much as doing it from your terminal).
I'd rather presume that these groups do have protection beyond what's obvious. But if they don't then they might get hacked up the ying-yang before they realize that someone has made it through.
It would probably run far afoul of anti-competition rules for Microsoft to officially pay SCO to spread FUD about Linux in the form of an IP suit. So if it was true that MS was really paying this money to SCO to make sure that they could afford their libel^H^H^H^H^Hlegal campaign, there is no way on god's green earth that they'd officialy admit it. This Linux Business Week article is about as close to it as we're gonna get (and closer than I thought we'd get) to an official admission.
If innovation was the norm .... it wouldn't be innovative.
Sic biscitus disintigrat.
Sounds like another case of "military intelligence".
One of the rules of security is to presume that any one layer is going to fail. Even the physical controls can fail. network attachment points halfway up the wall, and watching the MAC addresses of connected nodes still won't protect you from someone connecting a (supposedly) secure laptop with a spare wireless card in it and configured as a gateway.
People will circumvent security -- and they'll (almost) always think that they have a good reason for it.
IDSs and firewalls are still a good idea within a (supposedly) disconnected and private system, because if a cracker ever manages to connect, then you probably REALLY want to know about it.
"We don't use a firewall. We use an air gap."
I was in WaltDisney World, and I ended up talking to a guy from Texas. He asked where I was, and I told him "Alberta ... Canada".
"What state is that Next to?" he asked.
"We're right on the border with Montana".
"What?" he replied, incredulously, "I thought Montana was right next to Texas!".
This was around 1979, and he was a bit too old to have been GW Bush.
You wouldn't (currently) be able to enforce VRFY or FINGER as being required to accept emails, although it could be used as a way to cut down on false positives in spam-filtering. I.E. If you get something that looks like borderline spam, the last check would be to attempt to VRFY the sender. If it succeeds, then classify it as non-spam. If it fails, then throw it in the spam heap.
If enough people were doing that, it might encourage other systems to turn VRFY back on. It's the old chicken/egg problem. The more inertia that the idea gets the more popular it will be.
hey: I'm not trying to claim that there aren't a reasonable number of Europeans that do know the capital of canada (btw: Yes, you're correct). I'm just trying to point out that I deserve to be classified as a moron (as opposed to idiot) for getting the capital of Germany that far off. It's not like I couldn't have known better, or anything.
heh.. well, in this case, I'll just say "close enough".
I couldn't remember which german city was the capital, but Munich seemed like a not-too-bad guess. That's why I put the modifier on it. On the other hand, (last ditch effort at saving face!) what percentage of Europeans can properly name the capital of Canada?