I understand what you're saying. But understand that there are people (not as many as they'd like you to believe) who think that you and I should be living in a world where your 'car' has no steering wheel or other controls, you just strap yourself into the seat in your four-wheeled deathtrap and hope against all hope that the damned thing doesn't go completely berserk on you and get you killed, along with however many other people. In that case the manufacturer of the car would be 100% liable, since you have precisely 0% control over the vehicle -- not that it would matter, you'd likely be dead and therefore unable to sue anyone, and your next-of-kin would likely be tied up in civil court for years and years. Of course that scenario is insane, I have not spoken to a single person (in real life, mind you, the Internet doesn't count) that did anything other than respond with a look of horror and fear in their eyes at the mere idea that there could be such a contraption they'd be required to ride in. In the real-world case of so-called 'self driving cars' it'll be more like a 'driver assist' or 'autopilot' that you can turn on and off -- and in the case of an accident, I'm sure there'll be logfiles they'll download from your vehicle (enjoy your complete lack of privacy, by the way) to prove whether or not the vehicle was under computer control or human control at the time of an accident.
it will rapidly be turned from auto-sales into auto-rentals or leases, where you won't be able to buy a car anymore
Guess I'm going to be driving (not SELF-DRIVING) lots of old vehicles the rest of my life, then, if things go that way. I don't want to live in a world where someone else owns everything you need to use, and you have no control whatsoever over even the most basic privacy.
Considering how the current administration appears to feel about consumers rights, I'll take this as them setting precedent to deregulate internet regardless of how large the ISP is, so they can charge you whatever 'fees' they want to charge you on top of the actual service, and you won't have any say in the matter because you signed a contract. You thought Comcast violated your anus before? Just wait.
Bitter much? Enough so that you're going to make all sorts of assumptions about someone you've never met, never will meet, and that you don't even have so much as a picture of to go on, let alone any actual facts? Enough so, that you're willing to be a hypocrite, accusing me of making 'offensive comments about their anatomy', then calling me a 'neckbeard' (and you didn't even mean it as a compliment)? Sounds to me like you're the one who should be looking in the mirror for the source of your own problems, dearie -- and take off the rose-colored glasses this time.
A typical horse has a higher level of cognition and common sense than any so-called 'self driving car' does right now, and that's the way it's going to be for a long time to come yet.
"It's critical..", and "I can survive without it"'; make up your mind, which is it? You sound like you're in denial and would panic if your phone got lost or stopped functioning. You're caught in a technological trap and don't even want to admit it to yourself. I feel sad for you.
Considering that the software in vehicles is not open-source you can't be sure it's not storing location data for later uploading, which is plausible considering the possible unreliability of wireless communication. Therefore disable the GPS receiver.
My desire for privacy includes, naturally, not wanting my movements being tracked. That means disabling any sort of onboard GPS receiver, which is a trivial matter for someone like me; if it's a passive antenna, you disconnect it and short it to ground, or just disconnect it and leave it. GPS signals are so small that the receiver isn't going to get a satellite lock without a proper antenna.
You're implying I'd take a vehicle to a dealership for any sort of servicing. I do my own maintenance and repair, thank you very much, and of all the places you can get mechanical work done on a vehicle, a dealership is the most expensive choice 100% of the time. Besides which, if it was some warranty or recall situation I can't ignore, you're also implying I'd destroy some vital part of the vehicles' electronics in the process of disabling antennas; I am not some ham-fisted amateur with a soldering iron, I've been working in electronics for more than 30 years. Anything I do would be reversible. Dummy loads can be substituted for transceiver antennas, and the transceiver in question is none the wiser; receive-only antennas can simply be disconnected and shorted to ground. An active GPS antenna (one that has a preamp embedded in the antenna itself) can just be left disconnected; GPS signals are so low that it's not going to get a satellite lock without a proper antenna.
So far as auto manufacturers requiring vehicles to 'phone home' or they'd stop working: Sounds like a lawsuit in the making and a massive recall to me. Also if they actually had the gall to do such a thing, I just plain would refuse to own such a vehicle, because desiging it that way is utterly preposterous.
Encrypt the hard drive of your computer and ship it separate from your flight. Be sure to box it for shipment before you take it to where you're shipping it from, and tell them it's anything other than a computer. Leave your smartphone at home, and either take a burner phone with you, or buy the cheapest burner phone you can when you arrive at your destination, with the intention of destroying it utterly and discarding it before you depart to go back home. If you get asked about any 'social media' accounts you have, tell them in no uncertain terms that you don't use so-called 'social media', and then launch into an unasked-for diatribe on how so-called 'social media' is anything but, is making people LESS social, is responsible for so many social problems we're having in the world, is destroying the planet, etc etc etc, until their eyes glaze over and they wave you through the checkpoint just to get you to shut up. They can't search what you don't have, and they can't poke their noses into something they don't believe you have in the first place. Problems solved! Was that so difficult?
I do not currently own a vehicle that has so many bells-and-whistles that there is GPS, or wireless anything in it (it's a light pickup truck with a 5-speed stick, and I like it that way), but if-and-when I have to replace it, and discover I (somehow) have no option but to get something with all those extras, Job One will be to identify and short to Ground all the GPS and wireless antennas -- except the one for the radio, of course. No one should be able to remotely control any vehicle I'm driving for any reason, ever. I'd consider that to be a gigantic security hole and a safety hazard.
I think you should just admit that you're completely against nuclear power in any form whatsoever, the subject is closed to you, you're not willing to discuss it, let alone take the time to research anything mentioned; you're dismissing anything I'm saying out-of-hand without any hesitation whatsoever. It's like trying to discuss eating meat with a Vegan.
..oh and don't bother accusing me of 'not wanting to discuss all the reasons nuclear power is bad' or whatever permutation of that you might be considering retorting with. I'm one of the people who voted to shut down Rancho Seco back in the 80's for all the reasons you think nuclear power is bad. But I got over it.
So you live in NYC and poll people on the subway all the time, and know beyond a reasonable doubt that ALL of them are perfectly happy with the subway? LOL, no, you don't live in NYC, you don't talk to anyone, so you know nothing. Bet anyone $5 that if you polled 100 random people on a NYC subway, the majority would say "The subway is OK, but if I could get driven around in a car? Sure, that would be great!". Why do you think taxi drivers can make a living in a place like NYC? Because not everyone likes or wants to use the subway or buses. The only reason more people in NYC don't drive cars is it's expensive to park one there, enough so that it's not practical, and the traffic can be bad. But huge urban environments like NYC are the exception and not the rule, the majority of the people in the U.S. don't live in huge cities, therefore they own cars -- and like it.
The majority of people are poor, so using a form of transportation that poor people use is pretty natural for them.
Gee, you sound like you think you know a lot about the poor and what they think, but in reality you're not a poor person, never have been a poor person, and never will be a poor person. So then you sound like a rich person saying "..oh, they're used to being poor and are perfectly happy with their little lives the way they are." which is a bunch of baloney. You really think the poor don't see middle-class and richer people in their cars and wish that was them? Or envy them? Or hate them because they're 'the lucky ones' while they comparatively have nothing? Think again.
Even the most advanced reactors we have today are still not fail-safe with zero risk
There are new reactor designs that haven't even been built yet (which is not surprising considering how long the process is to get permission to built a reactor) that are inherently safer than the current generation, and that are much less complex designs. Then there's using Thorium instead of Uranium. All would be better than the current generation of reactors.
This AC is a flaming jerk, like most ACs are, but in this case he's not wrong on some points. The vast majority of people don't want to use public transportation. Aside from the various inconveniences of it, personal safety risks, personal health risks, etc, it's viewed as something that poor people use, and even poor people tend to want to maintain at least the appearance of not being poor. This is nothing new, either, humans have always been this way, and I see no reason that will ever change about humans, either; people want personal transportation. Has nothing to do with 'Americans' or any other nationality, has nothing to do with 'greed, avarice' or any of the other nonsense that this AC is spouting, it's just pure and simple human nature.
Public transportation will always have a place in civilization, but it will never replace personal transportation. Electric vehicles are not only more efficient and non-polluting in and of themselves, they're also lower maintenance and quieter; they are the future and we should embrace it. Concerns about where the energy comes from are temporary problems; re-introduction of nuclear power, in the form of redesigned, safer fission reactors, is also something we need to embrace, rather than succumbing to the 'nuclear boogieman' of the past. Continuing to research and develop energy storage systems will also help. So-called 'renewable' sources like solar and wind will supplement and tide us over until the new generation of reactors can be brought on-line. Meanwhile we'll continue to chase practical fusion power, and other more exotic sources of energy.
Why should I pay Miscreant-o-soft $20 per year to snoop on my email, when Comcast, the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, and for all I know, the DIA (and other nosy government agencies who don't even have three-letter designations) already does that for the tax money the government extorts out of every paycheck I get?
When there was only 64kB of memory to work with, you had no room for bloat or sloppy technique. This isn't so anymore. The first time I ever noticed that there was professional software written in 'Visual BASIC', I practically fell on the floor, I was laughing so hard; I thought it was a joke someone was playing.
Yeah, I remember those. When you only had 56kB of memory to work with (CP/M v2.2; the other 8kB was taken up by the BIOS) the only way to write really large programs, was to compile overlays, all with the same origin address of course, and to define variables as globals so everything could access them. Then you had to swap the overlays in and out as required, and ensure that one overlay didn't need to call something another overlay, or the whole thing would go completely off the rails and send your CPU off to la-la-land, potentially doing who-knows-what to whatever floppies were in the drive(s) or your hard disk.
It escapes me at the moment, but there were mainframe and minicomputer-related reasons why for the longest time octal was the numbering system of computers.
CP/M didn't have a tree-like subdirectory structure like MSDOS does, but it did have 'user' directories (numbered, zero through fifteen, if I remember correctly) that you could use that way if you wanted to, although it was of course only one level deep.
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I understand what you're saying. But understand that there are people (not as many as they'd like you to believe) who think that you and I should be living in a world where your 'car' has no steering wheel or other controls, you just strap yourself into the seat in your four-wheeled deathtrap and hope against all hope that the damned thing doesn't go completely berserk on you and get you killed, along with however many other people. In that case the manufacturer of the car would be 100% liable, since you have precisely 0% control over the vehicle -- not that it would matter, you'd likely be dead and therefore unable to sue anyone, and your next-of-kin would likely be tied up in civil court for years and years. Of course that scenario is insane, I have not spoken to a single person (in real life, mind you, the Internet doesn't count) that did anything other than respond with a look of horror and fear in their eyes at the mere idea that there could be such a contraption they'd be required to ride in. In the real-world case of so-called 'self driving cars' it'll be more like a 'driver assist' or 'autopilot' that you can turn on and off -- and in the case of an accident, I'm sure there'll be logfiles they'll download from your vehicle (enjoy your complete lack of privacy, by the way) to prove whether or not the vehicle was under computer control or human control at the time of an accident.
it will rapidly be turned from auto-sales into auto-rentals or leases, where you won't be able to buy a car anymore
Guess I'm going to be driving (not SELF-DRIVING) lots of old vehicles the rest of my life, then, if things go that way. I don't want to live in a world where someone else owns everything you need to use, and you have no control whatsoever over even the most basic privacy.
You mean the Pussy-Grabber-in Chief.
Considering how the current administration appears to feel about consumers rights, I'll take this as them setting precedent to deregulate internet regardless of how large the ISP is, so they can charge you whatever 'fees' they want to charge you on top of the actual service, and you won't have any say in the matter because you signed a contract. You thought Comcast violated your anus before? Just wait.
Bitter much? Enough so that you're going to make all sorts of assumptions about someone you've never met, never will meet, and that you don't even have so much as a picture of to go on, let alone any actual facts? Enough so, that you're willing to be a hypocrite, accusing me of making 'offensive comments about their anatomy', then calling me a 'neckbeard' (and you didn't even mean it as a compliment)? Sounds to me like you're the one who should be looking in the mirror for the source of your own problems, dearie -- and take off the rose-colored glasses this time.
A typical horse has a higher level of cognition and common sense than any so-called 'self driving car' does right now, and that's the way it's going to be for a long time to come yet.
"It's critical..", and "I can survive without it"'; make up your mind, which is it? You sound like you're in denial and would panic if your phone got lost or stopped functioning. You're caught in a technological trap and don't even want to admit it to yourself. I feel sad for you.
My cellphone doesn't "run my life", why does yours?
Considering that the software in vehicles is not open-source you can't be sure it's not storing location data for later uploading, which is plausible considering the possible unreliability of wireless communication. Therefore disable the GPS receiver.
My desire for privacy includes, naturally, not wanting my movements being tracked. That means disabling any sort of onboard GPS receiver, which is a trivial matter for someone like me; if it's a passive antenna, you disconnect it and short it to ground, or just disconnect it and leave it. GPS signals are so small that the receiver isn't going to get a satellite lock without a proper antenna.
You're implying I'd take a vehicle to a dealership for any sort of servicing. I do my own maintenance and repair, thank you very much, and of all the places you can get mechanical work done on a vehicle, a dealership is the most expensive choice 100% of the time. Besides which, if it was some warranty or recall situation I can't ignore, you're also implying I'd destroy some vital part of the vehicles' electronics in the process of disabling antennas; I am not some ham-fisted amateur with a soldering iron, I've been working in electronics for more than 30 years. Anything I do would be reversible. Dummy loads can be substituted for transceiver antennas, and the transceiver in question is none the wiser; receive-only antennas can simply be disconnected and shorted to ground. An active GPS antenna (one that has a preamp embedded in the antenna itself) can just be left disconnected; GPS signals are so low that it's not going to get a satellite lock without a proper antenna.
So far as auto manufacturers requiring vehicles to 'phone home' or they'd stop working: Sounds like a lawsuit in the making and a massive recall to me. Also if they actually had the gall to do such a thing, I just plain would refuse to own such a vehicle, because desiging it that way is utterly preposterous.
Encrypt the hard drive of your computer and ship it separate from your flight. Be sure to box it for shipment before you take it to where you're shipping it from, and tell them it's anything other than a computer. Leave your smartphone at home, and either take a burner phone with you, or buy the cheapest burner phone you can when you arrive at your destination, with the intention of destroying it utterly and discarding it before you depart to go back home. If you get asked about any 'social media' accounts you have, tell them in no uncertain terms that you don't use so-called 'social media', and then launch into an unasked-for diatribe on how so-called 'social media' is anything but, is making people LESS social, is responsible for so many social problems we're having in the world, is destroying the planet, etc etc etc, until their eyes glaze over and they wave you through the checkpoint just to get you to shut up. They can't search what you don't have, and they can't poke their noses into something they don't believe you have in the first place. Problems solved! Was that so difficult?
I do not currently own a vehicle that has so many bells-and-whistles that there is GPS, or wireless anything in it (it's a light pickup truck with a 5-speed stick, and I like it that way), but if-and-when I have to replace it, and discover I (somehow) have no option but to get something with all those extras, Job One will be to identify and short to Ground all the GPS and wireless antennas -- except the one for the radio, of course. No one should be able to remotely control any vehicle I'm driving for any reason, ever. I'd consider that to be a gigantic security hole and a safety hazard.
I think you should just admit that you're completely against nuclear power in any form whatsoever, the subject is closed to you, you're not willing to discuss it, let alone take the time to research anything mentioned; you're dismissing anything I'm saying out-of-hand without any hesitation whatsoever. It's like trying to discuss eating meat with a Vegan.
..oh and don't bother accusing me of 'not wanting to discuss all the reasons nuclear power is bad' or whatever permutation of that you might be considering retorting with. I'm one of the people who voted to shut down Rancho Seco back in the 80's for all the reasons you think nuclear power is bad. But I got over it.
So you live in NYC and poll people on the subway all the time, and know beyond a reasonable doubt that ALL of them are perfectly happy with the subway? LOL, no, you don't live in NYC, you don't talk to anyone, so you know nothing. Bet anyone $5 that if you polled 100 random people on a NYC subway, the majority would say "The subway is OK, but if I could get driven around in a car? Sure, that would be great!". Why do you think taxi drivers can make a living in a place like NYC? Because not everyone likes or wants to use the subway or buses. The only reason more people in NYC don't drive cars is it's expensive to park one there, enough so that it's not practical, and the traffic can be bad. But huge urban environments like NYC are the exception and not the rule, the majority of the people in the U.S. don't live in huge cities, therefore they own cars -- and like it.
The majority of people are poor, so using a form of transportation that poor people use is pretty natural for them.
Gee, you sound like you think you know a lot about the poor and what they think, but in reality you're not a poor person, never have been a poor person, and never will be a poor person. So then you sound like a rich person saying "..oh, they're used to being poor and are perfectly happy with their little lives the way they are." which is a bunch of baloney. You really think the poor don't see middle-class and richer people in their cars and wish that was them? Or envy them? Or hate them because they're 'the lucky ones' while they comparatively have nothing? Think again.
Even the most advanced reactors we have today are still not fail-safe with zero risk
There are new reactor designs that haven't even been built yet (which is not surprising considering how long the process is to get permission to built a reactor) that are inherently safer than the current generation, and that are much less complex designs. Then there's using Thorium instead of Uranium. All would be better than the current generation of reactors.
Need I say more?
This AC is a flaming jerk, like most ACs are, but in this case he's not wrong on some points. The vast majority of people don't want to use public transportation. Aside from the various inconveniences of it, personal safety risks, personal health risks, etc, it's viewed as something that poor people use, and even poor people tend to want to maintain at least the appearance of not being poor. This is nothing new, either, humans have always been this way, and I see no reason that will ever change about humans, either; people want personal transportation. Has nothing to do with 'Americans' or any other nationality, has nothing to do with 'greed, avarice' or any of the other nonsense that this AC is spouting, it's just pure and simple human nature.
Public transportation will always have a place in civilization, but it will never replace personal transportation. Electric vehicles are not only more efficient and non-polluting in and of themselves, they're also lower maintenance and quieter; they are the future and we should embrace it. Concerns about where the energy comes from are temporary problems; re-introduction of nuclear power, in the form of redesigned, safer fission reactors, is also something we need to embrace, rather than succumbing to the 'nuclear boogieman' of the past. Continuing to research and develop energy storage systems will also help. So-called 'renewable' sources like solar and wind will supplement and tide us over until the new generation of reactors can be brought on-line. Meanwhile we'll continue to chase practical fusion power, and other more exotic sources of energy.
Why should I pay Miscreant-o-soft $20 per year to snoop on my email, when Comcast, the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, and for all I know, the DIA (and other nosy government agencies who don't even have three-letter designations) already does that for the tax money the government extorts out of every paycheck I get?
is that when Fran Drescher gets specific about a subject?
Come on, Slashdot editors, don't you have anyone proofread these before you post them to the front page? Or at least run them through a spellchecker?
When there was only 64kB of memory to work with, you had no room for bloat or sloppy technique. This isn't so anymore. The first time I ever noticed that there was professional software written in 'Visual BASIC', I practically fell on the floor, I was laughing so hard; I thought it was a joke someone was playing.
Yeah, I remember those. When you only had 56kB of memory to work with (CP/M v2.2; the other 8kB was taken up by the BIOS) the only way to write really large programs, was to compile overlays, all with the same origin address of course, and to define variables as globals so everything could access them. Then you had to swap the overlays in and out as required, and ensure that one overlay didn't need to call something another overlay, or the whole thing would go completely off the rails and send your CPU off to la-la-land, potentially doing who-knows-what to whatever floppies were in the drive(s) or your hard disk.
It escapes me at the moment, but there were mainframe and minicomputer-related reasons why for the longest time octal was the numbering system of computers.
CP/M didn't have a tree-like subdirectory structure like MSDOS does, but it did have 'user' directories (numbered, zero through fifteen, if I remember correctly) that you could use that way if you wanted to, although it was of course only one level deep.