The entire purpose of copyright, as allowed by the U.S. Constitution, is to facilitate creators of works to earn money off their creations for a time. So yeah, copyright is about money (as a means to encourage further creative work).
One pass would do it, for all practical purposes. There isn't a software recovery program in existence that can recover files wiped even with one pass of all zeros. You need some pretty sophisticated means (hardware-based) to recover anything beyond that, plus a lot of time, effort, money and expertise to use them.
The thing is, a normal hard drive has all sorts of old, deleted files lying around, including temporary files, etc. They have older time stamps on the files, both deleted and non-, to boot.
So a computer forensic team looks at your hard drive with a fresh installation and can tell pretty quickly that it's brand new, and that the drive is either basically unused before a certain date or has been wiped and re-installed.
What's needed is either 1) two separate hard drives, one used for normal business and one used exclusively for filesharing (switch back and forth frequently), which is a pain, or 2) a program that can re-create the appearance of a normally-used drive by creating "deleted" files, deleted temp files, etc., and modify the file dates back to a certain fake install date.
As the article discusses, the explosives in question are actually quite unstable even after they're made. They would be extremely lucky to actually get on the plane instead of dying on their way out the door.
The point, as the OP didn't quite make clear, is that you'd not be able to make enough of this exceedingly unstable mixture to do more than hurt or kill yourself, and possibly take the bathroom out of commission.
Not exactly the glorious martyrdom that they'd likely been planning for themselves. But hey, if the plan was to injure or kill only yourself and embarrass your cause in the process, then sure.
For a given feature size, the magnet probably is more robust, but the radiation resistance of an MRAM won't be anything close to that of core memory.
I'm actually rather skeptical of this. If I recall the research I read on GMR for my graduate study (it's been several years), the magnetic field required to make spin valves switch actually increases as size decreases.
It all depends upon the strength of the applied magnetic field, either from an external magnet (e.g. another spin valve or "bit") or from a write line.
If it takes a higher demagnetizing field to flip a domain, then logically, you can place the domain closer to the source of a field of equal strength (e.g. another domain).
As for the heat, well, that's going to remain a problem, but given the switching time (on the order of 1 ns has been reported), you're not talking about applying a whole lot of energy overall, and when considering the Tc values for the materials generally used, I'd be surprised if it were that much of a problem.
But I'd be interested in any research or numbers on the subject.
Hmmm...I guess I'll have to check into this a little more. My understanding was that the problem with cosmic rays is that they leave a trail of damage in the form of charged particles through semiconductor devices, and when that happens to gate material (e.g. flash memory), it provides a path for charge to escape.
Obviously, no such problem would be encountered in a magnetic material. What is the mechanism by which a cosmic ray would flip the domain magnetization in e.g. a pseudo spin valve?
Since magnetic fields from the electric current in write lines decrease as the square of the distance from the lines, you don't have to worry all that much about crosstalk at write time, either.
Oops -- slaughtered that one, didn't I? It's been too long since I looked at the equations. Straightfoward Ampere's Law: the decrease is linear, not with the square of the distance.
Still, the decrease is significant enough, and the resistance to switching state high enough, that you don't generally have to worry about write lines inadvertently flipping more than one bit.
Actually, that's not true, or rather, it depends upon the technology. GMR-based systems can be made quite dense, since it actually takes quite a strong magnetic field to flip them from one state to another. If I recall correctly (I'd need to review), ironically, the smaller the dimensions, the stronger the field required. Since magnetic fields from the electric current in write lines decrease as the square of the distance from the lines, you don't have to worry all that much about crosstalk at write time, either. And they're read directly by current passing through the devices.
The biggest problem with density is fabrication issues and design of the cells.
What other applications could this have besides boot time?
This could potentially (once the storage density grows significantly) compete with flash memory as a longer-lasting, more durable alternative. So I think the potential is obvious in that respect: anything flash could do, this could do better--again, presuming the storage densities can be made comparable.
There's one other potential upside to MRAM: it likely has the same advantages as core memory in high-radiation environments (in other words, radiation that would screw with DRAM/SRAM/Flash memory, or even EPROM). Magnetic memory tends to be immune to such problems. So you could make use of it in space probes and satellites, for example.
Hence they made universal access a requirement of granting the monopoly.
A bad new law to band-aid over that mistake.
Until we have total competition in all aspects of the network
That won't happen. The last mile is a natural monopoly. I believe that localities should own last mile media. Any interested party should be able to rent use of said media.
Isn't that the regulation you just said is a "bad new law to band-aid over that mistake"? Otherwise, how are you going to make sure that localities share the last mile media they own?
Nothing is wrong with the New York Times. The problem is with Cult-Of-Bushers like "Dr. Kool, PhD" who refuse to believe anything not seen on Fox News.
Weren't you the one running around here yesterday decrying everyone who had a problem with this as holding "fringe kook views?"
Sure didn't take long for the American People to reconsider that one, did it? Come to think of it, that's a perpetual problem for you Bush-loving dead-enders: the moment people get a chance to think through what you're selling, most recognize it for the crap it is.
(In reality, of course, the WaPo poll clearly had some serious problems, but you guys don't have much to hold on to these days, so I understand you latching on to it like Jack Abramoff clutching at Tom Delay.)
Try this on for size: you are part of a small and shrinking minority of people who still think Bush is doing a good job. By your definition, that makes you a member of a "fringe kook minority".
Enjoy that petard you've hoist yourself in.
Oh, and you do realize you're dead wrong about that "record job growth" and "record economic growth" thing, right?
Try getting your information from someone other that Bill O'Reilly. People will laugh at you less. Promise.
Well, yeah. But that's pretty much because since attacking Iraq, the number of terrorist attacks have skyrocketed. Presumably, that's both because of increased motivation and because of the training opportunity we've provided.
However, the cause for lack of successful attacks here at home over the last four years is pretty difficult to determine. In the 10 years before 9/11, the FBI stopped over 130 terrorist plots here at home. What's more, considering the sorry state of port security here at home and other security holes, I'd be pretty reluctant to credit the current administration with the lack of a second 9/11 as of yet.
Not really. If you look at the questions between the two polls, the number of respondents, the time over which the polls were taken and the correlation between the results and other recent polls, it's pretty clear the WaPo poll suffered from some pretty serious problems.
But there does need to be some avenue for the government to actually have a functioning intelligence system. Warrents are for criminal prosecution. This is about foreign intelligence.
I think this displays a serious misunderstanding about the law and the way our system works.
The warrants in question are obtained from a court that is explicitly designed to deal with foreign intelligence, called the "Foreign Intelligence Survellience Court". The law in question is called the "Foreign Intelligence Survellience Act" (FISA). They were set up expressly for the purpose of dealing with foreign intelligence issues and the wiretaps necessary to carry out intelligence gathering.
No objection has been put forth that the current law cannot deal with. The one thing that the law wouldn't allow for is abuse of the system. In other words, the fact that they're avoiding the law and the system strongly implies that it's being abused.
The FISA system has been in place for three decades, and has dealt with tens of thousands of wiretap requests quite successfully. And because the "foreign intelligence" apparatus can be abused to harm Americans, that system provides oversight and a check.
Seriously, the arguments you're making could just as easily be used to justify putting cameras and microphones in everyone's houses.
Anyone think that maybe there might be good and legitimate reasons for this system?
Of course! Good Lord, man, no one I know has any problem with going after terrorists.
The problem here isn't that the system can be used to nail the bad guys. The problem is that there is absolutely no oversight, and it violates the law. Worse, any attempts to apply oversight have been shut down. If the system isn't being abused, then what the hell is all that about?
Our system of government is predicated on the notion that power inevitably corrupts. This system involves a lot of people, and the idea that absolutely all of them are uncorruptable is absurd.
On this very site as we type, it's reported that the U.S. Government is in negotiations to obtain the same sort of private information from European countries. Quite likely, that sharing will go both ways. Furthermore, media companies are closer than you'd like to getting access to that data, too, in order to "fight piracy". Other companies can't be far behind. Are we to believe that everyone who will eventually have access to our private communications without oversight will be on the up-and-up?
It is the potential for abuse that is the problem. And the fact that this administration has actively resisted any attempt to apply checks and balances in order to prevent abuse is extremely troubling.
...how history repeats itself. How many times do people have to declare that "innovation is dead", "all ideas have been invented", or "there's not going to be a 'next big thing'" before we all realize that such predictions are bunk, and general promulgated by those who are themselves out of ideas?
I've been arguing politics online for more than 10 years. I've seen sources come and go, and I've seen the blatant mendacity on the right. It's unmatched by most anything I've seen from the left.
I've also visited LGF, and debunked a number of their pieces. I really feel no need to go through the whole process each time a new link is posted: the lack of credibility is already pretty much established.
Slashdot Mirror
The entire purpose of copyright, as allowed by the U.S. Constitution, is to facilitate creators of works to earn money off their creations for a time. So yeah, copyright is about money (as a means to encourage further creative work).
Good or bad, copyright is, indeed, about money.
One pass would do it, for all practical purposes. There isn't a software recovery program in existence that can recover files wiped even with one pass of all zeros. You need some pretty sophisticated means (hardware-based) to recover anything beyond that, plus a lot of time, effort, money and expertise to use them.
The thing is, a normal hard drive has all sorts of old, deleted files lying around, including temporary files, etc. They have older time stamps on the files, both deleted and non-, to boot.
So a computer forensic team looks at your hard drive with a fresh installation and can tell pretty quickly that it's brand new, and that the drive is either basically unused before a certain date or has been wiped and re-installed.
What's needed is either 1) two separate hard drives, one used for normal business and one used exclusively for filesharing (switch back and forth frequently), which is a pain, or 2) a program that can re-create the appearance of a normally-used drive by creating "deleted" files, deleted temp files, etc., and modify the file dates back to a certain fake install date.
As the article discusses, the explosives in question are actually quite unstable even after they're made. They would be extremely lucky to actually get on the plane instead of dying on their way out the door.
Given the chemicals involved, this still wouldn't do much more than injure or kill the suicide bomber.
It's not that easy to create a high explosive in this way. It's actually a rather involved, meticulous process that takes hours and special equipment.
You'd get a violent reaction that would like hurt/kill yourself and put the bathroom out of order. You probably would NOT down the plane.
The point, as the OP didn't quite make clear, is that you'd not be able to make enough of this exceedingly unstable mixture to do more than hurt or kill yourself, and possibly take the bathroom out of commission.
Not exactly the glorious martyrdom that they'd likely been planning for themselves. But hey, if the plan was to injure or kill only yourself and embarrass your cause in the process, then sure.
For a given feature size, the magnet probably is more robust, but the radiation resistance of an MRAM won't be anything close to that of core memory.
I'm actually rather skeptical of this. If I recall the research I read on GMR for my graduate study (it's been several years), the magnetic field required to make spin valves switch actually increases as size decreases.
It all depends upon the strength of the applied magnetic field, either from an external magnet (e.g. another spin valve or "bit") or from a write line.
If it takes a higher demagnetizing field to flip a domain, then logically, you can place the domain closer to the source of a field of equal strength (e.g. another domain).
As for the heat, well, that's going to remain a problem, but given the switching time (on the order of 1 ns has been reported), you're not talking about applying a whole lot of energy overall, and when considering the Tc values for the materials generally used, I'd be surprised if it were that much of a problem.
But I'd be interested in any research or numbers on the subject.
Hmmm...I guess I'll have to check into this a little more. My understanding was that the problem with cosmic rays is that they leave a trail of damage in the form of charged particles through semiconductor devices, and when that happens to gate material (e.g. flash memory), it provides a path for charge to escape.
Obviously, no such problem would be encountered in a magnetic material. What is the mechanism by which a cosmic ray would flip the domain magnetization in e.g. a pseudo spin valve?
Since magnetic fields from the electric current in write lines decrease as the square of the distance from the lines, you don't have to worry all that much about crosstalk at write time, either.
Oops -- slaughtered that one, didn't I? It's been too long since I looked at the equations. Straightfoward Ampere's Law: the decrease is linear, not with the square of the distance.
Still, the decrease is significant enough, and the resistance to switching state high enough, that you don't generally have to worry about write lines inadvertently flipping more than one bit.
Actually, that's not true, or rather, it depends upon the technology. GMR-based systems can be made quite dense, since it actually takes quite a strong magnetic field to flip them from one state to another. If I recall correctly (I'd need to review), ironically, the smaller the dimensions, the stronger the field required. Since magnetic fields from the electric current in write lines decrease as the square of the distance from the lines, you don't have to worry all that much about crosstalk at write time, either. And they're read directly by current passing through the devices.
The biggest problem with density is fabrication issues and design of the cells.
That's good information. Of course, Freescale is now mass-producing the devices, so this really is an advance, commercially speaking.
Still, you're right that the densities really need to increase dramatically to make this useful in anything but a few niche applications.
As was noted above, this is actually being produced, so by definition it isn't vaporware.
The problems MRAM could address are very real, and people have been working on using MRAM/GMR-based memory for a long time for that very reason.
What other applications could this have besides boot time?
This could potentially (once the storage density grows significantly) compete with flash memory as a longer-lasting, more durable alternative. So I think the potential is obvious in that respect: anything flash could do, this could do better--again, presuming the storage densities can be made comparable.
There's one other potential upside to MRAM: it likely has the same advantages as core memory in high-radiation environments (in other words, radiation that would screw with DRAM/SRAM/Flash memory, or even EPROM). Magnetic memory tends to be immune to such problems. So you could make use of it in space probes and satellites, for example.
Or belt buckles, etc., etc.
Basically, whenever you hear thunder, act like you're going through airport check-in: dump all your metal and run.
Somehow, I doubt the practicality of this advice.
Isn't it simply better to get in out of the rain?
Hence they made universal access a requirement of granting the monopoly.
A bad new law to band-aid over that mistake.
Until we have total competition in all aspects of the network
That won't happen. The last mile is a natural monopoly. I believe that localities should own last mile media. Any interested party should be able to rent use of said media.
Isn't that the regulation you just said is a "bad new law to band-aid over that mistake"? Otherwise, how are you going to make sure that localities share the last mile media they own?
Nothing is wrong with the New York Times. The problem is with Cult-Of-Bushers like "Dr. Kool, PhD" who refuse to believe anything not seen on Fox News.
Weren't you the one running around here yesterday decrying everyone who had a problem with this as holding "fringe kook views?"
e t?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=CES0000000001 &output_view=net_1mthe lectedTable=1&FirstYear=1990&LastYear=2006&Freq=An n
Sure didn't take long for the American People to reconsider that one, did it? Come to think of it, that's a perpetual problem for you Bush-loving dead-enders: the moment people get a chance to think through what you're selling, most recognize it for the crap it is.
(In reality, of course, the WaPo poll clearly had some serious problems, but you guys don't have much to hold on to these days, so I understand you latching on to it like Jack Abramoff clutching at Tom Delay.)
Try this on for size: you are part of a small and shrinking minority of people who still think Bush is doing a good job. By your definition, that makes you a member of a "fringe kook minority".
Enjoy that petard you've hoist yourself in.
Oh, and you do realize you're dead wrong about that "record job growth" and "record economic growth" thing, right?
Try getting your information from someone other that Bill O'Reilly. People will laugh at you less. Promise.
http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServl
http://www.bea.gov/bea/dn/nipaweb/TableView.asp?S
Well, yeah. But that's pretty much because since attacking Iraq, the number of terrorist attacks have skyrocketed. Presumably, that's both because of increased motivation and because of the training opportunity we've provided.
However, the cause for lack of successful attacks here at home over the last four years is pretty difficult to determine. In the 10 years before 9/11, the FBI stopped over 130 terrorist plots here at home. What's more, considering the sorry state of port security here at home and other security holes, I'd be pretty reluctant to credit the current administration with the lack of a second 9/11 as of yet.
Not really. If you look at the questions between the two polls, the number of respondents, the time over which the polls were taken and the correlation between the results and other recent polls, it's pretty clear the WaPo poll suffered from some pretty serious problems.
But there does need to be some avenue for the government to actually have a functioning intelligence system. Warrents are for criminal prosecution. This is about foreign intelligence.
I think this displays a serious misunderstanding about the law and the way our system works.
The warrants in question are obtained from a court that is explicitly designed to deal with foreign intelligence, called the "Foreign Intelligence Survellience Court". The law in question is called the "Foreign Intelligence Survellience Act" (FISA). They were set up expressly for the purpose of dealing with foreign intelligence issues and the wiretaps necessary to carry out intelligence gathering.
No objection has been put forth that the current law cannot deal with. The one thing that the law wouldn't allow for is abuse of the system. In other words, the fact that they're avoiding the law and the system strongly implies that it's being abused.
The FISA system has been in place for three decades, and has dealt with tens of thousands of wiretap requests quite successfully. And because the "foreign intelligence" apparatus can be abused to harm Americans, that system provides oversight and a check.
Seriously, the arguments you're making could just as easily be used to justify putting cameras and microphones in everyone's houses.
Anyone think that maybe there might be good and legitimate reasons for this system?
Of course! Good Lord, man, no one I know has any problem with going after terrorists.
The problem here isn't that the system can be used to nail the bad guys. The problem is that there is absolutely no oversight, and it violates the law. Worse, any attempts to apply oversight have been shut down. If the system isn't being abused, then what the hell is all that about?
Our system of government is predicated on the notion that power inevitably corrupts. This system involves a lot of people, and the idea that absolutely all of them are uncorruptable is absurd.
On this very site as we type, it's reported that the U.S. Government is in negotiations to obtain the same sort of private information from European countries. Quite likely, that sharing will go both ways. Furthermore, media companies are closer than you'd like to getting access to that data, too, in order to "fight piracy". Other companies can't be far behind. Are we to believe that everyone who will eventually have access to our private communications without oversight will be on the up-and-up?
It is the potential for abuse that is the problem. And the fact that this administration has actively resisted any attempt to apply checks and balances in order to prevent abuse is extremely troubling.
...how history repeats itself. How many times do people have to declare that "innovation is dead", "all ideas have been invented", or "there's not going to be a 'next big thing'" before we all realize that such predictions are bunk, and general promulgated by those who are themselves out of ideas?
I've been arguing politics online for more than 10 years. I've seen sources come and go, and I've seen the blatant mendacity on the right. It's unmatched by most anything I've seen from the left.
I've also visited LGF, and debunked a number of their pieces. I really feel no need to go through the whole process each time a new link is posted: the lack of credibility is already pretty much established.
...the fun that can be had with the Libertarian Party's platform is endless :)
...no one who links to Little Green Footballs as a source has the right to critique someone else's fact checking :)