However, I see no reason why we should pursue additional means of pressure, sanctions, etc.. whatever.
One problem being that we already have just about every available sanction placed on Iran. We really have very little leverage in this case.
It is a fine line between 'interferring' and upholding basic human rights. That is, assuming you agree that we should attempt to promote what we consider basic human rights in other nations (I do, but I know that some do not)
Again, there's not a whole lot that we can do, aside from invade (and I don't think that's really going to happen). Yes, we can talk a good game about freedom and rights, though I would imagine there are few people anywhere in the world who doubt we can do that.
The real question is whether what we do will help or hurt the cause of promoting those freedoms and rights. And as to whether we should be opening our mouths more, I think Iran has already answered that in their state-sponsored broadcasts, in which they've literally invented statements by the White House expressing support for the protesters. I, for one, think it's safe to say they wouldn't be doing that if such statements would actually help the protesters.
I agree with you that general statements expressing support for the press, freedom to assemble, etc. probably won't hurt. But this really is a situation in which the best the U.S. can do is likely just keep quiet and let things play out.
The "Great Zero Challenge" isn't the only one out there looking. The National Bureau of Economic Research (that tiny organization no one has ever heard of who just provide the authoritative figures for business cycle dates, among thousands of other economic pieces of data) looked into this several years ago, and also couldn't find a single data recovery service who could recover overwritten data.
There's ample opportunity and motivation and reward for someone who can do this to come out of the woodwork and announce it. The fact that they haven't amply demonstrates crisco's point.
It doesn't matter who the challenge is from--marketing is what you put into it. Simply being able to demonstrate the ability to do it would be big news in the tech world, and regardless of who originated the challenge, the successful company could spread the news far and wide in their own advertising.
There is a need for someone who can recover overwritten data, and if anyone demonstrates publicly they can do it, it would indeed be worth its weight in gold.
Always possible. But at least from what's publicly known, it's not doable.
Also, I think you need to factor in a certain experience with general government competence.
Finally, it's not as though people haven't tried. A paper I saw not too long ago detailed attempts to recover overwritten data using direct readouts of the hard drive read heads and magnetic force microscopy. It found recovery of an occasional bit possible for one overwrite with a known pattern. With a random overwrite pattern or more than one overwrite, even this measly recovery wasn't possible.
Realize also we're talking about the raw signal from the read heads. If there is no signal remaining above the noise on the disk, then there simply is no signal and no technology on God's Green Earth, no matter who developed it or how advanced, will recover the data.
They're not the only ones who have looked into this.
Really, it would be easy to prove: find a data recovery company that can recover overwritten data (here's a hint: you'll be looking for a while).
I guarantee that by taking up the "Great Zero Challenge," for instance, they'd have all the business they could ever ask for from the advertising value alone.
You would take the word of a $30000 electricity bill a month person that "we all need to conserve power" ?
Do they take right wing guys aside and give them classes in simplistic thinking?
If the electricity usage is efficient, then yeah, I would.
And yes, I'd take Dick Cheney's word over Al Gore's any day. It's closer to reality, by a wide margin. Even if that doesn't mean it's anywhere near the truth.
BlueStrat, You do realize that outside of Wingnuttia, the "boogeymen" you listed are not, in fact, seen as boogeymen?
It's so cute watching radical right wing loons, fresh off of electoral butt-kickings that would have caused deep introspection in virtually everyone else, assume that everyone still thinks like them.
The bottom line is this: corporations don't answer to most of us, and they act on the profit motive, which is what they're supposed to do. But failing to keep those characteristics in mind when deciding whether to make them responsible for something is just plain foolish.
Most of us get that. Perhaps someday, you will, too--but not at the rate you're going.
Good find. And I'll also note this study isn't the first one to try and recover data. Previously, others have tried and also failed.
As the NBER paper notes, the simple fact that it's basically impossible to find a data recovery company that can recover overwritten data should tell you all you need to know. There'd be a hell of a lot of money in it for anyone who could actually do this.
Wow. And here I was going to say that this latest development (if the previous ones weren't enough) seemed to be rock-solid evidence that the people who run McColo knew exactly what they were hosting, and should go to prison for a long, long time.
The point about detecting hidden volumes is certainly a good one, but also obvious and one that has been noted in Truecrypt documentation and elsewhere for a long time now.
That's one reason why I prefer to use hidden volumes with read-only media (e.g. full-volume CD-ROMS).
Indium is a very rare material, one which we're slated to deplete in less than 10 years or so at current rates of consumption, due in part to its use in display screens.
I highly doubt that widespread use in solar cells would be feasible.
The "problem" is that there are periods in history where it was warmer than it is now, without all of the man-made air pollution.
This is hardly a problem, any more than it would be a problem to rule a death a homicide despite the fact that people have died in the past from natural causes.
What you're referring to is a political talking point, not a rational argument.
At this point in time, there's not much of a serious debate over whether humans are causing the climate change we're seeing, either.
If you're going to accuse someone of doing something "low", you might want to have a rationale for it.
When I buy something from the local supermarket, I'm not doing it to help the supermarket. But that doesn't mean what I'm doing is "low".
You don't have to have altruistic motives in order to not be scum. In this case, I think you'd have to make the case that recording the trailer and putting it on the Internet in any way hurt Fox.
"The question is do you want to play Russian roulette with your brain," [Devra Lee Davis] said...
Heh. No.
The question is, does Ms. Davis have any solid evidence whatsoever to back up alleged medical advice that could so profoundly affect (and perhaps panic) millions of people, to say nothing of potential economic consequences?
And since the answer seems to be a resounding "no", all that is demonstrated here is the speaker's deep credulity, alarmism and incompetence, and her future statements on scientific/medical issues should be evaluated as strongly suspect in credibility.
If there were the slightest shred of solid proof that there's a problem, she'd be right to spread the alarm far and wide. In this case, it appears she is happy to spread Internet urban legends without the slightest thought to the consequences.
Slashdot Mirror
One problem being that we already have just about every available sanction placed on Iran. We really have very little leverage in this case.
Again, there's not a whole lot that we can do, aside from invade (and I don't think that's really going to happen). Yes, we can talk a good game about freedom and rights, though I would imagine there are few people anywhere in the world who doubt we can do that.
The real question is whether what we do will help or hurt the cause of promoting those freedoms and rights. And as to whether we should be opening our mouths more, I think Iran has already answered that in their state-sponsored broadcasts, in which they've literally invented statements by the White House expressing support for the protesters. I, for one, think it's safe to say they wouldn't be doing that if such statements would actually help the protesters.
I agree with you that general statements expressing support for the press, freedom to assemble, etc. probably won't hurt. But this really is a situation in which the best the U.S. can do is likely just keep quiet and let things play out.
I think it may have been less "advertising" and more leveraging Windows Live Search redirections and newly-installed IE8 defaults.
Good for one day's bragging rights, I guess.
Time was, that would have resulted in a new monopoly. Guess you can't go back again.
You could always reformat the darned thing from scratch using a known-good version of whatever OS you're going to be using.
Honestly, ever since Vista became the de-facto OS shipped with new computers, I've been doing that, anyway.
The "Great Zero Challenge" isn't the only one out there looking. The National Bureau of Economic Research (that tiny organization no one has ever heard of who just provide the authoritative figures for business cycle dates, among thousands of other economic pieces of data) looked into this several years ago, and also couldn't find a single data recovery service who could recover overwritten data.
There's ample opportunity and motivation and reward for someone who can do this to come out of the woodwork and announce it. The fact that they haven't amply demonstrates crisco's point.
It doesn't matter who the challenge is from--marketing is what you put into it. Simply being able to demonstrate the ability to do it would be big news in the tech world, and regardless of who originated the challenge, the successful company could spread the news far and wide in their own advertising.
There is a need for someone who can recover overwritten data, and if anyone demonstrates publicly they can do it, it would indeed be worth its weight in gold.
Always possible. But at least from what's publicly known, it's not doable.
Also, I think you need to factor in a certain experience with general government competence.
Finally, it's not as though people haven't tried. A paper I saw not too long ago detailed attempts to recover overwritten data using direct readouts of the hard drive read heads and magnetic force microscopy. It found recovery of an occasional bit possible for one overwrite with a known pattern. With a random overwrite pattern or more than one overwrite, even this measly recovery wasn't possible.
Realize also we're talking about the raw signal from the read heads. If there is no signal remaining above the noise on the disk, then there simply is no signal and no technology on God's Green Earth, no matter who developed it or how advanced, will recover the data.
The value of advertising/bragging rights alone would make it worthwhile to do successfully take the challenge for free.
They're not the only ones who have looked into this.
Really, it would be easy to prove: find a data recovery company that can recover overwritten data (here's a hint: you'll be looking for a while).
I guarantee that by taking up the "Great Zero Challenge," for instance, they'd have all the business they could ever ask for from the advertising value alone.
Indeed.
Now if only Fox News would become a "pay-by-the-minute" service...
You would take the word of a $30000 electricity bill a month person that "we all need to conserve power" ?
Do they take right wing guys aside and give them classes in simplistic thinking?
If the electricity usage is efficient, then yeah, I would.
And yes, I'd take Dick Cheney's word over Al Gore's any day. It's closer to reality, by a wide margin. Even if that doesn't mean it's anywhere near the truth.
Just...wow.
Well it'd have to be horseshit for that to be an option. So no, not an option.
Oh, but it is, young padawan.
BlueStrat,
You do realize that outside of Wingnuttia, the "boogeymen" you listed are not, in fact, seen as boogeymen?
It's so cute watching radical right wing loons, fresh off of electoral butt-kickings that would have caused deep introspection in virtually everyone else, assume that everyone still thinks like them.
The bottom line is this: corporations don't answer to most of us, and they act on the profit motive, which is what they're supposed to do. But failing to keep those characteristics in mind when deciding whether to make them responsible for something is just plain foolish.
Most of us get that. Perhaps someday, you will, too--but not at the rate you're going.
Well, time, for one, especially for home users who overwrite empty space or clear a drive before reformatting with e.g. DBAN.
More passes = more downtime.
Good find. And I'll also note this study isn't the first one to try and recover data. Previously, others have tried and also failed.
As the NBER paper notes, the simple fact that it's basically impossible to find a data recovery company that can recover overwritten data should tell you all you need to know. There'd be a hell of a lot of money in it for anyone who could actually do this.
Wow. And here I was going to say that this latest development (if the previous ones weren't enough) seemed to be rock-solid evidence that the people who run McColo knew exactly what they were hosting, and should go to prison for a long, long time.
I was speaking more of the article summary here than the article itself.
Hmmm...as the article notes, the idea of liquid mirror telescopes isn't new, so it seems a tad odd that this is being trumpeted as a breakthrough.
The ionic liquid coated with silver is cool, though.
The point about detecting hidden volumes is certainly a good one, but also obvious and one that has been noted in Truecrypt documentation and elsewhere for a long time now.
That's one reason why I prefer to use hidden volumes with read-only media (e.g. full-volume CD-ROMS).
True...but at this point in time indium is being used in larger quantities to make the afore-mentioned displays.
At this rate, we'll run out of indium long before gallium.
Indium is a very rare material, one which we're slated to deplete in less than 10 years or so at current rates of consumption, due in part to its use in display screens.
I highly doubt that widespread use in solar cells would be feasible.
Nice efficiency, though.
This is hardly a problem, any more than it would be a problem to rule a death a homicide despite the fact that people have died in the past from natural causes.
What you're referring to is a political talking point, not a rational argument.
At this point in time, there's not much of a serious debate over whether humans are causing the climate change we're seeing, either.
This would be about copyright, not privacy nor property ("intellectual property" is a PR phrase).
And the basis (indeed, the entire rationale) of copyright is promoting the creation of useful works.
Seems pretty cut-and-dry to me.
If you're going to accuse someone of doing something "low", you might want to have a rationale for it.
When I buy something from the local supermarket, I'm not doing it to help the supermarket. But that doesn't mean what I'm doing is "low".
You don't have to have altruistic motives in order to not be scum. In this case, I think you'd have to make the case that recording the trailer and putting it on the Internet in any way hurt Fox.
Are you going to try to do that?
Yeah, because, you know, leaking this trailer onto the Internet will only hurt Fox :)
As with all things, perhaps this isn't black-and-white.
Hell, if I worked for Fox's PR department, I would have done this myself, if no one in the audience had done so.
Heh. No.
The question is, does Ms. Davis have any solid evidence whatsoever to back up alleged medical advice that could so profoundly affect (and perhaps panic) millions of people, to say nothing of potential economic consequences?
And since the answer seems to be a resounding "no", all that is demonstrated here is the speaker's deep credulity, alarmism and incompetence, and her future statements on scientific/medical issues should be evaluated as strongly suspect in credibility.
If there were the slightest shred of solid proof that there's a problem, she'd be right to spread the alarm far and wide. In this case, it appears she is happy to spread Internet urban legends without the slightest thought to the consequences.