so, the people who work at the airport don't respect peoples human rights, becuase if you talk about carrying a gun or bombing the airplane your ass gets thrown in jail immediately!
Airports are not schools - few people spend several hours a day, five days a week in an airport. But yes, there are many restrictions made on travel in the name of false safety, or preventing smuggling, that do infringe upon human rights. The existence of bad laws is not a justification for more bad laws.
You don't scream fire in a movie theater...
Writing a story is in no way comparable to starting a dangerous stampede towards the exits.
...that is trying to finish up rebuilding from the fire a year ago where countless numbers of teachers and students were killed.
Oh, please. Where was this? I think that the number of teachers and students killed in school shooting last year was quite countable, and very small compared to the number of people gunned down in the streets of any medium sized American city.
And maybe the day after tomorrow one of the people getting pissed on gets a gun and blows away the pisser, and few innocent bystanders, before turning the gun on himself.
Or, maybe the day after tommorrow a few of the pissed-upon band together for mutual protection and stop the bullies.
Or, maybe parents and teachers come to understand that it's not a good idea to let kids piss on each other. (If you're consenting adults, of course, it's you're own damn business. Weird, but your own damn business.)
IIRC, there is actually a theoretical minimum on the energy needed to flip a bit. Assuming limitless energy input, the limiting factor becomes how fast you can remove waste heat.
I have no numbers, but I think there's a section in Applied Cryptography that discusses some theoretical maximums of computing power. My copy's at home - anyone have theirs handy?
I suggest you click on The Hunger Site and try giving something for free. Then come back and tell us how much it affected your morgtage or car loan or whatever.
That which is supported by advertising is not free.
Massive corporations want you to buy their stuff. They spend money on advertising. The cost of advertizing is included in the cost you pay for their product. When you buy a can of Coca-Cola, part of what you pay goes to Coke's advertising budget; Coke buys advertising on UPN; UPN makes another season of Voyager. So you don't get to ogle Seven Of Nine(TM)[1]'s tits for free[2], no no no; you pay for it with every can of Coke, every Gateway computer, every new Toyota, whatever you see advertised.
There's also the fact that you are paying by allowing these companies to attempt to influence your buying decisions, but that's a more subtle topic.
([1] Yes, "TM", according to the Star Trek website. Bleh.
[2] No disrespect intended to Jeri Ryan. Much disrespect intended to whoever decided her character should dress like that.)
To compare car theft, arson, assult, and destruction of property with making unauthorized copies makes you look extremely foolish.
Cracking copy protection is an intellectual exercise that in and of itself has no ethical connotations - if anything, by increasing human knowledge (it is, after all, the solution of a mathematical problem) it could be considered ethically positive.
Using the solution to actually produce unauthorized copies can be ethically good (making backups for your own use), bad (massive pirating), or indifferent (making a mix tape for your friend).
The corporate state will keep trying to patch copyright law, but it's far too late. We need new systems to "promote the progress of science and useful arts," because current copyright and patent law just don't cut it in the face of modern tech.
(P.S. Let me point out that it is "copyright, as in the right to copy, not "copywright" or "copywrite" as has been often seen here on Slashdot. Thank you, enjoy the show.)
Re:Do you know why they call it a Royale with chee
on
Pentium III hits 1Ghz
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· Score: 1
Uh, d00d, Hz (and MHz and GHz) is metric.
I guess the non-metric version would be "cycles" or "cycles per second", as I recall from old books and movies.
Which are just Hz under another name, but sound kinda cool - "Zounds! Professor, this interocitor is running at a speed of one million kilocycles! Surely it's the product of an advanced civilization!"
Infection with HIV is unrelated to diet, although a healthy diet may help delay the actual onset of AIDS. And the SAD (Standard American Diet) is linked to increased rates of cancer and heart disease.
But diet doesn't cause the common cold or AIDS, and it's only one factor in cancer. And your recommndation of a high-fat, high-protein diet is completely bogus - that's what leads to increased cancer risk in the first place!
Complex carbohydrates are your friends. Go eat yer veggies.
Thats why I cannot understand it when enviromental activists tamper with geneticaly modifyed crop tests.
Perhaps because these tests are being carried out without safety precautions? Nothing keeps pollen from GE crops in the field where they're being grown; the pollen can contaminate the genome of neighboring fields, and can even be a hazzard unto itself (the toxic effects of BT corn pollen on butterflies, for instance).
Until we have plenty of understanding and experience - say, a century's worth or so - of the technology, GE crops should be grown under biohazard protocols.
I'm fairly sure that the 'continuo' synthesizer part to "Baba O'Riley" (on Who's Next) is an example of how this was supposed to work.
"This was a number I wrote while I was doing these experiments with tapes on the synthesizer. Among my plans was to take a person out of the audience and feed information - hieight, weight, autobiographical details - about the person into the synthesizer. The synthesizer would then select notes from the pattern of that person. It would be like translating a person into music. On this particular track I programmed details about the life of Meher Baba [who the heck is that? -tms] and that provided the backing for the number." - Pete Townshend on "Baba O'Riley", from the liner notes on my handy disk "My Generation - The Very Best of The Who."
It's been a while since I researched this, but IIRC research is allowed under the ABM treaties, it's just deployment of a missle defense that's prohibited.
I expect that we'll just ignore the treaty and deploy, if Congress thinks it's to our stratigic advantage - the US generally has little respect for international law or treaties. (Unless of course some major campain contributor stands to gain.)
1) Unisys pulled a "bait and switch" by allowing free use for so long, then trying to enforce the patent. I have to wonder if this would hold up in court; I know that you can not allow a trademark to linger like that. Is there an IP equivalent to squatter's rights?
2) Patents - most especially software patents - have nothing to do with the free market; they are artifical inventions of the state.
But if it comforts you, consider the current outrage part of the market adjusting. Feel better?
Re:Puhleze. Earth Does Not Revolve Around the Vall
on
The New, New, Thing
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· Score: 2
Isn't the whole point of the Net that the world no longer "revolves" around any geographical location? If the Valley doesn't make itself obsolete, it's a failure. Any place with a reasonably fast data connection is just as centered as any other.
For instance: my first job out of grad school was at a company called TIS (Trusted Information Systems). They're located in the countryside about a half-hour outside of Baltimore; there was a horse pasture right next door. The power tended to go out when there was a good storm (machines were of course well-UPSed) and if we got a good snow, we shut down.
That office was the original location of whitehouse.gov, and developed the FireWall Tool Kit and the Gauntlet firewall. (I wasn't involved in any of those projects, BTW.) Not bad for a company in the middle of nowhere.
On the other hand, they did eventually get bought out by California-based Network Accociates.
I've suggested on several occaisons that "thaumaturg" would be expressive
I'm looking for a job that will let me claim "TechnoMage" as my title. Maybe I'll put that on the business cards for my side consulting work - "Infamous Productions - Tom Swiss, proprietor and Chief TechnoMage."
I've also seen "Speaker to Teletypes" and "Head Robot Wrangeler" in people's.sigs.
In fact, it will be possible to run multiple UNIX environments at once. If desired, each user can be given a UNIX system that they fully control and adminster, without compromising the security of the other UNIX environments on the machine.
Trusted Mach had something like this - the idea was that not only could you have multiple Unix environments running, you could simultaneously have Dos/Windows, OS/2 (this was around 1993-96), etcetera. Some cool ideas, but the project never really went anywhere; TIS ramped it down shortly after going public.
but historically Linux has had a rather mediocre TCP/IP stack,
That was certainly true in the early days...it's gotten better, but I understand that *BSD still does outperform Linux a little in this department. But...
with problems that force workarounds on systems that need to connect to a Linux host.
And what workarounds would these be, pray tell? I've connected to Linux boxes from Solaris, HP-UX, Macs, Windows, and AIX - were all these OS vendors nice enough to put "workarounds" in so they could talk to Linux boxen? That's especially remarkable on those systems released before Linux got big.
If I was ever to consider an offshore account, it wouldn't be from tax concerns - while I dislike the income tax for its privacy invasiveness, USAmericans pay low taxes compared to other nations. (Though there are still many changes I'd like to see - a general shift towards consumption taxes, raise the taxes on capital gains for absentee ownership and other forms of unearned income while cutting payroll taxes, and direct tax credits (rather than deductions) for charitable contributions, among others. But I ain't holding my breath.)
If I had substantial assests, I'd be using them to make myself a royal pain in the ass to the powers that be. I'd therefore be concerned about making someone's shit list and having the hammer of civil forfeiture - whereby the state can take anything and everything you own without even charging you with a crime, much allowing you a trial by a jury - directed against me.
I'd say that a book where you know something is going to follow the ending, but you don't know what, corresponds pretty well to reality. Stuck here in reality, we don't know what's going to happen next. A realistic story should give the impression that events of some sort or another will continue to occur.
Unless maybe your story ends at the Omega Point like Charles Sheffield's strange and interesting Tommorrow and Tomorrow, though I guess even that has room for a sequal of sorts.
Knuth is the author of the Art of Computer Programming books, which are required textbooks in many CD programs. He created the groundbreaking computer typesetting system TeX. His work with a text/code system called the Web (no, not the WWW) basicly started the "literate programming" movement. And he seems to be an all around smart and articulate guy.
So when Donald Knuth talks, people listen. Shame he's infected with that Christian meme, though... B-) (ducks objects thrown from/.'s Xian section, dons asbestos longjohns)
Searches for pr0n, sex, nude wouldn't do me any good. Sex and nudity aren't enough for me, there HAS to be petrification.
Off topic, but...ya know, I never cease to be amazed at the wonderful diversity of human sexual response! Gives hope to us all - if there's people out there turned on by petrification, there's just got to be a woman who finds my look sexy...
Anyway, no pointers but good luck in your search. (Just so long as you don't start going around actually coating real live girls with quick-dry cement.)
And your point is...? Yeah, I have a slightly goofy bio page at my site; my resume is also up there (although it needs an update), do you want to copy that to/. instead of providing a link, too? (And you could have at least preserved the paragraph breaks...)
If you find the tone a little too egoistic, I think you missed the punchline:
This page almost undoubtedly makes him sound more interesting than he really is.
Now does this have anything to do with my request for proof about "anybody can find out anything about anybody", or are you just feeling cranky?
Yes, I thought the Programmer's Stone was mostly old ground; some of the presentation was new, but most of it was much more obfuscated than it needs to be. This new stuff seems even more obfuscated; I'm reminded of an old Calvin and Hobbes cartoon about how "the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog!"
Oh, and the diagram under the "M0" page use yellow text on a white background! I mean, c'mon...
Re:Somebody please post the article here.
on
Sir Arthur Speaks
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· Score: 3
Use login cypherpunks01, password cypherpunks01. Or cypherpunks02, etcetera. Someone mentioned in another thread that there are over a hundred "cypherpunksN accounts on the NYT site.
Look, I gotta wonder: why the hell is everyone so concerned about privacy? I ask because it's a losing battle: anyone can find out what they want about you, period.
If anyone says otherwise, they're a liar.
Do you really think that's true? Ok - prove it! Post the following information about me:
driver's licence number
VISA number
ATM PIN
vehicle tag number
vehicle serial number
contents of my last grocery purchase
contents of the last prescription I had filled
names of the last three women I dated
title of the last book I finished reading (or, any of the books I'm currently reading will do)
Where is your damn problem with getting TARGETED ads? They can't kill you or anything, they can just make your life easier if they show you stuff in your interest!
Ah, I see your corporate masters have programmed you well.
Let me let you in on a few things they might not have told you, though. Ads are not in my interest. If I was interested in buying something right now, I'd be at eBay or Amazon, not Slashdot. Ads are targeted at getting me interested in something I'm not interested in.
The purpose of advertising is to influence behavioral choices. Targeted advertising is meant to be a more effective means of influencing behavioral choices. Some of us would prefer not to be programmed in this manner.
Also, non-text attached cookies serve a higher purpose than to target the banner ads.
A higher purpose?! What could it be? Do GIF cookies feed the starving, house the poor, fight for Truth, Justice, and the Open Source Way? Oh, shoot, they just help with statistics. And they don't even do a good job of that since you don't know how many users have cookies off, deleted, or filtered!
What do you want, to kill all your favorite websites? To kill the whole web as it exists right now?
Well, there was a WWW before there were banner ads, you know? (There was even an Internet before the WWW! Really, it's true!) And the banner ad seems to be dying. If it goes away, something else will take its place - maybe PBS style memberships, maybe affiliate programs, maybe sponsored links.
But that aside, you don't need to track me to show me an ad! TV doesn't. Radio doesn't. Billboards don't. I am perfectly anonymous when I ignore those ads. I prefer to also be anonymous when I ignore banner ads.
Slashdot Mirror
As far as the grade is concerned, I wonder if it wsa the written version or the oral presentation that was graded?
Or, maybe the day after tommorrow a few of the pissed-upon band together for mutual protection and stop the bullies.
Or, maybe parents and teachers come to understand that it's not a good idea to let kids piss on each other. (If you're consenting adults, of course, it's you're own damn business. Weird, but your own damn business.)
That's life too.
I have no numbers, but I think there's a section in Applied Cryptography that discusses some theoretical maximums of computing power. My copy's at home - anyone have theirs handy?
Massive corporations want you to buy their stuff. They spend money on advertising. The cost of advertizing is included in the cost you pay for their product. When you buy a can of Coca-Cola, part of what you pay goes to Coke's advertising budget; Coke buys advertising on UPN; UPN makes another season of Voyager. So you don't get to ogle Seven Of Nine(TM)[1]'s tits for free[2], no no no; you pay for it with every can of Coke, every Gateway computer, every new Toyota, whatever you see advertised.
There's also the fact that you are paying by allowing these companies to attempt to influence your buying decisions, but that's a more subtle topic.
([1] Yes, "TM", according to the Star Trek website. Bleh.
[2] No disrespect intended to Jeri Ryan. Much disrespect intended to whoever decided her character should dress like that.)
Cracking copy protection is an intellectual exercise that in and of itself has no ethical connotations - if anything, by increasing human knowledge (it is, after all, the solution of a mathematical problem) it could be considered ethically positive.
Using the solution to actually produce unauthorized copies can be ethically good (making backups for your own use), bad (massive pirating), or indifferent (making a mix tape for your friend).
The corporate state will keep trying to patch copyright law, but it's far too late. We need new systems to "promote the progress of science and useful arts," because current copyright and patent law just don't cut it in the face of modern tech.
(P.S. Let me point out that it is "copyright, as in the right to copy, not "copywright" or "copywrite" as has been often seen here on Slashdot. Thank you, enjoy the show.)
I guess the non-metric version would be "cycles" or "cycles per second", as I recall from old books and movies.
Which are just Hz under another name, but sound kinda cool - "Zounds! Professor, this interocitor is running at a speed of one million kilocycles! Surely it's the product of an advanced civilization!"
But diet doesn't cause the common cold or AIDS, and it's only one factor in cancer. And your recommndation of a high-fat, high-protein diet is completely bogus - that's what leads to increased cancer risk in the first place!
Complex carbohydrates are your friends. Go eat yer veggies.
Until we have plenty of understanding and experience - say, a century's worth or so - of the technology, GE crops should be grown under biohazard protocols.
I expect that we'll just ignore the treaty and deploy, if Congress thinks it's to our stratigic advantage - the US generally has little respect for international law or treaties. (Unless of course some major campain contributor stands to gain.)
1) Unisys pulled a "bait and switch" by allowing free use for so long, then trying to enforce the patent. I have to wonder if this would hold up in court; I know that you can not allow a trademark to linger like that. Is there an IP equivalent to squatter's rights?
2) Patents - most especially software patents - have nothing to do with the free market; they are artifical inventions of the state.
But if it comforts you, consider the current outrage part of the market adjusting. Feel better?
For instance: my first job out of grad school was at a company called TIS (Trusted Information Systems). They're located in the countryside about a half-hour outside of Baltimore; there was a horse pasture right next door. The power tended to go out when there was a good storm (machines were of course well-UPSed) and if we got a good snow, we shut down.
That office was the original location of whitehouse.gov, and developed the FireWall Tool Kit and the Gauntlet firewall. (I wasn't involved in any of those projects, BTW.) Not bad for a company in the middle of nowhere.
On the other hand, they did eventually get bought out by California-based Network Accociates.
I've also seen "Speaker to Teletypes" and "Head Robot Wrangeler" in people's .sigs.
If I had substantial assests, I'd be using them to make myself a royal pain in the ass to the powers that be. I'd therefore be concerned about making someone's shit list and having the hammer of civil forfeiture - whereby the state can take anything and everything you own without even charging you with a crime, much allowing you a trial by a jury - directed against me.
Unless maybe your story ends at the Omega Point like Charles Sheffield's strange and interesting Tommorrow and Tomorrow, though I guess even that has room for a sequal of sorts.
So when Donald Knuth talks, people listen. Shame he's infected with that Christian meme, though... B-) (ducks objects thrown from /.'s Xian section, dons asbestos longjohns)
Anyway, no pointers but good luck in your search. (Just so long as you don't start going around actually coating real live girls with quick-dry cement.)
If you find the tone a little too egoistic, I think you missed the punchline:
Now does this have anything to do with my request for proof about "anybody can find out anything about anybody", or are you just feeling cranky?
Oh, and the diagram under the "M0" page use yellow text on a white background! I mean, c'mon...
Use login cypherpunks01, password cypherpunks01. Or cypherpunks02, etcetera. Someone mentioned in another thread that there are over a hundred "cypherpunksN accounts on the NYT site.
Let me let you in on a few things they might not have told you, though. Ads are not in my interest. If I was interested in buying something right now, I'd be at eBay or Amazon, not Slashdot. Ads are targeted at getting me interested in something I'm not interested in.
The purpose of advertising is to influence behavioral choices. Targeted advertising is meant to be a more effective means of influencing behavioral choices. Some of us would prefer not to be programmed in this manner.
A higher purpose?! What could it be? Do GIF cookies feed the starving, house the poor, fight for Truth, Justice, and the Open Source Way? Oh, shoot, they just help with statistics. And they don't even do a good job of that since you don't know how many users have cookies off, deleted, or filtered! Well, there was a WWW before there were banner ads, you know? (There was even an Internet before the WWW! Really, it's true!) And the banner ad seems to be dying. If it goes away, something else will take its place - maybe PBS style memberships, maybe affiliate programs, maybe sponsored links.But that aside, you don't need to track me to show me an ad! TV doesn't. Radio doesn't. Billboards don't. I am perfectly anonymous when I ignore those ads. I prefer to also be anonymous when I ignore banner ads.