"whereas tracking and killing innocent animals on foot is just fine."
In the post-apocalyptic world that will soon be upon us, don't you come whining to my cave about not knowing how to hunt because you can't make your own damn tofu, you insensitive clod!
Hey, I like Macs. I think Apple rules the roost in the OS world, etc. But hey, reality check: SysAdmin Rule #1: If you depend on it, and it works fine the way it is, don't mess with it. [If it ain't broke...] SysAdmin Rule #2: If you want to mess with it, test it before deploying it.
Why the hell did people install a.0 release and expect that it would not be without bugs? I say if any sysadmins out there were silly enough to make a hasty upgrade before testing (ignoring the above caveats) they deserve the problems they're experiencing.
We waited to deploy WinXP until the first service pack was released--and that saved our ass. I think it's ignorant to ignore that principle on the Mac side as well--esp. with a major update.
Early adopters are unpaid beta testers. Congratulations--you found the bugs!
This is corporate America we are talking about--not freedom of speech. Their marketing people are all about "positive spin" for everything. They're profiteers cashing in on a new fangled fad where you're nothing but an emerging market demographic.
You must be smoking crack if you even thought your negative comment would go unchecked on a large corporation's website.
Now, it would be nice to live in a Utopian world where people are treated fairly, corporations aren't greedy, and their products don't have (ahem) "quality control issues." But, seriously, dude-- you're either a very young, starry-eyed, idealist or you live on another planet, cuz that ain't the way of capitalism.
You're generation next sucker--where you wallet is the target of all things corporate. Check your ethics and egalitarian notions at the door.
For the price of a *properly outfitted Mini plus the price of this little widget, you could just get either an iBook or maybe even an entry level iMac G5. I'm not saying this isn't filling someone's niche out there, but for the lion's share of users, you might as well get a better processor or go portable if you're starting to get into that kind of spending. But, if your needs are matched up to a Mini (i.e., tight spaces, etc.), then I can see this widget being useful. Otherwise, I think it's more of an accessory than a necessity.
YMMV.
*by properly outfitted, I mean a machine that will likely be using those extra ports, etc.-- 1.42 GHZ, superdrive, and 1GB RAM. That, of course, is disputable. If you have to buy a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, then you're really spending some money. Oh, don't forget the "AppleCare" (you might need it!) Now you're looking at ~$1,250.00 (give or take).
Our University changed this particular item for just these reasons. We don't use SSNs as identifiers for anything but taxes for those getting paid.
Still, that information *IS* in the system--if you're getting a paycheck.
However, if a cracker gets in deep enough, he's going to have enough information about a given set of users to be dangerous.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone who works at a university. There are several mitigating factors that make this sort of intrusion inevitable.
Here's why:
Unlike private companies, universities are difficult places to enforce security policies because PhDs feel that these policies somehow inhibit their freedoms or that the rules shouldn't apply to them. Profs and researchers each get their own computer money and they build their own little networks, server farms, and have their own methods. Because they often want to share their servers with other univerisities, they are usually not behind a firewall and/or given address space that is world addressable.
This usually creates a perfect place for intrusion--lack of cohesive security policy, machines that are run by novice sysadmins, and a really fat uplink the net.
To make things worse, the networks on campuses are generally a hodge-podge of technologies and topologies that have been piece-mealed together like some kind of electric crazy quilt. You might have aging border router equipment, old hubstacks with vulnerabilities in their management utilities, random unmanaged/non-seucre wireless networks in the dorms or offices, etc--a nice untraceable uplink to your LAN.
Managing the security for these networks is almost impossible unless the entire infrastructure has been updated--which costs millions of dollars that universities do not likely to spend (at least not without a major campaign).
All of these computers--Macs, PCs, Linux, Solaris, etc., have no real security policy, they're poorly managed by amatures, and they have a network with no real firewall. Talk about a honeypot!
Each node on this honeynet is now a prime place for root kit installations. They lie in wait for someone to log in to the right systems and, voila--a password and userid. A keylogger records a legit log-in. Now your cracker is using one of the unmanaged nodes on your network to have his way with your student/employee information system.
If any university has a better system, I think they're in the minority. Hopefully, this will change. But until then, the inmates run the asylum.
"...Paramount Network Television and the producers of Star Trek: Enterprise are very flattered and impressed by the fans' passionate outpouring of attention for the show and their efforts to raise funds to continue the show's production...."
Means: "Your pathetic attempt to subvert our decision to find more lucrative programming is laughable. We will be cancelling the show because you don't really matter when we can be making shitloads more money with a show that targets the MTV demographic. Have a nice day, you pathetic geeks."
It's a simple matter of economics--they want to make money selling shitty brainless programming. They're not interested in quality or cult status.
Actually, the "dictionary" definition of opera is a little too sterile to make the connection.
Lucas's movies are very much like operas--the music is used very much like the leitmotif in the Wagner operas (Das Reingold, Die Walkure, Tannhauser, etc.) where each character has their own musical motif. William's scores, in fact, take much of their musical style from Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky, Prokovief, and Shostakovich. In fact, I've found sections that were almost verbatim to pieces from each of the above! But I digress.
The Opera connection, I think, are linked with 3 things:
1) Music--the music is very neo-Romantic in style and firmly achored as a strong story-telling device. It simply would not be what it is if it didn't have such a strong score. However, I'd say the original 3 scores were the better of the 6 and that the latter have lost their operatic flavor.
2) Characters--each character is very close to the opera architypes and they each have a role in unfolding a tragedy and a triumph.
3) The Story--much like Wagners's Ring Cycle and unlike most movies, is one that spans generations and a universal good-versus-evil theme.
And don't forget, before we had movies, we had Opera and theatre. Even theatre was accompanied by live musicians. The difference was that opera was sung and theatre was not. But given the strong role of the Star Wars musical score, I would definitely say it leans more toward opera that it would if the music was more incidental or "mood" setting.
I work at a small private university with Ivy League educated faculty. These are not dumb people--well, not in their own fields. But, get them outside their comfort zone, and they're just as dumb as anyone.
Recent ID10T errors on my watch:
User: There are invisible folders and files in this folder. What happened to them? Me: Hmmm. Let me see...scroll up a bit? User: There they are! F*ck me! (repeating)
User: I'm not sure what to do... Me: Ok, right click on the... User:...wait, is that my right your right?
User: My mail client is losing my e-mail! Me: Really? Let me see... User: See--it says I have new mail but it isn't here Me: OK, sort them by date instead of subject User: Wow! You're magical.
If users ever take a few moments to learn how to use their software, my job will be in danger.
-You spend 6-8 week in line for movie tickets to Star Wars and no one at work really misses you. -While you're in line, your mom is just glad to have your ass out of the house so she can fumigate your room. -In your zeal to be "first" (you're probably the same geeks that post "first post" trolls on/.), you overlook the possibility that this theatre may not premiere your beloved movie. -Even slashdotters make fun of you.
-If your barber needs to use "Gumout" before cutting. -If that smell from behind your ear reminds you of "Cheetos." -If your laundry is piled in the categories "wear again," "throw away," or "get mom to wash." -If you can't read the letters on your keyboard because they're covered with a sebaceous tar. -If your dandruff shampoo bottle quakes with fear as you reach for it. -If your complexion reminds you of a field of gopher holes stuffed with mashed potatoes. -If your clothes contain the stains of every known donut filling, pizza sauce, and Jolt Cola.
-If you've ever tried to explain the difference between a "cracker" and a "hacker" to anyone -If your tan comes exclusively from CRT radiation. -If you've ever been used by a woman for your "computer hacking skills" rather than your nunchuck or bow hunting skills. -If you downloaded the leaked copy of the new "Dr. Who" show.
-If you pronounce unix commands -If you get agitated everytime you hear someone use the term "information super highway." -When you heard the Ricky Martin song, "She Bangs" you thought "#!" -If you think the GUI was the downfall of computing. -If you consider reading "the news" is going to "Slashdot." -If you've ever used the words "grep," "sed," and "awk" in a sentence. -If you've ever been in a heated debate with someone over "vi" versus "emacs." -If you just picked one of the above. -If you know who RMS is. -If you've ever looked at a household appliance and wondered, "Can I install minix on that?" -If your sp3llin9 b3ginz to l00k l1k3 th1$. -If your entire wardrobe is made up of IT vendor T-Shirts. -If you have ever attended a LAN party but left because they didn't have a gigabit switch. -If you've ever attended a movie opening in costume. -If you own a Batleth or know someone who does. -If you've ever uttered a word in Klingon. -If you've ever argued with someone regarding Kirk or Picard being the better Captain. -If you can name more than 3 planets in the Star Wars movies. -If you're not offended by the term "BitchX" -If you know what a "Tardis" is. -If you've ever dressed as a Sci-Fi/Fantasy character at a Rennaissance Festival. -Actually, if you dressed up as anything at a RenFest. -If you kept a journal of all the things changed or left out of the Tolkien novels while watching the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy. -If you've ever used "geek code" in your e-mail signatures -If the value of your comic book collection exceeds your annual income. -If you attend any sort of convention plugged on Slashdot.....you might be a card-carrying hard core geek.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
Whatever. Our brainiac bosses scheduled the IT picnic for that day. Talk about double jeopardy.
Today, on Slashdot.org, Michelle Delio was reported to have said, "Hey, screw you, you marauding horde of rumor mongering socialist geeks!"
...or maybe I made that up.
It's on now, girl!
"whereas tracking and killing innocent animals on foot is just fine."
In the post-apocalyptic world that will soon be upon us, don't you come whining to my cave about not knowing how to hunt because you can't make your own damn tofu, you insensitive clod!
Hey, I like Macs. I think Apple rules the roost in the OS world, etc. But hey, reality check:
.0 release and expect that it would not be without bugs? I say if any sysadmins out there were silly enough to make a hasty upgrade before testing (ignoring the above caveats) they deserve the problems they're experiencing.
SysAdmin Rule #1: If you depend on it, and it works fine the way it is, don't mess with it. [If it ain't broke...]
SysAdmin Rule #2: If you want to mess with it, test it before deploying it.
Why the hell did people install a
We waited to deploy WinXP until the first service pack was released--and that saved our ass. I think it's ignorant to ignore that principle on the Mac side as well--esp. with a major update.
Early adopters are unpaid beta testers. Congratulations--you found the bugs!
The marketing jargon in that blurb made my head spin! I'm still not sure what it means but it sounds good...I think.
This is corporate America we are talking about--not freedom of speech. Their marketing people are all about "positive spin" for everything. They're profiteers cashing in on a new fangled fad where you're nothing but an emerging market demographic.
You must be smoking crack if you even thought your negative comment would go unchecked on a large corporation's website.
Now, it would be nice to live in a Utopian world where people are treated fairly, corporations aren't greedy, and their products don't have (ahem) "quality control issues." But, seriously, dude-- you're either a very young, starry-eyed, idealist or you live on another planet, cuz that ain't the way of capitalism.
You're generation next sucker--where you wallet is the target of all things corporate. Check your ethics and egalitarian notions at the door.
I'm not bitter--I live in Houston: Home of Enron!
For the price of a *properly outfitted Mini plus the price of this little widget, you could just get either an iBook or maybe even an entry level iMac G5. I'm not saying this isn't filling someone's niche out there, but for the lion's share of users, you might as well get a better processor or go portable if you're starting to get into that kind of spending. But, if your needs are matched up to a Mini (i.e., tight spaces, etc.), then I can see this widget being useful. Otherwise, I think it's more of an accessory than a necessity.
YMMV.
*by properly outfitted, I mean a machine that will likely be using those extra ports, etc.-- 1.42 GHZ, superdrive, and 1GB RAM. That, of course, is disputable. If you have to buy a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, then you're really spending some money. Oh, don't forget the "AppleCare" (you might need it!) Now you're looking at ~$1,250.00 (give or take).
Our University changed this particular item for just these reasons. We don't use SSNs as identifiers for anything but taxes for those getting paid. Still, that information *IS* in the system--if you're getting a paycheck. However, if a cracker gets in deep enough, he's going to have enough information about a given set of users to be dangerous.
This really shouldn't surprise anyone who works at a university. There are several mitigating factors that make this sort of intrusion inevitable.
Here's why:
Unlike private companies, universities are difficult places to enforce security policies because PhDs feel that these policies somehow inhibit their freedoms or that the rules shouldn't apply to them. Profs and researchers each get their own computer money and they build their own little networks, server farms, and have their own methods. Because they often want to share their servers with other univerisities, they are usually not behind a firewall and/or given address space that is world addressable.
This usually creates a perfect place for intrusion--lack of cohesive security policy, machines that are run by novice sysadmins, and a really fat uplink the net.
To make things worse, the networks on campuses are generally a hodge-podge of technologies and topologies that have been piece-mealed together like some kind of electric crazy quilt. You might have aging border router equipment, old hubstacks with vulnerabilities in their management utilities, random unmanaged/non-seucre wireless networks in the dorms or offices, etc--a nice untraceable uplink to your LAN.
Managing the security for these networks is almost impossible unless the entire infrastructure has been updated--which costs millions of dollars that universities do not likely to spend (at least not without a major campaign).
All of these computers--Macs, PCs, Linux, Solaris, etc., have no real security policy, they're poorly managed by amatures, and they have a network with no real firewall. Talk about a honeypot!
Each node on this honeynet is now a prime place for root kit installations. They lie in wait for someone to log in to the right systems and, voila--a password and userid. A keylogger records a legit log-in. Now your cracker is using one of the unmanaged nodes on your network to have his way with your student/employee information system.
If any university has a better system, I think they're in the minority. Hopefully, this will change. But until then, the inmates run the asylum.
...How fast will it get me to Spacely Space Sprockets?
The power of the darkside is very seductive, young Jedi.
You're not hired by The Borg, you're assimilated...resistance is futile. Accept this eventuality.
Incredi-bull!
It looks like my resume!!
"...Paramount Network Television and the producers of Star Trek: Enterprise are very flattered and impressed by the fans' passionate outpouring of attention for the show and their efforts to raise funds to continue the show's production...."
Means: "Your pathetic attempt to subvert our decision to find more lucrative programming is laughable. We will be cancelling the show because you don't really matter when we can be making shitloads more money with a show that targets the MTV demographic. Have a nice day, you pathetic geeks."
It's a simple matter of economics--they want to make money selling shitty brainless programming. They're not interested in quality or cult status.
Actually, the "dictionary" definition of opera is a little too sterile to make the connection.
Lucas's movies are very much like operas--the music is used very much like the leitmotif in the Wagner operas (Das Reingold, Die Walkure, Tannhauser, etc.) where each character has their own musical motif. William's scores, in fact, take much of their musical style from Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky, Prokovief, and Shostakovich. In fact, I've found sections that were almost verbatim to pieces from each of the above! But I digress.
The Opera connection, I think, are linked with 3 things:
1) Music--the music is very neo-Romantic in style and firmly achored as a strong story-telling device. It simply would not be what it is if it didn't have such a strong score. However, I'd say the original 3 scores were the better of the 6 and that the latter have lost their operatic flavor.
2) Characters--each character is very close to the opera architypes and they each have a role in unfolding a tragedy and a triumph.
3) The Story--much like Wagners's Ring Cycle and unlike most movies, is one that spans generations and a universal good-versus-evil theme.
And don't forget, before we had movies, we had Opera and theatre. Even theatre was accompanied by live musicians. The difference was that opera was sung and theatre was not. But given the strong role of the Star Wars musical score, I would definitely say it leans more toward opera that it would if the music was more incidental or "mood" setting.
I'm sure Emma Bunton will be very pleased.
I'm sure you can really appreciate the irony of the story's title, then?
;-)
"Al Gore Invents Intenet TV"
I work at a small private university with Ivy League educated faculty. These are not dumb people--well, not in their own fields. But, get them outside their comfort zone, and they're just as dumb as anyone.
...wait, is that my right your right?
Recent ID10T errors on my watch:
User: There are invisible folders and files in this folder. What happened to them?
Me: Hmmm. Let me see...scroll up a bit?
User: There they are! F*ck me! (repeating)
User: I'm not sure what to do...
Me: Ok, right click on the...
User:
User: My mail client is losing my e-mail!
Me: Really? Let me see...
User: See--it says I have new mail but it isn't here
Me: OK, sort them by date instead of subject
User: Wow! You're magical.
If users ever take a few moments to learn how to use their software, my job will be in danger.
-You spend 6-8 week in line for movie tickets to Star Wars and no one at work really misses you. /.), you overlook the possibility that this theatre may not premiere your beloved movie.
-While you're in line, your mom is just glad to have your ass out of the house so she can fumigate your room.
-In your zeal to be "first" (you're probably the same geeks that post "first post" trolls on
-Even slashdotters make fun of you.
I wonder if it will make that cool boopity sound like Steve Austin's Six Million Dollar eye did?
[For the record--I have no idea WTF that music is in that sound byte!]
By public demand:
You might be a geek if:
-If your barber needs to use "Gumout" before cutting.
-If that smell from behind your ear reminds you of "Cheetos."
-If your laundry is piled in the categories "wear again," "throw away," or "get mom to wash."
-If you can't read the letters on your keyboard because they're covered with a sebaceous tar.
-If your dandruff shampoo bottle quakes with fear as you reach for it.
-If your complexion reminds you of a field of gopher holes stuffed with mashed potatoes.
-If your clothes contain the stains of every known donut filling, pizza sauce, and Jolt Cola.
those aren't funny... ...ok, so maybe "naming your right hand" is funny.
regards,
catdevnull & "Jackhammer"
dude...your geek light is showing ;-)
YOU MIGHT BE A GEEK IF:
:)
-If you've ever tried to explain the difference between a "cracker" and a "hacker" to anyone
-If your tan comes exclusively from CRT radiation.
-If you've ever been used by a woman for your "computer hacking skills" rather than your nunchuck or bow hunting skills.
-If you downloaded the leaked copy of the new "Dr. Who" show.
--I'll write more
YOU MIGHT BE A GEEK:
....you might be a card-carrying hard core geek. :-)
-If you pronounce unix commands
-If you get agitated everytime you hear someone use the term "information super highway."
-When you heard the Ricky Martin song, "She Bangs" you thought "#!"
-If you think the GUI was the downfall of computing.
-If you consider reading "the news" is going to "Slashdot."
-If you've ever used the words "grep," "sed," and "awk" in a sentence.
-If you've ever been in a heated debate with someone over "vi" versus "emacs."
-If you just picked one of the above.
-If you know who RMS is.
-If you've ever looked at a household appliance and wondered, "Can I install minix on that?"
-If your sp3llin9 b3ginz to l00k l1k3 th1$.
-If your entire wardrobe is made up of IT vendor T-Shirts.
-If you have ever attended a LAN party but left because they didn't have a gigabit switch.
-If you've ever attended a movie opening in costume.
-If you own a Batleth or know someone who does.
-If you've ever uttered a word in Klingon.
-If you've ever argued with someone regarding Kirk or Picard being the better Captain.
-If you can name more than 3 planets in the Star Wars movies.
-If you're not offended by the term "BitchX"
-If you know what a "Tardis" is.
-If you've ever dressed as a Sci-Fi/Fantasy character at a Rennaissance Festival.
-Actually, if you dressed up as anything at a RenFest.
-If you kept a journal of all the things changed or left out of the Tolkien novels while watching the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.
-If you've ever used "geek code" in your e-mail signatures
-If the value of your comic book collection exceeds your annual income.
-If you attend any sort of convention plugged on Slashdot.