In related news, the Government of India just announced that anyone with Bitcoins must bring them in to be exchanged for "miniBitcoins" worth 1/10 the value or else they will expire next Tuesday.
Really, you think that it's easy to update the iOS for an entire previous generation of phone hardware and keep the full thing working, just to be able to add a slowdown-feature to a small part of the battery / power management algorithms to make people want to upgrade?
I see. So they intentionally spend many, many man-years to build in extra functionality to slow down your phone while upgrading all sorts of other features, when they could've just stopped supporting it altogether like other phone makers do, to get you to upgrade? They really are clever and devious!
If Apple cares so little about supporting users on older phones, why does it put so much time into designing OSes that are compatible with its older phones for years longer than competitors do? Hm?
I know it's fun to play the conspiracy game and blame a big company, but do you think they would be bothering to spend years on this stuff if they were trying to disable your phone? There are easier ways to do it, just stop writing iOS updates for out of date equipment. But they don't, they keep supporting it, years after other manufacturers or OS teams would.
If they don't believe the phones are secure and are telling carriers not to sell them, why not just go all the way and ban their importation and operation on US networks as a national security matter?
This is why the utopia of a democratized internet of citizen reporters and transparency is a false hope. As much as you'd like to believe in such a future, we need *authorities* and institutions to do the work (yes, hard work) to determine what is truth and have some objective standards.
Uninformed crowds voting for what they believe sounds correct or newsworthy (or worse, what's just trendy or fun, no intellectual effort required) leads to very damaging scams and fake news flying around like a virus on an unvaccinated population.
Smart governments know that information is not just something that can be left to figure itself out at the whim of the crowd.
I've always been curious to know how people who are face-blind find other people attractive? As depicted in biology texts, they basically perceive faces as gray nondescript blurs. Do they have any attraction to faces at all, or what takes the place of this? It certainly opens the interesting notion of a group of people who are foreclosed from being as facially superficial as most people are...
"...Original manufacturers of digital electronic products sold on or after January 1, 2019, in Washington state are prohibited from designing or manufacturing digital electronic products in such a way as to prevent reasonable diagnostic or repair functions by an independent repair provider. Preventing reasonable diagnostic or repair functions includes permanently affixing a battery in a manner that makes it difficult or impossible to remove...."
None of the phone makers do this. As it is now, their batteries are not permanently affixed, nor are they difficult or impossible to remove. You can see this for yourself by the copious self-repair videos on Youtube.
So. What does this bill accomplish?
In addition, all it does is require manufacturers to make available manuals, parts, etc. to independent repairers for the same price as made available to its own outlets. What prevents the manufacturer from charging $1M for the manual?
These pieces of legislation are pointless and just symbolic.
Well, people have the same kind of complaint that luxury hotels charge their customers for wifi access (who are already paying top $ for the room). It's a price discrimination, willingness to pay thing.
Separately, BMW is falling way behind in awareness of consumer preferences for technology. They're relegating the product ownership of this stuff to a stepchild, while consumers are actually viewing it one of the core experiences of driving now. This is a mistake.
Well, aside from the idiocy of many in the American public being anti-intellectual false populists... I would venture to say that in fact, most of our policy problems are not problems that an individual's incrementally higher IQ is needed to solve. We're not stymied by cold fusion or quantum tunneling or something like that. Our problems are social, not scientific.
I suppose this the the banks (hubs of the financial world) being made to detect money laundering by the pattern and size / frequency of money transfers. They don't know about the source or nature of the transaction underlying the money, just that when it obeys certain flows, they're supposed to flag it.
When exactly does it become obstruction of justice? After you're informed and instructed not to interfere with an investigation? Or before?
If you delete a file on your laptop in the course of a normal day that no police is interested in, clearly that cannot be obstruction of justice. Even if 2 weeks later someone tells you that file was relevant to some investigation.
If you actively push a police investigator with a valid warrant away from your computer and type a command to erase the laptop, clearly that could be called obstruction of justice.
Now, how about if you erase your file after you read in the news that your general industry is being investigated for some wrongdoing? How about as you see the police pull up to your house? They haven't given you any notice that your files are of interest to "justice". How about as they knock on the door?
Kids in other countries live and die to get into college by standardized test scores on really actually tough exams, while here in the US, we seem to have a fetish for removing any sort of criteria that makes kids feel bad, puts up "barriers" to opportunity, or treats some people differently from others.
There's some lesson to be learned in there, but I'm not sure yet what it is.
This is outrageous that Apple is rolling out some software update to "help" our processors function better without asking us! I demand to be asked whether I want this software fix to be implemented, because it makes my processor work slower! I want to do this myself. Apple sucks and don't get me started on batteries.
I quote for Slashdot posterity a long and informative piece of relevant information from many years ago,
because I fear it's disappearing from the web:
> From: Peter G. Neumann [Neumann@SRI-CSL.ARPA]
> For those of you who haven't heard, the Challenger blew up this morning...
> One unvoiced concern from the RISKS point of view is the presence on each
> shuttle of a semi-automatic self-destruct mechanism. Hopefully that
> mechanism cannot be accidentally triggered. [COMMENT: I did not intend to imply that as the cause -- only to raise concern about the safety of such mechanisms. PGN]
Peter, I assume that you are talking about the Range Safety Command Destruct
System, which is used to destroy errant missiles launched from Cape Canaveral.
From 1980 to 1983 I was the lead programmer/analyst on the ground portions of
that system, and I am the primary author of the software which translates the
closing of destruct switches into the RF destruct signals sent to the vehicle.
I think I can address the question of whether the system can be accidentally
triggered; worrying about that gave me nightmares off and on for months
while I was on the project. I'd like to tell you a little about the system
and why I think the answer is No. Note that my information is now three years
old, and some details may have changed; there may also be minor errors in
detail due to lapses in my memory, which isn't as good as my computer's!
On board the vehicle, there are five destruct receivers: one on the external
tank (ET) and two on each of the solid rocket boosters (SRBs). There is no
receiver or destruct ordnance on the Orbiter; it is effectively just an
airplane. The casing of each SRB is mined with HMX, a high explosive; the ET
contains a small pyrotechnic device which causes its load of liquid hydrogen
and liquid oxygen to combine and combust. The receivers and explosives are
connected such that the receipt of four proper ARM sequences followed by
a proper FIRE sequence by any of the receivers will explode the ordnance.
The ARM sequence and FIRE sequence must come from the ground; they cannot be
generated aboard the vehicle. These sequences are transmitted on a frequency
which is reserved, at all times, for this purpose and this purpose alone.
There are several transmitters around the Eastern Test Range which can be used
to transmit the codes. These transmitters have a power of 10 kw (continuous
wave). The ARM and FIRE sequences consist of thirteen tone pairs (different
for each command and changed for each launch). There are eight possible
tones, resulting in 28 possible tone pairs; thus, there are (28^13) or
slightly over 6.5E18 correct sequences.
The Range Safety Officer has two switches labeled "ARM" and "DESTRUCT".
When he throws a switch, it generates an interrupt in the central processor
(there are actually two central processors running and receiving all inputs,
but only one is on-line at any time; in case of software or hardware error
the backup is switched in. And yes, they have different power sources.)
The central program checks for the correct code on each of two different
hardware lines (the correct code is different for each line); if correct,
and all criteria are met to allow the sequence to be sent, the central program
requests the tone pairs for that sequence from another processor. That
processor (like everything else in the system, actually redundant processors)
has only one function: to store and deliver those tone pairs. The processor
resides in a special vault and can only be accessed in order to program the
tone pairs (which are highly classified) before each launch. The data line
between the central processor and the storage processor is
This is outrageous that Apple is rolling out some software update to "help" our processors function better without asking us! I demand to be asked whether I want this software fix to be implemented, because it makes my processor work slower! Apple sucks and don't get me started on batteries.
I am in principle in favor of more stringent voter ID laws, if we could disentangle them from the silly issues that they're being used (I agree) for voter suppression. I lay blame on people using it as an aggression on voters, but also those voters who can't manage to get it done. Knowing who voted, with certainty, is something you would think is part of the system.
I just really don't understand how you can be a functioning member of society and not have managed to get an identification card once in your life that is sufficient proof of identity. Is it really that much of a burden, once every 10 years to get your drivers license / ID card? If these are the people we're relying on to participate in public life and be informed, we're in bad shape judging by how they can't even have time to manage to get an ID card. I'm serious in an earnest way, if someone doesn't even have time / ability to get an ID card, they are really in bad shape.
I guess the thing to do would be for Republicans to propose that every state / locality have outreach days where everyone has a really easy opportunity to sign up for ID, and then require it from then on. I mean, how long do we have to give people the excuse that they can't get an ID?
I recall a few years ago (maybe 10 years?) during the GWB election, that there was an elegant proposal by voting researchers on how giving each voter someone else's anonymized receipt / code to check online via a website later was a very simple method that could audit the results with just a few % of people doing the checking. And people checking get the satisfaction of being part of the system, and/or maybe being rewarded if they find a mistake.
Does anyone else recall this method?
It sounds kind of like the method in China where, to help ensure that people ask for sales receipts and make everyone pay tax -- by looking afterwards for their receipt being a winning lottery ticket on the national website.
So here's the uncomfortable thing about virtual currencies... If there's no bank to authorize transactions or impose sanctions or prevent cash from moving, how do you stop North Korea, or criminals, or terrorists, from using it as a way to get around laws? I feel this will become an increasing problem for these currencies... The only way would be for banks to refuse to put in or withdraw money from accounts related to cryptocurrencies?
And how about the phone's cloud backup of the app's content, that the government probably insisted that they have access to as part of the phone manufacturer being allowed to do business in China?
Just to be clear, there's nothing physically significant or different about a "blue moon". It's just a calendar thing where the moon appearing full (every 28 days) happened to fall twice within 31 days of a calendar month. "THIS IS A ONCE IN A 150 YEAR EVENT!" is kind of a dumb thing to emphasize (but I guess if it gets people to watch who didn't know before, then I suppose it's worth something, if a little "markety"). A blue moon happens every single month with *some* phase of the moon...
And the statement, "... The eclipse will take place during the middle of the night..." is kind of a no-brainer. *Every* astronomical event takes place during the middle of the night on Earth somewhere! Maybe it could've been more informatively stated "since lunar eclipses are only visible to the parts of of the Earth facing towards the moon and away from the sun, people in Asia, Hawaii, Australia, India, etc. will get the best view."
The reason so many people find the downfall and disgrace of this company so satisfying is that it symbolizes the just retribution of the market / facts against a company that:
- was based on hype and deception
- punished its employees for speaking the truth
- had access to capital and investment that others with more legitimate products didn't, only on account of its founder's connections
- was so tied to the idea of an idealistic successful woman CEO that they were willing to take shortcuts and sell that more as the product instead
And here is another investor throwing $100m after the bad, hoping to pick something from the scraps. If there's a quicker way to lose $100m, I would be surprised.
Slashdot Mirror
In related news, the Government of India just announced that anyone with Bitcoins must bring them in to be exchanged for "miniBitcoins" worth 1/10 the value or else they will expire next Tuesday.
So, what does this mean for the whole life insurance industry then? Their whole business model is charging people more as they get older.
Really, you think that it's easy to update the iOS for an entire previous generation of phone hardware and keep the full thing working, just to be able to add a slowdown-feature to a small part of the battery / power management algorithms to make people want to upgrade?
Cmon man, listen to your own bullshit...
I see. So they intentionally spend many, many man-years to build in extra functionality to slow down your phone while upgrading all sorts of other features, when they could've just stopped supporting it altogether like other phone makers do, to get you to upgrade? They really are clever and devious!
If Apple cares so little about supporting users on older phones, why does it put so much time into designing OSes that are compatible with its older phones for years longer than competitors do? Hm?
I know it's fun to play the conspiracy game and blame a big company, but do you think they would be bothering to spend years on this stuff if they were trying to disable your phone? There are easier ways to do it, just stop writing iOS updates for out of date equipment. But they don't, they keep supporting it, years after other manufacturers or OS teams would.
http://www.androidpolice.com/2...
Maybe do a little independent thought before signing onto the lazy conspiracy theory and jumping on the mindless bandwagon?
If they don't believe the phones are secure and are telling carriers not to sell them, why not just go all the way and ban their importation and operation on US networks as a national security matter?
This is why the utopia of a democratized internet of citizen reporters and transparency is a false hope. As much as you'd like to believe in such a future, we need *authorities* and institutions to do the work (yes, hard work) to determine what is truth and have some objective standards.
Uninformed crowds voting for what they believe sounds correct or newsworthy (or worse, what's just trendy or fun, no intellectual effort required) leads to very damaging scams and fake news flying around like a virus on an unvaccinated population.
Smart governments know that information is not just something that can be left to figure itself out at the whim of the crowd.
I've always been curious to know how people who are face-blind find other people attractive? As depicted in biology texts, they basically perceive faces as gray nondescript blurs. Do they have any attraction to faces at all, or what takes the place of this? It certainly opens the interesting notion of a group of people who are foreclosed from being as facially superficial as most people are...
"...Original manufacturers of digital electronic products sold on or after January 1, 2019, in Washington state are prohibited from designing or manufacturing digital electronic products in such a way as to prevent reasonable diagnostic or repair functions by an independent repair provider. Preventing reasonable diagnostic or repair functions includes permanently affixing a battery in a manner that makes it difficult or impossible to remove...."
None of the phone makers do this. As it is now, their batteries are not permanently affixed, nor are they difficult or impossible to remove. You can see this for yourself by the copious self-repair videos on Youtube.
So. What does this bill accomplish?
In addition, all it does is require manufacturers to make available manuals, parts, etc. to independent repairers for the same price as made available to its own outlets. What prevents the manufacturer from charging $1M for the manual?
These pieces of legislation are pointless and just symbolic.
Maybe if you've got a stalker watching who you swipe on Tinder, you should ask him/her out on a date instead? Problem solved.
Well, people have the same kind of complaint that luxury hotels charge their customers for wifi access (who are already paying top $ for the room). It's a price discrimination, willingness to pay thing.
Separately, BMW is falling way behind in awareness of consumer preferences for technology. They're relegating the product ownership of this stuff to a stepchild, while consumers are actually viewing it one of the core experiences of driving now. This is a mistake.
Hey, I heard that Blockchain is going to solve this problem! Where can I invest?
Well, aside from the idiocy of many in the American public being anti-intellectual false populists... I would venture to say that in fact, most of our policy problems are not problems that an individual's incrementally higher IQ is needed to solve. We're not stymied by cold fusion or quantum tunneling or something like that. Our problems are social, not scientific.
I suppose this the the banks (hubs of the financial world) being made to detect money laundering by the pattern and size / frequency of money transfers. They don't know about the source or nature of the transaction underlying the money, just that when it obeys certain flows, they're supposed to flag it.
When exactly does it become obstruction of justice? After you're informed and instructed not to interfere with an investigation? Or before?
If you delete a file on your laptop in the course of a normal day that no police is interested in, clearly that cannot be obstruction of justice. Even if 2 weeks later someone tells you that file was relevant to some investigation.
If you actively push a police investigator with a valid warrant away from your computer and type a command to erase the laptop, clearly that could be called obstruction of justice.
Now, how about if you erase your file after you read in the news that your general industry is being investigated for some wrongdoing? How about as you see the police pull up to your house? They haven't given you any notice that your files are of interest to "justice". How about as they knock on the door?
Where is the line drawn?
Kids in other countries live and die to get into college by standardized test scores on really actually tough exams, while here in the US, we seem to have a fetish for removing any sort of criteria that makes kids feel bad, puts up "barriers" to opportunity, or treats some people differently from others.
There's some lesson to be learned in there, but I'm not sure yet what it is.
This is outrageous that Apple is rolling out some software update to "help" our processors function better without asking us! I demand to be asked whether I want this software fix to be implemented, because it makes my processor work slower! I want to do this myself. Apple sucks and don't get me started on batteries.
I quote for Slashdot posterity a long and informative piece of relevant information from many years ago, because I fear it's disappearing from the web:
Reliability of Shuttle Destruct System [LONG]
"MARTIN J. MOORE" [mooremj@eglin-vax]
28 Jan 86 14:06:00 CDT
Copyright © 1986 Martin J. Moore
[COMMENT: READERS -- PLEASE OBSERVE THE RESTRICTIONS ON THIS MESSAGE AT THE END OF THE MESSAGE. PGN]
> From: Peter G. Neumann [Neumann@SRI-CSL.ARPA]
> For those of you who haven't heard, the Challenger blew up this morning...
> One unvoiced concern from the RISKS point of view is the presence on each
> shuttle of a semi-automatic self-destruct mechanism. Hopefully that
> mechanism cannot be accidentally triggered.
[COMMENT: I did not intend to imply that as the cause -- only to raise concern about the safety of such mechanisms. PGN]
Peter, I assume that you are talking about the Range Safety Command Destruct System, which is used to destroy errant missiles launched from Cape Canaveral. From 1980 to 1983 I was the lead programmer/analyst on the ground portions of that system, and I am the primary author of the software which translates the closing of destruct switches into the RF destruct signals sent to the vehicle. I think I can address the question of whether the system can be accidentally triggered; worrying about that gave me nightmares off and on for months while I was on the project. I'd like to tell you a little about the system and why I think the answer is No. Note that my information is now three years old, and some details may have changed; there may also be minor errors in detail due to lapses in my memory, which isn't as good as my computer's!
On board the vehicle, there are five destruct receivers: one on the external tank (ET) and two on each of the solid rocket boosters (SRBs). There is no receiver or destruct ordnance on the Orbiter; it is effectively just an airplane. The casing of each SRB is mined with HMX, a high explosive; the ET contains a small pyrotechnic device which causes its load of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to combine and combust. The receivers and explosives are connected such that the receipt of four proper ARM sequences followed by a proper FIRE sequence by any of the receivers will explode the ordnance.
The ARM sequence and FIRE sequence must come from the ground; they cannot be generated aboard the vehicle. These sequences are transmitted on a frequency which is reserved, at all times, for this purpose and this purpose alone. There are several transmitters around the Eastern Test Range which can be used to transmit the codes. These transmitters have a power of 10 kw (continuous wave). The ARM and FIRE sequences consist of thirteen tone pairs (different for each command and changed for each launch). There are eight possible tones, resulting in 28 possible tone pairs; thus, there are (28^13) or slightly over 6.5E18 correct sequences.
The Range Safety Officer has two switches labeled "ARM" and "DESTRUCT". When he throws a switch, it generates an interrupt in the central processor (there are actually two central processors running and receiving all inputs, but only one is on-line at any time; in case of software or hardware error the backup is switched in. And yes, they have different power sources.) The central program checks for the correct code on each of two different hardware lines (the correct code is different for each line); if correct, and all criteria are met to allow the sequence to be sent, the central program requests the tone pairs for that sequence from another processor. That processor (like everything else in the system, actually redundant processors) has only one function: to store and deliver those tone pairs. The processor resides in a special vault and can only be accessed in order to program the tone pairs (which are highly classified) before each launch. The data line between the central processor and the storage processor is
This is outrageous that Apple is rolling out some software update to "help" our processors function better without asking us! I demand to be asked whether I want this software fix to be implemented, because it makes my processor work slower! Apple sucks and don't get me started on batteries.
I am in principle in favor of more stringent voter ID laws, if we could disentangle them from the silly issues that they're being used (I agree) for voter suppression. I lay blame on people using it as an aggression on voters, but also those voters who can't manage to get it done. Knowing who voted, with certainty, is something you would think is part of the system.
I just really don't understand how you can be a functioning member of society and not have managed to get an identification card once in your life that is sufficient proof of identity. Is it really that much of a burden, once every 10 years to get your drivers license / ID card? If these are the people we're relying on to participate in public life and be informed, we're in bad shape judging by how they can't even have time to manage to get an ID card. I'm serious in an earnest way, if someone doesn't even have time / ability to get an ID card, they are really in bad shape.
I guess the thing to do would be for Republicans to propose that every state / locality have outreach days where everyone has a really easy opportunity to sign up for ID, and then require it from then on. I mean, how long do we have to give people the excuse that they can't get an ID?
I recall a few years ago (maybe 10 years?) during the GWB election, that there was an elegant proposal by voting researchers on how giving each voter someone else's anonymized receipt / code to check online via a website later was a very simple method that could audit the results with just a few % of people doing the checking. And people checking get the satisfaction of being part of the system, and/or maybe being rewarded if they find a mistake.
Does anyone else recall this method?
It sounds kind of like the method in China where, to help ensure that people ask for sales receipts and make everyone pay tax -- by looking afterwards for their receipt being a winning lottery ticket on the national website.
So here's the uncomfortable thing about virtual currencies... If there's no bank to authorize transactions or impose sanctions or prevent cash from moving, how do you stop North Korea, or criminals, or terrorists, from using it as a way to get around laws? I feel this will become an increasing problem for these currencies... The only way would be for banks to refuse to put in or withdraw money from accounts related to cryptocurrencies?
And how about the phone's cloud backup of the app's content, that the government probably insisted that they have access to as part of the phone manufacturer being allowed to do business in China?
Just to be clear, there's nothing physically significant or different about a "blue moon". It's just a calendar thing where the moon appearing full (every 28 days) happened to fall twice within 31 days of a calendar month. "THIS IS A ONCE IN A 150 YEAR EVENT!" is kind of a dumb thing to emphasize (but I guess if it gets people to watch who didn't know before, then I suppose it's worth something, if a little "markety"). A blue moon happens every single month with *some* phase of the moon...
And the statement, "... The eclipse will take place during the middle of the night..." is kind of a no-brainer. *Every* astronomical event takes place during the middle of the night on Earth somewhere! Maybe it could've been more informatively stated "since lunar eclipses are only visible to the parts of of the Earth facing towards the moon and away from the sun, people in Asia, Hawaii, Australia, India, etc. will get the best view."
I will just state again here --
The reason so many people find the downfall and disgrace of this company so satisfying is that it symbolizes the just retribution of the market / facts against a company that:
- was based on hype and deception
- punished its employees for speaking the truth
- had access to capital and investment that others with more legitimate products didn't, only on account of its founder's connections
- was so tied to the idea of an idealistic successful woman CEO that they were willing to take shortcuts and sell that more as the product instead
And here is another investor throwing $100m after the bad, hoping to pick something from the scraps. If there's a quicker way to lose $100m, I would be surprised.