If cell companies are giving out this information without warrants, hopefully they have some security to prevent someone from impersonating a police officer and tracking someone.
Is that the only problem you see with this?
In California, any police officer can already pull up any person's medical prescriptions just for curiosity's sake (and not just controlled substances, they get access to every prescription ever written for that person). In other words, anytime a police officer is interested in dating somebody, that officer can just pull up that person's prescriptions and infer all kinds of things about that person's mental health status, birth control prescriptions, sexual activity, and possible STDs. And according to one former disgruntled SFPD officer at least, who was suing the department for wrongful dismissal, this is something that everyone in his police department routinely did.
This reminds me of an experiment that was conducted a while ago, during the times of Tonya Harding (if anyone can remember her). They had Tonya Harding enter a private clinic on some BS reason (it wasn't even during any of the incidents that made her famous, but it was still before the Olympics). And according to the computerized records of the clinic, there were 360+ computer queries for her private medical records throughout the clinic on that one day she visited.
And if that incident has taught us anything, it's that given half a chance, anyone, even trained professionals, will violate the privacy of others -- for no other reason than curiosity -- if it's too easy for them to query anyone they like (for no work reasons whatsoever).
The only way your 'traffic data' could be shared 'unknowingly' is through ignorance.
And even then, ignorance wouldn't really work in this case (unless you're someone who just stole someone else's phone).
They keep on reminding you that you're sharing your location with them both through the Android interface, and also through an email reminder (that you can't turn off even if you wanted to) at least once a month.
Most probably, as the criteria for diagnostics have indeed changed over the years, but this is not the only problem. One issue is that the risk for autism increases the more a mother waits to have a kid. This is at least one of the reasons that kids with autism are appearing more and more frequently all over the country.
Medicine/contraception has been getting better. Education is getting longer. And families are waiting longer and longer to procreate. This is in stark contrast with the opposite problem of mothers who are still giving birth way too young, or giving birth to babies with the alcohol-syndrome...
Our society is now suffering from both types of problems, parents who wait too long and parents who do not wait at all, and an entrenched political system that seems to discourage and penalize middle-of-the-ground discussions over these topics.
Actually, speaking of clouds and data centers, may be you should just cut the umbilical chord in two, keep an off-site backup buried in the frozen ground in Alaska/Greenland/wherever it's cold, and keep the second half in your own freezer for quick emergency access, just next to the Hagen Daz.
The chance that someone else is going to need your cord blood is way, way higher than the chance that you'll need it for your own family. Give it to the public bank.
Yeah, when I have kids, I'll tell them the same thing. You're not getting my house when I die. There are just too many homeless people that need it way more than you do. I'm donating it to Public Housing instead, they'll know what to do with it.
Plus, the private banks are damned expensive.
You've actually got a point there. At $170 a month, full cable TV with HBO and internet for the entire family sounds like a much better deal than being able to get a new liver for your kid. I wonder if it wouldn't be cheaper to invest yourself in a do-it-yourself cryogenic solution (with a series of backup generators). Since the company I found doesn't seem to be offering group discounts for umbilical chords, and since I'm not sure I'd trust them with the lifeblood of my family, for a large family -- doing it yourself would seem like the cheapest way to go (and perhaps, even the most reliable way to go, assuming your'e diligent/paranoid/OCD enough at doing this kind of installation yourself).
Despite all their excuses, the food that's served in first class is actually pretty decent.
After all, it's not just a question of food preparation, it's also a question of saving space, using cheap labor/ingredients, cleaning stuff up, and cutting the number of trips the passenger wants to use the restrooms (without making him/her sick).
The one in London should be easy. You won't even need to use your own camera, given that they're ubiquitous already.
That's assuming you're a government official (or you're the family member of one) who has ready access to those feeds.
In any case, it won't be a problem snapping any of those pictures given that those people actually want to be seen. This is after all, a cheap $5,000 publicity stunt, not an actual serious scientific investigation.
If I had to sit next to someone yakking nonstop on their cell phone for a 10-hour flight, I would go absolutely nuts.
Do cell phones work that well at high altitudes? I doubt that (either that, or they'd be using an on-board phone). Or may be, your flight has been grounded for 10 hours and they're refusing to let anyone off the plane.
In that case, I'd be glad to have a cell phone I can use so I can call everyone I know and complain that they're not letting us get off.
And that's the thing, we're talking about departures and arrivals, the most critical times when we might want to get in touch with someone to let them now we're two hours late or two hours early. If you want to have rules about electronics usage in the plane, or about noise in general, by all means have some rules, but have those rules chosen by the airline itself. I think using the real reason that someone is yakking with someone on the phone (or yakking loudly non-stop with the person next to them, which is a more likely scenario) is better than using fake reasons to try to silence someone at the beginning or at the end of a flight.
Hunt down an online programmer in another country.
Pay them a few hundred.
They will knock up an app that's better, works on everything, and can be extended and customised later and you'll have the source too.
I won't comment on the feasibility of this. I've been part of enough failed software projects to know better.
But if you're going to do this, at least get it done in Android.
In Android, even if it's removed from the Market by a court order, it will still be able to reach a wide audience without the Market. On the iPad, without the Apple App Store -- you'd be lucky if your app reached a couple hundred people.
But prior art is irrelevant unless you can afford a couple of good attorneys who bill at $500 / hour, and are willing to devote months if not years of your life to a legal battle. Is it worth $100,000, or even $1,000,000, to invalidate the plaintiff's patent? You can win the battle but lose the war when your small business goes bankrupt from the legal costs.
Thankfully, you were not there to discourage the guy who invalidated most of the patent claims in the Amazon one-click buy patent. That guy wasn't a lawyer and he didn't hire a lawyer. He just did it himself and he succeeded where so many $500 per hour lawyers (and so many $500 per hour consultants) had failed previously.
Now I'm not saying that anyone can do this, after all you need to find someone who is patient enough, detail-oriented enough, and motivated enough to undertake all the research and the back and forth paperwork. And that's certainly not an easy person to find. Most people have lives. And if you're the business owner yourself who is being attacked, you probably have your existing business to run as well.
But it is possible for the right person, for the right kind of personality, especially if the person is pissed off enough, and is either retired or on disability, so that this person has plenty of free time on their hands.
Not easily they can't - you need to change the phone's IMEI number, which on many modern phones is way beyond the ability of your average smack-head.
That really doesn't matter.
A smack-head wouldn't know how to manufacture his own smack, or evaluate stolen diamonds, but he would know enough to go to find someone who does. That's the invisible hand of the grey market for you. If there is a need, someone with enough knowledge will come up and eventually fill that need.
And sure, it may take a few months, especially the first time a new law is enacted, but you can rest assured that once a new workaround is found to a new legal problem, every criminal will be telling each other about it, and if they can't do it themselves -- they'll just tell each other where to go to find someone who can.
I think you are getting your terminology mixed up, this is nothing about IMSI. Instead, it's about IMEI numbers, which are sent from the phone to the celltower every time the phone authenticates with the service provider.
Yes, in theory that's what supposed to happen, and that's what I was initially told.
In actual practice, "10% of the IMEIs are not unique" according to BT, that's why the IMEI is usually factored with another (usually network-related) id to make sure a collision doesn't happen.
That's why I believe the term IMSI would be more appropriate in this case.
They're about as relevant to security as the bag checkers on your way out of Fry's. If someone gets caught, they can simply run away, and there's probably a pretty good chance they'd make it to a car waiting for them curbside.
Are you suggesting that the potential terrorist wearing a bomb be shot in the back when attempting to run away?
Hopefully, they'd wait for him to get in the car and far away from the crowds of people before they'd choke off his exit and potentially shoot him (or detonate him).
Please feel free to steal/use/modify any of my questions. I do not use Facebook for politics.
What limits do you think should be placed on the TSA to avoid mission scope-creep?
What did you think of the "digging up Marilyn Monroe" incident over Twitter? Do you believe TSA employees should screen passengers based on their twitter feed? Do you think TSA employees should be allowed to wear police-like uniforms/badges when none of them received the training of police officers? Do you think the long lines at the security checkpoints are becoming themselves counterproductive since those long lines themselves could become terrorist targets?
Air travel (especially Economy class air travel) has become more inconvenient, more uncomfortable, and more stressful for passengers. What are some of the ways you'd suggest congress could alleviate those issues? Could the congress suggest ways to measure those problems as objectively as possible (without going through airport officials who have the incentive to keep those figures as artificially low as possible)?
Do you support the construction of huge airports that look cool and inflate the ego of the architect who designed them? Or do you think all that money could be better spent at making an airport more usable and more comfortable for the public? Do you support the monopoly practice of limiting which cab companies/airport shuttle companies get to pick up random passengers from the airport? Do you have any friends or family members sitting on those airport commissions yourself?
Should first class passengers be allowed to skip the extra screening at La Guardia airport for United (vs. the Economy class passengers)? I'm not talking about the pre-checked passengers or the frequent fliers, I'm asking about the first class/business class passengers that just had to pay extra money to get those tickets (just like the terrorists on 9/11 did to get first class tickets).
Although in the USA every boyfriend would be reporting their girlfriends phone "stolen" when she left them and it would be a support nightmare trying to keep it all straight.
So you're saying that every boyfriend would file a false police report?? because I'm pretty sure that a police officer would know not to get in between such a dispute, and would just refer the boyfriend to the Small Claims Court system.
It's not like this is a new issue. When there is bad break up, there are always issues around cell phone bills, rental contracts/deposits, car leases/loans, and high penalty fees for early terminations of contracts that a couple may have gotten together (but that only one person usually paid).
The phone would be useless if the carrier was not cooperating.
You're taking their comments at face value. GSM network locks can be removed by third parties. Granted, it's illegal to do so, but this is not something that's going to stop pawn shops, recyclers, or fencing operations.
That's why, I'm having trouble taking their comment at face value. They claim violent crimes in Australia went down in the last ten years. Is this really the case? Where are the actual statistics? Besides, I believe that violent crimes also went down in the United States within the last ten years. So is this really the best argument they have for supporting this kind of law?
Network portability is always going to be easy for people who don't mind skirting the law. To make this system really tamper-proof, the entire IMSIs system would have to be re-engineered from scratch, and even then I seriously doubt that it will be completely tamper-proof (unless you're willing to make network portability almost impossible for everyone).
I find it odd that QPS Media has failed to supply the public with any technical information on what tools they are using and the scope of the exercise
Also, why are they limiting themselves to wifi only? Unsecured trash cans, unsecured cable boxes, and cheap mailboxes can be another way for people to steal your data. And in bad neighborhoods, unsecured backyards, unsecured windows, and easy to break doors, are a boon for criminals. If they're going to have someone driving around inspecting security issues, they might has well give that person multiple things to look for -- to save on gas.
Microsoft's documentation is generally well organized, comprehensive, and the writing style is simple and concise; basically everything you'd want technical writing to be.
Microsoft's documentation is pretty good, yes, but publishing a book on it as the ideal example to follow (without any caveats) is a dis-service to the industry. It isn't until fairly recently that you couldn't find anything on MSDN without doing a Google search first.
And yes, it is nice that they mix knowledge base articles with forum posts in their search results now, but nothing beats the way I've seen Macromedia do it (now owned by Adobe) and that's to allow people to post comments directly at the bottom of each relevant document (and have them publicly visible!). This way, if something wasn't clearly documented, or if the documentation had a small mistake, it wasn't hidden from view, and as a developer, you didn't have to waste an hour's worth of work trying to find out on your own.
Here in Scotland, the police take your DNA for speeding and then keep it regardless of conviction.
I guess this may be useful for really high speed crashes, when your car, your body, and your teeth, are completely impossible to recognize (this is Scotland after all, a place not known of its dental care), and there is only one long streak of blood on the pavement that remains -- everything else vaporized.
I'm curious how many people who are generally considered to be law-abiding citizens have a misdemeanor at some point in their past which did not lead to later felonies.
Unless those weren't misdemeanors to begin with, I can think of at least three well-known people: Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, and Laura Bush
May be Bill Clinton is a bad example. I think many people would love to have his DNA on file (just in case it's ever needed again).
1) A man at a bar repeatedly punches another man because he is wearing a t-shirt that shows his endorsement of a rival sports team.
You forgot option #3
3) A man at a bar repeatedly punches another man because he is wearing a t-shirt that shows his endorsement of a rival sports team. And that other man dies, because of medical reasons unbeknownst to the first man who punched him, nevertheless the punches coupled with the pre-existing medical condition are found to be what triggered his death.
In life, this happens all the time. I remember the case of two African Americans sucker punching randomly two Chinese American guys on the streets of Oakland a while ago. One of those Chinese guys died as a result of the sucker punch. Was his death improbable? Yes. Was his death unfortunate? Yes.
But that doesn't meant that the guy who punched him won't have his life ruined by the Justice system because of what his punch caused. If you're going to commit a crime, you have to be willing to accept the consequences of that crime (however improbable those consequences were supposed to be). And the same goes if you start a fight in a bar, if you punch someone -- you better pray that the person you hit doesn't die on you.
Precheck members usually get to use security lines set up for first-class and elite-level frequent fliers.
Are they implying that first-class travelers are already getting this kind of preferential treatment?
Because the 911 terrorists all had first-class tickets!
I'm sorry, but as long as first-class passengers have their own sectioned-off area in the front of the plane, near the cockpit area, they should be checked and groped more thoroughly than any of the Economy-class passengers (otherwise, this entire thing is a farce). First class sections rarely have passengers in them, furthermore I very much doubt that the one or two sixty year old executives that normally sit in those sections would be able to do very much physically if they saw their terrorist seat-mates trying to take over the plane.
When there is a passenger uprising against the terrorists, it will come from the Economy-class, -- not the First class (barring a few exceptions). And if terrorists try to take over a plane again, they'll try it again from First class, not the Economy class (they'd be crazy not to come from First class). And maintaining this old Caste system under this new terrorist threat is only helping the would-be terrorists.
Slashdot Mirror
StreamZoo does. Instagram sounds exactly like streamzoo on Android for that matter.
If cell companies are giving out this information without warrants, hopefully they have some security to prevent someone from impersonating a police officer and tracking someone.
Is that the only problem you see with this?
In California, any police officer can already pull up any person's medical prescriptions just for curiosity's sake (and not just controlled substances, they get access to every prescription ever written for that person). In other words, anytime a police officer is interested in dating somebody, that officer can just pull up that person's prescriptions and infer all kinds of things about that person's mental health status, birth control prescriptions, sexual activity, and possible STDs. And according to one former disgruntled SFPD officer at least, who was suing the department for wrongful dismissal, this is something that everyone in his police department routinely did.
This reminds me of an experiment that was conducted a while ago, during the times of Tonya Harding (if anyone can remember her). They had Tonya Harding enter a private clinic on some BS reason (it wasn't even during any of the incidents that made her famous, but it was still before the Olympics). And according to the computerized records of the clinic, there were 360+ computer queries for her private medical records throughout the clinic on that one day she visited.
And if that incident has taught us anything, it's that given half a chance, anyone, even trained professionals, will violate the privacy of others -- for no other reason than curiosity -- if it's too easy for them to query anyone they like (for no work reasons whatsoever).
Me too. I would almost rather have my day in court and be acquitted than be shot and have my life ended by a man who thought I was a criminal.
The only way your 'traffic data' could be shared 'unknowingly' is through ignorance.
And even then, ignorance wouldn't really work in this case (unless you're someone who just stole someone else's phone).
They keep on reminding you that you're sharing your location with them both through the Android interface, and also through an email reminder (that you can't turn off even if you wanted to) at least once a month.
Or are we changing how we measure it?
Most probably, as the criteria for diagnostics have indeed changed over the years, but this is not the only problem. One issue is that the risk for autism increases the more a mother waits to have a kid. This is at least one of the reasons that kids with autism are appearing more and more frequently all over the country.
Medicine/contraception has been getting better. Education is getting longer. And families are waiting longer and longer to procreate. This is in stark contrast with the opposite problem of mothers who are still giving birth way too young, or giving birth to babies with the alcohol-syndrome...
Our society is now suffering from both types of problems, parents who wait too long and parents who do not wait at all, and an entrenched political system that seems to discourage and penalize middle-of-the-ground discussions over these topics.
Actually, speaking of clouds and data centers, may be you should just cut the umbilical chord in two, keep an off-site backup buried in the frozen ground in Alaska/Greenland/wherever it's cold, and keep the second half in your own freezer for quick emergency access, just next to the Hagen Daz.
The chance that someone else is going to need your cord blood is way, way higher than the chance that you'll need it for your own family. Give it to the public bank.
Yeah, when I have kids, I'll tell them the same thing. You're not getting my house when I die. There are just too many homeless people that need it way more than you do. I'm donating it to Public Housing instead, they'll know what to do with it.
Plus, the private banks are damned expensive.
You've actually got a point there. At $170 a month, full cable TV with HBO and internet for the entire family sounds like a much better deal than being able to get a new liver for your kid. I wonder if it wouldn't be cheaper to invest yourself in a do-it-yourself cryogenic solution (with a series of backup generators). Since the company I found doesn't seem to be offering group discounts for umbilical chords, and since I'm not sure I'd trust them with the lifeblood of my family, for a large family -- doing it yourself would seem like the cheapest way to go (and perhaps, even the most reliable way to go, assuming your'e diligent/paranoid/OCD enough at doing this kind of installation yourself).
That's what I was going to say.
Despite all their excuses, the food that's served in first class is actually pretty decent.
After all, it's not just a question of food preparation, it's also a question of saving space, using cheap labor/ingredients, cleaning stuff up, and cutting the number of trips the passenger wants to use the restrooms (without making him/her sick).
The one in London should be easy. You won't even need to use your own camera, given that they're ubiquitous already.
That's assuming you're a government official (or you're the family member of one) who has ready access to those feeds.
In any case, it won't be a problem snapping any of those pictures given that those people actually want to be seen. This is after all, a cheap $5,000 publicity stunt, not an actual serious scientific investigation.
If I had to sit next to someone yakking nonstop on their cell phone for a 10-hour flight, I would go absolutely nuts.
Do cell phones work that well at high altitudes? I doubt that (either that, or they'd be using an on-board phone). Or may be, your flight has been grounded for 10 hours and they're refusing to let anyone off the plane.
In that case, I'd be glad to have a cell phone I can use so I can call everyone I know and complain that they're not letting us get off.
And that's the thing, we're talking about departures and arrivals, the most critical times when we might want to get in touch with someone to let them now we're two hours late or two hours early. If you want to have rules about electronics usage in the plane, or about noise in general, by all means have some rules, but have those rules chosen by the airline itself. I think using the real reason that someone is yakking with someone on the phone (or yakking loudly non-stop with the person next to them, which is a more likely scenario) is better than using fake reasons to try to silence someone at the beginning or at the end of a flight.
Hunt down an online programmer in another country.
Pay them a few hundred.
They will knock up an app that's better, works on everything, and can be extended and customised later and you'll have the source too.
I won't comment on the feasibility of this. I've been part of enough failed software projects to know better.
But if you're going to do this, at least get it done in Android.
In Android, even if it's removed from the Market by a court order, it will still be able to reach a wide audience without the Market. On the iPad, without the Apple App Store -- you'd be lucky if your app reached a couple hundred people.
But prior art is irrelevant unless you can afford a couple of good attorneys who bill at $500 / hour, and are willing to devote months if not years of your life to a legal battle. Is it worth $100,000, or even $1,000,000, to invalidate the plaintiff's patent? You can win the battle but lose the war when your small business goes bankrupt from the legal costs.
Thankfully, you were not there to discourage the guy who invalidated most of the patent claims in the Amazon one-click buy patent. That guy wasn't a lawyer and he didn't hire a lawyer. He just did it himself and he succeeded where so many $500 per hour lawyers (and so many $500 per hour consultants) had failed previously.
Now I'm not saying that anyone can do this, after all you need to find someone who is patient enough, detail-oriented enough, and motivated enough to undertake all the research and the back and forth paperwork. And that's certainly not an easy person to find. Most people have lives. And if you're the business owner yourself who is being attacked, you probably have your existing business to run as well.
But it is possible for the right person, for the right kind of personality, especially if the person is pissed off enough, and is either retired or on disability, so that this person has plenty of free time on their hands.
Not easily they can't - you need to change the phone's IMEI number, which on many modern phones is way beyond the ability of your average smack-head.
That really doesn't matter.
A smack-head wouldn't know how to manufacture his own smack, or evaluate stolen diamonds, but he would know enough to go to find someone who does. That's the invisible hand of the grey market for you. If there is a need, someone with enough knowledge will come up and eventually fill that need.
And sure, it may take a few months, especially the first time a new law is enacted, but you can rest assured that once a new workaround is found to a new legal problem, every criminal will be telling each other about it, and if they can't do it themselves -- they'll just tell each other where to go to find someone who can.
I think you are getting your terminology mixed up, this is nothing about IMSI.
Instead, it's about IMEI numbers, which are sent from the phone to the celltower every time the phone authenticates with the service provider.
Yes, in theory that's what supposed to happen, and that's what I was initially told.
In actual practice, "10% of the IMEIs are not unique" according to BT, that's why the IMEI is usually factored with another (usually network-related) id to make sure a collision doesn't happen.
That's why I believe the term IMSI would be more appropriate in this case.
They're about as relevant to security as the bag checkers on your way out of Fry's. If someone gets caught, they can simply run away, and there's probably a pretty good chance they'd make it to a car waiting for them curbside.
Are you suggesting that the potential terrorist wearing a bomb be shot in the back when attempting to run away?
Hopefully, they'd wait for him to get in the car and far away from the crowds of people before they'd choke off his exit and potentially shoot him (or detonate him).
Please feel free to steal/use/modify any of my questions. I do not use Facebook for politics.
What limits do you think should be placed on the TSA to avoid mission scope-creep?
What did you think of the "digging up Marilyn Monroe" incident over Twitter? Do you believe TSA employees should screen passengers based on their twitter feed? Do you think TSA employees should be allowed to wear police-like uniforms/badges when none of them received the training of police officers? Do you think the long lines at the security checkpoints are becoming themselves counterproductive since those long lines themselves could become terrorist targets?
Air travel (especially Economy class air travel) has become more inconvenient, more uncomfortable, and more stressful for passengers. What are some of the ways you'd suggest congress could alleviate those issues? Could the congress suggest ways to measure those problems as objectively as possible (without going through airport officials who have the incentive to keep those figures as artificially low as possible)?
Do you support the construction of huge airports that look cool and inflate the ego of the architect who designed them? Or do you think all that money could be better spent at making an airport more usable and more comfortable for the public? Do you support the monopoly practice of limiting which cab companies/airport shuttle companies get to pick up random passengers from the airport? Do you have any friends or family members sitting on those airport commissions yourself?
Should first class passengers be allowed to skip the extra screening at La Guardia airport for United (vs. the Economy class passengers)? I'm not talking about the pre-checked passengers or the frequent fliers, I'm asking about the first class/business class passengers that just had to pay extra money to get those tickets (just like the terrorists on 9/11 did to get first class tickets).
Although in the USA every boyfriend would be reporting their girlfriends phone "stolen" when she left them and it would be a support nightmare trying to keep it all straight.
So you're saying that every boyfriend would file a false police report?? because I'm pretty sure that a police officer would know not to get in between such a dispute, and would just refer the boyfriend to the Small Claims Court system.
It's not like this is a new issue. When there is bad break up, there are always issues around cell phone bills, rental contracts/deposits, car leases/loans, and high penalty fees for early terminations of contracts that a couple may have gotten together (but that only one person usually paid).
The phone would be useless if the carrier was not cooperating.
You're taking their comments at face value. GSM network locks can be removed by third parties. Granted, it's illegal to do so, but this is not something that's going to stop pawn shops, recyclers, or fencing operations.
That's why, I'm having trouble taking their comment at face value. They claim violent crimes in Australia went down in the last ten years. Is this really the case? Where are the actual statistics? Besides, I believe that violent crimes also went down in the United States within the last ten years. So is this really the best argument they have for supporting this kind of law?
Network portability is always going to be easy for people who don't mind skirting the law. To make this system really tamper-proof, the entire IMSIs system would have to be re-engineered from scratch, and even then I seriously doubt that it will be completely tamper-proof (unless you're willing to make network portability almost impossible for everyone).
I find it odd that QPS Media has failed to supply the public with any technical information on what tools they are using and the scope of the exercise
Also, why are they limiting themselves to wifi only? Unsecured trash cans, unsecured cable boxes, and cheap mailboxes can be another way for people to steal your data. And in bad neighborhoods, unsecured backyards, unsecured windows, and easy to break doors, are a boon for criminals. If they're going to have someone driving around inspecting security issues, they might has well give that person multiple things to look for -- to save on gas.
To be fair to the parent, "Ender's Game" almost looks like "Rear Enders Games" -- my favorite magazine.
It's an honest mistake. Really. Anyone could have made it.
Microsoft's documentation is generally well organized, comprehensive, and the writing style is simple and concise; basically everything you'd want technical writing to be.
Microsoft's documentation is pretty good, yes, but publishing a book on it as the ideal example to follow (without any caveats) is a dis-service to the industry. It isn't until fairly recently that you couldn't find anything on MSDN without doing a Google search first.
And yes, it is nice that they mix knowledge base articles with forum posts in their search results now, but nothing beats the way I've seen Macromedia do it (now owned by Adobe) and that's to allow people to post comments directly at the bottom of each relevant document (and have them publicly visible!). This way, if something wasn't clearly documented, or if the documentation had a small mistake, it wasn't hidden from view, and as a developer, you didn't have to waste an hour's worth of work trying to find out on your own.
Here in Scotland, the police take your DNA for speeding and then keep it regardless of conviction.
I guess this may be useful for really high speed crashes, when your car, your body, and your teeth, are completely impossible to recognize (this is Scotland after all, a place not known of its dental care), and there is only one long streak of blood on the pavement that remains -- everything else vaporized.
I'm curious how many people who are generally considered to be law-abiding citizens have a misdemeanor at some point in their past which did not lead to later felonies.
Unless those weren't misdemeanors to begin with, I can think of at least three well-known people: Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, and Laura Bush
May be Bill Clinton is a bad example. I think many people would love to have his DNA on file (just in case it's ever needed again).
1) A man at a bar repeatedly punches another man because he is wearing a t-shirt that shows his endorsement of a rival sports team.
You forgot option #3
3) A man at a bar repeatedly punches another man because he is wearing a t-shirt that shows his endorsement of a rival sports team. And that other man dies, because of medical reasons unbeknownst to the first man who punched him, nevertheless the punches coupled with the pre-existing medical condition are found to be what triggered his death.
In life, this happens all the time. I remember the case of two African Americans sucker punching randomly two Chinese American guys on the streets of Oakland a while ago. One of those Chinese guys died as a result of the sucker punch. Was his death improbable? Yes. Was his death unfortunate? Yes.
But that doesn't meant that the guy who punched him won't have his life ruined by the Justice system because of what his punch caused. If you're going to commit a crime, you have to be willing to accept the consequences of that crime (however improbable those consequences were supposed to be). And the same goes if you start a fight in a bar, if you punch someone -- you better pray that the person you hit doesn't die on you.
Precheck members usually get to use security lines set up for first-class and elite-level frequent fliers.
Are they implying that first-class travelers are already getting this kind of preferential treatment?
Because the 911 terrorists all had first-class tickets!
I'm sorry, but as long as first-class passengers have their own sectioned-off area in the front of the plane, near the cockpit area, they should be checked and groped more thoroughly than any of the Economy-class passengers (otherwise, this entire thing is a farce). First class sections rarely have passengers in them, furthermore I very much doubt that the one or two sixty year old executives that normally sit in those sections would be able to do very much physically if they saw their terrorist seat-mates trying to take over the plane.
When there is a passenger uprising against the terrorists, it will come from the Economy-class, -- not the First class (barring a few exceptions). And if terrorists try to take over a plane again, they'll try it again from First class, not the Economy class (they'd be crazy not to come from First class). And maintaining this old Caste system under this new terrorist threat is only helping the would-be terrorists.