While the article discusses a "massive" shift in developers. It does not address what those developers are working on. Are they working on server applications that will strenghten Linux's hold on the server market? Or are they working on desktop applications? That fact is key to interpreting the shift.
If you told me that there was a massive shift in developers at Intuit or Adobe that would raise my eyebrows.
At the risk of being flamed, are we putting too much emphasis on human life? Historically, all exploration has been risky, with significant loss of life. As an example, look at the original Jamestown settlers. The astronauts are well aware of the dangers involved in spaceflight. And if they didn't know before, they should know after both the Challenger and Columbia accidents. So if they are willing to take the risk with the current design, should we stop them? If the engineers say, there is no way we can improve on Feynman's odds of 1 in 50, should we stop them? It seems to me, that the astronauts should have the final say in what is safe enough. If they're willing to take the risk, as informed adults, I'm willing to let them take it.
Certainly something to be concerned about, as discussed in RFID tags. At the same time does this open a new market for those wanting to remain anonymous? For example, a small metal wallet to contain your smart cards that acts as a Faraday cage. Or a home scanner that zaps RFID tags rendering them useless. Or a detector that alerts the wearer to any devices trying to read smartcards and RFID. For the truely paranoid, it could set off a jammer. The ideas are endless, patent pending.
I don't understand some of the logic behind some of the guns features, for example, the built-in camera. If I'm going to do something illegal, I can put a piece of tape over the lens. And if its recording data on all shots, and taking pictures, how much memory does it have? If I go to the shooting range, and I go thru a couple of boxes of ammo, will I run out of memory? If I run out of memory, does the gun lock up? Regarding the the biometric data locked into the gun. Knowing how fast most other things are cracked, how long till mod chips are available? Somehow this doesn't seem to be the answer to gun crime.
Yes they were that small. The original Levittown home, built in 1947, was a Cape Cod, with a concrete slab floor and an unfinished attic. It's dimensions was 25 x 30 feet, yielding 750 square feet. In 1949, they expanded the home to a ranch style with dimensions 25 x 32 feet. Thousands of these homes were built all to the same plan.
Levittown was the first significant example of the tract home community. It was also the first example of mass production of housing in this country. The town was designed to provide housing for the hugh number of men returning from WW II. The size of Levittown homes were typical for new construction in the 50s.
A new house of today tends to be much larger and more featured than house of yesteryear. For example, the great housing story of the 50s was Levittown. Its where the great suburban fantasy started. A typical new home in Levittown was something like 700 square feet. Typical new homes of today are two and three times as large. They tend to have washers and dryers standard, and other features that were unheard of in Levittown. Similar statements can be made about cars. I've owned cars from the 60s and 70s. There is no meaningful comparison with the cars of today in terms of features, safety, and quality. Therefore, you cannot directly compare their costs in such a simplistic way.
I'm old enough to remember the 70s. The decade of stagflation, high unemployment, the death of smokestack industries, etc. In many ways, the comments of today, mirror those of that decade. Concerns about jobs moving to other countries. Whether the youth of today will ever have jobs. Clearly the fears of the 70s were overblown. The U.S. experienced great prosperity thru the 80s and 90s.
Is today just a dip that will go away? I think so.
I understand the skeptism that surrounds claims such as "piracy funds terrorism." Everyone will try to jump on the latest bandwagon. We need to see proof.
At the same time, don't trivialize a claim. For example, the recent convictions on cigerette smuggling used to fund terrorism. The smuggling was done right here in the old U.S. of A. So it is plausible that other avenues of crime are being used, including sales of drugs.
What I am trying to say is be skeptical, but don't dismiss outright.
For more info check out Who Was Martin Niemoller?. Two major points. First, he was a pastor who was held prisoner in Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps. Second, he was a major force behind the Stuttgart Confession of Guilt, in which the German Protestant churches formally accepted guilt for their complicity in Hitler's reign of terror. BTW, my original post is a quote from a speech he gave to the U.S. Congress in the late 60s.
I've always been a firm believer in listening to your instincts. If the voices in your head are raising doubts, there's probably a problem. In those situations, I would argue that the choice is obvious -- quit.
The more damning problem is situations where the feature creep slowly brings on new capabilities. Until one day you look at the big picture and wonder what you had done.
"In Germany, they first came for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came for me -- and by that time there was nobody left to speak up."
-Martin Niemöller
The Feds are auditing what should be on Internet
on
Feds Move to Secure Net
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· Score: 4, Informative
For all those saying I can't believe the Feds don't have a separate network -- golly gee yes they do and have had such separate networks for years. What the Feds are doing is auditing which systems are connected to which networks. If it was originally assumed that the public Internet was safe enough, those assumptions are being checked. If it is decided that those assumptions were wrong, that a system is threatened, it is moved to a private internet. Considering the size of the Federal government it should surprise no one that history, changes in the internet and other factors should justify such an audit. Its not like private companies don't do the same thing on occassion. The difference is this time politics are involved. Its a way to wave the flag and see we're doing something for homeland security. Three years ago, the press would have ignored this.
Each company determines it's retention policy, with advice from lawyers. These policies are intended to do many things. Two big ones are 1) reducing costs associated with storing old files and 2) limiting costs associated with litigation. While it is obvious companies want to hide guilt, there are other costs involved in litigation - e.g., the man-hours to search through old files, inventory them, copy them for other lawyers, etc.
HOWEVER, regardless of a company's retention policy, it is illegal to destroy documents related to a government investigation once the company is aware an investigation will occur or is likely to occur. This is what got Arther Anderson in trouble, they knew an investigation was coming and then destroyed documents. This is also why a written policy is important, and that it be strictly observed. That way in court it is easy to defend the statement we destroy all documents older than X months automatically. We did not destroy them because an investigation was coming.
A design consists of the visual ornamental characteristics embodied in, or applied to, an article of manufacture. Since a design is manifested in appearance, the subject matter of a design patent application may relate to the configuration or shape of an article, to the surface ornamentation applied to an article, or to the combination of configuration and surface ornamentation. A design for surface ornamentation is inseparable from the article to which it is applied and cannot exist alone. It must be a definite pattern of surface ornamentation, applied to an article of manufacture.
For more info see USPO. A design patent is intended to protect the look of a design. It's what keeps Ford from building a car that looks exactly like a Chevy Corvette.
I do not believe in mandatory filtering, but as a parent of a small child I have major problems with the current situation and with those who argue "just monitor your child."
We monitor what our child does, in fact the computer is in our living room so we know what she is doing. At the same time, all it takes is a trivial error to expose her to pornographic material. For example, type whitehouse.com instead of whitehouse.gov. This bit me the other day. She wanted to buy something for her "American Girl" doll. So we sat down at the computer. Unfortunately, I typed americangirls.com instead of americangirl.com.
Frankly I don't care if people have access to pornography. More power to them. BUT I do wish there was some simple way to separate pornography from everything else. E.g., a XXX domain. That way anyone who wants it can get it. At the same time, I just install a simple filter and I don't have to worry about trivial errors like I had with americangirl.
Frankly, I don't believe this is too much to ask. For example, I go to the book store and they put the porno mags on the top shelf, where my child is unlikely to make a trivial error and pick one up. In essence, that is all I'm asking of the internet.
Obviously upgrades to Air Traffic Control (ATC) systems and communication links to ATC can be cause problems. There is a significant safety of flight issue. Therefore, the FAA maintains strict control of these systems. And in fact, has a dedicated network reserved for ATC. Only "essential" programs and systems are allowed to connect to it.
Passenger listings, airline booking systems, and related software are NOT connected to the ATC network. Since CAPPS II looks at booking data, credit card info, and related data, it would not be connected to the ATC network.
I've read in various articles that supercomputer weather prediction systems look at around 200,000 points on the earth surface. With the points being a few km apart. When you think about the size of the earth, this is a very fine grid. However, when you think about a specific person, the spacing is hugh. Hence the problem with weather prediction. A few km can mean the difference between a downpour in a city, or completely missing it.
There are always cases of excessive punishment, whether we're talking about hacking or loitering. But to claim that all hackers are unfairly treated, defies reality. I refer you to a recent slashdot article on sentencing. The government is trying to develop appropriate sentences.
It's because lawmakers have no idea what hacking is
I do no understand this type of argument. It implies that if I don't program, I can't write appropriate laws. There is an old saying about all the jokes were written long ago, all we do is change the names and the places, It's the same way with crime. All the basic types of crime were listed in the Ten Commandants. All technology has done is provide new ways of committing those same crimes.
Depending on exactly what the hacker does, we're talking about vandalism, or thief, or trepassing using a new technique. When bank robbers moved from horses to cars was it important that lawmakers have a detailed understanding of cars before writing applicable laws? When copyright laws moved from covering just books to motion pictures, did lawmakers require a detailed understanding of how motion pictures are created? Does it really matter the exact technical approach used to commit the crime? I don't think so. Vandalism is vandalism. It doesn't matter whether I use can of spraypaint or I hack into the web server. It costs the company money to fix. The dollar value of the damage should drive the punishment.
References to Weapons of Mass Destruction have nothing to do with this issue. The fact that we are talking about rocket motors is only tangentially relevent. The issue is transportation of "explosive materials," and the new regulations due to the "Homeland Security." Sometimes there are legitimate concerns regarding potentially explosive devices. Remember that airplane crashing in Florida because of the fire in its cargo hold.
No argument that the changes may be excessive. But to claim the government is equating model rockets and weapons of mass destruction shows deliberate ignorance or a pure attempt to get reader reaction.
As with many browsers, Safari has a URL box and a Google search box. Each has a Snapback icon. So for a Google search, you enter your key words, and hit return. Once you start clicking on links in the google search results, the Google Snapback icon becomes active in the Google search box. Click the snapback icon for the google search and you're returned to the Google search results.
FYI, I have two Snapback icons visible on Safari at this very moment. One for my last Google search, and one for the last bookmark I selected. BTW, you can not have more than these two Snapback icons.
Snapback takes you back to the last time you typed a URL (or selected one from your bookmarks). Say I type slashdot.org and hit return. Then I click-on a storylink, then a comment link. I am now multiple levels beyond my original typed-in URL. And a little orange arrow appears by the URL. Click on it and I'm returned to the original slashdot.org page.
This is useful, for example, on a google search. Do the google search, click on link, burrow a few links in. Now I want to go back to the google search results page. Click on the Snapback arrow, and viola I'm there.
Yes, there are other ways of doing this, e.g. tab browsing. But it is a neat and useful feature.
How will the RIAA react to this, seeing as this is legitimizing one of the oldest forms of music pirating?
Note the word "official," as long as the Clear Channel concert contracts have this stipulated as an option, it will not be an issue. Heck, RIAA will probably like it because now they can get a cut unlike the unofficial bootlegs. I also note this is not the first mention of this. I can't find the press release now, but another group recently mentioned that concert goers would be given access to a website to download mp3s of the concert. Within a couple of weeks of the concert they would receive a professional CD of the concert.
Slashdot Mirror
If you told me that there was a massive shift in developers at Intuit or Adobe that would raise my eyebrows.
At the risk of being flamed, are we putting too much emphasis on human life? Historically, all exploration has been risky, with significant loss of life. As an example, look at the original Jamestown settlers. The astronauts are well aware of the dangers involved in spaceflight. And if they didn't know before, they should know after both the Challenger and Columbia accidents. So if they are willing to take the risk with the current design, should we stop them? If the engineers say, there is no way we can improve on Feynman's odds of 1 in 50, should we stop them? It seems to me, that the astronauts should have the final say in what is safe enough. If they're willing to take the risk, as informed adults, I'm willing to let them take it.
Certainly something to be concerned about, as discussed in RFID tags. At the same time does this open a new market for those wanting to remain anonymous? For example, a small metal wallet to contain your smart cards that acts as a Faraday cage. Or a home scanner that zaps RFID tags rendering them useless. Or a detector that alerts the wearer to any devices trying to read smartcards and RFID. For the truely paranoid, it could set off a jammer. The ideas are endless, patent pending.
I don't understand some of the logic behind some of the guns features, for example, the built-in camera. If I'm going to do something illegal, I can put a piece of tape over the lens. And if its recording data on all shots, and taking pictures, how much memory does it have? If I go to the shooting range, and I go thru a couple of boxes of ammo, will I run out of memory? If I run out of memory, does the gun lock up? Regarding the the biometric data locked into the gun. Knowing how fast most other things are cracked, how long till mod chips are available? Somehow this doesn't seem to be the answer to gun crime.
Levittown was the first significant example of the tract home community. It was also the first example of mass production of housing in this country. The town was designed to provide housing for the hugh number of men returning from WW II. The size of Levittown homes were typical for new construction in the 50s.
A new house of today tends to be much larger and more featured than house of yesteryear. For example, the great housing story of the 50s was Levittown. Its where the great suburban fantasy started. A typical new home in Levittown was something like 700 square feet. Typical new homes of today are two and three times as large. They tend to have washers and dryers standard, and other features that were unheard of in Levittown. Similar statements can be made about cars. I've owned cars from the 60s and 70s. There is no meaningful comparison with the cars of today in terms of features, safety, and quality. Therefore, you cannot directly compare their costs in such a simplistic way.
Is today just a dip that will go away? I think so.
At the same time, don't trivialize a claim. For example, the recent convictions on cigerette smuggling used to fund terrorism. The smuggling was done right here in the old U.S. of A. So it is plausible that other avenues of crime are being used, including sales of drugs.
What I am trying to say is be skeptical, but don't dismiss outright.
For more info check out Who Was Martin Niemoller?. Two major points. First, he was a pastor who was held prisoner in Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps. Second, he was a major force behind the Stuttgart Confession of Guilt, in which the German Protestant churches formally accepted guilt for their complicity in Hitler's reign of terror. BTW, my original post is a quote from a speech he gave to the U.S. Congress in the late 60s.
The more damning problem is situations where the feature creep slowly brings on new capabilities. Until one day you look at the big picture and wonder what you had done.
For all those saying I can't believe the Feds don't have a separate network -- golly gee yes they do and have had such separate networks for years. What the Feds are doing is auditing which systems are connected to which networks. If it was originally assumed that the public Internet was safe enough, those assumptions are being checked. If it is decided that those assumptions were wrong, that a system is threatened, it is moved to a private internet. Considering the size of the Federal government it should surprise no one that history, changes in the internet and other factors should justify such an audit. Its not like private companies don't do the same thing on occassion. The difference is this time politics are involved. Its a way to wave the flag and see we're doing something for homeland security. Three years ago, the press would have ignored this.
HOWEVER, regardless of a company's retention policy, it is illegal to destroy documents related to a government investigation once the company is aware an investigation will occur or is likely to occur. This is what got Arther Anderson in trouble, they knew an investigation was coming and then destroyed documents. This is also why a written policy is important, and that it be strictly observed. That way in court it is easy to defend the statement we destroy all documents older than X months automatically. We did not destroy them because an investigation was coming.
Sorry... americagirl.com is the wrong URL. When I wrote it this morning, I was doing it from memory without doublechecking the URL
We monitor what our child does, in fact the computer is in our living room so we know what she is doing. At the same time, all it takes is a trivial error to expose her to pornographic material. For example, type whitehouse.com instead of whitehouse.gov. This bit me the other day. She wanted to buy something for her "American Girl" doll. So we sat down at the computer. Unfortunately, I typed americangirls.com instead of americangirl.com.
Frankly I don't care if people have access to pornography. More power to them. BUT I do wish there was some simple way to separate pornography from everything else. E.g., a XXX domain. That way anyone who wants it can get it. At the same time, I just install a simple filter and I don't have to worry about trivial errors like I had with americangirl.
Frankly, I don't believe this is too much to ask. For example, I go to the book store and they put the porno mags on the top shelf, where my child is unlikely to make a trivial error and pick one up. In essence, that is all I'm asking of the internet.
Some people prefer the command line version, but for those who want a carbonized app, a MacOSX version of gnuplot exists at gnuplot for Macintosh.
Passenger listings, airline booking systems, and related software are NOT connected to the ATC network. Since CAPPS II looks at booking data, credit card info, and related data, it would not be connected to the ATC network.
I've read in various articles that supercomputer weather prediction systems look at around 200,000 points on the earth surface. With the points being a few km apart. When you think about the size of the earth, this is a very fine grid. However, when you think about a specific person, the spacing is hugh. Hence the problem with weather prediction. A few km can mean the difference between a downpour in a city, or completely missing it.
There are always cases of excessive punishment, whether we're talking about hacking or loitering. But to claim that all hackers are unfairly treated, defies reality. I refer you to a recent slashdot article on sentencing. The government is trying to develop appropriate sentences.
Depending on exactly what the hacker does, we're talking about vandalism, or thief, or trepassing using a new technique. When bank robbers moved from horses to cars was it important that lawmakers have a detailed understanding of cars before writing applicable laws? When copyright laws moved from covering just books to motion pictures, did lawmakers require a detailed understanding of how motion pictures are created? Does it really matter the exact technical approach used to commit the crime? I don't think so. Vandalism is vandalism. It doesn't matter whether I use can of spraypaint or I hack into the web server. It costs the company money to fix. The dollar value of the damage should drive the punishment.
No argument that the changes may be excessive. But to claim the government is equating model rockets and weapons of mass destruction shows deliberate ignorance or a pure attempt to get reader reaction.
For those wanting to see SnapBack, Apple has a QuickTime movie demonstrating is, Demo Movie
FYI, I have two Snapback icons visible on Safari at this very moment. One for my last Google search, and one for the last bookmark I selected. BTW, you can not have more than these two Snapback icons.
This is useful, for example, on a google search. Do the google search, click on link, burrow a few links in. Now I want to go back to the google search results page. Click on the Snapback arrow, and viola I'm there.
Yes, there are other ways of doing this, e.g. tab browsing. But it is a neat and useful feature.