Heh. This article evokes some memories for me. As a previous poster mentioned, there are hordes of unique gargoyles on the National Cathedral (I had lots of time to check them out as a student on the Cathedral Close in the 90s).
By far my favorite is a gargoyle facing NCS, the Cathedral-affiliated girl's school. It's carved to resemble a constuction worker lewdly whistling at the nymphets passing by on their way to class...
Caveat: I use Mozilla as my primary browser. That said, I'd like to make this observation:
It seems to me that we spend a lot of time on Slashdot talking about Mozilla as a premiere project of the open source community. However, my impression is that Mozilla is largely still an internal project of Netscape (and by extension of AOL Time Warner). This impression is based on, among other things, the very large number of @netscape.com email addresses that pervade Bugzilla, the mozilla.org web site, etc. I can't believe that Netscape's engineers restrict themselves to working solely on their release branch of the Mozilla codebase during working hours.
I don't think it at all diminishes the magnitude of the Mozilla project's achievement to say that it has made progress largely under the aegis of AOL/TW. But we should at least be honest that Mozilla is furthering the agenda of a very large corporation that is just as rapacious and profit-motivated as Microsoft.
Anyone have any hard data about the investment that AOL has made in Mozilla development?
Seems to me that the most obvious "single point of attack" on the Internet is anything having to do with the Windows Update mechanism hardwired into Windows XP and, one would assume, all future versions of the OS... MS-bashing aside, I am certain that Microsoft has taken all reasonable precautions to prevent the co-option or subversion of this channel into millions of computers, but the fact remains that Windows Update is proprietary "security through obscurity..."
on a related note, does anyone have any insight as to HOW the MS Windows Update mechanism works, and how it is secured? Seems as though it must run on a massive server installation, given how much traffic it has to handle...
A quintessentially American solution to security
on
The Post 9/11 Tech Boom
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
There is always a remarkable trickle-down effect within private enterprise that occurs when massive, targeted government spending pours forth. And it's no surprise that, given the trauma of 9/11, the government is bringing its massive resources to bear to develop technological solutions to many domestic security issues (many of which are structurally almost insoluble, by the application of technology or otherwise). Interestingly, the Dep't of Defense is even resorting to open-ended solicitation of "new ideas relevant to homeland defense and security" from technology companies with which it has dealings.
All you have to do is glance at the tailfins on a 60s Cadillac to understand the unshakeable faith Americans have had in new technology over the past century. Technological progress as panacea is still a fundamental, if often unspoken, tenet of our shared culture.
However, when it comes to "homeland security", the search for technological solutions (e.g. systems to put air passengers and air cargo under x-ray and gas-cromatographic microscope) largely misses the point. Massive essentially indefensible borders, enormous reliance on a vulnerable modern communications infrastructure, the lack of internal security paranoia characteristic of a wealthy, free democratic society... these characteristics militate against easy high-tech band-aid solutions to "homeland defense."
So what's the solution? We can protect the United States from attack by consistent and forceful _projection_ of power, by eradicating from the earth those who bring violence inside our domestic boundaries, those who threaten to do so and those who aid and support such people. By doing so we relentlessly disincentivise those who might consider attacking us. Structurally, the United States will always be vulnerable to attack within its borders. A massive and massively expensive build-out of new security technology will not alter this fundamental truth.
Deployment of massive amounts of high-tech infrastructure that will do little more than inconvenience honest US citizens will not secure our nation. Judicious application of our Rooseveltian "big stick" will.
Slashdot Mirror
Heh. This article evokes some memories for me. As a previous poster mentioned, there are hordes of unique gargoyles on the National Cathedral (I had lots of time to check them out as a student on the Cathedral Close in the 90s).
By far my favorite is a gargoyle facing NCS, the Cathedral-affiliated girl's school. It's carved to resemble a constuction worker lewdly whistling at the nymphets passing by on their way to class...
I see many "What is .NET" posts here. The best single whitepaper I've seen on .NET is by the Ars Technica folks:
.NET at Ars Technica
Microsoft
cheers.
Caveat: I use Mozilla as my primary browser. That said, I'd like to make this observation:
It seems to me that we spend a lot of time on Slashdot talking about Mozilla as a premiere project of the open source community. However, my impression is that Mozilla is largely still an internal project of Netscape (and by extension of AOL Time Warner). This impression is based on, among other things, the very large number of @netscape.com email addresses that pervade Bugzilla, the mozilla.org web site, etc. I can't believe that Netscape's engineers restrict themselves to working solely on their release branch of the Mozilla codebase during working hours.
I don't think it at all diminishes the magnitude of the Mozilla project's achievement to say that it has made progress largely under the aegis of AOL/TW. But we should at least be honest that Mozilla is furthering the agenda of a very large corporation that is just as rapacious and profit-motivated as Microsoft.
Anyone have any hard data about the investment that AOL has made in Mozilla development?
Everquest III?
"Just hook it to my veins..."
-- Barney
Seems to me that the most obvious "single point of attack" on the Internet is anything having to do with the Windows Update mechanism hardwired into Windows XP and, one would assume, all future versions of the OS... MS-bashing aside, I am certain that Microsoft has taken all reasonable precautions to prevent the co-option or subversion of this channel into millions of computers, but the fact remains that Windows Update is proprietary "security through obscurity..."
on a related note, does anyone have any insight as to HOW the MS Windows Update mechanism works, and how it is secured? Seems as though it must run on a massive server installation, given how much traffic it has to handle...
Seems this page is a Slashdot victim due to Tripod's bandwidth limits...
Google's cache of the page is here.
There is always a remarkable trickle-down effect within private enterprise that occurs when massive, targeted government spending pours forth. And it's no surprise that, given the trauma of 9/11, the government is bringing its massive resources to bear to develop technological solutions to many domestic security issues (many of which are structurally almost insoluble, by the application of technology or otherwise). Interestingly, the Dep't of Defense is even resorting to open-ended solicitation of "new ideas relevant to homeland defense and security" from technology companies with which it has dealings.
All you have to do is glance at the tailfins on a 60s Cadillac to understand the unshakeable faith Americans have had in new technology over the past century. Technological progress as panacea is still a fundamental, if often unspoken, tenet of our shared culture.
However, when it comes to "homeland security", the search for technological solutions (e.g. systems to put air passengers and air cargo under x-ray and gas-cromatographic microscope) largely misses the point. Massive essentially indefensible borders, enormous reliance on a vulnerable modern communications infrastructure, the lack of internal security paranoia characteristic of a wealthy, free democratic society... these characteristics militate against easy high-tech band-aid solutions to "homeland defense."
So what's the solution? We can protect the United States from attack by consistent and forceful _projection_ of power, by eradicating from the earth those who bring violence inside our domestic boundaries, those who threaten to do so and those who aid and support such people. By doing so we relentlessly disincentivise those who might consider attacking us. Structurally, the United States will always be vulnerable to attack within its borders. A massive and massively expensive build-out of new security technology will not alter this fundamental truth.
Deployment of massive amounts of high-tech infrastructure that will do little more than inconvenience honest US citizens will not secure our nation. Judicious application of our Rooseveltian "big stick" will.