That would be because the RIAA have been shouting from the mountaintops since the dawn of time that it's all about the artist. They want to stop filesharing because, according to them, it directly takes money away from the artists in the form of lost sales. Every single anti-P2P campaign you see from them is preaching the same thing. "Please don't hurt the poor artists."
But in reality, they're just trying to line their own coffers. When someone settles for some outrageous fee, not a damned cent of that goes to "making the artist whole" or making up for their lost sales. Nope, it goes directly into either the lawyer's wallets or the legal war-chest. The artist continues to get screwed to the tune of pennies per album sold, and tough shit about those lost sales killing your already paltry (unless you're Metallica or some other hyper-famous act) royalty payments.
BTW - What is the BFD about this movie? I waited to see it from Netflix like usual... but I was really anticipating a great movie from all the hype it got when it was released. Both my wife and I agreed that it was a mediocre movie at best. It had a lot of ridiculous plot elements and quite a few instances of bad acting. The camera work felt cliche and the dialog was uninspired. I just don't get it. I had a friend of mine say that he liked Iron Man more than the Dark Knight... but I don't think they're even in the same league...
Not saying it's the greatest movie ever made, but I thought it was pretty damned good. I think part of the hype was how visually impressive it is. The other facet to that is the spot-on casting of Tony Stark. He's an alcoholic, womanizing, arrogant bastard. Robert Downey Jr. is quite similar. Downey even said himself that the HARD part was turning Stark into a likeable hero, not playing the part of the arrogant prick. Jeff Bridges also does an extremely nice job of portraying the backstabbing bastard what deals on the side. Never would have thought that possible from one of the heroes in Tron, but he pulled it off admirably.
Admittedly, some of the dialogue was cheesy, and the acting overdone. But remember that this IS a comic book movie. If you've read some of the earlier issues, you know just how horrifically cheesy the characters can be. My only REAL complaint is that they could have done more with the characters instead of spending literally half the movie setting everything else up. Fortunately, there will almost definitely be a sequel, and this gives a plausible (if highly improbable) backstory to frame the next film with. Overall, it's a solid A-.
Your friend who liked it better than Dark Knight is on some serious drugs, however. Iron Man was great, Dark Knight was epic.
I know, I know, tl;dr. PS3 is about the only non-retarded BR player out right now.
There is no requirement to actually utilize the BD-Live features to watch this title. I picked it up the other day, popped the disc into my PS3 and let it load. You know what happened? A screen came up ASKING wether or not I wanted to download the additional content. I chose not to, and it continued on its merry way to the main menu and I was able to watch the movie without any issues whatsoever.
No BD-Live just means I can't have the option to have random quiz questions pop up on my screen during the film like "What kind of plane is shooting at Iron Man?" (F-22, btw). So no, it won't cause the world to end if they shut down the servers. All you have to do is click "No" and continue on to watch the movie that you actually bought the disc for.
I've been a pretty hardline PS3 basher since before the system was even released, but I still found myself looking forward to this game. Great gameplay concept, being able to design your own levels is good for replay value, and the game itself looks absolutely beautiful. The only downside is that it's on PS3, which I swore up and down I would never buy just for one game.
Fast forward to this past March, and I'm in need of a TV and some entertainment equipment for my new place. I snag an HDTV and reluctantly get a PS3 since the format war was finally done with. I still have maybe 3 games for the thing, but it excels as a BR player and a network media center, so I'm quite happy (albiet, surprisingly so) with my purchase. The main point of all this? Now that LBP is FINALLY about to be released, I can eagerly await the release date even more since I'll actually be able to have my own copy to play. This seems to be one of the titles that, if they had released it at launch, would have sold systems like crazy. Hopefully it lives up to my lofty expectations.
Now if only the people working on White Knight Chronicles would finish the damned game already, I would be even happier.
"There is no shortage of comments about us selling out or running advertisements as stories. As you might expect there is no shortage of mail with the same theme."
There is also no shortage of people who find this "disagree mail" thing to be a complete waste of time and editor resources, especially when they STILL can't seem to make the reply box width more than some horribly miniscule value. Listen to the tags, guys. Make it stop!
It's time to use Big Content's methods against them. Will Wright and Maxis should file suit against EA for illegally damaging the sales of this game through the use of malware. Find every 1-star review of the game that pledges not to buy the game on every online retailer that carries the title. Treat EVERY one of these as a lost sale. Is it really a lost sale? Probably not. But if they want to argue that 1 download = 1 lost sale, then they should adhere to this as well. And since merely giving money equal to the sale is not enough, according to the industry, set the damages at some arbitrary level. Let's say $5000 per lost sale due to DRM issues. From Amazon alone, that should be about $10,000,000 USD in damages.
If the content industry wants to ruin people's lives under the assumption that downloading games/movies/music inderectly harms the artists that create them, they need to be held accountable by the same rules. People refusing to buy due to publisher meddling is DIRECTLY harming the artists and developers in this case. They (the publisher) need to either admit that they were wrong and greedy, or be painted with the exact same brush they seem to want everyone else painted with.
Someone needs to send a message to these assholes that treating your PAYING CUSTOMERS like criminals will NOT be tolerated.
Let's face it folks here's the only difference:
* Google's monopoly will hurt businesses wanting to buy web ads.
* Microsoft's monopoly will hurt individuals who use desktop products.
And THAT is the reason that the suit against Google will move far swifter and with more tenacity than the Microsoft suit could have ever garnered.
Microsoft Suit: Relax, we've got plenty of time. They're only hurting individual consumers.
Google Suit: My GOD! They could be hurting COMPANIES! Something has to be done RIGHT NOW!!!!
If there are so many of these emails, then why only post this small snippet of a supposedly larger flood of alleged hillarity? And shouldnt there be a new section specifically for this? Maybe bash.slashdot.org, so we can actually rate the emails and the boring/stupid ones can disappear forever?
So now we will get even MORE draconian measures to stop the "evil hackers" when in reality, it was a combination of bad intentions, and old-fashioned stupidity. The article specifically mentions looking for "vulnerable" access points. This means that whoever set the network up for these stores did not do a proper job in securing said network. Also, why the HELL were the systems used to process credit card transactions on the same insecure wireless network? There is NO excuse for that. I'm not excusing what these guys did, but once again we have a case where whoever setup the hardware in these places needs to be held for criminal negligence.
...and they are worried about a thousand people watching poor quality pirated copies. Bet it wouldn't even be 1mil less in earnings
Nowhere close. Well, unless all the downloaders were regulars at the most expensive movie theater in the world. But hey, at $1,000 per ticket there, you can't always afford to go see EVERY movie that comes out...
if they can't strain hard enough naturally without having a stroke while pulling 9 Gs for 30 seconds, then they should get out of the cockpit.
Well, it certainly keeps you out of the Blue Angels. Although the main reasoning there is an errant twitch from the air-bladder around your legs could cause you to fly into the ground or a teammate, since the stick is between your knees. Thunderbirds don't have this issue, however, since they use a sidestick (begin USAF vs USN argument now, heh).
As messed up as the American legal system is becoming with regard to computer and internet law, I hope that they stick it to her and give her the maximum punishment.
There are SEVERAL things they could get her on: criminal child abuse, coercion of a minor, etc. But no, that would be too much work. Instead, they want to give her felony charges for violating the TOS of a website. I'm all for making sure she's punished, but this is not the way. Have the DA actually DO HIS JOB and not hoist her on something that can set a precedent which can be later used to fuck all of us at will...
And, frankly, what's so wrong about having a specific method of payment used throughout a website? If eBay had their own internal payment system identical in every way to PayPal, would there be as much fervor?
A specific method of payment is not the issue here. The issue is that eBay owns PayPal, making the whole "we're doing this to protect YOU" argument rather spurious at best.
eBay takes a commission on each item sold through their site. Paypal takes a chunk of every transaction that goes through. So it works like this. Person A puts up an item for sale. Person B is the winning bidder. Person A now owes eBay X amount of money based on the final price of the item. This comes out of what they receive in payment from Person B. Person B sends the money through PayPal, which takes a percentage of the transaction, Y. If the item sold for Z dollars, person A will only ever see Z-(X+Y). Essentially, eBay gets paid twice for the same auction. THAT is where people are getting (rightfully) peeved.
Not the datacenter itself, but the InfoWorld coverage. Two pages that could have EASILY been put on a single page (although that would decrease ad impressions and we can't have that, now can we?) and a complete lack of pictures of this supposedly awesome upgrade? Can we PLEASE stop posting stories from the dolts at InfoWorld? All we're doing is driving ad impressions on shoddy articles. Mod me as offtopic if you wish. I couldn't care less as I have plenty of karma.
Is InfoWorld trying to start a new trend of making the printer-friendly version so damned annoying to read that people are more likely to choose the regular one? With AdBlock installed, I see just the article, but the article becomes all of one paragraph per page, for 10 pages or so. I switch to the printer-friendly version, and everything just seems to run together; text ads crammed in and looking like section headers, section headers not clearly defined from the previous, using the same spacing between different sections as between headers and the content... Forget boneheaded IT mistakes, whatabout being a clownshoes webmaster?
Simply put, there has not been a hijacking incident involving a US Airline since these enhanced security measures went into effect. Furthermore, there hasn't even been a catastrophic crash of a US Airline since these enhanced security measures went into effect.
Correlation != Causation
Tell me something. When was the last hijacking incident involving a US airline BEFORE 9/11?
Pan Am 73, 1986: Karachi, Pakistan. 16 hour seige on the ground, 22 dead.
TWA 847, 1985: Departs from Cairo for Athens, diverted to Beirut.
These were 15 and 16 years prior to 9/11. There was FedEx 705 in 1994, but they are a freight carrier and as such do not deal with passengers. That was a disgruntled employee. We're not even 7 years past 9/11, so there is no way to tell if these measures are having any effect without them actually catching people in the act of trying to interfere with a flight. Another interesting thing to note is that while both of these incidents involved a major US air carrier, they had NOTHING to do with US soil. These flights originated from airports outside of the US, so domestic airport security cannot be factored in.
Those who wish to try to compromise any of these security measures by resisting and challenging them, well they are free not to fly and I personally think that they really should be placed on a no-fly list for life.
So because some people don't like to give up their privacy without a damned good reason (at the very least, probable cause) in the name of "security", then they should be banned from flying for life? This attitude both saddens and sickens me. It's the very same "roll over and do what your told because we want you to believe it will keep you safe" mentality that I was talking about in the first place. It's not about safety, it's about control. We have PLENTY of safety already if we only stop flinching away from shadows and stand up for doing what's right.
...and saddening part of the whole mess is this little gem from TFA:
"Some of this stuff seems a little crazy," Reardon said, "but in this day and age, you have to go along with it."
This is exactly what they want EVERYONE to think. But the truth of the matter is, no, you DON'T have to go along with it. People need to wake up and stop being a bunch of ignorant sheep in the face of all of this. Refuse the scan, refuse the pat-down, refuse to even fly anymore. Prices are going up and so is the amount of bullshit they make you go through to squeeze yourself into a cramped metal tube with not but a package of stale peanuts as food.
Really, why is all of this crap even necessary? All it does is create more headache for everyone involved. I'm not saying we need NO security, but this is honestly going completely overboard. Metal detectors? Good idea. Keeps people from bringing certain bad things on planes. X-ray luggage? Also good, for reasons stated above. Air marshalls? I'm not keen on the idea of firearms at 35,000 feet, but someone in law enforcement is a good idea if someone gets a bit drunk or stupid. Re-enforced cockpit doors? Should have been done a long time ago. That's just common sense.
Beyond that, I don't really see any of it as more than an excuse to spend vast sums of money. Air travel is still one of the safest (albiet nowhere near the most comfortable these days) ways to travel. The only reason incidents get so much media attention is the number of people killed in one event. Wait a couple hours and the number of deaths on the highway will take the lead once again, however. Bombings went out of style in the 80's, and you can forget about any more hijackings. After 9/11, do you REALY think passengers are going to stand for that sort of crap anymore? Not a chance. We're throwing money at phantoms, here. Attacking air travel is pretty much dead these days, but not because of any new security measures. All the same, I think I'll take my chances on the highway. At least nobody is going to attempt coercing me into a full-body scan and cavity search just to get into my car.
One final aside:
Wasn't the whole mantra several years back one of "We musn't change our way of life, or THEY will have won."? Now look at us. We allow draconian measures to be passed in the name of "security". We freak like children with imaginary boogeymen under our beds when someone even THINKS the word "terrorist." We happily give up privacy because we are sold on the illusion that it's for our own good and it will only effect those who have nothing to hide. We have become completely paranoid and changed the way we do pretty much anything, out of fear that we will get hit again. I'm sorry, but isn't that the very goal of a terrorist act? To have us do EXACTLY what we have done in the past seven years?
Society has become so caught up in going apeshit trying to prevent THEM from winning, that the exact opposite effect seems to have occured. Eight years ago, almost nobody had ever heard of the names being tossed about on the news. Now, it's foremost in everyone's mind. Their goal wasn't to savagely murder thousands of people, that was just the tool they chose to use. No, their real goal was to make themselves known, and us frightened. I hate to say it, but they succeeded.
"For example page three, paragraph one is a "Pirate Bay killer" clause designed to criminalize the non-profit facilitation of unauthorized information exchange on the internet..."
EXACTLY. It will criminalize unauthorized information exchange on the internet. Sounds all fine and good until you start thinking about who gets to define what constitutes "unauthorized." A legislative body with proper representation drafting the definition after careful consideration, input from constituents, and an informed debate on the issue? Hardly. "Unauthorized" will be at the sole whim of the MAFIAA and whatever political party is in power at the time. This will be used to squash differences in opinion from those in power. It may take down Wikileaks first, but who is to say if it will stop there? What they're trying to do with this is no less than pulling the wool over everyone's eyes until it's too late to do anything about it. They're going to try and present it fait accompli because they know it won't stand up if they actually ask people what they think.
Face it, power no longer rests with the people, and hasn't for some time. It all resides in the hands of the corporations with money to buy votes. The oil, content, and software industries are the ones ACTUALLY running the US. So when does everyone decide to use what little power they have left to say "That's it, you're ALL fired. Every single one of you. Get the HELL out of Washington and find a REAL job, while we vote in people who actually have a spine to stand up for those that they represent!"
I know, I know. It's a pipe dream that won't happen in my lifetime, or even in my grandchildren's lifetimes (I'm 26, single, no kids. Typical Slashdotter, but there's an idea of the timescale I'm talking about), but can't a man dream?
You can bet your bottom dollar that's what is really on the table: the right of a government to demand all the personal information an ISP has in its possession at any time, and for any reason.
Isn't that what the Home Office is already trying to do. Seems like the only difference would be that the Home Office isn't trying to hide behind dodgy "anti-piracy" legislation.
...using TrueCrypt to secure the file then sending it via a secure FTP? It's exceedingly simple to use, and you secure it to your needs. All she has to do is mount the file and type in the password you give her. Tell her you will send the password via another means, and send it via registered mail making sure that there is absolutely no clue on the paper as to what the text means.
If booting from a Live CD isn't an option (which was said even in the summary, do people not even read THAT anymore?), then she's going to have ZERO clue what a hardware keylogger looks like.
Anyway, several people here have already stated the blindingly obvious, and I'll agree with it 100%. If things are to the point where this is even a question, then the marriage is doomed. She doesn't trust him to not spy on her, and if he IS spying, then he doesn't trust her. Communication Fail and Trust Fail built into one package.
That would be all fine and good if it were as simple as saying "No, thank you." and going back the other way. Unfortunately, once you've landed, you are pretty much at the whim of the airport. If you refuse, you can't just hop back on the plane and go home. Not only would the airline have NO clue what to do with your luggage (as if they do in the first place), but security could probably then hold you suspect for failure to comply with procedures. If they end up doing that, your laptop will get searched anyway. After all, you must have SOMETHING to hide? Why else would you not let them search the computer in the first place (not saying that point is valid, but you KNOW it would get used)?
Slashdot Mirror
That would be because the RIAA have been shouting from the mountaintops since the dawn of time that it's all about the artist. They want to stop filesharing because, according to them, it directly takes money away from the artists in the form of lost sales. Every single anti-P2P campaign you see from them is preaching the same thing. "Please don't hurt the poor artists."
But in reality, they're just trying to line their own coffers. When someone settles for some outrageous fee, not a damned cent of that goes to "making the artist whole" or making up for their lost sales. Nope, it goes directly into either the lawyer's wallets or the legal war-chest. The artist continues to get screwed to the tune of pennies per album sold, and tough shit about those lost sales killing your already paltry (unless you're Metallica or some other hyper-famous act) royalty payments.
Not saying it's the greatest movie ever made, but I thought it was pretty damned good. I think part of the hype was how visually impressive it is. The other facet to that is the spot-on casting of Tony Stark. He's an alcoholic, womanizing, arrogant bastard. Robert Downey Jr. is quite similar. Downey even said himself that the HARD part was turning Stark into a likeable hero, not playing the part of the arrogant prick. Jeff Bridges also does an extremely nice job of portraying the backstabbing bastard what deals on the side. Never would have thought that possible from one of the heroes in Tron, but he pulled it off admirably.
Admittedly, some of the dialogue was cheesy, and the acting overdone. But remember that this IS a comic book movie. If you've read some of the earlier issues, you know just how horrifically cheesy the characters can be. My only REAL complaint is that they could have done more with the characters instead of spending literally half the movie setting everything else up. Fortunately, there will almost definitely be a sequel, and this gives a plausible (if highly improbable) backstory to frame the next film with. Overall, it's a solid A-.
Your friend who liked it better than Dark Knight is on some serious drugs, however. Iron Man was great, Dark Knight was epic.
I know, I know, tl;dr. PS3 is about the only non-retarded BR player out right now.
There is no requirement to actually utilize the BD-Live features to watch this title. I picked it up the other day, popped the disc into my PS3 and let it load. You know what happened? A screen came up ASKING wether or not I wanted to download the additional content. I chose not to, and it continued on its merry way to the main menu and I was able to watch the movie without any issues whatsoever.
No BD-Live just means I can't have the option to have random quiz questions pop up on my screen during the film like "What kind of plane is shooting at Iron Man?" (F-22, btw). So no, it won't cause the world to end if they shut down the servers. All you have to do is click "No" and continue on to watch the movie that you actually bought the disc for.
I've been a pretty hardline PS3 basher since before the system was even released, but I still found myself looking forward to this game. Great gameplay concept, being able to design your own levels is good for replay value, and the game itself looks absolutely beautiful. The only downside is that it's on PS3, which I swore up and down I would never buy just for one game.
Fast forward to this past March, and I'm in need of a TV and some entertainment equipment for my new place. I snag an HDTV and reluctantly get a PS3 since the format war was finally done with. I still have maybe 3 games for the thing, but it excels as a BR player and a network media center, so I'm quite happy (albiet, surprisingly so) with my purchase. The main point of all this? Now that LBP is FINALLY about to be released, I can eagerly await the release date even more since I'll actually be able to have my own copy to play. This seems to be one of the titles that, if they had released it at launch, would have sold systems like crazy. Hopefully it lives up to my lofty expectations.
Now if only the people working on White Knight Chronicles would finish the damned game already, I would be even happier.
There is also no shortage of people who find this "disagree mail" thing to be a complete waste of time and editor resources, especially when they STILL can't seem to make the reply box width more than some horribly miniscule value. Listen to the tags, guys. Make it stop!
Why does it come as absolutely no surprise that they will sell a way to track your movements with "think of the children"?
It's time to use Big Content's methods against them. Will Wright and Maxis should file suit against EA for illegally damaging the sales of this game through the use of malware. Find every 1-star review of the game that pledges not to buy the game on every online retailer that carries the title. Treat EVERY one of these as a lost sale. Is it really a lost sale? Probably not. But if they want to argue that 1 download = 1 lost sale, then they should adhere to this as well. And since merely giving money equal to the sale is not enough, according to the industry, set the damages at some arbitrary level. Let's say $5000 per lost sale due to DRM issues. From Amazon alone, that should be about $10,000,000 USD in damages.
If the content industry wants to ruin people's lives under the assumption that downloading games/movies/music inderectly harms the artists that create them, they need to be held accountable by the same rules. People refusing to buy due to publisher meddling is DIRECTLY harming the artists and developers in this case. They (the publisher) need to either admit that they were wrong and greedy, or be painted with the exact same brush they seem to want everyone else painted with.
Someone needs to send a message to these assholes that treating your PAYING CUSTOMERS like criminals will NOT be tolerated.
Fiscal
Enhancement
Content
Encumbrance
Service.
There. Much more fitting, don't you think?
And THAT is the reason that the suit against Google will move far swifter and with more tenacity than the Microsoft suit could have ever garnered.
Microsoft Suit: Relax, we've got plenty of time. They're only hurting individual consumers.
Google Suit: My GOD! They could be hurting COMPANIES! Something has to be done RIGHT NOW!!!!
If there are so many of these emails, then why only post this small snippet of a supposedly larger flood of alleged hillarity? And shouldnt there be a new section specifically for this? Maybe bash.slashdot.org, so we can actually rate the emails and the boring/stupid ones can disappear forever?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7545212.stm has a much better write-up.
So now we will get even MORE draconian measures to stop the "evil hackers" when in reality, it was a combination of bad intentions, and old-fashioned stupidity. The article specifically mentions looking for "vulnerable" access points. This means that whoever set the network up for these stores did not do a proper job in securing said network. Also, why the HELL were the systems used to process credit card transactions on the same insecure wireless network? There is NO excuse for that. I'm not excusing what these guys did, but once again we have a case where whoever setup the hardware in these places needs to be held for criminal negligence.
Nowhere close. Well, unless all the downloaders were regulars at the most expensive movie theater in the world. But hey, at $1,000 per ticket there, you can't always afford to go see EVERY movie that comes out...
Well, it certainly keeps you out of the Blue Angels. Although the main reasoning there is an errant twitch from the air-bladder around your legs could cause you to fly into the ground or a teammate, since the stick is between your knees. Thunderbirds don't have this issue, however, since they use a sidestick (begin USAF vs USN argument now, heh).
There are SEVERAL things they could get her on: criminal child abuse, coercion of a minor, etc. But no, that would be too much work. Instead, they want to give her felony charges for violating the TOS of a website. I'm all for making sure she's punished, but this is not the way. Have the DA actually DO HIS JOB and not hoist her on something that can set a precedent which can be later used to fuck all of us at will...
A specific method of payment is not the issue here. The issue is that eBay owns PayPal, making the whole "we're doing this to protect YOU" argument rather spurious at best.
eBay takes a commission on each item sold through their site. Paypal takes a chunk of every transaction that goes through. So it works like this. Person A puts up an item for sale. Person B is the winning bidder. Person A now owes eBay X amount of money based on the final price of the item. This comes out of what they receive in payment from Person B. Person B sends the money through PayPal, which takes a percentage of the transaction, Y. If the item sold for Z dollars, person A will only ever see Z-(X+Y). Essentially, eBay gets paid twice for the same auction. THAT is where people are getting (rightfully) peeved.
Not the datacenter itself, but the InfoWorld coverage. Two pages that could have EASILY been put on a single page (although that would decrease ad impressions and we can't have that, now can we?) and a complete lack of pictures of this supposedly awesome upgrade? Can we PLEASE stop posting stories from the dolts at InfoWorld? All we're doing is driving ad impressions on shoddy articles. Mod me as offtopic if you wish. I couldn't care less as I have plenty of karma.
Is InfoWorld trying to start a new trend of making the printer-friendly version so damned annoying to read that people are more likely to choose the regular one? With AdBlock installed, I see just the article, but the article becomes all of one paragraph per page, for 10 pages or so. I switch to the printer-friendly version, and everything just seems to run together; text ads crammed in and looking like section headers, section headers not clearly defined from the previous, using the same spacing between different sections as between headers and the content... Forget boneheaded IT mistakes, whatabout being a clownshoes webmaster?
Correlation != Causation
Tell me something. When was the last hijacking incident involving a US airline BEFORE 9/11?
These were 15 and 16 years prior to 9/11. There was FedEx 705 in 1994, but they are a freight carrier and as such do not deal with passengers. That was a disgruntled employee. We're not even 7 years past 9/11, so there is no way to tell if these measures are having any effect without them actually catching people in the act of trying to interfere with a flight. Another interesting thing to note is that while both of these incidents involved a major US air carrier, they had NOTHING to do with US soil. These flights originated from airports outside of the US, so domestic airport security cannot be factored in.
So because some people don't like to give up their privacy without a damned good reason (at the very least, probable cause) in the name of "security", then they should be banned from flying for life? This attitude both saddens and sickens me. It's the very same "roll over and do what your told because we want you to believe it will keep you safe" mentality that I was talking about in the first place. It's not about safety, it's about control. We have PLENTY of safety already if we only stop flinching away from shadows and stand up for doing what's right.
This is exactly what they want EVERYONE to think. But the truth of the matter is, no, you DON'T have to go along with it. People need to wake up and stop being a bunch of ignorant sheep in the face of all of this. Refuse the scan, refuse the pat-down, refuse to even fly anymore. Prices are going up and so is the amount of bullshit they make you go through to squeeze yourself into a cramped metal tube with not but a package of stale peanuts as food.
Really, why is all of this crap even necessary? All it does is create more headache for everyone involved. I'm not saying we need NO security, but this is honestly going completely overboard. Metal detectors? Good idea. Keeps people from bringing certain bad things on planes. X-ray luggage? Also good, for reasons stated above. Air marshalls? I'm not keen on the idea of firearms at 35,000 feet, but someone in law enforcement is a good idea if someone gets a bit drunk or stupid. Re-enforced cockpit doors? Should have been done a long time ago. That's just common sense.
Beyond that, I don't really see any of it as more than an excuse to spend vast sums of money. Air travel is still one of the safest (albiet nowhere near the most comfortable these days) ways to travel. The only reason incidents get so much media attention is the number of people killed in one event. Wait a couple hours and the number of deaths on the highway will take the lead once again, however. Bombings went out of style in the 80's, and you can forget about any more hijackings. After 9/11, do you REALY think passengers are going to stand for that sort of crap anymore? Not a chance. We're throwing money at phantoms, here. Attacking air travel is pretty much dead these days, but not because of any new security measures. All the same, I think I'll take my chances on the highway. At least nobody is going to attempt coercing me into a full-body scan and cavity search just to get into my car.
One final aside:
Wasn't the whole mantra several years back one of "We musn't change our way of life, or THEY will have won."? Now look at us. We allow draconian measures to be passed in the name of "security". We freak like children with imaginary boogeymen under our beds when someone even THINKS the word "terrorist." We happily give up privacy because we are sold on the illusion that it's for our own good and it will only effect those who have nothing to hide. We have become completely paranoid and changed the way we do pretty much anything, out of fear that we will get hit again. I'm sorry, but isn't that the very goal of a terrorist act? To have us do EXACTLY what we have done in the past seven years?
Society has become so caught up in going apeshit trying to prevent THEM from winning, that the exact opposite effect seems to have occured. Eight years ago, almost nobody had ever heard of the names being tossed about on the news. Now, it's foremost in everyone's mind. Their goal wasn't to savagely murder thousands of people, that was just the tool they chose to use. No, their real goal was to make themselves known, and us frightened. I hate to say it, but they succeeded.
EXACTLY. It will criminalize unauthorized information exchange on the internet. Sounds all fine and good until you start thinking about who gets to define what constitutes "unauthorized." A legislative body with proper representation drafting the definition after careful consideration, input from constituents, and an informed debate on the issue? Hardly. "Unauthorized" will be at the sole whim of the MAFIAA and whatever political party is in power at the time. This will be used to squash differences in opinion from those in power. It may take down Wikileaks first, but who is to say if it will stop there? What they're trying to do with this is no less than pulling the wool over everyone's eyes until it's too late to do anything about it. They're going to try and present it fait accompli because they know it won't stand up if they actually ask people what they think.
Face it, power no longer rests with the people, and hasn't for some time. It all resides in the hands of the corporations with money to buy votes. The oil, content, and software industries are the ones ACTUALLY running the US. So when does everyone decide to use what little power they have left to say "That's it, you're ALL fired. Every single one of you. Get the HELL out of Washington and find a REAL job, while we vote in people who actually have a spine to stand up for those that they represent!"
I know, I know. It's a pipe dream that won't happen in my lifetime, or even in my grandchildren's lifetimes (I'm 26, single, no kids. Typical Slashdotter, but there's an idea of the timescale I'm talking about), but can't a man dream?
Isn't that what the Home Office is already trying to do. Seems like the only difference would be that the Home Office isn't trying to hide behind dodgy "anti-piracy" legislation.
...using TrueCrypt to secure the file then sending it via a secure FTP? It's exceedingly simple to use, and you secure it to your needs. All she has to do is mount the file and type in the password you give her. Tell her you will send the password via another means, and send it via registered mail making sure that there is absolutely no clue on the paper as to what the text means.
If booting from a Live CD isn't an option (which was said even in the summary, do people not even read THAT anymore?), then she's going to have ZERO clue what a hardware keylogger looks like.
Anyway, several people here have already stated the blindingly obvious, and I'll agree with it 100%. If things are to the point where this is even a question, then the marriage is doomed. She doesn't trust him to not spy on her, and if he IS spying, then he doesn't trust her. Communication Fail and Trust Fail built into one package.
That would be all fine and good if it were as simple as saying "No, thank you." and going back the other way. Unfortunately, once you've landed, you are pretty much at the whim of the airport. If you refuse, you can't just hop back on the plane and go home. Not only would the airline have NO clue what to do with your luggage (as if they do in the first place), but security could probably then hold you suspect for failure to comply with procedures. If they end up doing that, your laptop will get searched anyway. After all, you must have SOMETHING to hide? Why else would you not let them search the computer in the first place (not saying that point is valid, but you KNOW it would get used)?