You've probably got a good point here -- but it'd be an even better one if you mentioned what mail server this little recipe worked with. Would you be so kind as to post that info, so I and other mail server admins might be able to use it?
Too bad it'd never be feasible to penalize all of the people who aren't patching their systems and thus flooding people's inboxes with virus spam. I'm still getting hundreds, sometimes thousands of fscking "Your Details" e-mails every day -- despite the fact that the problem was widely publicized and (supposedly) widely patched. In a way, this is worse than spam, because not only do I often get more virus mails than regular spams, I *know* I'm using a lot more bandwidth on all the SoBig.F crap...but until it's ever feasible to punish folks who won't/can't patch their systems, I guess we're stuck with this crap, too.
For everyone out there who's wondering, "Why would you pay $20 for this song...geez!!", let me explain why I just put in a bid at $37.00 (username of schnarff over on eBay, too, if anyone cares to check).
This auction isn't about just getting a song -- I own no Mac hardware/software, so even if I won the auction, I couldn't play the song. It's about, as the seller says, testing basic rights in the digital age -- whether the (relatively) undisputed right of people to sell used CDs, etc. still exists when dealing with electronic formats. I figure, the more people who bid on this thing, the greater the interest will be shown to be in retaining basic rights in relation to digital media.
Besides, I know I won't win with the attention Slashdot is throwing at this thing, so the money is meaningless. That, and I wouldn't mind sending a $37.00 donation to the EFF anyway, since that's what the seller is doing with the proceeds of the auction.:-)
Seems like we need to point the FCC towards Open Spectrum (mentioned in a previous Slashdot article). After all, why go to all the trouble of reshuffling the tiny spectrum we've got now when the proper devices and management can give us more bandwidth than we know what to do with yet?
I can personally vouch for the fact that phone companies are doing their best to not provide local number portability while busily raking in cash.
I recently decided to switch from Verizon to Cavalier Telephone, a local CLEC. It took me almost two months to complete the transition, including some two weeks where I had no inbound phone service, unless the caller was coming from Cavalier's network (i.e. 0.0001% of the universe). Sparing everyone the gory details, I had problems including:
Cavalier required me to be at home to tell a technician to cut over from my Verizon line, despite my having told them it was OK at least a dozen times over the phone
Neither company could explain exactly what was happening with the split-bank on my line, required (at least by Verizon) for DSL. Understanding a that problem and getting it fixed added two weeks to the switchover.
When Verizon finally claimed it had ported my old number, they didn't bother to change their routing information, leaving me with my lack of inbound service. Neither company had a way of expediting a fix ("That'll be 3 business days, sir"), or even a person or department who specifically dealt with number portability or the like.
I was paying both companies throughout the switch, mainly due to the fact that if I cancelled my Verizon account, the number I was trying to port would have disappeared for good.
I was told many times over that neither company had ever experienced such a painful switch; even so, the fact that such a disaster could happen at all tells me that companies aren't paying nearly the attention they should to number portability issues, considering the millions they're raking in from it.
Since you're a "geek candidate", you're obviously well-aware of the massive short- and long-term savings California could achieve by switching its computing systems to free, Open Source projects. Considering the current budget crisis, I'm also assuming that such a switch has probably crossed your mind, at least fleetingly.
What I want to know is, do you think that passing a law mandating the use of free software wherever it does the job properly would be proper? While many people here at/. feel that such legislation is obviously correct, I personally feel that mandation of almost any sort from government, particularly when it relates to engineering choices, is likely to cause problems from a technical standpoint, not to mention the fact that it restricts freedom -- something I think we all want -- unnecessarily, since something as simple as executive direction to consider free projects could likely achieve the same objective.
The thing that really scares me after hearing this is that the rest of the computer sales world is, by and large, well below Fry's in terms of knowledge and selection. The Fry's I frequented in Sacramento was full of people who could tell me the average failure rates of the brand name RAM vs. their generic stuff, whether a 5400 or 7200 RPM hard drive would make a difference, etc. When I moved to Washington, DC and found that the best computer store around was MicroCenter -- a horribly overpriced, understaffed, and generally terrible store -- I about cried. More to the point of this story, though, if Fry's is this clueless about Linux, I hate to see the rest of the computer stores out there attempting to sell it. Heaven knows that may cause a step *backwards* in terms of adoption by the general public!
You know, it would really do you some good to check your sources before posting.
I followed your link, and the second search result actually identifies Reagan as calling Nicaraguan contras "the moral equivelant of [America's] Founding Fathers". While the document goes on to quote Reagan's praise for the mujahadeen fighting against the Soviets, it gives no evidence of him praising the Taliban -- which he could not have done in any case, seeing as how he had literally lost his mind by the time the Taliban came to power.
I wish I had something to offer you, but unfortunately, as a product of the California State Public School System in the 80's and 90's, I'm in much the same boat. I got taught a lot of rules and dates, not a lot of theory or application.
Since this thread may well have people who can be helpful responding in it, though, I'd like to ask quickly: can anyone suggest any good books on calculus as it applies to the physical world (i.e. astronomy, music, etc.)? I've been told by many geeks that calculus is the math that's most applicable in the real world (besides arithmetic, of course), but I've never been able to see how that works.
Actually, if you're saying the government should exit the spaceflight business altogether to save money during our current economic downturn, you're incorrect.
The government actually makes money by launching commercial payloads into space -- how do you think all of those cell phone satellites, etc. get up there? Obviously, the program as a whole is a loss, thanks to wastes like the ISS; however, if the government were to drop research and simply operate as a commercial entity, launching private payloads, they could actually turn a profit.
If laws were eased to the point that commercial entities could do the same -- currently, there are so many restrictions on launches as well as non-competitive agreements between those who need launch services and the government that private companies can't compete -- we'd end up with a thriving spaceflight/tourism industry, freeing the government to do real research projects with even less money than it spends now.
Oh, and BTW, anyone who says that the space program is taking money away from poor people needs to check their facts first. The whole reason NASA is so underfunded is because its budget comes out of the Veterans Affiars/Housing & Urban Development (VA/HUD) Subcommittee, and every time they ask for more money, someone comes along with a "but you're taking money away from the poor children!" line, and the NASA budget gets slashed.
I've posted a mirror of this site (based upon the text a previous poster said it contained, since the server appears to be down) on my own Dreamcast.
As my page says, the Dreamcast is running NetBSD 1.6.1, with its connection to the Internet being a 608/128 ADSL modem. It's living behind an OpenBSD 3.1 firewall that's just redirecting the port appropriately.
Hopefully, since this isn't on the front page, it won't get Slashdotted...but it ought to be interesting to see how many hits it can take before it goes down.
Note that, for some odd reason, I seem to be able to get to the page through Lynx from a box on another network, but not through the boxes on the same LAN. If you have problems getting to the page, try Lynx for the fun of it and let me know.;-)
It seems to me there's a relatively simple way to combat trojans/viruses/damaged files sent out onto the network by the RIAA: MD5 sums.
Imagine if you had a client that allowed you to click a "this file is busted" button -- and perhaps let you pick from a list of things like "1. Virus; 2. Corrupt; 3. Kiddie Porn; 4. This Music Just Sucks!", which went off and reported the MD5sum of the file and the reason you gave for reporting it to either a centralized base of servers, or all of your local peers. The recipients of this information would then hang onto it until a critical mass of reports about that particular MD5sum had been reached (the critical mass being necessary to prevent the ??AA from just coming onto the network and spewing out MD5sums of legit files). Once that point came, they'd put it onto a blacklist of sorts, which could be constantly distributed throughout the network.
I know this wouldn't exactly be perfect, but it'd be a good start against this sort of thing, it'd be perfectly legal -- and actually, it would work as a great evidence-gathering tool for a potential case against the ??AA folks. Just imagine going to court, telling a judge that you've got the unique fingerprint of a particularly malicious file showing up all over the network, and then pointing at the RIAA/MPAA. That could have the potential to seriously screw these guys!
I was able to snag a copy of the Features page before the Slashdotting began (damn near got first post, too, but I actually wanted to *read* a bit before I posted). I've put a copy on my web server.
Oh, and I believe this is the Google Cache, but it's barely even responding. We couldn't have Slashdotted Google, could we?
Now if only we can get a coffee machine that's compatible with this, I'll be set.:-)
Of course, the other thing to worry about here is security -- I sure would hate to get 0wn3d by some idiot who then had the power to play with my lights, change my channels, etc. I know the easy crack here is to say "then just don't run it on Windoze!", but I won't take that road because RedHat, etc. are almost as vulnerable if improperly configured.
I know that our current patent system is set up so that, if you don't defend your patent for a certain amount of time, you can't just come back and start attempting to enforce it. Perhaps, as we see more and more cases like this, it would be smart for the Congress or the Courts to much more clearly define the limits on trying to enforce a patent after you didn't bother for a while. Though this might lead to more vigorous legal action to defend ridiculous patents in the short-term, it might do good long-term by helping prevent fiascos like this one (or the one where some company tried to claim they'd patented the hyperlink...etc, ad nauseum).
First of all, let me say that I support the use of less fossil fuels -- I'm all for things like hydrogen-powered cars, nuclear power, etc. So for any Greens that may want to refute the rest of this post, keep in mind that I'm not a total anti-environmentalist.
Anyway, an earlier poster mentioned that we're coming off of solar max, so of course temperatures have been getting warmer. I'd like to point out that we're actually coming off of several solar maxes: the 11, 100, and 1,000 year orbital maxes, to be precise. For those who may be unaware, we not only get peaks and valleys in solar flare/sunspot activity, but our orbit around the Sun brings us closer and further away in predictable cycles as well.
My uncle actually put together a very good study on Space Weather for the National Space Architects a while back. It's still quite relevant, and is available in PDF form on my web site.
Actually, accodring to our dear ol' Founding Fathers, there's quite a difference.
I was recently reading the Federalist Papers, and Madison (I believe) made the good point that a Democracy requires the direct participation of all the citizens on everything, whereas in a Republic, certain people are empowered by the people to attend to the mundanities of everyday government. He mentioned this as a reason why a Republic could work over a physical area as large as the United States, while a Democracy could not (you just couldn't get all those people together all the time to run everything).
If you ask me, having the people vote directly on everything versus having them empower a select few to do the voting is a giant difference. In case you're wondering, I'm actually a supporter of the Republican model here -- mainly because the average member of the public is just too dumb to be trusted to vote on everything without screwing things up royally.
Hey! I'm a Slashdot reader, and I get laid. Of course, I'm married, so it probably doesn't count...but I can make it up in the fact that I've got my non-techie wife laughing at anti-M$/DRM/etc. jokes.
It would be a total shame to waste such a great console as the original NES on something so...useless and unoriginal as this mod. I bought my NES with birthday/allowance/savings money in April of 1985 (86? whenever it first came out), and it's been played on pretty much continuously ever since by me, my siblings, and now my wife, who never had one as a kid. Despite all this abuse, the thing's still in great shape...I had to get one of those replacement cartridge readers from EBay for $20 a year ago, but it was an easy install, and it works like a charm now. Why destroy such a good machine?
Oh, and as for greatest game ever...my vote definitely goes in for SMB3...but you can't forget Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a runner-up!
While a lot of people here are going to spend a lot of time bashing the Bush Administration and urging their ouster, let's pause for a moment and consider the fact that none of you could name a nationally recognized politician whose administration would be any better. I mean, seriously, can't you see the same sort of stuff coming out of a Gore/Lieberman/Gephardt/McCain administration? Or worse yet, a Pat Buchannan or Al Sharpton presidency?
The problem is, all of the politicians on today's scene want to grab power for the government, and there's not a lot of hope for the future, because that's the nature of most politicians. What we really need is a system that imposes even more severe restraints on the power of government than what we've got now...something along the lines of a freshly drafted Constitution.
Of course, this won't happen any time soon...so meanwhile, go write all of the people who are supposedly representing your interests and tell them just how strongly opposed you are to the police state a bill like this would create. Do us all a favor, though, and be coherent when you do it -- flames to representatives are about as constructive as your average mailing list flame war.
Slashdot Mirror
You've probably got a good point here -- but it'd be an even better one if you mentioned what mail server this little recipe worked with. Would you be so kind as to post that info, so I and other mail server admins might be able to use it?
Too bad it'd never be feasible to penalize all of the people who aren't patching their systems and thus flooding people's inboxes with virus spam. I'm still getting hundreds, sometimes thousands of fscking "Your Details" e-mails every day -- despite the fact that the problem was widely publicized and (supposedly) widely patched. In a way, this is worse than spam, because not only do I often get more virus mails than regular spams, I *know* I'm using a lot more bandwidth on all the SoBig.F crap...but until it's ever feasible to punish folks who won't/can't patch their systems, I guess we're stuck with this crap, too.
For everyone out there who's wondering, "Why would you pay $20 for this song...geez!!", let me explain why I just put in a bid at $37.00 (username of schnarff over on eBay, too, if anyone cares to check).
:-)
This auction isn't about just getting a song -- I own no Mac hardware/software, so even if I won the auction, I couldn't play the song. It's about, as the seller says, testing basic rights in the digital age -- whether the (relatively) undisputed right of people to sell used CDs, etc. still exists when dealing with electronic formats. I figure, the more people who bid on this thing, the greater the interest will be shown to be in retaining basic rights in relation to digital media.
Besides, I know I won't win with the attention Slashdot is throwing at this thing, so the money is meaningless. That, and I wouldn't mind sending a $37.00 donation to the EFF anyway, since that's what the seller is doing with the proceeds of the auction.
You know, if the amount of code SCO claims is infringing continues to grow at this rate, eventually it'll be as big as Darl McBride's head.
;-)
I can see it now -- when IBM finally bursts their bubble in court, McBride's head explodes right along with it.
Seems like we need to point the FCC towards Open Spectrum (mentioned in a previous Slashdot article). After all, why go to all the trouble of reshuffling the tiny spectrum we've got now when the proper devices and management can give us more bandwidth than we know what to do with yet?
I recently decided to switch from Verizon to Cavalier Telephone, a local CLEC. It took me almost two months to complete the transition, including some two weeks where I had no inbound phone service, unless the caller was coming from Cavalier's network (i.e. 0.0001% of the universe). Sparing everyone the gory details, I had problems including:
- Cavalier required me to be at home to tell a technician to cut over from my Verizon line, despite my having told them it was OK at least a dozen times over the phone
- Neither company could explain exactly what was happening with the split-bank on my line, required (at least by Verizon) for DSL. Understanding a that problem and getting it fixed added two weeks to the switchover.
- When Verizon finally claimed it had ported my old number, they didn't bother to change their routing information, leaving me with my lack of inbound service. Neither company had a way of expediting a fix ("That'll be 3 business days, sir"), or even a person or department who specifically dealt with number portability or the like.
I was paying both companies throughout the switch, mainly due to the fact that if I cancelled my Verizon account, the number I was trying to port would have disappeared for good.I was told many times over that neither company had ever experienced such a painful switch; even so, the fact that such a disaster could happen at all tells me that companies aren't paying nearly the attention they should to number portability issues, considering the millions they're raking in from it.
Since you're a "geek candidate", you're obviously well-aware of the massive short- and long-term savings California could achieve by switching its computing systems to free, Open Source projects. Considering the current budget crisis, I'm also assuming that such a switch has probably crossed your mind, at least fleetingly.
/. feel that such legislation is obviously correct, I personally feel that mandation of almost any sort from government, particularly when it relates to engineering choices, is likely to cause problems from a technical standpoint, not to mention the fact that it restricts freedom -- something I think we all want -- unnecessarily, since something as simple as executive direction to consider free projects could likely achieve the same objective.
What I want to know is, do you think that passing a law mandating the use of free software wherever it does the job properly would be proper? While many people here at
Thank You,
Alex Kirk
The thing that really scares me after hearing this is that the rest of the computer sales world is, by and large, well below Fry's in terms of knowledge and selection. The Fry's I frequented in Sacramento was full of people who could tell me the average failure rates of the brand name RAM vs. their generic stuff, whether a 5400 or 7200 RPM hard drive would make a difference, etc. When I moved to Washington, DC and found that the best computer store around was MicroCenter -- a horribly overpriced, understaffed, and generally terrible store -- I about cried. More to the point of this story, though, if Fry's is this clueless about Linux, I hate to see the rest of the computer stores out there attempting to sell it. Heaven knows that may cause a step *backwards* in terms of adoption by the general public!
You know, it would really do you some good to check your sources before posting.
I followed your link, and the second search result actually identifies Reagan as calling Nicaraguan contras "the moral equivelant of [America's] Founding Fathers". While the document goes on to quote Reagan's praise for the mujahadeen fighting against the Soviets, it gives no evidence of him praising the Taliban -- which he could not have done in any case, seeing as how he had literally lost his mind by the time the Taliban came to power.
I wish I had something to offer you, but unfortunately, as a product of the California State Public School System in the 80's and 90's, I'm in much the same boat. I got taught a lot of rules and dates, not a lot of theory or application.
Since this thread may well have people who can be helpful responding in it, though, I'd like to ask quickly: can anyone suggest any good books on calculus as it applies to the physical world (i.e. astronomy, music, etc.)? I've been told by many geeks that calculus is the math that's most applicable in the real world (besides arithmetic, of course), but I've never been able to see how that works.
Thanks in advance!
Actually, if you're saying the government should exit the spaceflight business altogether to save money during our current economic downturn, you're incorrect.
The government actually makes money by launching commercial payloads into space -- how do you think all of those cell phone satellites, etc. get up there? Obviously, the program as a whole is a loss, thanks to wastes like the ISS; however, if the government were to drop research and simply operate as a commercial entity, launching private payloads, they could actually turn a profit.
If laws were eased to the point that commercial entities could do the same -- currently, there are so many restrictions on launches as well as non-competitive agreements between those who need launch services and the government that private companies can't compete -- we'd end up with a thriving spaceflight/tourism industry, freeing the government to do real research projects with even less money than it spends now.
Oh, and BTW, anyone who says that the space program is taking money away from poor people needs to check their facts first. The whole reason NASA is so underfunded is because its budget comes out of the Veterans Affiars/Housing & Urban Development (VA/HUD) Subcommittee, and every time they ask for more money, someone comes along with a "but you're taking money away from the poor children!" line, and the NASA budget gets slashed.
I've posted a mirror of this site (based upon the text a previous poster said it contained, since the server appears to be down) on my own Dreamcast.
;-)
As my page says, the Dreamcast is running NetBSD 1.6.1, with its connection to the Internet being a 608/128 ADSL modem. It's living behind an OpenBSD 3.1 firewall that's just redirecting the port appropriately.
Hopefully, since this isn't on the front page, it won't get Slashdotted...but it ought to be interesting to see how many hits it can take before it goes down.
Note that, for some odd reason, I seem to be able to get to the page through Lynx from a box on another network, but not through the boxes on the same LAN. If you have problems getting to the page, try Lynx for the fun of it and let me know.
It seems to me there's a relatively simple way to combat trojans/viruses/damaged files sent out onto the network by the RIAA: MD5 sums.
Imagine if you had a client that allowed you to click a "this file is busted" button -- and perhaps let you pick from a list of things like "1. Virus; 2. Corrupt; 3. Kiddie Porn; 4. This Music Just Sucks!", which went off and reported the MD5sum of the file and the reason you gave for reporting it to either a centralized base of servers, or all of your local peers. The recipients of this information would then hang onto it until a critical mass of reports about that particular MD5sum had been reached (the critical mass being necessary to prevent the ??AA from just coming onto the network and spewing out MD5sums of legit files). Once that point came, they'd put it onto a blacklist of sorts, which could be constantly distributed throughout the network.
I know this wouldn't exactly be perfect, but it'd be a good start against this sort of thing, it'd be perfectly legal -- and actually, it would work as a great evidence-gathering tool for a potential case against the ??AA folks. Just imagine going to court, telling a judge that you've got the unique fingerprint of a particularly malicious file showing up all over the network, and then pointing at the RIAA/MPAA. That could have the potential to seriously screw these guys!
I didn't think we'd Slashdotted Google, but I could think of no other cause immediately. Glad to know what it was.
Dude, that's not cool! That link sent me to The Pimp House! If you're going to post a Google cache, do it right!
Probably a bad idea, but...
I was able to snag a copy of the Features page before the Slashdotting began (damn near got first post, too, but I actually wanted to *read* a bit before I posted). I've put a copy on my web server.
Oh, and I believe this is the Google Cache, but it's barely even responding. We couldn't have Slashdotted Google, could we?
Now if only we can get a coffee machine that's compatible with this, I'll be set. :-)
Of course, the other thing to worry about here is security -- I sure would hate to get 0wn3d by some idiot who then had the power to play with my lights, change my channels, etc. I know the easy crack here is to say "then just don't run it on Windoze!", but I won't take that road because RedHat, etc. are almost as vulnerable if improperly configured.
I know that our current patent system is set up so that, if you don't defend your patent for a certain amount of time, you can't just come back and start attempting to enforce it. Perhaps, as we see more and more cases like this, it would be smart for the Congress or the Courts to much more clearly define the limits on trying to enforce a patent after you didn't bother for a while. Though this might lead to more vigorous legal action to defend ridiculous patents in the short-term, it might do good long-term by helping prevent fiascos like this one (or the one where some company tried to claim they'd patented the hyperlink...etc, ad nauseum).
Why am I not surprised that the people in Humboldt found a way for themselves to do less work?
;-)
I wonder if we'll see a press release from them later saying they've designed something to emulate a particularly famous local plant.
Now if only we can find a way to share more than bad pr0n and cheezy MP3s, this will be perfect.
First of all, let me say that I support the use of less fossil fuels -- I'm all for things like hydrogen-powered cars, nuclear power, etc. So for any Greens that may want to refute the rest of this post, keep in mind that I'm not a total anti-environmentalist.
Anyway, an earlier poster mentioned that we're coming off of solar max, so of course temperatures have been getting warmer. I'd like to point out that we're actually coming off of several solar maxes: the 11, 100, and 1,000 year orbital maxes, to be precise. For those who may be unaware, we not only get peaks and valleys in solar flare/sunspot activity, but our orbit around the Sun brings us closer and further away in predictable cycles as well.
My uncle actually put together a very good study on Space Weather for the National Space Architects a while back. It's still quite relevant, and is available in PDF form on my web site.
Actually, accodring to our dear ol' Founding Fathers, there's quite a difference.
I was recently reading the Federalist Papers, and Madison (I believe) made the good point that a Democracy requires the direct participation of all the citizens on everything, whereas in a Republic, certain people are empowered by the people to attend to the mundanities of everyday government. He mentioned this as a reason why a Republic could work over a physical area as large as the United States, while a Democracy could not (you just couldn't get all those people together all the time to run everything).
If you ask me, having the people vote directly on everything versus having them empower a select few to do the voting is a giant difference. In case you're wondering, I'm actually a supporter of the Republican model here -- mainly because the average member of the public is just too dumb to be trusted to vote on everything without screwing things up royally.
Hey! I'm a Slashdot reader, and I get laid. Of course, I'm married, so it probably doesn't count...but I can make it up in the fact that I've got my non-techie wife laughing at anti-M$/DRM/etc. jokes.
It would be a total shame to waste such a great console as the original NES on something so...useless and unoriginal as this mod. I bought my NES with birthday/allowance/savings money in April of 1985 (86? whenever it first came out), and it's been played on pretty much continuously ever since by me, my siblings, and now my wife, who never had one as a kid. Despite all this abuse, the thing's still in great shape...I had to get one of those replacement cartridge readers from EBay for $20 a year ago, but it was an easy install, and it works like a charm now. Why destroy such a good machine?
Oh, and as for greatest game ever...my vote definitely goes in for SMB3...but you can't forget Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a runner-up!
While a lot of people here are going to spend a lot of time bashing the Bush Administration and urging their ouster, let's pause for a moment and consider the fact that none of you could name a nationally recognized politician whose administration would be any better. I mean, seriously, can't you see the same sort of stuff coming out of a Gore/Lieberman/Gephardt/McCain administration? Or worse yet, a Pat Buchannan or Al Sharpton presidency? The problem is, all of the politicians on today's scene want to grab power for the government, and there's not a lot of hope for the future, because that's the nature of most politicians. What we really need is a system that imposes even more severe restraints on the power of government than what we've got now...something along the lines of a freshly drafted Constitution. Of course, this won't happen any time soon...so meanwhile, go write all of the people who are supposedly representing your interests and tell them just how strongly opposed you are to the police state a bill like this would create. Do us all a favor, though, and be coherent when you do it -- flames to representatives are about as constructive as your average mailing list flame war.