well for older macs (ones with serial ports) you can piggyback a localtalk connection over regular phone wires. the phone system only uses 2 of the 4 wires. the other 2 can be used by a localtalk network using phonenet adapters from farallon. they're about $8 a piece and all you have to do is get a 4 conductor cable splitter for your phone jacks.
the court ruling was not a Supreme Court ruling and is therefore only applicable to the district court in which it was handed down (chicago I believe). also the decision only pertains to source code or algorithms. as these are in (relatively) clear language they are subject to free speech protection. OTOH if it's a binary release it's still subject to current restrictions.
- Darth Maul, who we did not see die, will play an important role in II/III...
excuse me...? from what I saw of the two halves of Darth Maul seperating from eachother and falling down the shaft I think it's pretty reasonable to believe that he is quite dead.
With new tech there's always some danger of misuse. but the fact remains that seeing through walls is already possible with a simple IR camera.
but think about the possible good it could do. A SWAT team can get an up to the second 3d image of the inside of the drug lab they're about to raid uncluding the guy in the closet with a gun and the boobytraps on the the door to the third floor office (for example)
If you think about it probably the best thing that can happen for us is to have the DOJ appeal the decision and lose in the Supreme Court. The only way to overrule the Court is to make a Constitutional ammendment. The article quotes someone as saying that the worst case for the DOJ is to appeal and lose. The Supreme Court in the past has been very strict on free speech issues. despite decades of being packed with conservatives by the republicans the Court has been unfailingly ruthless in upholding freedom of speech. Just look at flag burning as an example. Most of the American public is behind an anti-flag burning law. but the Court has struck it down twice and Congress has tried and failed to make an Ammendment to overrule the Court.
So I say that we encourage the DOJ to appeal to the Supreme Court. They'll lose again and then there will be no further recourse for them.
Para2801 Sec 3 `(1) GENERAL RULE- Subject to paragraphs (2) and (3), the Secretary shall have exclusive authority to control exports of all computer hardware, software, computing devices, customer premises equipment, communications network equipment, and technology for information security (including encryption), except that which is specifically designed or modified for military use, including command, control, and intelligence applications
from what I can tell this is less of a real move to free american companies from restrictive export controls than a power grab. it is basically saying that the sec of commerce is responsible for export controls and checks rather than any other department. except in the case of things that are specifically listed as being military in nature.
it does remove the need for an export liscense for things after a 15 day review by the commerce dept. which IMHO is a good thing (TM) because if anyone has ever dealt with the government they know that 15 days is a laughably small time frame. it looks like if you submit it and if 15 days later it's not listed as restricted then you get to sell it all you want.
the one that worries me the most though is `(1) in the case of a first offense under this section, shall be imprisoned for not more than 5 years, or fined in the amount set forth in this title, or both; and
`(2) in the case of a second or subsequent offense under this section, shall be imprisoned for not more than 10 years, or fined in the amount set forth in this title, or both
this basically says that if you're arrested for a felony and you use encryption on your files then you get lots of prision time tacked on. since there's no real way to determine what's in the file other than decrypting it and if you refuse to do that then the state can say that that's evidence of it being used in the commission of a felony. Say you have 200 encrypted emails on your hard drive. and you get arrested for grand theft(a felony). you refuse to decrypt the email claiming that it's personal in nature and irrelevant. The state says that it was used to plan your crime. then you get convicted of the crime. they tack on 5 years for the first offense (message) and 10 years for the next 199 offenses (messages. that adds up to about 2000 years in jail for encrypting your love letters or whatever.
while it's unlikely that it will be pushed to that extreme point we need to be aware that it's a possibility and not just assume that the whole bill is good for our side of this debate.
I'm sorry, but that attitude is what's going to kill all the good PBS does. PBS still provides programming that is absolutely not available anywhere else. Some people still do not have cable (myself included) and PBS is the only place to find that type of content. While Discovery and others on cable have good programming they still lack the cultural elements that make PBS great. I doubt we will ever see anything like "Turandot Live at the Forbidden City" on Discovery or even A&E.
I say that we need to stop spending billions of dollars on non-functional missle intercept systems and spend more on public broadcasting.
In last month's Asimov's Science Fiction magazine there was a story called Written In Bloodabout someone who develops this kind of a technology and uses it to inscribe passages of the Koran into the blood of believers. Since this would be passed down from parent to child it could be used to mark Muslims in a way that was impossible before. It raises some interesting ideas about uses for writing in the genetic code of humans. I recommend the story and the magazine in general.
From what I've read/heard about OS X Client that's exactly what Apple's in the process of doing. It's based on a Mach Kernel and it has a MacOS GUI with all the smiley prettiness and ease of use that entails. We'll have to wait for betas to be released before we can see how good a job they do, but if OS X Server is any indication of the direction they're headed I think it looks very promising.
This morning's MacOSRumors page has some additional information about the problem. It seems to not be as easy to do as the c't article makes it appear. It is definately a problem, but it's not as easy to do as they make it out.
I live in the Philadelphia area and there's a weekly Tech section in the Inquirer(Philly Newspaper)
Yesterday they had an article about the 'Dark Net'. That was the actual term used by the Author. He went on for a while about how software companies have chased all the evil warez people off the web and then they've all moved to the Dark Net where they can trade their illegal software with impunity. After reading the article a couple times trying to figure out what he was talking about I noticed a single reference to FTP which is apparently the Dark Net.
The author seems to believe that anything done on FTP couldn't possibly be legal because the web is so much easier.
There were also some references to 'other software' and non-standard (non-web) protocols that make it simpler for pirates to trade stolen software at higher speed. All I can think of is Hotlne, but there's no reference to any real information. The entire article seems to be based on some vague notion of pirates being everywhere and being the only people who use high speed connections. for more info you can read the whole article on the Inquirer's website
Another possible reason for making an IPO and letting the "overspeculation of a million tech-hyper investors" is to finance the free software. Think about it... If you're working to produce the best OS in the world and you want to spend all your time on it then why not let some financial weenies from wallstreet pay your salary. Or you could offer your best people stock options to encourage them to stay with you and not bail out for higher paying jobs. This is after all still a competetive industry and our economy is still based on making money to pay the bills.
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I personally would consider 180GB to be an obscene amount of data. especially if it fits inside my watch.
well for older macs (ones with serial ports) you can piggyback a localtalk connection over regular phone wires. the phone system only uses 2 of the 4 wires. the other 2 can be used by a localtalk network using phonenet adapters from farallon. they're about $8 a piece and all you have to do is get a 4 conductor cable splitter for your phone jacks.
I just checked out the Apple site and now that the Keynote is over the new iBook is announced and will be sold starting in september.
for more info go here
looks like another winner for Apple
the court ruling was not a Supreme Court ruling and is therefore only applicable to the district court in which it was handed down (chicago I believe).
also the decision only pertains to source code or algorithms. as these are in (relatively) clear language they are subject to free speech protection. OTOH if it's a binary release it's still subject to current restrictions.
- Darth Maul, who we did not see die, will play an important role in II/III...
excuse me...?
from what I saw of the two halves of Darth Maul seperating from eachother and falling down the shaft I think it's pretty reasonable to believe that he is quite dead.
With new tech there's always some danger of misuse. but the fact remains that seeing through walls is already possible with a simple IR camera.
but think about the possible good it could do. A SWAT team can get an up to the second 3d image of the inside of the drug lab they're about to raid uncluding the guy in the closet with a gun and the boobytraps on the the door to the third floor office (for example)
If you think about it probably the best thing that can happen for us is to have the DOJ appeal the decision and lose in the Supreme Court. The only way to overrule the Court is to make a Constitutional ammendment.
The article quotes someone as saying that the worst case for the DOJ is to appeal and lose.
The Supreme Court in the past has been very strict on free speech issues. despite decades of being packed with conservatives by the republicans the Court has been unfailingly ruthless in upholding freedom of speech.
Just look at flag burning as an example. Most of the American public is behind an anti-flag burning law. but the Court has struck it down twice and Congress has tried and failed to make an Ammendment to overrule the Court.
So I say that we encourage the DOJ to appeal to the Supreme Court. They'll lose again and then there will be no further recourse for them.
Para2801 Sec 3
`(1) GENERAL RULE- Subject to paragraphs (2) and (3), the Secretary shall have exclusive authority to control exports of all computer hardware, software, computing devices, customer premises equipment, communications network equipment, and technology for information security (including encryption), except that which is specifically designed or modified for military use, including command, control, and intelligence applications
from what I can tell this is less of a real move to free american companies from restrictive export controls than a power grab. it is basically saying that the sec of commerce is responsible for export controls and checks rather than any other department. except in the case of things that are specifically listed as being military in nature.
it does remove the need for an export liscense for things after a 15 day review by the commerce dept. which IMHO is a good thing (TM) because if anyone has ever dealt with the government they know that 15 days is a laughably small time frame. it looks like if you submit it and if 15 days later it's not listed as restricted then you get to sell it all you want.
the one that worries me the most though is `(1) in the case of a first offense under this section, shall be imprisoned for not more than 5 years, or fined in the amount set forth in this title, or both; and
`(2) in the case of a second or subsequent offense under this section, shall be imprisoned for not more than 10 years, or fined in the amount set forth in this title, or both
this basically says that if you're arrested for a felony and you use encryption on your files then you get lots of prision time tacked on. since there's no real way to determine what's in the file other than decrypting it and if you refuse to do that then the state can say that that's evidence of it being used in the commission of a felony. Say you have 200 encrypted emails on your hard drive. and you get arrested for grand theft(a felony). you refuse to decrypt the email claiming that it's personal in nature and irrelevant. The state says that it was used to plan your crime. then you get convicted of the crime. they tack on 5 years for the first offense (message) and 10 years for the next 199 offenses (messages. that adds up to about 2000 years in jail for encrypting your love letters or whatever.
while it's unlikely that it will be pushed to that extreme point we need to be aware that it's a possibility and not just assume that the whole bill is good for our side of this debate.
I'm sorry, but that attitude is what's going to kill all the good PBS does. PBS still provides programming that is absolutely not available anywhere else. Some people still do not have cable (myself included) and PBS is the only place to find that type of content.
While Discovery and others on cable have good programming they still lack the cultural elements that make PBS great. I doubt we will ever see anything like "Turandot Live at the Forbidden City" on Discovery or even A&E.
I say that we need to stop spending billions of dollars on non-functional missle intercept systems and spend more on public broadcasting.
my $.02 of course.
The author is Kim Stanley Robinson.
Great Series. I bought it as a set and killed about 3 weeks of vacation time last summer.
In last month's Asimov's Science Fiction magazine there was a story called Written In Bloodabout someone who develops this kind of a technology and uses it to inscribe passages of the Koran into the blood of believers. Since this would be passed down from parent to child it could be used to mark Muslims in a way that was impossible before. It raises some interesting ideas about uses for writing in the genetic code of humans. I recommend the story and the magazine in general.
From what I've read/heard about OS X Client that's exactly what Apple's in the process of doing. It's based on a Mach Kernel and it has a MacOS GUI with all the smiley prettiness and ease of use that entails.
We'll have to wait for betas to be released before we can see how good a job they do, but if OS X Server is any indication of the direction they're headed I think it looks very promising.
This morning's MacOSRumors page has some additional information about the problem. It seems to not be as easy to do as the c't article makes it appear. It is definately a problem, but it's not as easy to do as they make it out.
I live in the Philadelphia area and there's a weekly Tech section in the Inquirer(Philly Newspaper)
Yesterday they had an article about the 'Dark Net'. That was the actual term used by the Author. He went on for a while about how software companies have chased all the evil warez people off the web and then they've all moved to the Dark Net where they can trade their illegal software with impunity. After reading the article a couple times trying to figure out what he was talking about I noticed a single reference to FTP which is apparently the Dark Net.
The author seems to believe that anything done on FTP couldn't possibly be legal because the web is so much easier.
There were also some references to 'other software' and non-standard (non-web) protocols that make it simpler for pirates to trade stolen software at higher speed. All I can think of is Hotlne, but there's no reference to any real information. The entire article seems to be based on some vague notion of pirates being everywhere and being the only people who use high speed connections.
for more info you can read the whole article on the Inquirer's website
Another possible reason for making an IPO and letting the "overspeculation of a million tech-hyper investors" is to finance the free software. Think about it... If you're working to produce the best OS in the world and you want to spend all your time on it then why not let some financial weenies from wallstreet pay your salary. Or you could offer your best people stock options to encourage them to stay with you and not bail out for higher paying jobs. This is after all still a competetive industry and our economy is still based on making money to pay the bills.
just my $.02