Maybe they could just ask to see the source code and audit it themselves, or just use software with the source code available. Its not as though they need to write it themselves, just be able to examine the source code. If they don't want to, well, they get what they deserve.
Not good enough. See Ken Thompson's argument that any code that you cannot contol with 100% certainty cannot be trusted. Even if the source is clean, the compiler, JVM or the like may insert malicious code that cannot be detected by even the most thorough code review.
...most politicians are geezers in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and sometimes 90s. so the current crop is ignorant,
Umm -- age has nothing to do with it. I'm in my 50's, work full-time in the IT industry and am reasonably up on things technological. On the other hand, my grasp of carpentry, medicine, geology, and a whole host of other subjects hovers at or near zero.
What we are really seeing is that everyone is mis-or-underinformed on something. Mind you, i'm as prone as the next person to complain about stupidity in governement, but really, no one can be completely and unambiguously informed on every possible subject, and no one has the right to expect that one single person will be so informed. The best we can hope for is that the person(s) in positions of power will at least make an honest attempt to understand (not master) a topic before casting a vote on it. That happens less frequently than we'd hope, but we do have the option of not voting slackers back into office.
When you see just how much information Corporate America has on it's customers, it makes you shudder thinking about how much the Government must have on you. It is odd, however, to note that occasionally the Industrial Espionage works better than the US Government's does.
Of course now that I want to be clever I cannot find the reference, but there was a discussion about how the political parties track and segment their various constituencies. The number quoted (which I cannot verify) was that they have roughly 17,000 data points on each registered voter...
#1 has an obvious financial incentive, but #2 may have one too, if the cracker is willing to consider extortion or similar modes of funding. If the cracker is doing it just to spite MS and/or MS users, the same double whammy applies.
Personally I think we should write a thank-you note to Gates and Balmer on this one. Think about it -- for years people have warned about issues ranging from monopoly abuse to the dangers of a "software monoculture", yet nothing really has changed (even after the DOJ antitrust "win"). Now we have the prospect of MS figurativly slitting its own throat with this foolishness. If Dvorak's fears are realized, this could be just the thing to push the public at large over the edge in terms of consciousness-raising.
Two postings now and the obvious question is still not answered... where the hell are you supposed to get the fuel for these things? How are they supposed to be refilled? Still nothing.
And like I said the last time this was posted -- good luck getting it on board an aircraft. You can't take hair gell much less butane lighters aboard, so what makes anyone think that you're going to be cleared carrying a laptop and a small can of gasoline? Yes, I know, there are better ways to take out an aircraft than gasoline, and many folks pointed that out last time. Still, try walking up to a security checkpoint at Logan International, say, with a can of gasoline, ethanol, diesel fuel, butane, hydrogen or what have you and just try explaining how it's not dangerous and that you need it to refuel your laptop in flight.
Yes, but that's a recent change. Prior to that, no one has ever tried to use something like gasoline to down an airliner. The fact is that there are easier and better ways to do it. For one, gas doesn't hold as much energy by mass compared to many other potential terrorist weapons. It's also very identifable by most people by smell alone.
So? Try walking onto an airliner with any sort of easily identifiable flammable liquid. See what happens. It doesn't matter if no one's tried to bring down an airliner with gasoline before. It doesn't matter that there are better ways to do it. It doesn't matter if it's easily identifiable by smell or some other property. My point is, the rules have changed, and getting on board a plane with a laptop fuled by gasoline, diesel, cooking oil, propane, butane, ethanol, compressed hydrogen, etc. is not going to happen in either of our lifetimes unless there's some sort of gross oversight in screening. Sheesh!
One thing that many people forget - mostly due to the impression given by hollywood - is that gasoline and diesel don't explode at the drop of a hat. But the liquid form doesn't ignite, it must first be vaporized and mixed with oxygen before you have something that will readily combust.
I'm aware of all of the above. However, given that the TSA won't allow water, hair gel, infant formula, breast milk, and other seemingly innocuous substances on board, I seriously doubt that they would allow gasoline, diesel, methanol, butane, or any other substance on board that could be deliberately set aflame while the plane was in flight.
It also doesn't mention how to fuel the engine...what happens when it runs out of gas?
Also, shouldn't they be making these run on bio-diesel?
What will be interesting is trying to get a fueled laptop (and spare fuel containers) aboard a commercial airliner. I read something the other day about one of the airlines (Virgin?) banning Dell and Apple laptops due to the exploding/burning battery debacle. Can you see them letting you on board with flammable and potentially explosive fuels? I sure can't!
I work on the help desk for a large company. Every time I ask the customer to right-click on something and the context menu appears, the customer just freaks out. That makes my job tougher than it should be.
I haven't had to call the HelpDesk here since the arrival of Clippy (tm)!
verizon communications is the single largest builder and owner of fiber in the entire country. however, they are forced by the government to operate at a loss. since they are considered "communications",
Do tell? Well, for operating at a loss, their execs sure are well paid. For instance, in 2005, salary ans other compensation (rounded) for the top five VZ execs were:
Ivan Seidenberg, Chairman, CEO: ~ $19,400,000
Lawrence Babbio, Jr. Vice Chairman/President: ~ $8,600,000
Dennis Strigl EVP, Pres/CEO VZ Wireless: ~ $10,100,000
Willam Barr EVP/General Counsel: ~ $15,200,000
Doreen Tobin EVP/CFO: ~ $6,700,000
No, the levy is there to compensate - in theory - the creators of artistic works. In practise I imagine it's completely wasted.
So -- if the existing levy is there to compensate the creators of artistic works I have two questions:
On what basis is the RIAA allowed to sue? The RIAA exists, in theory, to represent the labels, who in turn exist to represent the creators (yeah -- right). If the creators are already compensated, then they have, in theory, experienced no loss.
If the creators have not experienced loss due to the existing "compensation", why do we need an additional tax to ensure end users against liability?
We need to form the MCAA - Media Consumer's Association of America, get Congress to insist on a levy on blank tapes and CDs and DVDs etc in order to to allow the members to participate in [rampant piracy] exercising their rights and be indemnified for all their legal costs!
News flash -- blank tapes and many CDs already incorprate such a levey in their price. The question then becomes why should the RIAA be allowed to sue individuals when they (the RIAA) are already receiving monies intended to compensate them for such behavior?
As a vendor of a web-based, access-restricted product, keyloggers are a real issue. I've been considering setting up client-side SSL certificates in order to restrict access to only machines that have been "set up" in order to deal with the problem of keyloggers. Are there better solutions?
I don't know if there are better solutions, but please don't rely on two-factor ID. There are at least two downsides there:
If you have multiple accounts at various institutions, you wind up having a half-dozen or more of the silly security tokens. This quickly confuses and annoys the customer.
Two-factor ID does nothing to prevent man-in-the-middle attacks. There was an article recently (not here) that described that very type of attack
If the photo gets published, and the officers are identifiable, a criminal could find the officers and possibly kill them.
Ummm -- unless the cops were wearing masks as they arrested the drug dealers, they were already known to the dealer(s). At some point they have to appear in court and testify against the people they arrested. Not only will they be known at the time, but the court proceedings are a matter of public record and transcripts of a case can be had for a few cents a page. Sorry -- your objection does not hold water.
You're comparing this to nuclear meltdown? You are insane, that is in no way a valid comparison.
My point, if you had bothered to think about it, was that the relative number of incidences of [insert bad thing here] has no bearing on how severe the damage might be to the surrounding environment; in this particular discussion thread, civil liberties. The fact that one cop (or however many were involved) felt that he could arrest a citizen and throw him in jail for taking a photograph of a drug bust occurring in the open on a public street is a severe incursion on civil liberties, even if it was the only such incident. In the same manner, TMI, while only a single incident, was severe and long lasting in its effects.
The trend is getting more disturbing these days. I grew up with the believe that police were there to protect and serve. I'm not quite sure who they are protecting now. The sad truth is that if police weren't harming the innocent, there wouldn't be so many loopholes that the guilty can use to get off the hook.
A quote from Robert Specht (I've also found his name spelled a "Sprecht") might prove instructive:
"Under any conditions, anywhere, whatever you are doing, there is some ordinance under which you can be booked."
This isn't a major civil liberties breach because it's an isolated incident, not far reaching.
The near meltdown of Three Mile Island (a nuclear plant here in the states) was an isolated incident as well, and "not far reaching" in terms of damage or release of radiation. That it was an "isolated incident" did not make it less serious. After the TMI incident, no new nuclear plants have been licensed in the US. isolated != devastatingly serious.
Passion does not scale well. The greatest restaurants are all one-offs where the staff is passionate about serving good food and giving the customer a quality experience. Programs that we love to use (Linux, say) are put together by people who are passionate about what they do to the point of evangelism. Art house movies are made by people who are passionate about using cinematic techniques to tell stories that are compelling both visually and in terms of their plotlines. But passion takes time, is monetarilly intensive, and, let's face it, is a crapshoot; there are many folks who are passionate about their beer can collections or what have you (I knew a woman who was fascinated by bricks or all things), but they aren't ever going to make money from it.
Enter the financial folks. They are absolutely necessary any time a business moves beyond being an expensive hobby, but they will strive for efficieny. Efficiency is best gained by homogenizing operations, but that also weeds out the things that tended to make the enterprise truly great in the first place. On top of that, some things (movies in this case) are enormously expensive to make (someone has to pay Industrial Light and Magic for all those special effects), and once the expense goes up, the natural tendency is to minimize risk. But again, minimizing risk keeps you from taking that fresh view and going out on a limb.
Sometimes this isn't really all that bad. If I swing by the supermarket to pick up a gallon of milk I want commodity pricing, and the bean counters excell at building the sort of enterprise that can deliver those commodity prices. You want really good creative stuff? Stay far away from the big guys and shell out extra for the starving artists who live for this sort of thing.
Maintenance? If you can lower the cost of creation enough, it's cheaper to just start from scratch every couple of years. It's the same phenomenon seen in blenders and automobiles.
Ehhhhh -- no. Maybe some trivial applicationm can be thrown away and reengineered every few years, but business generally does not have that luxury. There are data conversions to consider, as well as the fact that, depending on the system in question, an entire "ecosystem" has likely grown up around the core application. You cannot just throw the application away without ripping out and reworking all those other systems that depend on it in some form or fashion. Yes, I know -- Software as a Service to the rescue -- well defined interfaces between applications, etc. Except that in the main, that does not happen, so you are better off having an extensible, maintainable system. Now if I could only sell that idea to the PHB...
until I see a body. Just a little too convenient./where the hell's my tinfoil hat?
He's not dead. He was sedated with a CIA blow-dart, then surreptitiously removed from the hospital. His body was replaced by a clone grown in a secret underground bunker adjoining area 51. He will be revived as soon as he gets to the secret room in the sub-sub-basement of the White House where he, along with Howard Hughes will advise Vice President Dick "Dick" Cheney on energy policy. Elvis is there too; he's the entertainment director and is also in charge of procuring hookers to keep JFK happy.
Re:Won't someone please think of the children?
on
Enron's Kenneth Lay Dies
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Um, does anyone know whether the gov't seized all his assets before he croaked? Because if they didn't, his heirs might just try to take what's left "while the body's still warm". I haven't heard of passing a sentence on a dead body before, but I'm sure there's a legal battle in there somewhere that lawyers are chomping at the bit to get in on.
I'd hate for "Kenny-Boy" to get the last laugh on America, you know, by dying early.
He might just. As I was driving home this evening a blurb came over the radio that the 5th cirtcuit court (I think that's what they said -- I only snapped to attention on the next sentence) has a history of "extinguishing" the conviction of a person who dies before their appeals are exhausted. It would be as if the trial, or even the indictment, never happened. Now that's from the crimial side of things (and at present it's only the newscaster's speculation), but any pending civil suits could still proceed regardless of what the criminal court does or does not do. First I've heard of such "extinguishment"...
Perhaps you're right, but isn't a little presumptuous to say that in response to a story that completely defies our current understanding of the human brain?
It might be presumptuous except for the fact that the autopsy clearly indicated gross loss of brain tissue. For instance -- from the autopsy report:
Comment: Brain weight is an important index of its pathologic state. Brain weight is correlated with height, weight, age, and sex. The decedant's brain was grossly abnormal and weighed only 615 grtams (1.35 lbs.). That weight is less than half the expected tabular weight for a decedant of her adult age of 41 years 3 months and 28 days. By way of comparison, the brain of Karen Ann Quinlan weighed 835 grams at the time of her death, after 10 years in a similar persistant vegitative state.
I am not a physician, but the autopsy report appears to be very conclusive evidence that Ms. Schiavo was never going to regain conciousness in any way, shape or form that could be considered even minimally functioning. Should you wish to read the full autopsy report (39 pages), it is available as a PDF from this location: http://www.sptimes.com/2005/06/15/schiavoreport.pd f
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is that techniques we used against the Soviets during the Regan Era may also be used against us if we're not careful? Say it ain't so!
What we are really seeing is that everyone is mis-or-underinformed on something. Mind you, i'm as prone as the next person to complain about stupidity in governement, but really, no one can be completely and unambiguously informed on every possible subject, and no one has the right to expect that one single person will be so informed. The best we can hope for is that the person(s) in positions of power will at least make an honest attempt to understand (not master) a topic before casting a vote on it. That happens less frequently than we'd hope, but we do have the option of not voting slackers back into office.
Ivan Seidenberg, Chairman, CEO: ~ $19,400,000
Lawrence Babbio, Jr. Vice Chairman/President: ~ $8,600,000
Dennis Strigl EVP, Pres/CEO VZ Wireless: ~ $10,100,000
Willam Barr EVP/General Counsel: ~ $15,200,000
Doreen Tobin EVP/CFO: ~ $6,700,000
Source: SEC Def/14-A filing
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/732712/000
Hard to justify those salaries for a company operating at a loss, don't you think?
Passion does not scale well. The greatest restaurants are all one-offs where the staff is passionate about serving good food and giving the customer a quality experience. Programs that we love to use (Linux, say) are put together by people who are passionate about what they do to the point of evangelism. Art house movies are made by people who are passionate about using cinematic techniques to tell stories that are compelling both visually and in terms of their plotlines. But passion takes time, is monetarilly intensive, and, let's face it, is a crapshoot; there are many folks who are passionate about their beer can collections or what have you (I knew a woman who was fascinated by bricks or all things), but they aren't ever going to make money from it.
Enter the financial folks. They are absolutely necessary any time a business moves beyond being an expensive hobby, but they will strive for efficieny. Efficiency is best gained by homogenizing operations, but that also weeds out the things that tended to make the enterprise truly great in the first place. On top of that, some things (movies in this case) are enormously expensive to make (someone has to pay Industrial Light and Magic for all those special effects), and once the expense goes up, the natural tendency is to minimize risk. But again, minimizing risk keeps you from taking that fresh view and going out on a limb.
Sometimes this isn't really all that bad. If I swing by the supermarket to pick up a gallon of milk I want commodity pricing, and the bean counters excell at building the sort of enterprise that can deliver those commodity prices. You want really good creative stuff? Stay far away from the big guys and shell out extra for the starving artists who live for this sort of thing.
Comment: Brain weight is an important index of its pathologic state. Brain weight is correlated with height, weight, age, and sex. The decedant's brain was grossly abnormal and weighed only 615 grtams (1.35 lbs.). That weight is less than half the expected tabular weight for a decedant of her adult age of 41 years 3 months and 28 days. By way of comparison, the brain of Karen Ann Quinlan weighed 835 grams at the time of her death, after 10 years in a similar persistant vegitative state.
I am not a physician, but the autopsy report appears to be very conclusive evidence that Ms. Schiavo was never going to regain conciousness in any way, shape or form that could be considered even minimally functioning. Should you wish to read the full autopsy report (39 pages), it is available as a PDF from this location: http://www.sptimes.com/2005/06/15/schiavoreport.pd f
Just think -- it should now be possible to recycle the giant ball of candy wrappers that I've accumulated over the last thirty years...