then there is no need for McAfee and CO. Makes you think!
McAfee is that nag-ware that comes pre-installed with all those new computers, right? So what does that have to do with malware? It does slow down your machine, but you can usually uninstall McAfee without needing any anti-malware tools.
my contention is there would be no scanners if no one could make a profit on them.
Yeah - Free market rules!
Oh, wait, these are government mandated devices (pushed through with Chertoff's help who also consults with the contractor). And no one does any quality control - they are proven to be ineffective at actually detecting dangerous items, but more are bought anyway
It's like saying that if the speeding ticket/toll booth collection wasn't profitable it wouldn't exist.
What is your objection to them making money on a specialized product like that?
They make money even after devices have been shown unsafe (I believe the old xray machines have been banned in Europe for some time due to health concerns) and even after the devices have been shown ineffective.
They should be making zero profit (maybe just cover the costs) from a device that has not delivered on the specifications. Without stringent quality control, that's literally just money being shuffled to contractors.
Food is essential but farmers are allowed to make a profit on it. The scanners are offensive because of the loss of freedom they represent, not because someone is making a profit on them.
People _need_ food.
The scanner are _mandated_ by law.
Profiting from something that had been decreed necessary and made a monopoly by the government is the problem. Where are my non-TSA airports so that I could vote with my wallet? They would probably be cheaper, but I'd pay more to make my point.
This I don't understand - I, too, dislike/don't use facebook chat, but I have turned it off once and haven't had it reset on me.
Maybe it was an accident for me. I wouldn't say that it happens every time - just once or twice. I was very surprised though when it did.
I just think that users need to adopt some responsibility for managing their own privacy, which includes both staying on top of the service's privacy controls, and being aware of what you're posting.
No, no, NO (well, I agree on "being aware of what you're posting" part)
I should NOT "stay on top" of the privacy controls. You make it sound like an arm race, in which user should be participating. Privacy settings should stay put! I should not spend my time doing research to see how they may have changed settings behind my back. It's not a fair fight - facebook could just reset me to "all public" every day and require me to login and change it back. One should be aware of their privacy settings, yes -- but I don't see why one should be working hard to maintain them where they are.
I do not use facebook much, but I tend to notice things when I do. For example, the chat feature had been enabled on my behalf. I do not want people to see that I am "currently online" and by now I have disabled that feature more than once, since it somehow magically gets reset to "enabled"
Then there is this tendency to allow indirect access. See here. Basically, applications may access your information by your friend's permission instead of yours.
Finally, see a quote from this article. It is from 2009, but I think it is very representative of Facebook attitude. Most of the time you _can_ keep your setting private, but _only_ if you are actively tracking how facebook re-enabled access by default and proactively re-disabling that in settings.
Facebook announced this morning that its 350 million users will be prompted to make their status messages and shared content publicly visible to the world at large and search engines. It's a move we expected but the language used in the announcement is near Orwellian. The company says the move is all about helping users protect their privacy and connect with other people, but the new default option is to change from "old settings" to becoming visible to "everyone."
Facebook's privacy didn't change, it just failed to be breached. So what got 'boosted'? Your perception of it?
Facebook unintentional (i.e. the kind that doesn't make them money) privacy breach has been proven false. Facebook intentional privacy breach (i.e. turn sharing of everything on and either move around or completely remove the means of disabling such sharing) is their whole mode of operation
So their legal defense against the potential lawsuit got boosted a little.
Traffic tickets are a service to the other participants of traffic, because by punishing undesireable behaviour they limit it.... speeding traps are often put not at the spots where speeding is dangerous but where they'll catch the most people
I think you may have contradicted yourself there.
Punishing undesirable behavior would require targeting the "unsafe" places. That's not really an "implementation detail", that hijacking the original/stated purpose (keeping highways safe) and rerouting it to the new purpose (making money for the local municipality).
Also, I am pretty sure that "unsafe" speeds are mostly relative. Someone going +30miles with traffic is nowhere near as dangerous as a person weaving around/passing at +15miles. So "implementation details" make a difference in what the practice actually achieves.
When I was shopping for an ultrabook, I found the MacBook Air was quite competitively priced.
It's more than competitive. There isn't anything decent in the same price range as MacBook air! I was looking for an ultrabook PC a year ago. The only competitive item is the Sony Vaio Z line (~ same specs), but it is FAR more expensive than macbook air.
Ultra-portable PC manufacturers don't think high-resolution screen is important! I really can't figure out why.
EVERY. TIME. Apple is AT MINIMUM 1.5X the price of a similarly-specced Windows Boxen.
I challenge you to find a similarly spec-ed 0.66X priced (or, heck, even similarly priced) machine to the macbook air line. It may be easy to match the specs of the heavy-ass machines, but the pickings are slim in the ultra-portable category (with a nevertheless high resolution for the 13" screen!)
The best option at this point is to select "alternative screening" whenever you go through the airport.
That's a clever plan (which I use), but it is only good until "alternative screening" is available. What if they declare that opting for the pat down alternative supports the terrorists?
Avoid engaging in smalltalk, even if solicited, during the pat down.
The workers certainly do not make the policy, so what is the point of ignoring them?
So you want to give veto power to 5 unelected people who have a lifetime term of office? I understand the instincts, but this seems like a really bad idea.
1. They already have that power. Their decisions shape the US to a much greater degree than the president who has actual veto power (health care certainly got decided by supreme court). They do have to wait until someone challenges the law, but how much of a deterrent is that?
2. Our elected president is not using the veto power he has despite promising that he would (e.g., the illegal wiretapping immunity which Obama swore to veto during his campaign). So again, I don't see what we have that much to lose.
He argues that copyright protection holds regardless of the technological means used to engage in an action which constitutes infringement, which is true as far as it goes.
Interestingly, I don't see anyone lining up to argue that the reverse is also true. That is, that the technological means used to enforce copyright protection _must_ be disabled as soon as copyright protection expires
Oddly enough, no one seems concerned that DRM never expires (while copyright theoretically does).
The video is the illegal act, not because of its content, but because conduct unrelated to the content, that is, him posting online without approval of his probation officer (which is probation terms required him to get before posting online), and his use of a pseudonym in association with it (his probation prohibited him using pseudonyms.)
So, a probation violator got noticed because of the act by which he violated his probation.
Why does this bother you?
Because if he made an equally famous two-cute-cats-singing-synchronously video, he would likely not be noticed at all.
I am guessing that it's not the famous video that got him noticed, it's the "unpopular" famous video that got him noticed. Someone went to look over his file and actively searched for anything that can be construed as illegal. And nowdays, many things are illegal - if nothing so obvious was available, maybe they could find some "fishing endangered fish without a license" on his record.
So to you, the application of justice should be dependent on the political views someone espouses? The law should treat someone differently based on what he's said in public?
I don't agree with the GP, but it does bother me that he got noticed because of the video. What do you want to bet that he'd still be free if the video did not attract so much world-wide attention?
Therefore, one could argue the application of justice (or certainly the resources of justice) is already being applied based on his political views.
Well, US did seize his servers. And cut out access to his customer accounts, including his paying customers. So (orthogonal to legality questions), there is some actual, lost revenue.
Since "Dotcom" was - let's be honest - growing rich from ripping off the MPAA et al, I find it hard to sympathise with his predicament.
You don't have to sympathize with him to insist on legality of his treatment. Let them punish Dotcom legally, if he's such a bad guy
Or do you mean illegal means are fine with you as long as the guy is scumbag?
They had enough evidence to get plenty of legal wiretaps.... But instead it is horribly misplayed, and as a result there is a non-trivial chance that Dotcom will slip free with his millions intact.
His servers have been seized long ago, though. Even if he gets them back, the business is presumably damaged beyond repair (whether it was legal or not)
That was probably the point -- why bother with unpredictable "legal" routes, when you can just quickly eradicate his business? But yes, law enforcement _should_ follow laws, even if it is easier not to.
Don't do wrong, especially to bad people, since in the latter case you have to apologize to bad people
Cool - and next US can apologize for seizing his assets and we can forget about this little ugly incident?
How about trying to compensate him for the damage?
Who is lining up to do that?
From the TFA:
American authorities are appealing against a New Zealand court decision that Dotcom should be allowed to see the evidence on which the extradition hearing will be based.
The world, and how wars are fought, has changed drastically.
I honestly want to know what do people mean when they say "the world has changed" or use the term "post-9/11 world". The world has not changed. Terrorism (as a vaguely defined concept) existed before and it will continue to exist in the future.
State or private sponsored terrorism can do significant damage these days with increasingly cheap & available tools.
How is this new these days? I think that people who seriously invested in this had access to all the damaging tools they need for a long time. The increasing availability mostly affected people who lack the skill, resources and discipline to actually perpetrate a terrorist act. Have you seen the people who got convicted in the last 10 years? Without 9-11-based interest, they'd probably still be sitting in their basements dreaming of being terrorists. Is there any data to prove that terrorists attacks do more damage now than they did 50 years ago?
Yes, the article claims that. The article is completely wrong on that point. Thank you for asking, rather than treating the article as if it were gospel truth.
Oh, wait. You didn't ask. You just went ahead and assumed (even though anyone with half a brain knows that journalists are rarely right) the article was right.
Well, they do quote an actual military rule... and a brief search gets us (I highlighted the interesting part):
(6) Communicating with the enemy.
(a) Nature of the offense. No unauthorized communication, correspondence, or intercourse with the enemy is permissible. The intent, content, and method of the communication, correspondence, or intercourse are immaterial. No response or receipt by the enemy is required. The offense is complete the moment the communication, correspondence, or intercourse issues from the accused. The communication, correspondence, or intercourse may be conveyed directly or indirectly. A prisoner of war may violate this Article by engaging in unauthorized communications with the enemy.
Slashdot Mirror
As providers try to cap their data plans, new market players will emerge and take over by offering unlimited plans that consumers want
Right?
then there is no need for McAfee and CO. Makes you think!
McAfee is that nag-ware that comes pre-installed with all those new computers, right? So what does that have to do with malware?
It does slow down your machine, but you can usually uninstall McAfee without needing any anti-malware tools.
my contention is there would be no scanners if no one could make a profit on them.
Yeah - Free market rules!
Oh, wait, these are government mandated devices (pushed through with Chertoff's help who also consults with the contractor). And no one does any quality control - they are proven to be ineffective at actually detecting dangerous items, but more are bought anyway
It's like saying that if the speeding ticket/toll booth collection wasn't profitable it wouldn't exist.
What is your objection to them making money on a specialized product like that?
They make money even after devices have been shown unsafe (I believe the old xray machines have been banned in Europe for some time due to health concerns) and even after the devices have been shown ineffective.
They should be making zero profit (maybe just cover the costs) from a device that has not delivered on the specifications. Without stringent quality control, that's literally just money being shuffled to contractors.
Food is essential but farmers are allowed to make a profit on it. The scanners are offensive because of the loss of freedom they represent, not because someone is making a profit on them.
People _need_ food.
The scanner are _mandated_ by law.
Profiting from something that had been decreed necessary and made a monopoly by the government is the problem. Where are my non-TSA airports so that I could vote with my wallet? They would probably be cheaper, but I'd pay more to make my point.
This I don't understand - I, too, dislike/don't use facebook chat, but I have turned it off once and haven't had it reset on me.
Maybe it was an accident for me. I wouldn't say that it happens every time - just once or twice. I was very surprised though when it did.
I just think that users need to adopt some responsibility for managing their own privacy, which includes both staying on top of the service's privacy controls, and being aware of what you're posting.
No, no, NO (well, I agree on "being aware of what you're posting" part)
I should NOT "stay on top" of the privacy controls. You make it sound like an arm race, in which user should be participating. Privacy settings should stay put! I should not spend my time doing research to see how they may have changed settings behind my back. It's not a fair fight - facebook could just reset me to "all public" every day and require me to login and change it back.
One should be aware of their privacy settings, yes -- but I don't see why one should be working hard to maintain them where they are.
Are you referring to anything specific?
I do not use facebook much, but I tend to notice things when I do. For example, the chat feature had been enabled on my behalf. I do not want people to see that I am "currently online" and by now I have disabled that feature more than once, since it somehow magically gets reset to "enabled"
Then there is this tendency to allow indirect access. See here. Basically, applications may access your information by your friend's permission instead of yours.
Finally, see a quote from this article. It is from 2009, but I think it is very representative of Facebook attitude. Most of the time you _can_ keep your setting private, but _only_ if you are actively tracking how facebook re-enabled access by default and proactively re-disabling that in settings.
Facebook announced this morning that its 350 million users will be prompted to make their status messages and shared content publicly visible to the world at large and search engines. It's a move we expected but the language used in the announcement is near Orwellian. The company says the move is all about helping users protect their privacy and connect with other people, but the new default option is to change from "old settings" to becoming visible to "everyone."
Facebook's privacy didn't change, it just failed to be breached. So what got 'boosted'? Your perception of it?
Facebook unintentional (i.e. the kind that doesn't make them money) privacy breach has been proven false.
Facebook intentional privacy breach (i.e. turn sharing of everything on and either move around or completely remove the means of disabling such sharing) is their whole mode of operation
So their legal defense against the potential lawsuit got boosted a little.
After seeing I robot, I simply can't trust him to do science fiction.
You can't possibly blame Will Smith for the I, Robot disaster? He was neither a director nor a writer. Blame the director ("Alex Proyas")
I also love it that IMDB says
Isaac Asimov (suggested by book)
That's certainly accurate. The title and some of the names in the movie were indeed suggested by the book...
But the whole twist is the ending. I am afraid I will not be looking forward to it knowing how it ends.
It's ok! Most of the audience would not have read the book
Most of the movie audience of the LOtR has not read the books (or didn't finish because "it's boring"). And Tolkien is probably better known
You're just one of the few unlucky ones :)
Traffic tickets are a service to the other participants of traffic, because by punishing undesireable behaviour they limit it. ... speeding traps are often put not at the spots where speeding is dangerous but where they'll catch the most people
I think you may have contradicted yourself there.
Punishing undesirable behavior would require targeting the "unsafe" places. That's not really an "implementation detail", that hijacking the original/stated purpose (keeping highways safe) and rerouting it to the new purpose (making money for the local municipality).
Also, I am pretty sure that "unsafe" speeds are mostly relative. Someone going +30miles with traffic is nowhere near as dangerous as a person weaving around/passing at +15miles. So "implementation details" make a difference in what the practice actually achieves.
Why, it's the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory that explains it
When I was shopping for an ultrabook, I found the MacBook Air was quite competitively priced.
It's more than competitive. There isn't anything decent in the same price range as MacBook air! I was looking for an ultrabook PC a year ago. The only competitive item is the Sony Vaio Z line (~ same specs), but it is FAR more expensive than macbook air.
Ultra-portable PC manufacturers don't think high-resolution screen is important! I really can't figure out why.
EVERY. TIME. Apple is AT MINIMUM 1.5X the price of a similarly-specced Windows Boxen.
I challenge you to find a similarly spec-ed 0.66X priced (or, heck, even similarly priced) machine to the macbook air line.
It may be easy to match the specs of the heavy-ass machines, but the pickings are slim in the ultra-portable category (with a nevertheless high resolution for the 13" screen!)
The best option at this point is to select "alternative screening" whenever you go through the airport.
That's a clever plan (which I use), but it is only good until "alternative screening" is available. What if they declare that opting for the pat down alternative supports the terrorists?
Avoid engaging in smalltalk, even if solicited, during the pat down.
The workers certainly do not make the policy, so what is the point of ignoring them?
So you want to give veto power to 5 unelected people who have a lifetime term of office? I understand the instincts, but this seems like a really bad idea.
1. They already have that power. Their decisions shape the US to a much greater degree than the president who has actual veto power (health care certainly got decided by supreme court). They do have to wait until someone challenges the law, but how much of a deterrent is that?
2. Our elected president is not using the veto power he has despite promising that he would (e.g., the illegal wiretapping immunity which Obama swore to veto during his campaign). So again, I don't see what we have that much to lose.
He argues that copyright protection holds regardless of the technological means used to engage in an action which constitutes infringement, which is true as far as it goes.
Interestingly, I don't see anyone lining up to argue that the reverse is also true. That is, that the technological means used to enforce copyright protection _must_ be disabled as soon as copyright protection expires
Oddly enough, no one seems concerned that DRM never expires (while copyright theoretically does).
The video is the illegal act, not because of its content, but because conduct unrelated to the content, that is, him posting online without approval of his probation officer (which is probation terms required him to get before posting online), and his use of a pseudonym in association with it (his probation prohibited him using pseudonyms.)
So, a probation violator got noticed because of the act by which he violated his probation.
Why does this bother you?
Because if he made an equally famous two-cute-cats-singing-synchronously video, he would likely not be noticed at all.
I am guessing that it's not the famous video that got him noticed, it's the "unpopular" famous video that got him noticed. Someone went to look over his file and actively searched for anything that can be construed as illegal. And nowdays, many things are illegal - if nothing so obvious was available, maybe they could find some "fishing endangered fish without a license" on his record.
So to you, the application of justice should be dependent on the political views someone espouses? The law should treat someone differently based on what he's said in public?
I don't agree with the GP, but it does bother me that he got noticed because of the video. What do you want to bet that he'd still be free if the video did not attract so much world-wide attention?
Therefore, one could argue the application of justice (or certainly the resources of justice) is already being applied based on his political views.
What "lost revenue"?
Well, US did seize his servers. And cut out access to his customer accounts, including his paying customers. So (orthogonal to legality questions), there is some actual, lost revenue.
Since "Dotcom" was - let's be honest - growing rich from ripping off the MPAA et al, I find it hard to sympathise with his predicament.
You don't have to sympathize with him to insist on legality of his treatment. Let them punish Dotcom legally, if he's such a bad guy
Or do you mean illegal means are fine with you as long as the guy is scumbag?
Ignorance of the law doesn't make you exempt from the punishment for your crime.
No, but based on the data, direct involvement in writing the laws does.
They had enough evidence to get plenty of legal wiretaps. ... But instead it is horribly misplayed, and as a result there is a non-trivial chance that Dotcom will slip free with his millions intact.
His servers have been seized long ago, though. Even if he gets them back, the business is presumably damaged beyond repair (whether it was legal or not)
That was probably the point -- why bother with unpredictable "legal" routes, when you can just quickly eradicate his business? But yes, law enforcement _should_ follow laws, even if it is easier not to.
Don't do wrong, especially to bad people, since in the latter case you have to apologize to bad people
Cool - and next US can apologize for seizing his assets and we can forget about this little ugly incident?
How about trying to compensate him for the damage? Who is lining up to do that?
From the TFA:
American authorities are appealing against a New Zealand court decision that Dotcom should be allowed to see the evidence on which the extradition hearing will be based.
Ah, another proud day for America :(
The world, and how wars are fought, has changed drastically.
I honestly want to know what do people mean when they say "the world has changed" or use the term "post-9/11 world".
The world has not changed. Terrorism (as a vaguely defined concept) existed before and it will continue to exist in the future.
State or private sponsored terrorism can do significant damage these days with increasingly cheap & available tools.
How is this new these days? I think that people who seriously invested in this had access to all the damaging tools they need for a long time. The increasing availability mostly affected people who lack the skill, resources and discipline to actually perpetrate a terrorist act. Have you seen the people who got convicted in the last 10 years? Without 9-11-based interest, they'd probably still be sitting in their basements dreaming of being terrorists.
Is there any data to prove that terrorists attacks do more damage now than they did 50 years ago?
Yes, the article claims that. The article is completely wrong on that point. Thank you for asking, rather than treating the article as if it were gospel truth. Oh, wait. You didn't ask. You just went ahead and assumed (even though anyone with half a brain knows that journalists are rarely right) the article was right.
Well, they do quote an actual military rule... and a brief search gets us (I highlighted the interesting part):
(6) Communicating with the enemy. (a) Nature of the offense. No unauthorized communication, correspondence, or intercourse with the enemy is permissible. The intent, content, and method of the communication, correspondence, or intercourse are immaterial. No response or receipt by the enemy is required. The offense is complete the moment the communication, correspondence, or intercourse issues from the accused. The communication, correspondence, or intercourse may be conveyed directly or indirectly. A prisoner of war may violate this Article by engaging in unauthorized communications with the enemy.