The source of MyDoom may be unclear, but much clearer is that it is a stunning PR win for SCO, and to a somewhat lesser degree, Microsoft. The anti-linux publicity from having their site knocked down is many orders of magnitude better than any publicity or business generated by having it stay up. So, far from doom and gloom, this is entirely to SCO and Microsoft's benefit.
I hope that MyDoom is not the work of Linux zealots. But if it is, and if any of the responsible parties read this, you should know that it is not appreciated. This juvenile act of revenge, far from damaging SCO and Microsoft, has instead handed them their greatest victory so far.
After measuring the effects on cooling with his usual methods... the difference amounts to diddly-squat. And yes, that includes the difference between Artic Silver 3 and Toothpaste.
That doesn't surprise me at all. As long as there's no air gap, the electrically insulative packing of any IC (usually either a ceramic or epoxy) is by far the weakest link in the thermal transfer between the silicon die and the heat sink. The best heat transfer possible would be if the heat sink just bonded perfectly to the IC package with nothing at all in between. Since that's not an option, the next best thing is to put something squishy in between and squish out as much as possible, leaving only enough to displace any air from between the imperfect mating surfaces. That layer is so thin compared to the IC packaging material that its thermal conductivity would have to be vastly worse to make any significant contribution to the thermal resistance of the whole die-package-grease-heatsink series.
(Actually, toothpaste was marginally superior.)
That's not overly surprising either. The addition of any kind of solid particles will increase the thickness of the heat-sink compound layer, thus increasing the effect of whatever thermal resistance it has. Even if the solid particles themselves are very good heat conductors, the spaces in between the particles will be worse than would have otherwise been the case, so might offset, or even exceed, any advantage from the better conductivity of the particles.
Personally, I think that all of the expensive heat sink compounds are a scam. Plain old silicone grease is pretty close to an optimal solution. It conforms to the surfaces and displaces air, squeezes to a thin layer, ages well, and is unaffected by pretty much any chemical that it's likely to be exposed to, including water in the form of humidity and condensation. If you really want "the good stuff", that's what to get.
Please send snail mail instead of e-mail, if possible. Snail mail is more likely to be read.
Better yet, send both. Snail mail may be taken more seriously, but then again, it might also be more likely to be impeded by security concerns about letter bombs or hazardous substances (anthrax, for example).
I also think that it would be a good idea to avoid sending more than one copy by each method, and to mention the existence of the other copy in each letter so that you don't leave them feeling that they've been spammed, or with the impression that you're trying to decieve them in any way.
I think it is very important for each and everyone to take 10 minutes to write your congressman/woman about why Open Source is important and why you feel strongly that they do *not* vote for any bills limiting open licensing.
I think so too.
Project Vote Smart can help you find out who to write. Just enter your zip code and click "Go", and it will tell you who your representatives are and provide links to their contact info.
It also lists candidates. I hadn't really thought about writing people other than current office-holders. But now that I think about it, sending letters to candidates is probably a pretty good idea.
That's a good point. But I wonder if the process of getting the certification, with whatever scrutiny and preparation that entails, might make the later uncertified patched versions better than they might otherwise have been simply by having been built upon a well-tested foundation. So, while religiously maintaining a system's certification is probably counterproductive, obtaining that certification in the first place might not be.
Perhaps an internet movement along the lines of the "Blue Ribon Campaign", or the Internet Blackout, might be good about now. The visibility of this and other IP related issues needs to be raised.
Maybe Microsoft will just have to find an urgent need to license some more of SCO's valuable IP, or to add a few more years to their existing license(s). MS has nearly as much to gain from Novell's misfortune as from that of IBM and the Linux community. That seems to be the case for everyone SCO has attacked so far.
or example, I recall once saying that I thought a feature of one of our ads was obnoxious and would certainly cost us sales. So, my boss said "let's test it", and we went over to the graphics department, I described the changes I wanted, an artist made them in a few minutes in Photoshop, and my boss purchased 25k impressions of the new banner. A couple hours later, we had complete stats on how this banner had done compared to other banners we'd run in the same time on the same sites, and knew by exacly how much my banner was worse than the others.
What was the verdict? Did your less obnoxious ad do worse? A lot or a little?
I'm curious because I make it a point not to buy things that are advertized using obnoxious, distracting ads. If I can't block 'em, I'll scroll 'em off the top of the window, or drop some other window over them so I can read the article without the stupid things visually screaming at me. If everyone were like me, such advertising would be highly counterproductive. And yet it is still popular. Am I an exception to the rule?
Nevertheless, I don't believe this for 1 second. They must be stretching the definition of 'tech.'
Or more likely, shrinking the definition to mean only ready-to-use consumer stuff. Which would be neither surprising nor conspiratorial, since this is the CEA's area of interest, and naturally, is what they would have been studying.
To me, buying 'tech" includes (and is even dominated by) things like test equipment, electronic components (i.c.'s, transistors, etc.), and computer parts (drives, boards, etc.). Given the severe male dominance in electrical engineering and CS, and also in the related hobby activities, I suspect that a much different picture would have emerged if their definition of "tech" did not exclude such things.
Still, a long-distance maglev line would have been really cool, and there's got to be a region where it would make economical sense as well. Maybe we'll see one in Japan first.
The Texas Department of Transportation has mentioned maglev as a possible option for the high-speed rail portion of the huge "Trans Texas Corridor" project between Austin and Dallas.
The maglev idea is just a mention of a possibility, and a long way from being an actual plan. But it's interesting that they're taking it seriously enough to publicly mention it at all.
See TTC Report (PDF) and search for "maglev" if you're curious. This also has a few cost comparisons from other maglev projects.
That's pretty much the only kind of spam I see anymore, because the rest gets filtered.
But while it may have some success getting around filters, I have to wonder how effective it is. Who would seriously consider buying something from someone who writes like this: "vi-agra in dustbinnew pill at cheap xkakcla"? Add to that the fact that the existence of the filters in the first place is a good indication that the recipient is not interested in doing business with spammers. The hit rate must be orders of magnitude worse than the already miniscule rate for conventional spam.
It would be nice if a good fingerprint reader could be made cheap enough to use it for things like unlocking doors and starting cars. Wouldn't need to carry so many keys around. Should be simpler for these kinds of applications since it would only have to match against a very small local database of prints.
I think Silicon Valley is destined to lose jobs and businesses regardless of where it loses them to. I've recently been checking into a job opening in San Diego, but the cost of living there is so much higher than here (Dallas area), that I figure it would take a 60% pay raise just to break even, so it would have to be an extraordinary offer to make it worthwhile at all.
The bulk of the cost difference is in the cost of real estate. The real estate business is an economic parasite. It consumes what other economic activities create, increasing it's own consumption without a corresponding increase in value created, sucking the life out of an otherwise healthy economy.
I know SD is not in Silicon Valley, but the principle is still valid. Areas with exhorbitant cost of living just cannont stay competitive outside of very high-value specialized niches. So regardless of whether it's Bangalore or Texas, either way Silicon Valley is destined to lose to some place.
Slashdot Mirror
They're not the ones to feel sorry for.
The source of MyDoom may be unclear, but much clearer is that it is a stunning PR win for SCO, and to a somewhat lesser degree, Microsoft. The anti-linux publicity from having their site knocked down is many orders of magnitude better than any publicity or business generated by having it stay up. So, far from doom and gloom, this is entirely to SCO and Microsoft's benefit.
I hope that MyDoom is not the work of Linux zealots. But if it is, and if any of the responsible parties read this, you should know that it is not appreciated. This juvenile act of revenge, far from damaging SCO and Microsoft, has instead handed them their greatest victory so far.
With friends like that, who needs enemies?
If that proved true, it would warm the cockles of my heart. But I'd have to see very credible confirmation before I'd believe it.
Just what the hell are "cockles", anyway?
What do you mean? Sun + Microsoft is close enough to qualify as "about 20%" of "15 or so".
Exactly. It was a version control/documentation control problem. Not a unit conversion error.
Personally, I think that all of the expensive heat sink compounds are a scam. Plain old silicone grease is pretty close to an optimal solution. It conforms to the surfaces and displaces air, squeezes to a thin layer, ages well, and is unaffected by pretty much any chemical that it's likely to be exposed to, including water in the form of humidity and condensation. If you really want "the good stuff", that's what to get.
I also think that it would be a good idea to avoid sending more than one copy by each method, and to mention the existence of the other copy in each letter so that you don't leave them feeling that they've been spammed, or with the impression that you're trying to decieve them in any way.
Project Vote Smart can help you find out who to write. Just enter your zip code and click "Go", and it will tell you who your representatives are and provide links to their contact info.
It also lists candidates. I hadn't really thought about writing people other than current office-holders. But now that I think about it, sending letters to candidates is probably a pretty good idea.
That's a good point. But I wonder if the process of getting the certification, with whatever scrutiny and preparation that entails, might make the later uncertified patched versions better than they might otherwise have been simply by having been built upon a well-tested foundation. So, while religiously maintaining a system's certification is probably counterproductive, obtaining that certification in the first place might not be.
Perhaps an internet movement along the lines of the "Blue Ribon Campaign", or the Internet Blackout, might be good about now. The visibility of this and other IP related issues needs to be raised.
Maybe Microsoft will just have to find an urgent need to license some more of SCO's valuable IP, or to add a few more years to their existing license(s). MS has nearly as much to gain from Novell's misfortune as from that of IBM and the Linux community. That seems to be the case for everyone SCO has attacked so far.
I'm curious because I make it a point not to buy things that are advertized using obnoxious, distracting ads. If I can't block 'em, I'll scroll 'em off the top of the window, or drop some other window over them so I can read the article without the stupid things visually screaming at me. If everyone were like me, such advertising would be highly counterproductive. And yet it is still popular. Am I an exception to the rule?
To me, buying 'tech" includes (and is even dominated by) things like test equipment, electronic components (i.c.'s, transistors, etc.), and computer parts (drives, boards, etc.). Given the severe male dominance in electrical engineering and CS, and also in the related hobby activities, I suspect that a much different picture would have emerged if their definition of "tech" did not exclude such things.
Yeah, they suck as oil rags. But they're good for applying wood stain.
The maglev idea is just a mention of a possibility, and a long way from being an actual plan. But it's interesting that they're taking it seriously enough to publicly mention it at all.
See TTC Report (PDF) and search for "maglev" if you're curious. This also has a few cost comparisons from other maglev projects.
That's pretty much the only kind of spam I see anymore, because the rest gets filtered.
But while it may have some success getting around filters, I have to wonder how effective it is. Who would seriously consider buying something from someone who writes like this: "vi-agra in dustbinnew pill at cheap xkakcla"? Add to that the fact that the existence of the filters in the first place is a good indication that the recipient is not interested in doing business with spammers. The hit rate must be orders of magnitude worse than the already miniscule rate for conventional spam.
(And I thought I'd never get a chance to use the word "doppelganger" in casual conversation.)
What's so funny about it?
Libraries probably are next. Maybe not by the RIAA (yet), but journal publishers already have them in their sights.
Libraries under attack
Pat Schroeder's New Chapter
Publishers vs. Libraries
It would be nice if a good fingerprint reader could be made cheap enough to use it for things like unlocking doors and starting cars. Wouldn't need to carry so many keys around. Should be simpler for these kinds of applications since it would only have to match against a very small local database of prints.
I think Silicon Valley is destined to lose jobs and businesses regardless of where it loses them to. I've recently been checking into a job opening in San Diego, but the cost of living there is so much higher than here (Dallas area), that I figure it would take a 60% pay raise just to break even, so it would have to be an extraordinary offer to make it worthwhile at all.
The bulk of the cost difference is in the cost of real estate. The real estate business is an economic parasite. It consumes what other economic activities create, increasing it's own consumption without a corresponding increase in value created, sucking the life out of an otherwise healthy economy.
I know SD is not in Silicon Valley, but the principle is still valid. Areas with exhorbitant cost of living just cannont stay competitive outside of very high-value specialized niches. So regardless of whether it's Bangalore or Texas, either way Silicon Valley is destined to lose to some place.
Yes, give credit where credit is due. AOL deserves some credit for their spam fighting efforts.