Weirder still is the fact that Duke Nukem Forever has taken more time to create than NASA took to design & build a pair of robots, fly them to Mars, and drive them around for a year.
I know you're referring to the 2003 rover missions but, and this may sound crazy, you can also include much of the Mars Pathfinder mission too.
Due to the commercial success of DukeNukem3D, one could argue that a franchise sequel was unofficially in the works immediately after its release date.
DukeNukem3D release date: 29-Jan-96 Mars Pathfinder launch date: 04-Dec-96
Final transmission from Pathfinder was on 27-Sep-97, so some of the mission was being exercised even after DNF's official announcement in Apr-97.
Once we establish a solid base, and knowledge about building a new colonie we can send humans...??
I think these are the steps we need to follow:
1. We can't survive in an environment that is constantly either light or dark. The easiest solution to this is to use an existing light source and then figure out a way to block out the light periodically so that we create a cycle of day and night. 2. Atmospheric conditions similar to our own are an absolute requirement. 3a. We need a water source, preferably on the terrain itself (due to the limitation of containment costs). To support any reasonablly sized colony these would need to be very large bodies of water. 3b. Vegitation starting with very simple plants (from grasses and herbs before we eventually introduce trees) would establish the terrain for cultivation and solid development. 4a. The vegitation may not initially adapt to the existing seasonal flow, so the environment should also be adjusted to reflect this need. 4b. We've learned that tidal forces are significant in the circulation of large bodies of water and, from experience, we may need to establish a large orbiting satelite to accomplish this. 5. Once the tidal circulation system is set up, we can start incorporating sealife to eventually sustain other forms of life, like birds. 6a. With the sealife in place, we can start settling land-dwelling animals and other larger species everywhere. 6b. Once everything above is established, only then can we start introducing humans. 7. At this point we can rest assured that we properly colonized the extra-terrestrial world. We'll look at the accomplishment, and see that it was good.
However, there's an idea I read about that if extra-terrestrial colonies were to become self-sufficient or better, then those colonies would have no need to keep close ties to Earth. Wait a number of generations and those colonies could have little concern over Earth's destruction. For political reasons, the inhabitants may even trigger Earth's demise. This situation would lead to irony.
As it stands, there's only one rock so if anything catastrophic occurs to it, everyone directly suffers.
Unfortunately, I can't remember where I first read about this idea. Some help, maybe?
Is some marketing or PR firm trying to use/. as an unpaid focus group? I was thinking the same thing.
Don't tell 'em squat, people. Or lie. Or, since these firms are trolling for ideas, provide them with the type that advocate shunning in-game advertising.
Appealing to someone else's greater goal is the first step to having them adopt yours over the short term.
There's a potentially good PR move here, similar to the "Do no evil" Google promotion.
Picture this: A company releases a statement that they will not advertise in video games. The statement is so weird to the mainstream media that they pick up on it and advertise the company for them, especially the company's new posture.
Such promotions can backfire, but that usually happens to companies that pick broad/vague mottos (such as the Google example). The move would restrict the company from a very specific channel for product advertising, but would instead advertise the company as a whole via other channels.
Lastly, this only works for companies that already have a relatively high level of exposure (for mainstream news to notice) and will only work for the first adopter.
More likely, the police knew when TPB did their last maintenance shutdown and assumed a routine schedule.
The best time for the police to inspect an item that contains possible criminal evidence is before the owner does so themselves. For items that accumulate such evidence: the day before, if possible.
Lave (958216) writes: I totally agree with you - but at least this set a precedent that this kind of behaviour is unacceptable.
Whiney Mac Fanboy (963289) writes: You spend hundreds of hours following it up, removing the PCs from the network, checking to see there were no secondary malware infections, etc, etc, etc.
A blackhat would have been prosecuted for causing over $1 million worth of damage, easily. Such damage costs are mostly attributed to labor and downtime, so that's probably a fair claim.
Comparing to the extent of this fiasco, jail time for the admitted blackhat would be certain.
My question: Who approved of this project and authorized the release of this malware?
pedantic: adj 1: Like a pedant, overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning; 2: Being showy of one's knowledge, often in a boring manner; 3: Often used to describe a person who emphasizes their knowledge through the use of vocabulary; 4: Being finicky or picky with language.
joke: n. 1. Something said or done to evoke laughter or amusement, especially an amusing story with a punch line. 2. A mischievous trick; a prank. 3. An amusing or ludicrous incident or situation.
recursion: n. Mathematics. 1. An expression, such as a polynomial, each term of which is determined by application of a formula to preceding terms. 2. A formula that generates the successive terms of a recursion.
recursion: n. Mathematics. 1. An expression, such as a polynomial, each term of which is determined by application of a formula to preceding terms. 2. A formula that generates the successive terms of a recursion.
Disclaimer: I haven't tried the program but I did read the article. All italicize text is from that article.
There's definitely some BS in the form of PR: the topic is very sensitive for a lot of people and anyone seriously discussing the matter should be careful not to mis-speak. Given that, there are some statements within the game that sound callous so I assume that the designer is performing an attempt at damage control.
As for the question of why even release this game...
It's quite probable that he was affected by the event during his emotional development - like, "he was in another Colorado high school when the shooting occurred." Columbine's incident affected every high school, due to the nature of the crime.
Aside from that, video games may be his most comfortable or effective medium for expression. If he wrote a book with his proposed intentions, the book would certainly garner much less controversy. It's this point that interests me here.
"I've talked and written for some time about how games need not be fun to be worthwhile. This game is not fun, it is challenging and difficult to play - not technically difficult, but conceptually difficult. We need more of that."
I agree with the opportunity to use the format to illustrate situations and so forth, but there are concerns noted along the lines of:
"sad and sick thing to make a video game out of a tragedy where 13 innocent people were murdered."
Note that the concern quoted is that of making a video game, not the content of the game itself. This illustrates to me that there exists a misunderstanding over the usage of the words "game" and "play" in that such words are usually associated with "fun". It reminds me of the problems mature titles face by many people who don't consider that games have developed beyond side-scroller SuperMarioBros.
Of course the program in question may simply be just a sick game, but the comments by "Richard Castaldo, who was paralyzed from the chest down in the Columbine shooting" make me think that the designer's arguments have at least some level of merit.
You can easily DDoS the system by shipping a blank DVD in every FedEx package.
If the dogs are sniffing the chemicals in recordable DVDs, a broken one should smell *really* good...
No. No reasonable person would willingly do this to themselves.
Why would I want to increase the likelihood of Customs tearing apart my parcel? Have fun shipping static-sensitive, sealed or fragile material. When Customs cuts the packing tape, they can easily manhandle the contents.
I've seen some impressive damage: like a thick solid metal rod broken in half. I assume they just dropped it from a decent height. If they can stuff it all back into the box, broken or not, what do they care? It's all part of the inspection process to them.
Either way, using your example you're advertising that a disc is in there somewhere, and they'll want to find it. I assume that your gripe is with the MPAA/RIAA but this action only inconveniences you and Customs, not the MPAA/RIAA.
This will not even apply to most NY workers, either.
NY happens to be one of those states where an employer can fire you for any reason ("Employment at will"), except for 8 very specific circumstances (Here's the list of exceptions).
Given that, I guess the critical point to this case was that the employer was the Dept of Education: a public sector job.
A single use pad is just a simple substitution cipher, employing a truly random and secret key. OTP does not specify parameters for message length, ever - that issue is beyond its scope.
Message length can expose message content. OTP (when used by itself) has this one flaw which means that extra measures (such as using fixed length messages) are needed to combat this weakness. But, by utilizing these extra measures, the system then becomes "more than OTP".
My response was to the claim that OTP is unbreakable, which I believe I proved false by counterexample. It's an extremely limited set, but you only need one counterexample.
Even if OTP is employed correctly (used once, truly random, completely secret), there are still a finite amount of possible combinations that a message can represent. A sufficiently short message and knowing the context of the message will greatly reduce the security of any system.
For example, if an eavesdropper is expecting a "yes" or "no" communication and captures a 2 character message: not so secure anymore, eh?
In the end, everything has a breaking point. The point of using encryption is to make discovery more difficult, not completely impossible.
A system on the box akin nutritional facts is a fantastic idea- if it were done properly as a standard, it would clear up a lot of confusion regarding EULAs.
I'm pleased to see that I'm not the only one to understand and encourage the concept (mentioned in passing here: clicky).
Of course, using such a system makes hiding controvertial clauses problematic: a change that many current publishers would not willingly adopt.
The biggest difficulty to adoption is formulating the standard/reference, but the biggest deterrence is the effective indifference by the vast majority of end-users (with the corresponding lack of economic influence toward such adoption).
It's discouraging from a practical POV since, why should a company bother if most people just click "I agree" to anything being presented?
There is some money to be made by the first person to come up with a simple, powerful, universal encryption program that works for all data and all computers or computer like devices.
I understand the motivation and it seems like a reasonable appeal (I even held this belief for a time), but when we consider history and the practical problems, it's a really bad idea.
Unbreakable encryption systems have been found to be broken, more often because of some unexpected practical aspect or limitation (timing attacks, for example).
Likewise, absolutely "bug-free" applications have been found to have bugs due to local (physical) problems or underlying OS bugs.
Secondly, an attacker's performance costs decrease every day and the performance of an encryption algorithm has to meet this threat. The relative strength of a algorithm is proportional to its keylength (a longer key is stronger than a shorter one for a given algo), so all the computer-like devices would need to have the ability to utilize and recognize a flexible keylength (as opposed to having it hardwired). Most importantly, these devices would also need to be designed to meet a perceived future performance cost. The alternative is to design them to be 'discardable'.
Third, there are different approaches to cryptography, with the two biggest divisions being symmetric vs asymmetric. Both have their own strengths and weaknesses (symmetric does not allow for anonymous submissions and asymmetric has poorer timesensitive performance). Fixing everything to one standard forces the use of one type or the other, but not both.
Fourth, not everything needs the same level of security. The shelflife for secured information (in conjuction with the performance costs) should be the criteria for the application being used.
Lastly, having one standard creates a dependence. Break or weaken that, and an attacker has EVERYTHING.
... He hit the "video" button by accident, and got this clip of the rousing billow of grey smoke. "Now I know what that guy felt like at the burning of the Hindenberg back in the 30s," George said.
The guy filming the Hindenburg had originally meant to take still photos but accidentally shot moving pictures instead - just like this guy!
Take this example: a person gets beaten by a man wielding a golf club, but the man committing the assault calls it "a few rounds of golf". He was swinging the appropriate club, right? And he won too!
Basically, lose the premise that the event was an actual boxing match, with official results. I thought the approach in my previous post was clear but hopefully the above should be enough to explain things.
if the software pirate wasn't tied down to a chair.:)
Really, how do we know it didn't happen that way? TFA states, "Manager of the company's software department, Andrei Smirnov, offered to fight the dealer in a fitness center. He defeated the computer pirate 24-16 in three rounds, lasting three minutes each."
16 points being tied down, though - that's one tough "boxing" opponent!:)
(to self): "Wait, what were the variable types for each? hmmm... how about "
>j
As you read the variable, they ALL disappear. Your fun weekend plans crumble into tiny threads and fall apart! Debug this five-year-old garbage you wrote instead - oh look, you didn't use comments or naming conventions!
(to screen): "ARRGGHH!! I KNEW I should have dropped everything on the Simulated Altar when I passed it!"
Hell, even without that, it's no surprise that the DoJ would rule in its own favor. They've never been the most objective of agencies.
I'm assuming that you don't know the function of the DoJ. In the setting of the Court, they are the equivalent of a prosecutor. Outside that setting, the department also has control over federal law enforcement. Not quite the background of an impartial body, huh? But as an extension of the Executive branch, no one should assume that they are impartial.
Basically, the DoJ doesn't make rulings on cases - justices of the Court in the Judicial branch do that. The DoJ's role is to prosecute and/or represent the federal government in a Court setting.
The same party has controlled both houses and the executive for a while, so it's easy to place blame for current and/or recent problems (since it was under their watch)
That party's house members are mired in scandal (which is directly linked to their current majority status)
Mid-term elections in 9 months (less than one year)
I expect a big shift in the house membership and a smaller one in the senate (since only 1/3 are participating this year), but this might not be enough for those impeachment requirements. A loss of control due to the above would probably piss off plenty of senators, but the executive would have to attack each of them personally (a doubtful scenario) before they'd vote in favor.
However, a lot can happen in the next two years so, who knows?
Slashdot Mirror
Weirder still is the fact that Duke Nukem Forever has taken more time to create than NASA took to design & build a pair of robots, fly them to Mars, and drive them around for a year.
I know you're referring to the 2003 rover missions but, and this may sound crazy, you can also include much of the Mars Pathfinder mission too.
Due to the commercial success of DukeNukem3D, one could argue that a franchise sequel was unofficially in the works immediately after its release date.
DukeNukem3D release date: 29-Jan-96
Mars Pathfinder launch date: 04-Dec-96
Final transmission from Pathfinder was on 27-Sep-97, so some of the mission was being exercised even after DNF's official announcement in Apr-97.
Once we establish a solid base, and knowledge about building a new colonie we can send humans...??
I think these are the steps we need to follow:
1. We can't survive in an environment that is constantly either light or dark. The easiest solution to this is to use an existing light source and then figure out a way to block out the light periodically so that we create a cycle of day and night.
2. Atmospheric conditions similar to our own are an absolute requirement.
3a. We need a water source, preferably on the terrain itself (due to the limitation of containment costs). To support any reasonablly sized colony these would need to be very large bodies of water.
3b. Vegitation starting with very simple plants (from grasses and herbs before we eventually introduce trees) would establish the terrain for cultivation and solid development.
4a. The vegitation may not initially adapt to the existing seasonal flow, so the environment should also be adjusted to reflect this need.
4b. We've learned that tidal forces are significant in the circulation of large bodies of water and, from experience, we may need to establish a large orbiting satelite to accomplish this.
5. Once the tidal circulation system is set up, we can start incorporating sealife to eventually sustain other forms of life, like birds.
6a. With the sealife in place, we can start settling land-dwelling animals and other larger species everywhere.
6b. Once everything above is established, only then can we start introducing humans.
7. At this point we can rest assured that we properly colonized the extra-terrestrial world. We'll look at the accomplishment, and see that it was good.
I called the number for Fernando's New Beginnings, but apparently it was disconnected...
:)
Fernando hasn't paid the bill from the phone company, either.
True, no irony there.
However, there's an idea I read about that if extra-terrestrial colonies were to become self-sufficient or better, then those colonies would have no need to keep close ties to Earth. Wait a number of generations and those colonies could have little concern over Earth's destruction. For political reasons, the inhabitants may even trigger Earth's demise. This situation would lead to irony.
As it stands, there's only one rock so if anything catastrophic occurs to it, everyone directly suffers.
Unfortunately, I can't remember where I first read about this idea. Some help, maybe?
Is some marketing or PR firm trying to use /. as an unpaid focus group?
I was thinking the same thing.
Don't tell 'em squat, people. Or lie.
Or, since these firms are trolling for ideas, provide them with the type that advocate shunning in-game advertising.
Appealing to someone else's greater goal is the first step to having them adopt yours over the short term.
There's a potentially good PR move here, similar to the "Do no evil" Google promotion.
Picture this: A company releases a statement that they will not advertise in video games. The statement is so weird to the mainstream media that they pick up on it and advertise the company for them, especially the company's new posture.
Such promotions can backfire, but that usually happens to companies that pick broad/vague mottos (such as the Google example). The move would restrict the company from a very specific channel for product advertising, but would instead advertise the company as a whole via other channels.
Lastly, this only works for companies that already have a relatively high level of exposure (for mainstream news to notice) and will only work for the first adopter.
More likely, the police knew when TPB did their last maintenance shutdown and assumed a routine schedule.
The best time for the police to inspect an item that contains possible criminal evidence is before the owner does so themselves. For items that accumulate such evidence: the day before, if possible.
technoextreme (885694) writes: PS. Is this the first Slashdot article that actually mentions S&M .
:)
I thought every article was, at least indirectly, S&M!
It's not just limited to the articles, and some days are just worse (or if you prefer: "better") than others.
Am I the only one that noticed this?
Lave (958216) writes: I totally agree with you - but at least this set a precedent that this kind of behaviour is unacceptable.
Whiney Mac Fanboy (963289) writes: You spend hundreds of hours following it up, removing the PCs from the network, checking to see there were no secondary malware infections, etc, etc, etc.
A blackhat would have been prosecuted for causing over $1 million worth of damage, easily. Such damage costs are mostly attributed to labor and downtime, so that's probably a fair claim.
Comparing to the extent of this fiasco, jail time for the admitted blackhat would be certain.
My question: Who approved of this project and authorized the release of this malware?
pedantic: adj 1: Like a pedant, overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning; 2: Being showy of one's knowledge, often in a boring manner; 3: Often used to describe a person who emphasizes their knowledge through the use of vocabulary; 4: Being finicky or picky with language.
joke: n. 1. Something said or done to evoke laughter or amusement, especially an amusing story with a punch line. 2. A mischievous trick; a prank. 3. An amusing or ludicrous incident or situation.
recursion: n. Mathematics. 1. An expression, such as a polynomial, each term of which is determined by application of a formula to preceding terms. 2. A formula that generates the successive terms of a recursion.
recursion: n. Mathematics. 1. An expression, such as a polynomial, each term of which is determined by application of a formula to preceding terms. 2. A formula that generates the successive terms of a recursion.
Disclaimer: I haven't tried the program but I did read the article. All italicize text is from that article.
There's definitely some BS in the form of PR: the topic is very sensitive for a lot of people and anyone seriously discussing the matter should be careful not to mis-speak. Given that, there are some statements within the game that sound callous so I assume that the designer is performing an attempt at damage control.
As for the question of why even release this game...
It's quite probable that he was affected by the event during his emotional development - like, "he was in another Colorado high school when the shooting occurred." Columbine's incident affected every high school, due to the nature of the crime.
Aside from that, video games may be his most comfortable or effective medium for expression. If he wrote a book with his proposed intentions, the book would certainly garner much less controversy. It's this point that interests me here.
"I've talked and written for some time about how games need not be fun to be worthwhile. This game is not fun, it is challenging and difficult to play - not technically difficult, but conceptually difficult. We need more of that."
I agree with the opportunity to use the format to illustrate situations and so forth, but there are concerns noted along the lines of:
"sad and sick thing to make a video game out of a tragedy where 13 innocent people were murdered."
Note that the concern quoted is that of making a video game, not the content of the game itself. This illustrates to me that there exists a misunderstanding over the usage of the words "game" and "play" in that such words are usually associated with "fun". It reminds me of the problems mature titles face by many people who don't consider that games have developed beyond side-scroller SuperMarioBros.
Of course the program in question may simply be just a sick game, but the comments by "Richard Castaldo, who was paralyzed from the chest down in the Columbine shooting" make me think that the designer's arguments have at least some level of merit.
You can easily DDoS the system by shipping a blank DVD in every FedEx package.
/. UID is "surprise_audit".
If the dogs are sniffing the chemicals in recordable DVDs, a broken one should smell *really* good...
No. No reasonable person would willingly do this to themselves.
Why would I want to increase the likelihood of Customs tearing apart my parcel? Have fun shipping static-sensitive, sealed or fragile material. When Customs cuts the packing tape, they can easily manhandle the contents.
I've seen some impressive damage: like a thick solid metal rod broken in half. I assume they just dropped it from a decent height. If they can stuff it all back into the box, broken or not, what do they care? It's all part of the inspection process to them.
Either way, using your example you're advertising that a disc is in there somewhere, and they'll want to find it. I assume that your gripe is with the MPAA/RIAA but this action only inconveniences you and Customs, not the MPAA/RIAA.
Oh I get it, your
They can't trademark "2 cores @ 3.8 ghz with 2 MB Cache 800 FSB."
This will not even apply to most NY workers, either.
:)
NY happens to be one of those states where an employer can fire you for any reason ("Employment at will"), except for 8 very specific circumstances (Here's the list of exceptions).
Given that, I guess the critical point to this case was that the employer was the Dept of Education: a public sector job.
Albany's culture of "pay to play", indeed.
A single use pad is just a simple substitution cipher, employing a truly random and secret key. OTP does not specify parameters for message length, ever - that issue is beyond its scope.
Message length can expose message content. OTP (when used by itself) has this one flaw which means that extra measures (such as using fixed length messages) are needed to combat this weakness. But, by utilizing these extra measures, the system then becomes "more than OTP".
My response was to the claim that OTP is unbreakable, which I believe I proved false by counterexample. It's an extremely limited set, but you only need one counterexample.
Even if OTP is employed correctly (used once, truly random, completely secret), there are still a finite amount of possible combinations that a message can represent. A sufficiently short message and knowing the context of the message will greatly reduce the security of any system.
For example, if an eavesdropper is expecting a "yes" or "no" communication and captures a 2 character message: not so secure anymore, eh?
In the end, everything has a breaking point. The point of using encryption is to make discovery more difficult, not completely impossible.
A system on the box akin nutritional facts is a fantastic idea- if it were done properly as a standard, it would clear up a lot of confusion regarding EULAs.
I'm pleased to see that I'm not the only one to understand and encourage the concept (mentioned in passing here: clicky).
Of course, using such a system makes hiding controvertial clauses problematic: a change that many current publishers would not willingly adopt.
The biggest difficulty to adoption is formulating the standard/reference, but the biggest deterrence is the effective indifference by the vast majority of end-users (with the corresponding lack of economic influence toward such adoption).
It's discouraging from a practical POV since, why should a company bother if most people just click "I agree" to anything being presented?
There is some money to be made by the first person to come up with a simple, powerful, universal encryption program that works for all data and all computers or computer like devices.
I understand the motivation and it seems like a reasonable appeal (I even held this belief for a time), but when we consider history and the practical problems, it's a really bad idea.
Unbreakable encryption systems have been found to be broken, more often because of some unexpected practical aspect or limitation (timing attacks, for example).
Likewise, absolutely "bug-free" applications have been found to have bugs due to local (physical) problems or underlying OS bugs.
Secondly, an attacker's performance costs decrease every day and the performance of an encryption algorithm has to meet this threat. The relative strength of a algorithm is proportional to its keylength (a longer key is stronger than a shorter one for a given algo), so all the computer-like devices would need to have the ability to utilize and recognize a flexible keylength (as opposed to having it hardwired). Most importantly, these devices would also need to be designed to meet a perceived future performance cost. The alternative is to design them to be 'discardable'.
Third, there are different approaches to cryptography, with the two biggest divisions being symmetric vs asymmetric. Both have their own strengths and weaknesses (symmetric does not allow for anonymous submissions and asymmetric has poorer timesensitive performance). Fixing everything to one standard forces the use of one type or the other, but not both.
Fourth, not everything needs the same level of security. The shelflife for secured information (in conjuction with the performance costs) should be the criteria for the application being used.
Lastly, having one standard creates a dependence. Break or weaken that, and an attacker has EVERYTHING.
... He hit the "video" button by accident, and got this clip of the rousing billow of grey smoke. "Now I know what that guy felt like at the burning of the Hindenberg back in the 30s," George said.
:)
The guy filming the Hindenburg had originally meant to take still photos but accidentally shot moving pictures instead - just like this guy!
At least, that's how I read it.
Un chiste.
Take this example: a person gets beaten by a man wielding a golf club, but the man committing the assault calls it "a few rounds of golf". He was swinging the appropriate club, right? And he won too!
Basically, lose the premise that the event was an actual boxing match, with official results. I thought the approach in my previous post was clear but hopefully the above should be enough to explain things.
if the software pirate wasn't tied down to a chair. :)
:)
Really, how do we know it didn't happen that way? TFA states, "Manager of the company's software department, Andrei Smirnov, offered to fight the dealer in a fitness center. He defeated the computer pirate 24-16 in three rounds, lasting three minutes each."
16 points being tied down, though - that's one tough "boxing" opponent!
>r
What do you want to read? [ijk or ?*]
>?
Variables
i - tmp
j - tmp2
k - tmp3
(to self): "Wait, what were the variable types for each? hmmm... how about "
>j
As you read the variable, they ALL disappear. Your fun weekend plans crumble into tiny threads and fall apart! Debug this five-year-old garbage you wrote instead - oh look, you didn't use comments or naming conventions!
(to screen): "ARRGGHH!! I KNEW I should have dropped everything on the Simulated Altar when I passed it!"
Hell, even without that, it's no surprise that the DoJ would rule in its own favor. They've never been the most objective of agencies.
I'm assuming that you don't know the function of the DoJ. In the setting of the Court, they are the equivalent of a prosecutor. Outside that setting, the department also has control over federal law enforcement. Not quite the background of an impartial body, huh? But as an extension of the Executive branch, no one should assume that they are impartial.
Basically, the DoJ doesn't make rulings on cases - justices of the Court in the Judicial branch do that. The DoJ's role is to prosecute and/or represent the federal government in a Court setting.
Perfect 10's copyright infringement case may take years to wend its way through the courts.
Oh man, too much VB programming... but the crazy thing is that the sentence still works.
I expect a big shift in the house membership and a smaller one in the senate (since only 1/3 are participating this year), but this might not be enough for those impeachment requirements. A loss of control due to the above would probably piss off plenty of senators, but the executive would have to attack each of them personally (a doubtful scenario) before they'd vote in favor.
However, a lot can happen in the next two years so, who knows?