You need to wake up. The rest of the world is catching up and the US is doing nothing but languishing. The generation before us or especially the one before them (you know, the guys who kicked off the explosion in technology) would have a stroke over what passes for literacy today. The English language (even American English) used to be a thing of beauty. Today it has been compromised so that those too lazy to learn to speak it (mostly US-indigenous non-immigrants) can think of themselves as having a mastery or at least a grasp of it.
Look, if you both worked in the USAF, then you know policies and implementations vary widely from base to base. While everybody's reading off the same page of directorates, AFPCA's way of implementing is not the same as DISA's is not the same as Podunk AFB's CS which doesn't fall under the purview of either yet.
The hurdles the AF is dealing (not too poorly) with right now do not differ that much from a lot of the businesses today. Their IT sprung up a little here and a little there, with no centralized view of THE way to do things. This has its pros and cons, but, sooner or later, if from a purely management standpoint, it is inevitable that there has to be some top-down policy to keep things safe but still usable.
Anybody in the business knows that bringing policy down from above onto a wide array of systems that have grown up grassroots over very many years is next to impossible. Until a single authority takes over all.MIL network client installations, it will remain spotty. But it is getting better. For a long time, you saw the "security before functionality" mindset reign supreme and the base CS didn't care if you got any work done; in fact, they rather liked it if you couldn't because it was an indication that the system was locked down good. Luckily that is changing as they slowly figure out that you can secure a workstation relatively well (security is a tradeoff and all you have to do is decide what risks you want to mitigate for what loss of functionality or simplicity) and still let and end user get some work done. A big shift to server-based applications has made this easier too. A single cluster of application servers is much easier to lock down while retaining functionality than thousands of desktops. Now the problems they face are that the application servers have gotten very pervasive and some of the data they serve up is truly sensitive stuff. So they're able to implement good best-practices role-based security at the server, but what to do with the data as it leaves the server and is in the hand of the requester? There is a huge need for good research into some RM technology in the gov't sector in general that can limit what an user can do with output. WHile it would be difficult to stop someone bent on pilfering or leaking info, such activity could be made very difficult with the right application of good RM tech.
But my original point was, just because an implementation worked as adverised at AFB #1 doesn't mean it would at #2. There's just a lot of variables there and you know it.
Not only that either, Canuck. I think everybody in the world has something riding on the outcome... maybe everything. Speak your mind. Just because you can't vote doesn't mean you can't think. Although the polls indicate about half of US are incapable.
Well, more accurate this time around would be, "while voting for a good candidate is important, if that vote has a good chance of helping the very worst candidate win, you need to reconsider that vote."
Bush said if you're not for him you're against him. Well, I ain't for him.
"You know when you buy windows you're buying something harder to secure than OSX, Solaris, Linux, etc"
what the hell are you talking about?
I'm talking about a default install of those others (just saying "yes" to everything asked) has the potential to be a more secure out-of-the-box experience. I couldn't care less about a default install because I know how to configure an OS but the parent's argument was it is unfair to users that Windows is more insecure out of the box (or "harder to secure"). My point was, when you have all that functionality that we want to "just work", it's gonna be insecure. We each have to decide what we want and how much of it we can have for what acceptable risk. It's all about thinking for ourselves. Neither Bill nor Linus nor anybody else is ever going to do a good job of that for us, But one Ashcroft or someone like him is sure bound to give it a go if we don't start doing it on our own and soon.
I don't even know if you're American, but reagrdless of where you live, if you can't see an international coalition shoving tech restrictions down your throat while loving it up with the tech firms in the WTO to a much greater degree than today in the name of security and "global stability" you are lacking not in imagination but plain deduction, let alone foresight. The only thing that fend it off is if people start acting more responsibly AND also stand up for their rights and their neighbor's. I just don't see enough of it going on. Barlow has had the right idea, but the scope of focus for our EFF and similar orgs is just not expanding at the same rate at the competition (i.e. the Earth, Incorporated). Not even close. And when tech stops being available to the little guy, that's when it's going to do some really terrible stuff.
Actually, having needs that are confined to email and term papers is an excellent excuse to use linux on the desktop. And I would dare say a majority of desktop users are at least dimply aware of it. They may not be savvy enough to tweak it to its extreme, but you could say the same of them and XP.
MS's attitude toward security is like expecting your typical minivan operator to be able to replace an engine just in case.
No, that's not it. It's just that a networked computer OS capable of meeting the demads of a wide range of todays users is not an "hello, world" application. And if it's going to be capable of delivering to the demanding, it's going to be capable of confounding those with more modest needs -- either you have the modular approach like a *N*X which is utterly confusing to the simple user or you put it all under the hood to begin with, which puts them at higher risk.
Now I wasn't saying Joe Job better know how to lock down his Media Center PC. I was saying, if he doesn't, since he is able to afford a media center, he can afford an occasional house call for preventative purposes. I was also saying that as prominent as internet outbreaks are not only in the news but also at the water cooler regardless of the business you're in, the percentage of home users who don't know the threat is increasing exponentially with the stakes would have to be infinitesimal. I didn't say they should know how to fix it, just that they should know what the stakes are and what a responsible operator (cause that's what they are regardless of their skill level) should do (or who they should call) to mitigate risk.
And there are stripped down linux distros which are easy to use/maintain and also are locked down pretty good for the average joe/josie. As long as your demands are light, your previous argument is weak at best. It makes me wonder about that "stripped-down windows" we've been hearing about going to some other countries. It may well be that MS is missing a market for something like that here. I know if they offered something secure (as opposed to securable) and it was a little less feature-rich, quite a few would buy it. Are you listening, Gates?
However, you are on to something if not on target. As desktops gain in power and the ability of server apps multiplies as well, we're seeing tech creep into areas it never would have before. See, I don't know how old you are, but there used to be a time when most people didn't *need* a computer to do a job or prepare for the job market. Anyone who comes from that era but doesn't realize (a) that times have changed and (b) the consequences of those changes, well, that's just a bit myopic. And those that don't remember those days don't fully understand that this is a new set of sociological and technological problems that the majority of society didn't have to grapple with a few generations ago. And something that we all need to observe is that computing technology in general has really just begun its invasion into all facets of our daily life. Sure, a few "big" apps were out there before, but not like today and not in so many facets of life. Computing and related tech is on the march in most every office, likely a majority of living rooms and dens, almost all "playrooms", probably (I know I'll get trolled for saying it) some bedrooms, kitchens, etc. And that's just in the home. What about stores today? Even CHURCHES. I would've thought that would be kind of taboo, but, no, tech stomped right into the sanctuary too. In our cars. And the thing is, this is just the beginning, because tech still hasn't really found a groove in a lot of the markets it's really courting. And as tech creeps more and more into things like identification systems, oh man, well, I won't even get started on that! But the point is this is an evolving problem that is going to get worse before it gets better, because all of these applications of tech have risks that have to be mitigated and yet the desire is for it to all
Yes, MS defaults are a problem. But it is well-known. Average users are really very sub-par to the level of effort they employ to get set up right. Fast implementation wins over proper configuration from the outset every time.
And RE: the 1337 smug hacker feeling the same about me... no doubt. It's not about how much I expect an user to know -- it's about how little I expect their lackadaisical approach to operating powerful machinery to affect my computing experience.
Is it wrong for me to despise zombie scans and blame the guy whose PC does it to me when he is unaware? I don't think it is. Absence of malice is just not a defense here. As much as it is in the headlights now, absolutely nobody can claim anymore "I didn't know the gun was loaded." Plainly, everybody has to know these high-powered desktops are capable of wreaking havoc on the network. My stance is, if you're going to touch the network and you don't know how to secure yourself for it, you can afford to pay somebody to help you do it. If you can afford broadband, you can afford a house call from the neighborhood geek every few months for a checkup, and you can sure as hell afford good AV software. If one doesn't do it they're being lazy and cheap. And the long and short of it is, they may deserve exactly what they get. If it were that simple and they didn't end up affecting others, it'd be a beauty of karma - not the/. kind - but the fact is the effects are wider and that's why I say learn about it or hire someone who has.
Windows users do not have too much of a burden on them regarding basic security. You know when you buy windows you're buying something harder to secure than OSX, Solaris, Linux, etc. But you weigh that against why you're buying an OS and you make a choice. I'm just asking that people be honest with themselves about the responsibility that goes with the decision and follow through with it however necessary. I do not think that unreasonable.
Finally, if anything, Google should be commended for this. They just made a marketing gaffe -- they should be billing it as a home user's security checkup tool instead of a local search novelty!
OK, bashing where it is due, NT-based OSes at once introduced the concept of local admin to a community that was not ready for it. They provided the vehicle for segmenting privilege while implying to joe user that he should usurp it all if he is to be able to get his work done. It got the whole world of n00bs thinking they had to be root and not just via context-switching to get particular tasks done. It has fed the average windows user's megalomania into believing himself to be a computing genius.
In Redmond's defense, they developed these features in an earnest attempt to enable best practices functionalities in the product line. The problem was that even though the features had been enabled in an somewhat OK manner, nobody who would be caught dead in a Win32 environment knew the first thing about how to implement those best practices given the tools. MS knew it too, but they still had to sell this "Windoze is EZ to use, even at the server, so you can pay less for adminz and more for s0ftwarez" line a little longer if they were to penetrate the server market enough to ensure they didn't have to compete seriously with Novell and/or IBM again for another 15 years or so. To be fair, from a purely market driven view, they have played it well. Their products were insecure to some degree, the implementations were disastrously so, but the market bears it without so much as a whimper and comes back for more.
Redmond's dilemma now is they are trying to make themselves over as the Trustworthy One, because they are no longer selling themselves to businesses, they are selling themselves to entire industries. And particularly industries that NEED the kind of security they wish they could be seen as providing. So they are pumping out obscene amounts of $$$ to try to make the systems truly enterprise-grade securable, while dragging (kicking and screaming I might add) that admin community that got hired cheap and promised easy advancement. The admins still make shit wages, even though some have adequately educated themselves with real security education, not MS certification crap. And then there are the users they support and their PHBs who understand PC security about as well. And the PHB says "just make 'em local admins on the box - that'll solve everything". If you mean dis-solve, maybe.
Your point that it was always insecure is well-taken, but your notion that Joe Jobs shouldn't be expected to know how to secure their data or their PC is out-and-out dangerously flawed thinking. Basically, if you're not inclined to educate yourself on how to secure data, you should have access to none of any import, and anything that happes to your personal data, whether of value to anyone else or no, is your own fault. More to my point, if you're not keen to get steeped in how to protect your PC in some small way, I don't want you traversing the same network I do. I sure don't want you knowing my email address or such. Otherwise, I'm just the next subject of interest for your new 0wn3r.
There way a time when AOL was its own network and the users didn't affect the rest of us too much. Then they got access to NNTP and cracked w4r3z with embedded subSeven. Now look where we are.
Spot-on. It's only if you "gotta-have" OSX either for support or less rational reasons but don't need the extra tower/book/whatver. Primary appeal is developers(3)
Yeh, that should piss them off... make Mac-only software just another obsolete reason for buying pricey Macs over cheap Intel. Even with the cost a Windoze license you could still build a pretty beefy workstation to host an OSX image for the same money you'd pay for a closed G5 setup.
The flip-side: a report will be out in a week saying 90% of Windows installations are only used to pirate OSX!!!
Library? Don't count on it. The argument will be it is a resource provided by public money and therefore any info on your use of it is fair game, almost in a FOIA kind of way.
But yeah, Barnes & Noble may be able to fight off the gestapo. Don't hold much hope for the small bookstores though. Even if compulsion is ruled out, thugs will find a way to pressure the little guy into spilling your beans or else paint him pink. The lesson? If you don't want big bro subpoenaing your reading list, better buy from big biz, who just happens to run big gov.
What's so encouraging about this? You miss the point. Again, the system stands up for the rights of COMPANIES. Is anyone surprised? IOW, the Patriot Act has crossed the line when it infringes on the rights of BUSINESS.
Actually, I had a friend who told me their aunt tried a variant of this and got burned (It may be fable but this guy usually doesn't make stuff up).
The way the story goes, she had a watermelon patch that just gave a really wonderful bounty each year, but it was next to a road, and she often had up to half of the yield boosted by passers-by who would stop, climb her meager fence and help themselves.
She decided to do something to deter this and posted a sign that said something to the effect of "Pick at your own risk - these watermenlons are great but one of them is poisoned. Can you guess which one?"
For weeks, the effort seemed to pay off... not one melon was missing. With a few weeks left until harvest, she went into the field to inspect the crop. To her surprise, a piece of posterboard was affixed to the back of the sign. In big magic-markered letters was the message "Now there are two -- Your guess!!!"
The relevance is, if SCOX can prove that IBM had already mis-appropriated UNIX code into some part of AIX where it was not specifically licensed, then they can try to say that the entire AIX license deal from that point forward is revoked via breach of contract. Then they can try some kind of hocus pocus to try to implicate by association that JFS, NUMA, etc. belong to them or something. It's still bullshit, it's just bullshit based on something that may be truer than what they had before. I'm still betting on Big Blue's IP department.
My only question is: If they can't seem to patch their OS fast enough, what makes them think they can keep their AV software up to date?"
That's just it. I think there's a conflict of interest claim to be made. Most viruses propagate by exploiting some security hole or another. If there's money to be made in an epidemic, they might drag their feet on a patch for vuln-X but be johnny-on-the-spot with AV signatures. As a result, the AV product looks good in the press. In that same vein, a planned outbreak where they had the sig ready to go before each variant hit the streets (IOW, an outbreak they create or manage secretly) would make them look "more responsive" than the competition. I make a point to support MS when they get unfair bashing around here, but their venture into this arena bothers me.
many, if not most "pirates" would not buy the software/music, but would instead go without.
That may well be to begin with, but it's like crack or heroin... you allow it to be given away for free for a while to get 'em hooked, then pull the rug out. Once they have too much of their process invested in using it, they'll do anything to keep from losing it, including pay and pay. Yo, biatch... suck my disk!
Slashdot Mirror
You need to wake up. The rest of the world is catching up and the US is doing nothing but languishing. The generation before us or especially the one before them (you know, the guys who kicked off the explosion in technology) would have a stroke over what passes for literacy today. The English language (even American English) used to be a thing of beauty. Today it has been compromised so that those too lazy to learn to speak it (mostly US-indigenous non-immigrants) can think of themselves as having a mastery or at least a grasp of it.
Look, if you both worked in the USAF, then you know policies and implementations vary widely from base to base. While everybody's reading off the same page of directorates, AFPCA's way of implementing is not the same as DISA's is not the same as Podunk AFB's CS which doesn't fall under the purview of either yet.
.MIL network client installations, it will remain spotty. But it is getting better. For a long time, you saw the "security before functionality" mindset reign supreme and the base CS didn't care if you got any work done; in fact, they rather liked it if you couldn't because it was an indication that the system was locked down good. Luckily that is changing as they slowly figure out that you can secure a workstation relatively well (security is a tradeoff and all you have to do is decide what risks you want to mitigate for what loss of functionality or simplicity) and still let and end user get some work done. A big shift to server-based applications has made this easier too. A single cluster of application servers is much easier to lock down while retaining functionality than thousands of desktops. Now the problems they face are that the application servers have gotten very pervasive and some of the data they serve up is truly sensitive stuff. So they're able to implement good best-practices role-based security at the server, but what to do with the data as it leaves the server and is in the hand of the requester? There is a huge need for good research into some RM technology in the gov't sector in general that can limit what an user can do with output. WHile it would be difficult to stop someone bent on pilfering or leaking info, such activity could be made very difficult with the right application of good RM tech.
The hurdles the AF is dealing (not too poorly) with right now do not differ that much from a lot of the businesses today. Their IT sprung up a little here and a little there, with no centralized view of THE way to do things. This has its pros and cons, but, sooner or later, if from a purely management standpoint, it is inevitable that there has to be some top-down policy to keep things safe but still usable.
Anybody in the business knows that bringing policy down from above onto a wide array of systems that have grown up grassroots over very many years is next to impossible. Until a single authority takes over all
But my original point was, just because an implementation worked as adverised at AFB #1 doesn't mean it would at #2. There's just a lot of variables there and you know it.
Not only that either, Canuck. I think everybody in the world has something riding on the outcome... maybe everything. Speak your mind. Just because you can't vote doesn't mean you can't think. Although the polls indicate about half of US are incapable.
"the administration simply means outsourcing to private companies
Yeah... guess whose companies?!?
Well, more accurate this time around would be, "while voting for a good candidate is important, if that vote has a good chance of helping the very worst candidate win, you need to reconsider that vote."
Bush said if you're not for him you're against him. Well, I ain't for him.
I don't even know if you're American, but reagrdless of where you live, if you can't see an international coalition shoving tech restrictions down your throat while loving it up with the tech firms in the WTO to a much greater degree than today in the name of security and "global stability" you are lacking not in imagination but plain deduction, let alone foresight. The only thing that fend it off is if people start acting more responsibly AND also stand up for their rights and their neighbor's. I just don't see enough of it going on. Barlow has had the right idea, but the scope of focus for our EFF and similar orgs is just not expanding at the same rate at the competition (i.e. the Earth, Incorporated). Not even close. And when tech stops being available to the little guy, that's when it's going to do some really terrible stuff.
No, that's not it. It's just that a networked computer OS capable of meeting the demads of a wide range of todays users is not an "hello, world" application. And if it's going to be capable of delivering to the demanding, it's going to be capable of confounding those with more modest needs -- either you have the modular approach like a *N*X which is utterly confusing to the simple user or you put it all under the hood to begin with, which puts them at higher risk.
Now I wasn't saying Joe Job better know how to lock down his Media Center PC. I was saying, if he doesn't, since he is able to afford a media center, he can afford an occasional house call for preventative purposes. I was also saying that as prominent as internet outbreaks are not only in the news but also at the water cooler regardless of the business you're in, the percentage of home users who don't know the threat is increasing exponentially with the stakes would have to be infinitesimal. I didn't say they should know how to fix it, just that they should know what the stakes are and what a responsible operator (cause that's what they are regardless of their skill level) should do (or who they should call) to mitigate risk.
And there are stripped down linux distros which are easy to use/maintain and also are locked down pretty good for the average joe/josie. As long as your demands are light, your previous argument is weak at best. It makes me wonder about that "stripped-down windows" we've been hearing about going to some other countries. It may well be that MS is missing a market for something like that here. I know if they offered something secure (as opposed to securable) and it was a little less feature-rich, quite a few would buy it. Are you listening, Gates?
However, you are on to something if not on target. As desktops gain in power and the ability of server apps multiplies as well, we're seeing tech creep into areas it never would have before. See, I don't know how old you are, but there used to be a time when most people didn't *need* a computer to do a job or prepare for the job market. Anyone who comes from that era but doesn't realize (a) that times have changed and (b) the consequences of those changes, well, that's just a bit myopic. And those that don't remember those days don't fully understand that this is a new set of sociological and technological problems that the majority of society didn't have to grapple with a few generations ago. And something that we all need to observe is that computing technology in general has really just begun its invasion into all facets of our daily life. Sure, a few "big" apps were out there before, but not like today and not in so many facets of life. Computing and related tech is on the march in most every office, likely a majority of living rooms and dens, almost all "playrooms", probably (I know I'll get trolled for saying it) some bedrooms, kitchens, etc. And that's just in the home. What about stores today? Even CHURCHES. I would've thought that would be kind of taboo, but, no, tech stomped right into the sanctuary too. In our cars. And the thing is, this is just the beginning, because tech still hasn't really found a groove in a lot of the markets it's really courting. And as tech creeps more and more into things like identification systems, oh man, well, I won't even get started on that! But the point is this is an evolving problem that is going to get worse before it gets better, because all of these applications of tech have risks that have to be mitigated and yet the desire is for it to all
We agree on a lot and disagree on a lot.
/. kind - but the fact is the effects are wider and that's why I say learn about it or hire someone who has.
Yes, MS defaults are a problem. But it is well-known. Average users are really very sub-par to the level of effort they employ to get set up right. Fast implementation wins over proper configuration from the outset every time.
And RE: the 1337 smug hacker feeling the same about me... no doubt. It's not about how much I expect an user to know -- it's about how little I expect their lackadaisical approach to operating powerful machinery to affect my computing experience.
Is it wrong for me to despise zombie scans and blame the guy whose PC does it to me when he is unaware? I don't think it is. Absence of malice is just not a defense here. As much as it is in the headlights now, absolutely nobody can claim anymore "I didn't know the gun was loaded." Plainly, everybody has to know these high-powered desktops are capable of wreaking havoc on the network. My stance is, if you're going to touch the network and you don't know how to secure yourself for it, you can afford to pay somebody to help you do it. If you can afford broadband, you can afford a house call from the neighborhood geek every few months for a checkup, and you can sure as hell afford good AV software. If one doesn't do it they're being lazy and cheap. And the long and short of it is, they may deserve exactly what they get. If it were that simple and they didn't end up affecting others, it'd be a beauty of karma - not the
Windows users do not have too much of a burden on them regarding basic security. You know when you buy windows you're buying something harder to secure than OSX, Solaris, Linux, etc. But you weigh that against why you're buying an OS and you make a choice. I'm just asking that people be honest with themselves about the responsibility that goes with the decision and follow through with it however necessary. I do not think that unreasonable.
Finally, if anything, Google should be commended for this. They just made a marketing gaffe -- they should be billing it as a home user's security checkup tool instead of a local search novelty!
OK, bashing where it is due, NT-based OSes at once introduced the concept of local admin to a community that was not ready for it. They provided the vehicle for segmenting privilege while implying to joe user that he should usurp it all if he is to be able to get his work done. It got the whole world of n00bs thinking they had to be root and not just via context-switching to get particular tasks done. It has fed the average windows user's megalomania into believing himself to be a computing genius.
In Redmond's defense, they developed these features in an earnest attempt to enable best practices functionalities in the product line. The problem was that even though the features had been enabled in an somewhat OK manner, nobody who would be caught dead in a Win32 environment knew the first thing about how to implement those best practices given the tools. MS knew it too, but they still had to sell this "Windoze is EZ to use, even at the server, so you can pay less for adminz and more for s0ftwarez" line a little longer if they were to penetrate the server market enough to ensure they didn't have to compete seriously with Novell and/or IBM again for another 15 years or so. To be fair, from a purely market driven view, they have played it well. Their products were insecure to some degree, the implementations were disastrously so, but the market bears it without so much as a whimper and comes back for more.
Redmond's dilemma now is they are trying to make themselves over as the Trustworthy One, because they are no longer selling themselves to businesses, they are selling themselves to entire industries. And particularly industries that NEED the kind of security they wish they could be seen as providing. So they are pumping out obscene amounts of $$$ to try to make the systems truly enterprise-grade securable, while dragging (kicking and screaming I might add) that admin community that got hired cheap and promised easy advancement. The admins still make shit wages, even though some have adequately educated themselves with real security education, not MS certification crap. And then there are the users they support and their PHBs who understand PC security about as well. And the PHB says "just make 'em local admins on the box - that'll solve everything". If you mean dis-solve, maybe.
Your point that it was always insecure is well-taken, but your notion that Joe Jobs shouldn't be expected to know how to secure their data or their PC is out-and-out dangerously flawed thinking. Basically, if you're not inclined to educate yourself on how to secure data, you should have access to none of any import, and anything that happes to your personal data, whether of value to anyone else or no, is your own fault. More to my point, if you're not keen to get steeped in how to protect your PC in some small way, I don't want you traversing the same network I do. I sure don't want you knowing my email address or such. Otherwise, I'm just the next subject of interest for your new 0wn3r.
There way a time when AOL was its own network and the users didn't affect the rest of us too much. Then they got access to NNTP and cracked w4r3z with embedded subSeven. Now look where we are.
But in 2002 it went like this:
Spot-on. It's only if you "gotta-have" OSX either for support or less rational reasons but don't need the extra tower/book/whatver. Primary appeal is developers(3)
Yeh, that should piss them off... make Mac-only software just another obsolete reason for buying pricey Macs over cheap Intel. Even with the cost a Windoze license you could still build a pretty beefy workstation to host an OSX image for the same money you'd pay for a closed G5 setup.
The flip-side: a report will be out in a week saying 90% of Windows installations are only used to pirate OSX!!!
You may need to raise the ceiling for this one.
Yes.
Bookstore? Maybe.
Library? Don't count on it. The argument will be it is a resource provided by public money and therefore any info on your use of it is fair game, almost in a FOIA kind of way.
But yeah, Barnes & Noble may be able to fight off the gestapo. Don't hold much hope for the small bookstores though. Even if compulsion is ruled out, thugs will find a way to pressure the little guy into spilling your beans or else paint him pink. The lesson? If you don't want big bro subpoenaing your reading list, better buy from big biz, who just happens to run big gov.
What's so encouraging about this? You miss the point. Again, the system stands up for the rights of COMPANIES . Is anyone surprised? IOW, the Patriot Act has crossed the line when it infringes on the rights of BUSINESS.
Yada, yada, yada.
Actually, I had a friend who told me their aunt tried a variant of this and got burned (It may be fable but this guy usually doesn't make stuff up).
The way the story goes, she had a watermelon patch that just gave a really wonderful bounty each year, but it was next to a road, and she often had up to half of the yield boosted by passers-by who would stop, climb her meager fence and help themselves.
She decided to do something to deter this and posted a sign that said something to the effect of "Pick at your own risk - these watermenlons are great but one of them is poisoned. Can you guess which one?"
For weeks, the effort seemed to pay off... not one melon was missing. With a few weeks left until harvest, she went into the field to inspect the crop. To her surprise, a piece of posterboard was affixed to the back of the sign. In big magic-markered letters was the message "Now there are two -- Your guess!!!"
What are you guys smokin? My download from MSDN says:
File
en_winxp_sp2.iso, ISO-9660 CD Image
Size
475.35 MB
My favorite part?
Minimum Estimated Download Times
T1 42 minutes
128 KB 8 hours, 39 minutes
64 KB 19 hours, 29 minutes
28.8 KB 43 hours, 18 minutes
The relevance is, if SCOX can prove that IBM had already mis-appropriated UNIX code into some part of AIX where it was not specifically licensed, then they can try to say that the entire AIX license deal from that point forward is revoked via breach of contract. Then they can try some kind of hocus pocus to try to implicate by association that JFS, NUMA, etc. belong to them or something. It's still bullshit, it's just bullshit based on something that may be truer than what they had before. I'm still betting on Big Blue's IP department.
It figures. This line of BS was played out two posts ago and /. doesn't have a mod rating of -5: Derivative.
His name can't be Larry Laffer, can it? Wasn't that the full name of Leisure Suit Larry?