I think people spend far too much time worrying about false positives with CAPTCHA tests and not enough time worrying about false negatives.
The proliferation of CAPTCHAs is a big problem for web accessibility and one that needs to be a addressed a little more urgently than the possible emergence of human spam teams in india.
I've created my own CAPTCHA solution, which I'm too embaressed to plug... again... I've already plugged it 2 or 3 times in other replies to this post, just do a search for my nick in this thread if you really want to see it;). I created my solution based on the same points you have addressed. Whilst I've built in a lot checks that were pretty easy to do such as checking IP's, automatic expiration and time outs, logging etc etc.
At the end of the day I've kept it pretty simple, and created a text based solution, because you're absolutely right at the moment it is only the lowest hanging fruit that gets attacked and any sort of protection is going to suffice at this point in time. However, I'm sure over time, spammers will get more sophisticated and I've designed my system to allow sophistication to be added as needed in the future.
For now I think most sites would be better off without any protection at all than using CAPTCHA images, at least you may think so if you're blind or visually impaired.
I think if you're going to use CAPTCHA images you should at least have an alternative manual system for registration *cough-slashdot*.
I think it's a good thing in some ways. Any kind of redistribution of wealth from the wealthy west to the 3rd world can't be a bad thing. It will just give us more reason to raise their standard of living, ie to make it too expensive for spammers to hire them.
You're either relaying the request and the post for the CAPTCHA. Or you could get your horny porn dude to request the CAPTCHA directly and run your spam bot as client side javascipt from his browser.
In either case I don't think a generic solution is going to be possible, I think your porn site would need to be specifically coded to attack a specific site. Both of these approaches have problems and are going to be ridiculously easy to counter, compared to the amount of effort required to make the attack in the first place.
Basically I think the idea is as stupid as your comment.
Anyhow rather than respond with more negativity, why not show us how technically brilliant you are and tell us all the approach that is so obvious and that I'm too stupid to have thought of. I would love to hear it.
Or aren't you involved in any sort of technical role in your job? Or maybe you're a spammer that is too stupid to think up a solution for yourself and you're just fishing for one on here.
Not all Indians speak english, they mostly speak Hindi or Urdu, english is spoken by well educated people, and they probably won't be the ones working in data entry centers for $4 a day.
In any case I never claimed it was resistant to this sort of attack. I'm sure it's going to be more resistant than a system that requires simple data entry.
I don't think you're going to find a flawless system for verifying the authenticity of anonymous requests, that statement in itself is kind of a give away. Obviously the alternative is a trusted computing model that relies certificates and the power to revoke a persons certificate. This sort of system excludes by default rather than www which by default is inclusive.
The system I've created is a framework for supplying logical CAPTCHAs, it's not an attempt at creating a full proof system, just one that's extremely adaptable and extendible, with logging features to enabling web masters to analyse and counter attacks.
I'm sure there are ways of defeating that at the CAPTCHA server level. Generate a brand new image every time, and send it out along with a cookie. The cookie is a database key which refers to the CAPTCHA solution; the record also contains the timestamp when the image was generated and the IP address to which it was sent. (NOT the MD5 of the solution: anyone can generate an MD5 for any word and send that as the cookie contents with their word as the answer, effectively bypassing the image altogether.) The answer must not only be correct; it must also come from the same IP address that received the image, and within a reasonable time limit. IP addresses cannot be forged (or else the server would be speaking to the wrong client) and nor can timestamps (which come from the server anyway), so this ought to be fairly robust. Checking the referrer won't help, because referrers can be forged.
Already done I'm sure most implementations of CAPTCHA's use means to timeout a CAPTCHA and limit that CAPTCHA to one request.
As for the rest of your post as I've already said in this thread, false positives are not the biggest problem with CAPTCHA images, it is the false negatives. CAPTCHAs exclude the blind and visually impaired, people using CAPTCHAs for their site should be more concerned by this than the possibility of spammers circumventing their protection.
Nice idea, but there are going to be problems with this. For starters most CAPTCHA images time out, the bot would need to get it solved by a horny porn dude within about 1min of it being served. Also you have the problem of actuall relaying the image to the horny porn dude. Most CAPTCHA images work by not allowing you to serve the image to more than one request, new request, new CAPTCHA. So they would have to capture the captcha. Tryin to pick the image from the download cache is going to be a little tricky for a single site, I think this gets exponentially harder if you try making a generic CAPTCHA breaking solution.
Most concepts are always easy to talk about. Actually getting these things to work in the real world is another matter. The approach I've taken with my CAPTCHA solution is to make it adaptable so that any system someone develops out there to counter it can be quickly unravelled with a few configuration changes.
I think the real problem with CAPTCHA's is not the false positives, but the false negatives. CAPTCHA images exclude the blind and visually impaired, I think this is a bigger problem than horny porn dudes.
I think this one is a little different, the other article was just a hypothetical, this is actually a real case of spamming occuring with a captcha image.
I also found his quotation from Bill Gates quite interesting...
Oh well. I guess I'll have to sit in the corner with Bill Gates, who declared in January 2004 that "spam will be solved in two years". After you with the pointy-D hat, Bill.
Perhaps Bill was thinking about his trusted/treacherous computing model (posted earlier today on slashdot) when he made this statement.
Anyhow old news is good news. It gives me a chance to plug my CAPTCHA solution, which will take more than just a few seconds for a 3rd world data entry person to get past. I created this component mainly because I'm trying to make a site that adheres to accessibility standards, which of course is an impossibility if you use CAPTCHA images. The other reason I think CAPTCHA images are a bad idea is OCR. If there isn't already an OCR solution available today I think it is inevitable that there'll one day be one that can read any image that a human can read.
But I guess this is one more thing to add to the list of reasons as to why CAPTCHA images are stupid - 3rd world data entry teams.
I've watched the video. I don't really see you're very negative point.
My comment was just a joke, most people with a life would recognise this.
To be honest I actually quite like Microsoft. I can't wait to get my hands on Vista. I think it's gonna be the biggest success ever for Microsoft and 20 years from now will be seen as revolutionary turning point in personal computing.
Also I'm very familiar with the Patterns & Practices stuff. Their stuff is good, some of it actually useful, the exception management block combined with log4net as a publisher is fantastic, but now it's a little redundant at least for ASP.NET with the 2.0 health monitoring API. I'm very happy they're so agile and decubified, it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling in much the same way as when they take zoo animals out of concrete cages and set them free in the wild.
Anyhow I think I've made your point... Just what the hell was yours?
I guess they really don't like Microsoft. Maybe someone should find out if they're interested in a version of Linux localised in their native language?
My guess is that some entrepreneurial member of this community has thought of a way to get some cash out of Micro$$$oft.
Create groups of 5 co-workers strap them together with ropes back to back eliminating the need for chairs or desks.
Every morning pitch scrums against each other making them run from opposites sides of the office to clash in the middle. The team that manages to push the other team back to their side of the office gets to spend half the day eating coffee and drinking doughnuts, whilst the other team is forced to refactor all the work done by the winning team the previous day.
I don't know Symbian model. But that sounds correct. With windows Mobile OS you they use digital certificates.
If the mobile phone vendor chooses to lock down the system, then only applications signed with the digital certificate of the vendor can run on the OS, other applications will either not install on the device or throw a security exception when you attempt to execute them.
Well I don't have full knowledge of the functionality of every handset out there, if there's not a phone already on the market that only allows DRM music to be played like Itunes, then I'm sure it's only a matter of time. The example I gave was just that, a hypothetical example.
I'm talking about installing new software on your phone. Most mobile phones are locked down and don't allow you to install new software on it. With the Microsoft Mobile OS you just make an activesync connection from your PC then you can run applications on your desktop computer that will install software on the phone supplied from a 3rd party (depending on the security policy of the mobile phone vendor).
If you want details of what I'm talking about you can find it here.
If anyone else has information on the security systems of other mobile operating systems like the symbian OS, I think it would be interesting to hear about it.
You guys are totally off the track, they're not talking about SIM locks. They're talking about software locks, which is the ability to install software on your phone that for example allows you to play mp3's or view divx videos which are not DRM protected. Not whether you can get a cheap phone on a contract then break the contract and go to another carrier with cheaper call rates, that has nothing to do with this at all.
I have some experience developing applications for Microsoft Windows mobile smartphones. They have always allowed vendors to choose what level the OS is locked down. By default the Windows Mobile OS is not locked down, which is something I must commend Microsoft for, however vendors of mobile phones can choose to change this such that the Windows Mobile OS is either totally locked down i.e. doesn't allow any 3rd party applications to be installed or run, or locked in such a way that the user is prompted to verify software should be run that has not authorised by the mobile phone vendor.
This is a discussion about whether or not small DEVELOPERS can get into developing applications for the mobile market or whether it is going to be left to the big players to decide what software we're allowed to have on our handsets.
As mobile phones become increasingly more like mobile pcs, this is a big issue. If the day comes when this is the platform on the market, and XP, Linux and all other desktop flavours of operating systems are history, which is actually quite a likely scenario, then how locked down a system is to 3rd party developers becomes a major issue for personal liberty and freedom of choice. If we cannot choose what software we can develop and run on our computers we have lost our ability to communicate freely.
Basically I simply don't think any locked down system is going to prevail simply because the market will ultimately reject it in favour of who ever supplies a system that is not locked down. In terms of features no locked down system is going to compete with another that allows any developer in the world to create new applications for it.
Congratulations Slashdot... yet another low, this would have to be one the worst articles I've read off here. Is this a piss take or did you seriously think this crap warranted any attention what so ever?
Or maybe you just didn't even bother reading the article before posting it...
imagine a game where players compete to clothe a runway model that will be judged in a contest by other players. This game could very well be a job requisition submitted by a major fashion company that wants to get advanced market research on what clothes buyers will prefer
!!!! Just imagine.... I'm imagining how much of an idiot you would have to be to write this stuff, then going to an extra level to imagine how much of an idiot you would have to be to post it on a site like slashdot, and then going to the next level to be a slashdot reader.
I think you're talking like someone who has no experience what-so-ever with what lies outside your borders. I can tell you with 100% certainty that if you changed your laws to allow anyone to come and do IT work in the US top dollar in IT will be something like 50K per annum with the average wage being closer to 20K.
If you don't believe me try looking round the job market in countries without visa restrictions, you'll soon realise what the market rate currently is.
This guy is just another fat cat, licking his chops thinking about the next meal, and that be your ass.
I think this guy is a complete idiot, because A he's telling a very obvious lie, and B the sort of people he'd end up hiring would ultimately ruin his business anyway, because time is more valuable than money. People like this guy don't think past the next quarter financial reports and the term of their current stock options.
There are a lot of companies out there currently realising they're losing years of development time, and facing possible extinction because of their short sited outsourcing of projects crucial to their business model.
They've ended up being hood-winked by a bunch of people who have no interest in the delivering value for the company that hired them. These people are desperate, they are willing to do anything, say anything and claim anything that might need to, because where they come from earning 2K USD a year is the average wage.
I can't really blame them because when there are such massive differences in wealth why would you not swindel these companies when you have an opportunity to do it. But the thing is whilst these companies go down, the senior management driving these companies into the ground will still come out with big fat bank accounts, stock and real estate portfolios, whilst you and I join the 3rd world's way of life - subsistence existance.
Did you actually even read the link to full statement.
I don't think I've misrepresented what they've said at all. The quote I gave is a complete sentence from their statement. So what's your point?
I think their statement is completely unprofessional and is their quality control. For a company like Apple both things are unforgiveable. They have absolutely no credibility to be making comment on anyone elses quality control at this point in time.
As you might imagine, we are upset at Windows for not being more hardy against such viruses, and even more upset with ourselves for not catching it.
As for the rest of what you said I suppose you'll back flip and rant about DRM when the next article comes out about how evil Microsoft has been for locking down Vista. What the majority of linux community fail to understand is the ability of the average person to administrate a PC.
System security is always going to be at the expense of useability and openness. If you have a highly secure, easy to use system, is likely you are going to sacrifice openess. Conversely if you have an a very open, highly secure system it is likely you are going to sacrifice useability. In the case of windows, it's extremely easy to use, with a very open development architecture, the end result is....?
Yes thats right google has tracked you and every other poster on slashdot. Each time you view a page on slashdot a little cookie is being sent off to google to let them know who you are, what you're doing.
Whats more is this script is spreading across most of the web sites on the internet as each web master gets lured into the google "we're not evil" bullshit marketing.
If anyone had a clue in this thread it would have been a complete shoot down of slashdot for invading the privacy of it's readers.
My question is did either of you read it ? Or were you just too busy getting your slashdot post in on it to get your ignorant comments modded up ?
This article is not a harp on global emissions... it's simply an interesting theory for explaining previous mass extinctions that have occurred. A theory that links global warming to previous mass extinctions. The point of the article is the linking of global warming to a catastrophic event that can cause a sudden mass extinction, not the mechanism by which global warming occurred.... so this whole C02/methane rant is completely irrelevant to the contents of the article.
Plus you are both making out that this article is about current global warming when in fact it really only featured in one section of one page of a five page paper.
I think Slashdot needs to do something to stem the urge for people to rush to post. There shouldn't be any moderation reward for rushing an ill thought, uninformed comment to a thread. In fact it seems taking the time to put some forethought into a post gets you penalised. Perhaps moderators should be forced first to view newest first, or maybe rather than new posts coming in with no mod points they should receive a rating equivalent to the current average of all the posts made so far.
Slashdot Mirror
I agree 100%.
;). I created my solution based on the same points you have addressed. Whilst I've built in a lot checks that were pretty easy to do such as checking IP's, automatic expiration and time outs, logging etc etc.
I think people spend far too much time worrying about false positives with CAPTCHA tests and not enough time worrying about false negatives.
The proliferation of CAPTCHAs is a big problem for web accessibility and one that needs to be a addressed a little more urgently than the possible emergence of human spam teams in india.
I've created my own CAPTCHA solution, which I'm too embaressed to plug... again... I've already plugged it 2 or 3 times in other replies to this post, just do a search for my nick in this thread if you really want to see it
At the end of the day I've kept it pretty simple, and created a text based solution, because you're absolutely right at the moment it is only the lowest hanging fruit that gets attacked and any sort of protection is going to suffice at this point in time. However, I'm sure over time, spammers will get more sophisticated and I've designed my system to allow sophistication to be added as needed in the future.
For now I think most sites would be better off without any protection at all than using CAPTCHA images, at least you may think so if you're blind or visually impaired.
I think if you're going to use CAPTCHA images you should at least have an alternative manual system for registration *cough-slashdot*.
My reply to you is the same as the anonymous coward below (you're probably the same person anyhow)
I think it's a good thing in some ways. Any kind of redistribution of wealth from the wealthy west to the 3rd world can't be a bad thing. It will just give us more reason to raise their standard of living, ie to make it too expensive for spammers to hire them.
Whatever...
You're either relaying the request and the post for the CAPTCHA.
Or you could get your horny porn dude to request the CAPTCHA directly and run your spam bot as client side javascipt from his browser.
In either case I don't think a generic solution is going to be possible, I think your porn site would need to be specifically coded to attack a specific site. Both of these approaches have problems and are going to be ridiculously easy to counter, compared to the amount of effort required to make the attack in the first place.
Basically I think the idea is as stupid as your comment.
Anyhow rather than respond with more negativity, why not show us how technically brilliant you are and tell us all the approach that is so obvious and that I'm too stupid to have thought of. I would love to hear it.
Or aren't you involved in any sort of technical role in your job? Or maybe you're a spammer that is too stupid to think up a solution for yourself and you're just fishing for one on here.
Not all Indians speak english, they mostly speak Hindi or Urdu, english is spoken by well educated people, and they probably won't be the ones working in data entry centers for $4 a day.
In any case I never claimed it was resistant to this sort of attack. I'm sure it's going to be more resistant than a system that requires simple data entry.
I don't think you're going to find a flawless system for verifying the authenticity of anonymous requests, that statement in itself is kind of a give away. Obviously the alternative is a trusted computing model that relies certificates and the power to revoke a persons certificate. This sort of system excludes by default rather than www which by default is inclusive.
The system I've created is a framework for supplying logical CAPTCHAs, it's not an attempt at creating a full proof system, just one that's extremely adaptable and extendible, with logging features to enabling web masters to analyse and counter attacks.
Already done I'm sure most implementations of CAPTCHA's use means to timeout a CAPTCHA and limit that CAPTCHA to one request.
As for the rest of your post as I've already said in this thread, false positives are not the biggest problem with CAPTCHA images, it is the false negatives. CAPTCHAs exclude the blind and visually impaired, people using CAPTCHAs for their site should be more concerned by this than the possibility of spammers circumventing their protection.
Nice idea, but there are going to be problems with this. For starters most CAPTCHA images time out, the bot would need to get it solved by a horny porn dude within about 1min of it being served. Also you have the problem of actuall relaying the image to the horny porn dude. Most CAPTCHA images work by not allowing you to serve the image to more than one request, new request, new CAPTCHA. So they would have to capture the captcha. Tryin to pick the image from the download cache is going to be a little tricky for a single site, I think this gets exponentially harder if you try making a generic CAPTCHA breaking solution.
Most concepts are always easy to talk about. Actually getting these things to work in the real world is another matter. The approach I've taken with my CAPTCHA solution is to make it adaptable so that any system someone develops out there to counter it can be quickly unravelled with a few configuration changes.
I think the real problem with CAPTCHA's is not the false positives, but the false negatives. CAPTCHA images exclude the blind and visually impaired, I think this is a bigger problem than horny porn dudes.
I think this one is a little different, the other article was just a hypothetical, this is actually a real case of spamming occuring with a captcha image.
I also found his quotation from Bill Gates quite interesting...
Oh well. I guess I'll have to sit in the corner with Bill Gates, who declared in January 2004 that "spam will be solved in two years". After you with the pointy-D hat, Bill.
Perhaps Bill was thinking about his trusted/treacherous computing model (posted earlier today on slashdot) when he made this statement.
Anyhow old news is good news. It gives me a chance to plug my CAPTCHA solution, which will take more than just a few seconds for a 3rd world data entry person to get past. I created this component mainly because I'm trying to make a site that adheres to accessibility standards, which of course is an impossibility if you use CAPTCHA images. The other reason I think CAPTCHA images are a bad idea is OCR. If there isn't already an OCR solution available today I think it is inevitable that there'll one day be one that can read any image that a human can read. But I guess this is one more thing to add to the list of reasons as to why CAPTCHA images are stupid - 3rd world data entry teams.
I've watched the video. I don't really see you're very negative point.
My comment was just a joke, most people with a life would recognise this.
To be honest I actually quite like Microsoft. I can't wait to get my hands on Vista. I think it's gonna be the biggest success ever for Microsoft and 20 years from now will be seen as revolutionary turning point in personal computing.
Also I'm very familiar with the Patterns & Practices stuff. Their stuff is good, some of it actually useful, the exception management block combined with log4net as a publisher is fantastic, but now it's a little redundant at least for ASP.NET with the 2.0 health monitoring API. I'm very happy they're so agile and decubified, it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling in much the same way as when they take zoo animals out of concrete cages and set them free in the wild.
Anyhow I think I've made your point... Just what the hell was yours?
I guess they really don't like Microsoft. Maybe someone should find out if they're interested in a version of Linux localised in their native language?
My guess is that some entrepreneurial member of this community has thought of a way to get some cash out of Micro$$$oft.
Use SCRUM !!
Create groups of 5 co-workers strap them together with ropes back to back eliminating the need for chairs or desks.
Every morning pitch scrums against each other making them run from opposites sides of the office to clash in the middle. The team that manages to push the other team back to their side of the office gets to spend half the day eating coffee and drinking doughnuts, whilst the other team is forced to refactor all the work done by the winning team the previous day.
I think I should be writting books on this stuff.
Yea and that worked really well in helping to deliver Vista to plan and on schedule.... oh hang on.
I don't know Symbian model. But that sounds correct. With windows Mobile OS you they use digital certificates. If the mobile phone vendor chooses to lock down the system, then only applications signed with the digital certificate of the vendor can run on the OS, other applications will either not install on the device or throw a security exception when you attempt to execute them.
Well I don't have full knowledge of the functionality of every handset out there, if there's not a phone already on the market that only allows DRM music to be played like Itunes, then I'm sure it's only a matter of time. The example I gave was just that, a hypothetical example.
I'm talking about installing new software on your phone. Most mobile phones are locked down and don't allow you to install new software on it. With the Microsoft Mobile OS you just make an activesync connection from your PC then you can run applications on your desktop computer that will install software on the phone supplied from a 3rd party (depending on the security policy of the mobile phone vendor).
If you want details of what I'm talking about you can find it here.
If anyone else has information on the security systems of other mobile operating systems like the symbian OS, I think it would be interesting to hear about it.
You guys are totally off the track, they're not talking about SIM locks. They're talking about software locks, which is the ability to install software on your phone that for example allows you to play mp3's or view divx videos which are not DRM protected. Not whether you can get a cheap phone on a contract then break the contract and go to another carrier with cheaper call rates, that has nothing to do with this at all.
I have some experience developing applications for Microsoft Windows mobile smartphones. They have always allowed vendors to choose what level the OS is locked down. By default the Windows Mobile OS is not locked down, which is something I must commend Microsoft for, however vendors of mobile phones can choose to change this such that the Windows Mobile OS is either totally locked down i.e. doesn't allow any 3rd party applications to be installed or run, or locked in such a way that the user is prompted to verify software should be run that has not authorised by the mobile phone vendor.
This is a discussion about whether or not small DEVELOPERS can get into developing applications for the mobile market or whether it is going to be left to the big players to decide what software we're allowed to have on our handsets.
As mobile phones become increasingly more like mobile pcs, this is a big issue. If the day comes when this is the platform on the market, and XP, Linux and all other desktop flavours of operating systems are history, which is actually quite a likely scenario, then how locked down a system is to 3rd party developers becomes a major issue for personal liberty and freedom of choice. If we cannot choose what software we can develop and run on our computers we have lost our ability to communicate freely.
Basically I simply don't think any locked down system is going to prevail simply because the market will ultimately reject it in favour of who ever supplies a system that is not locked down. In terms of features no locked down system is going to compete with another that allows any developer in the world to create new applications for it.
No shit sherlock!
Congratulations Slashdot... yet another low, this would have to be one the worst articles I've read off here. Is this a piss take or did you seriously think this crap warranted any attention what so ever?
Or maybe you just didn't even bother reading the article before posting it...
imagine a game where players compete to clothe a runway model that will be judged in a contest by other players. This game could very well be a job requisition submitted by a major fashion company that wants to get advanced market research on what clothes buyers will prefer
!!!! Just imagine.... I'm imagining how much of an idiot you would have to be to write this stuff, then going to an extra level to imagine how much of an idiot you would have to be to post it on a site like slashdot, and then going to the next level to be a slashdot reader.
You guys smoking crack or what?
I think you're talking like someone who has no experience what-so-ever with what lies outside your borders. I can tell you with 100% certainty that if you changed your laws to allow anyone to come and do IT work in the US top dollar in IT will be something like 50K per annum with the average wage being closer to 20K.
If you don't believe me try looking round the job market in countries without visa restrictions, you'll soon realise what the market rate currently is.
This guy is just another fat cat, licking his chops thinking about the next meal, and that be your ass.
I think this guy is a complete idiot, because A he's telling a very obvious lie, and B the sort of people he'd end up hiring would ultimately ruin his business anyway, because time is more valuable than money. People like this guy don't think past the next quarter financial reports and the term of their current stock options.
There are a lot of companies out there currently realising they're losing years of development time, and facing possible extinction because of their short sited outsourcing of projects crucial to their business model.
They've ended up being hood-winked by a bunch of people who have no interest in the delivering value for the company that hired them. These people are desperate, they are willing to do anything, say anything and claim anything that might need to, because where they come from earning 2K USD a year is the average wage.
I can't really blame them because when there are such massive differences in wealth why would you not swindel these companies when you have an opportunity to do it. But the thing is whilst these companies go down, the senior management driving these companies into the ground will still come out with big fat bank accounts, stock and real estate portfolios, whilst you and I join the 3rd world's way of life - subsistence existance.
Did you check out the balmer video on the blog ?
"Un-be-lievable! It comes with Write and Reversi and runs bla-zing-ly fast on a 286! And all that for only 99 Dollars! (Except in Nebraska)"
Don't install flash and block macromedia.
Did you actually even read the link to full statement.
I don't think I've misrepresented what they've said at all. The quote I gave is a complete sentence from their statement. So what's your point?
I think their statement is completely unprofessional and is their quality control. For a company like Apple both things are unforgiveable. They have absolutely no credibility to be making comment on anyone elses quality control at this point in time.
Well to start with...
They didn't blame Microsoft for their failure ....
Aaah yes they did, to quote their statement...
As you might imagine, we are upset at Windows for not being more hardy against such viruses, and even more upset with ourselves for not catching it.
As for the rest of what you said I suppose you'll back flip and rant about DRM when the next article comes out about how evil Microsoft has been for locking down Vista. What the majority of linux community fail to understand is the ability of the average person to administrate a PC.
System security is always going to be at the expense of useability and openness. If you have a highly secure, easy to use system, is likely you are going to sacrifice openess. Conversely if you have an a very open, highly secure system it is likely you are going to sacrifice useability. In the case of windows, it's extremely easy to use, with a very open development architecture, the end result is....?
think this entire trend is a problem, partly because of a trend towards less and less personal responsibility
The irony of this conversation is quite funny. Try doing a view source you'll see the bottom of every page on slashdot...
<script src="http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js" type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> _uacct = "UA-32013-5"; _udn = "slashdot.org"; urchinTracker(); </script>
Yes thats right google has tracked you and every other poster on slashdot. Each time you view a page on slashdot a little cookie is being sent off to google to let them know who you are, what you're doing.
Whats more is this script is spreading across most of the web sites on the internet as each web master gets lured into the google "we're not evil" bullshit marketing.
If anyone had a clue in this thread it would have been a complete shoot down of slashdot for invading the privacy of it's readers.
audiofile-0.2.6/test/testaupv.c - 10 identical
45: long fuck = 99;
Awwww yea..... makes me want to go off and write some code right now.
>Legality does not stop criminals.
What if it did ?
Would they still be criminals ?
My question is did either of you read it ? Or were you just too busy getting your slashdot post in on it to get your ignorant comments modded up ? This article is not a harp on global emissions... it's simply an interesting theory for explaining previous mass extinctions that have occurred. A theory that links global warming to previous mass extinctions. The point of the article is the linking of global warming to a catastrophic event that can cause a sudden mass extinction, not the mechanism by which global warming occurred.... so this whole C02/methane rant is completely irrelevant to the contents of the article. Plus you are both making out that this article is about current global warming when in fact it really only featured in one section of one page of a five page paper. I think Slashdot needs to do something to stem the urge for people to rush to post. There shouldn't be any moderation reward for rushing an ill thought, uninformed comment to a thread. In fact it seems taking the time to put some forethought into a post gets you penalised. Perhaps moderators should be forced first to view newest first, or maybe rather than new posts coming in with no mod points they should receive a rating equivalent to the current average of all the posts made so far.