...distributed file sharing, cryptography, proxies, and parity will collide and instead of any one person hosting a complete file, the file will be containerized, split, parity containers built, and the pieces uploaded to peers at random based only on their availible space and relative activity and pipe size and so on and the original copy deleted.
Enough copies of pieces and parity files would propagate out based on statistics to ensure reasonable chance to get at anything, not any less easy than eMule of today. If you download all pieces and construct successfully, the solid file isn't seen and listed by IP because only the parts are shared at large. Your whole copy is totally outside the system once gotten.
Once no one person has a complete copy of anything, and each piece is named in gibberish that only the system understands and knows, what are they going to do then? Sue a teen girl because one twentieth of a Metallica song might be on their hard drive and she's got no way of knowing for sure because her storage is managed by the collective peer network?
I wish them luck (cuz they need it), but, if all translation software will produce, which really work must include it acquisition elements of this nature. It is a thing to receive for from of dictionary translations to. That is around for decades, with his laughable results. Humans speak simile and jargon and contractions and abbreviations of the thought the whole time in the metaphor and. We are meow the cat of the language (attempt that, computer!). But, if you give a bundle human material to computers, in order to read, set the dictionaries language, like them are really used, not out, straight there the dictionary them have. If odd language consumption falls after us, how it rains cats and dogs, has it a data base of similar consumption to draw to on. He, is it a rising ascent, but this is a good avenue, to of of Cheerio to try from of computers and of of top side O ' mornin ' to ya.
English->German->English courtesy of Babel.
I will wish their luck (cuz they to need it), but if any will cause to work it truly to have to include this natural study the element translation software. This is a matter obtains the dictionary translation. That is dozens of years, by its laughable result. The person always speaks in the metaphor and simile and the slang and the idea contraction and the abbreviation. We are the language (attempt cat's meow, computer!) . But if you give the computer each bunch of people's material to read, you expose the dictionary to use in fact to the language according to the original design, the dictionary does not have it. Then when the strange language usage falls in our following torrential downpour, they will have the similar usage information bank to the draw. Hey, this is difficultly climbs, but this is a good main road attempts Cheerio, the computer, with above o ' mornin ' to ya.
English->Chinese Traditional->English courtesy of Babel.
I wonder what everyone's doing with all these huge drives
Creating a digital archive of the extended families photographs (5 Mb per print, 46 Mb per negative image when available). Figure 10,000+ negatives. Plus archiving all the digital photos.
Creating a digital archive of all the vinyl records for the extended family
Digital archive of all family Super-8 films
Digital archive of all video tapes (The Wiggles won't last forever with a weekly screening)
Digital archive of the DVDs (sooner or later Nemo will get scratched)
Nothing is so good I laugh immediately Perfect paraodying of a song But this has never yet prevented me From laughing far too much, for far too long.... Looking back, I could have mod it differently Given some more karma, who can tell? But it took time to understand the post Now at least I know, I know it well
Wasn't it good, wasn't it fine Isn't it madness, it can't be mine But in the end, he need a little bit more from me Replies (he needs Karma and Natalie) I modded so well....
No one carries mod points with them constantly No one is completely on your side, And though I thread reply to be with him Still the gap between us is too wide... Looking back, I could've written differently Learned about his friends and his foes, But I never even read his Journal then Now at least I Know, I know Taco's...
Wasn't so good, wasn't so fine Isn't it madness, this has to rhyme But in the end, this needs more creativity Frustration (he needs inspiration) I ended not well....
The word "bias" gets tossed around a little too much in American discourse these days. How, pray tell, might we honestly construe this man as biased?
This 'review' was one of the more appalling works I have read. How may we construe him as biased?
The first 4 paragraphs of his 'review' (I'd estimate about 1/5th including subsequent references) were to a previous failed initial discussion about online encyclopaedias that had no direct (or indirect) connection to Wikipedia. So what is he trying to do? Show the idea had been around for a long time? No, the bias was to link a failed idea with Wikipedia to imply Wikipedia was similarly doomed or had a doomed or failed foundation. Failure by association.
Following on this point, he uses a series of subtle ad hominem attacks mocking the collaborative nature of this failed project, continually referring to the "nonleaders" in the context that requires a reading of "leaders". He casts aspersions on this model of development, tars Wikipedia with the same brush, but also decries Wikipedia by failing to live up to the pure goals of this unassociated project because Wikipedia has more of a structure. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.
He castigates Wikipedia for being honest about its standing. Having been caught out by Britannica (et al) I at least appreciate some honesty about the validity of the articles. As has been commented in other Wikipedia stories, correction of errors in print Encyclopaedias can take decades (not every article is revised in every addition - even glaring errors).
He identifies the way encyclopaedias are reviewed, acknowledges this is difficult, and then completely fails to apply these review standards to Wikipedia.
Instead he picks out one article (one!) on which he is knowledgeable and critiques that one. A poor critique - the problems he identifies he also points out how someone else could identify these issues. Contrariwise I could rip to shred many Britannica articles on which I'm only moderately knowledgeable.
His "review" could have taken a completely different slant. His bias shows here. He could have used his knowledge and time to correct all the errors he identified. He could have identified this as the strength of Wikipedia. I have no such ability with my forever frozen in time copy of Britannica. Nor can I share my insights and corrections with anyone else.
His final statement What he certainly does not know is who has used the facilities before him. is patently false, as he himself states in his article. I will certainly grant you that the average browser may not check the revision history, but I'd venture anyone doing serious research on a topic (where it mattered) would as a matter of course check out the revisions.
So yeah, I'd say it was a highly biased article, and wouldn't call it a "review".
I'd also call it unhelpful.
This function allows you to test the mail system, and will act as if your death was confirmed. BE VERY CAREFUL AS ALL OF THE MAIL MESSAGES YOU HAVE COMPOSED WILL BE REALLY SENT IF YOU GO ALONG WITH THIS?
Are you sure you don't want to not run the test or are you not sure?
But you confused modesty with abject fear and terror. You think I'd want to mention I'd written a programme in Visual Basic on/. ? My UID ain't that high!
Genuinely I was just trying to forestall questions on why I'd be so popular for being joe-jobbed.
Assuming AOL goes the other way (honouring SPF records published by other domains) then that also stops AOL customers receiving job-jobbed emails (at least from SPF publishing domains). And from a personal perspective (as a regular joe-job victim) I would not longer get thousands of "non-delivery" bounces from AOL servers trying to bounce back undelivered email they had accepted from a forged address.
Having finally persuaded my ISP that = (equals) is a valid character in a TXT record I was able to publish my own SPF records.
Based on a sample size of 1 I'd like to suggest that spammers don't joe-job domains with restrictive SPF records. That makes sense. We already know spammers know about (and use) SPF records. It make sense for them not to use a domain that will be blocked by any SPF aware mail recipient.
The fantastic news for me is that instead of 8,000+ bounces from joe-jobs flooding my mail server each day (imagine how many more emails are delivered or blocked by spam filters), since publishing my SPF records that has completely stopped.
Why am I such a target? I notice that the more often I report to SpamCop the more often I am targetted, but the heavy waves seem to have coincided with increased awareness of an anti-spam SMTP filter I wrote. I guess my work got noticed. Just a guess though.
Lister: Any problems?
Kryten: Well, just one or two. In fact I've compiled a little list if you'll indulge me. Now then, uh, my optical system doesn't appear to have a zoom function.
Lister: No, human eyes don't have a zoom.
Kryten: Well then, how do you bring a small object into sharp focus?
Lister: Well, you just move your head closer to the object.
Kryten: I see. Move your head... closer, hmm, to the object. All right, okay. Well, what about other optical effects, like split screen, slow motion, Quantel(tm)?
Lister: No. We don't have them.
Kryten: You don't have them -- just the zoom? Hmm. Well, no, that's fine, that's great, no, no, that's really great, that's great.
Yes New Zealand will most likely jump on this band-wagon.
It has already been raised by America as being a part of any free trade agreement (which supposedly New Zealand wants) and the only reason we don't have a free trade agreement now is our less than 100% support on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - the ongoing nuclear-ship ban also hasn't helped.
Of course New Zealand is most likely to give that bargaining chip away before negotiating any free-trade agreement. Our copyright and patent laws are alredy being revised to bring them more into line with a DMCA type approach. American forces in particular are bringing their weight to bear to re-outlaw parallel importing. And we're mostly likely to bring our commercial laws (including copyright, and DMCA type provisions) into line with Australia. Whenever that happens (eg food regulations) it is always new Zealand that changes to match Australia.
Pretty much our only hope is a general anti-American sentiment by our leftish government. Two problems with that:
a) we won't have a leftish government forever
b) a leftish government is more likely to trade away copyright provisions (no votes there) in exchange (or compensation) for being able to slightly bad-mouth America in the political arena
I'm not surprised that Freeserve will take stuff offline without a question. They'll give user accounts away on the same basis.
I helped a friend set up a free email account on Freeserve. After about a year she started receiving someone else's email. Same initial and surname. This bozo had tried and failed to sign up with the same user name, got a different user name but set up her email software with the one already taken.
Then a month later my friend can't access her email - the password has been changed. So she contacts Freeserve who change it back for her.
And this process repeats - she asks for a note on the account for them to confirm her identity - her phone number and address she used when she signed up, but the account kept swapping between the two of them.
Finally after another year Freeserve closed the account due to "hacking".
Spam is all about the signal to noise ratio, you know.
is completely wrong.
Ratios of spam, and false positives and false negatives are relevant to spam detection.
But by and large only absolutes are relevant to amount of spam received. The fact business colleagues send me 1,000 messages a day does not change the amount of spam I receive. I would neither receive less or more spam if they increased or decreased their so-called signal.
Spam is not proprotional to non-spam email (ok there is a possible _very minor_ correlation in that you may receive a lot of email because your email address is widely distributed. But that is not a necessary factor and is not always true).
The usual Hotmail allegation is that Microsoft sells off your Hotmail address as soon as you sign up. As evidence people point out they receive email as soon as they sign up. My point is that is provably false.
However, several large users, including world governments, have voiced their opinions that they love what Spamhaus has done
Gee, I leave my tinfoil hat off for just one lousy week and there's not just one but multiple world governments. I was just getting to grips with overthrowing a few national governments.
Do I get to choose which world government I'm under? Given the choice I, for one, would like to welcome my new illuminati overlords.
Never. Not 1 spam in Junk mail or anywhere else. Ever. Not since I first opened it 3 years ago with the sole purpose of testing how much spam I get.
I've never publicised the email address.
More importantly the address is obscure. I've seen/.ers offer their so-called "obscure" email addresses and I've thought them all laughably likely to be hit in a dictionary attack.
Mine is 14 characters, mixing letters and numbers, as a sentence implying a certain head of state doing something naughty. Easy to rememebr, and not in any dictionary attack.:-o
And no spam!
I have to say those who claim to have got spam within minutes of opening an account and blaming Microsoft) need to adjust their tindoil, and learn what obscure really means when a computer is systematically working through a dictionary.
Six months after Kirk stranded us here, Ceti Alpha 6 blew up, and according to GRAVITY RULES the 720 fractured pieces large enough to collapse into roughly spherical shapes count as planets, even though they aren't spherical yet and won't be even in my eugenically extended life time.
So the shockwave that blasted our planet outside their orbit means THIS is Ceti Alpha 726. Gravity Rules. MINE is the superior intellect!
You're only looking at it from the "guessing to find porn" point of view. As you have correctly observed pron merchants try and make their stuff easy to find. But you aren't at all considering people trying to find stuff that isn't pron.
Now you may argue that porn merchants will grab www.idigbigholes.xxx and also www.idigbigholes.com and I think that won't happen to a large extent. We won't know until it's been tried for a few years so we can just agree to disagree? You may well be right...the only evidence I can offer is that as other domain names (eg.co.uk) have grown known and accepted, people have drifted away from the need to double-banger domain registration. I suggest the doubles are onyl registered when there is ambiguity.
The otehr point you miss is that someone clicking on a www.pipes.xxx link (whether a guess or from a Google search) will know exactly what they will get. With a.com you are never sure becaue.com has such a very wide range of material. Any effort to help people self-categorise will help.
I agree with your last point and I apologise for not making it crystal clear (although I took about voluntary uptake). The idea is fraught with strife if the objective is perfection. I am concerned that if some effort isn't made to provide an.xxx type option then a mandated very imperfect solution will be forced down by Congress. Most of whom, I suspect, won't read an RFC.
Thank you for your reasoned discourse and debate. I think I agree on your key point, and time will tell if my more optimistic views on the uptake of.xxx (_instead_ of.com) is borne out.
1. a)
You seem to be missing the point. I thought I had made it clear. Let me trying beign clearer. If I type www.pipes.com I may get porn or I may get drain pipes. If I type www.pipes.xxx I will ONLY get porn (or something 'adult' conencted with pipes). *IF* xxx is available, typing www.pipes.com is less likely to give me porn. If I'm searching for porn I'll type www.foobar.xxx because that gives me a betetr chance of finding porn. If I search on a web engine I can ignore any results (and probably ask the search engine to block) anything with.xxx unless I'm searching for porn.
A system that helps group content can only be beneficial. By your argument, why should we have.net.int.com.org.uk.au.nz ? just www.foobar would be sufficient.
Your argument thst sex is easier to find doesn't apply. While true, that's because porn merchants have to make it easy to find because there's no one place to go to get it. So grab a.com (and a.org and whatever else you can) and try and drive people to your site, in amongst all the other.com for other companies around. Look, porn merchants want.xxx and it's the same reason for.museum - they want to standard out from the crowd.
b) Yes, but you had to look first. Which is my point.:-) And America has sucecssfully prosecuted on laws designed to trick children. I'm not sure whitehouse.com would agree they are trying to trick - capitalise on a name, sure. The trick is useful bonus - perhaps. But as the heat goes on...see end of d).
As for disnye.com - he was making money on (mostly pronographic) banner ads which I think is the case for most tricking mistake sites. Now if those banner ads were hosted on.xxx sites, then poor little Jimmy wouldn't get to see them (if his aprent's had so configrued his system).
c) Your point is a serious one. My response would be that the website would respond
i).xxx is for smut and w're not smut
ii) what would happen now is worse. Net-nanny blocking whole universities. Legislation that may be developed in the future to ban such sites. I really don't think someone is goign to force a breast augmentation site to move into.xxx. I don't think they will force AIDS awareness sites. I think freedom of exprssion and civil liberties, and history are too strong. I think voluntary separation will be good enough.
d) Well it wouldn't be hard to block a site if it was point to by both.xxx and.com:-)
Other than that, yes it's a strong argument although it doesn't sound like much harm (and extra domain name registration). I think that existing sites wouldn't change unless strongly motivated. I suspect many new sites would stay exclusively in the.xxx zone. It would be nice if pornographic banner ads had to be hosted from.xxx But I don't see the harm in adding.xxx - it may help. A lot of the porn industry wants it. And I come back to this - large porn merchants don't want to trick - they'r there to make money like any other business - they want visitors who will hand over their credit card. Maybe they score some business from people trying to go to www.slashdot.org and ending up at http://slahsdot.org/ but I wonder if that's worth the heat from the complainsn and the community upset. I think many (the larger reputable ones) would be happy to shift to.xxx and be left in peace for those wanting to find them.
1. a) because if people know *.xxx is the place to make guesses that's where they'll go
b) because if I guess www.disnye.com (sic) I won't get a nasty surprise, whereas if I guess www.disnye.xxx or www.disney.xxx I shoudl expect what I get
c) is www.biggertits.com for breast augmentation or for porn? is www.biggertits.xxx ? See how it makes it easier. is www.whitehouse.com porn? what about www.whitehouse.xxx
2. *YOU* don't have to institute any changes to add a.xxx TLD so there's no unnecessary complication from your point of view. It certainly makes any filters you _choose_ to add much simpler.
I don't know how effective it will be. But there seems little harm in offering people the choice to register in.xxx if they see the benefits.
It may take the time to make the change. I remember when most people thought.com was all there was..org was crazy. People from every country in the world would try and grab a.com because that's what all address were....http://www.foobar.com - in fact browsers would just take you there if you type foobar.
But over time.co.uk.com.au started to take hold and now I see people who when they want a local company assume foobar.co.uk if they are in the UK. And even foobar.org.uk is becoming acceptable.
I think th same process will happen with.xxx - if everyone goes to www.sex.xxx as a matter of course, then www.sex.com will become irrelevant...it could become a virtuous circle - once everyone knows porn is in.xxx then why look in.com - that's companies, duoh! It would take a few eyars but it is quite likely IMO, to happen by natural commercially-driven forces. If people are given the choice of a TLD to hang out in.
1. It would make it easy to find in the same way so many people guess now. But instead of bigtits.com they would type bigtits.xxx
It would also work the other way. Lookign for the (Bush's) Whitehouse web site? You'd know that whitehouse.xxx wasn't what you were looking for.
2. Actually, and to my surprise, most porn providers do try and do the right thing. My explanation for this suprising empirical observation is that they don't want to go looking for trouble. They don't *want* people under 18 viewing their wares - people who can't enter into legal contracts to view and pay for stuff and probably don't have credit cards. They don't want law suits for distributing porn to minors. Porn merchants don't want to be an obvious target or to inflame community attack. They just want to be quietly available to those who want it and collect as much money off them as they can. That's why they try and filter people out with age checks. That's why the complicance with voluntary ratings system is so high. Because if they don't play nice they't get clobbered in a moral crusade, and more to the point, there's no money in it.
The Internet is the great pull-mechanism. Advertisers haven't got around this and try and push pop-ups and ads at us. But the pron mcerchants have got it. If they build it, people will come.
So yeah I really believe if we make it easy for them to keep out of our way unless we actually are looking for it, then yeah they'll cooperate.
The owner of a computer has **NO CONTROL** over what DNS names are pointed at their IP address. That means that there is no way you can prosecute an adult-themed site for being referred to by a non-adult TLD, or prevent an adult TLD from being pointed at a non-adult site for DoS purposes.
Firstly, what's the motivation in the real-world for this. Secondly, what's the problem...www.britneyspares.com points to www.naughty.xxx without www.naughty.xxx's consent. Well duoh! Who do I complain to...www.britneyspares.com of course....someome sues www.naughty.xxx for having www.britneyspares.com pointing at them? We have no control over www.britneyspares.com - check the WHOIS. Case dismissed.
This is just a not-a-problem.
2. PICS and such-like is fine, but what's the problem with creating a.xxx and a.adult and see who uses it. Those who want to be goot netizens will use it. Those who want to be easy to find will use it. And I can block it in my company boxen. Not perfect but I don't have a perfect block for all my spam. Doesn't stop me using simply filters to stop 90% of it.
Slashdot Mirror
Accounting Troll: "Over here we have our random number generator"
Number Generator Troll: "Nine Nine Nine Nine Nine Nine"
Dilbert: "Are you sure that's random?"
Accounting Troll: "That's the problem with randomness: you can never be sure"
I wish them luck (cuz they need it), but, if all translation software will produce, which really work must include it acquisition elements of this nature. It is a thing to receive for from of dictionary translations to. That is around for decades, with his laughable results. Humans speak simile and jargon and contractions and abbreviations of the thought the whole time in the metaphor and. We are meow the cat of the language (attempt that, computer!). But, if you give a bundle human material to computers, in order to read, set the dictionaries language, like them are really used, not out, straight there the dictionary them have. If odd language consumption falls after us, how it rains cats and dogs, has it a data base of similar consumption to draw to on. He, is it a rising ascent, but this is a good avenue, to of of Cheerio to try from of computers and of of top side O ' mornin ' to ya. English->German->English courtesy of Babel. I will wish their luck (cuz they to need it), but if any will cause to work it truly to have to include this natural study the element translation software. This is a matter obtains the dictionary translation. That is dozens of years, by its laughable result. The person always speaks in the metaphor and simile and the slang and the idea contraction and the abbreviation. We are the language (attempt cat's meow, computer!) . But if you give the computer each bunch of people's material to read, you expose the dictionary to use in fact to the language according to the original design, the dictionary does not have it. Then when the strange language usage falls in our following torrential downpour, they will have the similar usage information bank to the draw. Hey, this is difficultly climbs, but this is a good main road attempts Cheerio, the computer, with above o ' mornin ' to ya. English->Chinese Traditional->English courtesy of Babel.
Yeah I made a 50 page submission to h2g2 all about /.
But after it had been looked over by staff all the
article said was:
Harmless.
Nothing is so good I laugh immediately
Perfect paraodying of a song
But this has never yet prevented me
From laughing far too much, for far too long....
Looking back, I could have mod it differently
Given some more karma, who can tell?
But it took time to understand the post
Now at least I know, I know it well
Wasn't it good, wasn't it fine
Isn't it madness, it can't be mine
But in the end, he need a little bit more from me
Replies (he needs Karma and Natalie)
I modded so well....
No one carries mod points with them constantly
No one is completely on your side,
And though I thread reply to be with him
Still the gap between us is too wide...
Looking back, I could've written differently
Learned about his friends and his foes,
But I never even read his Journal then
Now at least I Know, I know Taco's...
Wasn't so good, wasn't so fine
Isn't it madness, this has to rhyme
But in the end, this needs more creativity
Frustration (he needs inspiration)
I ended not well....
This 'review' was one of the more appalling works I have read. How may we construe him as biased?
So yeah, I'd say it was a highly biased article, and wouldn't call it a "review". I'd also call it unhelpful.
Currently it is only set to update my Slashdot bio to say that I have passed away.
So don't bother adding me to your Fan list or checking my journal or emailing me if my Bio says I am dead. It's a public service.
Now is this Funny, Informative or Interesting? Probably -1 Pathetic.
Are you sure you don't want to not run the test or are you not sure?
But you confused modesty with abject fear and terror. You think I'd want to mention I'd written a programme in Visual Basic on /. ? My UID ain't that high!
Genuinely I was just trying to forestall questions on why I'd be so popular for being joe-jobbed.
Having finally persuaded my ISP that = (equals) is a valid character in a TXT record I was able to publish my own SPF records.
Based on a sample size of 1 I'd like to suggest that spammers don't joe-job domains with restrictive SPF records. That makes sense. We already know spammers know about (and use) SPF records. It make sense for them not to use a domain that will be blocked by any SPF aware mail recipient.
The fantastic news for me is that instead of 8,000+ bounces from joe-jobs flooding my mail server each day (imagine how many more emails are delivered or blocked by spam filters), since publishing my SPF records that has completely stopped.
Why am I such a target? I notice that the more often I report to SpamCop the more often I am targetted, but the heavy waves seem to have coincided with increased awareness of an anti-spam SMTP filter I wrote. I guess my work got noticed. Just a guess though.
Lister: Any problems? ... closer, hmm, to the object. All right, okay. Well, what about other optical effects, like split screen, slow motion, Quantel(tm)?
Kryten: Well, just one or two. In fact I've compiled a little list if you'll indulge me. Now then, uh, my optical system doesn't appear to have a zoom function.
Lister: No, human eyes don't have a zoom.
Kryten: Well then, how do you bring a small object into sharp focus?
Lister: Well, you just move your head closer to the object.
Kryten: I see. Move your head
Lister: No. We don't have them.
Kryten: You don't have them -- just the zoom? Hmm. Well, no, that's fine, that's great, no, no, that's really great, that's great.
The private rocket project barely alive...
Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the technology.
We can make it better than it was before.
Better...
For the $10 million dollar X-PrizeIt has already been raised by America as being a part of any free trade agreement (which supposedly New Zealand wants) and the only reason we don't have a free trade agreement now is our less than 100% support on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - the ongoing nuclear-ship ban also hasn't helped.
Of course New Zealand is most likely to give that bargaining chip away before negotiating any free-trade agreement. Our copyright and patent laws are alredy being revised to bring them more into line with a DMCA type approach. American forces in particular are bringing their weight to bear to re-outlaw parallel importing. And we're mostly likely to bring our commercial laws (including copyright, and DMCA type provisions) into line with Australia. Whenever that happens (eg food regulations) it is always new Zealand that changes to match Australia.
Pretty much our only hope is a general anti-American sentiment by our leftish government. Two problems with that:
a) we won't have a leftish government forever
b) a leftish government is more likely to trade away copyright provisions (no votes there) in exchange (or compensation) for being able to slightly bad-mouth America in the political arena
So we're doomed. But lobby anyway.
LIMIT 17
I helped a friend set up a free email account on Freeserve. After about a year she started receiving someone else's email. Same initial and surname. This bozo had tried and failed to sign up with the same user name, got a different user name but set up her email software with the one already taken.
Then a month later my friend can't access her email - the password has been changed. So she contacts Freeserve who change it back for her.
And this process repeats - she asks for a note on the account for them to confirm her identity - her phone number and address she used when she signed up, but the account kept swapping between the two of them.
Finally after another year Freeserve closed the account due to "hacking".
Spam is all about the signal to noise ratio, you know.
is completely wrong.
Ratios of spam, and false positives and false negatives are relevant to spam detection.
But by and large only absolutes are relevant to amount of spam received. The fact business colleagues send me 1,000 messages a day does not change the amount of spam I receive. I would neither receive less or more spam if they increased or decreased their so-called signal.
Spam is not proprotional to non-spam email (ok there is a possible _very minor_ correlation in that you may receive a lot of email because your email address is widely distributed. But that is not a necessary factor and is not always true).
The usual Hotmail allegation is that Microsoft sells off your Hotmail address as soon as you sign up. As evidence people point out they receive email as soon as they sign up. My point is that is provably false.
Gee, I leave my tinfoil hat off for just one lousy week and there's not just one but multiple world governments. I was just getting to grips with overthrowing a few national governments.
Do I get to choose which world government I'm under? Given the choice I, for one, would like to welcome my new illuminati overlords.
I've never publicised the email address.
More importantly the address is obscure. I've seen /.ers offer their so-called "obscure" email addresses and I've thought them all laughably likely to be hit in a dictionary attack.
Mine is 14 characters, mixing letters and numbers, as a sentence implying a certain head of state doing something naughty. Easy to rememebr, and not in any dictionary attack. :-o
And no spam!
I have to say those who claim to have got spam within minutes of opening an account and blaming Microsoft) need to adjust their tindoil, and learn what obscure really means when a computer is systematically working through a dictionary.
Six months after Kirk stranded us here, Ceti Alpha 6 blew up, and according to GRAVITY RULES the 720 fractured pieces large enough to collapse into roughly spherical shapes count as planets, even though they aren't spherical yet and won't be even in my eugenically extended life time.
So the shockwave that blasted our planet outside their orbit means THIS is Ceti Alpha 726. Gravity Rules. MINE is the superior intellect!
Now you may argue that porn merchants will grab www.idigbigholes.xxx and also www.idigbigholes.com and I think that won't happen to a large extent. We won't know until it's been tried for a few years so we can just agree to disagree? You may well be right...the only evidence I can offer is that as other domain names (eg.co.uk) have grown known and accepted, people have drifted away from the need to double-banger domain registration. I suggest the doubles are onyl registered when there is ambiguity.
The otehr point you miss is that someone clicking on a www.pipes.xxx link (whether a guess or from a Google search) will know exactly what they will get. With a .com you are never sure becaue .com has such a very wide range of material. Any effort to help people self-categorise will help.
I agree with your last point and I apologise for not making it crystal clear (although I took about voluntary uptake). The idea is fraught with strife if the objective is perfection. I am concerned that if some effort isn't made to provide an .xxx type option then a mandated very imperfect solution will be forced down by Congress. Most of whom, I suspect, won't read an RFC.
Thank you for your reasoned discourse and debate. I think I agree on your key point, and time will tell if my more optimistic views on the uptake of .xxx (_instead_ of .com) is borne out.
A system that helps group content can only be beneficial. By your argument, why should we have .net .int .com .org .uk .au .nz ? just www.foobar would be sufficient.
Your argument thst sex is easier to find doesn't apply. While true, that's because porn merchants have to make it easy to find because there's no one place to go to get it. So grab a .com (and a .org and whatever else you can) and try and drive people to your site, in amongst all the other .com for other companies around. Look, porn merchants want .xxx and it's the same reason for .museum - they want to standard out from the crowd.
b) Yes, but you had to look first. Which is my point. :-) And America has sucecssfully prosecuted on laws designed to trick children. I'm not sure whitehouse.com would agree they are trying to trick - capitalise on a name, sure. The trick is useful bonus - perhaps. But as the heat goes on...see end of d).
As for disnye.com - he was making money on (mostly pronographic) banner ads which I think is the case for most tricking mistake sites. Now if those banner ads were hosted on .xxx sites, then poor little Jimmy wouldn't get to see them (if his aprent's had so configrued his system).
c) Your point is a serious one. My response would be that the website would respond .xxx is for smut and w're not smut
.xxx. I don't think they will force AIDS awareness sites. I think freedom of exprssion and civil liberties, and history are too strong. I think voluntary separation will be good enough.
i)
ii) what would happen now is worse. Net-nanny blocking whole universities. Legislation that may be developed in the future to ban such sites. I really don't think someone is goign to force a breast augmentation site to move into
d) Well it wouldn't be hard to block a site if it was point to by both .xxx and .com :-)
Other than that, yes it's a strong argument although it doesn't sound like much harm (and extra domain name registration). I think that existing sites wouldn't change unless strongly motivated. I suspect many new sites would stay exclusively in the .xxx zone. It would be nice if pornographic banner ads had to be hosted from .xxx But I don't see the harm in adding .xxx - it may help. A lot of the porn industry wants it. And I come back to this - large porn merchants don't want to trick - they'r there to make money like any other business - they want visitors who will hand over their credit card. Maybe they score some business from people trying to go to www.slashdot.org and ending up at http://slahsdot.org/ but I wonder if that's worth the heat from the complainsn and the community upset. I think many (the larger reputable ones) would be happy to shift to .xxx and be left in peace for those wanting to find them.
b) because if I guess www.disnye.com (sic) I won't get a nasty surprise, whereas if I guess www.disnye.xxx or www.disney.xxx I shoudl expect what I get
c) is www.biggertits.com for breast augmentation or for porn? is www.biggertits.xxx ? See how it makes it easier. is www.whitehouse.com porn? what about www.whitehouse.xxx
2. *YOU* don't have to institute any changes to add a .xxx TLD so there's no unnecessary complication from your point of view. It certainly makes any filters you _choose_ to add much simpler.
I don't know how effective it will be. But there seems little harm in offering people the choice to register in .xxx if they see the benefits.
It may take the time to make the change. I remember when most people thought .com was all there was. .org was crazy. People from every country in the world would try and grab a .com because that's what all address were....http://www.foobar.com - in fact browsers would just take you there if you type foobar.
But over time .co.uk .com.au started to take hold and now I see people who when they want a local company assume foobar.co.uk if they are in the UK. And even foobar.org.uk is becoming acceptable.
I think th same process will happen with .xxx - if everyone goes to www.sex.xxx as a matter of course, then www.sex.com will become irrelevant...it could become a virtuous circle - once everyone knows porn is in .xxx then why look in .com - that's companies, duoh! It would take a few eyars but it is quite likely IMO, to happen by natural commercially-driven forces. If people are given the choice of a TLD to hang out in.
2. Actually, and to my surprise, most porn providers do try and do the right thing. My explanation for this suprising empirical observation is that they don't want to go looking for trouble. They don't *want* people under 18 viewing their wares - people who can't enter into legal contracts to view and pay for stuff and probably don't have credit cards. They don't want law suits for distributing porn to minors. Porn merchants don't want to be an obvious target or to inflame community attack. They just want to be quietly available to those who want it and collect as much money off them as they can. That's why they try and filter people out with age checks. That's why the complicance with voluntary ratings system is so high. Because if they don't play nice they't get clobbered in a moral crusade, and more to the point, there's no money in it.
The Internet is the great pull-mechanism. Advertisers haven't got around this and try and push pop-ups and ads at us. But the pron mcerchants have got it. If they build it, people will come.
So yeah I really believe if we make it easy for them to keep out of our way unless we actually are looking for it, then yeah they'll cooperate.
1. This is another straw argument:
Firstly, what's the motivation in the real-world for this. Secondly, what's the problem...www.britneyspares.com points to www.naughty.xxx without www.naughty.xxx's consent. Well duoh! Who do I complain to...www.britneyspares.com of course....someome sues www.naughty.xxx for having www.britneyspares.com pointing at them? We have no control over www.britneyspares.com - check the WHOIS. Case dismissed.
This is just a not-a-problem.
2. PICS and such-like is fine, but what's the problem with creating a .xxx and a .adult and see who uses it. Those who want to be goot netizens will use it. Those who want to be easy to find will use it. And I can block it in my company boxen. Not perfect but I don't have a perfect block for all my spam. Doesn't stop me using simply filters to stop 90% of it.