His attack methodology is correct, but it will take more than 40 devices to break the system. The chances are very low that all 40 devices being linearly independent, and therefore each one offering non-duplicate information about the system. If you read the comments, he actually inadvertantly ran into this problem with his small example of 4 keys.
However, in writing this, I realize that I do not know how many keys you would need to present a good probability of solving the system of equations. Anyone want to run a simulation?
I work for a 15 person consulting company that specializes in web applications. Us developers can telecommute all we want, set our own hours, etc.
All it takes is communication, responsibility, transparency, and a good set of development tools.
AIM and email work just fine for most communications, but there are always cell phones or iChat AV if we need to have a longer discussion. But honestly, I never use a phone for my job. I don't have one on my desk in the office, because it is little more than a distraction. I don't talk to clients often, that is what the managers are for. And asynchronus email is better overall for our diverse team -- I don't want to call one developer with a question in the morning because he usually doesn't wake up until noon.
I will admit that face time is important, though. I go in every other day on average. More if I am in the thick of a new project, and less once things settle in that regard and its just code. It does help that the managers are almost always in the office.
Also, we have in-house project management software that tracks project assignments, task status, and trouble tickets. With good use by both managers and developers, there is no question who is doing what, when they are doing it, and how it is coming along. Then it's just a matter of staying focused, and on track.
Finally, open-source tools are a staple. All the software is kept in subversion repositories, and every developer has a local development setup (apache, postgres, php) on their workstation in the office, their laptop, and home office. I can easily switch my physical location without sacrificing the ability to work. We are beginning to rely on unit tests, and perform continuous integration to catch any problems that arise from a team working on a code base in a distributed fashion. It works well, and will only get better as we build up the tools and integrate them on more projects.
I didn't really want to go into software development after school, but I can't deny the benefits. I am self-employed, have no dress code, make good money and set my own hours. I use far less gas than the other people I know, even though I moved to a great house in a rougher, and more remote neighborhood than choosing a nasty apartment complex near the office.
Maybe your company isn't working on software that lend to distributed, open, and orthogonal development? Maybe it is too big for its own good when it comes to developer independence. I hope it isn't a trust issue like you suggest. I certainly wouldn't be ok with employers that don't trust me to know how I can be most effective in my life and job.
I played around with Windows for the first time in years before getting linux up and running on a new computer. There are a few media apps that very well-programmed, light weight, unobtrusive, quite capable and FREE. These are what I miss on both on my OS X and Gnome desktops:
Foobar2000 - An audio player that is a painful reminder how heavy iTunes feels. Has 10x the functionality, and brutally enforces good practices in keeping a media library. 0.9 just came out a few weeks ago.
Media Player Classic - The only media player you'll need. With ffdshow, it handles just about anything I can throw at it, audio works, subtitles work, and its one exe.
uTorrent - Everything you'd want from Azureus, in a 150k self-contained exe. Makes it almost manditory to leave it open all the time because its just that slick and efficient.
BurnAtOnce - A cdrdao based burner with an amazingly simple interface. Who needs Nero with this around?
Exact Audio Copy - THE cd ripper. cdparanoia works fine in most cases, but doesn't leave you 100% sure your rip is 100% perfect like this one. And this fits in almost any audio workflow with its advanced tagging, and command line support.
It sounds like you know what you're talking about, but still this service raises questions...
Thusfar, the RIAA has only been going after people sharing copyright material, not downloading. If I recall, this has to do with (1) limited resources and (2) the fact that it is almost impossible to prove that someone is commiting copyright violation when downloading (i.e. the download is not a copyright song, the downloader owns the song, the downloader is unaware he is violating copyright until he listens to the song, etc.)
This all falls in the legal grey area, but is the RIAA ever going to go after downloaders and not sharers in general? And if so, will they target these Russian websites when they could just go after the regular P2P users?
Demographics are a huge part of Bollywood, if not everything in India. Like everything else, shows in the theater break down among class and wealth lines.
For the lower class, movie tickets are dirt cheap. But this cheap ticket gets you standing room only, right in front of the screen, with thousands of other cheap ticket holders.
If you can afford it, expensive tickets land you a seat in the balcony, where you don't have to rub elbows with everyone else.
By this design, the movies are more of a social gathering than a film experience. Numerous comments have mentioned how every Bollywood film is the same plot. This is true, because nobody cares about the movies that much. As long as there is song/dance, it makes good background noise for socialization.
Because films are already necessarily cheap, and the films themselves are not very meaningful, I doubt the Indian movie industry has much to lose from Kazaa. This is only good news for the US, as it is yet another sign that Hollywood is quite broken.
This guy is no stranger to programming. Many a day in middle school, and high school, was spent playing games Jimmy made for the TI-85 and TI-92. Specifically, he programmed Boulderdash, Tetris, Solitare, and many more to the various calculator platforms. A comprehensive list can be found at ticalc.org.
Thanks man! Sqrxz was great.
Sponsored by Martin Luther King III and Greg Palast (author of "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy") this petition calls for a halt to computerizing the elctions until the process is shown to be resistant to manipulation, fraud, and racial bias.
Read some of Palast's book (pertinent chapters available on his website) for the hardest-hitting investigation into the 2000 Florida elections. Quite the eye opener as to how corrupt the system, irregardless of who won, actually is. The most shocking part, however, is that the main stream press, still to this day, has never picked up on any of his findings.
Us voters, Republican, Democrat or otherwise, have a responsibilty to see that our democratic process is never again misused so horribly.
Slashdot Mirror
Why can't just anyone make his account private?
His attack methodology is correct, but it will take more than 40 devices to break the system. The chances are very low that all 40 devices being linearly independent, and therefore each one offering non-duplicate information about the system. If you read the comments, he actually inadvertantly ran into this problem with his small example of 4 keys.
However, in writing this, I realize that I do not know how many keys you would need to present a good probability of solving the system of equations. Anyone want to run a simulation?
So work for a small company.
I work for a 15 person consulting company that specializes in web applications. Us developers can telecommute all we want, set our own hours, etc.
All it takes is communication, responsibility, transparency, and a good set of development tools.
AIM and email work just fine for most communications, but there are always cell phones or iChat AV if we need to have a longer discussion. But honestly, I never use a phone for my job. I don't have one on my desk in the office, because it is little more than a distraction. I don't talk to clients often, that is what the managers are for. And asynchronus email is better overall for our diverse team -- I don't want to call one developer with a question in the morning because he usually doesn't wake up until noon.
I will admit that face time is important, though. I go in every other day on average. More if I am in the thick of a new project, and less once things settle in that regard and its just code. It does help that the managers are almost always in the office.
Also, we have in-house project management software that tracks project assignments, task status, and trouble tickets. With good use by both managers and developers, there is no question who is doing what, when they are doing it, and how it is coming along. Then it's just a matter of staying focused, and on track.
Finally, open-source tools are a staple. All the software is kept in subversion repositories, and every developer has a local development setup (apache, postgres, php) on their workstation in the office, their laptop, and home office. I can easily switch my physical location without sacrificing the ability to work. We are beginning to rely on unit tests, and perform continuous integration to catch any problems that arise from a team working on a code base in a distributed fashion. It works well, and will only get better as we build up the tools and integrate them on more projects.
I didn't really want to go into software development after school, but I can't deny the benefits. I am self-employed, have no dress code, make good money and set my own hours. I use far less gas than the other people I know, even though I moved to a great house in a rougher, and more remote neighborhood than choosing a nasty apartment complex near the office.
Maybe your company isn't working on software that lend to distributed, open, and orthogonal development? Maybe it is too big for its own good when it comes to developer independence. I hope it isn't a trust issue like you suggest. I certainly wouldn't be ok with employers that don't trust me to know how I can be most effective in my life and job.
Foobar2000 - An audio player that is a painful reminder how heavy iTunes feels. Has 10x the functionality, and brutally enforces good practices in keeping a media library. 0.9 just came out a few weeks ago.
Media Player Classic - The only media player you'll need. With ffdshow, it handles just about anything I can throw at it, audio works, subtitles work, and its one exe.
uTorrent - Everything you'd want from Azureus, in a 150k self-contained exe. Makes it almost manditory to leave it open all the time because its just that slick and efficient.
BurnAtOnce - A cdrdao based burner with an amazingly simple interface. Who needs Nero with this around?
Exact Audio Copy - THE cd ripper. cdparanoia works fine in most cases, but doesn't leave you 100% sure your rip is 100% perfect like this one. And this fits in almost any audio workflow with its advanced tagging, and command line support.
More apps like these on other platforms please!
Hey, I used to read your blog all the time. That must have been two years ago now?
But now I can't remember what it was called... Can you help me out?
P.S. patroitboy kicks ass!
It sounds like you know what you're talking about, but still this service raises questions...
Thusfar, the RIAA has only been going after people sharing copyright material, not downloading. If I recall, this has to do with (1) limited resources and (2) the fact that it is almost impossible to prove that someone is commiting copyright violation when downloading (i.e. the download is not a copyright song, the downloader owns the song, the downloader is unaware he is violating copyright until he listens to the song, etc.)
This all falls in the legal grey area, but is the RIAA ever going to go after downloaders and not sharers in general? And if so, will they target these Russian websites when they could just go after the regular P2P users?
Demographics are a huge part of Bollywood, if not everything in India. Like everything else, shows in the theater break down among class and wealth lines.
For the lower class, movie tickets are dirt cheap. But this cheap ticket gets you standing room only, right in front of the screen, with thousands of other cheap ticket holders.
If you can afford it, expensive tickets land you a seat in the balcony, where you don't have to rub elbows with everyone else.
By this design, the movies are more of a social gathering than a film experience. Numerous comments have mentioned how every Bollywood film is the same plot. This is true, because nobody cares about the movies that much. As long as there is song/dance, it makes good background noise for socialization.
Because films are already necessarily cheap, and the films themselves are not very meaningful, I doubt the Indian movie industry has much to lose from Kazaa. This is only good news for the US, as it is yet another sign that Hollywood is quite broken.
This guy is no stranger to programming. Many a day in middle school, and high school, was spent playing games Jimmy made for the TI-85 and TI-92. Specifically, he programmed Boulderdash, Tetris, Solitare, and many more to the various calculator platforms. A comprehensive list can be found at ticalc.org. Thanks man! Sqrxz was great.
ActForChange Petition: Stop the Florida-tion of the 2004 Election
Sponsored by Martin Luther King III and Greg Palast (author of "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy") this petition calls for a halt to computerizing the elctions until the process is shown to be resistant to manipulation, fraud, and racial bias.
Read some of Palast's book (pertinent chapters available on his website) for the hardest-hitting investigation into the 2000 Florida elections. Quite the eye opener as to how corrupt the system, irregardless of who won, actually is. The most shocking part, however, is that the main stream press, still to this day, has never picked up on any of his findings.
Us voters, Republican, Democrat or otherwise, have a responsibilty to see that our democratic process is never again misused so horribly.