The Mac & *nix users who failed to heed the advice not to take the brown acid, perhaps, and believed themselves to be having a major bummer in which their user interface morphed into... oh god... oh no... gotta go (can I sue for emotional distress too?)
*LOL* I'll confess that the USAF isn't representative of the militray in general, but I was hardly a bus driver. I worked in an underground building near Omaha. I *wish* I'd been a bus driver; the scenery would have been more interesting!
This is very much a tangent, but is there a list anywhere of companies that have such requirements, so I can choose not to do business with them? Seems to me that if they treat all their potential employees as criminals, customer service won't be up to my standards either.
Whatever happened to hiring and firing based on merit? I've known some people who weren't fit to shovel manure but didn't do any illegal drugs -- and some who did partake of such and were responsible in it as far as job performance went. And the entire spectrum in between.
I'd encourage folks who don't do drugs to apply for jobs they don't really want and submit clean urine samples, then decline the job citing the drug testing policy as the reason. I've done this a couple of times, and been rather amused at the responses...
...Therre is loyalty, discipline and the service of your country.
Dont like it? Dont enlist. Simple as that.
Let me see if I understand you correctly...
... military members shouldn't expect privacy of any sort (I exclude the voting booth, something you understandably overlooked in your blanket statement) and should just shut up and accept what's dished out, as that's what they signed up for.
...non-military members should shut up and let the military run itself (despite the fact that the militay spends a fair proportion of my Federal tax dollars).
This seems to leave no sentient being in control... much like your fingers when posting.
No thanks, I did a hitch in the USAF in the early 1980's. I did my job (pushing an ancient U-1100/42 at HQ SAC (ADDOS)) and didn't re-enlist, finding it not to my liking. No problem.
There is absolutely no privacy in the army
I'm sure that medical-admin enlisted types who were disciplined for mishandling "Confidential" military medical records eagerly await having their Letters-of-Reprimand (or more) vacated. That the military does enforce such regulations (rightly, I think) demonstrates that there is in fact some expectation of privacy, even for the lowly, err, Private.
the military told soldiers about this when they started doing it.
Were those who enlisted prior to this given the option to opt-out? Would they hae been courtmartialled if they refused to cooperate with this additional sacrifice of privacy that was not in effect at the time of enlistment? (Anthrax vaccination comes to mind - not as a further sacrifice of privacy beyoond that which was agreed to, though)
Your use of the ad-hominem "conspiracy theorists" and the implication that anyone who objects must "be a druggie of some sort" further demonstrates that you're unable or unwilling to make a cogent argument. I'm surprised that you played neither the race nor the terroism cards -- equally intellectually dishonest means of attempting to debate an issue.
These guys are supposed to be all about small government!
Actually that's the Libertarians you're thinking about, maybe? Both the Democrats and Republicans give lip service to "smaller government"...
(D): Cut Defense! (R): Cut Entitlement Programs!
The net result often is that they compromise and screw everyone by cutting neither, because that's the only way they can "bring home the bacon" to "the District" and help their chances of e-election. In effect, the entire Federal Budget becomes indirect welfare for incumbents.
Is it really Microsoft catching the bugs, or third parties reporting them? I honestly don't know... certainly security-related bugs are often first discovered by outsiders on other platforms -- and I assume that holds true for MS as well.
Perhaps you meant to say that you were happy that MS was more responsive recently to demonstrated bugs, regardless of who first reported them?
While the author claims that it's "slightly off-topic" that doesn't mean that moderators need to blindly mod it so. If the poster is having issues applying patches, that's certainly a valid and relevant post in the context of this thread.
Regardless of how others might feel about the platform he or she finds themself in the position of supporting, it's best that everyone run as secure a system as they can given their circumstances. Ignoring someone who is making a sincere effort to be responsible with that they have (perhaps because an employer requires it, or perhaps because they genuinely prefer it) is disingenuous at best, no?
I happen to run OSX and linux -- and am rather bigotted against Microsoft in general -- but I applaud anyone who gives a damn and tries to be responsible as a sys admin.
That's doubleplus ungood. I assumes that you're able to interatct with the terminal session so launched, as the user who was logged in?
I'm not being sarcastic here... but have you complained yet to Apple? I know that the person who disclosed the original problem (the buffer overflow in the password feild, was it?) expresssed dismay that Apple hadn't responded to him. But here we are two weeks after the public disclosure and there's at least a partial fix for what (forgive me) is a slight problem that requires physical access. I suspect that Apple might simply choose to not even admit that they've been notified of a problem until they have a patch ready.
Much like MS in that regard... but perhaps more timely.
I think Babbage is correct here, in that you gain no benefit from the update until rebooting.
But if you feel as I do that the bug this update addresses is trivial, skipping the eboot makes sense. Install it and forget it, then simply let it take effect when you next need to reboot. Or wait; it's up to you.
Maybe better to wait; sometimes the damndest things... happen.
Yep, you said it yourself: keeping apache et al running. And other servers; I happen to run several instances of TinyMUSH 3.1 on my aging 500MHz dual. It's helpful for them to not rely on proper handling of signals to "shit! I better checkpoint!" - let alone the inconveninece my users would suffer from an actual reboot.
So... some folks do have a lot more to worry about than the GUI. Sure, I could just run Darwin, but I do a small amount of stuff that requires a GUI too.
True, the same would hold true if it had been a mailman. The point was that the killing had nothing to do with the person in the performance of their job (be it mailman or FBI employee (I'm not sure if the victim was an agent or an FBI employee of some other sort)).
The killings in point of fact had nothing to do with the professions of the people killed, so the fact that the Federal Gov't happened to employ one of the victims should be irrelevant unless we assign greater worth to a life because of who the employer is. Had it been "in the line of duty" I'd feel differently.
I'm sure that someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that both Maryland and Virginia lack a state death penalty? Not really relevant I guess... even if they do have it, it should be up to the prsecutors in each of those states to decide what punishment to seek for murders that occured within their borders. Claiming Federal jurisdiction based on an irrelevancy (employment) here is, I think, over reaching and sends the wrong message. I can see it being a matter for the Feds for, say, transporting firearms across state lines for illegal purposes, but that's not how they're approaching it.
Sanity! Context makes a difference! The authority figures in The Matrix (like the Sheriff of Nottingham) were the bad guys.
Kids need to learn to judge people by their behavior, and not just blindly to assume "uniform: must be good". The vast majority of cops are good people doing a difficult and often thankless job. That doesn't mean the (hopefully few) bad apples among them get a free pass. If I saw a uniformed cop obviously engaged in attempted murder and my only method of stopping him was to kill him, of course I would. Because at that point he's not acting as a police officer
Well we no longer have equal protection, what with "aggravating factors" -- look at the DC sniper of last autumn. Strictly by chance one of his victims happened to be some FBI employee. (They) had no clue who they were shooting; it was blind chance (if I recall correctly, the female FBI person and her husband were leaving a Home Depot) and were the unfortunate victims of random, insane violence
Now the sniper is eligible for the death penalty, because the "public servants" are "better" than everyone else. Or that's the message it seems to send.
If they are really afraid (foolishly, i think...) that violence in a video game is going to somehow spill over, the law should have prohibited the killing of taxi drivers and convenience store clerks -- both of which (i'm pretty sure) are statistically more likely to be murdered in the course of their jobs. Oh, but they're not "special". How silly of me to forget that.
This means that John Q. Neverpatches is going to be in a lot of trouble if this law gets written incorrectly!
You say that as if it's a bad thing. I'd like to see moderate fines imposed on those people who - for example - still have unpatched IIS and still attempt to spread Code Red. Ditto for those who run an open mail relay.
Not a complete solution by any means, but it would help. Call it "maintaining an attractive nuisance" and we might not even need new laws.
I suspect it is perfectly legal to "go after" a single individual for a single instance of copyright infringement.
I don't doubt that it's "legal" to go after such people...but as you say it's likely imprudent. For a different reason, though: they run the risk of alienating customers who have actually purchased a CD with the tracks in question and are downloading it in (arguable) exercise of their fair use rights. Perhaps they would do this either because the media was damaged or they simply are too lazy or ill-equipped to rip it to MP3 themselves. Either way, threatening your law-abiding customers with huge fines and legal action isn't very intelligent.
I would think that such a ruling would bring it back to the front of the line, but I guess not.
I might be 100% wrong, but I seem t recall Bertelsman AG (SP?) buying the hulk of Napter (the Company) at firesale prices. Since they are a major holder of copyright interests, I doubt we'll see "Napster" as a name surface again.
If it's in fact true that there is no real user consent to the gator-driven pop-ups, tend to think that the owners of websites defaced by the popups have a reasonable claim for damages.
What about those of us who block ads, run junkbuster, proximation, etc? Your proposal would force us to render pages as the webmaster sees fit. Err, no thanks. If you publish HTML you take your chance at how the end user renders it. Don't like it? Then publish with something else.
Um, no. My proposal -- if one chooses to call it that -- says that the end user should be in ultimate control of the rendering of html content, and the operators of websites on which such pop-ups appear (absent explicit consent from the viewer) might have a cause for action against Gator for trademark dilution. What I'm objecting to is the introduction of content that the user did not request, either directly by asking to view a web page or indirectly by the provider of the page including advertising material. The end user retains the right, I think, to block advertising, permit it, or direct the entire page to/dev/null.
IF a user willinging installs Gator or some other product that pops up advertising beyond that which the content provider condones, then fine; they're on their own. My gripe is solely with the lack of user consent that is implied by a stealth install.
I'm glad to hear that you are working to develop ad-blocking software, and certainly did not intend to group you in with Gator or any other ad-delivery "service". We're in agreement about stealth installs and deliberately difficult EULAs.
Perhaps you posted your reply to the wrong post, or misunderstood me. Ad blocking is a good thing, and Gator and comapny are the antithesis of that (if they do in fact condone stealth installs). I think we're actually on the same side here: letting the end user make informed decisions as to what to render, and how.
I think this problem could easily be solved if Antivirus companies had a "treat spyware as a virus" setting. Why isn't Norton et al putting their necks on the line for their customers?
This is an excellent idea, and I wish Norton et al would do this.
If it's in fact true that there is no real user consent to the gator-driven pop-ups, then I'd tend to think that the owners of websites defaced by the popups have a reasonable claim for damages. If it was the result of a user knowingly agreeing to view popups in exchange for some consideration, then those users are on their own just as much as if they'd made a cron job pop a dialog box up every 10 minutes informing them that they were an idiot.
IANAL, but I seem to recall that for there to be a contract, both parties must knowingly consent to it, and there must be consideration (value) in both directions. If in fact gator is installed surreptitiously, and if gator.com knows this and fails to take measures to prevent it, I think a case could be made that they are in guilty of trademark infringement by placing pop-ups that fraudulently appear to be condoned by the unwitting website beneath them.
Slashdot Mirror
The Mac & *nix users who failed to heed the advice not to take the brown acid, perhaps, and believed themselves to be having a major bummer in which their user interface morphed into... oh god... oh no... gotta go (can I sue for emotional distress too?)
*LOL* I'll confess that the USAF isn't representative of the militray in general, but I was hardly a bus driver. I worked in an underground building near Omaha. I *wish* I'd been a bus driver; the scenery would have been more interesting!
Whatever happened to hiring and firing based on merit? I've known some people who weren't fit to shovel manure but didn't do any illegal drugs -- and some who did partake of such and were responsible in it as far as job performance went. And the entire spectrum in between.
I'd encourage folks who don't do drugs to apply for jobs they don't really want and submit clean urine samples, then decline the job citing the drug testing policy as the reason. I've done this a couple of times, and been rather amused at the responses...
...non-military members should shut up and let the military run itself (despite the fact that the militay spends a fair proportion of my Federal tax dollars).
This seems to leave no sentient being in control... much like your fingers when posting.
Your use of the ad-hominem "conspiracy theorists" and the implication that anyone who objects must "be a druggie of some sort" further demonstrates that you're unable or unwilling to make a cogent argument. I'm surprised that you played neither the race nor the terroism cards -- equally intellectually dishonest means of attempting to debate an issue.
(D): Cut Defense!
(R): Cut Entitlement Programs!
The net result often is that they compromise and screw everyone by cutting neither, because that's the only way they can "bring home the bacon" to "the District" and help their chances of e-election. In effect, the entire Federal Budget becomes indirect welfare for incumbents.
Perhaps you meant to say that you were happy that MS was more responsive recently to demonstrated bugs, regardless of who first reported them?
While the author claims that it's "slightly off-topic" that doesn't mean that moderators need to blindly mod it so. If the poster is having issues applying patches, that's certainly a valid and relevant post in the context of this thread.
Regardless of how others might feel about the platform he or she finds themself in the position of supporting, it's best that everyone run as secure a system as they can given their circumstances. Ignoring someone who is making a sincere effort to be responsible with that they have (perhaps because an employer requires it, or perhaps because they genuinely prefer it) is disingenuous at best, no?
I happen to run OSX and linux -- and am rather bigotted against Microsoft in general -- but I applaud anyone who gives a damn and tries to be responsible as a sys admin.
I wish I had your faith that common sense and bureaucracy could peacefully co-exist..
I'm not being sarcastic here... but have you complained yet to Apple? I know that the person who disclosed the original problem (the buffer overflow in the password feild, was it?) expresssed dismay that Apple hadn't responded to him. But here we are two weeks after the public disclosure and there's at least a partial fix for what (forgive me) is a slight problem that requires physical access. I suspect that Apple might simply choose to not even admit that they've been notified of a problem until they have a patch ready.
Much like MS in that regard... but perhaps more timely.
But if you feel as I do that the bug this update addresses is trivial, skipping the eboot makes sense. Install it and forget it, then simply let it take effect when you next need to reboot. Or wait; it's up to you.
Maybe better to wait; sometimes the damndest things... happen.
So... some folks do have a lot more to worry about than the GUI. Sure, I could just run Darwin, but I do a small amount of stuff that requires a GUI too.
The download file is named: "SecurityUpd2003-07-14.dmg
Its SHA-1 digest is: 210f4819b8559b590632cd62b4055a437b9a0267
Nielsen is meaningless, just a pacifier for advertisers to suck on.
The killings in point of fact had nothing to do with the professions of the people killed, so the fact that the Federal Gov't happened to employ one of the victims should be irrelevant unless we assign greater worth to a life because of who the employer is. Had it been "in the line of duty" I'd feel differently.
I'm sure that someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that both Maryland and Virginia lack a state death penalty? Not really relevant I guess... even if they do have it, it should be up to the prsecutors in each of those states to decide what punishment to seek for murders that occured within their borders. Claiming Federal jurisdiction based on an irrelevancy (employment) here is, I think, over reaching and sends the wrong message. I can see it being a matter for the Feds for, say, transporting firearms across state lines for illegal purposes, but that's not how they're approaching it.
GRR. make that grandparent.
Sanity! Context makes a difference! The authority figures in The Matrix (like the Sheriff of Nottingham) were the bad guys.
Kids need to learn to judge people by their behavior, and not just blindly to assume "uniform: must be good". The vast majority of cops are good people doing a difficult and often thankless job. That doesn't mean the (hopefully few) bad apples among them get a free pass. If I saw a uniformed cop obviously engaged in attempted murder and my only method of stopping him was to kill him, of course I would. Because at that point he's not acting as a police officer
Now the sniper is eligible for the death penalty, because the "public servants" are "better" than everyone else. Or that's the message it seems to send.
If they are really afraid (foolishly, i think...) that violence in a video game is going to somehow spill over, the law should have prohibited the killing of taxi drivers and convenience store clerks -- both of which (i'm pretty sure) are statistically more likely to be murdered in the course of their jobs. Oh, but they're not "special". How silly of me to forget that.
Not a complete solution by any means, but it would help. Call it "maintaining an attractive nuisance" and we might not even need new laws.
Oops, I forgot we're talking about the RIAA here.
IF a user willinging installs Gator or some other product that pops up advertising beyond that which the content provider condones, then fine; they're on their own. My gripe is solely with the lack of user consent that is implied by a stealth install.
I'm glad to hear that you are working to develop ad-blocking software, and certainly did not intend to group you in with Gator or any other ad-delivery "service". We're in agreement about stealth installs and deliberately difficult EULAs. Perhaps you posted your reply to the wrong post, or misunderstood me. Ad blocking is a good thing, and Gator and comapny are the antithesis of that (if they do in fact condone stealth installs). I think we're actually on the same side here: letting the end user make informed decisions as to what to render, and how.
This is an excellent idea, and I wish Norton et al would do this.IANAL, but I seem to recall that for there to be a contract, both parties must knowingly consent to it, and there must be consideration (value) in both directions. If in fact gator is installed surreptitiously, and if gator.com knows this and fails to take measures to prevent it, I think a case could be made that they are in guilty of trademark infringement by placing pop-ups that fraudulently appear to be condoned by the unwitting website beneath them.
Or maybe not. *shrugs*