Actually in Washington state, I believe what's holding up vote by mail is Pierce County rather than King.
Much (dare I say MOST?) of Washington state votes by mail. There are just a few hold-out counties, usually where some parties *cough* rely on a great deal of highly questionable voting practices.
The biggest single problem with the Vote by Mail system as used in Washington is the ability for unions to buy votes (watch while you vote at home, "lose" $40 bucks in your couch cushions on their way out the door). Some complain that it misses homeless voters as well, but there are provisions made for these in my county.
Other than that, I like the system, and it takes an army to game it unlike an electronic system where a couple clever guys in a basement could probably tip the balance.
With some form of digital ID, I suspect Electronic voting is going to one day take over. Given the level of graft and corruption with the current system, anything short of a totally compromised system might be an improvement.
Or stop using a dynamic IP for a business. I know static IPv4 addresses are an endangered species, but come on man.
Agreed.
Our company has the business pacakge from Comcast which includes a static IP. Its not a problem for our mail server. We don't get blocked, and our reverse is properly set up, and our IP is in a non-dynamic pool. Yeah, we pay a tad more for this. But we can run all the services we want, and our mail goes out.
Most of the blockage you get with dynamic SENDING IPs is on the the RECEIVING end, not always your local ISP.
You seem to be assuming the way they would implement this is to have your client send a second copy of the stream to the FBI. Certainly that is the easy way to do it, but also the trivially detectable way -- the app is using twice as much bandwidth as it should and half the packets are going to some server in Virginia.
Agreed.
There is already evidence that taps at ISPs and carriers have been used in the past, so as you suggest, placing backdoors in the client itself would be the hard way. Even if they did, what percentage of users would even notice twice the outbound packets were being sent? Especially if it were turned on only for parties under investigation.
The people who would be doing this probably have enough computer power to capture a stream and decrypt it at their leisure.
I speculate it might be easier to know when you arrive at a proper decryption key on a voice stream than it would be for a text stream. Speech. Perhaps (a href=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkeFHT96TUA>Serene Branson simply was a decryption fail.
How true this is remains debatable because no one has yet demonstrated decoding a voice message. Some reports suggest that the most you can do is determine that the content IS Skype, but not what is in it.
With enough computer power it might be easier to just decode the packet stream by brute force.
Would peer to peer services which offer end to end encryption like Skype be required to re-engineer their software to allow government wiretaps? This could be the end of personal use encryption as we know it.
Any time someone offers you an encrypted service where you don't have the option to set your own encryption key you need to view it as encryption as a minor inconvenience to eavesdroppers, and nothing more.
Nothing on any service like skype can assumed to be truly private. Best you can do is encrypt your email with some strong encryption and hope your correspondent does as well. A wiser choice might be to never commit to a computer record that which you may need to keep secret.
You don't need to be involved in any nefarious stuff to use encryption. I've ordered several things via emai with credit cards, and I always send it encrypted.
Helicopter are inherently unstable because the gyro (the blades) are on top, so they are very hard to fly. If you put the blades at the bottom, like they did with this, the stability is utterly amazing.
Why should the position of the blades matter as far as stability? Given the same whirling mass you have the same gyro effect.
A payload hanging below the rotors is easier to balance than payload perched on top of the rotors.
For top mounted payloads , in addition to tilt needed for forward motion, the side vectored thrust needed to fight airframe rotation, you now have to add balancing forces.
You may thing this device was utterly amazing, but the truth of the matter is it was an technological dead end, which while possible to achieve, offered no compelling advantage over the helicopter. There is a reason you don't see these things flying around. They were very problematic, and contrary to your assertion, they were not stable, but required constant correction to keep them upright.
Full Retail price of a samsung galaxy tablet from Verizon as of this writing is 499.99 It weighs 13.58 oz.
Same weight of silver at your $30 price is 407.47.
But as you point out this is a silly comparison, because raw silver is hardly the standard of measurement except for people who want to write sensational sounding headlines.
Bouncee is a VPN service designed to protect the privacy of international travelers. It encrypts all your network traffic and routes it through a server in the United States.
It's also really, really cheap. This sounds like what he's looking for.
About the best you can do with off the shelf phones is to use an email client that supports secure communications, and visit web sites using ssl only. (not Slashdot).
You could try some of the secured proxy browsers such as https://www.the-cloak.com/ (self issued certificate - so due diligence required) as a way to browse sites like Slashdot that don't offer secure connections.
Why, yes, there has been changes to patent laws since then.
Several court rules, including a couple from SCOTUS have changed the rules. You might think these don't apply retroactively, but a review is not strictly a retroactive action. They would have to apply the current standards for any review.
Things like Prior Art, Obviousness, overly broad patents have all had reviews in the courts, as any google search will reveal.
Patents are challenged almost weekly, and a significant number of these are invalidated.
Probably means we have have to launch new satellites.
The satellites will probably read some steamy romance/werewolf novel being downloaded across the net and start screwing with or biting each other. Either that or someone will download all the Slashdot source code and the satellites will crash and burn.
Me: Hello, I would like to order 10 bags of cement. Hardware Store: yes sir, we will deliver those today. Me: Wait, make that two times less bags. Hardware Store: But Sir, there is no such thing as a negative bag of cement.
We need Constitution Impact statements filed with each bill.
We also need a provision that if you introduce or vote for a bill that is subsequently struck down as unconstitutional you lose half your salary and half your retirement for the first offense, and your office, salary, and retirement for the next offense.
Well, what I was getting at is there is a lot of functionality in Exchange/Outlook that is not needed, seldom used, designed for specific markets. Like every other Microsoft product, everything thrown at it sticks, and crappy functionality leads to code bloat.
Kerio and several others try to cut to the core needs. Instead of replacing everything they provide the essentials.
Most of those support contract requirements are done from a CYA point of view.
The few I've seen, the end users didn't know there was a support contract, and in at least one case there was no record of it ever being exercised. Even their IT staff didn't know who to call, but just got on the web and found all the answers.
That you spend your entire day in an overgrown Email program speaks to your skill set more than anything else. Perhaps Microsoft should just ditch Windows and make an Outlook OS since that's about all some people ever learn to do.
When the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, you tend to look at every problem as it it were a nail.
Downloading a JRE doesn't seem that big of a deal. Most people have that installed already.
The review specifically stated:
I found no difference between the two offerings either in performance or stability. Neither crashed on me, even when handling documents designed to put productivity apps through the wringer.
That is my assessment as well. I've never seen any crashes on either version.
I agree that the UI puts things in odd places, and some things are done in un-obvious ways.
But basically I disagree with the author's "amateurish" assessment. That is pure Microsoft speak there, which translates into "Not all the things learned from years of swearing at Word translate to either of these packages".
At work we (and some of our customers) switched to OOO about 3 years ago, and for the types of documents (including some rather large manuals) it works just fine, and imported all of our old documents, from multiple different versions of MSOffice and Word.
When the devs jumped ship, we jumped with them to LibreOffice, retaining just a few seats of OOO in our customers shop, because they already paid for support contracts. But reports are that they have not been happy with what little help they got. The phone techs knew less than our people.
There are some missing functions that MS-Office users wish were available, and maddeningly well hidden features as well as stuff that just does not work. But these were not mainstream functionality that we needed in our shop.
LibreOffice is currently every bit as good as OOO, and in some ways better. Going forward, all the wet-ware is in their corner, and Oracle will probably take a year bringing replacements up to speed before any serious bugs can be addressed, let alone new features. (Although nothing will stop them from feeding off of the efforts of LibreOffice).
LibreOffice probably needs to think about a revenue stream for the future. I'm fine with that. Let those who absolutely have to have support contracts in place (for what ever reason) foot the bill.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually in Washington state, I believe what's holding up vote by mail is Pierce County rather than King.
Much (dare I say MOST?) of Washington state votes by mail. There are just a few hold-out counties, usually where some parties *cough* rely on a great deal of highly questionable voting practices.
The biggest single problem with the Vote by Mail system as used in Washington is the ability for unions to buy votes (watch while you vote at home, "lose" $40 bucks in your couch cushions on their way out the door). Some complain that it misses homeless voters as well, but there are provisions made for these in my county.
Other than that, I like the system, and it takes an army to game it unlike an electronic system where a couple clever guys in a basement could probably tip the balance.
With some form of digital ID, I suspect Electronic voting is going to one day take over. Given the level of graft and corruption with the current system, anything short of a totally compromised system might be an improvement.
Or stop using a dynamic IP for a business. I know static IPv4 addresses are an endangered species, but come on man.
Agreed.
Our company has the business pacakge from Comcast which includes a static IP.
Its not a problem for our mail server. We don't get blocked, and our reverse is properly set up, and our IP is in a
non-dynamic pool. Yeah, we pay a tad more for this. But we can run all the services we want, and our mail
goes out.
Most of the blockage you get with dynamic SENDING IPs is on the the RECEIVING end, not always your local
ISP.
oops:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkeFHT96TUA
tap-stream
You seem to be assuming the way they would implement this is to have your client send a second copy of the stream to the FBI. Certainly that is the easy way to do it, but also the trivially detectable way -- the app is using twice as much bandwidth as it should and half the packets are going to some server in Virginia.
Agreed.
There is already evidence that taps at ISPs and carriers have been used in the past, so as you suggest, placing backdoors in the client itself would be the hard way. Even if they did, what percentage of users would even notice twice the outbound packets were being sent? Especially if it were turned on only for parties under investigation.
The people who would be doing this probably have enough computer power to capture a stream and decrypt it at their leisure.
I speculate it might be easier to know when you arrive at a proper decryption key on a voice stream than it would be for a text stream.
Speech. Perhaps (a href=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkeFHT96TUA>Serene Branson simply was a decryption fail.
Yes, there were stories about Skype Encryption being Broken.
How true this is remains debatable because no one has yet demonstrated decoding a voice message.
Some reports suggest that the most you can do is determine that the content IS Skype, but not what is in it.
With enough computer power it might be easier to just decode the packet stream by brute force.
Would peer to peer services which offer end to end encryption like Skype be required to re-engineer their software to allow government wiretaps? This could be the end of personal use encryption as we know it.
Any time someone offers you an encrypted service where you don't have the option to set your own encryption key
you need to view it as encryption as a minor inconvenience to eavesdroppers, and nothing more.
Nothing on any service like skype can assumed to be truly private. Best you can do is encrypt your email with
some strong encryption and hope your correspondent does as well. A wiser choice might be to never commit
to a computer record that which you may need to keep secret.
You don't need to be involved in any nefarious stuff to use encryption. I've ordered several things via emai
with credit cards, and I always send it encrypted.
And also When suing china in some US court.
Get real, the chance of them paying a single penny is slim to none.
Yeah, right, China doesn't get paid so it decides to commit suicide instead.
Helicopter are inherently unstable because the gyro (the blades) are on top, so they are very hard to fly. If you put the blades at the bottom, like they did with this, the stability is utterly amazing.
Why should the position of the blades matter as far as stability? Given the same whirling mass you have the same gyro effect.
A payload hanging below the rotors is easier to balance than payload perched on top of the rotors.
For top mounted payloads , in addition to tilt needed for forward motion, the side vectored thrust needed to fight airframe rotation, you now have to add balancing forces.
You may thing this device was utterly amazing, but the truth of the matter is it was an technological dead end, which while possible to achieve, offered no compelling advantage over the helicopter. There is a reason you don't see these things flying around. They were very problematic, and contrary to your assertion, they were not stable, but required constant correction to keep them upright.
I'm not even sure what I would do with that much silver!
Well instead of just watching the porn, you could participate.
Full Retail price of a samsung galaxy tablet from Verizon as of this writing is 499.99
It weighs 13.58 oz.
Same weight of silver at your $30 price is 407.47.
But as you point out this is a silly comparison, because raw silver is hardly the standard of measurement except for people who want to write sensational sounding headlines.
Bouncee is a VPN service designed to protect the privacy of international travelers. It encrypts all your network traffic and routes it through a server in the United States.
It's also really, really cheap. This sounds like what he's looking for.
Do they have a mobile version?
About the best you can do with off the shelf phones is to use an email client that supports secure communications, and visit
web sites using ssl only. (not Slashdot).
You could try some of the secured proxy browsers such as https://www.the-cloak.com/ (self issued certificate - so due diligence required)
as a way to browse sites like Slashdot that don't offer secure connections.
ASP Fail.
200 million bucks and they can't even support standard browser.
Why, yes, there has been changes to patent laws since then.
Several court rules, including a couple from SCOTUS have changed the rules. You might think these don't apply retroactively, but a review is not strictly a retroactive action. They would have to apply the current standards for any review.
Things like Prior Art, Obviousness, overly broad patents have all had reviews in the courts, as any google search will reveal.
Patents are challenged almost weekly, and a significant number of these are invalidated.
What could possibly go wrong?
Probably means we have have to launch new satellites.
The satellites will probably read some steamy romance/werewolf novel being downloaded across the net and start screwing with or biting each other. Either that or someone will download all the Slashdot source code and the satellites will crash and burn.
Me: Hello, I would like to order 10 bags of cement.
Hardware Store: yes sir, we will deliver those today.
Me: Wait, make that two times less bags.
Hardware Store: But Sir, there is no such thing as a negative bag of cement.
We need Constitution Impact statements filed with each bill.
We also need a provision that if you introduce or vote for a bill that is subsequently struck down as unconstitutional you lose half your salary and half your retirement for the first offense, and your office, salary, and retirement for the next offense.
How's that for Ex Post Facto, Mr Congressman!!!?
Well, to be fair, the author didn't text on OS X, he only tested on Windows.
I run OL on both Linux and Windows and have not seen this crash on save, but others in this thread have reported it.
Well, what I was getting at is there is a lot of functionality in Exchange/Outlook that is not needed, seldom used, designed for specific markets. Like every other Microsoft product, everything thrown at it sticks, and crappy functionality leads to code bloat.
Kerio and several others try to cut to the core needs. Instead of replacing everything they provide the essentials.
Most of those support contract requirements are done from a CYA point of view.
The few I've seen, the end users didn't know there was a support contract, and in at least one case there was no record of it ever being exercised. Even their IT staff didn't know who to call, but just got on the web and found all the answers.
Those contract are almost never helpful.
replacing all the functionality of Exchange/Outlook is not easy.
Nor even remotely necessary.
Neither attempts to be Outlook.
A better comparison would be Microsoft Office.
That you spend your entire day in an overgrown Email program speaks to your skill set more than anything else. Perhaps Microsoft should just ditch Windows and make an Outlook OS since that's about all some people ever learn to do.
When the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, you tend to look at every problem as it it were a nail.
Downloading a JRE doesn't seem that big of a deal. Most people have that installed already.
The review specifically stated:
I found no difference between the two offerings either in performance or stability. Neither crashed on me, even when handling documents designed to put productivity apps through the wringer.
That is my assessment as well. I've never seen any crashes on either version.
I agree that the UI puts things in odd places, and some things are done in un-obvious ways.
But basically I disagree with the author's "amateurish" assessment. That is pure Microsoft speak there, which translates into "Not all the things learned from years of swearing at Word translate to either of these packages".
At work we (and some of our customers) switched to OOO about 3 years ago, and for the types of documents (including some rather large manuals) it works just fine, and imported all of our old documents, from multiple different versions of MSOffice and Word.
When the devs jumped ship, we jumped with them to LibreOffice, retaining just a few seats of OOO in our customers shop, because they already paid for support contracts. But reports are that they have not been happy with what little help they got. The phone techs knew less than our people.
There are some missing functions that MS-Office users wish were available, and maddeningly well hidden features as well as stuff that just does not work. But these were not mainstream functionality that we needed in our shop.
LibreOffice is currently every bit as good as OOO, and in some ways better. Going forward, all the wet-ware is in their corner, and Oracle will probably take a year bringing replacements up to speed before any serious bugs can be addressed, let alone new features. (Although nothing will stop them from feeding off of the efforts of LibreOffice).
LibreOffice probably needs to think about a revenue stream for the future. I'm fine with that. Let those who absolutely have to have support contracts in place (for what ever reason) foot the bill.