...Thin-clients are rising in popularity again and it won't be long for them to become a familar site in small to large buisnesses. The only reason I can find to purchase Microsoft's XP thin-client is for those of us who would use it with terminal services. Terminal server requires a license for each connecting client, which a Windows OS has. One of the arguments I've heard against thin clients is the licensing fees for terminal service. Why purchase a $200 thin client and then a CAL license[1]when you can purchase a $400 full fledge desktop with XP? If my manager wasn't so strong against Office alternatives[2] a Linux server with OO.org would save the company a fortune. We wouldn't have to worry about costly maintenance[3] or extradanory licensing fees with an OSS thin-client.
[1] can't recall how much a CAL costs
[2] we're a government contractor and worried about compatibility
[3] defrag, spyware, updates, corruption, etc
Interesting that you bring up XP and Terminal Services Licensing. With the introduction of Server 2003, Microsoft obsoleted the built in XP CAL. You must purchase a separate CAL for TS regardless of which OS you are running (or regardless of whether had a license to connect before) Terminal Services
As Windows 2000 Server standard support is at EOL you might as well go with 2003 which runs TS very well and forget about which OS is on the client- you have to pay for it anyway.
My office runs thin clients or dumb terminals off the k12 terminal server project to grab the OS and connects to a 2003 server using rdesktop to connect to TS for the Windows software that we still *have* to use.
>>You can't even say that about Microsoft's production software let alone beta software.
Ya right. Their production software was good enough to power thousands and thousands of companies (both big and small) through the largest economic boom in the history of the U.S. Can't say that for Linux, or Apple. Stuff that in your pipe and smoke it.
It was also "good enough" to "power" the navy. If the Navy's experience is any indication of what happened during the "bubble" no wonder the economy crashed.
I'm confused; I thought we were against software patents?
We are. But even a GPL code writer does not want their code taken without "payment" regardless of whether there is a patent involved or not.
This is more about Bill Gate's long standing behavior of stomping on other people to get what he wants. His purchase of DOS is equivilant to paying beads and trinkets for Long Island and then he had the gall to write his "open letter to hobbyists" saying don't steal my code.
Even though Apple and Microsoft both stole/borrowed the GUI/mouse from Xerox Gates was pissed at Jobs for "stealing" it too (and then Jobs did it better/first so they had to "steal" again from Apple).
I have made, a number of times submissions, all of which were rejected. I noticed, two of my submissions were then submitted by someone else (and posted up) two days after my submission (and rejection).
Some things take two days to post. Just cause it was days after your submission doesn't mean you were first.
As a maintainer of GPLd software (in php) this begins to sound like any users who modify any part of it will have to release their changes... this is just goofy. I don't want to track anyone else's changes, especially if they are trivial which happens very frequently with php.
This would also mean anyone who downloads a package off the web would be required to contribute back essentially non public code. While some code might be beneficial to have in the base package I would argue that there is far more that only "scratches one itch" and who, as a maintainer/developer wants to have all that "itchiness" to keep track of? Not me.
Re:No matter how careful you are, you aren't enoug
on
ID Theft Made Easy
·
· Score: 2, Informative
CC numbers are not stored after usage locally if you use an electronic means of verifying them. (As opposed to the carbon paper machine you sometimes see when the power is down.) The store cannot get to them. They are required to not store them as part of their contract with the CC company.
Some states require that only the last 4 digits show up on the receipt and a lot of merchants only print them. But they are there - even if you think they aren't they are. When a cardholder refutes a charge with Amex (for example) Amex asks for the entire, unobfuscated card number to verify that you charged the right person.
As a merchant who accepts credit cards it amazes me that people think the SEE ID is valid. Just a few days ago someone posted a link that completely rebuffs the SEE ID line.
SEE ID is not a valid signature
An unsigned card (blank signature line) is not a valid card.
The card must be signed, period. Merchants who accept these cards are in violation of their contract with the card processing company and can potentially lose their right to accept credit cards. I don't know any that actually have though.
On the other hand, I have had people with unsigned cards argue with me that they don't sign their cards so a thief can't copy their signature I usually advise them that an unsigned card is not valid (it's written right under or over the signature line) and that they will have to sign the card in my presence and provide ID to verify the signature. Otherwise they have to come up with cash or another valid form of payment.
Perhaps if more merchants actually read the agreement that they sign there would be more protection for the card user. I don't expect it to happen any time soon though, there are still "$10 minimum for credit card purchases" signs (Visa and Mastercard do not allow minimums, Discover does) and merchants who want your phone number before they swipe a card (personal information as a requirement for purchases is a violation of the merchant contract)
If you really want them to look at photo id, get a card with your photo on it. Otherwise "rules is rules" and they should be followed on both sides.
I suppose that I am talking about forward compatibility. But I'm also talking about the newer version using different formats such that the older version is obsoleted due to its inability to read the newer versions.
I wonder if it will initially (or as a consequence of interactions between versions) have the same resistant uptake that occurs when Microsoft releases a new version of their office suite. I personally might hesitate a little - but only a little if there are no major glitches in my documents - due to document differences.
The more interesting long term affect will be the ability of all the listed to share documents between them which might leave MS Office as the odd man out when it comes to compatibility.
The question I have is will the new file format create a backwards compatibility problem? No one seems to have touched on this yet. The article does say that 1.1.5 will be able to use the new formats, so is that "enough"?
Backwards compatibility has always been a problem with MS Office and it seems that it's possible that older versions will get "obsoleted".
I believe you are correct. The first year that I was "a business" I did not claim it. My tax accountant said that it was not enough to claim. The following years after that, sometime it is, sometimes it is not. Either way, it is not that difficult to save the paper and recipts, and then throw them away if I don't need them.
The difference between whether you are a business or a hobby has to do with profit intent, not whether you actually "show" income. BTW, the definition of gross income essentially is total worldwide income that is not specifically exempt. This includes the value of services you receive in exchange for your services. When you exchange goods or services you are required to include the value of goods or services that you receive as your income.
And as much as I like google, I am not using it as a source of "tax advice". On top of that, your "tax accountant" gave you incorrect legal/tax advice. If you made at least $1.00 in gross receipts the form should be attached to your return, period. Your "tax accountant" should have also advised you of your requirement to report all income, if you are comfortable with not reporting all your income- or even letting someong talk you out of taking deductions that reduce your other income then I guess that will create whatever it creates, bad karma, whatever. Remember Capone was not convicted of his illegal activities, but for income tax evasion. Technically, crack dealers have to properly report their income whether it comes from legal or illegal sources.
IANATABIAAEA (I am not a "tax accountant" but I am an Enrolled Agent)
Luckily, the article was not about tax advice, but how to charge for services.
The point is that you should be allowed to benefit from it without your competitors being able to co-opt your idea and benefit from it also. Considering that, unless a market is in a phase of significant growth, a businesses success usually means there are other businesses failing, a new business process that gives you a competitive advantage can make the difference between sink or swim.
This us usually called trade secrets and are normally covered under some form of contract law between the company and the employee or company and another company. You don't need to patent a trade secret- someone else mentioned Coke's secret recipe, I'll throw KFC's secret recipe and other similar items into the mix- trade secret, not patentable. But if someone sold it to a competitor it would be detrimental to Coke/KFC and they could sue for business damages.
And The Peter Principle. Both authors (Scott and Peter) say very similar things and I found them to be quite interesting when dealing with management of any kind.
Back before I decided I couldn't stand it anymore I worked for a multinational corporation at the lowest and next lowest management tier.
The most important part of my job IMO was deciding what did not need to be "passed down" or heaped onto the front line employees. There was always stuff I considered to be stupid, trivial, a waste of time for those who really only get paid when they are doing their primary job description (yeah "other duties as assigned" means you work against your commission if there is commission to be made, and if there isn't there are too many people working/not enough business and you are working for "free")
When there are support personnel who only get paid hourly, they should take care of non-revenue jobs, not the revenue generating employees. And support personnel includes you as the manager if you don't get paid to directly generate revenue.
The best line I have ever heard about managers came from someone whose only purpose in quoting it was to try to get managment to just through hoops for her, "managers work for the employees". (She was/is a poor manager and tried to push her own shortcomings up the chain the way needy people do)
"Linus ate at McDonalds!" "Linus uses 2 ply toilet paper!" etc etc. Why not make a section devoted strictly to Linus (linus.slashdot.org) for the fawning and drooling and leave the Linux section to all things about Linux proper? That and some other minor changes would allow the readership to disable stories about what movie Linus watched over the weekend and other fluff if they wanted.
If I recall RMS properly, Linux is only the kernel everything else is GNU, so I would say that Linus/Linux kernel = Linux proper
(Note that I don't necessarily agree with RMS' megalomanical ranting that everything must be labeled GNU, and we passed on having him speak to our LUG cause he wanted us to change our name in order to be associated with us in any way)
They point out that they indemnify end users by paying out money to companies suing over patent infringments.
Last I checked it was Microsoft that was sued for infringing, not me, not you, Microsoft. We can't infringe if we didn't know the code was in there. They sure as hell better pay when they get sued and lose. No individual user is going to be sued for Microsoft's patent infringement. This is called covering your own ass and pretending that it is for the benefit of your customers. The theory of deepest pockets also comes into play.
Their TCO studies (commissioned by Microsoft) put the price of a *nix environment higher than a MS Windows environment, by counting the cost of moving from MS Windows, without considering the cleanup and patching costs of running MS Windows... or more precisely the lost productivity from the network/workstations/servers being down. They also don't consider in the Windows TCO the cost of moving from a *nix environment.
They call it a "bad thing" when customers buy RHEL, Suse Pro and customers are locked into older versions of software comparing Apache 1.3 to 2.0 on RH without pointing to the fact that bugfixes are backported and support for updates is listed at at least 5 years and without pointing out that with them you will either be buying a new OS or paying for the privilege of buying a new OS without one actually coming out within the subscription period (Software Assurance).
All in all no better than an infomercial.
According to the linked pdf of the settlement: 12. The settlement, in my view, is particularly valuable to the General Public because its benefits as a practical matter will have a broad reach to protect the rights of millions of consumers and it will for the first tim in history cause teh major software retailers to make available to consumers at the point of sale software license agreements for review, allow consumers to get ALL their money back from Software Publishers even if the shrink-wrap is broken, and cause the major software publishers like Microsoft to post their EULAS on the web for public viewing prior to slae with the corresponding web addresses printed in the respective software cartons. This result is particularly important as the software industry enters a new era of activation procedures, consumer tracking methods, and digitial rights managment - the remedies in this case allow consumers to more fairly review the software license agreements prior to sale and vote with their wallets - potentially causing software publishers to more efficiently compete on licensing terms.
Emphasis and spelling errors mine.
"Sloppy writing implies carelessness at best, ineptitude at worst."
What exactly are you alledging here? If the employee is inept, he/she should be fired. There are more effective means of testing ineptitude than evaluating email transcripts.
Except this is exactly what happens in business(or anywhere else for that matter) people are promoted until they are no longer competent to do their job- and thus are no longer promotable. Read The Peter Principle for more insight into this concept. Even though originally written in 1969 it still applies today.
I've read many an email, letter, and even a "corporate report" from one especially agrieving individual who not only fell under the Peter Principal, but also into the "Dumb People Are Too Dumb to Recognize Their Own Lack of Intelligence".
The "marketing" letters sent by this man were atrocious with hideously poor grammar including multiple fonts, bold on in one sentence off in the next, run on and incomplete sentences. He might as well have been writing a Nigeria scam letter.
Since when are newspaper columnists "accountable" to anybody other than their editors? Was Novak been brought to account for outing a CIA operative? And Dan Rather and CBS were actually brought to account primarily by bloggers.
Novak has not been brought to account due to the fact that the Administration wanted the CIA operative outed because her husband (also a journalist) refuted the Administration's claims that Saddam Hussein was purchasing the prerequesites for a nuclear weapon.
Novak is the type of right wing Clinton bashing blow hard that George W Bush likes. The person who leaked the CIA operative's name to Novak has committed a treasonous act but won't ever be brought to justice for two major reasons:
1) W doesn't want to find out who it was- hell it probably was ordered by W himself and they will do anything to keep it covered up.
2)Once the Dems get back into power, and they will, they will have a real respect for the First Amendment- not just when it suits them.
"Couldn't they put all sorts of compliance clauses into to insure that MS moves heaven and earth to deliver stable secure code?"
Damn. I have mod points too...
You mean like the Bush administration "...moved heaven to prevent a terrorist attack... if we had known" OH wait, that was "would have". But the Bush administration knew, Microsoft and the Air Force know.
Monoculture is dangerous in nature, eg. potato famine, and it is dangerous in networks, eg. slammer. This solution stinks. They already admit in the article that it takes them months to roll out patches, this ensures that all of the unpatched machines will have all, or nearly all, of the same vulnerabilities.
How about those using *nix workstations and connecting to their 2003 Server(using RDP) to use the few still required appsincluding freaking IE cause there really are some industries (mainly financial) who continue to dance to the snake charmer's flute and require ActiveX?
Newspapers, magazines, TV shows. All of these have ads so what's the difference that we are talking about here?
If I buy/rent a movie I have already paid for the movie. The ad exsists only to encourage me to buy/rent another movie. With TV, newspaper or magazines the ad plays a different purpose. In these cases the ad supliments the income received from the subscribers, in the case of a movie it's advertising for other movies from the same studio. Movie ads don't cost the movie companies anything AFAIK while these other ads do. There is a distinct difference in what the ads are, what they do and who they cost. So is it going to be illegal to stand in line to get popcorn until the movie starts?
How many stupid, redundant laws do we need?
According to the presentation on security given by Cisco this may be the ultimate tool for larger environments: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/secursw/ps5 057/index.html
It's supposed to lock machines down based upon master policies that you set centrally, and when laptop users reconnect after being 'out of the office' they can pull updates right off the central configuration. And it can be hidden from the end user.
The downside is that it comes from Cisco in a proprietary binary and that you usually have to get it from a channel, but if it works as advertised....
Slashdot Mirror
As Windows 2000 Server standard support is at EOL you might as well go with 2003 which runs TS very well and forget about which OS is on the client- you have to pay for it anyway.
My office runs thin clients or dumb terminals off the k12 terminal server project to grab the OS and connects to a 2003 server using rdesktop to connect to TS for the Windows software that we still *have* to use.
This is more about Bill Gate's long standing behavior of stomping on other people to get what he wants. His purchase of DOS is equivilant to paying beads and trinkets for Long Island and then he had the gall to write his "open letter to hobbyists" saying don't steal my code.
Even though Apple and Microsoft both stole/borrowed the GUI/mouse from Xerox Gates was pissed at Jobs for "stealing" it too (and then Jobs did it better/first so they had to "steal" again from Apple).
I have made, a number of times submissions, all of which were rejected. I noticed, two of my submissions were then submitted by someone else (and posted up) two days after my submission (and rejection).
Some things take two days to post. Just cause it was days after your submission doesn't mean you were first.
As a maintainer of GPLd software (in php) this begins to sound like any users who modify any part of it will have to release their changes... this is just goofy. I don't want to track anyone else's changes, especially if they are trivial which happens very frequently with php.
This would also mean anyone who downloads a package off the web would be required to contribute back essentially non public code. While some code might be beneficial to have in the base package I would argue that there is far more that only "scratches one itch" and who, as a maintainer/developer wants to have all that "itchiness" to keep track of? Not me.
CC numbers are not stored after usage locally if you use an electronic means of verifying them. (As opposed to the carbon paper machine you sometimes see when the power is down.) The store cannot get to them. They are required to not store them as part of their contract with the CC company.
Some states require that only the last 4 digits show up on the receipt and a lot of merchants only print them. But they are there - even if you think they aren't they are. When a cardholder refutes a charge with Amex (for example) Amex asks for the entire, unobfuscated card number to verify that you charged the right person.
- SEE ID is not a valid signature
- An unsigned card (blank signature line) is not a valid card.
The card must be signed, period. Merchants who accept these cards are in violation of their contract with the card processing company and can potentially lose their right to accept credit cards. I don't know any that actually have though.On the other hand, I have had people with unsigned cards argue with me that they don't sign their cards so a thief can't copy their signature
I usually advise them that an unsigned card is not valid (it's written right under or over the signature line) and that they will have to sign the card in my presence and provide ID to verify the signature. Otherwise they have to come up with cash or another valid form of payment.
Perhaps if more merchants actually read the agreement that they sign there would be more protection for the card user. I don't expect it to happen any time soon though, there are still "$10 minimum for credit card purchases" signs (Visa and Mastercard do not allow minimums, Discover does) and merchants who want your phone number before they swipe a card (personal information as a requirement for purchases is a violation of the merchant contract)
If you really want them to look at photo id, get a card with your photo on it. Otherwise "rules is rules" and they should be followed on both sides.
I suppose that I am talking about forward compatibility. But I'm also talking about the newer version using different formats such that the older version is obsoleted due to its inability to read the newer versions.
I wonder if it will initially (or as a consequence of interactions between versions) have the same resistant uptake that occurs when Microsoft releases a new version of their office suite. I personally might hesitate a little - but only a little if there are no major glitches in my documents - due to document differences.
The more interesting long term affect will be the ability of all the listed to share documents between them which might leave MS Office as the odd man out when it comes to compatibility.
The question I have is will the new file format create a backwards compatibility problem? No one seems to have touched on this yet. The article does say that 1.1.5 will be able to use the new formats, so is that "enough"?
Backwards compatibility has always been a problem with MS Office and it seems that it's possible that older versions will get "obsoleted".
I believe you are correct. The first year that I was "a business" I did not claim it. My tax accountant said that it was not enough to claim. The following years after that, sometime it is, sometimes it is not. Either way, it is not that difficult to save the paper and recipts, and then throw them away if I don't need them.
The difference between whether you are a business or a hobby has to do with profit intent, not whether you actually "show" income. BTW, the definition of gross income essentially is total worldwide income that is not specifically exempt. This includes the value of services you receive in exchange for your services. When you exchange goods or services you are required to include the value of goods or services that you receive as your income.
And as much as I like google, I am not using it as a source of "tax advice". On top of that, your "tax accountant" gave you incorrect legal/tax advice. If you made at least $1.00 in gross receipts the form should be attached to your return, period. Your "tax accountant" should have also advised you of your requirement to report all income, if you are comfortable with not reporting all your income- or even letting someong talk you out of taking deductions that reduce your other income then I guess that will create whatever it creates, bad karma, whatever. Remember Capone was not convicted of his illegal activities, but for income tax evasion. Technically, crack dealers have to properly report their income whether it comes from legal or illegal sources.
IANATABIAAEA (I am not a "tax accountant" but I am an Enrolled Agent)
Luckily, the article was not about tax advice, but how to charge for services.
The point is that you should be allowed to benefit from it without your competitors being able to co-opt your idea and benefit from it also. Considering that, unless a market is in a phase of significant growth, a businesses success usually means there are other businesses failing, a new business process that gives you a competitive advantage can make the difference between sink or swim.
This us usually called trade secrets and are normally covered under some form of contract law between the company and the employee or company and another company. You don't need to patent a trade secret- someone else mentioned Coke's secret recipe, I'll throw KFC's secret recipe and other similar items into the mix- trade secret, not patentable. But if someone sold it to a competitor it would be detrimental to Coke/KFC and they could sue for business damages.
And The Peter Principle. Both authors (Scott and Peter) say very similar things and I found them to be quite interesting when dealing with management of any kind.
Back before I decided I couldn't stand it anymore I worked for a multinational corporation at the lowest and next lowest management tier.
The most important part of my job IMO was deciding what did not need to be "passed down" or heaped onto the front line employees. There was always stuff I considered to be stupid, trivial, a waste of time for those who really only get paid when they are doing their primary job description (yeah "other duties as assigned" means you work against your commission if there is commission to be made, and if there isn't there are too many people working/not enough business and you are working for "free")
When there are support personnel who only get paid hourly, they should take care of non-revenue jobs, not the revenue generating employees. And support personnel includes you as the manager if you don't get paid to directly generate revenue.
The best line I have ever heard about managers came from someone whose only purpose in quoting it was to try to get managment to just through hoops for her, "managers work for the employees". (She was/is a poor manager and tried to push her own shortcomings up the chain the way needy people do)
"Linus ate at McDonalds!" "Linus uses 2 ply toilet paper!" etc etc. Why not make a section devoted strictly to Linus (linus.slashdot.org) for the fawning and drooling and leave the Linux section to all things about Linux proper? That and some other minor changes would allow the readership to disable stories about what movie Linus watched over the weekend and other fluff if they wanted.
If I recall RMS properly, Linux is only the kernel everything else is GNU, so I would say that Linus/Linux kernel = Linux proper
(Note that I don't necessarily agree with RMS' megalomanical ranting that everything must be labeled GNU, and we passed on having him speak to our LUG cause he wanted us to change our name in order to be associated with us in any way)
They point out that they indemnify end users by paying out money to companies suing over patent infringments.
Last I checked it was Microsoft that was sued for infringing, not me, not you, Microsoft. We can't infringe if we didn't know the code was in there. They sure as hell better pay when they get sued and lose. No individual user is going to be sued for Microsoft's patent infringement. This is called covering your own ass and pretending that it is for the benefit of your customers. The theory of deepest pockets also comes into play.
Their TCO studies (commissioned by Microsoft) put the price of a *nix environment higher than a MS Windows environment, by counting the cost of moving from MS Windows, without considering the cleanup and patching costs of running MS Windows... or more precisely the lost productivity from the network/workstations/servers being down. They also don't consider in the Windows TCO the cost of moving from a *nix environment.
They call it a "bad thing" when customers buy RHEL, Suse Pro and customers are locked into older versions of software comparing Apache 1.3 to 2.0 on RH without pointing to the fact that bugfixes are backported and support for updates is listed at at least 5 years and without pointing out that with them you will either be buying a new OS or paying for the privilege of buying a new OS without one actually coming out within the subscription period (Software Assurance).
All in all no better than an infomercial.
According to the linked pdf of the settlement:
12. The settlement, in my view, is particularly valuable to the General Public because its benefits as a practical matter will have a broad reach to protect the rights of millions of consumers and it will for the first tim in history cause teh major software retailers to make available to consumers at the point of sale software license agreements for review, allow consumers to get ALL their money back from Software Publishers even if the shrink-wrap is broken, and cause the major software publishers like Microsoft to post their EULAS on the web for public viewing prior to slae with the corresponding web addresses printed in the respective software cartons. This result is particularly important as the software industry enters a new era of activation procedures, consumer tracking methods, and digitial rights managment - the remedies in this case allow consumers to more fairly review the software license agreements prior to sale and vote with their wallets - potentially causing software publishers to more efficiently compete on licensing terms.
Emphasis and spelling errors mine.
"Sloppy writing implies carelessness at best, ineptitude at worst."
What exactly are you alledging here? If the employee is inept, he/she should be fired. There are more effective means of testing ineptitude than evaluating email transcripts.
Except this is exactly what happens in business(or anywhere else for that matter) people are promoted until they are no longer competent to do their job- and thus are no longer promotable. Read The Peter Principle for more insight into this concept. Even though originally written in 1969 it still applies today.
I've read many an email, letter, and even a "corporate report" from one especially agrieving individual who not only fell under the Peter Principal, but also into the "Dumb People Are Too Dumb to Recognize Their Own Lack of Intelligence".
The "marketing" letters sent by this man were atrocious with hideously poor grammar including multiple fonts, bold on in one sentence off in the next, run on and incomplete sentences. He might as well have been writing a Nigeria scam letter.
Since when are newspaper columnists "accountable" to anybody other than their editors? Was Novak been brought to account for outing a CIA operative? And Dan Rather and CBS were actually brought to account primarily by bloggers.
Novak has not been brought to account due to the fact that the Administration wanted the CIA operative outed because her husband (also a journalist) refuted the Administration's claims that Saddam Hussein was purchasing the prerequesites for a nuclear weapon.
Novak is the type of right wing Clinton bashing blow hard that George W Bush likes. The person who leaked the CIA operative's name to Novak has committed a treasonous act but won't ever be brought to justice for two major reasons:
1) W doesn't want to find out who it was- hell it probably was ordered by W himself and they will do anything to keep it covered up.
2)Once the Dems get back into power, and they will, they will have a real respect for the First Amendment- not just when it suits them.
"Couldn't they put all sorts of compliance clauses into to insure that MS moves heaven and earth to deliver stable secure code?"
Damn. I have mod points too...
You mean like the Bush administration "...moved heaven to prevent a terrorist attack... if we had known" OH wait, that was "would have". But the Bush administration knew, Microsoft and the Air Force know.
Monoculture is dangerous in nature, eg. potato famine, and it is dangerous in networks, eg. slammer. This solution stinks. They already admit in the article that it takes them months to roll out patches, this ensures that all of the unpatched machines will have all, or nearly all, of the same vulnerabilities.
"/now watch this drive"
/now That's a good sig
How about those using *nix workstations and connecting to their 2003 Server(using RDP) to use the few still required apps including freaking IE cause there really are some industries (mainly financial) who continue to dance to the snake charmer's flute and require ActiveX?
I mean, if everything I own had its own RFID tag, nothing would ever get lost in my room!
Unless you lost the RFID reader.
Newspapers, magazines, TV shows. All of these have ads so what's the difference that we are talking about here?
If I buy/rent a movie I have already paid for the movie. The ad exsists only to encourage me to buy/rent another movie. With TV, newspaper or magazines the ad plays a different purpose. In these cases the ad supliments the income received from the subscribers, in the case of a movie it's advertising for other movies from the same studio. Movie ads don't cost the movie companies anything AFAIK while these other ads do. There is a distinct difference in what the ads are, what they do and who they cost. So is it going to be illegal to stand in line to get popcorn until the movie starts?
How many stupid, redundant laws do we need?
According to the presentation on security given by Cisco this may be the ultimate tool for larger environments: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/secursw/ps5 057/index.html
It's supposed to lock machines down based upon master policies that you set centrally, and when laptop users reconnect after being 'out of the office' they can pull updates right off the central configuration. And it can be hidden from the end user.
The downside is that it comes from Cisco in a proprietary binary and that you usually have to get it from a channel, but if it works as advertised....