he may be very smart and write very good science fiction, but on this occasion, he's being a complete tit.
No solutions, no real rebuttal, just a bunch of sophomoric remarks that appear to be justified by a belief that James Lovelock is proposing that the answer to our energy problems are nuclear *weapons*.
Move along, nothing to see here.
I think your title is correct (minus the question mark).
The ACLU can't publish because they are bound by the court's order... but since the Post knows what the text said (because it appeared on the website) and they are not the subject of the order, they can. At least that's my interpretation. I'm thinking that the post published the text precisely to highlight the complete absurdity of requiring redaction of something that is already out in the open...
"Similar criticisms have been leveled against Paul Heckel, president of Intellectual Property Creators in Los Altos, Calif. Heckel has a patent for the partial display of computer files, allowing them to be presented as an index so users can preview files before opening them. Heckel now says many online newspapers across America use this technique on their home pages to tease visitors to click on links and read entire articles. He sent license demand letters to 60 of them recently. "Three or four" newspapers have paid license fees to Heckel, he said; the other cases have been dismissed and will be refiled. Hangartner represented one of the newspapers.
Heckel said he couldn't discuss the patent, citing ongoing litigation. But he defended the practice of first suing small companies to win settlements that would then be used to finance lawsuits against larger litigants with bigger legal budgets."
need to go and look at the specific claims in the patent. But wouldn't the rather old "head" tool in every flavor of *N*X I can think of perform a partial display of computer files?
It's just unfortunate that so much (of our) money had to be spent before it became obvious to the point that something had to be done about it.
What I found truly shocking was the way that Diebold admitted yesterday that thousands of voters had been disenfranchised as a result of their practices, and didn't seem to treat it as a big deal. Now we have an employee complaining that the state is being "too confrontational" and they should be "working together to fix the problems"
Fundamental disconnect here, methinks. If you pay a commercial organization good money to deliver a system, which they get to keep proprietary, it's up to them to fix it. If the system design and software is to be open to inspection, then we can talk about "working together"
firstly, this is a processor for phones and PDAs, not for PCs. Phones are typically closed platforms in any event, and I can't think of any mid-range phones (leaving aside the full-feature-OS type of phones) that are frequently hacked with your own software.
Secondly, calling this a "DRM" feature is a bit of a stretch. Whilst it could be used for such a function, what is being provided is a security processor with a locked key store. I don't see anything wrong with that per se. It does have useful applications.
A particular phone manufacturer might be able to utilize it for "DRM" applications - but that's up to them. Nothing prevents them from installing non-"DRM"ed software should they choose.
If you are looking at a phone or PDA on which you can load your own software (like a PalmOS phone, say) then this is doubly true. Don't want a DRMed application? No problem. Don't use it, and don't buy the DRMed content. Use some other application.
While I recognize that some people (myself included) hate the idea of DRMed content, my concern is with the market for content getting monopolized as DRMed only. Application providers are going to write DRM applications with or without hardware crypto support, and most of it will get broken irrespective of hardware crypto support. I don't really see that as an issue.
Having hardware crypto support, with locked key stores, is still a good thing, in my view. Ignore the stuff about how it's good for DRM. Recognize that it's good for security too.
I doubt that's what they had in mind, but I take the point.
Making everything illegal and then selectively enforcing it effectively destroys justice - you no longer have any kind of due process, but instead are judged a criminal or not on a whim
(2) In particular, legal remedies shall be provided against those who:
(i) decrypt an encrypted program-carrying signal;
(ii) receive and distribute or communicate to the public an encrypted program-carrying signal that has been decrypted without the express authorization of the broadcasting organizatoin that emitted it;
(iii) participate in the manufacture, importation, sale or any other act that makes available a device or system capable of decrypting or helping to decrypt an encrypted program-carrying signal.
so... this means that digital TVs would become illegal. Or, in fact, any device that would allow you to actually watch the encrypted TV, since the proposal is that a device which can decrypt the content under any circumstances (even to watch it) is illegal. Period. No exceptions. Only part (ii) here has an exemption for express authorization by the broadcaster. Part (i) makes it illegal to watch TV if it was encrypted (since you have to decrypt it to watch it) and part (iii) makes it illegal to sell a TV.
Y'know, I'm thinking maybe that isn't what they meant. Isn't overbroad legislation wonderful?:-)
I can't see anything in the text of the article that even speaks to the subject of the headline, much less justifies it.
The article talks about how difficult it is to make a persistent-world multiplayer game to work out financially, and talks about a couple of such games being cancelled for that reason. It also contrasts persistent versus non persistent multiplayer games.
I talks about platforms they run on, but I don't see where the console/PC distinction is being made. What am I missing?
Why are you proposing "solutions" here? Aren't you and the *AA supposed to work it out yourselves? I am suspecting you're an *AA supporter, or a wannabe.
Sorry. I had no idea that (gasp!) proposing solutions would be so controversial. I'm not sure what a "wannabe" even means in this context, and I don't "support" the *AA, whatever that means either. I'm just a communications engineer (with a cryptography background) thinking about the problem. Apparently I'm also an old fart. It's perfectly clear that the *AAs idea of a leakproof "digital rights management" system is cryptographically bogus, and if they want anything functional they're going to have to compromise. What I'm suggesting is something which doesn't attempt to lock anything at the user end, but might just be good enough to persuade file sharers to use it.
This is for the moderators on crack:
What's to stop someone from ripping songs to.mp3 or other more free formats and distribute them in current P2P? You want DRM in your songs and BigBro to watch you? The stupid suggestions only work, if the customers cooperate. If you have customer cooperation, you wouldn't have people uploading and downloading stuff they didn't pay for - this is only a problem for most, if not all, *AA style businesses.
Nothing *stops* you doing it. I'm not proposing any "DRM" or other locks, or even closed source clients. What I'm proposing is a model which makes it not worth doing it.
Look at it like this: if I pay to "get legal" under this system, but don't follow the rule that says I must use the auth protocol before uploading, what I'm doing is permitting other people to get away without paying the fee, but I'm the one who gets busted for doing it, even though I paid the fee myself. Add to that the fact that the system is policable, in that the administrator server knows who you are by means of your authenticating with it, and I'm figuring it's not worth cheating.
This is a very different philosophy from the "DRM" approach. I don't like the idea of a system that tries to make it impossible to cheat and tramples all over your ability to do reasonable things at the same time (that's how I would characterize a DRM system). I'd rather have a system which assumes you won't cheat if given a fair deal.
The whole point of the *AA's monopoly is to rip off musicians, to solely use their distribution systems, and to use DRM file formats for pay-per-play, if possible. If they change, they no longer have a monopoly.
You may be right. Personally, I don't think what they're doing is sustainable. If they don't figure that out very soon, they're history.
These lawsuits are perfect. The only effective way to defeat the *AA is to boycott them permanently en masse, and support the alternatives simultaneously.
Don't disagree. But that assumes that the big label music industry continues down it's current path. I'm wondering if they have another option, that's all.
Isn't this why Open Source is thriving today? It started with people boycotting closed source, and developed Open Source. If you can't write a half-assed song, look for Free alternatives; and stop proposing solutions, even stupid ones, for the *AA.
I don't know that the free software model will work for music. Not very many people are *really* good at making music. But hey, competition is good. If people want to make music and release it for free, good for them.
This one has been suggested many times and indeed implemented a few times as you point out, but personally I'm not a fan of this method, because everybody pays regardless of their usage of the media. I make a lot of CD-Rs with family photographs to send out to family and freinds. Should I have to pay the music industry to be able to do that?
I find that objectionable myself. That's why I'd like to see a scheme which you pay for if you actually download music, and tied only to that.
agreed that it's difficult, but I think it's just about workable using known protocols. File sharing relies on a large number of people using the same protocol, so it's difficult to keep a secret.
And yes, spyware or "trusted computing" would destroy the whole thing. A basic premise here is that it has to work with an arbitrary client. People don't like being forced into using a specific closed source client.
...but it's only going to stop when the music industry is prepared to work with some alternatives. The EFF proposed a licensing scheme that is a good start, but my view is that it's still missing something.
Here's my problem statement:
1. File sharers like the p2p model as a way of finding new music. They like it partly because it's free, but my suspicion is that there's more to it than that. They like the model. Radio is dead, and the RIAA killed it, via ClearChannel. I'm going to suggest that, given a workable model that preserves file sharing, but allows musicians and their promoters to earn revenues, file sharers will move to a legal model. But it has to preserve the basics of the current open file sharing model.
2. File sharers want to use whatever client they feel like. Any "legalized" file sharing method which forces users into using a specific locked, closed source client is likely to fail.
3. A flat fee system, with built in means to prevent cheating (leaking to uncontrolled distribution) and gaming the system (permitting individuals to artificially inflate download numbers for a particular song) would generate sufficient revenues and a method for divvying up those revenues that would be acceptable to the music industry and musicians.
That's a tall order, but I think it can be done. Consider this:
If you pay a flat fee into my proposed system, you have the rights to:
a. download content with copyrights held by participating contributors freely, by any method.
b. upload that participating content, but only to those that have also paid the fee.
I believe this can be done. To meet my criterion 2, it has to be done by defining a protocol, not a specific client. Criterion 3 can be met by making it trivial to police, to ensure that subscribers aren't cheating. So here's my protocol, at least in a cartoon-back-of-the-envelope form:
Subscribers use a client which authenticates with the license administrator's server. This authentication may be long term, results in a symmetric key shared with the server and bound to a subscriber's identity, and which is your proof that you are a participant. The protocol requires that, prior to actually sharing any content (but not necessarily advertizing it) you perform a 3-way authentication with the party that wishes to share your content and the administration server farm. This can be done using a Needham-Schroeder protocol, by which the administration server pushes, on request, a symmetric key to the two parties. By using this protocol, you have fulfilled your obligation to only upload content to participating subscribers. Your proof is provided by the administration server in distributing the key. Note that you don't need to know the identity of the other party; you only know that they are a subscriber. The symmetric key you share with them is then used to encrypt the content you send them.
Data gathering in this scheme is trivial; the administrators take a sample of the content which has been distributed by scanning the upload directories of subscribers. What is measured is the relative distribution of content, not the number of uploads, and because you don't know the identity of the scanning party, it's very difficult to game the system.
Policing is also simple. The administrative server can ping authenticated subscribers to verify that they aren't using any other file sharing protocol.
So, there may be some things in here you find objectionable. But is this a fair compromise? Could this work?
showing such unlikely locations as base camp on the ascent to the peak of a mountain. In such a case having 802.11b in your laptop would be the absolute least of your technological worries.
Maybe you didn't see the news about that... somebody complained that the ad about getting Wi-Fi access at Everest base camp was misleading. Intel pointed out that there is in fact a Wi-Fi hotspot at Everest base camp, because Intel set one up there. It's still there.
Let's get this straight. If Intel sells a processor with higher clock speed, the AMD processor is better because it has higher IPC.
On the other hand, if Intel sells a processor with higher IPC, the AMD processor is better because it has higher clock speed.
Have you actually looked at the Centrino specs?
Also, did you actually RTFA? It talks about the researchers finding that Intel sent round teams of engineers with "an impressive array of test gear" to the hotspots and made sure they were running correctly, fixing any compatibility problems they might have run into, particularly with regard to making sure VPN connect through worked correctly.
Sure as hell beats turning up with a window sticker, no?
you could start by talkig to El Al. They do actually have a proven track record under very difficult conditions.
As has been pointed out, random extra searches are much more effective. We know that the 9/11 hijackers self-screened themselves - going through airport checkpoints many times to make sure that those that arose suspicion could be eliminated from the team. This is precisely why this green/yellow/red tagging system will fail. Not only is it circumventable by real terrorists, but the exact method that completely circumvents it has already been practiced by exactly the people we're looking for.
...which, realistically, I don't think I have anyway. You might disagree, but it doesn't worry me hugely in this specific case.
What does worry me is that the means by which the green/yellow/red designation is arrived at is classified, and it isn't possible to examine the data which led to it. So what happens if I'm one of the people incorrectly flagged as red? Do I have any means of redress, or setting the record straight? That doesn't seem likely, given that the data and methods are classified. It simply isn't possible to question.
Given that there will be false positives, what do those people do about it? Or are they just basically screwed, and have no due process? Are they going to be simply told that flying isn't actually a right, and they have been denied permission, so deal with it?
I'll wait eagerly for the first case of this happening, to see the reaction.
I have a horrible feeling that, shortly after the system is switched on, a small group of carefully picked selectees, who do in fact have violent criminal pasts (and that would be public data) are paraded before the media, in order to plant the meme that the system is infallible and has "made us all safer". I anticipate headlines along the lines of "CAPPS II huge success - stops several violent criminals from boarding aircraft on first day". Then, when an innocent person is selected, it will be presented as "there's no smoke without fire" and "the system knows something" but we can't be told what it is for "national security reasons". That way, the innocent selectees are doubly screwed, convicted and sentenced without knowing what algorithm was used, and shrouded in a cloud of suspicion they can do nothing about?
That leads to another important question - will the green/yellow/red status determined for an individual be protected information, or will it be accessible to, say, employers and landlords? And will there be any protection against other discrimination (besides airline travel) on those individuals? I'm thinking not. To do so would be to admit that the system is fallible. I'm not holding my breath.
This has to be the scariest system I've ever seen this side of the Berlin wall (when it existed). Even worse, it seems plain to me that it won't actually make us any safer
"Morph" was the name of Nick Parks' (of Wallace and Gromit fame) first televised claymation character. So called because he would, well, morph into different objects during the course of the sequence.
It was a short spot on an afternoon children's TV show in the UK, originating in 1976:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bristol/content/goingout/2004/02/09/aardman.shtml
it's all about drivers. From a software point of view, it'll look like USB. That might not sound like a big deal, but believe me, if you develop USB devices, it matters a lot
no they didn't. Rob Enderle declared that WUSB meant that Bluetooth was dead, and extrapolated from *his* inference to get to "Intel says Bluetooth is dead"
Krill
the important difference is the ability to manufacture gigabit speed optical transceivers from silicon.
Previously, such devices either required gallium arsenide or were much slower (the cited article states the previous silicon optical speed record at 20 Mbit/s). That's a pretty big advance
The issue I see (potentially) with RFID tags is that there isn't the same expectation of a response. I'm heartened by some of the reactions, and that it gave manufacturers pause (Gillette caused a storm with experiments in Cambridge, England, and were forced to withdraw their scheme - kind of spooky for me, because even though I now live several thousand miles away, that used to be my local store at one time. But I digress...).
However, there is a difference. TiVo is a relatively small company (no, really, it is) and their survival is far from assured at this point. I hope they do survive, but that fact gives them cause to be sensitive.
This doesn't necessarily apply to RFID tags. Whilst some retailers and manufacturers have backed off for now (see above) they are, right now, working out how to make this happen without consumers noticing until it's too late to change. As I saw one quote (wish I'd kept it, I really do) which said "consumers will not accept this if we introduce it all at once, so it is important to take a step-by-step approach". That horrified me when I saw it. It reads to me as "we need to boil the water slowly so the frogs don't notice". Maybe I'm being too cynical, but this is exactly what I belive the major retailers will do. They see significant advantages in this technology, and want to see it happen for their own purposes. I have seen proposals that talk about tracking goods post-sale for purposes of repair history and so on. There is great willingness to push the technology, and I haven't seen very much genuine concern for the privacy implications - only what it will mean for the bottom line (which is, to be fair, reasonable for a public company). Nonetheless, one has to be concerned about these issues. A number of big retailers implementing RFID tags all at the same time would not be quite so sensitive to customer concerns here.
Slashdot Mirror
he may be very smart and write very good science fiction, but on this occasion, he's being a complete tit. No solutions, no real rebuttal, just a bunch of sophomoric remarks that appear to be justified by a belief that James Lovelock is proposing that the answer to our energy problems are nuclear *weapons*. Move along, nothing to see here.
The ACLU can't publish because they are bound by the court's order... but since the Post knows what the text said (because it appeared on the website) and they are not the subject of the order, they can. At least that's my interpretation. I'm thinking that the post published the text precisely to highlight the complete absurdity of requiring redaction of something that is already out in the open...
"Similar criticisms have been leveled against Paul Heckel, president of Intellectual Property Creators in Los Altos, Calif. Heckel has a patent for the partial display of computer files, allowing them to be presented as an index so users can preview files before opening them. Heckel now says many online newspapers across America use this technique on their home pages to tease visitors to click on links and read entire articles. He sent license demand letters to 60 of them recently. "Three or four" newspapers have paid license fees to Heckel, he said; the other cases have been dismissed and will be refiled. Hangartner represented one of the newspapers. Heckel said he couldn't discuss the patent, citing ongoing litigation. But he defended the practice of first suing small companies to win settlements that would then be used to finance lawsuits against larger litigants with bigger legal budgets." need to go and look at the specific claims in the patent. But wouldn't the rather old "head" tool in every flavor of *N*X I can think of perform a partial display of computer files?
It's just unfortunate that so much (of our) money had to be spent before it became obvious to the point that something had to be done about it. What I found truly shocking was the way that Diebold admitted yesterday that thousands of voters had been disenfranchised as a result of their practices, and didn't seem to treat it as a big deal. Now we have an employee complaining that the state is being "too confrontational" and they should be "working together to fix the problems" Fundamental disconnect here, methinks. If you pay a commercial organization good money to deliver a system, which they get to keep proprietary, it's up to them to fix it. If the system design and software is to be open to inspection, then we can talk about "working together"
Secondly, calling this a "DRM" feature is a bit of a stretch. Whilst it could be used for such a function, what is being provided is a security processor with a locked key store. I don't see anything wrong with that per se. It does have useful applications.
A particular phone manufacturer might be able to utilize it for "DRM" applications - but that's up to them. Nothing prevents them from installing non-"DRM"ed software should they choose.
If you are looking at a phone or PDA on which you can load your own software (like a PalmOS phone, say) then this is doubly true. Don't want a DRMed application? No problem. Don't use it, and don't buy the DRMed content. Use some other application.
While I recognize that some people (myself included) hate the idea of DRMed content, my concern is with the market for content getting monopolized as DRMed only. Application providers are going to write DRM applications with or without hardware crypto support, and most of it will get broken irrespective of hardware crypto support. I don't really see that as an issue.
Having hardware crypto support, with locked key stores, is still a good thing, in my view. Ignore the stuff about how it's good for DRM. Recognize that it's good for security too.
just my humble opinion, of course...
Krill
Making everything illegal and then selectively enforcing it effectively destroys justice - you no longer have any kind of due process, but instead are judged a criminal or not on a whim
Alternative V
(2) In particular, legal remedies shall be provided against those who:
(i) decrypt an encrypted program-carrying signal;
(ii) receive and distribute or communicate to the public an encrypted program-carrying signal that has been decrypted without the express authorization of the broadcasting organizatoin that emitted it;
(iii) participate in the manufacture, importation, sale or any other act that makes available a device or system capable of decrypting or helping to decrypt an encrypted program-carrying signal.
so... this means that digital TVs would become illegal. Or, in fact, any device that would allow you to actually watch the encrypted TV, since the proposal is that a device which can decrypt the content under any circumstances (even to watch it) is illegal. Period. No exceptions. Only part (ii) here has an exemption for express authorization by the broadcaster. Part (i) makes it illegal to watch TV if it was encrypted (since you have to decrypt it to watch it) and part (iii) makes it illegal to sell a TV.
Y'know, I'm thinking maybe that isn't what they meant. Isn't overbroad legislation wonderful? :-)
Mostly Italian Electrician
The article talks about how difficult it is to make a persistent-world multiplayer game to work out financially, and talks about a couple of such games being cancelled for that reason. It also contrasts persistent versus non persistent multiplayer games.
I talks about platforms they run on, but I don't see where the console/PC distinction is being made. What am I missing?
Krill
Sorry. I had no idea that (gasp!) proposing solutions would be so controversial. I'm not sure what a "wannabe" even means in this context, and I don't "support" the *AA, whatever that means either. I'm just a communications engineer (with a cryptography background) thinking about the problem. Apparently I'm also an old fart. It's perfectly clear that the *AAs idea of a leakproof "digital rights management" system is cryptographically bogus, and if they want anything functional they're going to have to compromise. What I'm suggesting is something which doesn't attempt to lock anything at the user end, but might just be good enough to persuade file sharers to use it.
This is for the moderators on crack: What's to stop someone from ripping songs to .mp3 or other more free formats and distribute them in current P2P? You want DRM in your songs and BigBro to watch you? The stupid suggestions only work, if the customers cooperate. If you have customer cooperation, you wouldn't have people uploading and downloading stuff they didn't pay for - this is only a problem for most, if not all, *AA style businesses.
Nothing *stops* you doing it. I'm not proposing any "DRM" or other locks, or even closed source clients. What I'm proposing is a model which makes it not worth doing it.
Look at it like this: if I pay to "get legal" under this system, but don't follow the rule that says I must use the auth protocol before uploading, what I'm doing is permitting other people to get away without paying the fee, but I'm the one who gets busted for doing it, even though I paid the fee myself. Add to that the fact that the system is policable, in that the administrator server knows who you are by means of your authenticating with it, and I'm figuring it's not worth cheating.
This is a very different philosophy from the "DRM" approach. I don't like the idea of a system that tries to make it impossible to cheat and tramples all over your ability to do reasonable things at the same time (that's how I would characterize a DRM system). I'd rather have a system which assumes you won't cheat if given a fair deal.
The whole point of the *AA's monopoly is to rip off musicians, to solely use their distribution systems, and to use DRM file formats for pay-per-play, if possible. If they change, they no longer have a monopoly.
You may be right. Personally, I don't think what they're doing is sustainable. If they don't figure that out very soon, they're history.
These lawsuits are perfect. The only effective way to defeat the *AA is to boycott them permanently en masse, and support the alternatives simultaneously.
Don't disagree. But that assumes that the big label music industry continues down it's current path. I'm wondering if they have another option, that's all.
Isn't this why Open Source is thriving today? It started with people boycotting closed source, and developed Open Source. If you can't write a half-assed song, look for Free alternatives; and stop proposing solutions, even stupid ones, for the *AA.
I don't know that the free software model will work for music. Not very many people are *really* good at making music. But hey, competition is good. If people want to make music and release it for free, good for them.
Krill
I find that objectionable myself. That's why I'd like to see a scheme which you pay for if you actually download music, and tied only to that.
Krill
And yes, spyware or "trusted computing" would destroy the whole thing. A basic premise here is that it has to work with an arbitrary client. People don't like being forced into using a specific closed source client.
Krill
Here's my problem statement:
1. File sharers like the p2p model as a way of finding new music. They like it partly because it's free, but my suspicion is that there's more to it than that. They like the model. Radio is dead, and the RIAA killed it, via ClearChannel. I'm going to suggest that, given a workable model that preserves file sharing, but allows musicians and their promoters to earn revenues, file sharers will move to a legal model. But it has to preserve the basics of the current open file sharing model.
2. File sharers want to use whatever client they feel like. Any "legalized" file sharing method which forces users into using a specific locked, closed source client is likely to fail.
3. A flat fee system, with built in means to prevent cheating (leaking to uncontrolled distribution) and gaming the system (permitting individuals to artificially inflate download numbers for a particular song) would generate sufficient revenues and a method for divvying up those revenues that would be acceptable to the music industry and musicians.
That's a tall order, but I think it can be done. Consider this:
If you pay a flat fee into my proposed system, you have the rights to:
a. download content with copyrights held by participating contributors freely, by any method.
b. upload that participating content, but only to those that have also paid the fee.
I believe this can be done. To meet my criterion 2, it has to be done by defining a protocol, not a specific client. Criterion 3 can be met by making it trivial to police, to ensure that subscribers aren't cheating. So here's my protocol, at least in a cartoon-back-of-the-envelope form:
Subscribers use a client which authenticates with the license administrator's server. This authentication may be long term, results in a symmetric key shared with the server and bound to a subscriber's identity, and which is your proof that you are a participant. The protocol requires that, prior to actually sharing any content (but not necessarily advertizing it) you perform a 3-way authentication with the party that wishes to share your content and the administration server farm. This can be done using a Needham-Schroeder protocol, by which the administration server pushes, on request, a symmetric key to the two parties. By using this protocol, you have fulfilled your obligation to only upload content to participating subscribers. Your proof is provided by the administration server in distributing the key. Note that you don't need to know the identity of the other party; you only know that they are a subscriber. The symmetric key you share with them is then used to encrypt the content you send them.
Data gathering in this scheme is trivial; the administrators take a sample of the content which has been distributed by scanning the upload directories of subscribers. What is measured is the relative distribution of content, not the number of uploads, and because you don't know the identity of the scanning party, it's very difficult to game the system.
Policing is also simple. The administrative server can ping authenticated subscribers to verify that they aren't using any other file sharing protocol.
So, there may be some things in here you find objectionable. But is this a fair compromise? Could this work?
Comments?
Krill
Not in the least. It's a completely different architecture from any of the previous Pentium CPUs
Maybe you didn't see the news about that... somebody complained that the ad about getting Wi-Fi access at Everest base camp was misleading. Intel pointed out that there is in fact a Wi-Fi hotspot at Everest base camp, because Intel set one up there. It's still there.
Let's get this straight. If Intel sells a processor with higher clock speed, the AMD processor is better because it has higher IPC.
On the other hand, if Intel sells a processor with higher IPC, the AMD processor is better because it has higher clock speed.
Have you actually looked at the Centrino specs?
Also, did you actually RTFA? It talks about the researchers finding that Intel sent round teams of engineers with "an impressive array of test gear" to the hotspots and made sure they were running correctly, fixing any compatibility problems they might have run into, particularly with regard to making sure VPN connect through worked correctly.
Sure as hell beats turning up with a window sticker, no?
As has been pointed out, random extra searches are much more effective. We know that the 9/11 hijackers self-screened themselves - going through airport checkpoints many times to make sure that those that arose suspicion could be eliminated from the team. This is precisely why this green/yellow/red tagging system will fail. Not only is it circumventable by real terrorists, but the exact method that completely circumvents it has already been practiced by exactly the people we're looking for.
Krill
What does worry me is that the means by which the green/yellow/red designation is arrived at is classified, and it isn't possible to examine the data which led to it. So what happens if I'm one of the people incorrectly flagged as red? Do I have any means of redress, or setting the record straight? That doesn't seem likely, given that the data and methods are classified. It simply isn't possible to question.
Given that there will be false positives, what do those people do about it? Or are they just basically screwed, and have no due process? Are they going to be simply told that flying isn't actually a right, and they have been denied permission, so deal with it?
I'll wait eagerly for the first case of this happening, to see the reaction.
I have a horrible feeling that, shortly after the system is switched on, a small group of carefully picked selectees, who do in fact have violent criminal pasts (and that would be public data) are paraded before the media, in order to plant the meme that the system is infallible and has "made us all safer". I anticipate headlines along the lines of "CAPPS II huge success - stops several violent criminals from boarding aircraft on first day". Then, when an innocent person is selected, it will be presented as "there's no smoke without fire" and "the system knows something" but we can't be told what it is for "national security reasons". That way, the innocent selectees are doubly screwed, convicted and sentenced without knowing what algorithm was used, and shrouded in a cloud of suspicion they can do nothing about?
That leads to another important question - will the green/yellow/red status determined for an individual be protected information, or will it be accessible to, say, employers and landlords? And will there be any protection against other discrimination (besides airline travel) on those individuals? I'm thinking not. To do so would be to admit that the system is fallible. I'm not holding my breath.
This has to be the scariest system I've ever seen this side of the Berlin wall (when it existed). Even worse, it seems plain to me that it won't actually make us any safer
Krill
"Morph" was the name of Nick Parks' (of Wallace and Gromit fame) first televised claymation character. So called because he would, well, morph into different objects during the course of the sequence. It was a short spot on an afternoon children's TV show in the UK, originating in 1976: http://www.bbc.co.uk/bristol/content/goingout/2004 /02/09/aardman.shtml
it's all about drivers. From a software point of view, it'll look like USB. That might not sound like a big deal, but believe me, if you develop USB devices, it matters a lot
no they didn't. Rob Enderle declared that WUSB meant that Bluetooth was dead, and extrapolated from *his* inference to get to "Intel says Bluetooth is dead" Krill
The word you're looking for is fascism
Sorry to be a pedant
Krill
What do you mean, "only"?
Previously, such devices either required gallium arsenide or were much slower (the cited article states the previous silicon optical speed record at 20 Mbit/s). That's a pretty big advance
The issue I see (potentially) with RFID tags is that there isn't the same expectation of a response. I'm heartened by some of the reactions, and that it gave manufacturers pause (Gillette caused a storm with experiments in Cambridge, England, and were forced to withdraw their scheme - kind of spooky for me, because even though I now live several thousand miles away, that used to be my local store at one time. But I digress...).
However, there is a difference. TiVo is a relatively small company (no, really, it is) and their survival is far from assured at this point. I hope they do survive, but that fact gives them cause to be sensitive.
This doesn't necessarily apply to RFID tags. Whilst some retailers and manufacturers have backed off for now (see above) they are, right now, working out how to make this happen without consumers noticing until it's too late to change. As I saw one quote (wish I'd kept it, I really do) which said "consumers will not accept this if we introduce it all at once, so it is important to take a step-by-step approach". That horrified me when I saw it. It reads to me as "we need to boil the water slowly so the frogs don't notice". Maybe I'm being too cynical, but this is exactly what I belive the major retailers will do. They see significant advantages in this technology, and want to see it happen for their own purposes. I have seen proposals that talk about tracking goods post-sale for purposes of repair history and so on. There is great willingness to push the technology, and I haven't seen very much genuine concern for the privacy implications - only what it will mean for the bottom line (which is, to be fair, reasonable for a public company). Nonetheless, one has to be concerned about these issues. A number of big retailers implementing RFID tags all at the same time would not be quite so sensitive to customer concerns here.
or maybe I'm just paranoid...